The Straw Men Read online

  ‘Well, little friar,’ Cranston grinned down at him, ‘and what have you discovered?’

  Athelstan dusted down his robe, got up and told him what he had concluded, before moving back into the chapel to examine the front of Hell’s mouth. He pushed hard but the scenery was wedged between the edges of the screen and held tight by clasps. Cranston did the same from the other side. Hell’s mouth was like a stopper in a wine skin. Athelstan reasoned it could be shoved loose but this would damage the clasps, the thick leather strips on either side, and there was no sign that this had happened.

  ‘The Straw Men must have made sure Hell’s mouth was secure,’ Athelstan sighed. ‘And yet, if it could be moved, the assassin might be able to place the heads, then push or pull it back in again. Of course,’ he rubbed his face, ‘that would have been seen or even heard; the clasps would have been broken, very obvious to detect. So, Sir John, the severed heads must have been put down in another way. Then there’s the vexed question of the assassin having a clear view of Oudernarde. The assassin would only gain this by moving Hell’s mouth, yet there’s not a shred of evidence to suggest that happened.’ Athelstan stood, arms crossed, staring down at the floor.

  ‘I’m back in the schools, Sir John.’ Athelstan scratched at a piece of wax on his wrist. ‘You can only get a logical conclusion, a truthful conclusion from a logical, truthful beginning, yet that escapes me. Look, Sir John.’ He nodded towards the now-empty doorway, ‘Of your kindness, please ask Lascelles and Rosselyn to join us. Plead with them to bring two hand-held arbalests like the ones our assassin certainly used, as well as a quiver of bolts on a war belt.’ He paused. ‘Oh, yes, and a small inflated pig’s bladder, the type children use as a ball.’ Cranston looked surprised but shrugged and strode away, shouting for the archer on guard.

  Athelstan stayed for a while.

  ‘One assassin here,’ he murmured, ‘or could it have been two? And Barak? Murder, suicide or a simple accident?’

  Athelstan left the chapel and went down the spiral staircase into the cavernous murky crypt. For a while he stumbled about with a cresset torch he’d taken from the stairwell. Eventually he lit every sconce, candle and lantern box in that dark, gloomy chamber. Athelstan walked up and down. ‘This is a strange place,’ he murmured. ‘Most crypts are beneath ground level but this is the first floor of the White Tower.’ He held the torch up. The crypt reminded him of a tithing barn: its paved stone floor was scrubbed clean with no matting, while the whitewashed walls lacked any ornamentation – even a cross. Apparently used for storing furniture, the crypt was bleak and soulless. He noticed how all the windows were shuttered and barred before moving down to where the shutters on the furthest window had been thrown back. According to all the evidence, Barak had tried to escape through this but had, due to some mishap, fallen to his death. Athelstan stood listening to the different sounds from both the stairwell and elsewhere in the Tower. Again, he heard the roaring from the menagerie and promised himself a visit to examine both the lions as well as to see for himself that great snow bear swimming in the moat. ‘But that will have to wait,’ he whispered. ‘Barak’s ghost is more important.’

  Athelstan crouched down to examine the thick, oiled hempen rope with its tarred, twisted strands, which Barak had used in his abortive escape. The rope was secured tightly to a great iron ring driven into the wall. The rope had been pulled back after Barak’s fatal use and simply tossed on to the floor. Athelstan picked it up, scrutinizing the heavy knots placed every twelve inches. He could detect nothing out of the ordinary. Such ropes were common in both the Tower and other castles in case of fire or if the stairway to St John’s Chapel somehow became blocked. He sifted the rope through his hands and tugged hard, but the rope was sound in itself and firmly secured. He opened the shutters and flinched at the strong gust of icy wind; nevertheless, he persisted. He took the rope and threaded it out; it was long enough to allow someone to safely descend then jump to the ground below, the well-placed heavy knots providing some sort of hold for foot and hand. Athelstan leaned over the sill and peered down.

  ‘What did happen to you, Barak?’ he whispered to the darkness. ‘Did you slip from the rope? Were you nervous? Why take the arbalest with you? Were you on the rope when someone pushed you?’ Athelstan recalled the horrid wound to the right side of the dead man’s face, the broken neck, the way the body had crumpled. ‘I don’t think you slipped.’ Athelstan again peered over the window ledge: it was a dizzying drop to the cobbles beneath. ‘Do you know what I think, Barak, God rest your soul? You didn’t fall from the rope, you fell from here. Or, even more logical – and this would explain your savage wounds – you were thrown from here.’

  Athelstan pulled the rope back and clasped the heavy shutters close. He leaned his hands on them and tried to make sense of his own thoughts. Such an escape could be depicted as probable. Barak the assassin could have easily checked both rope and shutters earlier in the day. According to the evidence, Barak carried out those attacks, left the severed heads and, when everybody else was fleeing the chapel, he joined them. That would be feasible. The rest would only be too eager to escape the White Tower but Barak slipped into the crypt. He certainly reached this window. Such an escape, Athelstan reasoned, from the fastness of this Tower would not be the first. Years ago Athelstan, while studying at Blackfriars, had used the top of the White Tower with its four unique turrets as an observatory to study the stars. Athelstan smiled at the memories. He’d also learnt a great deal about the Tower’s history. How a number of prisoners, including a Welsh prince, Ranulf Flambard, Bishop of Durham, and Roger Mortimer of Wigmore had all escaped by rope from this great Norman keep. Indeed, hadn’t one of them, the Welsh prince, fallen to his death? And yet . . . Athelstan felt a deepening disquiet about the accepted story of Barak’s death. The evidence didn’t appear correct; there was a lack of logic to it. ‘Not only the details,’ Athelstan murmured to the darkness, ‘but the motivation. According to his comrades, there was no change in Barak in the hours or days before he committed these dreadful crimes.’ Athelstan rubbed his face. Would, he wondered, the Upright Men have entrusted those severed heads to Barak? Yet there was no evidence, apart from what was found on his corpse, of any link between him and the Upright Men. According to Thibault nothing incriminating was found among Barak’s personal belongings. Athelstan stood with his back to now-closed shutters. He peered through the gloom then walked across to the recess built into the far wall. The paving stones here were the same light colour as those of the chapel while, despite the dust and cobwebs, the walls had been recently whitewashed, probably as late as the previous spring. Athelstan took another cresset from its holder and went into the recess. He crouched down. Using the pools of light from both torches, he scrupulously examined both floor and wall inch by inch.

  ‘May the Lord be thanked,’ Athelstan prayed, ‘I have found it.’ He stretched out and touched the wall, certain those dark stains were small splashes of fresh blood on the plaster of the enclave. Athelstan put one of the torches down and sat with his back to the wall, rubbing the plaster with the back of his head. He turned so he was on his hands and knees. Barak, if he remembered correctly, was slightly taller than him. Athelstan scrutinized the wall and murmured a prayer of thanks. The small bloodstains were just above where the friar had rested the back of his head.

  ‘Athelstan, Athelstan! Brother Athelstan!’ The friar returned to the chapel, where Cranston, Lascelles and Rosselyn were waiting. The two soldiers were deeply intrigued by what Athelstan asked for but quickly agreed to help. First Rosselyn and then Lascelles acted as a would-be assassin.

  ‘I want you to go beneath the table, behind Hell’s mouth and,’ Athelstan pointed to the two stools each marking the place where Lettenhove and Oudernarde had fallen, ‘pretend to loose a bolt at the Fleming’s henchman and then at Master Oudernarde. However, you are to do it twice. The first time you must pretend to have one arbalest, the next that you have two and the second is already
primed. Now,’ Athelstan insisted, ‘you must use the gaping jaws of Hell’s mouth as your vantage point. I suspect that, like me, you will find Lettenhove an easy target to mark; Oudernarde not so. Once you are ready, shout out. Sir John here will start counting.’ After some confusion and a few false starts, Lascelles declared he was ready. Cranston had almost reached twenty when Lascelles declared he had used the same arbalest twice, and twelve when he used a second one already primed. Rosselyn was not so swift on either occasion, declaring how the war bow was his weapon, but Athelstan was satisfied. He now had a clearer idea of how long an assassin would take if he had used Hell’s mouth as his screen, while both had confessed that aiming at Oudernarde was difficult. The friar also noticed how the two soldiers, being right-handed, wore the box-like quiver of bolts on the left side of their war belt.

  ‘So you found the first mark easy enough?’ asked Athelstan.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Lascelles replied, nodding in agreement, ‘but Oudernarde was very difficult.’

  ‘To present the best target,’ Rosselyn declared, ‘Hell’s mouth would either have to be dragged back a little or Oudernarde stand further from it.’

  ‘I agree,’ Lascelles murmured.

  ‘Shall we move the scenery?’ Athelstan asked. All four men pressed against the gaping jaws. Eventually the dragon’s jaws snapped free of the rood screen to roll back on its castors. Athelstan carefully examined the thick leather straps which acted as both a cushion and a clasp to protect the edges of the rood screen. Athelstan patted the jaws. He would love to bring this to his church. He realized that the doors to most rood screens were about the same measurement. ‘Very clever. They must calculate the gap in the rood screen, then adjust the leather straps accordingly, folding them into a wedge. Now,’ Athelstan eased himself past the dragon’s head, inviting the others to join him in the sanctuary beyond. Once they were, Athelstan and Cranston positioned Hell’s mouth correctly and pushed it back so it wedged easily in the rood screen door, although not as snugly as before with two of the leather straps now damaged. Athelstan shook his head in disbelief. ‘So it couldn’t have been moved.’ He spoke to himself. ‘Well, well, well.’

  ‘Brother, I have brought you the pig’s bladder,’ Rosselyn, hidden in the shadows, called out.

  ‘Oh, thank you, bring it here. Please, all of you, go back into the chapel and stare at Hell’s mouth.’ Athelstan, lost in thought, stood staring at the black canvas sheeting as Rosselyn brought across the pig’s bladder. Athelstan waited until he’d left, crouched beneath the table and pushed the ball through the gaping jaws. Cranston confirmed it rolled away from the rood screen. Athelstan just shook his head. How, how, how, he thought to himself, had those two severed heads been placed so carefully? If they had been despatched through Hell’s mouth, although not as light or round as a pig’s bladder, they would have certainly rolled and so been seen, even heard. Yet they had been positioned like two ornaments on a sill. Calling out to the rest, Athelstan left the chapel and walked down into the hollow, empty crypt, the torches still flaring fitfully casting shafts of light which made the shadows dance and shiver. They reached the window Barak had apparently used for his escape. Rosselyn opened the shutters, stared down and confirmed that Barak’s corpse had been found just beneath.

  ‘Did you or anyone see or hear the fall?’

  ‘Brother, this is a January day. Darkness had fallen. A sentry by sheer chance stumbled over the corpse just lying there, the arbalest a short distance away. As I said, it was mere luck; the corpse might not have been discovered until daybreak.’

  ‘And were the window shutters open or closed?’

  ‘I don’t truly know – perhaps almost closed. I sent one of my archers up to light the lantern box. I can’t remember distinctly. Perhaps the assassin, once he was through, paused to pull them across – I mean, to hide any light.’ Rosselyn stamped his feet, rubbing his hands. ‘In brief, we found the corpse. We believed the assassin had been escaping through that window in the crypt when he slipped. An archer went up to light the lantern as a signal and,’ he shrugged, ‘that’s all I know.’

  ‘The shutters were probably closed,’ Athelstan agreed. ‘If they’d been open on a winter’s day that would certainly attract attention. Anyway, gentlemen,’ Athelstan stepped back, ‘pretend you are the assassin. You are preparing to leave as Barak did – remember you are carrying a crossbow.’ Athelstan watched as both men did the same, fastening the small crossbow to a clasp on their war belt before pulling their cloaks around them.

  ‘I have it,’ Athelstan murmured. ‘Gentlemen,’ he sketched a blessing in the air, ‘I thank you.’

  ‘What have you learnt, Brother?’ Rosselyn seemed anxious, and Athelstan wondered why. Had he to report back to Thibault, or did he have personal reasons? Lascelles, on the other hand, remained cold and impassive, as he had throughout. Athelstan wondered if Lascelles, as Thibault’s henchman, had reflected on this bizarre mystery and was speculating that the accepted story may not be true.

  ‘Brother,’ Rosselyn came out of the shadows, ‘I asked you a question?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Athelstan apologized. ‘The truth is I have learnt very little.’ He paused as the bell of St Peter ad Vincula began to answer those tolling from the city, announcing the hour of Compline.

  ‘We have lodgings here?’ Cranston demanded. ‘I’m becoming hungry, cold and, if the truth be known, exhausted.’

  ‘Sir John,’ Rosselyn reassured him, ‘you and Brother Athelstan will share a chamber in the Garden Tower near the Watergate. The kitchens will serve you.’

  ‘Before you leave,’ Athelstan gestured around, ‘I want this left as it is.’

  Rosselyn promised he would do what he could, and both men left. Athelstan watched them go.

  ‘Brother, you don’t want to share your thoughts?’

  ‘Well, not with those two, Sir John. One of them might be the killer.’

  ‘But Barak?’

  ‘Aye, poor Barak,’ Athelstan echoed. ‘We will let the dead sleep in peace for a while. Come, Sir John, your belly is rumbling like a drum.’

  Outside the baileys and yards of the Tower were freezing cold. A thick river mist had descended to create a land of ghosts, broken only by the shouts of sentries, the neighing of horses and that deep, throaty roaring from the royal menagerie. Pinpricks of lights glowed from battlements and tower windows. Torches flared in their desperate fight against the chilly night breeze.

  Cranston and Athelstan were pleased to reach the Garden Tower; the smell from around the Watergate was offensive but the chamber on the ground floor of that squat, sinister-looking tower had been well prepared. A circular, comfortable room, the windows were not only shuttered but covered with heavy leather drapes embroidered with heraldic devices. The fire in the small hearth roared up the flue, the pine logs cracking and snapping. The lime-washed walls gleamed cleanly and displayed a crucifix with small statues of the Virgin and saints placed in niches. The servant waiting for them loudly assured Sir John that the cot beds were comfortable, while he would place more rope matting on the floor to curb the chill. The servant then offered to bring food. Cranston, bellowing how hungry he was, began to take off his cloak. Athelstan kept thinking about that desolate chapel. He walked towards the door.

  ‘Sir John, wait here.’

  ‘No, I will not,’ Cranston barked. ‘You are off again on your travels, little friar? Well, if you are, I will stay with you in this benighted place.’ Athelstan told the surprised servant not to serve the food and, pulling up his cowl, walked back into the icy blackness. Cranston followed, cursing quietly. Athelstan stopped an archer who kindly led them down the steps into the gloomy dungeons of the White Tower.

  ‘Oh Lord, save us, Brother,’ Cranston moaned. ‘What in Heaven’s name are we doing?’

  ‘The archer told me Barak’s corpse is here, I want to see it. Come on, Sir John.’

  The dungeons proved to be a stygian underworld of shadow-filled, stinking tunnel
s and enclaves. Torches glowed in their rusty holdings. Vermin, like little black demons, scurried across the pools of light. The reeking odour of decay caught their noses and mouths. A figure jangling keys lurched out of the murk. The burly-faced janitor immediately recognized Cranston, though the coroner could only shake his head when the man introduced himself as William Ockle, former assistant hangman at Smithfield. He asked their business. Athelstan replied and the janitor led them to a dungeon door, opened it and ushered them in.