Uneasy Lies the Crown

by Tasha Alexander

  I had not told him to meet me for another half an hour, so I walked along the embankment until I reached the pub. The poor man was a picture of shock and distress when he saw me, and did his best to bundle me back to the carriage, but I was half frozen and insisted on having a cup of tea before I went back outside. The landlord brought me a sad little cup, but I cannot say it offered much satisfaction. Next time I would ask for ale. Just a half pint, my driver insists. Anything more and I’d have a scandal on my hands.

  We left the warmth of the pub and were immediately pelted with more sleet. The wind had started to howl, but not louder than the voice of a newsboy who was shouting with a mixture of horror and glee.

  “Special edition! Another king’s dead! Special edition! Another king’s dead!”

  My heart nearly stopped and I froze in my tracks. Surely Bertie had not been cut down in, well, not quite the prime of his life, but so soon after inheriting the throne for which he had so long waited! I approached the boy and started to quiz him for more information, but he insisted on my buying the paper if I wanted to know more. I fumbled for a coin and took the damp tabloid from him, noticing his bare hands. I took more coins from my purse and gave them to him, crouching down so that I could look in his eyes and make him promise to use the money to buy gloves. He nodded enthusiastically and then ran down the pavement, continuing to shout about the king’s death.

  I shook as much of the sleet from the newsprint as I could. The ink had started to run, but it was obvious at a glance that Bertie was not the subject of the headline story. Rather, a man called Clive Casby had been brought to an inglorious end by the same heinous method inflicted upon King Edward II. Should the reader be unfamiliar with the indelicate manner in which this fourteenth-century sovereign was killed, I recommend the excellent play by Sir Christopher Marlowe. Short of that, I will say only that red hot pokers ought never meet any part of the human anatomy.

  1415

  8

  The baron’s household had fallen under the spell of Dario Gabrieli, the noble troubadour from Milan. There was nothing about the man that did not fascinate, from his accent to his clothes, his manner of carrying himself to his raucous sense of humor. At least three of Adeline’s ladies declared themselves to be in love with him, but none of them had the courage to admit it to the man himself. They parsed his every word, imitated his mode of speech, and argued over who would bring him spiced wine and sweets in the evening after his performances. Adeline alone held herself apart from Gabrieli. She listened attentively when he sang and praised him without reserve, but she never sought him out during the day, nor did she ask him to go riding in the afternoon with her ladies.

  Cecily enjoyed the troubadour’s company more than she expected. She adored his songs, but was more taken with his stories of life in Milan. Everything there sounded exotic, from the art to the music, and she wished she could travel to see it herself. It was only when Gabrieli began to praise her nobility and told her that in his heart he was never away from her that she realized he was attempting a flirtation, following the manner of Andreas Capellanus, whose treatise The Art of Courtly Love had for centuries guided those in search of romance. She reacted so strongly against his advances—heeding none of the advice given by Capellanus, preferring instead to rely on Christine de Pizan, who insisted in no uncertain terms that a lady must never allow herself to be seduced in such a way—that she feared Gabrieli would flee Sussex altogether. If he did, she might have to explain to Adeline what had happened.

  Her fears were unjustified, born from youth and lack of experience. Dario Gabrieli would not be so easily discouraged. He recognized that he had chosen the wrong object for his affections, but there were other ladies in the castle. Two days after she had rebuffed his advances, Lord Esterby called Cecily to his parlor. Frightened that he believed she had encouraged the Italian, she silently recited a simple prayer as she stood before him. His broad face, normally bright and quick to smile, bore a grave expression, and Cecily feared the worst.

  “Word has come from France,” he said. “The fighting has begun.”

  * * *

  It surprised no one that the French rejected King Henry’s offer of peace.

  The English cleared the land around the city, making way for their guns and trebuchets. They built defensive screens and dug deep trenches. The sound of the cannons and the acrid smell of the thick smoke they spewed as they shot their enormous stones made the earth seem like hell itself. Miners from Wales excavated beneath Harfleur’s walls at an inhuman pace, their goal to cause the collapse of the city’s defenses. Many soldiers died in those mines, when the French, digging as well, broke through and attacked their attackers.

  This hand-to-hand fighting in the mines, a part of every siege, was always the most dangerous combat—claustrophobic spaces, men relying on their poleaxes and battle hammers, swords and knives. It was dark and dirty, the air close and hot, the ground slick with blood. Those who succeeded in besting their opponents earned reputations for being the bravest and most skilled of all knights. Even those who were vanquished were lauded for their feats.

  Though he was no miner, William dug every day, listening for any sound that might suggest the French were nearby, just on the other side of the dirt, digging a tunnel of their own. When it came, first the soft scratching of axes, then shouts as the enemies knew they were about to clash, William pushed his way toward the front, ordering archers to prepare a line of defense. They might stop the first men through the break in the tunnel, but eventually they would be overwhelmed. And when they were, William and the other men-at-arms were ready.

  The bite of arrows striking armor and blades clanging against each other echoed, sounding more like the death blows of mythical beasts than the work of mortal men, and the scant light provided by flickering torches made it difficult to distinguish friend from enemy. William raised his sword, brought it crashing down hard on the helmet of a man running toward him, and then used his ballock to stab through the man’s visor as he fell. He took a glancing blow to his arm, but hardly felt it and charged ahead, cutting down anyone who stood in his way. He tasted blood and felt it running warm down his face, but he continued moving forward until there was no one left to fight.

  Both sides retreated. There was no real victory to be had, but every man who fought in the mines had made himself worthier than he had been the day before. William had proved his mettle. And now, all he wanted was to fight more.

  1901

  9

  Grateful though I was for my closed carriage after we’d left the pub, I was nonetheless half frozen and desperate for a warm bath when I reached home, but this did not make me regret finding myself unable to take advantage of these comforts. No sooner had I started for my chamber, than my butler called to me from the bottom of the stairs. When I had first met Davis, more than a dozen years ago, he was a model of propriety, a butler among butlers. I like to think that I had corrupted him, just a bit, during our time together. He still objected to my smoking cigars, but he had accepted my habit of taking port after dinner with such equanimity—and at such an early stage of our association—that I could forgive him nearly anything. He ran a tight ship, and my households, both here and at Anglemore Park, were the envy of my neighbors.

  “Mr. Hargreaves on the telephone for you, madam.”

  Colin had installed the contraption the moment it became possible, and although I understood—and, at least intellectually, appreciated—the benefits and convenience of it, I still could not count myself among its admirers. I went into the library, where the odious object sat on his desk. My husband’s voice sounded odd and faraway, not like himself at all. But on this occasion, I had to admit I was grateful for the invention. He had called to summon me to Berkeley Square, the scene of our murderer’s latest tableau.

  My husband must have told Davis as much, because my butler was waiting for me in the front hall with a dry coat, my warmest scarf, gloves, and an umbrella. I thanked him profusely and set
off on foot, as the location to which I headed was both nearby and as familiar to me as my own home. I had, in fact, once called it home, as the house I had briefly shared with my late first husband was situated in Berkeley Square. As I rushed along Mount Street, I struggled to remember what I could about Edward II. Beyond the poker and his death having occurred at Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, I knew very little.

  The sleet was starting to turn to snow, a change I welcomed, and by the time I reached my destination, thick white flakes coated the pavement. The police had cordoned off the area, but there was very little activity to be seen. There was no sign of the wretched Inspector Gale, who must have already left. Obviously, the crime had occurred long enough ago for the papers not only to have learned of it, but to have printed and distributed their special editions on the subject.

  Colin ushered me past the police barrier. “I would have called for you earlier,” he said, “but you understand that, officially, you are not allowed to be here. The coroner is going to remove the body soon, so we’ll have to be quick. I’ve delayed him as long as possible.”

  I had never seen anything quite like it. In the center of the square rested a large wooden tabletop. Next to it, lying facedown, was the body of a man wearing a medieval-looking crown. I could not recall having seen a portrait of Edward II, but I assumed the dead man’s attire—his feet were shod in pointed leather boots—was meant to evoke the proper era. A sheet of canvas covered him from the torso to the knees, but did not entirely hide what I could only assume was a poker, no longer red-hot.

  “Edward II,” I said.

  “Yes,” Colin replied. “He was under the tabletop when discovered.”

  “And the cause of death was…” My voice trailed.

  “Yes. The poker. Unless the postmortem reveals something else.” He cleared his throat. “I apologize for bringing you to such an unorthodox scene.”

  “You know perfectly well I would never have forgiven you if you hadn’t. What do we know about him, other than his name?”

  “Not much, I’m afraid,” Colin said.

  I approached the body and reached into the back of the tunic worn by the dead man. “The label says Carson’s Theatrical Supply and I shouldn’t be surprised if the costume worn by our Henry VI came from the same source. How does one place a body in such … such…” I took a deep breath. “In such a fashion with no one taking notice? It’s dark now, but it couldn’t have been when it was brought here.”

  “The man who reported it saw it out his window around noon. We called at every house in the square and several people said they saw a large tarpaulin covering the spot earlier in the day and assumed there was some sort of work going on. We suspect the scene was staged before the sun rose.”

  “No one saw the tarpaulin being removed?” I asked.

  “No.” Colin shook his head. I looked around. This was hardly the most trafficked part of town, but neither could it be called out of the way. Surely someone had seen something. I said as much to Colin.

  “We’ve asked all the papers to publish an appeal for information,” he replied, “but it is perhaps too much to hope that anyone reliable will come forward. Even if someone does, we’re unlikely to get more than a description of an unremarkable-looking person in a coat and hat with a scarf hiding his face.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “It sounds almost as if you witnessed the crime.”

  “More like I have enough experience to know that whoever is responsible for this would have been careful not to leave himself vulnerable to identification.”

  I crouched next to the body. The crown, fashioned from metal painted gold, had been secured with hairpins. I did not remove the sheet altogether, content—rather, grateful—to rely on Colin’s description of the manner of death. If, like our other victim, this one was killed in another location, why choose such a difficult method? Far easier to stab, shoot, or poison the man first and then choreograph the scene. I tugged at the man’s tunic so that I could see his back, but found no signs of injury and rolled him onto his side. No wounds on his chest either.

  Colin cleared his throat. “Marks on his wrist suggest that he was bound before the, er…”

  “Quite.” The victim’s pained expression was haunting. Eyes wide open, his face frozen in a horrific grimace. A large port-wine birthmark covered nearly half of his left cheek. Colin rolled him back over and pulled me to my feet.

  “Home?” he asked. “Carson’s Theatrical Supply is unlikely to still be open by the time we could get there, wherever it is.”

  “No doubt the wretched Inspector Gale has already called there.”

  “I don’t believe he looked inside the tunic.”

  “A shocking oversight,” I said. “Home sounds lovely, but I think you should look at this first.” I recounted for him my visit to the Tower and handed him the envelope I had found there. He opened it and read aloud:

  The mercy that was quick in us but late,

  By your own counsel is suppress’d and kill’d:

  You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy;

  For your own reasons turn into your bosoms,

  As dogs upon their masters, worrying you.

  See you, my princes, and my noble peers,

  These English monsters!

  “Henry V again,” I said. “But this time, Shakespeare’s version. Surely his choice of passage—Henry about to dole out punishment to the nobles who planned to usurp his throne—is significant.”

  “Quite,” Colin said. “It makes me all the more concerned about the king. What do you make of the drawing?”

  At the bottom of the page, beneath the quote, was an odd sketch. “I haven’t the slightest idea. Is it a rock?”

  “It looks that way. At least now we know that it’s meant as a clue to be followed. A scavenger hunt, if you will, and now I’m to find a rock of some sort.” He frowned and returned the note to the envelope. “I must go to Scotland Yard. In the meantime, I’d like you to ring Nanny at Anglemore. It looks as if we shall be in London for some time and it’s been too long since we’ve seen the boys. Have her bring the little chaps as soon as she can.”

  He gave me a quick kiss and hailed a hansom cab to take him to the Yard, knowing I would prefer to walk back to Park Lane. I watched as he drove away and then turned back to the unfortunate Mr. Casby. What sort of a person would do such a thing to anyone? Surely this was not meant solely as a warning to our current King Edward. It felt too personal for that. To choose such a brutal method of attack … I cringed thinking about it. In my estimation, that required a burning anger that would not be sated by anything less violent. If Bertie were the cause of the murderer’s ire, would he squander it on someone else? Unless he had something even more awful planned for the king. I crouched next to the body again and closed the dead man’s eyes, vowing that I would seek justice for him.

  * * *

  Back home, I indulged in a long—and extremely hot—bath. No matter how much I scrubbed, I could not cleanse the horror of Mr. Casby’s death from my skin. It had permeated every pore of my body. After pulling on a dressing gown, I retired to the library, where I gathered all the books I could find on the English monarchs. I sat close to the fire so that my hair would dry more quickly and read everything I could about Edward II.

  In short order, I reached the conclusion that Edward had been treated very badly by historians. Some might criticize me for once again relying on my intuition, but it was shouting for me to reject the commonly accepted narration of his reign. His wife, Isabella of France, famously had a long affair with Roger Mortimer, and we are meant to consider this as a natural result of her husband’s … shall we say, lack of interest in her. I am no naïve girl, and understand perfectly well what our writers of history mean when they refer to the king’s close friendship with Piers Gaveston. We have crossed the threshold of the twentieth century and ought to be more enlightened than we were in the past. Has the torment of Oscar Wilde taught us nothing?

  Isa
bella, only twelve years old when she married Edward, could hardly have complained that the marriage went unconsummated for some time. She did eventually bear the king four children, so could not argue that she was cast aside. It seems to me wrong to condemn the man when we can know nothing about the intimate details of his personal life.

  By the time Colin came home, I was so wound up that I subjected him to a half-hour rant on the injustice of historians’ views of Edward. He listened patiently and without comment until I finished.

  “I agree that we know very little about him as a person,” he said. “But it cannot be denied that he was not the best sovereign England has ever had.”

  “There are plenty of others no better,” I started. “He is tarred because of speculation about his … his most private moments, and that is unjust. And for him to have been killed in such a manner—”

  “You will get no argument from me. For the moment, however, I think it best that we focus on someone else killed in such a manner: Mr. Casby. You may find your outrage at his treatment somewhat lessened when you hear what I have to say. He was a notorious procurer in the East End, known for his brutal treatment of the women who worked for him. The police could never get enough evidence to convict him of anything, primarily because the women were too afraid to speak against him.”

  “Hideous,” I said, “but even so, no one, not even the most awful amongst us, deserves to die in such a manner. This does, however, confirm my belief that this crime was personal and vindictive. Surely you can no longer suspect that our murderer is acting only to give notice that he intends to kill the king?”