‘Where are the mornes?’ asked Avenell.
‘Already in store, Sir Godfrey. Two hundred of them.’
‘Good. We need them to blunt our lances. We must not fright the ladies with the sight of blood.’
‘Our armour prevents that.’
Avenell waited until the full consignment had been checked and stored. He then took the clerk aside and whispered something to him. The man produced a second inventory from inside his doublet. Taking it from him, the Master of the Armoury read it to himself.
‘Five hundred pikes, four hundred spear staves, one hundred two-handed swords, one hundred rapiers…’
The list was long and comprehensive. Avenell handed it back to the clerk with a nod of approval. The man secreted it inside the doublet once again.
‘Delivery is in hand?’
‘Yes, Sir Godfrey. They’ll be at Deptford by evening.’
‘When will they leave?’
‘Tomorrow on the morning tide.’
Sir Godfrey Avenell was pleased. Efficient and industrious himself, he set high standards for his many underlings. He demanded complete loyalty and commitment from them. Discretion was also imperative. Those who fell short in any way were soon discharged. The clerk had been with him long enough to be trusted. It was good to have such men around him as part of a smooth-running system which had evolved over the years. The workshops at Greenwich Palace were a source of continual joy to the Master of the Armoury.
A small shadow suddenly fell across that joy. As he left the workshop and came out into the fresh air, Avenell was met by a servant bearing a message. It was delivered at the main gate of the palace with a request for urgent attention. Avenell dismissed the servant and tore off the crude seal on the letter. Two lines of spidery script made him hiss with rage.
Marching back into the workshop, he tossed the missive into the burning coals of a brazier and continued on down the room. A door at the far end gave access to an antechamber used for the fitting of armour. Sir John Tarker was preening himself in a mirror while his squire was polishing the new suit of armour. Avenell stormed in with murder in his eyes. The squire did not need to be told to leave at once. He bolted from the chamber to leave the two men alone together. Tarker was bewildered by the dramatic intrusion and the blistering anger.
‘What ails you?’ he said.
‘Maggs.’
‘He cannot harm us. Who will listen to the word of a hunted outlaw? His spite can never touch us.’
‘Maggs is dead,’ said Avenell.
Tarker grinned. ‘Then we have reason to celebrate, not to quarrel. If the rogue lies in his grave, all fear is gone. What benefactor took the life of that little rat for us?’
‘I did.’
‘You?’
‘By indirect means,’ said Avenell. ‘I could not rely on you. When you hired those men, they failed us badly.’
‘That is why I threw them to the law.’
‘You could not even do that properly. Freshwell was put in chains but Maggs broke free and ran.’
‘To the Isle of Dogs. What harm could he do us there?’
‘None until today. As long as Maggs stayed there and kept his mouth shut, I was content to let him live. But I took the precaution that you should have taken.’
‘Precaution?’
‘I had him watched.’
Tarker grew uneasy. ‘What happened?’
‘Someone tracked him down. They came to question him this morning about the murder. They may have wrung something out of him before my man could shut the villain’s mouth forever.’ He drew his rapier. ‘In other words, they are still sniffing after our scent.’
‘Maggs knew only part of the truth.’
‘He knew enough to keep them coming after us.’
‘Who are they?’
‘People you swore would never bother us again,’ snarled Avenell. ‘People who stand between me and my peace of mind.’ He advanced on Tarker with his sword raised. ‘People I would have put down once and for all.’
He slashed away with his weapon and Tarker jumped back involuntarily but he was not the target of the attack. Sir Godfrey Avenell was taking out his anger on the glistening armour, hacking away at the decorated breastplate until he knocked the whole suit over with a clatter, kicking the helmet free, then jabbing madly at the leg armour. Only when he had scored the metal in a hundred places did he pause to glare across at his alarmed companion.
‘Next time,’ he warned, ‘it will be you. Kill them!’
***
Emilia Brinklow was waiting for him when he returned to the house and they shared breakfast together. Nicholas Bracewell told of the visit to Orlando Reeve but divulged nothing of what passed between them and she did not press him on the matter. They simply ate and talked together quietly as if they had been doing it every day of their lives. Emilia was transformed. The pale and dispirited creature of the night before was now poised and alert. Her cheeks had colour, her eyes hope and her whole being had acquired a new definition. Sadness still rested on her but its weight was no longer quite so suffocating.
She made no reference, either by word or glance, to their brief time together in bed and Nicholas started to wonder if it had really occurred. Was it no more than a pleasant dream sent to ease his troubled mind? Or was it some waking fantasy conjured up by the intense pressures of recent days? Had she indeed come to him and now regretted her action so much that she had blotted it out of her mind? Did their moment beside each other perhaps contribute to her apparent recovery? At all events, it was not a barrier between them and he was grateful for that.
They remained happily at the table until midday when the constable and his two assistants arrived to resume their wayward investigation. After hours of questioning those who lived in the neighbouring houses, they had divined nothing of any significance. Nicholas again steered them through their halting routine. He also ensured that their interrogation of Emilia was neither too distressing nor robust.
The manservant who discovered the body then adjourned with Nicholas to make sworn statements at the nearby home of a magistrate. Valentine was sheltered from the need to give any testimony even though he had been first aware of the arrival of tragedy on the doorstep. Nicholas saw no point in dragging the gardener into the investigation and thereby exposing his eccentric sleeping arrangements to public gaze while only further complicating the situation for the law officers. The book holder had already taken long strides forward and he did not want three well-intentioned buffoons around his feet to trip him up.
When he got back to the house once more, he was amazed to see two familiar figures dismounting from their horses.
‘Nick, dear heart!’
‘We knew that we would find you at the house.’
Nicholas was thrilled. ‘By all, it’s good to see you!’
They exchanged embraces of welcome, then compared news. Lawrence Firethorn and Owen Elias had not tarried in the Isle of Dogs. The killing of Maggs made their own presence at once unnecessary and dangerous. Survival was the only law that existed in that human jungle. They left while they still could and were ferried across the Thames on a barge with their horses. Who despatched the naked Maggs with such brutal finality they could not tell but they felt that Freshwell’s partner in crime had somehow met his just deserts.
Nicholas took them into the house and introduced them to Emilia Brinklow. She had expected to meet the whole company after the performance of The Roaring Boy but she had been hustled away from the fiasco by Simon Chaloner and had forgone that pleasure. She was clearly honoured to meet Lawrence Firethorn, an actor whose work she revered, and she delighted Owen Elias as well by complimenting him on a number of performances. Emilia had obviously been a keen follower of the fortunes of Westfield’s Men for some time. For their part, they were charmed by her grace and composure. Firethorn was so taken with her that he even started to make flirtatious remarks. Nicholas cut short this standard reaction to female admiration by telling him
about the second murder. The newcomers were duly outraged.
‘Here on the doorstep?’ exclaimed Firethorn.
‘Slaughtered by the same hand,’ decided Elias.
‘Yes,’ said Nicholas. ‘Solve one murder, solve both.’
He saw that Emilia was sinking back into her grief once more and he quickly moved on to another topic. She rallied within minutes and remembered the duties of a hostess. Sensing that the men wished to be alone, she went off to the kitchen to order refreshment for the guests and to give them the chance to talk more freely.
‘Where did you spend the night, Nick?’ said Firethorn.
‘Here at the house.’
Elias chuckled. ‘We can see why you did not rush to get back to London. A warm bed here is better than a cold lodging in Shoreditch.’
‘Mistress Brinklow invited me to stay.’
‘Say no more, Nick,’ advised Firethorn. ‘We are green with envy already. On to our discoveries in the Isle of Dogs.’
‘You found Maggs?’ said Nicholas.
‘Found him and lost him.’
Firethorn recounted the tale and the book holder was spellbound. Everything he heard tallied with what he himself had found out or suspected. Between the three of them, they had made substantial progress and they at last knew the name of the man who was the true author of all the evils that had beset the Brinklow household.
‘Sir Godfrey Avenell!’ said Elias. ‘He’s worse than Freshwell and Maggs together. At least, they were honest rogues. He hides behind his rank.’
‘I’d like to meet up with the knave!’ said Firethorn.
‘You will get your chance,’ promised Nicholas. ‘Both he and Sir John Tarker are close by in Greenwich Palace. We three must find some way to smoke the two of them out. And we may not do that until we have first uncovered the deepest mystery of them all.’
‘The deepest?’ asked Elias.
‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why was Thomas Brinklow killed?’
‘The play explains that,’ said Firethorn. ‘He was the victim of a malignant enemy. Sir John Tarker hated him.’
‘It is not enough,’ argued Nicholas. ‘Sir John would do nothing without the approval of Sir Godfrey Avenell. He is the key to all this. Why did he want Thomas Brinklow dead?’
‘Were Sir Godfrey and Master Brinklow also at each other’s throats?’ suggested Elias.
‘Far from it. They were good friends. They even dined in each other’s company at the palace. Indeed, it was there that Master Brinklow was introduced to the lady who was to become his wife. And who brought the two of them together?’
Even as he asked the question, Nicholas caught a glimpse of an answer he had never even considered before. It made him revalue the whole situation. Before he could share his thoughts with his friends, Emilia returned with the promise of food and drink. They rose courteously from their seats and insisted that she rejoin them. When all four were once again seated, Nicholas explored an area which had been brought to light by the visit to the Isle of Dogs.
‘When you showed me your brother’s laboratory,’ he said, ‘you spoke of his papers having been destroyed.’
‘Why, yes. In the fire.’
‘What sort of papers were they?’
‘Drawings, calculations, inventions.’
‘None survived?’
‘None at all, Nicholas,’ she said. ‘Thomas was a careful man, as I told you. His papers were like gold to him. He kept them locked away at all times out of fear.’
‘Of what?’
‘Theft by his rivals, jealous of his success.’
‘Only rivals?’ She looked perplexed. ‘Was your brother ever commissioned to work for Sir Godfrey Avenell, the Master of the Armoury?’
‘He was. On more than one occasion.’
‘What was the nature of those commissions?’
‘I cannot say. Thomas did not discuss his work with me. I explained that to you. All I know is that he paid regular visits to the workshops at the palace to consult with Sir Godfrey. And then those visits stopped.’
‘Why?’ asked Firethorn.
‘Thomas would not tell me.’
‘Did you have no inkling of your own?’
‘None, Master Firethorn. It was not my place.’
Nicholas was curious. ‘How soon after these regular visits broke off did your brother meet his death?’
‘Less than a month.’
The three men were exercised by the same thought. Thomas Brinklow was not killed at the behest of a spiteful enemy who lusted after the former’s sister. He was removed out of the way so that his papers could fall into the hands of Sir Godfrey Avenell. Something in among those drawings and calculations was a sufficient motive for murder.
Nicholas Bracewell spoke for all three of them.
‘Have you nothing of your brother’s work to show us?’
‘Go to Deptford and you may see many examples of it,’ she said. ‘The royal dockyards worship the name of Thomas Brinklow. They will show you his navigational instruments.’
‘I hoped for something here in the house.’
‘It was all consumed in the fire.’
‘Some tiny item must surely survive,’ he continued. ‘He lent his skills to the design of this beautiful house. Did he not also create something to use or display in it?’
‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Except one trifling gift for me.’
‘Gift?’
‘It is hardly worth mention, Nicholas. I would certainly not offer it as an example of Thomas’s genius. He was a man who could invent telescopes to read the heavens and devices to plumb the depth of the sea. A simple knife is but a poor epitaph for him.’
‘Knife?’
‘He gave it to me to unseal letters.’
‘May we see it, please?’
‘If you wish, but what interest can it hold for you?’
Nicholas was adamant. ‘Send for it, I pray.’
‘I’ll fetch it myself directly,’ she volunteered.
In the short time it took her to get the knife, the three friends had agreed on the likely motive for the first murder. It was grounded in the scientific and engineering experiments of Thomas Brinklow. He had been killed for his papers. Failure to steal them had led Freshwell to the gallows with his tongue cut out and Maggs to the Isle of Dogs. What was so important about the mathematician’s work that justified such a wholesale waste of human life?
Nicholas Bracewell was made aware of another anomaly.
‘Maggs told you that they found the place on fire?’
‘Yes, Nick,’ said Elias. ‘It was not their work.’
‘Whose then was it? Someone started that blaze.’
Emilia came back into the room bearing a long, thin knife with a pearl handle. At first glance, it looked no more than an attractive implement for domestic use but Nicholas had second thoughts when he handled it. The knife was unusually light in his grasp and gave off a peculiar sheen. He passed it to Firethorn who was quite intrigued.
‘Your brother made this for you?’ he asked.
‘In his workshop.’
‘From what metal?’
‘He did not say.’
‘It is lighter by far than any knife I have seen,’ said Nicholas, taking it back into his own hands. ‘Yet its balance is perfect and its edge well-honed. May I test it against my dagger? I am loathe to damage it if it is the only keepsake you have of your brother.’
‘This house is keepsake enough,’ she said, realising that the knife might after all hold significance. ‘Do as you think fit with it, Nicholas.’
He slipped his dagger from its sheath and used it to clip the blade of the knife sharply. The latter withstood the blow without a blemish. Nicholas hit the blade much harder next time but it was still equal to the test. He passed the dagger to Owen Elias, then held the knife in front of him by its handle and its tip so that it lay horizontal. The Welshman lifted the dagger and smashed its blade down ag
ainst the target.
‘Aouw!’ he yelled, shaking his hand. ‘I have jarred my wrist. It was like striking against solid stone.’
Nicholas examined the two weapons. There was a deep nick in the blade of his dagger but the knife was unscathed.
‘Germans,’ he murmured.
‘Speak up, Nick,’ ordered Firethorn.
‘Germans. The two men who brought Master Chaloner here last night spoke to each other in German.’
‘This is Greenwich,’ said Elias, ‘and full of musicians from the palace. They come from all nationalities and you may hear a dozen languages in the streets. French, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese. Even German, I daresay.’
‘They were no musicians, Owen. But armourers.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because the best craftsmen in Europe were brought to the palace to make armour in its workshops. Most of them were German. They are experts at their work. They know how to bend the finest metals to their will. The finest-and the strongest.’
He held the knife out on the palm of his hand.
***
When Topcliffe lifted the poniard from the table, Edmund Hoode went weak at the knees. Wrists manacled, he had been hauled out of the Marshalsea and taken by prison cart to the house of the interrogator. Richard Topcliffe was seated behind a long table when the prisoner was brought in by the two gaolers. He made Hoode stand directly in front of him so that he could appraise him in minute detail, searching-or so the playwright feared-for the points of greatest weakness and vulnerability about his anatomy. As Topcliffe picked up the little dagger, Hoode feared that it would be used to cut a first morsel of flesh but his host reached instead for one of the large red apples in a bowl. Slicing it in two, he looked up quizzically at his guest.
‘Remove the manacles,’ he said.
‘We have orders to keep him restrained,’ said one of the gaolers. ‘He may be desperate.’
Topcliffe was curt. ‘I will not have the fellow trussed up in irons before me. Remove them without delay and then remove yourselves.’ The two men hesitated. ‘Master Hoode will not try to run away. I can vouch for him.’
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