[Master Mercurius 02] - Untrue Till Death

by Graham Brack

  UNTRUE TILL DEATH

  Master Mercurius Mysteries

  Book Two

  Graham Brack

  My wife Gillian has accompanied me as I wander round Dutch towns and cities researching these stories without ever quite knowing what I am looking for. For her patience, and for so much more, she deserves this book dedicated to her.

  It is customary to say that the characters in a story are all imaginary and no resemblance to anyone living or dead is intended. That is true, but there is a character in this book who was inspired by my friend Ben Salfield, whose concerts (details of which are found at www.kernowconcerts.co.uk) we have long enjoyed. When I approached Ben for permission to use his name, he agreed provided that the character was sufficiently disreputable. I hope that he will be satisfied with the result. Beniamino is not Ben; he may, however, be a person Ben would like to be.

  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  A NOTE TO THE READER

  ALSO BY GRAHAM BRACK

  PROLOGUE

  Now that I am advanced in years, the time has come to set down my memoirs before senility sets in and I can no longer remember what happened. I have had, by the grace of God, a long and exciting life. This is a small country, and as I have traversed it I have met many of the great and good that you, dear reader, will only have encountered in history books. Of course, much of my work has been devoted to the service of the University of Leiden, which God preserve, where I have worked my way up from juvenile student to even more juvenile professor. Although there was a new Rector every year (except that in difficult times nobody could be found to take the job and the old one had to continue) I never made it to the Rectorship, which is probably just as well, for I had some notions of reform which were too radical even for Leiden. Things like paying humble lecturers enough to live on, for example. The astute reader may notice that the matter of salaries is mentioned occasionally in these memoirs but let him not worry — there’ll be blood enough to sate anyone’s tastes sooner or later.

  Whenever a man publishes his diaries there are always naysayers keen to tell him that he has misremembered. No, I haven’t. I was there. It all happened exactly as I set it down. I am, after all, a man of the cloth. I don’t lie.

  I just get things wrong now and again, that’s all.

  CHAPTER ONE

  I was enjoying a glass of wine with the Rector when there was a commotion outside. I cannot quite recall the order of events, but there was a woman’s scream, the sound of rushing footsteps, a period of quiet, and then a stampede of feet on the stairs followed by an urgent hammering at the door. Before the Rector had given the command to enter, one of the kitchen boys threw the door open and rushed in.

  ‘Rector, sir, you’d best come. There’s been an accident.’

  The Rector put his wine down and beckoned me to follow him. Quickly, but without running, we followed the boy downstairs and along the corridor towards the dining hall. Just before its doors we turned to the left, where a small crowd had gathered. The Rector demanded passage and the bystanders stepped aside to allow him through. I followed like a lapdog, with no authority of my own except the right to follow my master.

  On the stairs was a man who had evidently tumbled down and broken his neck. The Rector gently eased the head towards us, and I found myself gazing into the staring eyes of —

  Just a minute, Mercurius. You’re getting ahead of yourself. Shouldn’t you begin at the beginning?

  I realise, gentle reader, that you probably want to know all about the body, but I pray you be patient. There will be bodies enough in time. I wish it were not so, but it is. Let us go back a bit.

  Van Looy had a way of looking at you that made you feel he regarded you as slightly lower than a snail’s belly.

  ‘Ah, there you are!’ he said.

  ‘Indeed I am,’ I replied.

  ‘The Rector sent me to find you. Of course, I should have known you wouldn’t be in the university library.’ He looked around the interior of the inn on the Langebrug where I do most of my reading.

  I find the silence of the library oppressive, and they don’t serve drink there, so I pass much of my free time in the inn. At the moment when he interrupted me I was trying to finish Spinoza’s Tractatus Theologico-Politicus as a matter of some urgency, since it had just been banned. Spinoza had backed the wrong side in the argument between the De Witts and the Prince of Orange. The De Witt brothers ended up being lynched by the mob, whereas the Prince of Orange became Stadhouder, which seems a pretty conclusive win to me.

  Anyway, Spinoza’s work defended democratic and constitutional government, which was not in fashion in the Netherlands in those days. The Reformed Church condemned his treatise, and therefore it was not a good idea for a lecturer of the University of Leiden, a Reformed institution if ever there was one, to be seen reading it. Fortunately, most of the customers at Steen’s inn couldn’t read, but Van Looy would undoubtedly have reported it if I had not quickly closed it as he spoke.

  ‘Why did the Rector want me?’ I enquired as levelly as I could, given my belief that Van Looy was one of those people who would look good impaled on a pike.

  ‘I believe he has a task for you,’ Van Looy responded, with just enough incredulity in his voice to make clear that he personally would not have entrusted me with peeing on a fire. Although, come to think of it, if Van Looy were in flames nothing would give me greater pleasure.

  I drank up, paid my bill and followed Van Looy through the streets of Leiden back to the Academy building on the Rapenburg. Conversation was sparse, which suited me perfectly. I concentrated on thinking holy thoughts, just to annoy Van Looy.

  When we reached the door, Van Looy held it open for me, bowing slightly and saying, ‘After you, Master.’

  I politely responded, ‘Thank you, mijnheer Van Looy,’ just to rub in that he did not have a higher degree. I was rewarded with the distinctive sound of grating teeth.

  The Rector was busy writing at his desk. His ink consumption must have been astonishing, because I rarely caught him doing anything else. He was a small man, neat, precise, tidy and very, very clever. Dressed as always in austere black with an old-fashioned white collar and a little black wool skullcap, his piercing blue eyes noted my arrival and he smiled slightly. The Rector liked me. He must have done, or he would not have allowed me the latitude that he did.

  ‘Master Mercurius! Welcome! Please seat yourself.’

  I humbly selected the bench along the wall.

  ‘No, not there, man. Take the chair.’

  That was a good sign. If you were in his bad books, the bench was your natural place. Errant students could pass an afternoon there as he harangued them.

  ‘No doubt you are wondering why I sent Van Looy for you.’

  I was, of course. A secondary question was why a man of sense would send Van Looy for anything.

  ‘We have a considerable responsibility, Master Mercurius, standing, as we do, in loco parentis. Our charges are impressionabl
e young men, many of them living away from home for the first time, and some of them in funds to a greater extent than ever before in their lives. One can understand the temptations that lie in wait to ensnare them.’

  This was, no doubt, a reference to the whores who hover outside the university gates each evening. There is a fascinating thesis waiting to be written about the economics of prostitution, but even the simplest courtesan has mastered the law of supply and demand and realises that the best customers to court are those who have money. And while Leiden is a prosperous town, it has become so largely because its burghers place a high emphasis on thrift and saving. Which leaves the whores looking for business from the students, who take a different view of life.

  All in all, 1674 was a hard time in Leiden. It was, however, the hundredth anniversary of the famous siege of the city, so plans were in hand for a celebration in October at which, I was sure, a re-enactment of the starvation of the population would not be a feature.

  One happy result of the collapse of the 1574 siege had been the foundation of the University of Leiden in 1575 by the Prince of Orange, who wanted to reward the city for its heroic resistance, although what exactly is heroic about choosing not to drop dead is unclear to me. But it neatly returns us to the Rector’s study, and the problem posed by importunate whores hanging around in the street outside. Incidentally, I had no vested interest in this. The whores have never been a problem for me, because they know how much we lecturers are paid. Those who fall within my price range are not at the select end of the market, so I would rather spend my money on beer and bread. Erasmus famously said that he spent his money on books, and if he had any left over, on food. I disagree. You can always borrow books, but you can’t eat a loaf and give it back.

  I realised, belatedly, that the Rector was still talking.

  ‘I need hardly stress that the recent contretemps with the civic authorities is not in keeping with the best traditions of the university. We must do what we can to curb the high spirits of our young men, both for their sake and for that of the university’s reputation.’

  I began to see where this was leading, and I did not particularly like it. Staging uplifting moral lectures in the evening is not my preferred occupation. In any event, I was convinced that in a contest between my moral philosophy seminars and an evening between the ample breasts of Fat Lysbeth, I was unlikely to come out on top, if you’ll pardon the expression.

  ‘Tomorrow we have a general convocation of students, and I shall use the opportunity to deliver a few remarks ex cathedra to remind them of their responsibilities. But I am under no illusions, Mercurius, as to the likely success of that proposal. You, on the other hand, are much nearer their own age.’

  I suppose when you’re nearly seventy, someone of my age seems not much more than a teenager, though in fact the students would probably have viewed me as a relic of the Golden Age. I was, after all, almost thirty-six then.

  ‘I intend to introduce you to them, and then withdraw so that you may address them privately, man to man. Mercurius, I’m too set in my ways. You speak their language.’

  He was wrong there. Nobody speaks their language. They shamble around the lecture theatres grunting. Ask them a direct question and the likely answer is “Uh?”

  ‘I’ll try, Rector,’ I replied, ‘but what exactly would you like me to cover?’

  ‘Well, I don’t want to be too prescriptive, Mercurius. Perhaps a general reminder of their privileged position, their responsibilities to their family name, the shame they bring to their mothers by their antics, the duties of a Christian gentleman, a review of the seven deadly sins and the ten commandments, all of which are endangered by such goings-on, the evils of prostitution, venereal disease, gambling, excessive drinking, riotous and noisy behaviour, and the importance of observance of the Sabbath. That should do it.’

  If that wasn’t prescriptive, I don’t know what is.

  I said that I would retire to compose a suitable charge to the students, and bowed gravely. As usual, I attempted to walk backwards out of the room in a respectful fashion, and as usual I got a door handle up my arse for my pains. I would have sworn that the Rector sniggered, but when I raised my head he had his usual composed and benign appearance.

  My first thought was that this required a couple of tankards of strong ale to inspire the muse, but it was growing late, so I sneaked down to the kitchen to see if anyone was around. Mechtild, that angel in human form, wife of Albrecht the master cook, who rescued her husband’s “cooking”, smiled when she saw me and wiped her hands on a towel.

  ‘Master Mercurius,’ she cried, ‘what brings you below stairs?’

  After a few minutes of light conversation, I was on my way up to my room with a jug of ale when I met Van Looy coming downstairs.

  ‘Not going to the inn, Master?’ he asked.

  ‘No, I’m preparing a speech for the Rector,’ I answered, hoping he wasn’t going to look in the jug. ‘But don’t let me stop you,’ I added cheerily.

  ‘Hardly my preferred way of passing the time,’ he responded. ‘I shall sit in my chamber with an improving book.’

  A book that improves you? Well, you won’t be short of choices, I thought, but inclined my head and ascended to my own room to compose my thoughts. And eat the fig tart Mechtild had slipped in my sleeve.

  Leiden is a university devoted to traditions, some of them utterly baffling. The students were formed up in pairs and paraded in the public streets to the Hooglandse Kerk, where they suffered a sermon from the minister which was not improved by substantial untranslated quotations from the original Greek New Testament. The students were then marched back to the Academy where the Rector addressed them vigorously and directly. He then introduced me and withdrew.

  I waited until the doors had closed behind him, and then began my disquisition along the lines the Rector had laid down. I reminded them of the need to save a small fraction of their money for food, made passing references to a number of aspects of morality (but told them they would have to attend my lectures to get the detail) and warned them that God’s grace is irresistible and that those whom God has unconditionally saved would face divine chastisement — and then moved on to whores and venereal disease.

  It was at this point that I think I made my greatest impact. I recalled that the late Franciscus Sylvius, vice-chancellor of the university and professor of medicine, had once described to me a man who contracted the Spanish disease and whose membrum virile had fallen off. This seemed to make a profound impression on my audience, several of whom shifted uncomfortably and one of whom took a sly peek down his breeches. I omitted to mention that the detachment had occurred post mortem as his body was being wrapped in a winding sheet, but it was one of those stories that simply cries out for as little corroborating detail as possible. I think it quite likely that by the end of my talk the subdued response of the students was due to their resolve to visit a physician with all speed.

  The students departed, and I collected my remaining notes and my bible with a view to reporting to the Rector. It was then I noticed that one student had not left the room.

  ‘Thank you, Master,’ he said, ‘for that valuable advice.’

  I dipped my head in gratitude for the thanks, and asked his name.

  ‘I am Jan van der Horst. My father was here a generation ago.’

  ‘Ah,’ I responded, ‘sadly I wasn’t.’

  ‘No matter. I believe the Rector taught him, but of course many of his other teachers are dead now.’

  ‘No doubt. How have you settled in here?’

  ‘Very well, thank you. Hearing you describe the city’s whores and taverns, I almost regret that I have had nothing to do with either.’

  ‘How very upright of you,’ I said, thinking all the while what an insufferable little prig this fellow was.

  ‘It’s not moral rectitude, Master. It’s the knowledge that my father would flay my hide with a strap if he found out I’d been doing it.’

  �
��A fear of punishment is not a bad reason for forswearing sin, mijnheer Van der Horst.’

  ‘No, perhaps not. But we ought to do the right thing simply because it is the right thing to do, wouldn’t you agree? Forgive me, I’m keeping you. I look forward to our next meeting.’

  He bowed politely, and was gone, leaving me to wonder why he had bothered to wait behind to converse. Had I missed something?

  The Rector had received a report of my talk already by the time I stood before him. Since it was favourable to me, it cannot have been provided by Van Looy, yet I had seen no other member of staff there.

  ‘One of the law students was good enough to wait upon me to convey his father’s greetings and took the opportunity to tell me how uplifting he found your talk.’

  ‘Van der Horst, by any chance?’

  ‘Yes, that’s him. I taught his father, you know. Old Van der Horst is now a minister somewhere near Haarlem, I believe.’

  ‘I am surprised his son is not following him to the cloth, Rector.’

  ‘The older son has. The younger one has been allowed to make his own way, and has chosen the law as a career. So many gifted young men do, you know.’ The Rector rose from his chair and walked round the desk towards me. This was ominous. ‘Since you have acquitted yourself so well, perhaps I may raise another subject with you, trusting to your sense of discretion.’

  ‘Of course, Rector,’ said my mouth, though my brain was already telling me this was getting worse by the minute.

  ‘It concerns the university staff stipends.’

  My heart sank. I could guess what was coming.

  There was a scale of pay within the university, but some faculties did better than others. Needless to say, philosophy ranked right at the bottom. The scale was varied, of course; Professor Sylvius, whom I mentioned earlier, was employed at double the standard salary of a professor. Adriaanus Heereboord, one of my illustrious predecessors, had — during one of his increasingly infrequent sober moments — complained bitterly about the salary, and finally announced that since they were only paying him half the money he was worth, he was only going to work half the week. I never did work out which half that was.