‘Put the dagger away.’ The other man spoke in a soft voice. Even as my trembling hand dropped the few inches of blade I had started to hold up against the apparition, I recognised the tone. It filled me with a mixture of relief and indignation. The man swept the hood off his head and turned towards the light.
‘Do you not recognise me, Master Edward Kelley?’ he said, in perfect Latin.
‘Your Majesty.’ I bowed as best I could, huddled against the wall.
He swept off his cloak, making the small fire waver, and smoke drift around the room. He spoke in a low growl to his companion, who lowered his sword and walked over to the fire. He pushed another log on with his foot, then set the lantern upon the table. In the light, I recognised the man seated beside the king at dinner.
Dee gestured the king to the chair. ‘Your Majesty, if you will sit and tell us how we may serve you?’ He sat up in bed as if he were accustomed to armed men waking us in the middle of the night.
The king sat in the chair. The big man leaned one shoulder against the door as if he would stop an invasion.
‘My half-brother, Count Miklós Báthory.’ The king set his own sword, point down, against the arm of the chair, always within reach. ‘You may speak freely before him. He has my absolute trust.’ He spoke in another tongue, and the big man nodded, once.
Dee nodded to the count, and I managed another bow as I scrambled out of bed and onto the low stool.
‘I need your help, and the utmost discretion. I have a niece, and she suffers from the most serious disease.’ The king’s face creased into wrinkles, as if careworn. ‘No physician can help her.’
Dee held out his hands. ‘If my studies in natural science can help in any way …’
The king ran his hand through dark hair, speckled with age, and glanced at me. ‘What ails Countess Erzsébet is not something a doctor can heal. Have you heard the story of Anna, my sister?’
‘I am sorry – we have been here so little a time,’ Dee said.
The king cut him off with a wave of his hand. ‘It is better that you hear the truth from me, rather than the lies people spread. All you need to know is that my youngest sister Anna was born in the most strange and … demonic of circumstances.’
Dee pulled at his beard, as he did when he was lost for words. ‘I am no expert on demonic forces, your Majesty. Can you explain further?’
I watched the other man, his eyes darting from Dee to Istvan.
The king spoke, his voice a rumble. ‘My sister Anna quickened inside the body of my mother … when she had been dead five years.’
Chapter 11
Felix was supposed to be grading assignments in his study at home. Rectangles on the wallpaper suggested where pictures had hung, dents in the old carpet remembered where furniture had stood. He had also conceded the cat, and exactly half their savings. The divorce was leaving him the house but had taken almost everything else. The desk had belonged to his father, when he worked for the War Office, so he had kept it.
He was relieving the tedium of reading essays by researching the markings on the dead girl’s body. He had scanned in each of the individual symbols from the post-mortem photographs, and could examine them separately. It helped to remove the distraction of the face, with its blank gaze. The shapes were separate, and those on the girl’s back, one circle inside another, were different from the ones on the front. About one third of the symbols appeared to be based on the Enochian alphabet, but he couldn’t make them form recognisable words in any language he knew. The differences were subtle, sixty-six distinct characters. He catalogued them into Enochian; degraded Enochian; unknown, possibly cuneiform; and what looked like an early Indian script, maybe Vedic Sanskrit of some sort. Three pictographs – what looked like a sun, a crescent moon and a spiky seven-pointed star – occurred several times. The images were laid out over his desk, some spilling onto the carpet. The house was so quiet, the radiators humming and bubbling into life were distracting. Images of Marianne intruded. Curled up in the armchair beside him, discussing work, falling asleep over a book, playing the baby grand …
Shaking off the memory, he searched through his diary for contacts at the British Museum. He’d last visited in January – or was it February? – to give a lecture on superstition on the Internet. He dialled the number.
‘Can I speak to Dr Martin Mackenzie, please?’
‘Speaking.’ The voice, as un-Scottish as you could imagine, was pure East London.
‘Hello, it’s Felix Guichard here, from Exeter. We met in the spring—’
‘Felix! The modern witchcraft guy, right? What can I do for you?’
Felix leaned back in his chair, looking out of the window at the darkening sky, and the overgrown shrubs. What do people do with gardens? Beyond mowing the grass, Felix had left all that to Marianne.
‘I’m helping the police with a case and there are some symbols involved. I believe you have something in the museum that may be similar. A medal.’
‘Ah. We have thousands of medals here. Can you narrow it down?’
‘It was bought by the museum about two years ago, from an auction.’ Felix turned over his notes and the pictures. ‘It was given to John Dee by King Istvan Báthory of Poland, around 1585. My photocopies are very basic; I really need a high-quality, magnified scan.’
He could hear the clicking of fingers on a keyboard. ‘It says here, two medals, bronze, report attached by one Felix Guichard. You authenticated them?’
‘I looked at a batch of papers, mostly notes written by Dee and his assistant, Kelley. I believe they went to a university in the States, but the museum got the medals.’
‘No one else wanted them, probably. The papers will be good for a bit of research money, maybe a couple of doctoral theses. So, how can I help? I can email you our scanned records, they’re pretty good.’
‘That would be great. The other thing is, I need to know the name of the person who sold them.’
There was a long pause at the end of the phone. ‘Strictly speaking, that’s confidential.’
‘I know. But this is an official investigation into a suspicious death. I’m sure the police could get paperwork in order – eventually. Between you and me,’ he paused for effect, ‘the symbols were drawn on the body of a dead teenager. You could be helping in what may turn out to be a murder.’
‘Well, obviously I want to help.’ There was some tapping of keys at Mackenzie’s end. ‘And I suppose you may have had this information, when you did the authentication.’
‘I may well have done. You would only be jogging my memory, I’m sure no one could blame you.’
There was more tapping and clicking. ‘The name of the vendor was a Mrs Margaret Slee, and the cheque was made out to J. Hammond. No address recorded but I have a phone number. Got a pen?’
Felix rang off, and sipped his cooling coffee. He ought to finish marking the essays first. Instead, he dialled the mobile number. After a few rings a woman answered.
‘Yes? What?’ He could hear her shut a door.
‘I believe you may be able to help the police with their investigation. My name is Professor Felix Guichard.’
‘How did you get this number?’
‘It is on the record of some artefacts auctioned two years ago. I’m looking for Mrs Slee or Ms Hammond.’
‘Mrs Slee moved out years ago.’ Her voice was husky, soft.
‘Ms Hammond, then?’
The voice hesitated. ‘What’s this about?’
‘I’m phoning about some medals you and Mrs Slee sold to the British Museum.’
‘What about them? Look, I’m really busy …’ He could hear thumping in the background.
‘I’m investigating the symbols that are inscribed on the medals.’
There was no response from the woman on the end of the phone, but he thought she took a deep breath.
Felix continued. ‘I was hoping we could discuss where you got the items from, and any background information you might have.’<
br />
‘Look, I don’t want to be rude, but we don’t want to get involved.’ Her voice was firm. ‘I don’t know anything about them, just a few old things in a box in the attic. I’m sorry, but I have to go …’
Felix started to get annoyed. ‘Ms Hammond, I’m helping with a police investigation into the death of a young girl. I would rather not pass your details on to the officers working the case. I thought if you answered my questions, they wouldn’t need to follow up in person.’
‘Well, OK,’ she responded, eventually. ‘I just can’t see how I can help.’
‘Would you prefer me to visit you at home, or perhaps you could come to the university?’ He tapped his pen on the paper with her number on it.
‘I’m, uh, working in town this week. Perhaps we could meet at a pub? Do you know Princesshay at all?’
‘Fairly well.’ It was an area of shops near the cathedral.
‘There’s a pub, the Keg and Apple. Could you meet me there?’
‘How about tomorrow? I’m teaching until six, I could make it by six-thirty. It should be quiet.’
Another silence. He started counting. She seemed strangely hesitant. He had just got to seventeen when she replied. ‘I’ll be there.’ Then her voice lightened a little. ‘I’m five foot six, blonde and will be wearing a green jacket.’
He smiled. ‘Thank you, Ms Hammond.’
‘Jack. My name is Jack.’
‘Felix. So – six-thirty tomorrow.’
Felix turned to write the time of the meeting on the calendar, before he remembered Marianne had taken that, too. He made a note of it on his mobile phone instead.
He walked around the kitchen for something – anything – for dinner. The fridge was almost empty. He had no idea how much of his life had been organised by Marianne. Food, laundry, messages, somehow all accomplished while she worked teaching music fulltime. As he stood in the kitchen he glanced out towards the street. It was empty, but he felt a strange uneasiness. The face of the girl against the glass was haunting him.
A sound behind his back made him jump. He swung around to see Tycho, Marianne’s fat tabby, pushing the cat flap open with his nose.
‘Why are you back again? Don’t like Heinrich, eh?’ At least Marianne had left the kitchen phone. He sat on one of the remaining chairs.
He keyed in Marianne’s new number as Tycho, rasping a purr, settled on his lap.
‘The cat’s back,’ he said, the second she picked up.
‘Well, he’s used to living there. I don’t think that’s surprising after twelve years. I’ll pick him up tomorrow.’ Marianne’s low voice was still sexy.
‘I haven’t got any cat food.’
She sighed. ‘Felix, don’t be childish. I’m not coming over, and it wouldn’t do any good if I did.’
‘Don’t flatter yourself.’ It was cheap, and he knew it. He did want her to come over. ‘I’ve been working, that’s all. I’m consulting on a case for the police. I don’t have time to cat-sit.’
‘Oh, God, not like that child in the Thames?’ Her voice got more husky.
‘Not that bad, no.’ The cat rubbed its face over Felix’s hand.
‘Look, there are a few tins of tuna in the cupboard. Just drain off the brine for him, and I’ll pick him up tomorrow.’ He could almost see her, curled up in her favourite wing chair, running her hand through her long hair.
‘I really miss you, you know?’ His voice was a growl, and he regretted saying it almost immediately.
He could hear her sigh down the phone.
‘I miss you too, Felix. But I’m in love with Heinrich, and that’s where my future is.’ There was a long gap, which she might once have filled with some comment like ‘love you’ or ‘bye darling’, in her slight Swedish accent. Instead, she said, ‘goodbye, Felix.’ Before he could answer, the phone clicked in his ear.
He sat for a long moment, letting the sadness settle on him as he remembered the easy affection they had had, the passion of the early years. It all seemed a long time ago, yet until Heinrich came along, he would have said they were just as happy. Just more … separate as their careers took them to different places. When she left she said her love had just faded away, which was fine for her, but he didn’t feel any different. He shook off the melancholy and put some music on in the study. He checked his university email account. Two excuses why assignments would be late, one reminder about a budget meeting, and an email from Mackenzie at the British Museum. He opened it.
Hi Felix,
I’ve done a detailed pic for you of each side of the medals. The curator of the collection said someone else was looking at them a few weeks ago. She wanted to know the vendor too; I’m not sure if they gave the information to her. Then, last week, a man from some police task force asked who sold them and they gave the info out. Let me know when you solve the murder and catch the bad guy.
All the best,
MM
He looked at the images Mackenzie had attached to the email. They were much better quality than the quick scans Rose had done. Mackenzie had also included files of every one of the sixty or so sheets of paper and vellum that had been auctioned. The folded and damaged paper, hatched with Kelley’s illegible script, was much clearer in the museum’s scans. He opened them, one at a time, on the screen. Kelley’s spellings were inconsistent as well as archaic, and he switched into Latin frequently. Felix started to see whole phrases. Far from being notes of experiments or alchemical formulae, the pages seemed to be in journal form. A sentence unravelled itself from loops and blotches.
Her mother gave byrthe to a chyld – when she had been ded fulle five yeares …
Chapter 12
‘It is said in Poland that nowhere is the line between alive and dead finer, than in Transylvania. Only when a corpse is bloated and festering, or entirely beheaded, is it believed dead.’
Edward Kelley
17 November 1585
Niepolomice
Her mother gave birth to a child – when she had been dead fully five years? It filled my mind with horrid possibilities.
I looked at Dee, whose hair was already standing on end from being asleep, and back to the long face of the king.
‘You do not believe me. What rational being could? I was just a small child when my parents were ambushed on the road to Buda.’ Istvan looked troubled, his face reddened by the glow from the fire as it brightened. A tendril of smoke stretched out and caught in my throat.
‘We have seen many things that have defied belief, your Majesty,’ Dee conceded. ‘Yet they were found to be true.’
The king stretched back in his chair, looking first at me, then at Dee, as if looking for signs of disbelief or deception. I gathered myself in my cloak, which I had hung upon the end of the bed to dry. I shall tell you the story in his words, for to relate it makes me shiver.
‘My father, the Voivode of Transylvania, was attacked by rebels. He managed to get my mother, Katalin, safely to the citadel at Poenari before he died of his wounds. But she had been gored in the side by a pike, and her women could not staunch the bleeding. They feared, not just for her life but that of her unborn child. They called upon a woman, known to the local peasants as Zsuzsanna, who was reputed to be skilled in herbs and midwifery, to save their mistress.
‘She sent my mother’s servants away, then demanded faggots of firewood, as many as the castle held. She barricaded the door to the tower where my mother lay, close to death. All night the people of the castle heard the terrible screams and moans of my mother, as if she was being tortured by the Turks, and smoke hung over the stronghold.
‘My mother’s servants tried to break into the tower, but the soldiers were afraid and stopped them. The castle guards confessed that Zsuzsanna was a notorious sorceress. After a night of terrible suffering, the door was unlocked and my mother’s retainers rushed to her aid.
‘Their lady, though deathly pale and weak, still breathed. She commanded that the witch Zsuzsanna be placed in charge, as only she
could keep my mother alive with her herbs and potions.
‘They had to defer to the witch in all matters concerning the countess, including her virtual imprisonment within that one chamber. She could not step outside the room for a whole year, during which her belly swelled with her living child, but very slowly. At the end of that time I and my brothers and sisters were taken to see her, but although she knew us, all affection seemed gone. Instead, her love was focused on the child inside her.
‘By the following year, the Lady Katalin could walk slowly within the confines of the tower. Her strength grew, but she was attended only by Zsuzsanna, who held her own peasants’ court in the castle’s yard, doing her devilish work. Although the palace servants loathed her and distrusted her entirely, the local people revered her and claimed she had saved many of their lives with her medicines and spells. The story of the lady with the baby forever trapped inside her womb spread, and there were those in the church who even said my mother – my own, gentle mother – was a witch, or else some dead creature, kept alive by evil spirits and carrying a dragon inside her.
‘She lived for five years inside the castle, getting stronger each year, until the time when the pains came to birth her child. The labour was cruel and lasted two nights, and it was said that the servants took out sheet after sheet soaked in Katalin’s blood, before a huge scream shook the castle and the baby was born. It was a girl – not a monster, not a dragon – and except for being born with a full head of curls and a few teeth, the baby was as other babies.
‘My mother did not survive, slipping away after her child was shown to her, but blessed her and named her Anna. The child weakened over the day and many prayed that it would also die. At Zsuzsanna’s insistence the baby was put to the breast of a fearful peasant woman, who had been chosen to nurse the child, but when suckling, the innocent babe bit the woman and blood mingled with the milk. She seemed to strengthen, and suckled fiercely while the woman cried for help, but Zsuzsanna made her feed the baby until she was strong and pink.
The Secrets of Life and Death Page 6