Blood On the Stone

by Jake Lynch

  ‘We ought to get that Unsworth round the back of his tavern and box his ears till he tells us the whole truth.’

  Ignoring this suggestion, Luke went on: ‘I came away from the Bobs convinced we were on to something, but then we saw Jones at the coffeehouse and it all seemed to fall flat. Plenty of people in politics hated Harbord but they’re not in Oxford – and anyway, would they kill him?’

  ‘Perhaps it was Papists after all.’ His deputy was, in Luke’s experience, disinclined to be swayed towards snap judgements: one reason why they worked well together. And yet here he was, echoing conspiracy theories from the Green Ribbon Club.

  ‘Well – you said yourself, there are not many Catholics in Oxford, and they don’t get involved in politics.’

  ‘Aye, but what about out-of-towners?’

  Their exchange was cut short by Cate’s arrival with the pottage.

  ‘Upper crust for you, Master Luke,’ she said, smiling as she set down the bread. Handed the bigger, darker underside of the loaf, Robshaw issued an appreciative grunt, muttering: ‘Stomach thought my throat had been cut.’

  Luke looked up, but she turned her gaze modestly downwards as she placed the bowls on the table. So he contented himself with watching her hands instead; hands that had, no doubt, kneaded the very bread that now sat on the plate in front of him. He remembered the quiet day when she had come out of the kitchen in search of help to dislodge the oven door – a wooden board with a handle, shaped to the opening in the brick-built cavity and soaked with water so it would expand to a tight fit. So tight, in fact, that on the occasion in question it had wedged fast, as the cooling air contracted and pulled it inwards. Luke had managed to free it, and stayed to help relight the oven for the next batch. It was as he held the faggot, and she ignited the ‘pimp’ – the small bundle of twigs that would act as a taper – that their eyes had met, and a spark of mutual realisation had passed between them.

  ‘Did you hear any of that?’ he asked, before she could turn to go.

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Why, I suppose you could call it a political meeting, taking place outside – a rowdy one, to be sure.’

  ‘Ah well, I heard something, but the kitchen’s not on the facing side.’ Turning from Cate’s retreating figure, Luke tore off a piece of the fresh bread and lowered it into the warm, slightly glutinous liquid, watching the doughy tendrils around the edge soften and dissolve into the swirling soup. Distracted from the day’s disquiets, his mind ranged back over the time he’d lost in declaring his true feelings for her. He stirred absently with his spoon, replaying the latest missed opportunity that very morning, when they’d met over coffee. Which was more difficult: to suppress his longing with silence, or to speak his mind, and face the consequences? There was Elizabeth to consider, of course: though, now the children had both left… Then again, his minister, the Reverend Richard Duckworth of St Martin’s, would surely warn him of the danger to his immortal soul, as he wrestled with temptation.

  Robshaw broke in on his reverie.

  ‘If you don’t want that soup, I’ll have it.’ Luke found he had little appetite. As the deputy finished off his second helping, the pot-boy brought the bill and Luke put down a handful of coins.

  *

  Outside, the streets were still crowded, with knots of angry-looking men congregating in doorways.

  ‘That there’s where it all kicked off, they say, on Scholastica’s,’ Robshaw said, nodding at The Mermaid tavern, on the corner of Queen Street, where quite a few from the original mob were now loitering.

  ‘That’s right. It was called The Swindlestock back in those days. But Bowell’s exaggerating, surely – we’re not going to see another battle of town and gown?’

  ‘You’d hope not.’

  Chapter 16

  Under the Microscope

  ‘So, we can take a look at the cadaver at last,’ Robshaw said as they neared the Guildhall. ‘Might find that letter, what he got given at The Unicorn.’ The ‘parlour’ behind Luke’s room was illuminated by a window that faced south-west, so the present hour – in late afternoon – often afforded the best light for inspecting a body, especially on a day such as this, with the sky now clear. Luke turned the key in the lock and they went in.

  Dust particles drifted in shafts of sunlight as Robshaw pegged back the curtain that separated the space from the main office. Luke unclasped the leather case containing his collection of medical forceps, scissors and tweezers, and took his microscope from its wooden box. The instrument came from a London master craftsman, Richard Reeve, to a design by Robert Hooke. Hooke was one of many eminent scientists to have forged a career from his involvement with the natural philosophy circle based at Wadham College during Luke’s days as an undergraduate. Ostensibly, his own studies had been dominated by the classics, but Luke soon came to regard this group as by far the most stimulating part of his university education. He had watched in wonderment as one discovery after another, revealing the laws and complexities of the natural world, had been unveiled.

  Hooke, now Secretary of the Royal Society in London, made his reputation at Oxford by designing and engineering precision equipment to enable deductions by such innovators as Robert Boyle, the physical chemist, to be brought to elegant life. The simplicity and harmony of their measurements, showing – with a long glass tube bent into a ‘J’ shape, a rack and pinion pump and a phial of mercury – that the volume of air halved as the pressure on it doubled, was a presentation Luke had witnessed in person, and one that left a lasting impression. Boyle and Hooke set up their laboratory on the High, just round the corner from the Sandys’ house, adding to the young man’s sense of personal involvement in the exciting intellectual ferment.

  Luke still did his best to keep in touch with new developments and, thanks chiefly to the wealth accumulated by his father, found himself in the fortunate position of being able to indulge his interests. He’d treated himself to a Reeve microscope when his son, Sam, obtained his apprenticeship. The instrument had not yet been used in the course of an actual case but – he was sure – its time would come. He had been bitten by a bug: having witnessed mysteries being unravelled by human ingenuity, making deductions from evidence that could be seen and demonstrated, he saw no reason why his own inquiries into crimes in Oxford should not be tackled by applying the same principles.

  *

  The two men carefully pulled back the length of muslin they had used to cover Harbord’s now-stiffened body. The distinctive aquiline features jutted slightly backwards, as though the MP’s last dying act had been to avert his gaze, perhaps in search of mercy from God. Removing the wig revealed a close-cropped pate, whose sparse grey hairs matched his skin and toned with a sober ensemble of jacket and waistcoat – the only interruptions to this drab colour scheme being the green ribbon on his lapel, and the large brown stain that spread from his abdomen and picked out runnels down the front of his breeches. His belt was undone, as if he’d tried to ease the pressure on his innards as they became engorged with blood. Luke gingerly lifted the outer garment by the lapel and inserted his fingers in the inside pockets. Nothing in the first. In the other, Harbord’s left, sure enough, his fingers closed around a folded sheet of paper, which he extracted and passed to Robshaw to open out. On it, in an untidy cursive, was written a short message. Luke read aloud:

  ‘The Old House. Friday at dusk. M.F.’

  Underneath this single line of text was a stylised image of four crudely drawn black and white birds, arranged in diamond formation.

  ‘Magpies,’ the deputy grunted. ‘As you know well, Master Sandys.’

  ‘From Magpie Lane, you mean?’

  ‘It wasn’t always called that,’ Robshaw murmured, continuing to peruse the letter.

  ‘Yes, I’m well aware of that Robshaw, since you take every opportunity to mention it.’ Luke felt a surge of irritation. Centuries ago, the narrow thoroughfare had been known for its association with prostitutes, by a name that would, he knew, ha
ve sounded merely matter of fact to contemporaries. In the context of modern manners, however, ‘Gropecunt Lane’ carried an obscenely comic effect that Robshaw never failed to find amusing.

  ‘So what’s it mean?’ the deputy asked as he peered at the paper.

  ‘Could be a political symbol. Looks almost heraldic in that configuration, like a coat of arms on a shield.’

  ‘What about them words?’

  ‘Well – the House, in political terms, would be the House of Commons, I’ll warrant. Probably not from any mystery caller at The Unicorn, then – more likely to have come with him from Westminster. Wonder why he kept it.’

  ‘Is there a new House and an old House then, in Westminster?’ Robshaw wondered. But this particular form of words had them flummoxed.

  ‘The initials, I suppose, would be those of the sender. “M.F.” – could be anyone,’ Luke thought aloud. They searched Harbord’s pockets again but found no sign of any other written communication. The only account of his having received a letter in Oxford had come from Unsworth, who could scarcely be regarded as a reliable source. Perhaps Robshaw was right – they would have to go back and lean on the innkeeper, though Luke was confident there would be no need for violence. A none-too-subtle hint about revoking that newly acquired liquor licence should loosen his tongue.

  Sandys and Robshaw turned their attention to the wound.

  ‘We don’t have the weapon, so let’s try to see from this what kind of blade the killer used,’ Luke said, turning to the pump he’d had connected from here to the Hinksey water pipe, and finding a can to fill with water.

  ‘Hold on a minute.’ Robshaw was looking more closely at Harbord’s stricken abdomen. ‘There’s something you should look at, before you clean it off.’ Luke peered down the line of Robshaw’s thick finger as it pointed to the centre of the stab mark. ‘Bits of something in there what don’t match. Blue, I’d say.’ Sure enough, he could just about make out a few small shreds of what looked like blue cloth in among the brown-stained grey mess of Harbord’s waistcoat front.

  With mounting excitement, Luke reached for a pair of tweezers and his magnifying glass from the open leather case. Steadying his hand, he slowly eased the steel prong under the edge of the tiny object; he prised it loose, held it up to the light and squinted through the lens.

  ‘By God, Robshaw, you’re right. ’Tis a piece of blue cloth.’

  ‘How’d that get there, then? Our man here favoured grey, not blue.’

  ‘Well, it could have come from the killer. Could be our first real clue! Let’s take a closer look.’

  This was the moment Luke had been waiting for. He delicately opened the paper wrapper from around a clean slide and, with the tweezers, lifted the shred of cloth on to its smooth surface. He put the slide on the platform of the microscope and secured it in place with a metal side clamp. Applying his eye to the eyepiece, Luke slowly twisted the focusing knob on the side of the viewing column, and then – suddenly and as if by magic – the distinctive latticework structure of closely woven fabric came clearly into view. Shifting the instrument so the maximum amount of light fell upon it, he satisfied himself that the colour of the swatch was indeed different from any of Harbord’s own garments.

  Flushed with success, Sandys was inclined to be generous.

  ‘D’you want to see?’ he asked Robshaw. He had reckoned without the man’s clumsiness, however – or perhaps the volume of alcohol he’d consumed earlier. In moving around the table, Robshaw stubbed his toe on one of the trestles and caused everything on it – corpse and microscope included – to wobble alarmingly.

  ‘Careful, man!’ Luke cried, steadying his prized possession. Good thing the slide was clamped on. A few incoherent but apparently sincere noises of apology having passed between them, Robshaw duly crouched over the gleaming instrument, a wary look on his face.

  ‘A bit of it’s black,’ he said, straightening up after a long examination of the material.

  ‘What d’you mean, a bit of it’s black?’

  ‘It looks burnt, like,’ the deputy said, a faraway light of comprehension beginning to dawn in his eyes. Luke looked into the microscope again. Robshaw’s inadvertent nudge had apparently displaced the slide sideways, and, sure enough, he was now looking, not at the middle of the sample as before but a portion of the fabric edge. It was, beyond doubt, burnt and blackened. Eagerly, Luke removed the slide, then with the tweezers placed the shred of material in an envelope. There would be time to label and store it later. He returned to the body and, from amid the congealed blood surrounding the wound, picked out several other fragments of about the same size. Even to the naked eye, it was plain – now he knew what to look for – that these, too, were fibres of the same blue woollen cloth, singed at the edge like the first. He went through the same procedure, confirming the impression through the powerful lenses of the Reeve microscope.

  The two men looked at each other with matching expressions of consternation.

  ‘If those burnt bits of blue stuff are not from Harbord’s own clothes…’ Luke began slowly.

  ‘Then they must have come from someone else’s,’ the deputy reasoned.

  ‘And we’ve just heard about someone who was wearing a blue uniform – one that was singed and shredded around the wrist.’

  ‘That story of Pawling’s. That there Guardsman what spooked Emily’s cattle.’ They sat down, and went back over the vivid account they’d received from the ex-Mayor that morning.

  ‘He’s reckoned to have had a backfire from his flintlock – and he was obviously blest by good fortune, as the powder was mostly caught by his coat cuff.’

  ‘And that’d shred and burn the wool?’

  ‘Certainly – it would be ablaze when it came out so it would stick on the cloth and burn through it like a hot knife through butter.’

  ‘That’ll be why he had to stamp it out, like – ’twas still smouldering.’ They paused as this insight and its implications sank in.

  ‘So some partially burnt fragments would have been left on his sleeve,’ Luke continued, before Robshaw completed the thought:

  ‘And if he’d stabbed Harbord, they could have got rubbed off when he stuck the knife in.’ Now their expressions were of mounting excitement.

  ‘When we find that Guardsman, Robshaw my friend, it looks as though we’ll have found our murderer as well!’

  Luke had pushed Pawling’s complaint to the back of his mind. He’d promised to raise the matter with Ed – probably that evening – but it had scarcely seemed important in context. Now, that conversation took on a wholly different complexion. As he’d indicated to Pawling, the most the offending Guardsman could expect to face by way of consequences for misusing his weapon and scaring off livestock would be the catch-all charge of ‘Conduct Prejudicial to Good Order and Discipline.’ With the evidence now in his possession, linking the incident to a capital crime, mere military jurisdiction would no longer suffice. He would have to get a letter from the Mayor asking the Colonel of Ed’s regiment, the Earl of Oxford, for permission to arrest and question the man.

  There was still the wound to examine. Robshaw pumped out water into the can and prepared a solution of soap, while Luke took his surgical scissors and sliced away the shirt and waistcoat from around the point of entry. He then took up a silken cloth, soaked it in the soapy mixture, and began swabbing the affected area – gently so as to preserve the shape. It took several minutes to dissolve and clear away the dried blood, but they were rewarded with a clear sight of the skin break on Harbord’s lean frame: a narrow isosceles triangle in profile, with an acute angle at the top and a broader fuzzy edge below. And it was big: no wonder he’d bled out quickly. ‘’Twas only sharp on one side,’ Robshaw observed.

  ‘But what knife these days has only one edge?’

  ‘I seen such a thing before. Could be a Scotch dirk – they’re like that. Wide blades an’ all.’

  ‘But you’d think it would be the other way round, surely – shar
p side downward?’

  ‘Maybe he just got it the wrong way up,’ the deputy said – and, Luke had to admit, he could not improve on this explanation for the moment.

  ‘Right, well, let’s observe the formalities. Fetch the horse and cart and take the body to the charnel-house. I’ll write a note for you to give to the coroner. Then I think we’ll call it a day.’

  ‘Yessir,’ Robshaw replied, and was gone. With his tweezers, Luke placed the remaining fragments of burnt blue cloth in the envelope and sealed it, wrote the details of date, time and place and signed it, then locked it in his desk drawer along with the mysterious magpie note from Harbord’s pocket. He had just finished jotting a short official notification of the MP’s death when the men came with the cart and removed the body from the parlour. He would have to talk to Ed, at least to give him due warning – and at some point, he and Robshaw would need to go back to The Unicorn and Jacob’s Well, to question Unsworth again and examine the dead man’s room and belongings. For now, those jobs could wait. Alone in his office and savouring a precious interlude of quiet, Luke put away his treasured microscope, retrieved a bottle of canary and a cup from their hiding place, and sipped slowly as the shadows lengthened, pondering the day’s events.

  Chapter 17

  A Fireside Tale

  At the farm, the soap had been satisfactorily finished off and was now drying. As there was still plenty of daylight, Emily had next been set to cheesemaking; her mother reckoning to keep her busy to take her mind off her ordeal on the London road. The puny pailful or two of milk she’d gathered from the cattle that morning was at an early stage of manufacture, having been separated into curds that were then cut up into small cubes, and gently warmed in the sun, to firm and settle. Under Mistress Hopkins’ watchful eye, she was now concentrating on the other end of the process, begun the previous autumn: bandaging the circular finished truckles top and bottom, and round the sides, with muslin, and smearing in a fine layer of lard to make the fabric stick to the cheese. These she would be in charge of taking to market in Oxford the next day, where they were destined to be sold and taken to kitchens and pantries to mature to the individual customer’s taste before being consumed.