The Sacred Stone

by The Medieval Murderers

  Before anyone could speak, there was a clatter on the steps and a man entered the cabin. He was well dressed in a maroon doublet and elaborate ruffs. The only unexpected note was a whistle hanging on a cord around his neck.

  ‘I did not expect—’

  He was addressing the physician but, catching sight of Jack and me, he broke off.

  ‘—expect us to return with company?’ said Dr Case smoothly, as if in continuation of what the other man was about to say. ‘These gentlemen are players from the King’s Men. They were taking part in the piece at Middle Temple. The play we have recently attended. They have been gracious enough to accept my offer of hospitality on board.’

  All this was said slowly and with care. The other man stroked his beard, square-cut like the doctor’s, while his watchful gaze flicked between the two of us. ‘Well, I suppose you are welcome on board the Argo,’ he said, ‘but know that we cast off at first light tomorrow.’

  The last part of the remark seemed to be directed at Dr Case rather than us. I realized the two men were brothers. There was the same stocky build and the same firm expression, and that more elusive sense of being two individuals cut from the same length of cloth. Therefore, Thomasina must be cousin to this gentleman also, although neither had so much as looked at the other.

  ‘You will join us in a glass, Colin?’ said Case.

  ‘No. The only glass I am concerned with is the half-hour glass. As I said, we leave early and there is much to be done.’

  He nodded at us and clumped back up the stairs. Moments later, we heard him barking an order on deck. It sounded as if he was taking out his irritation on one of the mariners.

  ‘As you probably guessed, that is my brother,’ said Dr Case. ‘He is the captain of this vessel, the Argo. Forgive his terseness, but his mind is obviously full of tide-times and half-hour glasses and caulking and . . . things nautical.’

  ‘This is his cabin?’ I said, wondering if that was the reason for the other’s gruff manner.

  ‘This is the great cabin,’ said the physician. ‘It is where sailors of rank and any travelling gentlemen sleep and eat.’

  We must have looked baffled at the absence of beds, for Dr Case proceeded to show us some hidden lodgings. Set into the walls on either side behind the curtains were alcove-like recesses containing mattresses. Once inside, the sleeper might make himself secure by drawing the curtain. Each space was provided with a shuttered port through which one could see a flicker or two of light from the world outside. The shipmaster had more elaborate quarters, a squared-off space behind one of the doors at the end of the great cabin. This was provided with a full-size bed which one did not have to contort oneself unduly to enter.

  Case explained that a trading vessel like the Argo carried paying travellers from time to time, and that they required better sleeping arrangements than were available to the common mariners, who ate, slept and took their ease in the stench of the fo’c’s’le under the bowsprit. The two things most to be valued at sea, he said, were a little area to oneself and a little bit of light. And, yes, he was presently occupying the bed belonging to his brother, the shipmaster.

  ‘I am paying him well. The least I can require is to be accommodated in comfort on the journey.’

  ‘Where are you travelling to, Dr Case?’ said Jack.

  ‘St-Malo.’

  I had not thought he would answer so directly. I rather thought St-Malo was in France but did not like to ask for fear of appearing ignorant.

  ‘To reply to your next question, Mr Wilson, I am going to meet a man in St-Malo about . . . a private matter. My brother, he is to pick up a cargo of French wine. He sails with empty tuns and substitutes them for full ones. He tells me that I am fortunate to be sailing on a wine trader. They smell sweeter and their seams are tighter than other vessels’. Talking of which, Thomasina, would you pour us some wine?’

  The woman busied herself with a jug and glasses and brought the drinks across to us one by one. She kept her eyes averted and that, coupled with the shadowy hat brim, meant that we had yet to get a clear look at her. Oddest of all, she had not spoken a single word so far, but she performed the task of serving drinks gracefully enough. I noticed a mole on the back of her hand and, queerly, it seemed the only personal note about her.

  We sipped appreciatively as the physician described the wine, which was an Osney – a fine specimen of its type – from Alsace (wherever that is). Then Jonathan Case said, ‘Now, Mr Revill, if you wouldn’t mind unfastening your doublet . . . so that I may examine you.’

  I had forgotten the injury to my side, but the discomfort returned the moment it was mentioned. I put down my glass and unbuttoned my doublet. The doctor felt my ribs beneath my shirt and nodded when I drew a sharp breath or winced.

  ‘No great damage done, although you may have cracked a rib,’ he said. ‘You will have to avoid exertion. No sudden movements. No leaping about or fighting duels, even mock ones.’

  ‘Duels and leaping about are part and parcel of a player’s lot,’ said Jack. ‘You’ll have to play old men for a week or two, Nick.’

  Case moved to open the bag, which had been resting by his feet all this time. There was some sort of complicated clasp to it, and he turned his back on us, as if to keep its precise operation a secret. When he turned to face us again, he was holding an object swathed in satin. He carefully unfolded it to reveal a lump of darkish rock about the size of his hand. He passed it to me. ‘Hold it. It should bring a benefit.’

  Not understanding, I nevertheless grasped the rock, which was so smooth and deliberately shaped that I assumed it had been carved and polished by hand. It was difficult to say exactly what the shape represented, however. Looked at one way, it was a bird with curved wings. Looked at in another, it might be a simple boat with a keel and a stubby mast. Or it was no such thing but a mere piece of rock, although curiously weighty. By the light of the candles in the cabin, I could make out a series of small grooves on one side. Accidental scratches or deliberate markings?

  I observed Dr Case watching me intently. How was I meant to respond? What ‘benefit’ was the rock supposed to confer? But all at once I did experience a sort of access of energy even as the pain in my side dulled.

  ‘What is it? Is it stone?’

  ‘It has several properties,’ said Case, putting out his hand for the rock. ‘Look at this.’

  He directed us towards the far end of the cabin by the pair of doors. A box with a glazed cover was set into the floor. Inside was an arrangement of metal hoops supporting a disc seemingly inscribed with the image of a sunburst surmounted by a pointer. An oil lamp was hanging overhead.

  ‘That’s a gimbal,’ said Jack, indicating the arrangement of metal rings.

  ‘Very good, my friend. However rough the seas and however violent the pitching of the boat that . . . item in the centre . . . will stay level.’

  I had the idea that quick-witted Jack knew what we were looking at. As for me, I was confused and, in my mind’s eye, could see the rough seas and the pitching boat.

  ‘Watch,’ said Dr Case.

  He brought the black stone near to the glass cover of the box and moved it from side to side. At once, the pointer became agitated and swung about as if it was dancing in response to the stone. Dr Case looked at Jack for an explanation.

  ‘The stone you are holding is acting as a magnet to the compass.’

  So this object was a compass. I knew the word, of course, but had never seen the thing. But then I’ve never been to sea.

  ‘This is no stone but a piece of iron,’ said our physician.

  ‘Where is it from?’ said Jack.

  ‘Not from this earth,’ said the physician, pausing after this remark in a style that would have done him credit onstage. ‘It fell from the heavens to a land of ice and who knows how many centuries ago. This is a sky-stone.’

  As with the compass, I had heard of such things but never seen one, let alone held it in my hands. Fallen from the sky, eh?
This idea was even stranger than the fact that the stone came from ‘a land of ice’, something which sounded as remote as the moon. I looked at the stone again and seemed to feel a strange vitality flowing from the thing. I passed it to Jack. Then, to show the refinement of my feelings, I said, ‘Is it valuable?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Case, without enlarging on the subject.

  I wondered whether his trip to St-Malo was connected to the stone. As if to reinforce his remark about its being a valuable item, he took the stone back from Jack and made a show of storing it inside a cabinet. This turned out to be another curious item. Not the cabinet itself, which was an ordinary if handsome piece of furniture made of cedar. No, it was the lock securing the cabinet which Case decided to demonstrate to us, his appreciative audience. He’d been about to open it, then paused.

  ‘Look at this, gentlemen,’ said Case.

  We crouched down to join him as he played the light from a candle across the brass plate of a lock, which was about the size of an extended hand. There was the figure of a woman on it in relief, with frisky legs visible beneath a skirt and an arm extended as if she were about to dance. Her head was surmounted by a large hat rather like cousin Thomasina’s. I glanced around to see where that lady was now, but we three men were alone in the cabin. She must have left while we were examining the compass.

  Case pressed down on the figure’s hat, which tilted back at a jaunty angle and which presumably operated a catch mechanism, for he was then able to swing open the door. Wrapping the sky-stone in the satin cloth once again, he deposited it with exaggerated care in the cabinet, closed the door and refastened the catch by nudging the woman’s hat back to a level position. This didn’t seem so very secure, since anyone familiar with the hat trick would have been able to unfasten the cabinet. But there was more to come.

  Case flicked with a forefinger at one of the miniature legs, and it kicked up to reveal a keyhole whose widest point was in a position which combined suggestiveness with practicality. Jack and I looked at each other in amusement. The physician produced a key from the folds of his gown and gave it a couple of twists in the keyhole. I heard the soft click as a bolt slid home inside the device.

  Case stood up with a satisfied look once he’d restored the female figure’s leg to its former position and back to respectability as well. ‘Made by Johannes Wilken of Dordrecht – in the Low Countries, you know. It has an additional feature which guarantees security. Look again.’

  I noticed that the lock-plate held more puzzles. The woman’s arm was extended not so much in preparation for the dance but so as to point at a clock-like dial, above which some words had been inscribed, although the light was not good enough for me to make them out. Jack took his turn to look.

  ‘I have heard of this, I think,’ he said.

  ‘It is a detector lock, my friends,’ said Case quickly, unwilling to find himself trumped. ‘Every time the key is turned to lock up the cabinet, the dial moves around a notch so that the lady’s hand indicates a higher number. Note that it presently stands at thirty-nine. So if, when I next open the door, I find my lady fingering the number forty I will know that some villain has been playing fast and loose with my key. And the inscription now, you must want to know what that says . . .’

  He peered at the cabinet lock as if to familiarize himself with the words again and then recited:

  ‘None but my master shall open me,

  Respect my virtue if you be not he.’

  Having delivered himself of all this news and the rhyme, Jonathan Case urged us to make ourselves comfortable on one of the benches at the table while he refilled our glasses.

  The good doctor proceeded to talk to Jack and me about our work. He was full of praise for our abilities as players. He complimented us on our nimbleness, the injury to my side nothwithstanding. He said that we must have remarkable memories to hold our parts in our heads for one day, only to have to discard them on the next in preparation for a fresh drama. He remarked that the common belief about players – that we were little better than uneducated vagabonds – was obviously untrue, for here (looking at Jack) was a fellow who knew about gimbals and spoke French. I gazed in surprise at Jack and then remembered that he’d said something about the French legate being un favori du roi, a favourite of King James. For his part, Jack mumbled some words about having had an aunt who came from Paris. For some reason this struck us as enormously funny – an aunt from Paris! – and we hooted with laughter.

  By this time, as you’ll probably have gathered, we were fairly pissed. Jonathan Case kept filling our glasses with the Osney and we kept on downing it. All thoughts of next day’s rehearsals were forgotten. After all, it was only a short walk back across the river, and the gatehouses at each end of the bridge closed later than the city ones so as to accommodate the pleasure-seeking folk who frequented Southwark in the evening. We had time for another drink. Always time for another one.

  We were well settled in when a man descended the short flight of steps to the cabin. None of us heard him enter. Case started up in surprise. He did not look pleased to see the newcomer.

  ‘Mr Tallman,’ he said. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I do not know that it is your business, Dr Case, but your brother wanted to consult me about the voyage.’

  ‘Well, it is I who have chartered the ship,’ said the physician. ‘He should have told me first.’

  The other shrugged. He fitted his name, if I’d heard it right (by this point my senses were none too sharp). Tallman was a tall man, and a dry, austere-looking one. His black garb might have enabled him to pass for a puritan in a poor light, except that his fingers glittered with rings and the shoes on his feet were ornamented with fine silver buckles. He had not acknowledged Jack or me, by the by.

  ‘You can see that Colin is not here. You must go and find him elsewhere.’

  The stranger turned about without a word and went up the steps as silently as he’d come. Jack said, ‘He is a navigator, a pilot?’

  ‘No, no, Henry Tallman is . . .’

  But whatever Tallman was exactly we were not to find out. Instead, Case let the sentence drift away and launched into a disquisition on sailors and their strange beliefs.

  At one point I got up to go outside. Unsteady on my feet, I had to cling on to the edge of the table. I stumbled up the steps, across the deck and, since the bulwarks which prevented the mariners falling off the boat were quite low, urinated with ease over the side of the boat, managing the considerable feat of not tumbling into the river. The night was still and cold. Down the front end of the craft the embers in the brazier had almost died out and there was no sound of voices. My unease at being on board a boat had gone. But then rather than going anywhere we were moored tight against the bank. I wondered what had happened to Case’s brother and his cousin, the silent Thomasina. Then I returned to the cabin and accepted Dr Case’s offer of another glass. And another. He was a generous host, dispensing several glasses for every one he consumed himself.

  I’m not sure how the rest of the evening went. Knowing that the bridge gatehouses would by now be shut, Jack and I must have accepted Case’s offer of accommodation for the night, or perhaps we simply slipped into a deep, fume-filled sleep without any offer being made. Either way, we did not leave the Argo that night.

  I’ve got only a couple of other memories. One was of being half hoisted, half propped up, before being escorted down into a place that was dark and dank. The other memory was earlier, even though I was still far gone, with eyelids drooping while the candles in the great cabin guttered. The physician’s cousin Thomasina finally returned – where had she been all this time? – and the middle-aged man and the young woman embraced in a close manner that, if I’d been in my right mind, I would have said was very un-cousin-like.

  All of this, the extended story of the previous evening beginning in Middle Temple with Twelfth Night and ending in a stupefied state on board the Argo, unfolded behind my tightly closed eyes in mu
ch less time than it takes to tell it here. Nevertheless, even in my mind I stretched the story out longer for fear of opening those eyes a second time and discovering what I already knew.

  I had to open them eventually. To glimpse a dark, cluttered space rather than the relatively comfortable cabin where Jack and I had drunk ourselves stupid. To realize that the fumy odours I was smelling emanated not just from my brain but from stacked and roped barrels. To understand that I was lying on a heap of sails or tarpaulins. To recall, when I made a slight movement, the injury I’d foolishly incurred on the Middle Temple stage. To realize that the snoring I’d heard was not my own but that of my friend and fellow, Jack Wilson.

  It was some consolation not to be alone. And to hear his voice.

  ‘Nick? You are awake?’

  ‘Yes. In God’s name, what’s happening?’

  ‘What’s happened, more like. We drank deep last night on the Argo. So deep I fear we never left the vessel.’

  ‘But the vessel has left . . . with us on board.’

  With one accord, both of us staggered off our makeshift beds. There was a conveniently placed ladder and a hatch, which yielded to our urgent shoving. In seconds Jack and I were out on deck, swaying on our feet, dazzled by the sunlight off the water, almost overwhelmed by the buffeting air.

  I suppose I’d imagined that, although we’d slipped our mooring by London Bridge, we couldn’t have gone very far. That I’d look about and see the smoke of the city chimneys and the Tower of London standing proud above a huddle of dwellings. But none of this was visible. Instead, the river stretched out on either side, broader than I’ve ever seen it. Where there was land, it had the look of marsh, although in the hazy distance I discerned low hills.

  Jack seized my arm. ‘Have we been captured by pirates?’

  ‘If we have, they’ll get no ransom for a couple of players. In fact, I can think of one or two people who might pay for us not to be returned.’