by Jake Lynch
About the Author
Jake Lynch divides his time between Australia, where he is Associate Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Sydney, and Oxford, where he acts in amateur theatricals and runs a local book group. Previously, Jake enjoyed a twenty-year career in journalism, with spells as a political correspondent for Sky News and the Sydney correspondent for the Independent, culminating in a role as a BBC World presenter. For his work in peace journalism research, training and development, he was honoured with the 2017 Luxembourg Peace Prize, awarded by the Schengen Peace Foundation. In 2020, he will be a Leverhulme Visiting Professor at Coventry University. Jake holds a BA in English and a Diploma in Journalism from Cardiff University, and a PhD from City University, London.
Blood on the Stone
Jake Lynch
This edition first published in 2019
Unbound
6th Floor Mutual House, 70 Conduit Street, London W1S 2GF
www.unbound.com
All rights reserved
© Jake Lynch, 2019
The right of Jake Lynch to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
ISBN (eBook): 978-1-78352-790-8
ISBN (Paperback): 978-1-78352-791-5
Cover design by Mecob
To Annabel and Finn, as ever
Super Patrons
Zainab Abdulnabi
Clariza Denise Ablaza
Nitasha Akerman
Lyn Aldridge
Patricia Aliño
Dan Anlezark
Vanessa Bassil
Ignasius Loyola Adhi Bhaskara
Madeline Brennan
Polixeni Brennan
Birgit Brock-Utne
Michael Brown Woliver
Laura Cairns
Nico Candelario
Leigh Cholakos
Peggy Craddock
Hilmi Dabbagh
Lyn Dickens
Fred Dubee
Saskia Gem Lear
James Godfrey
Vicki Hansen
Annie Herro
Amanda Hickey
Laura Holbach
Brami Jegan
Nimalan Karthikeyan
Dan Kieran
Dong JIn Kim
Robert Kinnane
Simon Lynch
Melissa McCullough
John Mitchinson
Diane Moore
Mark Norman
Biannca Pace
Scott Pack
Andrea Pagella
Erik Paul
Justin Pollard
Richard Powell
Jon Rail
Gobie Rajalingam
Nick Riemer
Senthan Selvarajah
Ahmad Shboul
Antonio Carlos Silva Rosa
Peter Slezak
Tedla Tedla Desta
Lauren Thackray
Leon Thapa
Heather Watkins
Sandra Whitehead
Leanne Wilson
Wei Zhu
Prologue
Monday 17 March, 1681
Captain Edwin Sandys was still a furlong short of the column’s vanguard when a loud bang and bright flash cut through the gloaming. A gunshot – and, judging by the size of the flame, a backfire. Quickening to a canter, he noticed several of the Guards drawing steel as he rode past. Colonel de Vere would be mystified. Moments earlier, the commanding officer’s carriage window had burst open with an irritable clatter, as Sandys bent down to brief him.
‘Well, Captain?’ he snapped.
‘Slight hold-up, sir. Should soon be on our way.’
‘Papists?’ The question was accompanied by a raised eyebrow.
‘No, sir – cattle.’
As the London road narrowed on its final descent through Shotover Woods, the Blues had run into a herd of milking cows, being taken in for the night. Frozen in panic, the animals formed a stubborn barrier. The news was received with a groan. In the order of conveyance, the Royal party itself travelled directly behind the regimental command, and the King was not known for his patience. Sandys remembered the men’s unease at receiving orders to escort His Majesty to Oxford for the forthcoming session of Parliament. He shared the Colonel’s scepticism at the popular notion of a ‘Popish Plot’ against the Crown. But what if it was right after all, and they were now coming under attack?
As the captain approached the front of the convoy, it was clear the shot was a false alarm. The Guards were moving again. One, dismounted by the path-side, had flung off his coat and was now stamping out a smouldering mess of fabric and embers. On the ground by his side lay a flintlock pistol, its hammer down. An irascible countenance, with a Cavalier’s T-shaped moustache and beard, turned in Sandys’ direction: Trooper George Gregory. He’d be in trouble. Discharging a firearm except in battle was deemed conduct prejudicial to military order and discipline.
‘What d’you think you’re doing, soldier?’
‘Clearing the King’s highway for His Majesty.’ The shot had caused a stampede, and the terrified beasts were trampling through the straggly bushes bordering the laneway.
‘Well, you should clean your weapon properly. Give it here.’
A quick examination of the gun showed the errant Guardsman was lucky. Sure enough, the mechanism was caked with residues he had not bothered to scrape off. But the extent of blowback through the touch-hole had been small, mostly diverted sideways by the frizzen, with the rest baffled by his tunic’s thick upturned cuff. Looking around for a fellow officer as he returned the firearm to its owner, Sandys’ gaze settled on the most junior of his colleagues, Captain Thomas Lucy.
‘Kindly keep your company in order, sir! That shot would’ve been heard in the Royal carriage.’
‘Sorry, Captain Sandys. Won’t happen again,’ the younger man replied, whey-faced.
The last of the cattle were disappearing up a slope on the far side of the hedgerow, and Sandys felt a pang of concern on seeing the young woman who’d been tending them set off in forlorn pursuit. If the herd should come to any harm, it would risk turning the countryside against the Royal party before they had even reached their destination. But his qualms were cut short by an urgent call from behind.
‘Colonel’s orders – make haste: Old Rowley is furious!’ (Old Rowley was the King’s nickname, after one of his stallions – a backhanded compliment to his sexual appetite. On this occasion the Royal party included not one but two of his mistresses.)
So the column pressed on towards their muster point on the meadow of Christ Church College. There, His Majesty would find succour, as his father had before him, during the Civil War; the Guards would be allocated their billets, stable their horses, and disperse for the night.
Chapter 1
Parliament Comes to Oxford
It had been one of those Oxford mornings when mist seems to percolate from scholastic limestone and half-dissolve the domes and spires, as though they had been dreamt into existence overnight and were about to fade away. By noon, however, the vapour had nearly all burnt off. The pale, unflattering daylight picked out the brown builder’s dust filming the windows of The Unicorn and Jacob’s Well, a tavern just opened on Fish Street, opposite Christ Church.
>
Luke Sandys, Chief Officer of the Oxford Bailiffs, had already made two calls to chase up the unpaid licence fee, and now his patience was at an end. As they emerged from the Guildhall, Robshaw, his deputy, was squinting and rubbing his eyes.
‘I still don’t see why we have to call again.’
‘That’s because you’re hung over, Robshaw – or still drunk.’
‘Why, if a man gets paid in ale for an early shift, what’s he to do?’
‘While you’re a constable, you’re supposed to be on a break from the brewery.’
‘Aye, but malt still needs turning. They got me to come in special, like. Big order on, see, what with them political folk coming to town. ’Tis reckoned they’ll be thirsty, from all that talking.’
Luke stopped, turned to face him, and sighed. Through their bushy-browed, bloodshot defiance, the other man’s eyes glinted with native intelligence, beneath furrows of vexation deepened by a shapeless black hat pulled down tight over unruly blond locks.
‘Yes, normally we would be content to wait for the licensee to pay up. But these are not normal times.’ He was rewarded with an indeterminate grunt. ‘That tavern is just across from the chambers that will house the King and Queen.’
‘King and mistresses, more like.’
‘Be that as it may. I’m not having the City exposed. If anything untoward goes on in those premises, and they turn out to be unlicensed, it’ll come back on us.’ With that, Luke turned and strode off down the slope in the direction of Christ Church. Robshaw dug his hands further into his pockets, set his shoulders, and plodded along behind.
*
The door opened on a rowdy scene, with as many as two dozen drinkers already well into their cups. Luke marched across to the counter.
‘Unsworth, how’s this? You’re not to entertain customers till your licence is paid in full, you know that.’
A crafty gleam in his eye, the landlord replied: ‘Why, Master Sandys, you see, these gentlemen ain’t customers, they’re guests. This here’s a private dinner.’
‘A liquid one!’ a loud voice exclaimed from the back of the room, to general merriment.
Luke made no move to leave, and a tall, aquiline character approached them, whereupon the din lowered appreciably.
‘I’m sure you’ll find whatever outstanding debt may remain will be paid with due despatch.’ A sidelong glare at the innkeeper added an undertone of menace to the otherwise emollient voice. ‘We are a bona fide political society, sir, and we are holding a meeting here.’ Greying temples only served to accentuate the speaker’s air of calm authority.
‘Aye – and lifting the cloven foot of Popery off the throats of freeborn Englishmen,’ came a growl from a thickset, hard-looking character at the end of the bar, whose intervention was greeted by noisy approval. The senior man hushed them by lifting a hand.
‘That will do, Hawkins. William Harbord Esquire, Member of Parliament for Thetford, Norfolk, at your service, sirs.’
‘Luke Sandys, sir. Chief Bailiff’s Officer.’ Somewhere close behind him, Robshaw grunted again.
‘I’m sure neither you nor the City would want to interfere with our liberties,’ Harbord continued. In an oddity Luke had overlooked on entering, every man wore a small green ribbon. He knew about the blue ribbons of the Whigs, or Country Party, and the Tories’ red, but this was new.
‘Why, we just turned away a gentleman, Luke, as wanted to come in,’ Unsworth wheedled. ‘We’re not open for business, not really.’
‘That “gentleman” was not a member of this club,’ Harbord said frostily.
‘Very well, sirs. Finish your meeting, but this must be the last alcohol served on these premises before the fee is fully paid.’ Luke quit the inn with Robshaw in tow, and resolved to ask his brother Edwin that evening – assuming he arrived in time for supper – about the green ribbons.
*
Next on their list of jobs was to advise on arrangements for royal security at the Bodleian Library, where the King would open the parliamentary session in the Convocation House. A red-coated military officer consulted a sheet of paper, pegged to a board of wood, as they approached.
‘Sandys?’
‘At your service, sir.’ Robshaw emitted yet another grunt.
‘Captain Sutherland. Foot Guards.’ He turned abruptly to a newly fitted door in the medieval Divinity School, opposite the back entrance of the Sheldonian Theatre.
‘This won’t do, Sandys. ’Tis a weak point. His Majesty will pass through right behind this door.’
Luke ran his hand over the timber. It seemed substantial enough. But the twitching of Sutherland’s ginger moustache was matched by his officious tone.
‘You’ll have to station constables outside at all times, is that clear?’
‘Crystal,’ Luke mouthed absently, but the deputy, roused at last from his stupor, cut loudly across him:
‘Daft idea!’
Sutherland turned on him at once, seething.
‘You will obey orders, damn you!’
But Robshaw merely planted his feet wider apart, hooked his thumbs in the belt that stretched across his ample waist, and returned the officer’s glare.
‘Not yours, I won’t.’
‘Robshaw!’ Luke warned.
‘Well, it don’t make no sense, do it? We should be out keeping an eye on troublemakers, not standing around behind the Sheldonian.’
Luke was suddenly aware of a tension that had been building up behind his brow. With an effort, he redoubled his concentration on the situation in hand.
‘He has a point, Captain. Surely the best contribution we can make to the King’s security in Oxford is by drawing on our local knowledge.’ Sutherland looked back to Luke and released the hilt of his sword – only after a moment of clenched fury.
‘I suppose you have a list of all the Papists hereabouts?’ The initial plosive ‘P’ was spat out with contempt.
‘We know where they are.’
‘Very well. But I shall want your men on duty here from daybreak on the first morning of Parliament.’ With that, Sutherland turned on his heel and bade Luke a curt good-day.
‘Looks like he’s got a sword stuck up his arse, that one,’ Robshaw said, as the officer marched stiffly away.
As they left, Luke glanced up at the Sheldonian’s smooth grey curvature. The building had made the reputation of Christopher Wren, a hero from his student days. The door that upset Sutherland was installed at the architect’s behest, to allow graduands to robe up in the Divinity School before walking across the narrow gap between the two buildings to reach their graduation ceremonies. Now his own son, Sam, was a bound apprentice in Wren’s London practice, working on the new St Paul’s Cathedral. But the boy had left a gap in the Sandys household when they’d waved him off, months earlier; and the gap, Luke realised, was starting to ache. Then, he’d had to suppress a wave of nausea, to go with his throbbing head, at the Captain’s menacing reference to ‘Papists’. There was one Roman Catholic household he routinely missed off any such incriminating list – but not even Robshaw knew about that, he was certain.
*
A sharp ‘clack’ sounded a discordant note amid the tinkling bells attached to the frame of Simon Gibson’s door as Luke pushed it open. The apothecary seemed to put something down in a hurry behind the counter, rubbing his mouth on his sleeve as he mumbled a greeting: ‘Why, Master Sandys, sir! Good day to you – good day indeed.’
‘Good day, Gibson,’ Luke said, suddenly on his guard. ‘Anything I should know about?’ he enquired, nodding towards the hidden shelf. A faint sickly-sweet undercurrent joined the familiar waft of herbal and floral scents that filled the shaded interior.
‘Why nay, sir, ’twas just some of that new tonic – laudanum, they call it.’ The man lifted an empty cup on to the surface to show his customer.
‘Laudanum – worthy of praise,’ Luke quickly translated.
‘’Tis surely that, sir. Strange thing is, once a man’s tr
ied it, he always comes back for more. Maybe I can interest you…?’
‘Nay, one of your milder remedies should suffice. ’Tis only a headache.’
‘As you wish. Some of this wood betony perhaps? Picked fresh this morning, from Wytham.’ He produced a vase of greenery from a ledge at the back of the shop. ‘Just wants making up into a nice hot drink, with a pinch of salt and a touch of honey.’
‘Aye, that’ll do. Thank you kindly.’ Luke handed the man a coin, and took his leave.
Chapter 2
Brotherly Reunion
A draught of the infusion, and a lie down, eased Luke’s physical ailments at least. The family home on Magpie Lane presented a deceptively modest frontage to the world at large. Behind lay a capacious interior, which tended these days to an almost sepulchral quiet, the daytime hubbub of the nearby High Street muffled by its thick stone walls. The children’s pattering footsteps and excitedly raised voices, enlivening the sombre rooms and corridors, were now a fading memory. Today, even Luke’s prized possession – one of the new pendulum clocks, accurate to within fifteen seconds a day, and obtained at great expense from a London merchant – brought him no consolation. From its niche in the hallway, its loud ‘tick-tock’ seemed to build up, layer on layer, into a jarring resonance.
Luke had begun the long-overdue job of restoring order to his study, but found he tended to clutch at any opportunity for distraction. He leafed through one of his father’s favourite books, retrieved from the back of a shelf: The Practice of Piety, by a Puritan, Lewis Bayly. Its doctrine of predestination was theological poison these days, as Anglican orthodoxy was prosecuted with ever greater official zeal. Better keep it out of sight. Still, Samuel Sandys had never let his nonconformist convictions get in the way of worldly advancement. Success in his trade of fine joinery had paid for Luke’s university place, and Edwin’s commission in the Royal Horse Guards. ‘Keep your shop,’ he would say, ‘and your shop will keep you.’ Fingering the intricate oak decorations on the arms of his favourite chair, Luke remembered helping the old man to carve it: a lucrative commission from a college Fellow who found himself embarrassed when it came to pay. So, they decided to use it themselves. A rare occasion when his father indulged in a bit of luxury – a comfortable seat on which to pore over his accounts.
