The Secrets of Life and Death

by Rebecca Alexander

  ‘Professor Guichard?’ His assistant Rose’s stern tone came from behind him. It got rid of the girl, who mumbled something about coming back later in the week.

  ‘To the rescue, as always.’

  ‘It’s just transference, you know,’ she said. ‘Indiana Jones has a lot to answer for.’

  ‘He’s archaeology, I’m anthropology,’ he said. ‘He’s also completely fictional.’

  She took the parcel off him. ‘Well, she’s eighteen; she can’t help herself. Don’t encourage them, that’s all. You aren’t exactly unattractive, and you have that fatherly thing going on …’

  Before he could form a cutting retort, he saw her standing by the desk, looking down at the bulky package. Her round, middle-aged face looked pensive.

  ‘That’s the post-mortem photographs from the police,’ he said. ‘I was hoping you would be able to help me with them.’

  ‘I thought so. Is this case going to cut into your time?’

  Felix dropped his briefcase on the desk and slid the laptop onto his chair. ‘Maybe. How many departmental meetings are there this semester?’

  She handed him the envelope. ‘You never go to them anyway. Is this to do with that poor girl on the train? I saw it on the evening news.’

  He hesitated, feeling the weight of the package in his hand. He could feel a flutter of adrenaline just holding it. ‘She was covered with symbols, some of them Enochian letters.’

  ‘Well, let’s have a look at them. At least they didn’t make you attend the autopsy.’

  ‘They called me to the scene to view the body.’ He fumbled with the seal. He slid the pictures onto the desk, large glossy prints that catalogued every inch of the dead girl’s inscribed skin.

  ‘Good God.’ Rose picked up a picture showing the girl’s torso, with two concentric circles drawn over her hollow belly and flattened breasts. ‘That poor girl.’ She reached for another picture, peering at a symbol at the top of her chest. ‘These ones look Enochian. But these others, what are they?’

  ‘They look cuneiform, but unlike anything I’ve seen before. Is the layout familiar? I keep thinking I’ve seen something similar.’

  Rose started laying out photographs on the desk, as Felix cleared piles of paperwork and academic journals onto his chair. There was a stack of ten-by-eights of both sides of the body. The circles on her back were smaller and were composed of less figures.

  ‘Do the letters spell anything?’ she asked, looking up at Felix with a frown.

  He reached for a pen and started jotting on the back of a memo he hadn’t read and had even less chance of responding to. ‘T … G … C … E … is that an O?’ In between were other shapes, more elaborate.

  She traced one, her finger almost touching the paper. ‘It’s so sad. She doesn’t look much older than my daughter.’

  He glanced across at the pictures that included the dead face. Blonde hair, almost white, had fallen back away from her pale forehead. Her half-open eyes were shadowed with a soft grey. ‘I don’t know how old she was. Young.’

  ‘The shapes do look familiar.’ She stepped back, head cocked on one side.

  Felix felt a surge of excitement as memory flickered in his mind, just out of reach. ‘That’s what I felt, at the station. Only, on something metal. Coin, maybe?’

  She started. ‘A medal, perhaps? Do you remember … ?’

  He crouched down and pulled open the bottom drawer of one of the filing cabinets. ‘There were two medals, the ones Dee was awarded by the king of Poland. I did an authentication for an auction house, around 2009, I think.’

  ‘I remember. There were some letters with them, and some notes. I photocopied them for you.’

  He paused, looking at her round face. ‘We weren’t supposed to keep duplicates. They were bought up by an American museum, they probably have some sort of copyright.’

  She shrugged. ‘The photocopies were in a big blue folder, if it helps. I just hope you kept them.’

  He paused, smiled at her. ‘You know I keep everything you ever give me.’

  She snorted with disbelief. ‘So you’ve got all those grant applications you’re supposed to keep for seven years?’

  The back of the drawer was stuffed with outside consultation records. ‘Here we go. British Museum.’ He pulled the folder out and lifted it onto the edge of the desk. ‘Put those photographs away, for the moment, will you? Just leave the ones that show the whole circles.’

  He rummaged through the folder, until he found the photocopies. The documents were mostly written in Dee’s precise hand. Many were household accounts and notes on vellum, but a smaller packet had been inscribed in a rough hand, on water-stained and pest-damaged paper. The medals, two large bronze discs, were the size of his palm, and she had copied each side. One had the face of King Istvan Báthory of Poland, the other had a curled dragon surrounded by two circles of inscribed shapes. There appeared to be a date, and he felt in his pocket for his glasses.

  ‘These must have been awarded during the fifteen eighties, when Dee was in Europe.’ He leaned over the greyscale image. ‘Hand me that magnifying glass, would you?’

  ‘The letters are very similar,’ she said, as she passed him a hand lens. ‘That spiral one looks like the one on the back of her neck.’

  He lined up the post-mortem photograph of the girl’s torso with the photocopy. ‘Did the medals sell?’

  ‘The British Museum bought them for a couple of hundred pounds. The letters were more interesting, they sold for thousands.’

  He picked up the pictures and slid them back in the envelope. ‘I’ll follow up with the BM.’

  ‘Because you have so much free time at the moment.’ Rose’s voice was dry. ‘You do remember you have a meeting with your solicitor this afternoon?’

  ‘Oh, well, maybe I’ll just phone the museum, see if they can send me better images.’ He flipped through the copies of the papers Rose had done for him at the time. ‘These are obviously Dee’s hand. There were some notes with them, by Kelley.’

  ‘So you thought at the time.’

  He found the image of the stained and folded booklet that Rose had recorded by teasing the sheets apart. The writing was cramped and faded. ‘This was on paper?’

  ‘So you said. It didn’t last as well as the vellum Dee used.’

  ‘Well, paper was a fairly new technology at this date.’ He squinted at the pale impression of the lettering. ‘Cheap ink, too, organic. And he’s crossed his lines.’

  The pages had been closely packed with script, then turned ninety degrees and more writing added, making it even less legible. The author had written close to the margins, and time and damp had frayed the edges, losing a few words.

  ‘Well, I’ll leave you with your research.’ She patted his shoulder. ‘And don’t forget your appointment.’

  ‘Oh, yes. The custody battle over who gets the Lucian Freud print and whether the cat can come over every other weekend.’ He hated the waspish note that crept into his voice when he mentioned the divorce. Rose shut the door behind her. He turned his attention back to the first faded scribble. Something, something … account … Secryts of Lyfe and Death …

  Chapter 5

  ‘The people of Niepolomice are mixed, fair Saxons, tall Poles, and among them, the dark Magyars and Székelys. I noticed, for I am observant as any scientist shall be, that one party came with soldiers, menservants and then a group of six or seven young children, all girls as I could divine, shepherded by an older woman. I wondered what household would bring so many young attendants. I also noticed their abnormal pallor and weakness, and disapproved of such sickly creatures being introduced to the castle where contagion could spread. For they were very white, dark eyes sunken in their faces, lips pale, and some had to support the others. Fever, I thought.’

  Edward Kelley

  14 November 1585

  Niepolomice

  The castle at Niepolomice was dark, and the great oak doorway seemed to swallow us whole. Kin
g Istvan Báthory’s banners hung over each doorway: a dragon curled around a shield, with three teeth inscribed upon it. The outer courtyard was a combination of an army marshalling yard and a country market. Women sold everything, from chickens swinging unhappily from their feet, to sausages the size of a man’s arm, carried aloft in great bunches. Soldiers stood in clusters, hands on weapons, hostility on every face. I soon realised it was not aimed at two weary travellers from England, but at each other. Bearskinned Magyars strutted in groups, the blue-uniformed Polish soldiers watching their every move, and polishing their weapons was a company of the emperor’s black-coated soldiers.

  The captain of our escort beckoned to us, as the last of our luggage was tossed onto the ground from the mules.

  ‘I suspect we shall carry our own bags,’ murmured Dee, still in a good humour.

  That meant I carried most of them, my master leaning over for the book bag and the leather packet containing our charts and maps. I followed Dee and the captain through the outer courtyard to an inner one, and along a corridor, which lifted my nose to the smell of roasting meat. We skirted a gallery full of portraits, then a feasting hall with raised dais and tables, and went into a warren of smaller rooms and antechambers filled with courtiers and servants.

  I dragged the packs up a curving stair, and into a hall lined with doors. One was opened, and we were ushered into a larger and lighter chamber than I had expected. A new fire spluttered in the hearth, glowing yellow. There was no chimney, but a smoke stain up the wall led to several openings at the top, the arrangement of which must have been unruly in windy weather.

  A manservant, as black-eyed and brown-skinned as a Turk, bowed low to Dee and then clamped the shutters against the night air. I saw a tallow candle upon the table, lit against the darkness, and fine lamps ready for a flame. A bed, as high as my waist, was stretched against the wall, leather straps across a frame, and as I watched, two women bustled in carrying a mattress. They lifted it onto the bed, and the manservant opened a coffer, handing them a thick, felted blanket.

  I slipped off my cloak, stretching it in front of the fire. One of the serving women started unpacking our clothes. I noticed she seemed afraid of Dee, who was already sharpening his pen. My sleeves were damp and stained, and she beckoned for me to give up my shirt. I changed it for a clean one, sewn with exquisite tiny stitches by Mistress Jane Dee herself. I had often seen her bent over her needlework, drawing on her experience as an embroiderer in her youth. Strange to think she was but thirty, the same age as myself. I fancied I could smell her perfume, and felt a momentary pang. I chastised myself for the sin of covetousness, for breaking the tenth commandment.

  The door creaked open, and a maidservant carried in a rush bag of logs. I stroked my beard, trimmed in the style of Drake, and she dimpled. Her smile faded at Dee’s voice, and she turned, crossing herself as she fled the room.

  ‘Why don’t you ask for some wine?’ Dee suggested, already looping his letters, chronicling the thoughts and observations he had memorised during the day’s travel. What he meant was, ‘go away so I can write’, but I was thirsty myself. I opened the door and walked into the armoured chest of a guard.

  I staggered back, and mimed holding a goblet up to my lips and drinking.

  ‘Crapula, wine, understand?’ The bearded man looked blank. I tried again. ‘Vinum? ’ The guard extended a long arm and pointed down the corridor whence we had come. He looked into the room, as if to check Dee was safe, or perhaps to confirm he was confined, and then shut the door behind me.

  The perfume of seared meat drew me by my nose down worn stairs and along dark hallways, and my belly growled. The vast kitchens were hellishly hot. The tongue-twisting language faded as a dozen or so men and women appeared to notice my shadow in the doorway.

  ‘Good evening,’ I managed, in passable Latin. One of the men spat on the blackened rushes at my feet. I tried again, in German, then in French.

  ‘They don’t understand you.’ A voice, in impeccable Latin, came from a corner I hadn’t noticed. A man that I had mistaken for a heap of rags tottered to his feet, and pulled back a hood. The bald head of an old man was revealed, his beard white where it wasn’t stained by food. ‘And if they did, they wouldn’t speak to you. They are his Carpathians, Transylvanians.’

  ‘Can you tell them I mean them no harm? I simply want wine and food for myself and my master.’

  The man shrugged, limping closer to the light of the fire. ‘They fear you, just the same. They know you are here with the sorcerer.’

  He jabbered something in the language of the Magyars. A woman, no more than a girl, cut off a slab of bread and topped it with a slice of the roast meat in the fireplace. Stepping around me, she handed it to the old man, then ran back. The smell of meat hit me, and my mouth filled with sweet water.

  The man tore the offering in half. ‘Here.’

  I hadn’t eaten since we left Krakow at dawn, and nodded my thanks to the fearful girl. The meat was good venison, but I struggled to swallow the dry bread. The man handed me a horn cup and I drank deep of half-fermented ale.

  ‘My thanks, good sir. You speak Latin like a scholar.’

  ‘Or a priest?’ The man grinned, revealing half a dozen rotten teeth. ‘Are you as wary of ecclesiastics as your master?’

  I took another bite, feeling my stomach cramp around the food and the yeasty brew. ‘In our land, our queen has some tolerance for those who follow Rome.’

  The man settled back on the stool in the corner, chewing the meat with his good teeth. ‘You are fortunate. The king invites the Pope to purify his Catholic court, while his own family and noble allies follow the Protestant heresy. Voivode of Transylvania, king of Lithuania and Poland – hah!’ He spat into the fire. ‘Istvan rules over three barrels of gunpowder, and spends his days putting out sparks.’

  I hesitated to speak anything but glowingly of their king. ‘The people at least live in peace.’

  The man spoke around a mouthful of the meat. ‘At present, they are united against the bastard Turks.’ He washed the mouthful down and belched. ‘Whenever we drive them back, the people turn on each other like hungry dogs.’

  I shrugged. ‘He seems to have the respect of the nobles.’

  ‘Hah!’ The man spat a laugh at me, with the stench from his rotten mouth. ‘Them! They either owe him money, and seek his indulgence against repayment, or he owes them money, in which case they need him to live long enough to pay it back. The court is bankrupt. The soldiers on the Turkish front get paid, everyone else waits.’

  I finished the food, and licked my greasy fingers. ‘My master is invited here to talk of theology and science. Then we are back to Krakow and on to Prague.’

  The man started making a choking noise and for a moment I thought he was ill. Then I realised the coughing was laughter. ‘You are here to help the witch save the lady countess.’

  ‘I assure you, I know of no witches …’

  He stepped forward into the flickering light of the torches and the roasting fire.

  ‘He may try and wrap himself in the blessings of Rome,’ he whispered, ‘but the Báthorys are cursed. Why else would he need a sorcerer’s spells and talismans? You know the Devil’s own magical letters, that is why you were invited here.’

  I stepped back from the reach of the man’s stink. ‘We have been blessed by angels who have spoken wisdoms to us,’ I said, with some anger. ‘Those angels affirmed that Jesus was the son of God.’

  ‘And demons cannot lie?’ He chuckled, then coughed, his whole body shaking with each racking paroxysm. I stepped back, and he splattered the stones and rushes at my feet with spots of blood. ‘Stupid child,’ he gasped, his lips speckled. ‘The witches will take your magical letters, and build abominations and monsters from the bodies of innocents.’

  ‘The king is a devout man. A true Catholic.’

  He cackled for a moment. ‘Devout, yes. But for Istvan, family comes first, and with family, money. Always money.’<
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  I stepped away from the man, from his malice.

  ‘We are serious men of science.’ I drained the last of the flagon.

  ‘You raise the dead.’

  I knew speaking to a spirit beyond the grave was a glimpse of heaven, or, at least, purgatory, worthy of scientific enquiry. ‘I have been a mouthpiece for angels, old man.’

  ‘You are a deluded child, manipulated by demons.’ The man shuffled closer until I could see the crucifix against his ragged robes. ‘Istvan will have you keep the dying from the grave with your demonic magics.’ He crossed himself, and despite myself I followed suit. ‘Leave the heretic sorcerer. Go, before—’

  A man entered, in the embroidered robes and red boots of a noble, and raised a fist at the priest. The old man returned to his humble stool, babbling what I took to be apologies.

  The newcomer turned to me. He tipped his head towards the door. I followed him, but cast a final look at the old man, his eyes bright with something that looked like malice. He was mumbling something familiar, crossing himself.

  ‘… et Judicis nostri, et in virtute Spiritus Sancti, ut descedas ab hoc plasmate Dei …’

  My throat tightened as I recognised the rite of exorcism.

  Chapter 6

  Jack’s cottage was over four hundred years old, hunkered into the landscape like a tortoise under a thatched shell. Built with two rooms downstairs, two upstairs, it had had a small bathroom squeezed between the two bedrooms at some time during the last century. The kitchen, added in the sixties and looking over the back of the plot, caught whatever morning sun was available. It was warmed by a chipped Rayburn. Jack huddled by the open firebox, occasionally poking the logs as they started to catch off the embers.

  ‘You’ll put that fire out,’ Maggie said. She was drying up, the familiar movements graceful and reassuring. Jack stretched her hands towards the warmth.

  ‘It’s cold in here.’

  ‘Still cold?’ She touched Jack’s forehead. ‘You can’t afford to get chilled like that. It’s been two days, and you’re still icy to the touch.’