by L. C. Tyler
‘Who is vain enough to worry about what number they are allocated in a cipher?’ Thurloe continues.
‘That is more difficult,’ I say.
‘Somebody well-connected enough to the Royalist cause to be trusted by Sir Edward Hyde. Somebody whose family fought for the late King.’
‘There are certainly fewer of those . . .’
The hawk folds back its wings and falls like a dart. It sees nothing except its prey.
‘The Cliffords were utterly ruined by the war, were they not? They might feel they had little to lose by plotting against His Highness the Lord Protector.’
Morland, who can see exactly where this is going, is still smiling.
I am not sure what to say next, but Morland unexpectedly fills in the gap. ‘The thought occurs to me,’ he says, ‘that it would be very helpful to us to root out this correspondent. If Mr Grey were willing to help us identify the lady you refer to, I would be willing to overlook this strange outburst against me – caused, I think, mainly by the blow he recently received to his head.’
I don’t know if you play chess. If you do, you may know of the combination of moves called Fool’s Mate, by which one player can win the game in, I think, four moves. It is rarely seen in practice because it requires the losing player to actively participate in his own destruction, moving his pieces in such a way that his king is exposed but has no square to fly to when attacked by his opponent’s queen. I had never been caught in Fool’s Mate until now.
‘And if I refuse to answer that question?’ I ask. But you will probably have already guessed Morland’s answer. It comes as no surprise to me.
‘You would be assisting in a Royalist conspiracy,’ he says. ‘You are quite aware of the penalties for treason. Your head would in due course find its place on a spike on London Bridge. In any case, it would make little difference. With the assistance you have already given us, we are in a good position to say who it might be. I think your silence would not save her. And if you enabled us to arrest her before she had a chance to conduct further treasonable activity, then you could in a way be said to be saving her from a worse fate.’
‘And what would her fate be now?’
‘Much would depend on how much she wished to tell us about the Sealed Knot. She has merely been rather foolish. I think we could promise you that we would deal with her no more harshly than we had to.’
Morland knows my thoughts. He is offering me a way out.
‘Would you like further time to consider?’ asks Morland with every show of concern.
I think of Aminta’s hand resting lightly on my arm as we walk through the garden. I think of the kiss she laid lightly on my cheek. I think of the duty I owe to a woman who is almost a sister to me and might have been my wife. But perhaps all is not lost.
‘Have you considered,’ I say, ‘that the writer might still be a man deliberately disguising their hand as a woman’s?’
‘Who?’ asks Thurloe.
Good point. It needs to be somebody who can write and who might really have the sort of contacts 472 seems to have. And not Roger Pole this time. ‘Colonel Payne,’ I hear myself say. ‘Mr Thurloe believes him to be disaffected. He knew well that I was in London. He might have asked that care should have been taken of me.’
Even I find this hard to credit, but Morland is, surprisingly, nodding his head. Payne is apparently a piece that he is happy to sacrifice to protect his agent, if it can be done. He looks at Thurloe, one eyebrow raised.
‘Why,’ asks Thurloe, ‘would Payne enquire about his own removal from the manor house?’
‘Well . . .’ says Morland. Then he looks at me and shrugs. He’s done his best for me. It’s scarcely his fault that I have played so badly. And now it’s Thurloe’s move.
‘So, it’s Aminta Clifford,’ says Thurloe. ‘It would have helped us greatly if you had said that before, but at least you have told us now.’
I sigh, but what can I do? What else can I do?
I expect a long and tedious interrogation. It is in fact mercifully brief. I am shown the letters again. I cannot confirm that the writing is Aminta’s. But the Cliffords do indeed have cucumbers in their garden. Quite a few actually. And damsons. Yes, Aminta is well-educated enough to write letters like that. Yes, perhaps she is vain enough to want a nicer number than 472. Morland nods amiably.
Thurloe switches the conversation to the stranger on horseback that I saw on my first evening back in the village. Up until now I have met few who believed in my rider. For the first time I have two people together in one room who believe in him wholeheartedly. For the first time I wish it were otherwise.
Could it indeed be that the rider was Aminta’s brother Marius, believed to have died at the Battle of Worcester but in fact still alive and carrying messages backwards and forwards for the Sealed Knot? Someone everybody would have assumed was dead? Somebody who would be – to paraphrase Jem’s words – the least likely suspect of anyone in the village? Is it not probable he was Henderson’s killer? Is it not likely that he is also the M at the Stuart court, addressed directly in Aminta’s letters? Would he not know me well enough to explain the references to me in the letters, even if the nature of his promises was unclear? So, did the Cliffords ever say anything – perhaps a brief slip of the tongue – to suggest that Marius was still living? I think about Aminta’s occasional lapses into French and her father’s comment at dinner about her brother. I shake my head and say nothing. And Sir Felix? Had he ever expressed treasonable sentiments? I concede that he had said it was wrong to close the theatres and to chop down the maypoles. He had said life was dull under the Commonwealth. Thurloe looks surprised that dullness might disappoint. He looks disappointed that I have offered no surprises.
Strangely, it is Morland who again comes to my rescue. ‘Mr Thurloe has, as ever, seen through these feeble attempts at treason. I congratulate you, my lord, on your insight, which far exceeds mine, and I am grateful that you have shown in the process that this has naught to do with me. I believe that Mr Grey always knew that Aminta Clifford was the correspondent in Essex. His not disclosing this was foolish – but his reasons may have been more chivalrous than treasonable. After all, he has known her since they were children together. In the end, he has put personal considerations to one side and has been helpful to us – more helpful than I had dared hope. I fear, however, that the blow he has received to his head has harmed him more than he thinks. How else can we explain the strange outburst that is so much to his discredit and disadvantage? Some of his accusations earlier – particularly those concerning me – have proved to be both wild and inaccurate. Isn’t that so, Mr Grey?’
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Inaccurate and unjustified?’
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Unjustified and foolish?’
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘And you retract them all?’
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘I think,’ says Morland, ‘that it would be better if Mr Grey returned to Essex to recover his wits. Then we need say no more about any of this, need we? His word will carry more weight with the court if he has willingly informed us of a treason that he has detected rather than if he appears to be a man who has simply informed on his friends to save his own neck. None of us would wish to accuse him of that.’
‘Indeed,’ says Thurloe. He scatters sand across the sheet of paper on which he has been taking notes, then blows it off. ‘That would seem conclusive then. 472 is Aminta Clifford. And her father cannot have been unaware of what she was doing. If you would be so kind as to sign this statement, we shall then proceed against both of them. We shall also issue a warrant for the arrest of the malignant Royalist and murderer Marius Clifford, should he dare to show his face in England again.’
‘What will happen to Aminta and Sir Felix now?’ I ask.
‘We shall get this indictment drawn up in a fair hand,’ says Thurloe, ‘then they will be arrested and brought to London.’
‘Perhaps
,’ says Morland, ‘it would be better if Mr Grey delayed his departure until tomorrow. It might be more convenient for all concerned if he arrived in Essex after the Cliffords’ arrest . . .’
Thurloe nods. ‘Much better,’ he says.
I nod. It would be much better.
‘Thank you, Mr Grey,’ says Morland. He is leaning against the doorframe, curling a golden lock of hair with his finger. ‘That was very kind of you. I am much obliged. More obliged than I can really say.’
And Morland winks at me.
It is a fine evening in midsummer. Dickon and I sit in the garden of an inn, enjoying the last of the sunshine and a cold pie.
‘You are wise to return with me,’ says Dickon. ‘The message you left at my lodgings caught me just in time. We can leave tomorrow at first light.’
‘Or perhaps a little later,’ I say.
‘You’re in no hurry, then, to get back to the village and continue your enquiries into Henderson’s murder?’
‘Dickon, I know who killed Henderson,’ I say.
Dickon leans forward.
‘Who?’ he asks.
Do I say that I now know the horseman’s identity? A stranger indeed, but one who knew the village well in the past. Do I add that in the process of discovery I have had to betray Aminta, and that she and her father were almost certainly arrested last night? Arrested and now on their way to London. That is bad enough, but naming the rider would be yet another betrayal.
‘It was somebody who was once very close to me,’ I say. ‘As Jem said, the last person I would have suspected.’
‘Not Pole then?’
‘No – for all the reasons we discussed before. There was one reason I continued to suspect him for some time, but no, it cannot be Pole.’
‘So what was the reason for thinking him guilty?’
Then I tell Dickon something that I have kept to myself, knowing how quickly it would spread if I voiced it, though the evidence was there all along for anyone to see who wished to see it. ‘Both Henderson and Jem were killed with a single knife stroke by somebody standing behind them cutting from right to left.’
‘So?’ says Dickon.
‘The killer was left-handed,’ I say.
Dickon puts his knife down suddenly and looks at the hand in which he had been holding it.
‘Don’t worry,’ I say. ‘I don’t mean that you killed either of them. But after Henderson was killed, I started to notice who else in the village other than you was left-handed.’
‘Why didn’t you say so before?’
‘I’m sorry, Dickon. It was so difficult to know who to trust. It was the one piece of information that I didn’t want the killer to know I had.’
‘You might at least have trusted me. But if you’re saying you are not accusing your oldest friend . . . and I hope you’re not . . . who else is left-handed?’
‘Pole,’ I say. ‘And Kit Mansell. Ifnot uses either hand equally well.’
‘It could hardly be Ifnot,’ says Dickon.
‘Nor Kit. Nor Pole. But I know who it was. You were right, Dickon, when you said that I should stay out of this. The knowledge of who the killer is has helped me not at all. It has merely brought me sadness.’
‘You won’t tell me who it is?’
‘There’s no need, is there?’
Dickon looks at me strangely, as well he might, then suddenly slaps me on the shoulder. ‘Well, old friend, you’d best away to bed. I shall be knocking at your door at first light with two horses tied up in the street outside.’
‘I shall be waiting – and not in my nightshirt . . .’ I stop abruptly because, leaving the garden, I spot somebody I think I recognise. And I am not sure whether we have been overheard. ‘Kit Mansell,’ I say. ‘I’m sure that was Kit Mansell.’
‘You are starting to imagine things,’ says Dickon. ‘But if I’d been knocked over the head by a gang of robbers, maybe I would too. You need some country air.’
Thank you, Dickon,’ I say. ‘Do you know? Throughout all this you’ve been the only one I could rely on.’
‘In which case . . .’ says Dickon.
Again he looks at me oddly. I fear that, having supported me for so long, he does not like my keeping this final secret. But I cannot tell him. How can I tell anyone that the rider was not Marius Clifford but Matthew Grey, my own father?
We are on the road again but this time travelling north into Essex, Dickon riding his own horse, a new purchase, and I trotting alongside on a hired mare. His horse is fresh, but my mare knows she is billed by the day and not by the mile. Each step takes her further from her own stable, and she goes reluctantly.
Dinner is some bread and cheese purchased from a farm. We drink from the stream nearby. The water is warm. I splash it on my face, but the day still feels too hot for travel.
‘It’s this mare you’ve put me on,’ I say. ‘You must have seen she wouldn’t get beyond Harlow today. Not in this heat anyway.’
Dickon nods. ‘You shouldn’t have sold the last horse I gave you. Perhaps I should have made you walk to teach you to value good horseflesh. We’ll do what we can, but I fear we’ll be sleeping in the woods tonight if you can’t get her to go faster.’
‘It’s dry enough,’ I say. ‘There will be bracken we can lie on.’
‘No doubt you’ve slept out before on a summer night,’ says Dickon.
‘No doubt I have,’ I say.
‘We’d best get moving again anyway,’ says Dickon. ‘The closer we can get to Clavershall West, the better. I won’t feel wholly safe until we are there. You may think this business is all over, but I thought I was being followed through the streets this morning. And it wouldn’t surprise me if it was Pole on our tail.’
I do not share Dickon’s fears about Pole, though I have fears of my own – that we shall encounter Aminta and her father travelling the other way under close arrest. That would be awkward. But we do not encounter them. The only soldiers who pass us on their way to London have no prisoner of any sort with them. They too look hot.
We ride through the afternoon, with no respite for horse or man. Sitting at a desk does not harden a person to a long day in the saddle. I am beginning to share the opinion of my mare that we have travelled far enough.
‘If we are to spend a night in the woods,’ I say, ‘we should seek a spot now while there is good light rather than wait until we have to stumble over tree roots in the dark.’
But Dickon is looking behind him. ‘Do you see that dust rising yonder?’ he asks.
‘Somebody else is trying to get somewhere before nightfall,’ I say, looking back down the road.
‘Let us hope they are not pursuing us,’ says Dickon.
‘Pole?’ I ask.
I look at the dust storm approaching. Somebody has a fresh horse certainly. Dickon’s eyes too are narrowed against the glare. ‘Two riders, I’d say, with all that dust. Two riders well mounted.’
‘They’ll be on us in a few minutes,’ I say.
‘There are woods over there to the right,’ says Dickon, pointing to a spot half a mile or so ahead. ‘If we ride swiftly, we can gain them perhaps before they catch up with us.’
‘But why . . . ?’ I begin. But perhaps I should be asking, why not? That Pole was not Henderson’s murderer does not stop his becoming mine. As Probert predicted long ago, I have waded into a stream that is deeper than I could have ever imagined. And Morland may already have told Pole how helpful I was in identifying 472. That may be incitement enough to kill me.
Dickon and I both urge our horses on. As we enter the woods, I look back. The man on the leading horse does look very much like Pole. Even from here, he looks sharp and unpleasant. The man on the second horse looks familiar too. Not unlike the man in the garden last night. There can be no avoiding their seeing where we have gone, but hopefully we will lose them amongst the trees, just as Jem hoped to lose his pursuers.
We dismount and take the narrowest paths. I lead, and Dickon brings up the rear. He
has a pistol and is ready to fire it at anyone who follows us and to enquire about their business later. I have nothing but my pocketknife. I have no idea how big this wood is or where this path will take us. Judging by the sun, we have already swung round through ninety degrees, but we must go where it takes us or crash noisily into the undergrowth. Pole and his friend could be anywhere. Ahead. Behind. To the left. To the right. I am reasonably sure they are not up above us. The bushes on either side of the path grow denser. Dickon seems to have stopped – I no longer hear his footsteps behind me.
‘Dickon,’ I say as I scan the path ahead. ‘I’m not sure where we are.’
Then there is a deafening roar, and my shoulder seems to explode. There is blood running down the face of my doublet and, for all I know, down the back as well.
Pole appears on the path in front of us, his pistol pointing directly at me. Just behind him stands Kit Mansell, his knife in his left hand. So much for Aminta’s theory that Kit could be trusted then. Or perhaps, like Pole, he is doing this on Aminta’s behalf. I can’t say I’d entirely blame him if that’s the case.
So far I’m only wounded, I think, but this time he can’t possibly miss.
There is a flash from the barrel of Pole’s gun, and my already-ringing ears are assaulted again. I look down at my doublet expecting to see evidence of a hole in my chest, but all is as it was before. Then behind me I hear Dickon crash to the ground.
‘Good thinking, Mr Pole,’ I mutter to myself. ‘Aim for the man with the loaded gun first.’ That was something else I learned from survivors on those battlefields many years ago. Strangely, until now it was not a piece of advice that I had had much use for. Why didn’t Dickon shoot Pole first though? I turn and see that Dickon’s face is a bloody mess. He won’t be getting up again.
The world sways alarmingly, and I notice I too am now on the ground. Not a bad place to be when your legs won’t support you any more. The bracken is as soft as I had expected it to be, and the birdsong is growing more distant. Kit is running towards me. I look from him to Pole.