A Murder too Soon

by Michael Jecks

  It was a good twenty yards along from the gatehouse, and the Coroner and others were turned mostly away from me. I took a deep breath and trotted out, the boy in my arms still. The chapel’s door was only a matter of feet away now, and I bent double as I went, hoping to remain unseen. All would have been well, too, had there not been a pebble.

  You know how it is. A man can hurtle along at speed, and if he’s careful, even stony or tussocky ground is safe enough. However, I was carrying the boy. I could not see what was in front of me. Suddenly, my ankle twisted and I was thrown to the dirt. Poor Gilbert gave a shriek that could have been heard in Oxford as his bad arm was jarred, and I would have given a loud cry too, had the pain that suddenly shot up both legs not been so entirely unmanning. I am a strong fellow, and I have courage that would be the equal of any, but the agony I felt there was so acute that I thought my heart must stop. It went from the knees up into my groin and thence my belly, and I was forced to arch my back like a spitting cat and try not to puke.

  I motioned to Gilbert to get inside the chapel, and even as he climbed to his feet and slipped to the door, I heard the march of booted feet. Soon I could see three pairs of them just by my ear.

  This, I felt, would not end well.

  ‘So you decided to visit me?’ Blount said in that sneering way he had.

  I was on my back, and from the smell of the place, my nice new jack would never be the same. ‘I wanted to see how you were, Master,’ I said in as sardonic a manner as I could accomplish.

  My hands were bound, although only with ropes, not fetters. Rolling, I could get to my knees, but that was enough to make me whimper. Both felt as though they had been clubbed to submission by an expert. It must have been as I fell, I thought. Both knees had struck the ground at the same time, with the full force of my weight and Gilbert’s behind them. My head was still very painful, and my nose felt freshly clogged. I snorted and hawked and spat a few times, and after bringing up great gobbets of clotted blood, I found I could breathe again. My head felt as if it was going to explode with every snort, though, and after the third attempt I decided that remaining partially blocked was preferable for now.

  ‘Good of you to come,’ Blount said loudly. ‘Of course, it would have been better had you brought some ale and bread. It’s not ideal down here. Perhaps you could have brought me a blanket, too? I think it will grow cooler tonight.’

  ‘What happened to me?’ I mumbled. My lips felt as though someone had swung me by the feet and slammed my face against a wall.

  ‘Oh, as far as that goes, I think you were caught outside and beaten up by a few of the Coroner’s men before they brought you down here. You were most entertaining, from what they were saying. You made for good sport. I suppose if you’re a man-at-arms in a Godforsaken spot like this, you get your pleasures wherever you may.’

  ‘It feels like I’ve been run over by the whole of the Queen’s army!’

  ‘You look like it too.’

  ‘What have they done to you?’

  Blount shrugged. I could make him out quite clearly. He had started out as a darker smudge against the blackness of the walls, but as my eyes cleared, I saw that he was sitting with his back to the wall. His long hair was lying about his shoulders in disarray, and his left eye was bloated. I felt sure that it would be black, blue and purple by the time I saw it in daylight. It felt good to know that he had shared a few of my tribulations.

  ‘They enjoyed themselves with butts of pikes, boots and fists until they found it tedious, and then they kicked me some more. The usual.’

  ‘And you told them about Lady Margery?’

  He said nothing, but from the little hiss of warning, I gathered that someone could be listening. A little later he said carefully, ‘I told them nothing but the truth, Jack. That we are here to deliver and take away messages for the Princess from Sir Thomas Parry. We have done nothing else, have we? The murderer of Lady Margery will have our suffering on his soul for all eternity.’

  ‘Good. I hope the bastard lies in the deepest and hottest pit in hell. In that case, the whole story they spun was deceit. I thought I was just being kept in the dark. They accused the Princess of trying to organize an army to depose the Queen.’

  ‘They actually said that?’ Blount asked.

  ‘She told them it was nonsense. You told me that she lost her seal to Lady Margery, so I don’t understand why they are turning her chamber upside down.’

  ‘You don’t? What if Elizabeth arranged to have Lady Margery slain? Perhaps the seal was returned to her, and she could correspond again?’

  ‘She thinks it must have been stolen. Now the Coroner and Sir Walter are searching her quarters high and low to find it. They have a letter that purports to be from her, but she denies writing it, even though it has her seal on it.’

  Blount was silent for a while. Then, ‘She has no seal, so the letter is a forgery. Sir Thomas Parry must be told. He must be warned. This could grow.’

  ‘Grow?’

  Blount’s head, I could see, was turned from me. His posture reminded me of a hunter listening for the breathing of a deer. His eyes, I thought, were fixed on a point behind me, near the door.

  He spoke clearly. ‘Use your brain, man! Sir Walter and the Coroner are setting their faces against the Princess. They will try to make it appear as though she has been plotting, and they may succeed for a period. With the lies that spread as rumours of her plotting with Wyatt and his rebels, it would take only a tiny spark for gossip to be spread about her again. And that must generate much smoke before the true culprits are uncovered. But before that happens, many will be killed. Old and young alike will be arrested and disappear; families of honour who have committed no offences will find themselves under suspicion and will lose all; women will be torn from their fathers and mothers. I fear that the consequences for the kingdom must be dire, and then a natural reaction must set in. Since the Princess was definitely not engaged in any such activity, the Queen will demand to know who was responsible for such a misdeed as persuading her to punish her sister. She only has one sibling now that her brother, King Edward, is dead. The person who cast doubt in her mind about her last remaining sibling will earn her everlasting detestation. Not only Sir Walter and the Coroner, but Sir Henry would all fall under suspicion if that were to happen. An old man like Bedingfield would not be able to cope with much in the way of interrogation and torture.’

  ‘You think that even he would be arrested?’

  ‘Oh, yes. And he would die in a cell like this.’

  I looked aside. ‘Oh.’ It occurred to me that Bedingfield was not the only man likely to suffer pain and death over this affair. First, all those whom the Coroner and Sir Walter had accused of any involvement would likely suffer a similarly unpleasant end.

  There was a quiet sound like the last gasp of a dying wren, and then a soft click. I turned, for the sound came from behind me. ‘Hello?’

  ‘There is no one there,’ said Blount, and there was an enormity of relief in his voice. ‘Not now. With luck, I said the right things. All we can do is wait.’

  I had no idea of the passage of time. There was so little light down there in that hideous dungeon that the only means of telling how much time had elapsed was by listening to the trickle and plop of drips falling from the walls. For a while I attempted to count them, as if that could give me an indication, but when I began to reach the high two-hundreds each time I found myself gabbling the numbers in my head to fit them between drops, and soon had to give up. I could not enunciate the numbers effectively enough.

  It was not only the passage of time that caused me trouble. I spent a considerable amount of the time available contemplating my likely end, and could barely conceal the whimper that rose from my breast every time I thought of the tortures I had heard spoken of in taverns and alehouses. They involved lots of mechanical devices, such as pulleys and screws and racks. I didn’t want to think of any of them, not here in the dungeon. But there were worse too
ls available to the denizens of such chambers: fires, knives, brands, pincers, pliers … the list was endless. I had heard much of the judicial armoury available to those who sought to enforce the law, or deter those who wished to withhold their secrets from their benign rulers.

  There was no odour of charcoal or burned wood, so I was hopeful that at least while in here I should be safe enough, but that did not hold true for anywhere else. Surely, if the Queen were to suspect Princess Elizabeth of complicity in a plot against her, all those who were implicated would soon find themselves transported to the nearest location where they could be questioned. I knew what that would likely mean: a short journey to London, to the Tower. It wasn’t set there as a decoration: the Tower was the symbol of royal power and authority, the place where those who had been guilty of any infraction were sent to atone. It was the place where poor Lady Jane Grey had been held and, only a matter of days after the collapse of Wyatt’s rebellion, had been executed. The true cruelty of killing a girl of only seventeen or eighteen lay in the decision to execute her husband, Guildford, first, so that she could see him being taken away on the wagon, and brought back a little later, decapitated, just before she was herself led away to the scaffold.

  It was a thought to make me shudder. Such barbarous treatment of a young woman did not tend to instil confidence in the treatment that would be meted out to me.

  ‘Silence!’ Blount said, and in that damp, dark, foul chamber, his shout carried like the roar of a gun. It jerked me away from my panicky thoughts, and suddenly I saw clearly what I must do. The door was locked and barred, but my hands were bound only with rope. The walls were of a rough, unsmoothed stone, and if I were to rub my rope against them, they must cause the rope to fray and break. Soon, with luck, I might be able to free myself. Then, when the gaoler came back, I could attack him and run from this hideous cell … or, first, take his keys, perhaps, and release Blount, for he was more capable than I with his hands, and then make our way to the courtyard, where we could steal a horse and ride off to freedom at Woodstock, warn Parry, and make good our escape while ensuring that the Princess was freed.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Blount asked while I stood at a wall, rubbing my rope.

  ‘I’m only bound with fibres. If I can wear them away, I may be able to free myself.’

  ‘Good!’

  There was a degree of amusement in his tone that I did not like, but just now it didn’t matter to me. I was rubbing hard. The fibres grew warmer, my skin was scraped and bloodied, but I continued. I think I knew that when the door reopened, I would not be able to win a fight with the gaoler, who was fed and comfortable, while I was frozen and enfeebled by terror, but it did at least keep me occupied.

  A cord came loose and fell away. Panting slightly, I grinned to myself in the dark. I could not see the cord, but it was the first proof of my theory.

  ‘Working, is it?’ Blount asked.

  ‘Yes, the first has gone!’

  I set to again, and on the third scrape, missed my mark. The stone tore a strip of flesh an inch long, two inches wide, from the base of my wrist, and I was close to sobbing with the pain of it. I sucked at my wrist and cast a glower at Blount, who appeared to be enjoying my discomfort.

  All at once I was defeated. I knew it couldn’t work, and this was merely the proof. I set my back to the wall and allowed myself to slide down until my arse was on the floor. I could have wept, but I didn’t want to before Blount. Instead, I reminded myself of happier times, of Jen with her glorious breasts bouncing over me, of the wenches at Piers’s brothel, of the three maids here, Sal, Kitty and Meg, and how I had been trying to pick my favourite – or the one most available – on the day Lady Margery died. And I saw again her body, no matter how hard I tried to block it, and that thought brought another, more hideous scene yet to my mind: my own body lying broken, bloodied and ruined, with my head beside it in a basket.

  I was about to sob for the pity of it when suddenly there was a soft rattle and slither, and then a chink of daylight entered, and I had to close my eyes against the glare. How long had I been incarcerated? A day? Two days? My eyes were so blinded that I could have been there for a week. If my appetite had not been so effectively destroyed by my fears for my future, I would have had a hunger as fierce as a lion’s.

  ‘Oh! Thank God!’ I said fervently, recognizing the face at the door. ‘How long have we been held here?’

  ‘Hello, Will,’ Blount said. ‘You took your time.’

  ‘Scarce a half hour since Master Blackjack was brought here. We came as swiftly as we may,’ Will smiled.

  It is a strange thing to be held prisoner and suddenly to be released. While you are held bound, there are a number of concerns going through your mind – what will happen to me, what will other people be doing, why does injustice happen, where should I go to urinate, will I be fed again? – and then all is resolved. There is light and life and the potential of laughter. The doors are opened, a large man bearing a large knife enters, and he releases you from your bonds, and suddenly the world looks a happier place. There is a hope of life to come beyond the confines of the cell’s walls. Of course, your hands are suddenly full of pins and needles, and your legs refuse to behave, but apart from that, the world looks good.

  I took Will’s hand as he offered it, and then we made our way to the doorway. There was a passage beyond, and after a short flight of stairs at last we were exposed to the sunlight. There, Will glanced at me with concern, and I realized that after my most recent tribulations I was hardly looking at my best. My jack was, to be generous, ruined, what with tears, muddy stains and blood marring the perfection of the surface. My hosen were little better, with rips and more blood. My knees were very sore, but then again, little of my body wasn’t. I sneezed, and it felt as though the whole of the front of my face was about to fly away.

  ‘Shut up!’ Will hissed.

  ‘What?’ I said. I was genuinely confused. Perhaps it was the beating I’d taken, but I’d forgotten all about the men in the courtyard and the danger from the soldiery. He turned and glowered at me, and I shrugged. Which was when I tripped over the body in the passageway.

  No one had mentioned to me that Will had slugged the gaoler as he entered the cells, and how was I to know to expect a slumped figure on the ground at my feet? I was still staring at Will as my left foot caught the man’s hip, and I felt as though I hung in the air for a full minute while my body tried to decide whether to float there or to slam to the ground like a man thrown in a wrestling match. The moment passed, and as I tried to bring my right foot to solid ground again, it too became entangled in the body, and suddenly I was falling. I could see Will’s desperate attempt to grab me, and then I was clattering to the stone flags with a loud wail, both shins resting on the gaoler’s lap, both knees striking the floor with all my weight behind them.

  My knees had hurt before, but it was as nothing compared with this fresh buffet. Their existing swelling seemed to increase the sensation I felt from a tepid, general anguish to an exquisite pain that was so agonizing it was almost intolerable. If I say that it was so bad that I couldn’t scream because the breath caught in my throat, you’ll get a bland simulation of the way it felt.

  Perhaps Will was happy that there was no screaming. He let out his breath with a great whoosh of relief. And that was when the gaoler’s body moved. Beside him there was a collection of polearms, all resting against the wall. As he slid sideways, he slumped against all these, his skull leaning towards them as though attracted like a magnet to steel. For an instant I thought we were safe. His temple hit the first ash pole, and gradually his leaning head rose, until his cheek was settled against it like a drunk taking a snooze, his head coming up to the vertical, and Will visibly relaxed. He reached down for a second time to help me up. I could hardly think, my knees hurt so much, and it took a moment for me to realize that he was holding out his hand. I took it gratefully, lifting my legs from the gaoler, and as I did so, he slid a little further.
There was a small scraping sound, then a rasp, and Will let go of my hand, his eyes wide, as he tried to grab all the weapons in a bear-hug.

  He failed. The arms slid, some of them rattling, others slithering, until they hit the ground in a discordant clatter.

  The noise seemed to go on for a long time. Will and I stared at each other dumbly, appalled. Ahead of us, when I turned, Master Blount stood with his eyes narrowed in a wince of horror. In front of him was another figure. I peered and was rewarded with the sight of Lady Anne.

  She drew the door shut behind her, shooting home two rusted bolts, and swore in a most unladylike fashion. She sounded more like a whore from the quayside who learned her language from the sailors. Be that as it may, I took her general gist: They’re coming! Run!

  We pelted back along the passageway. A short way along, the passage divided, with one route leading off to the cells’ corridor on the right. There was a strong door leading left. It was locked, and Lady Anne opened this with a key from her bodice, before pushing it wide. There was a short flight of stairs beyond. I glanced at her, and she thrust the key away on its chain with her chin held high, as though expecting me to make a comment about her selection of a storage space. An idea came to me, but this was not the time. What she stored down there, she was welcome to just now; I had other things on my mind, such as staying alive. Will and Master Blount hurried through, Blount hobbling slightly, and Lady Anne slammed and relocked this door, then took us up the short staircase, along a passageway, turning into a room and out through a door at the other side of it into the open air, then up a convenient ladder which she pulled up after us, and thence across to another door.

  She opened it and waved us all inside.

  It was a large chamber, with two maidservants doing whatever maids do. One, Kitty, gave a little scream as we ran past, and dropped a large armful of linen. Then we were in a long, bare, wood-lined corridor, down more steps, along a passageway, and ended up in a large chamber. Here Lady Anne, who hardly panted at all, for all that her face now wore a deliciously healthy glow, stopped and motioned about the room. ‘You will be safe in here,’ she said, glaring at me as she spoke.