Eventually he drifted into sleep, waking in the early hours as the church bells tolled for Divine Office. He rose and began his preparations. He did not shave as he frequently did, but used the lavarium and the great pitcher of water to remove what he could of the Alchemist’s disguise, including the swathe of bandage around his right foot, which made him hobble. He felt better as his skin, still pocked with real cuts and bruises, was cleaned and the tight bandages around his fingers, wrists and elbows removed. Afterwards, he dressed in the grey lazar robe of the hospital and put the mask back on, but decided to stay in his cell, only leaving when he had to, reverting to the shuffling gait he’d learnt so well. He also opened the heavy panniers he had brought and took out his weapons: a hand-held arblest, a leather case of barbed bolts and a Welsh stabbing dirk.
On the evening following their meeting, Holand brought a lay brother’s robe, a linen gauze face mask, and a pair of the thick dark blue mittens and stockings worn by those who cared for the lepers. The next morning, suitably disguised, Simon mingled with the other servitors. He easily left the male quarters of the lazar hospital, crossing to the other side of the church and into the women’s precinct. Its organisation was similar to the men’s, though it was easier for the female inmates to hide behind the robe, wimple and face mask of a nun. A sombre, lonely place with that same brooding sense of decay and imminent death. Simon concluded that if Argentine was hiding here, he would be in deep disguise, closeted in one of the cells around the garth.
Simon pretended to be moving rubbish; he even managed to secure a wheelbarrow, which he pushed around acting all busy. His efforts were soon rewarded. He noticed one cell at the far end of the row on the north side of the cloisters; its door had been recently strengthened with metal studs and a new latch, whilst to the right hung a brass bell. No one approached this cell; whoever was inside received their food and drink through the hatch. Just before Vespers, Simon, pretending to clear twigs and dead leaves from a flower bed, noticed Joachim slip along the cloisters, knock on the door and disappear inside. He rose hastily, and, using the crowds now milling towards the church, returned to his own cell. He was confident in his disguise. No one would dream of volunteering to work amongst lepers, and in his hood and mask, he was just another grey shape moving around the hospital. He decided that tomorrow he would strike at that cell, and if he was wrong, then he’d failed and would confess as much to Bray. Whatever the outcome, he must be out of here, away from this filthy contagion and its sense of unknown watching malevolence.
He slept poorly that night, and was roused in the early hours by a commotion in the cloisters. He dressed hastily, putting on his stockings and gloves before going out. A deep shifting fog flowed around the pillars and dulled the flames of torches and lanterns. A crowd of hooded, visored inmates clustered around a door further down; Simon realised it was Holand’s. He hurried along, pushing through the crowd into the rank-smelling chamber. Two lay brothers were already moving the corpse from the cot bed to a stretcher. Holand’s head lolled back, his eyes bulbous and staring. From the snatches of mumbled conversation, Simon gathered that he had died in his sleep. His flaking face was purple-hued, as if his breath had been swiftly choked off.
Simon gazed around, and froze in horror at the sight of the dead crow hanging by its shrivelled neck from a shelf above the bed. LeCorbeil had struck. The rest would dismiss the bird’s corpse as some deviation of Holand’s distorted mind. Simon knew the truth. He hastily withdrew and returned to his own preparations. He cleared his cell, packed the panniers and changed into the robes of a lay brother. He waited for a while until the hubbub outside died down, then left, slipping through the mist-filled cloisters to the common refectory, where he broke his fast on honey bread and a black jack of ale. Holand, he reasoned, had been summarily executed by those malevolent ghosts that had haunted his life. LeCorbeil were here at St Giles, probably keeping Argentine under careful watch until he could be safely spirited down to one of the city quaysides and aboard a French ship. During their stay here, they must have recognised Holand and decided he had lived long enough. But were they simply settling an old score, or had they discovered that Holand was involved in this subterfuge?
Simon recalled that flitting shadow and smiled grimly. Holand had wanted to leave. He was openly suspicious of Master Joachim. There must be some connection between Joachim and LeCorbeil: those French assassins had not only settled their grievance but removed a possible threat to Argentine, whom they must regard as a great prize. Perhaps LeCorbeil were not yet suspicious of Simon himself; maybe he was just regarded as Holand’s confidant, but he would not wait to find out.
He finished breaking his fast and left the refectory, walking purposefully as if on some errand. No one even glanced at him. Once he had reached the women’s precinct, he paused in a mist-filled corner of the cloisters. He waited for the passageway to clear, then slipped down towards the door, knocking gently and gabbling in French how he carried urgent messages from the master. The shutter across the grille opened and shut. Bolts were drawn and the door swung open. Simon took out the primed hand-held arbalest and stepped inside, knocking the veiled figure back into the chamber before slamming the door shut behind him. He dared not turn and draw the bolts; his quarry had recovered from the shock and would have lunged at him but for the arbalest held close to his face.
‘Remove your hood, wimple and mask,’ Simon ordered. The brown-garbed figure hesitated. Simon pushed the arbalest closer; the quarrel in its notch had a jagged, barbed point. Hood, wimple and mask were quickly removed and Simon stared into the man’s narrow, mean face, eyes gleaming furiously, tongue wetting lips dry with fear.
‘Giles Argentine,’ he murmured. ‘Physician extraordinary. The keeper of royal secrets.’ He peered at Argentine’s pale face. ‘No leprosy. Your skin is as smooth and unblemished as a child’s.’ He gestured around the warm, opulent chamber. ‘All the comforts of court, yes? Your secret known only to you and your kinsman, both cheeks of the same filthy arse.’
‘Who are you?’ Argentine clutched the back of a chair to steady himself, eyes desperate for escape. ‘Who are you?’ he repeated. ‘How did you discover—’
‘Hush!’ Simon replied. ‘Silence is the beginning of wisdom. One thing only will spare your life. Lie or obstruct me and I will kill you. Then I will ransack this chamber.’
‘What do you want?’
‘Your confession, your chronicle, your account of the births of certain children, be it those of the King or the Duke of York.’ Simon smiled at Argentine’s consternation, ‘I have come to collect that.’
‘Who are you?’
‘Shut up!’ Simon ordered. ‘The document?’ Argentine looked as if he was about to refuse, but with Simon closely following, he moved across to a small coffer. He removed a key from a chain around his neck and, hands shaking, opened the coffer and drew out a calfskin ledger. Simon took this and forced Argentine to sit on a chair with his hands on his lap. He pushed the tip of the crossbow bolt against the physician’s brow.
‘Any movement,’ he warned, ‘and my finger will slip. Open the ledger, and hold it as if you are an acolyte bearing the book of the Gospels in mass.’
Argentine did so, hands trembling. He undid the binding cord and turned the ledger so that Simon could leaf through the cream-coloured vellum pages. Pressing gently on the arbalest, Simon read a few entries and quietly whistled.
‘By all the angels, Master Argentine, you weave a tale of deep deceit.’ Simon felt the physician stir. ‘No.’ He stepped back, snatching the ledger. ‘You have copies?’
Argentine’s spiteful eyes glittered, lips twisted in fury as he realised he was about to lose his pot of gold.
‘There is no copy.’
‘Just to be sure…’ Simon, watching the physician carefully, pulled the coffer closer and threw down his own pannier beside it. ‘I am sure you keep everything in the same casket in case you have to flee.’ He pushed the crossbow closer. ‘Empty it. Put everything in the saddlebag.’
Argentine reluctantly obeyed, this time staring at the door. A bell tolled. Simon tensed. The pannier was full. The bell kept tolling. Footsteps echoed from outside and the door crashed open. Master Joachim and Prior Gervaise swept into the chamber. Argentine sprang forward. Simon’s finger slipped and the barbed bolt whirred, smashing the physician’s face into a bloody mess.
Joachim and Gervaise stood in shocked surprise. The prior was the first to recover, but Simon grabbed the pannier, knocked Gervaise aside with his crossbow and threw himself at Joachim, who hastily retreated. Simon hurtled through the door, leaping over the lower cloister wall, pannier in one hand, the crossbow in the other. He dropped this as he raced through the precincts, the cloister bell beginning to peal the tocsin. He had a clear idea of the lazar house buildings, fields and gardens. He knew he must cross the great meadow and reach the high curtain wall. He knocked aside figures who emerged out of the morning mist. Memories sparked in his mind of the running street fights of his youth and the sweaty, deadly struggles in French towns or lonely copses in Normandy. He might be captured, but there again, Argentine was dead.
At last he reached the great meadow. A pain in his side made him wince; the pannier slipped and slithered in his sweat-soaked hand. He glimpsed the wall through the mist and paused at the deep-throated barking that rang through the morning air. He whirled around. Torches flared and he caught the glint of steel. The murk shifted to reveal his pursuers, mastiffs straining on their leases, their masters bending to loosen the clasps. Simon hurried on. The barking grew louder. He drew closer to the wall, racing towards a buttress. When he reached it, he turned, cutting the air with his dagger just as the leading mastiff, lips curled back in a display of jagged teeth, leapt towards him. The dagger slashed the side of the hound’s face, forcing it to veer away into the path of the other two dogs. These, confused by the spraying blood, stumbled in their charge. Simon climbed the buttress, threw the pannier over and jumped down into the narrow lane. He grabbed the pannier and hurried out on to the thoroughfare leading down to the city.
Despite the early hour, the crowds were already out, a colourful, noisy stream of people, carts, barrows and wagons. An execution party was returning from the great gibbet and the red-masked executioners were already drunk. Around the hangman’s cart jostled the traders, fripperers, tinkers and relic sellers in their cowls, hoods and snoop caps, men and women who always attended execution morning for petty trading. Simon mingled with these. Some he recognised, though he kept his peace, concealing his face and head by pulling up the deep cowl.
He reached the great fleshing market outside Newgate, the salty tang of blood wafting everywhere, the cobbles underfoot slippery with scraps of offal. A relic seller stood on a cart, claiming how the box at his feet held the remains of one of the Holy Innocents. A short distance away, two choir clerks sang in unison the hymn ‘Ave Verum’. They had to compete with a chanteur who claimed he had news from the east, where a great army of yellow-skinned, red-armoured warriors massed under silk banners of the deepest vermilion. Such attractions drew the crowd, and it was hard to push through.
Simon turned and glimpsed lay brothers from St Giles not far behind. It was too dangerous to continue, so he hastened up the steps into the guild church of St Nicholas of the Shambles. The Jesus mass had finished, but people still stood in the nave, bathed by the light pouring through the lancet windows. Streams of incense smoke curled and twisted. Simon squatted on a stool near the great baptismal font close to the front door. A rack of votive candles glowed and caught the colours of a wall painting above the font. The vigorously painted fresco executed in red, green and blue celebrated the story of St Nicholas of Myra, who frustrated the designs of an evil butcher who had slaughtered some children, cut them up and pickled their flesh in a salt barrel. The artist had wondrously depicted how, due to the blessing of the saint, all the meaty scraps had reassembled into living flesh and the children, glowing with health, were restored to their parents. Despite his own troubles, Simon grinned at the irony of the painting here at the centre of the fleshers’ trade; his smile widened even further as a thought occurred to him. He rose, walked up the nave and entered the sacristy, where the altar boys were busy stowing the sacred vestments in the cope chest. As he stood in the sacristy door, cowl pulled over his head, he caught sight of his quarry: Fleabite, apprentice to Brancome the butcher, who supplied the Roseblood with some of its meat.
‘Fleabite!’ Simon hissed. The altar boy stared through the gloom. Simon beckoned him closer, a fresh coin glinting between his fingers. Fleabite, ignoring the muttered grumblings of the bell clerk, hurried across. Simon led him back into the nave and crouched, face close to the boy’s. ‘It’s Master Roseblood.’ He pulled back his hood.
‘Sir, your head and face, your hair is—’
‘I have been on a journey. Now listen. Get rid of your cassock and cotta. Take this coin and go as swiftly as you can to the Roseblood. Seek out Master Ignacio.’
‘The silent one?’
‘Yes, the silent one, together with Wormwood. Tell them to hasten here with clothing and weapons as swiftly as possible.’
‘Master, what—’
‘Another coin will be yours.’ Simon pushed the one he held into the apprentice’s hand. ‘Don’t worry, I will settle matters with Master Brancome. Now go.’
Fleabite needed no second bidding. His vestments were quickly discarded and the apprentice sped like the wind through the Devil’s door, taking a route that would evade his sharp-eyed master manning a stall not so far away.
Simon returned to the baptismal enclave. He took out the ledger and, in the fluttering candlelight, carefully read Argentine’s chronicle, or, as the dead physician pompously described it, his ‘Mirror of Truth’. Argentine had made his entries in good Latin, beginning each clause with the word ‘item’, as if he was a lawyer drawing up an indictment. He presented as if it were the gospel truth all the malicious chatter and scandalous gossip from the courts of York and Lancaster. Depicting himself as the royal birthing physician, he cleverly insinuated that both Edwards – the son of King Henry as well as the offspring of Richard of York – were illegitimate. Full of righteousness and quoting verses from Scripture and canon law, he described how the royal prince Edward was in fact the son of Edmund Beaufort, Margaret of Anjou’s alleged lover. He argued how King Henry, at the time of the child’s conception, had been infected by a mental stupor that rendered him impotent in every way. Indeed, he declared, King Henry himself, once he recovered his wits, believed that his alleged son must be a second divine conception, because he had no knowledge of it.