The Heresy of Dr Dee

by Phil Rickman

  About what happened after the battle between Mortimer’s cobbled-together army of untrained English peasantry and the hungry Welsh, serving their fork-bearded wizard. On windy nights, they say, the last cries of dying men still are heard, bright threads of agony woven into the fabric of the storm.

  This hill of faith and death. This holy hill soiled by slaughter and an old hatred that never quite goes away because this is border country and its air is ever ajangle with bewildered, jostling ghosts.

  Anna Ceddol sees the dead man’s mouth is a mash of shattered teeth, though nothing parts them but a bloody pulp.

  Betwixt his thighs, however…

  Anyone can tell that’s not done by the crows.

  XVI

  Pike-head

  I WAS THROWN back at the sight of several dozen men with pikes and crossbows and a half-concealed firearm or two. And a dozen laden carts, all gathered under a whelk-shell sky in the field beyond London Bridge.

  Seemed at first like an advance guard for the Queen, and it was only when I left the wherry that I marked the absence of flags, music or any hint of merriment. And saw that the shabby-clad man approaching me was Dudley.

  ‘Dr Dee.’ He shook my hand with formality. ‘Master Roberts. Remember me?’

  First I’d seen of him since that night in my workroom. When I’d taken up his offer for me to lie at his house in Kew until our departure for Wales, he’d been absent the whole time. A bedchamber had been prepared for me and my meals made daily by the servants, while I spent long hours in solitary book-study. No one in the house appeared to know where Dudley had gone.

  Master Roberts?

  The name he’d been known by on our mission to Glastonbury at the end of the winter. An indication that discretion was to be exercised on this journey, for him if not for me, and yet…

  …Jesu. I surveyed the clattering assembly with dismay. This was his idea of discretion? Before I could question it, Dudley led me across the well-trodden field, away from the throng.

  We stopped close to the bridge itself, where it was quiet.

  I said, ‘Have the trumpeters been delayed?’

  The crow-picked head of a man had fallen from one of the poles and lay in the grass near our feet. I wondered if it had belonged to some executed traitor I might recognise, winced and looked away as Dudley kicked the head down the bank, then grinned.

  ‘All this… it’s not for me, you fool.’

  Close up, I realised that shabby had been a wrong impression. If the mourning purple was gone and had not been replaced by his customary gilded splendour, his leathery apparel was still of good quality. Country landowner-class, at least, except for the exceptionally beautiful riding boots, possibly a small gift from the Queen at a time when there were no thousand-acre estates to spare.

  ‘It’s for the judge,’ Dudley said. ‘Sixty armed guards.’

  He explained. It seemed the trial in Radnorshire was for some Welsh felon, of whom an example must needs be made. Dudley said a London judge had been requested by the Council of the Marches in Ludlow to make sure it was handled efficiently and robustly.

  Well, I knew what that meant, but a London judge? Was that usual?

  ‘It is,’ Dudley said, ‘when the local judiciary fears for the health of its wives and children and safety of its property.’

  The man on trial was the leader of Plant Mat, a brotherhood of violent cattle-thieves, highway-robbers and killers lodged in the heart of Wales. Well organised, controlling trade, smuggling goods from France, running several inns at which travellers were habitually robbed or held for ransom.

  ‘I’ve never heard of this. Plant Mat? Children of Matthew?’

  Dudley shrugged.

  ‘It’s Wales. Where they seem to be regarded as heroes for the obvious reason that they’ve been preying, whenever they can, on the English. Or so they claim.’

  ‘Hence the guard?’

  ‘Procured with the full agreement of Cecil, I’d guess. Despite his being Welsh.’

  I tensed.

  ‘That means Cecil knows we’re travelling with them?’

  ‘Of course not. We’re here through Blount’s connections.’

  Thomas Blount, his steward, was a former attorney.

  ‘There’s a handful of others also travelling with us,’ Dudley said. ‘All of them well-investigated, no doubt, to make sure none are too… shall we say too Welsh?’

  When he smiled, I saw that his moustache had been trimmed close to his face, his beard cut back to little more than stubble. Hardly distinguished but it was wise enough, under these circumstances. A ransom for Lord Dudley would be not inconsiderable.

  ‘Sure you’re quite happy with this, Robbie?’

  ‘Welsh banditry? God’s bollocks, John.’ Dudley sniffed in contempt and began to walk back up the field. ‘Come on, we need to fix you up with a horse. Oh, and while I remember… if anyone should ask, Dr John Dee is journeying, as he often does, in pursuit of old books and also to inspect his family’s property in the borderlands. Assisted by his old friend, Master Roberts, the antiquary. That sound plausible to you?’

  Highly plausible, and it had worked in Glastonbury. Several dozen significant rare books and manuscripts in my library at Mortlake had come from the libraries of dissolved monasteries. When religious houses are plundered for treasure, either by common thieves or the Crown, the books are oft-times flung aside as worthless.

  I caught him up.

  ‘Who knows the truth?’

  ‘Nobody knows the truth, John. Though obviously Legge knows who Roberts is and can think what the hell he likes about my reasons for getting out of London for a while.’

  I stopped, grasping his arm.

  ‘Legge?’

  ‘The judge.’

  ‘Christopher Legge?’

  ‘Sir Christopher Legge. If you paid proper attention to the lists you’d know these things.’ Dudley scrutinised me. ‘History here?’

  ‘In a way.’

  Five years back, when I’d been accused of conjuring against Queen Mary, several false charges had also been levelled against me by a lawyer, name of Ferrers, now himself held in suspicion after a printing press producing pamphlets full of French lies about the Queen had been found on his premises. Ferrers had oiled his way out of the Fleet by convincing the court he’d had no knowledge of the treasonous intent of a man renting his premises.

  It seemed unlikely he’d yet have links with Christopher Legge who, as a young attorney, had helped process evidence against me for presentation to the Star Chamber. Evidence which, being qualified in law and so conducting my own defence, I’d assiduously broken to dust.

  Legge was now a judge? He must be a couple of years younger than me, maybe not even thirty. We’d never spoken and there was no reason to suppose he bore ill will towards me, if ever he had. But, for the duration of this journey, I’d try to avoid him, nonetheless.

  ‘He’ll be on the Privy Council one day, from what I hear,’ Dudley said. ‘If he survives the trial.’

  ‘Why would he not?’

  ‘Just something I heard.’

  He laughed, and I took the remark as being not too serious. Taking this opportunity to ask him where the hell he’d been while I was lying low at his house in Kew.

  ‘Later,’ Dudley said.

  He walked away.

  ‘Robbie…’

  Dudley stopped ten or so paces short of the first cart, looked over a shoulder and lowered his voice to a hiss.

  ‘Cumnor. I was at Cumnor.’

  Rapidly, I caught him up.

  ‘Was that advisable?’

  To my knowledge, until now he’d never been back to the house where Amy died since she was found. Would not have been seemly. Might have suggested he had traces to cover. On the surface, he’d behaved impeccably, only sending Thomas Blount to record the circumstances on his behalf.

  ‘Why?’ I said. ‘Why risk it, with the inquest still in process?’

  ‘Could be months before
the inquest returns its verdict. I’m to be held in purgatory till then?’

  ‘And was it worth it? Did you learn anything?’

  ‘Too much.’

  Ahead of us, I could now see Sir Christopher Legge. Would not have marked him if I hadn’t known he was here. He’d changed. Narrow features, which had been gawky when last I’d seen him, had hardened like a new-forged pike-head introduced to cold water. He was enclosed by a dozen attendants and minor attorneys but was somehow distant from them all.

  ‘Well?’ I said to Dudley.

  Still unsure how far I trusted him.

  ‘I’ll tell you when there’s privacy.’

  He began to walk up the riverside field towards the company of men and horses. His gypsy’s skin seemed darker under the pink-veined sky.

  Of a sudden, he turned back.

  ‘There’s an evil here, John,’ he said.

  XVII

  A Sense of the Ominous

  WHEN FIRST I was known as the Queen’s astrologer, my services were in big demand, mainly from ambitious people wanting my name on their child’s birthchart. In the euphoria following the coronation there were more of these requests than I could easily deal with.

  But a few others – and they still come, on occasion – related to the less-easily defined aspect of my role – adviser on the Hidden. And therein lies a dilemma.

  These approaches are, as you’d expect, more discreet and come from men who feel their homes or their families to be cursed by enemies or menaced by demons and ghosts. Coming to me as if I’m believed equipped to dispel a nameless evil in the name of the Queen.

  Dear God. Oft-times, I’ll make an excuse and walk away, knowing there’s confusion about the nature of my profession. While I’m no sorcerer, neither am I a proper priest.

  When I was made Rector of Upton-upon-Severn, during the short reign of the boy king Edward, it was a lay appointment, designed to provide a firm income so that I might pursue my studies and also eat. Later, I did take Holy Orders and during Mary’s reign could have passed as a Catholic priest – hence my time as Bonner’s chaplain. But it seemed to me no more than a formality, little better than having conveyed a quiet gift of silver to someone like the former Abbot of Wigmore.

  Even my mother fails to understand this and will, on occasion, berate me for giving up an income for life. But, dear God, I dread to think how many useless blessings have been given by unholy priests invested for money. What you must needs know is that I never believed myself to have been called to it, and thus have ever refused to accept responsibility for the cure of souls. Or the redemption of unquiet spirits.

  A priest’s approach to the unseen must needs be single-minded. He must deem all ghosts satanic, attacking them with a passion, assailing them with missiles of liturgy. And must never let himself become diverted from his task by tantalising and forbidden questions: What is this? Does it exist only in my mind, or has it a chemical reality? What can it tell me about the afterlife? What knowledge can it pass on about the hidden nature of things?

  The questions of a natural philosopher, a man of science. Who may have a firm grounding in divinity and a full devotion to God, but should never in this world don the robes of a practising priest.

  So I must have shown little enthusiasm when, as we came towards Hereford, one of the minor attorneys, a young man called Roger Vaughan, rode alongside me and asked if I were here to offer spiritual counsel.

  It was the close of our third day on the road. Such a company as ours – with ten carts and sixty armed men, for heaven’s sake – would not hope to make good progress. Neither did my relations with Vaughan get off to the most promising of starts.

  ‘Siarad Cymreig, Dr Dee?’

  I’d picked up enough of the language from my tad to know what he was asking, but best for it to stop there.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘My father spoke some Welsh, but I don’t. And never having been to Wales before—’

  ‘Never? Oh.’

  Vaughan was a solemn young man with a half-grown gingery beard and a mild Welshness in his voice. I knew his family was long-established on the border, claiming descent from princes – as, of course, did the Dees. Now he was telling me he’d been in London to study at the inns of court.

  ‘Indeed I was also hoping to study with you, Dr Dee, but… I was told you were away.’

  ‘I do spend a deal of time away. Which is one reason I’ve never had the time to visit Wales.’

  Why would he want to study with me? Although qualified in the law, I’d never practised it except in my own defence. I steadied my horse before a small pond. With all the cattle drovers passing through here, you’d surely expect these roads to be among the best in England.

  ‘You’re also interested in mathematics, Master Vaughan? Astrology, perhaps.’

  ‘I suppose… to a level. But that was not what I— That is, you’re said to be better qualified than anyone in other areas of knowledge.’

  The boy was almost as hesitant as I’d been at his age.

  I said, ‘You mean in matters of the Hidden?’

  ‘Such matters,’ Vaughan said, ‘tend to provoke sneers at the inns of court. But not to someone born and bred in the Border country.’

  ‘Some areas of life are not so easily manipulated as the law,’ I said.

  He laughed. I knew of the Vaughans through word of the Red Book of Hergest, a manuscript in the Welsh language, now nearly two hundred years old, containing the essence of the Mabinogi, the old Welsh mythology full of ancient wisdom and symbolism.

  In fact, a good reason for one day learning Welsh.

  ‘Your family still has the Red Book?’

  ‘On occasion, attempts are made to have it taken deep into Wales, but we resist. The Vaughans… we’re ever concerned with our heritage. Even have, as you may have heard, our own curse – spectral hound foretelling death in the family. However, this matter – the trial, that is – affects my family not at all. Yours, however…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Please understand I’m not trying to pry or to intrude in any way.’ Vaughan’s face was now redder than his hair. ‘I’m simply approaching you as a neighbour, your family home being but an hour’s ride from mine.’

  I had to shake my head.

  ‘Master Vaughan, my family home is at Mortlake on the Thames. I was born in London.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I’m here with my colleague to seek certain antiquities. The proximity of Nant-y-groes is purely coincidental. But if you’re saying there’s a problem there…?’

  ‘Not as such, no.’ Vaughan was looking directly ahead to where a spire had pierced the western clouds. God, the evasiveness of these border folk. ‘Well… not so much Nant-y-groes itself as the nearby village. Pilleth. Which stands to the side of Brynglas Hill. The site of the battle?’

  ‘The battle in which the English were, erm, slaughtered.’ I stared at the churned mud ahead of us, itself like a battlefield. ‘By the Welsh. Led by Owain Glyndwr.’

  ‘And his general, Rhys Gethin,’ Vaughan said.

  My tad had spoken of this, though not in any great detail. Owain Glyndwr’s campaign had begun as a dispute over the ownership of land and developed into a bitter war against England. Glyndwr had declared himself Prince of Wales and laid waste to the border and its strongholds. But this was a hundred and fifty years ago, in the time of King Henry IV.

  I remembered from my Cambridge days learning how, as a young man, Owain Glyndwr had been well known at the English King’s court. He was cultured, well educated, well qualified in the law… and also, it was said, in aspects of the Hidden. No one who knew him would have expected him to become such a ruthless and merciless opponent.

  ‘A place where a thousand men have been slaughtered,’ Vaughan said, ‘is not exactly the easiest place to make a home.’

  ‘But surely Nant-y-groes would have been there, in some form or other, before the battle?’

  ‘However, the village was not. Only isolated f
arms existed before, and no one lived there for years afterwards. But then a few dwellings were built to house farm workers and their families, and—’

  Of a sudden, he urged his horse forward as if to out-race an error, calling back over his shoulder, the wind whipping at his words.

  ‘When you meet members of your family, please don’t mention my approach to you.’

  I caught him up, but the conversation was dead. Ahead of us, the spire was become the body of what I guessed to be Hereford’s cathedral. Close by were the walls and tower of the castle, reddened not by the sun, as there was none, but by the nature of the stone itself.

  Roger Vaughan looked up as an arrowhead of wild geese passed overhead. As if this might be an omen.

  ‘Perchance there’ll be occasion to talk again, Dr Dee,’ he said.

  It had been a curiously muted journey from the start. Each night, we’d lain not at inns but at the country houses of well-off landowners, Justices of the Peace and county sheriffs, the guards all fed and bedded in their outbuildings, the horses accommodated in their stables. Everywhere, we were expected and bedchambers prepared. The talk over dinner was ever friendly but ever cautious.

  Each morning, as we set out, there was, for me, a sense of the ominous. Accuse me, if you like, of living in the shadow of imagined persecution, but I could not believe that only Judge Legge knew of the presence amongst us of a suspected wife-killer believed to have bedded the Queen.

  I watched Dudley riding ahead, with his man John Forest and the captain of the guard. He must have been known to at least one of the owners of the houses where we’d lain. Steps would have been taken to ensure discretion.

  He’d yet told me nothing of what he’d learned at Cumnor Place. What he learned that implied evil.

  Did Dudley prefer to ride at the head of the company because he was disinclined to be surrounded by unknown men with no cause to wish him a long life?

  Unknown armed men. I flinched as a vision of the imagination ripped through me: riders all bunched together and then separating, leaving one man dangling from his horse, dragged by a boot in the stirrup through a river of his own blood.