Within a heartbeat Marbury was outside under the stars. He used the rapier to secure the door, wedging it into the wood so tightly that it would hold for at least a few minutes. The sun had abandoned Westminster.
As he ran for the stables, Marbury realized why Lancelot Andrews had begged for his brother. It was obvious. Roger Andrews was murdering the translators.
46
Cambridge, That Night
The kitchen in the Deaconage filled with delectable smells as Anne poured red wine over the cooking onions. She had taken down several wooden platters and sat Timon down in front of them. One had held nearly an entire loaf of manchet, but it was gone.
“You are adding rosemary and sage?” he asked dreamily.
“I am.” She nodded pertly. “Not many men I know can identify those herbs with one sniff.”
Good, she thought, the rosemary has covered the scent of the other herbs I added.
She clutched her hand around the vial she had brought from her room.
“I have not always been as you see me now.” Timon sighed. “I once operated a dispensary for a local hospital and, of course, directed the planting and cultivation of all the various herbs needed for the infirmary—fennel and hyssop were my favorites.”
“Those herbs grow in our garden as well.”
“And you have a kitchen garden, one supposes,” Timon said, smiling. “Leeks, broad beans, a radish or two.”
“Yes.”
“Some people cannot imagine what bliss there is to be found in pulling a radish you have planted yourself,” Timon said, his lips barely moving, “after you have lived a life of blood and bile.”
Only then did Anne consider the full import of the words I have not always been as you see me now.
“Timon is a name that you have taken,” Anne said, not turning to look at him. “It is not your given name.”
“The Greek word timos means ‘value,’” he explained distractedly. “Whereas the noun timoria means both ‘assistance’ and ‘vengeance.’ It is a name that finds value in both assistance and vengeance.”
“No,” Anne said quickly. “There is a story of another Timon, a man who knows no middle path. He is given to extremes, first loving all humankind and then hating everyone that lives. Perhaps you know it. He ends by taking his own life.” Anne stirred white beans into the cooking pot.
“You are trying to understand the connection between that story and the man who is seated here in this kitchen. What you do not understand is that the men who gave me this name have only a fraction of your intelligence—and twice your sense of theatre.”
“What I do not understand is why any man, monk or misanthrope, would confess to a young woman that he has killed many men.”
“I am not myself,” Timon groaned.
Anne glanced his way for an instant. He was not looking at her. She took that moment to add the rest of the black powder from her vial to the cooking pot. Stirring the pot slowly, she held her breath as it dissolved.
“Well,” she said briskly, taking a step back, “you may begin with these beans. They will go well with your bread.”
“My bread is gone,” Timon lamented, staring down at his empty plate.
“I see.” Anne did her best to keep her voice calm. “Help yourself to the white beans. I shall fetch more bread.”
Timon stood without a word, picked up a plate, and lumbered over to the stove. Anne watched him carefully. She turned and moved deliberately to the pantry.
Timon sat and began at once to devour the beans with a large wooden spoon.
“These are wonderful,” he managed to say with his mouth full. “It must be the rosemary.”
Anne found another full loaf of bread. She walked slowly toward the table, saw that most of Timon’s plate was already gone.
He looked up at her. She took in a quick breath and held out the bread. “Here.”
He nodded and went back to his plate, finishing the rest in several huge bites.
“I was hungry,” he said, breathing heavily.
“So it would seem.” She took an imperceptible step backward.
“Anne, you are, without question, the most intelligent woman your age I have ever met, the best cook, and I have the intuition that you may have been instructed in matters of personal defense.”
“What?”
“A man who uses a knife as your father does is apt to demonstrate his abilities to a child. You are the sort of person who would be keen to learn such skills. In short, you have a knife, and you know its proper use.”
Anne’s shoulders sank. “There is a difference between knowing how to use a knife and sticking its blade into a man’s belly.”
“Very true.” Timon’s eyelids were heavy.
“Your lack of sleep,” Anne said soothingly, “seems to be catching up with you.”
“Indeed.” Timon could barely hold his head up.
“I would not be surprised if you fell right to sleep,” Anne said softly.
“No,” Timon objected weakly. “I must not sleep until—”
He laid his head on the table and began to snore almost at once.
Anne slowly backed out of the room. When she was out in the hallway, she began to run on tiptoe toward the Great Hall. She had seen its lit windows from her room when Timon had disturbed her. She was certain someone must be working there.
She burst from the Deaconage, running faster. The night was black, but Anne raced along the path. She glanced back twice to make certain Timon was not following her.
She reached the doors to the hall and threw them open, panting.
Across the room she could see Roger Andrews, head bowed, pen poised, deep in thought. She hesitated. She could not go to him. He would certainly order her from the building.
A quick look around and she saw Dr. Chaderton sitting in the shadows. Was he asleep?
She edged her way toward him.
“Anne,” he whispered. “Be quiet and come here.”
She slid along the wooden floor until she stood beside him. He was seated on a bench against a darkened wall.
“I am observing Andrews. I am determined to discover if he is, in fact, the murderer, as our Brother Timon has suggested.”
“But that is why I am here,” she blurted out. “I have subdued Brother Timon in the kitchen of the Deaconage.”
“What?” Chaderton’s voice was louder than it should have been.
“He came to my room,” she whispered, “acting so strangely, and telling me things that so discomforted me that I did not know what to do.”
“So you—what did you do?” Chaderton sat forward, as if he might stand.
“I gave him a dose of sleeping herbs. My father gives me a vial of the concoction whenever he thinks I have been too excited and will not be able to sleep. It works instantly.”
“And you gave the medicine to Timon?”
“Ten times the dosage I take.”
“Why?”
She thought to herself, because he may well be the murderer. But she said, “There is something the matter with him. He is driven to distraction. I do not trust him. He told me such things about his life!”
“Perhaps we should go outside,” Chaderton said, steadying himself against the bench and making ready to stand.
“Or perhaps you would come with me to the kitchen.”
Before any further discussion could ensue, Chaderton’s finger touched his lips. He inclined his head in the direction of the cellar steps.
Momentarily baffled, Anne peered into the darkness and was startled to see one of the shadows moving into the hall.
She drew in a breath to speak, but Chaderton pulled her down to the darkness of the bench beside him, out of the ambient light.
Andrews did not appear to have noticed anything unusual.
Chaderton put his lips close to Anne’s ear. “Someone has come to meet with Andrews.”
“No,” Anne whispered, craning her neck to see. “This is just what happened last nigh
t when—”
Anne froze. Candlelight caught the sudden image of a knife, a long, thin horror, a meat-slicing device. Gripping that blade was a hooded figure, a monk, a shadow. He inched toward Andrews.
Anne tried to shout a warning, but no sound could be forced from her lungs, a nightmare of silence. She stood but Chaderton grabbed her arm.
The hooded figure leapt over several desks; gravity did not seem to apply to his body. He came crashing down onto Andrews. Andrews shrieked. Both men toppled to the floor out of sight.
A great fit of grunting, strangled cursing, bumping, and scraping ended when a pale white hand flashed into the candlelight and Andrews began to pray. His syllables, loud and ragged, were absent sense, utterly filled with terror.
Anne lurched forward, trying to break free of Chaderton’s grip. She could see the hooded arm raised high, the blade catching the candle’s flame, then plummet with a sickening thud into the praying man’s back.
At last Anne screamed. Chaderton let go of her and called out.
The killer’s head shot upward, peering in the direction of the voices. Anne and Chaderton began to shout at the top of their lungs. The killer seemed startled by the intensity of the noise. Through the windows they could see tapers flicker into existence in the windows of other buildings. Other voices, not far off, called out alarms.
The killer froze, staring directly at Anne. She returned his gaze, but her knees began to tremble. A sudden racket of voices arose directly outside the Great Hall, men running, shouting.
The killer seemed to waver, uncertain what to do. Anne felt certain he was on the verge of attacking her, then Chaderton finally managed to stand.
“Stay where you are!” he called commandingly.
The voices outside were nearly at the door.
The killer blew out his breath, turned, and flew back into the shadows toward the cellar door. It slammed closed.
Anne only took an instant to fully realize that the killer was gone before she raced toward Andrews. He lay bleeding on the floor. Behind her she could hear that other men had come in the door.
She only glanced once at the closed cellar door as she came to Andrews, knelt beside him. His eyes were closed; his mouth was open. The wound at his chest continued to spill blood.
Anne gathered him up, determining how best to stop the bleeding. She felt the thick vein at his neck for a pulse. There was none. No breath escaped his lungs. Already his face was paler than it had been. Anne bit her upper lip, determined not to let the events overtake her, but it was clear that her ministrations would be in vain. She looked down at the face and whispered a short prayer for the soul of the man in her arms.
Roger Andrews was dead.
47
It was not yet midnight when Marbury saw his stables by moonlight. Returning from London he had torn open the road before him. With every breath, with every beat of his heart, with every quarter of a mile, his head had filled with evil visions. His torture was born of terror more than of exhaustion. He had done his best to hold it inside as he rode, but at the sight of light blazing from every window of the Great Hall, his last defenses were gone. He allowed himself to give full rein to his fears. Something had happened. No one should be there so late, with all the candles lit.
Marbury barely entered the courtyard before he dismounted from his still-moving horse, shouting for Lankin. Without waiting for a response he raced toward the hall. He scrambled like a madman across the loose stones. He could hear the buzz of voices. Something had happened.
Moments later he burst into the hall. The room was lit brighter than day. Marbury had never seen so many candles in the hall. He was greeted by such conflicting sights that his emotions nearly collapsed upon each other.
First he saw Anne and seemed to know her face for the first time. He had seen Raphael’s Madonna and Botticelli’s Venus, but even they could not remotely capture the miracle, the perfect simplicity, the utter holiness, of his daughter’s face.
Anne was all right.
Next, the sight of the rest of the group standing around Roger Andrews’s desk confirmed his worst fears. Andrews was the killer.
“Anne!” Marbury called out.
She whirled around. “Father!” she answered, running toward him.
They met and embraced, sharing a look reserved solely for fathers and daughters.
Others turned to see Marbury coming their way.
Then, Marbury saw that Timon stood over the body of Roger Andrews as it lay, quite motionlessly, on the floor. Timon’s face was grim.
“What has happened here?” Marbury stammered.
“Roger Andrews has been stabbed three times,” Timon said, his voice so clipped that it hurt the very air around him. “The blade was held flat so as to slip in between ribs. The forty-five-degree angle of the wounds was designed to wreck the operation of the heart; to do so very quickly. Blood has flooded from the wounds. This is my fault.”
Marbury stared at Timon. Everyone did.
“I,” Timon stammered, “I could have prevented this. I should have stood better guard.”
“Please, gentlemen,” Chaderton announced, “I think that events now make it clear that neither Brother Timon nor Mr. Andrews is the killer. I think it best to leave this place and let Brother Timon do his work.”
Anne shot a grateful look in Chaderton’s direction. Marbury took note and determined to ask her about it later.
The sleepy men, all in nightclothes, nodded and scratched, agreeing with Chaderton. Even Spaulding was too dispirited or tired for speeches.
Chaderton lingered.
As the rest shuffled toward the door, Anne stood close to her father and said in a low, urgent voice, “There was nothing Brother Timon could have done.” Her eyes blazed into her father’s. “He was asleep in the kitchen when the murder happened. Dr. Chaderton and I were here in the room and we could not prevent it.”
“What?” Marbury drew back.
“I saw lights in the hall,” Anne said quickly.
“And I was present, spying on Andrews,” Chaderton added with equal speed.
“The killer came from the cellar,” Anne interrupted.
“And did not see us.”
“He was upon Andrews before we knew what was happening.” Anne’s voice had gotten higher.
“How could I have been so stupid?” Timon shouted, clasping his forehead in the palm of his hand as if he were attempting to steady his brain. “Why did I not secure the bins down in the cellar—the secret door that leads to the underground passageway? We should have nailed it shut. Damnation!”
“There are a hundred ways into this hall.” Anne shook her head. “If the killer wanted to be here for his work and had found his secret door blocked, he could easily have gained access otherwise.”
Marbury wondered at his daughter’s concern for Timon’s guilt. At a loss for words, Marbury stared down at Andrews.
The face was contorted in anger. The eyes were still open. The pale blue doublet was brown-stained. Andrews had a pen clutched in his hand.
“When?” was all that Marbury could muster.
“Scarcely an hour ago,” Anne rushed to answer. “I had fixed Brother Timon a bit of supper, and he had succumbed to his exhaustion in our kitchen. That’s when I noticed the lights in the hall. I came to see who was here. Chaderton and I saw it all. We called out. The men came running.”
“And I slept all the while,” Timon moaned, self-loathing obvious in every syllable. “Anne had to wake me, to fetch me.”
“I—you were asleep while my daughter witnessed the murder?” Marbury’s exhaustion mixed with a growing anger. “This is exactly what I feared when I left—”
“You have returned from your trip with great haste,” Chaderton interrupted Marbury in a low voice. “Did Lancelot Andrews—?”
“We cannot count on Lancelot Andrews for aid in our task,” Marbury whispered. “More anon.”
Timon stood from Andrews’s body and moved to his desk.
“What was so important to Roger Andrews,” he wondered aloud, clearly irritated, “that he would risk coming here late at night after so many warnings?”
Despite himself, Marbury peered at the desk as Timon held the candle close to several pages. They appeared to be new notes on a mostly blank page. Those notes ended in a long, thick downward scratch of ink, as if the pen had suddenly been torn across the surface of the paper—or the page had begun to bleed.
“‘The Devil is permitted to put himself in the likeness of the Saints.’” Timon sighed. “‘It is plain in the Scriptures where it is said that Satan can transform himself into an Angel of light.’”
“I know those lines,” Marbury said slowly. “They do not come from any book of the Bible. They are words from King James himself, from his book called Demonology.”
Timon nodded. “Here is the passage upon which Andrews was working when the killer attacked: ‘None can study and put into practice the circles and art of Magic without committing a horrible defection from God.’”
“What can this mean?” Marbury marveled. “Was Andrews attempting to include those lines in some passage of the Bible?”
“And was the killer intent on stealing this page,” Timon countered, “or was it mere coincidence that this passage was the last Roger Andrews would ever write? The killer was startled in his business. He had no time for facial disfigurement or to place a note in the victim’s mouth. That part, at least, was foiled by your daughter and Chaderton—which is regrettable—”
“There are a thousand reasons to lament Anne’s presence at this event,” Marbury muttered. “But allow me to say that I am in no condition to explore this matter at the moment. Nor are you, Brother Timon. You have slept—what?—only an hour in nearly two nights. I have had severe shocks to my flesh and mind. I suggest that we take Dr. Andrews downstairs to lie with Mr. Lively and have done with this night.”
Before Timon could protest, Anne piped up, “Please. Neither of you will accomplish anything of merit without rest.”
The King James Conspiracy Page 23