Blood On the Stone

by Jake Lynch

  ‘Very well. Robshaw, fetch the note from my desk drawer.’

  ‘But my soup’s here!’ the deputy protested – and indeed their meal was just arriving.

  ‘Keep it warm for him will you, Henry?’

  ‘Whatever you say, Master Sandys,’ the innkeeper replied. So, a grumbling Robshaw stalked off in the direction of the Guildhall to retrieve the letter.

  Chapter 43

  Behind the Bay Tree

  The dying rays of the setting sun were picking out purple and orange patterns in the mackerel sky when Cate emerged on to Fish Street from her successful negotiation with Master Moreton at The Mermaid Tavern. From the direction of Bacon’s Tower and the Cathedral, two familiar figures hove into view: a pair she recognised from her visits to The Unicorn and Jacob’s Well. The thin, saturnine character invariably caused her a slight shudder, and she had consciously avoided catching his eye when calling to sell bread or cakes; but the other, well built and well dressed as he was, had immediately caught her attention as one of the first black men she had ever seen. Even seated at the table of an inn, he seemed to possess a certain vitality, and comfort in his own dark skin, which had simultaneously fascinated and disconcerted her. Now, his movement carried a lithe hint of menace, as if he were somehow lighter on his feet than someone of his bulk ought to be.

  As they saw her, they turned to each other for a brief exchange of words and quickened their step, which she thought odd, for they had seemed to pay her little enough attention as she plied her wares. At that point, however, raised voices distracted her from across the road. She frowned. Three or four men were engaged in a ‘brabble’. Such an encounter had led to Marcus’s death. When would they ever learn? But the build-up to Parliament had brought new tensions to the streets, apparently convincing many that they could not afford to go abroad in the city unarmed. Curiously, the quarrel seemed to involve others wearing green ribbons in their hatbands, which she could just make out in the shadows, thereby identifying them with the same group as the two she had just seen.

  Suddenly she felt a powerful hand grab her wrist and twist it roughly up behind her back, rocking her slightly backwards on her heels. She half-gasped, half-screamed, but the breath seemed to have been drained out of her lungs by the shock, so that the noise came out as a barely audible squeak. A hard, pointed object jabbed into the space between her shoulder blades and a deep voice spoke close to her right ear: ‘Nice and quiet now, miss, and you won’t get hurt.’ With implacable strength, her captor half-pushed, half-carried her a short distance down Fish Street and, in a trice, turned right into a narrow yard abutting the New Inn.

  ‘Hurry up, Francis, for God’s sake,’ a different voice piped up reedily from behind her. ‘Someone’ll see us.’ Sure enough, at this, the pace quickened again, and Cate felt her feet intermittently lift off the ground entirely – all without apparent effort on the part of the man in whose iron grip she wriggled unavailingly.

  ‘Please, sir, no!’ she gasped, as they hurtled towards the shadowy end of the laneway. Through the dusk she could see bushes and undergrowth in front of what looked like an ivy-covered wall – what did they mean to do with her?

  At the last moment, however, the owner of the second voice – whom she now recognised as the thin man from the Green Ribbon Club – dodged in front of them, drew a short rapier from his waistband and used it to hold back a tangled thicket of holly, bramble and hawthorn, revealing a door in the wall that was previously hidden from view. Quickly glancing behind to make sure they had not been followed, he felt in the pocket of his breeches and produced a key, turning this in the lock and impatiently ushering them through.

  The space behind the door, about eight feet in depth and the Oxford standard fifteen-foot width, had been left largely forgotten about in the course of several interlocking ownership disputes as the city expanded over the previous century. A resident of Queen Street had taken legal action to claim it as part of his property; but this was opposed by several other nearby freeholders, whose claims were also at odds with each other. Eventually, the original plaintiff wrote off the squabble as a waste of time and money, and simply built a back wall closer to the house, reasoning that, if he could not have the space, nobody would. On his near side – the far side from where the men now entered with Cate – he planted a bay. Left untended, the bush grew in time into a tree of substantial proportions, whose evergreen foliage permanently blocked the offending patch of land from his rear view.

  There had been a door into it from New Inn Yard since the wall on that side was built in medieval times (when the alley was called Kepeharm Lane), but that, too was generally forgotten. However, someone had remembered it; that someone surreptitiously got the old lock cut out and a new one installed, and made a few discreet snips in the stems of the evergreen ivy to enable it to be opened; the obscure enclave was cleared of the choking vegetation that had filled it over long years of disuse – and now it was a very handy secret refuge from prying eyes.

  Hidden by the high walls and the bay tree from being overlooked on any side, the space was now partially sheltered by a rudimentary pitched wooden roof, with a bench and chairs sitting on planks laid across the earth below. Cate was shoved roughly into one of the chairs and, as the big man caught his breath, the other squatted down so that his eyes were level with hers, an expression of sly menace on his face.

  ‘Now then, miss,’ he began. ‘Catherine Alexandra Napper, of The Mitre. And the Roman Catholic Church.’ He spat these last words. ‘Named for Saint Catherine of Alexandria, the martyr.’ She nodded miserably. ‘Thought you could keep it secret, with that little Papist prayer book, eh?’ Cate trembled, the air reaching her lungs only in short, shallow breaths.

  ‘Want to know how we knew? ’Twas sticking out of your pocket when you reached up to put those cakes on Unsworth’s high shelf, and we grabbed it, quick as ninepence. So from then on, you were unmasked, see? There’ll be a rosary and crucifix under that kerchief as well, unless I miss my guess?’ She nodded again, as the thin man rose to his full height.

  ‘Then there was Father Morris, of course.’ Cate gasped. ‘Oh, yes! Simeon Ignatius Morris – he’s been on our watch list for years. Thought he could slip away by night without anyone noticing. But a priest’s hat makes a pretty silhouette in the moonlight. Not hard to guess what he’s been doing in the vaults under your inn.’ They had grown too accustomed to the easy tolerance of their friends and neighbours in Oxford, she saw now. To these newcomers, their situation clearly looked very different.

  ‘Someone’s got to watch out for our liberties,’ Settle went on. ‘The authorities in Oxford obviously turn a blind eye to illegal rites and superstitious sacraments. So we’ve been looking out for you, on that corner. What a piece of luck that you were passing that way today, just as we had cause to be walking up!’ What luck indeed, Cate thought bitterly.

  ‘Well, you’ll be staying here for a day or two.’ He turned the key in the lock and returned it to his pocket. ‘With us.’

  ‘And you’d best keep quiet,’ Francis added, his hand straying suggestively to the hilt of his sword. ‘You get my meaning?’ Once again, Cate nodded mutely.

  Chapter 44

  Deciphering a Letter

  There was seldom any room for doubt when Robshaw arrived somewhere. Bursting through the door of The Golden Cross, he slightly caught his stave, dangling from his belt as it was, on one side of the doorframe, then overcompensated and nearly barged into a customer on the other. The second man performed a veritable feat of juggling to avoid dropping the two tankards he was carrying back from the bar. Agitated apologies followed, to the amusement of the watching Luke and Pawling. Still, allowances must be made: the deputy had, after all, been kept too long from his vittles, and – after his master shot a meaningful glance at Hadfield – a steaming bowl was duly set down in front of him as he shambled on to a bar stool at the counter.

  ‘Well?’ Luke demanded.

  ‘Well what?’ Robshaw rega
rded him suspiciously, spoon poised on its way from the surface of the warm fluid to his lips.

  ‘The letter, man!’

  ‘Oh aye. Here ’tis.’ He pulled it from his inside coat pocket and Luke opened it out in front of Pawling.

  ‘Ah – magpies,’ the ex-mayor said straight away.

  ‘Yes – we thought they might be a coat of arms, in that pattern.’

  ‘You did,’ Robshaw corrected him, through a mouthful of soup-dunked bread.

  ‘Well – it could be another connection with the abbey,’ Pawling continued.

  ‘How so?’

  ‘D’you not know the story? The abbey was built by old Robert D’Oyly, see, right back in the time of King Henry – the first one. Well, this Robert married a woman, name of Edith, but before that, she’d been Henry’s mistress.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Anyway, they’re crossing Osney meadow one day, and she sees a flock of magpies. Well, you know they’re reckoned to make a scolding sound: so when she hears it, she fancies they’re scolding her, as a sign from God, for living a sinful life. So she says to her husband, do you build an abbey here, Robert, to atone for the sin.’

  Luke listened intently to Pawling’s tale. It did resonate with far-off recollections of hearing similar accounts in childhood, but he had not dredged up such material from his memory banks in a long time.

  ‘It points to someone with local knowledge,’ he mused. ‘We initially thought – sorry Robshaw, I thought – the “House” must refer to the House of Commons, at Westminster.’

  ‘’Course, you’d know the old rhyme, Luke – “one for sorrow”, an’ all that?’

  ‘Aye – “one for sorrow, two for joy; three for a girl and four for a boy”. And there’s four of them in the picture. But what could a boy have to do with Harbord’s murder?’ At this, the men shook their heads.

  ‘Well, I must take my leave,’ Pawling said, as he finished his drink and stood up. ‘There was one more thing.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘Struck me straight away when I took a look at that body. Where was his dagger?’

  ‘Dagger? He didn’t have one.’

  ‘Aye, that’s right: he didn’t have one. Wonder why not. He was a quarrelsome sort of customer, by all accounts, this Harbord?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘Why, if I’d have been him, I wouldn’t have cared to go about in Oxford this week without a weapon for self-defence, if it came to that. And yet he never had one. His belt was undone – ’twas almost as though someone’d taken his dagger off him.’ Pawling evidently enjoyed the impact of his words. ‘Well, goodnight, sirs.’

  Robshaw put down his spoon in the bowl with a clatter.

  ‘Right good that, Henry. Hit the spot, and no mistake.’ As the innkeeper cleared away the things, he turned to Luke. ‘What d’you make of that, then?’

  ‘Interesting, about the weapon. I thought he’d just undone his belt to ease the pressure as he bled out – but I suppose it’s possible that someone removed his dagger and scabbard.’

  ‘And why would someone do that?’

  ‘No idea. What about the magpies?’

  ‘Well, I’d heard that about the abbey, that’s what they told us when we was kids.’

  ‘Me too. And “four for a boy”?’

  ‘That an’ all. But I can’t see how that comes into it, neither.’

  The pair bade Hadfield goodnight, and returned to The Unicorn and Jacob’s Well to find Tim Blount, whom they had left on guard, in discussion with two of the University proctors, then just coming on duty for the night watch. Luke left Robshaw to sort that one out, and called in again at The Mitre on his way home. The stricken faces of Cate’s parents told their own story: one by one, the search parties had returned with nothing but mumbled apologies and blank reports. That their daughter now looked certain to be missing for the night put a different complexion on her disappearance. He offered the few inadequate words of comfort that came to mind, and left them to what would no doubt be a sleepless vigil.

  *

  When he reached Magpie Lane, Luke found Elizabeth and Joan skeining wool by the light from the fire in the hall.

  ‘Still up, wife? ’Tis late, indeed.’

  Deftly winding the yarn around the back of a small dining chair the children had used when they began sitting up at the table, she looked him full in the face. ‘Can you wonder, Luke Sandys? There’s a man been stabbed, and the stabber is still abroad, somewhere. My husband’s trying to find him. So what’s this man like to do, when you catch up with him?’

  ‘We can’t sleep, master, as long as you’re out of the house, ’tis the truth,’ Joan added.

  ‘Why, come now, there’s no reason to worry. We’re all looking for him, remember, not just me.’ Luke took a taper from the fire and lit a sconce of candles. In turning, he caught the warm shade of the wool in the light.

  ‘Is that from my good red cloak? I wore that this winter!’

  ‘Begging your pardon, husband, but you did not. ’Tis high time the yarn was put to good use.’

  The servant stood to pour two cups of canary and then – as Luke nodded in answer to her enquiring glance – a third for herself. He gave them an abridged account of the investigation, concluding with the magpies: ‘four for a boy.’

  ‘I do hope all goes well with our boy,’ Elizabeth said wistfully, as she wound the last of the thread.

  ‘Sam? He’ll be fine. He’s found a good place.’

  ‘I know. But I can’t help worrying about him.’

  Almost despite himself, Luke felt the old impulse to ease his wife’s anxieties – even those he knew to be groundless. ‘Roger’s not far away. I could write and ask him to look in now and again.’

  Elizabeth brightened. The couple knew their son-in-law – who held a senior post at the Admiralty – was a substantial figure in his own right. She put her hand on his arm and looked at him again, this time with a gratified warmth. ‘Thank you, Luke.’

  He finished his drink; Elizabeth lifted off the skein of wool for Joan to put away, and they all turned in for the night.

  Chapter 45

  ‘What do you plan to do with me?’

  Cate rubbed her arm and felt the circulation slowly returning to normal, along with her breathing. Calculation now vied for her attention with the initial shock, outrage and terror of her abduction. She must be on the lookout for any chance to raise the alarm – or even escape. And, for that, she must try to keep a clear head, and remain the mistress of her feelings. Before twilight deepened into full darkness, she snatched a sidelong glance at her captors. Each had his blade drawn and resting on his knee: a military-looking sabre, in the case of the larger man, and the shorter sword from Settle’s thin scabbard.

  Presently, Francis broke the silence.

  ‘I’ll go and get us some provisions.’

  The other handed him the key.

  ‘Don’t be long.’

  When, presently, the black man returned, he handed her a halfpenny loaf of bread and a ceramic bottle of small beer.

  ‘Might as well eat and drink something,’ he said, before he and his companion got stuck into their meal.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ she replied softly. No point antagonising them – she would need the men to drop their guard at some point; so, she reckoned, she had best make herself appear as pliant and innocuous as possible.

  Francis drew a tinderbox from his pocket and she heard the clicking of stone on steel before presently the tinder caught and he lit a candle. In the sudden glow, Cate took the opportunity for a quick, unobtrusive look at her surroundings. The oddest sight, which caused her an involuntary shudder, was of a full-sized cartwheel – newly made, by the look of it – leaning against the far end of the shed. It was an object seared deep into her consciousness: as Settle correctly guessed, she was one of many Roman Catholic girls named after Catherine of Alexandria, who was killed by being tied to a cartwheel with blades attached to it. On the win
dow ledge of her room in the cock-loft of The Mitre she had a small framed picture of the saint, who was always shown with a wheel to commemorate her martyrdom.

  ‘Did you get that all down, then, what Norton was saying at the end of the meeting earlier?’ Francis asked.

  ‘Let me check,’ the other replied, feeling in his coat pocket as he took a sup from his bottle of small beer. ‘Wait… it’s not here!’

  ‘What’s not?’

  ‘My wallet, where I file my notes.’

  ‘Well, where is it then?’

  ‘I had it back at the inn… curse it! I must have dropped it there. Probably when we got up to leave.’

  ‘’God’s sake, Settle. ’Twas careless, indeed – given what’s written in there. You’ve never set down my name in those notes?’

  ‘Why would I – you never speak in any meetings,’ the other replied hotly.

  ‘Sshhh!’ Francis hurriedly put the candle on the floor and held up his hand for quiet. A moment passed while both men satisfied themselves no one was listening. ‘Keep your voice down,’ he hissed. ‘It’s definitely not in here somewhere?’ The pair spent some moments checking all over the confined area they shared with their captive.

  ‘You’ll have to go back for it,’ Francis said, as he held the lantern aloft.

  ‘You mean you’ll have to,’ Settle retorted. ‘That’s what we’re paying you for.’ The other scowled, but merely said:

  ‘I’ll slip down there and take a look when we’ve finished eating.’

  Round and round in Cate’s mind went the questions she did not yet dare to ask aloud. ‘Why are you holding me? What do you plan to do with me?’ At least her immediate fear, on being pushed through the door into a confined space – that they would force themselves on her – had receded for the moment. To be closeted with two strange men was an injury to her virtue in itself; but surely no one would hold it against her, as she was not here by choice? They obviously intended to keep her alive, at least for the time being – else, why would they take the trouble to feed her? On the other hand, they had not concealed their faces, or even their names; which, she realised, would put her in a position to identify and give evidence against them – if she survived. But this train of thought merely gave rise to still-worse forebodings that she resolved to suppress for the moment as useless to her quest.