The Final Sacrament

by James Forrester

  Clarenceux walked into the room feeling nauseous. Behind him he heard Dethick stumbling out, retching. In the cauldron he saw the loose dark hair stuck to the metal and patches of skull exposed where parts of the flesh had fallen from the bone. There was much fat and swollen white skin. The jaw had loosened and the lips come away, revealing the roots of the teeth in the skull. The eye sockets were emptied where the eyeballs had burst open. On seeing this, coupled with the smell of the boiled flesh, Clarenceux had to turn away.

  In the army, at Boulogne, more than two decades earlier, he had watched a surgeon disembowel and dismember a dead man—and then carefully boil each limb in a large cauldron, so the clean bones could be taken back to England for burial. But that had been done formally and properly, in the open air, and for a solemn reason. It had been an unpleasant exercise, but it had been motivated by honor and respect. This was quite the opposite: a horrific thing intended only to put fear into him, and one that dishonored the murdered woman.

  He crossed himself and left the kitchen.

  Outside, he blinked in the light. He walked to Fyndern and took the reins of Dethick’s horse. “Go and find the constable. Tell him a woman has been murdered in a house in Fleet Street and that her head has been boiled. Her name was Sarah Cowie. Say that the house is in the tenancy of one John Greystoke, a man in the employment of Mr. Francis Walsingham.”

  “Sir, I will. May I look first?”

  “If you feel you must.”

  Dethick was leaning against the front wall of the building, looking green.

  “Sir Gilbert, I will set out on my visitation tomorrow.”

  Dethick straightened himself. He took the reins of his horse and mounted. He said nothing but pulled on the reins and rode slowly back toward the College.

  ***

  After they had given evidence to the coroner, Clarenceux and Thomas took the horses for exercise. They rode silently beyond Islington and as far as Stoke Newington, returning by way of the main road to the city. The Tower of London, the cathedral tower, and all the lesser steeples of the city bristled against the horizon as they rode back southward. They passed a flock of sheep on the road, and a man carting chickens into the capital. A timber cart was stuck on the side, its wheel broken by a deep rut. Thomas sensed Clarenceux’s anger from his rigid posture and his knuckles as he clutched the reins.

  Across the sky was a pale golden light, as if the sun was trying to break through the clouds but was forbidden from shining on the city today. At Kingsland, Clarenceux deliberately rode off the highway toward an enclosure of cows, over some rough land that was the vestige of a common. There he stopped and dismounted, and walked along a narrow path, leading Brutus to a wider area, where the trees surrounded a grassy mound and a small stream ran nearby. He let Brutus nibble at the grass on the mound and stood still, looking at the stream and across the fields.

  Neither man spoke. Thomas believed that he knew what his master was thinking, yet at the same time he knew that these thoughts were going further, building higher, digging deeper. The man had been crushed into the darkest corner of his soul—and yet he was still unconquered.

  “I am going to bring it to an end, Thomas. There is no other way.”

  “Sir, forgive me—what do you mean?”

  In the distance, the city bells began to ring the hour.

  “I am going to destroy all my enemies and the document.”

  “How, Mr. Clarenceux?”

  “After we return home, I want you to go into the city and buy two more horses and a cart. I also want you to go to Mr. Carstens, the Dutch apothecary that Mr. Knott uses, and buy as much gunpowder as he can sell you. A whole keg—two, if he has so much. When you have the gunpowder and the cart, I want you to bore a couple of holes in the bottom of that iron-bound oak chest in the old shop and take it to Thame Abbey. I will give you detailed instructions.”

  He stared across the fields, listening to the noise of the stream. A shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds and cut its way through the leaves of the trees.

  Clarenceux continued, “When the day comes, you will wait at an inn in Thame, the Saracen’s Head. I will tell the captors to take Awdrey and Mildred there. You will then send me a date as a code, via Alice. If it is them, choose an even number; but if there is bad news, make the month a winter one. If they are dead, choose the present day’s date.”

  “You don’t worry that you are being too hasty?”

  “I would sooner bring down the judgment of Hell and all its dark angels now, and destroy my enemies now, than let them ruin another life. Or allow them the luxury of planning their next move. Do not get me wrong; I have been thinking and planning a long while now. I will hand over the document to the people who have stolen Awdrey from me—and I will do it in person. They will not be able to leave with it until I hear she is safe. But when I do hear…that is when I will destroy the building and everything in it.”

  “But Mr. Clarenceux—that means you too will be destroyed.”

  Clarenceux turned to face him. “Think about Awdrey. Think about my daughters. I have no doubt that they will grieve for me—but their lives are at stake. I want my daughters to have a chance of life and that requires me to risk everything, including my own life.”

  “But Mr. Claren—”

  Clarenceux held up a hand. “Thomas, no more. Your part in my plan is going to be vital. It has to be done, so let us do it well.”

  73

  Sunday, February 9

  The remains of Sarah Cowie were interred in the morning. The chaplain said a few prayers in the church, heard only by Clarenceux. A woman had cleaned out the cauldron and sewn the remains of the head into a leather budget; she had washed and prepared the headless corpse for its shroud, but she had no wish to attend the funeral. She accepted her money from Clarenceux and left.

  After the interment in the cemetery of St. Bride’s, Clarenceux spoke to the chaplain. He looked into the grave and crossed himself, aware that the gravediggers were nearby, anxious to fill it in. The chaplain too wanted to go. Clarenceux closed his eyes and fumbled in a pocket. He pulled out some coins.

  “You do not know this, Mr. Bowring, but that woman had a secret. She was compromised by a Catholic woman in the north who thought that by forcing women to carry out her acts of terror, she could avoid arousing suspicion. But in using Sarah, that Catholic woman miscalculated. Not every thief is without conscience. And Sarah especially had compassion. Her fall was that she once gave into temptation: she stole some plates and other pewter things worth a total of four shillings and two pence. I would like to atone for that, her original crime, and donate to one of the altars the same sum for the benefit of her soul.”

  Bowring looked sternly at Clarenceux. “Mr. Clarenceux, we do not maintain altar funds as we used to in the old days. It is against the law. And if she was a thief…”

  “But, Mr. Bowring, please—for the benefit of her soul.”

  “I am quite sure that her soul is in Heaven or Hell as she deserves, Mr. Clarenceux, and there is nothing you can do about it now,” he said, turning away.

  “Then for the poor,” implored Clarenceux, following him, trying to control his anger. “Can you accept it on behalf of her soul for the poor?” He put his left hand firmly on Bowring’s shoulder to stop him. When Bowring turned around, Clarenceux held the coins up in his face. “For the poor—or have you forgotten them?”

  “Very well,” Bowring said coldly. “For the poor.” He took the money. “Good day, Mr. Clarenceux. May the souls of all the departed rest in peace.” He bowed and walked away across the churchyard.

  Clarenceux silently said the words of the Lord’s Prayer to himself, then went into the church and sat alone. He thought of Sarah Cowie’s fate, and Rebecca Machyn’s, and that of his servant Joan, and his wife’s plight. Their suffering made him angry again, and helped him fix his mind on what he now h
ad to do.

  He would never again attend a service in this church. He looked up at the carved vine–entwined columns; after thirty years, he was going to leave forever. The place he sat in would be occupied by someone else. His place as Clarenceux would be taken by someone else. The idea of dying seemed not an end of himself but so many pieces of his identity falling apart. There would still be someone living in his house, someone sitting in his place in church, someone acting as Clarenceux: it was just that that person would have a different heart. What was in his mind would disperse, and what mattered of his life would be continued through his daughters, even though they did not see what he saw or know what he knew. For a moment it seemed unambiguously clear, how unimportant knowledge was. Knowledge seemed just a means to an end, like his house or his possessions—not an end in itself.

  He rose from the pew. After forty-eight years of life, most of it thinking and preparing, he had knowledge in abundance. If it was just a means to an end, he was going to put it to good use.

  ***

  Back at his house, Clarenceux assisted Thomas in boring two holes in the base of the chest that he kept in the closed-up shop. He then helped him move it onto the cart that Thomas had bought. Fyndern had taken a shine to one of the new horses: a pretty young brown-and-white mare. Clarenceux watched him brushing the animal’s coat and realized it was a long time since he had seen him with a pack of cards. There had been a change in him, a loss of desperation.

  As Thomas and the boy rode away on the cart, Fyndern turned and waved.

  74

  Monday, February 10

  Clarenceux awoke to hear movements in his daughter’s bedchamber. For one miraculous moment he believed that she was there, and that everything else—the shooting, the abductions, the killings—had all been a dream. Then he realized that the space where his wife slept was still empty; it was Alice in his daughter’s bed, not Annie. It all came back to him. He wept and clenched his fist and beat the mattress, his mind focused on the image of the white-haired Greystoke; the lizardlike, blinking Maurice Buckman; and that old, bitter woman in the north, Lady Percy. He yearned wholeheartedly for their destruction.

  He rose, opened the shutters, and went to the ewer. To his surprise it was not empty but full of clean water. He filled the basin and washed his face, neck, hands, and wrists, then his feet, and pulled off his shirt and washed his arms and armpits. There was a clean towel nearby; he dried himself. In the chest, when he looked, was a pile of clean shirts. She will make someone a fine wife when she grows up, he thought.

  The morning was spent writing letters. Alone in his chamber, he cut a quill to the right shape and neatly made a central cut to draw the ink. The first letter he wrote was to Tom Griffiths, a tenant of his, who was always struggling with money; he forgave him the rent due. Next he wrote to his friend in Chislehurst, Julius Fawcett. In his letter he explained what he had decided to do and expressed his regret that they had not seen more of each other in the last year or so. Julius’s friendship had meant much to him: their love of old things and past times had in truth not just been about the past but about a shared love of humanity. He added that he was going to bequeath all the chronicles left in his possession to the College of Arms but hoped that Julius would examine them first and select any that he particularly wanted for his own library.

  The next three letters were business-related. He wrote to Sir Richard Wenman promising him the return of his chronicle soon. In a quick note to John Hooker of Exeter, he supplied some details of how he thought Sir Peter Carew might be able to claim the barony of Idrone in Ireland. He wrote also to Sir William Cecil, enclosing instructions for Walsingham. When that was done, he pushed away his chair and sat back, preparing to write to Awdrey.

  Hungry, he went down to the kitchen and helped himself to some of Fyndern and Alice’s bread. Looking for things to do, he helped Alice tidy the kitchen; he saw to Maud and Brutus in the stables; he even took out the first batch of letters and gave them to a messenger boy at the city gate to dispatch. But then, walking back over Fleet Bridge, the city bells started to ring. That letter had to be written now.

  In fact, two last letters had to be written—one to Awdrey and the other to his sister-in-law in Devon. Both were difficult. He started writing one, then the other, and each time found himself overcome by emotion. Having torn them both up, he took another sheet and started again, and within minutes he was either crossing out words that did not express his feelings adequately or rubbing his face with his sleeve. The truth was that, as soon as he thought of Awdrey, he imagined Greystoke having her and felt sick. Only gradually did he push the image of the man away and see her as she was, and also rediscover himself as he had been before he became consumed by hatred for his enemies. Time passed. He wanted to write more—but the city clocks struck again, and it was time to bring the last letter to a close. He kissed the page, folded it, and sealed it with the seal on his desk.

  It was done. Looking around his study, he saw the old familiar books in the book presses, some still damaged from Walsingham’s searching of his house three years earlier. He got up and took the Old Testament he had read to Annie, kissed it, and said a short prayer for her, placing it flat on the table. He ran his fingers over Henry Machyn’s chronicle. What will they make of that strange document in the future? he wondered. Finally, he handled his father’s sword, remembering the bearded old man and his kindness, and set it down next to the Bible. The time has come, he thought. My time has come.

  ***

  At Cecil House that afternoon, Annie wanted to play and talk and tell childish jokes. Clarenceux did not mind. For a few moments he was able to forget what was happening to him and enter into her world. Lady Cecil had given her a cat; it had brown and black stripes and sharp claws that dug into Clarenceux’s shoulder when he picked it up. Annie was delighted. She had created a sleeping place for it inside her bed and named it Caxton. He had laughed when she said she had first thought of calling it Pursuivant. “Only a herald’s daughter would think of that,” he said.

  Eventually he had to say it was time for him to go. He embraced her and told her he would not be able to visit again until Friday. But then he hoped to see her and Sir William. He did his very best to sound encouraging—and did not mention that Friday would be the last time they would see each other.

  ***

  Alice helped him pack for the trip to Oxford. He in return looked through his wife’s old clothes chest for a dress that Alice could wear. He selected a practical dark green one with a small amount of lace trimming at the neck and buttons on the sleeves. He found a highcrowned hat, a jupp, and a safeguard for her too, to keep her dry on the journey, and leather boots and linen socks. In clothes befitting a lady, Alice was indeed beautiful—but nothing was going to erase the image in Clarenceux’s mind of her dancing in a black smock.

  They rode together in silence for fifteen miles, he on Brutus, she on Maud. Dusk forced them to stop for the night at an inn in Uxbridge. Eating together by candlelight at the table in their chamber, he asked her more about her childhood. She told him that her parents were both dead, and her sister, who was younger, was living with an uncle—a violent man who beat her regularly. He terrified the girl so much she would sometimes shake and be incapable of moving, holding her hands over her face as he came close to her. And when he touched her, she went like stone—unable to cry out or even speak.

  They drank more wine, but the alcohol drew them further apart. It made them more of what they were. Clarenceux became more serious, brooding on what lay ahead; Alice, more lighthearted, more conversational. She offered to dance for him. He shook his head. She danced anyway, performing the same routine in his wife’s dress, barefoot, that he had seen her dance in the tavern. It was very different, seeing her dance privately; he had been astonished by her self-confidence in front of the crowd as much as her eroticism the first time. Without the crowd, her performance, in the light of just tw
o candles, made him feel very uneasy. He turned away. What she was doing was captivating—and for that very reason he did not want to watch. The girl did not understand. She stopped and came over to him; she affectionately called him “a sad, old goat,” and ran her fingers through his hair. He poured more wine for each of them.

  As the fire in their chamber burned down and just a single candle was left alight, Clarenceux declared it time to sleep. He pulled out the truckle bed and dragged it into the middle of the room. Kneeling at the basin, they washed their hands and faces together, and he washed his mouth out, scrubbing his teeth with his finger. Alice glanced at him furtively, and when he had dried his hands, she came to him and turned her back to him, asking for help to undo the dress. He undid the topmost laces at the back. “More, please,” she asked. Unwillingly, he obliged, ignoring her pale skin. Leaving her, he took off his boots, lifted the sheets and blankets, and lay down in the main bed, fully dressed.

  Standing in the middle of the room in her smock, she smiled at him and walked very slowly to the bed. She put her hand on the counterpane. “I want to lie with you,” she said.

  Clarenceux turned over. “And I want to lie with my wife. We cannot all have what we want.”

  75

  Shrove Tuesday, February 11

  Alice was bright and friendly the following day, as if nothing had happened. She brought Clarenceux fresh water and joined him for a breakfast of bread and cheese before they left the inn. As they rode, the girl talked cheerfully about Halifax and how it was before the Dutch refugees had arrived, which had led to a rise in the level of hostility in the town. She told Clarenceux of the way they executed thieves there by beheading them with a wooden machine. This contained a wide blade set in a heavy block which descended along grooves in the side of the frame. The blade was raised high and the victim placed underneath, with his hands tied. Everyone from the town—or as many as could get near—took a part in the act of pulling on the rope that removed the peg holding up the blade. The latter descended with a huge rush—so forcefully it could easily sever a bull’s head.