by S. J. Parris
‘Well, we may learn more tomorrow night at Arundel House,’ Fowler mutters, as we pass the magnificent doors of the south transept and turn our steps away from the churchyard. ‘The Earl of Arundel is giving a supper party for the usual guests.’
‘I fear I am not top of the Howards’ invitation list.’
‘I’m sure the ambassador can find a way to include you. Speak to him. And let us keep our wits sharp. Which way are you walking?’
I pause, glancing towards the mouth of a narrow alley that leads between timber-framed buildings to a lane that will take me down to Paul’s Wharf. ‘To the river. I will see you soon, no doubt.’
‘Are you heading west? Perhaps we could take a boat together?’
‘Mortlake. But I think it will be quicker if I go alone. I mean no offence,’ I add, quickly, ‘only I am late already. And we should be careful.’ I glance over my shoulder.
‘Mortlake? You are not going to see Walsingham?’ He drops his voice again.
‘No. An acquaintance who lives nearby.’
He gives me a long look through narrowed eyes, as if he suspects this is not the whole truth. Perhaps he imagines I am attempting to pass him by, taking some juicy scrap of information to Walsingham that I have kept back from him. Such doubts has our master bred into us; instinctively we sift every man’s words for double meanings, even those we are supposed to trust.
‘God speed, then - you have a long journey.’ Fowler hesitates, as if he has grown suddenly shy. ‘I am glad we spoke of these matters, Bruno. Ours can be a lonely task at times, do you not feel? It is my hope that we can combine our wits and energies to find Walsingham the proof he needs to bring all these intriguers to justice. Well. You know where I am if ever you need a confidant, or some company.’ Then he claps me on the back, pulls up his collar and walks away briskly towards Carter Lane, while I turn towards the river as fat raindrops begin to spit emphatically from the darkening sky.
Chapter Eleven
Mortlake, south-west London
1st October, Year of Our Lord 1583
Out on the river, I find a moment of calm to unravel my tangled thoughts for the first time in what seems like days. The rain clouds have hastened the dusk, and I sit in the prow of the little wherry wrapped in my cloak and a curtain of thin drizzle, lulled by the rhythm of the oars, looking out at the lights winking from windows of the riverside buildings. I have been fortunate in finding one of the few boatmen who doesn’t feel the need to fill the journey with idle chatter; his lantern sways on its hook as he pulls against the tide and in the absence of voices, my thoughts return again to Marie’s behaviour this morning. My refusing her, with the best of intentions, has left me at her mercy, should she decide to make trouble for me. Perhaps it would have been easier to offer her some encouragement, allow her some small measure of what she wanted. In that moment of closeness, when she had leaned in to kiss me, my body had remembered what it was to be touched. It was some months since I had kissed a woman, and that had not ended well. What I had told Marie was true - my years in the Dominican order had at least taught me to master desire, to subdue the stubborn cravings of the body. But no amount of self-discipline can blot out loneliness from the heart. The life I have chosen - or had forced upon me, I am never sure which - offers little opportunity for intimacy of any kind. A writer, especially a writer in exile, must learn to be self-contained, to be content within his own mind, and for the most part I am so. But there is always, somewhere inside, however muted, the dull ache of a longing that I sometimes fear will be a lifelong companion. If I were a different man, I might have had no qualms about Marie; a man like Douglas, I imagine, would not think twice about taking any woman who offered herself. But apart from my loyalty to Castelnau, there is a coldness in Marie that instinctively repels me, even while her obvious attractions draw me in. Inevitably, my thoughts drift back to Sophia Underhill, the last woman I had held in my arms, the one whose mind and beauty had pierced my careful defences only a few months ago. I wonder where she is now and whether she has found some happiness.
Usually when my thoughts tend along this path, I can rein them back by setting my mind to work through the ordered paces of my memory wheel. This evening the images all meta-morphose into a picture of Marie’s lips; as a remedy, it is not especially effective.
As a result, I arrive in Mortlake as soaked in melancholy as in drizzle. Dusk has fallen and along the river bank the shapes of dwellings and trees grow indistinct, blurred by rain against a grey sky. I shiver, and feel suddenly very far from home. I must take hold of myself, I say sternly; my one firm purpose here is to find a killer, and self-pity is a distraction for weak minds.
At first there is no answer from Dee’s house; I stand at the door for some minutes as the rain grows steadily harder, and a cold anxiety creeps up to my throat. Perhaps the whole household has been taken for questioning; perhaps Ned Kelley has returned and is keeping the door barred. I shade my brow with my hand and try to peer through one of the small casements to the side of the front door, but there is no light within. Just as I am contemplating looking for a window I can force or break to climb in, there is a creak and the door opens a crack to show the flame of a candle.
‘Mistress Dee, it is I, Giordano Bruno, come to hear if there is news from court.’ I rush back to the porch, relieved. The face of a woman scowls at me from the darkness within. It is not Dee’s wife. ‘I beg your pardon. Is your mistress at home?’
She turns away; I hear footsteps, voices in hushed conference, then the door is opened wider but no more graciously. Behind the sullen servant I catch sight of Jane Dee, who steps forward into the light as the door is closed behind me, the toddler Arthur hanging on to her skirts, his small oval face tilted warily up to me.
‘Doctor Bruno.’ She smiles, but the strain shows around her eyes. The baby on her hip rubs its eyes with a small fist, knocking its linen cap awry; Jane expertly rights it with one hand, her expression tightening back to anxiety. She is about thirty years of age, not beautiful but with a kind, open face; Dee depends on her utterly and has joked that I must never think of marrying unless I can find another woman like Jane. I have the greatest respect for her; there are not many wives who would tolerate a house filled with the smell of boiling horse dung and the best of the household income going on manuscripts and astronomical instruments. Her hair is bound up untidily, with strands coming loose where the infant clutches at them, and she looks pale, older than her years. She raises her face to me and attempts another smile.
‘Do you bring news about my husband?’
‘No.’ I hold out my hands, a show of emptiness. ‘I came because I hoped you might have heard some.’
She glances briefly at the maid, who still hovers by the door, something irritatingly furtive in her posture. Jane gestures to me with her head, shifts the baby to her other hip, and I follow her and Arthur along a passageway and into a chilly parlour, where a fire is dying in the hearth. Jane pokes it and a feeble shower of sparks issues up the chimney; for a brief moment the logs gamely struggle back into life. She looks at me apologetically.
‘Take off your wet cloak, Doctor Bruno, and stand here by our sad apology for a fire, if you will. They came for him late last night.’ She brushes her hair from her face and bounces the infant gently to soothe it. Arthur sits down cross-legged, close to his mother’s feet, his eyes still fixed on me. ‘Five men in royal colours, said it was urgent. They bundled him out into a boat, hardly gave him a chance to fetch his cloak.’ Her mouth presses into a white line.
‘Were they rough?’ I lower my voice, glancing at the boy. Jane shakes her head tightly.
‘No. But they were armed, if you can believe it. Why would she send armed men for my husband, Doctor Bruno, who has never done anyone a stroke of harm in his life?’
I hesitate.
‘There was another murder at court. Earlier in the evening. You had not heard?’
Her eyes widen.
‘I have not been out. I have had enough t
o do with the comings and goings here.’ Her face darkens. ‘A murder? But surely -? What has that to do with us?’
‘When Doctor Dee went to see the queen the night before the murder,’ I begin, in the same low voice, ‘he described to her a vision of a red-haired woman violently killed. What he described was almost exactly what happened the following night to one of the queen’s maids, who had red hair. Not surprisingly, your husband’s apparent foreknowledge is a matter of interest to the Privy Council. These murders are regarded as a threat to the queen herself.’ I pause again, unsure how much I should divulge. Jane nods slowly, her lips still pressed tight. The baby grizzles; without looking, Jane inserts the knuckle of her little finger into its mouth, and it gnaws gratefully.
‘So they believe he prophesied it by some devilry?’ Her scorn is somehow reassuring.
‘I think they are more interested in whether he could have learned of it by more ordinary means.’
She frowns.
‘But of course it wasn’t his vision,’ she says, and the bitterness is unmistakable.
‘No. The vision was told to him by the cunning-man Kelley.’
‘Who has not been seen these past four days,’ she finishes. ‘But naturally my husband won’t tell the queen that. Won’t want her to think he doesn’t have the gift. Poor John.’ She laughs sadly. ‘He doesn’t have it and he never will. It’s not something you can get from books, however much time and money you spend fretting over them. My own grandmother had it, so I should know - she could divine with the sieve and the shears, and tell dreams. But if you ask me, that Ned Kelley has no such gift either. Kelley is many things - and it wouldn’t surprise me if a murderer was one of them - but he doesn’t see the future nor speak with any spirits.’ She nods a full stop and shifts the baby to her other hip.
‘We are agreed on that,’ I say, with feeling. ‘But I would like to know where Ned Kelley had his prophecy from. It cannot be coincidence. And I fear your husband’s loyalty to him is more than he deserves. If John knows anything, he will not divulge it to the queen’s advisors, and I fear that will be to his own cost.’
Jane sucks in her cheeks and glances down at the boy, who has nudged himself a few inches nearer to my feet.
‘You never spoke truer there, Doctor Bruno. It has been a sore enough subject between us these past months. God in heaven only knows how John has allowed himself to be duped by that man, I cannot account for it. Sleeping under our roof, taking the bread from our table, from the mouths of my babes -‘ She breaks off, realising how her voice has risen; there is a sudden colour in her cheeks. Little Arthur cranes his head up with interest.
‘Who took the bread from the table?’
‘Hush, my dove.’ Jane stops, motions to me to be silent. We all stand still for a moment, straining to hear, then she tiptoes across the room and flings open the parlour door. The scrabble of hurried footsteps can be heard retreating up the passage. Jane jerks her head towards the sound and casts me a meaningful look, as if to say, You see what I have to put up with?
‘You said there had been comings and goings here,’ I say, as she closes the door again. ‘What did you mean?’
‘John’s library. You know how he welcomes all comers, says his collection should be for any scholar who knows how to read them with due care? All except his magic books, naturally,’ she adds, dropping her voice. ‘Well, this very morning, while John is still detained at court, a man turned up on the doorstep, well before nine, saying he had travelled a long road to consult a particular manuscript, and that he had letters from my husband granting him permission.’ The baby grizzles and she offers it her knuckle again. It seems less willing to be fobbed off this time, and turns its face away, its cheeks an angry red. ‘I didn’t like to let a stranger in with John away and me here on my own with the babies, but neither did I like to turn the fellow away, for John never did, though you can imagine the sorts that fetch up at our door.’
I think of Kelley, and nod. ‘So you let him in?’
‘I didn’t know what else to do.’ She looks up, pained.
‘Did he show you these letters?’
‘He showed me some papers - you have to understand I don’t read well myself, Doctor Bruno, but I know my own husband’s signature. So I let him into the outer library, but I told him I wouldn’t know where to begin with this book he wanted. I said he’d have to look it out for himself, if he could, but as you know, John keeps no rhyme nor reason to his bookshelves.’
‘Did he tell you the title of this book?’
She frowns.
‘I’m sure he must have, but I don’t know if I recall. It was Latin.’ She shakes her head. ‘In any case, it seems he didn’t find it, because I kept an eye on him. Dropped in every few minutes, you know. I’m not a fool - some of those books are worth a year’s wages and I wouldn’t put it past anyone to try and steal them, no matter how much of a fine gentleman they dress. John has noticed a few missing, though I put that down to our house guest.’ Her lips draw tight with dislike.
‘He was a gentleman, then, this visitor?’ I ask, suspicion pricking. ‘Well dressed? What did he look like?’
‘Oh, tall. He wore a hat with a great feather which he didn’t take off even indoors - I thought that ill-mannered, I remember. Just shows you can have all the fine cloth you like and it won’t improve your manners. He had a pointed beard, dark, cut like this in a triangle.’ She indicates with her free hand, taking it from the baby’s mouth; it complains loudly.
‘A young man, was he?’
She considers.
‘Younger than John. Older than you, I’d guess. Forties, maybe.’
My heart seems to contract; it sounds unmistakably like Henry Howard. No doubt there are other men who would fit such a description, but who else would take the opportunity to rifle through Dee’s library, knowing he was detained? And if it had been Howard, what was he hoping to find?
‘So you observed him in the library?’ I make sure my voice betrays no alarm; the poor woman has enough to be anxious about. ‘Did you see what he read? Did he try to take anything?’
‘I don’t think so. But it was strange. He combed those shelves like the hounds of hell were at his heels, almost in a frenzy. And when he thought I wasn’t looking I saw him trying the door to John’s inner rooms, you know, where he keeps his secret books. Thank God John had locked it up and taken the key with him. Tapping on the panelling, too, this fellow was, as if he were looking for some secret hiding place. He even stuck his hand up the chimney breast - I didn’t see him do it, but when he came to leave he had soot on his sleeve.’ She half laughs at the man’s audacity.
I happen to know, as she must, that Dee keeps certain papers in a box hidden in a recess inside the chimney breast in his own office. Whoever this man was, he clearly had a good idea of what he hoped to find, and it must have been something he suspected Dee would keep away from prying eyes.
‘How long did he stay? Did he give the impression that he found what he wanted?’
‘So many questions, Doctor Bruno!’ Jane tries to make her voice light, but I catch the fear in it as she jiggles the baby more urgently on her hip. ‘He stayed until it was past dinner time, though he didn’t seem to notice. He took down one or two books and glanced inside them, I didn’t see what, but that was more for show. I started to think maybe he’d come on purpose, knowing John was away, thinking he’d have free run of the place. But who could have known about that, except the queen and her people?’ Her voice has risen; she looks at me as if for reassurance. ‘Do you know who he was? You suspect something, I can tell by your face.’
‘I think you should not allow any stranger in while your husband is detained,’ I say. ‘Especially not this man, if he shows up again. And I will see if someone can be sent to keep an eye on you while John is at court - it is not right that you should be left alone with the children.’
‘Oh, I am not alone,’ she says drily. ‘Not while I have that slattern for company.’
‘Might I look in Ned Kelley’s room?’ I ask. ‘There may be something there that will offer us a clue as to how he invents his visions, and that might be enough to clear John of any suspicion.’
‘Of course.’ She shows me to the door, hands me a candle and points up the main staircase. ‘The room over the stairs. Go on in and root around all you will, with my blessing. And don’t mind her,’ she adds, darkly.
Dee’s house is old and crooked, the wood of the stairs and banisters dark and smoothed to a sheen by generations of hands and feet. The treads groan like living things weary with age as I climb, and from the corner of my eye I glimpse shadows at my back as the watery pool of light moves with me. Though I know there is no one in the house except Jane and her children, save for the maid, still I find I am tensed against any sudden surprises, half-expecting someone to leap at me from a passage or doorway, as if Kelley might have been squirrelled away in some spidery corner all this time.
The door at the top of the stairs is not locked. It opens on to a generously proportioned room with two casement windows that must overlook the front of the house, towards the river path. Now, against the black sky, they offer only a distorted reflection of my outline with the flickering candle flame. As I turn with it slowly, the room reveals itself as a jumble of objects in the frail light: a wooden truckle-bed, the sheets twisted and thrown back, as if Kelley had only moments ago leapt out of them; two chests, one locked, one spilling with clothes or linen; a table with a few stumps of candle; beside them, a pair of dice and a locket. Their shadows climb up and down the walls as the candle passes them.
I push the door to behind me and fit my candle to one of the holders from the table; setting it on the floor beside me, I kneel by the closed trunk. Its lock is old and crusted with rust, and when I insert the tip of my little bone-handled knife, it takes only a few moments of easing and jiggling before the mechanism clicks open and I can prise up the lid. My pulse jumps as my fingers brush against paper; sheaves of letters, perhaps, and, further down, the calfskin cover of a book. I bring out a bundle of manuscript pages and examine them in the thin circle of light; what I see makes me gasp.
