Here's a new novel by Paul Harding (pen name by Paul Doherty), featuring Brother Athelstan. It goes without saying that this is one of Paul Doherty's most published and most followed series.
This novel, originally titled Candle Flame, predates by a few months the great revolt of 1381, which broke out in May 1381.
WARNING: SPOILERS
The story centers on the Candle Flame, a majestic tavern built with the blood of expeditions to France, during which its owner, the innkeeper Simon Thorne, had been captain of the Hobelars.
This very tavern is rented by one of the two Royal Collectors, Edmund Marsen, his scribe Mauclerc, and their armed escort, consisting of the archer captain Hugh of Hornsey and five bowmen. Marsen orders every conceivable thing for himself, his scribe, and his men, but something strange happens at night: the two archers guarding the barbican stand still (the two were killed in no time, and no sound comes from the tower, which is locked from the inside—not even the heavy door, the small window, or the trapdoor leading to the roof). When they manage to gain entry through the window, they find a massacre: everyone has been put to the sword, including two half-naked prostitutes. Only Hugh of Hornsey is missing, and it's unclear where he went or whether he committed the massacre.
John of Gaunt tasks Brother Athelstan and the London Coroner, Sir John Cranston, with determining how the events unfolded, who killed the seven men and the two prostitutes, and, above all, who stole the chest filled to the brim with gold and silver, which was supposed to bring new liquidity to the sovereign's coffers.
Athelstan must navigate a tangle of suspicions, first determining whether the massacre is to be blamed on Beowulf, the mysterious assassin who steals and kills wealthy Normans, heir to the Saxon tradition. He seems to have allied himself with the Righteous Men, the rebels arming for an insurrection feared by many, which also includes some of Athelstan's parishioners, including Watkin and Pyke. Or whether someone else was responsible for killing the men and stealing the treasure. But he must also understand the role of Brother Roger, a Franciscan involved in this impending rebellion, and of Marcel, a Dominican whom Athelstan has met and who has become an inquisitor, appointed by the Pope to investigate the substance of the Lollard and Wycliffe heresy. And he must also discover who killed a sailor with information on the English fleet in the Thames, and who killed Scrope, the doctor called to examine the bodies of the seven men killed inside and outside the Barbican, and then the minstrel Ronseval, who followed Marsen, and Captain Hugh of Hornsey of the Archers, in Athelstan's church. And also Lascelles, Thibault's right-hand man, Master Secretorum of John of Gaunt.
And if it all fits into a vast plan, why and how. Furthermore, not only is it unknown how the killer killed the five men and two prostitutes in the Barbican, escaping through locked doors from the inside, but also how he managed to kill Scrope, who was found pierced by a crossbow bolt in his locked room.
Amidst all sorts of adventures, in which even the Uprights Men and especially John Strike, Simon Grindcobbe, and Wat Tyler are involved, against the backdrop of an increasingly feared popular uprising, Athelstan and Cranston will uncover murderers and acquit and condemn those responsible for the various tragic events described in the novel.
END OF SPOILERS
A truly wonderful novel by Doherty: one wonders how Doherty manages to sometimes churn out one or two novels a year with such a complex narrative structure! Essentially, we have two assassins here, each acting independently, and their actions are easily distinguishable: the first, who carries out the Barbican massacre, does so essentially out of greed, to seize the gold; the second, for "political" reasons (he would be what we would call a "terrorist" today). The first also kills the other three and thus essentially kills 12 people alone; the second kills Lascelles, Thibault's right-hand man, in an ambush, and attempts to kill Thibault himself. And then there's a French spy, a figure of rank; and then there's the heresy of Wycliffe and the Lollards. And he manages to create a magnificent shared tapestry.
The two locked rooms are not equally comprehensible and difficult: the first is very complex and difficult to understand, that of the Barbican, and objectively, it seems to me that Doherty is trying to explain it in a way that is too complex; The second is brilliant in its simplicity: it's comparable to those of Carr's He Who Whispers or Heyer's Envious Casca, which, however, involved murders involving stilettos; here, however, it's the case of a crime committed with a crossbow bolt. The very presence of a lock with a large key reminded me of Carr's The Judas Window, but Doherty's is brilliant (and almost original) because it combines two distinct moments that together create the impossibility.
Otherwise, this is another of Doherty's fantastic novels, endowed with a magnificent atmosphere thanks to his almost unique ability to create settings so vivid that they make one think he's personally experienced them, almost as if he were a time traveler. Not only is he a great novelist and a brilliant writer, but he's also a great historian, who knows everything about the period, even its customs. And this gives me the opportunity to offer my opinion on historical mystery authors: there are many authors (oh my God, very worthy and very talented!) who write historical novels, perhaps even researching extensively beforehand (like Carr), but who aren't professional historians, and then there are historians who write novels (like Eco or Doherty). What's the difference then? That the latter often insert details into their writings that only they know or that are difficult to trace, which lend a unique freshness to the treatises. In particular, Doherty, who, we recall, specialized in English history at Liverpool and Oxford, and was for thirty years principal of Trinity College, the most coveted Catholic institution in England, here inserts details on the Peasant's Revolt of 1381: he inserts into the fictional, but potentially real, picture some of the protagonists of that uprising, Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, with Simon Grindcobbe (but who is he?) a fictional character, reminiscent of William Grindcobbe, another of the leaders of the insurrection, he has them interact with Wycliffe's heretics (and besides, historical criticism hypothesizes that Tyler and Ball, in their request to Richard II for the confiscation of church property, were also Lollards); he cites the Bishop of Canterbury, Simon Sudbury, who was later actually assassinated near the Tower of London by the rioters. He cites especially John of Gaunt, Regent of England and uncle of Richard II, having him interact with characters like Thibault, Magister Secretorum, who are completely fictional but could have actually existed; he mentions Sir Walter Manny's Hobelars, a real character. In short, he imbues fictional stories with a high degree of truth, managing to fit them perfectly into the context of historical events, which are entirely true (after all, "The Worms of the Earth" and "The Uprights Men" were actually the names by which the rebels were known).
A wonderful novel.
Pietro De Palma
