Sacrilege (49 page)

T
he morning service passed, interminably slowly. All through the singing of the choir, the reading of the Gospel, and the monotone of the dean's sermon, none of which I heard, Langworth glared across the carved stalls at me and Harry with a very unchristian light in his eyes, as if he hoped to wither us beneath his stare like a basilisk. Sun slanted through the high windows and lit the columns and the floor with geometric shapes in jewel colours. When I could tear my gaze away from Langworth's I looked up to those windows, where glass undimmed by centuries of sunlight depicted the miracles of Saint Thomas, the procession of pilgrims to the shrine, their hands thrown up in simple joy as the saint's bones give them back their sight, or their legs, or their children from the grave. Had they really thought, Langworth and his friends, that they could stage a miracle? Did they imagine people would believe in it? But why should they doubt it, I thought, recalling the trade in relics in my own country, the commerce of priests offering a touch of a weeping statue of the virgin for the chink of coins in their pockets, a statue they had engineered themselves to dispense tears at the appropriate time. For nearly four hundred years people had believed in the truth of the stories
told in the windows above us in the cathedral, and they would want to believe again.

When the dean eventually pronounced the final blessing, I took Harry's keys and tried to press my way out quickly ahead of him, leaving him to watch Langworth's movements. The treasurer's eyes followed me as I left, but he had been detained by the dean.

I nodded a brisk farewell to them both as I passed, and heard Dean Rogers saying, "No sign of Doctor Sykes this morning, John? I think we can forgive his absence in the light of his tireless devotion to the health of our town ..."

I pushed through the congregation out into the precincts and rushed to the gatehouse. Tom Garth's look of dismay told me immediately that Langworth's words were true.

"You gave me your oath, Tom," I said in a low voice, forcing my way into his small lodge.

He held his hands up as if in self-defence.

"He threatened me, sir. He said he knew you had been abroad in the precincts last night and I would be expected to say I'd seen you to the constable. He said if I lied I would lose my place." He leaned in closer. "But I never said a word about Mistress Kingsley, I swear it."

"But you will, if he threatens you again?"

He shook his head vehemently.

"No, sir--that was my promise. I reasoned if he knew about you already I couldn't very well deny it without bringing myself trouble. But I won't mention a word about her. And you won't say anything about the gloves--?"

His eyes were full of fear. I sighed.

"No. But I need your help, Tom. Langworth wants to search Harry Robinson's house--I need to put her somewhere else, just for this afternoon. Is there anywhere--an outbuilding, a shed, any place he wouldn't think to look, that we can get her to easily?"

He considered for a moment and nodded.

"There's an outbuilding behind the conduit house, the one that
stands between here and Doctor Robinson's house. It was used for storage, but there's nothing much there now. I have the key--I reckon she'd be safe in there for a few hours."

"Excellent. When the crowds have finished milling around, come and find me at Harry's. We have to move quickly--Langworth will not want to waste time. He's probably on his way to fetch the constable even now."

I returned to the house. Harry arrived a few minutes later, confirming that he had seen Langworth heading in the direction of one of the side gates. I bounded up the stairs to see Sophia bundled again in the clothes of Olivier's dead grandmother.

"They will find me this time for sure," she said, her voice flat.

"Come now--where is your spirit?" I said, more cheerfully than I felt. "This is only until Langworth has satisfied himself with ransacking the house."

At the foot of the stairs she came face-to-face with Harry for the first time. He gave a stiff little bow; she offered a shy smile in return. I watched her with interest; she has a way with men, I thought. All that fierce independence of spirit that I love in her--she knows how to suppress it when she senses modesty is required. She can lower her gaze and look demure with the best of them, but that expression hides a steeliness of purpose you might never guess at, unless you caught the flash of her amber eyes from under those lashes.

"I owe you a great debt, Doctor Robinson," she was saying, and Harry had taken her hand in his. "If we all get through this, I shall try to find some way of repaying your kindness, if it takes me the rest of my life."

"Well, I doubt I'll be around for much of that," Harry chuckled. "But do not talk of debts, Mistress Kingsley. There has been great wrong done here, in this holy place, and we must rely on Doctor Bruno to put it right, with God's help."

"I would trust Doctor Bruno with my life," she said, with unexpected feeling. As she spoke, she met my eye with a smile and my anxieties almost melted away.

Tom arrived, good as his word, and when we were certain that there was no one about on the path to see us, he and I bundled Sophia between us close to the boundary wall of the cathedral and along as far as the conduit house. The outbuilding was added onto the back wall; its roof was threadbare in patches and was clearly used by gulls as a roost, judging by the quantity of guano spattered over the remaining tiles and the walls. The door was not especially sturdy but was secured by a rusting iron padlock, which Tom unlocked from a key on his belt. Inside the place smelled of mould. A decayed gardening implement leaned against one wall, and the remains of some sacking lay rotting in a corner.

"Never say that I do not take you to the finest places," I murmured, as Sophia reluctantly stepped inside while Tom cast his eye over the grounds to make sure no one came. A brief smile flickered over her face, but quickly faded as she stood in the middle of the shed, wrapping her arms around herself, unsure of whether to sit.

"I have to lock you in," I whispered, apologetically. "Just in case."

"I know. Bruno?" she said, in a small voice. "Don't be too long, will you?"

"I will be back as soon as Langworth has finished poking around," I promised. "Here." I lifted the leather satchel from my shoulder and handed it to her. "He must not find the book either. Keep it safe for me."

"One day, will you tell me what is in it?"

"Perhaps. When I have worked that out for myself. For now, your only task is to keep still and silent."

"Oh, I am good at that," she said, with a sardonic flash of her eyes. "It is what women are taught to do all our lives."

"Well, now your life depends on it," I said, and closed the door on her.

Tom secured the padlock and gave me the key from his belt.

"Return it to me when you need to. And be assured, sir, my lips are sealed."

"Thank you." I hesitated. "Tom--if it comes to it, would you be willing
to testify about the gloves? To say they never belonged to Mistress Kingsley?"

His large frame visibly trembled.

"I would be punished, would I not?"

"I don't know," I said honestly. "As long as the killer is brought to justice, it would be clear you only acted to protect yourself. You might hope for clemency."

Tom narrowed his eyes.

"But you can't promise the killer will be brought to justice, can you? And I might not get clemency."

"The only evidence against Mistress Kingsley is that pair of gloves. Until you tell the truth, they could still hang her."

"I will give it some thought," he grunted, and walked away towards the gatehouse.

No one in this town has any faith in the law, I thought. I am the only fool here who thinks truth has a chance. A gull landed on the roof of the outbuilding and looked at me enquiringly with its yellow eye, its head tilted to one side. I prayed it would not shit through the holes on to my book, which I had no doubt Sophia was puzzling over even now.

When I returned to the house I found Harry shuffling about the kitchen at the back, peering into cupboards, lifting the lid on pots.

"Well, Harry. If you have anything hidden away in this house that you wouldn't want Langworth to see, now would be the time to dispose of it. Letters, for instance."

"I burn all Walsingham's letters. I'm not a fool. Tell you what--they won't find anything in this godforsaken kitchen, that's for certain," he grumbled, poking an iron spoon into the cauldron suspended above the empty grate to make his point.

"Yes, I hear you, there is no food here," I snapped, exasperated. "Looking in every pot won't change that."

"And whose fault is that?" he shot back. "Who sent my servant out of town and promised to take his place? God knows I am Her Majesty's
loyal servant, but this mire you have dragged me into is not the crown's business, it is all for the sake of your doxy!"

"Not the crown's business? That you have sat by while a viper's nest of traitors keeps guard over forbidden relics and plots to revive the greatest saint's cult in England, as a direct rebellion against the queen? Is that not her minister's business?"

"Keep your voice down, can't you?"

We glared at each other for a long moment, until my anger subsided first and I looked at the floor.

"I'm sorry. I have asked a lot of you, I know. But we are on the same side, Harry."

He pushed a hand through the front of his white hair and continued to look at me without speaking, his head to one side as if he were calculating the balance of my faults and my virtues.

"I have failed Walsingham here," he said eventually, deflated. "It is I who should be apologising to him. If you had not come and seen what I should have seen long ago, Langworth and Sykes might one day have achieved their aim. And most likely more children would have died along the way." He sighed and shook his head.

"The outcome is in the hands of the queen's justice now," I said.

"Let us hope he is competent," Harry said, in a tone that did not inspire hope. "So many of them can be bought. Still, I will not argue with you, Bruno, not with my stomach growling like an angry bear. Get yourself round to the Sun Inn while there's still time and bring back a dish of their beef stew, if they have it. And some pickled beetroot ..."

I was turning to go when a brusque rapping sounded at the front door. Harry and I froze, looking at each other.

"Open up, Doctor Robinson," came Langworth's voice from outside. "I have the constable with me and two armed men. We demand the right to search your property for stolen goods."

"Watch him like a hawk," I hissed. "If he tries to pretend money was found anywhere here, we must contradict it on the spot, as eyewitnesses."

Harry raised a sceptical eyebrow.

"You think that will help?"

Another knock; louder, more impatient.

"All right, all right," Harry called. "Give an old man time to find his stick." Under his breath he said to me, "Get upstairs and make sure there's nothing of hers lying around that room."

When I returned, taking the stairs two at a time, Harry's small entrance hall was full: Langworth, Constable Edmonton, and two armed men in the mayor's livery. I recognised one of them as one of the guards that had taken me to the West Gate prison; I nodded to him and he blinked hard, surprised, before nodding back, as if we were old drinking companions.

"Well, then," Langworth said, barely troubling to conceal his pleasure at the prospect before him. "Constable, you begin upstairs. Find the Italian's room. You know what you are looking for. I, meanwhile, will make a start in here." He indicated Harry's front parlour.

"Where shall I search, sir?" one of the guards asked, hand on his sword hilt.

Langworth looked at him with faint impatience.

"You are not searching anywhere. What we are looking for requires a practised eye. Your job is to keep the peace, and make sure the householders give us no trouble." He eyed me with resentment.

"Yes--mind I don't start a brawl and knock you to the ground, son." Harry waved his stick at the guard in mock threat.

We followed Langworth into the parlour. He crossed to Harry's desk and regarded the jumble of papers and books.

"This should prove interesting." He lifted the topmost paper of one pile, gave it a cursory examination and discarded it on the floor.

"You will discover nothing there but my work, John," Harry said, rubbing a hand across his chin. "Hard as you will find this to believe, there is an order to those papers, though it is known only to me. I would be grateful if you--"

Langworth waved a hand.

"We are investigating a serious crime of theft, Doctor Robinson,
you can hardly expect us to observe all the niceties." He tossed a pile of papers onto the floor and looked at Harry as if daring him to object. I watched Harry's jaw working as he battled to master his anger. When Langworth turned his attention to the desk once more, I backed slowly out of the room. If Edmonton was poking about in the upper rooms, I wanted to be there to witness whatever he claimed to find there.

But I had hardly set foot on the stairs when there was more furious hammering at the door. I looked back at the guard in the hall.

"Reinforcements?"

He shrugged. Langworth emerged from the parlour, his mouth twisted in irritation, followed by Harry.

"Yes?" Langworth flung the door open to reveal Tom Garth, breathing hard, his face flushed. "What is it, Garth? We are all occupied here."

"Masters--" Tom snatched a breath and his eyes flitted nervously from one face to the next. "There is a man at the gate just now wanting Constable Edmonton, as a matter of urgency. There's been another killing, he says."

"Another--? Good God. Call the constable down," Langworth barked over his shoulder to the guard. I pressed closer, so that I could see the vein begin to pulse in his temple. "Did he say who it was, Garth?"

"Doctor Sykes, he says. Found in the river up past St. Radigund's Street, where the two streams meet."