The Lost Prophecies (39 page)

‘I heard voices last night,’ said Abel. ‘The Mass would be said at a secret time, the middle of the night.’

‘Probably it’s also where Henry Gifford slept. We’re a long way from the main entrance to the house, and the doors are especially thick here and the locks are solid. If the priest needed to make a quick escape he only had to open the trapdoor and hide in the drains until the pursuivants left.’

‘And the bedchamber next door abuts on our room of last night,’ said Abel.

‘There’s probably a space between the walls. That’s how Gifford was able to spy on us last night. This place is a honeycomb of false walls and secret places.’

‘I haven’t told you of my own discoveries yet,’ said Abel.

Standing in the room with the close-stool, we leaned towards each other like conspirators.

‘I went to wash myself in the yard and then I asked the laundrywoman for a fresh shirt, since mine had got all dirty and bloody while I was down in that kitchen drain. I thought it was the least that Combe House owed me, a clean shirt, since I’d recovered a body for them.’

‘Wasn’t the laundrywoman willing to give you a shirt?’

‘Very willing. She handed me this,’ he said, indicating the shirt beneath his doublet. It looked too large for him. ‘But when I was in the washroom I noticed a pile of clothes that were due for washing. Some of them had spatters of blood on them.’

‘Difficult to get out, bloodstains,’ I said.

‘You can use salt and water, or milk or even human spit,’ said Abel. ‘I remember the tire-house man in the Globe telling us so. It may take a couple of washings, but the stains will fade eventually. But that’s not the point, Nick. Those items of clothing with the stains were good pieces, doublets and hose and women’s bodices. Fine pieces made of brocade, taffeta. They weren’t servants’ garments. They belong to the Shaws.’

‘Perhaps they got their clothes marked when they were attending to Gifford’s body.’

‘No, these things were already in the washroom. They must have been there before the body was found.’

‘So you’ve made a jump between the bloodstained clothes and a dead man.’

‘Wouldn’t you?’

‘You think the Shaws had a hand in Gifford’s death?’

‘Don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘William Shaw was very quick to declare it was an accident in front of the whole household. Too quick. In fact, I had the impression he was saying it for our benefit.’

‘The servants are loyal to the Shaws. They would accept whatever their master or mistress told them. They might even accept a violent death. They would not ask questions about blood-spattered clothes.’

‘The sooner we leave this house of murderers the better,’ I said.

‘There’s more,’ said Abel. ‘I said I’d made discoveries. The bloody clothes weren’t all.’

He paused. I thought he was doing it for effect. But he’d heard something in the passageway outside. The scrabbling of claws on the wooden floor. The sound of the spaniels. Then a shushing noise. A woman trying to silence the dogs. Abel and I had been so absorbed in our speculations that we hadn’t been conscious of anything beyond the close-stool room. The door was slightly ajar. I’d pushed it to, not latched it.

As one we made for the exit. Too late. In the passage outside was assembled the whole family. Mother and father, son and daughter, the sister-in-law, the steward Gully. How long had they been there? What had they overheard?

Curiously, they had the air of suppliants, as though they’d come not to surprise us but to make a request.

‘We must speak to you,’ said William Shaw.

We were ushered into the large empty bedchamber, the one that I’d speculated might have been used by the family for hearing Mass. Abel and I stood awkwardly in the middle of the room while the Shaws and Gully clustered about us in a half-circle. Incongruously, the spaniels Finder and Keeper scampered about their heels. I didn’t fear the family exactly – the three men surely would not attempt anything against Abel and me in the presence of three women – but it was a very uncomfortable moment. I felt my palms go clammy. Sweat ran down my sides. I cursed Tom Cloke, dead as he was, for ever having introduced us to this house.

‘Gentlemen,’ said William Shaw. ‘We have been listening to your conversation. I heard you, Master Revill, suggest that this was a house of murderers.’

I blushed, as if I was the one guilty of some offence. I opened my mouth to apologize, to justify myself, but Shaw gave an impatient wave of his hand.

‘You are wrong. The Shaws are not murderers. Hear me out. Say nothing until I have finished. Then you may decide on your next step. You have correctly understood the nature of Combe and of my family. We are followers of the old religion. We wish harm to no man or woman, we wish no injury to our country or its rulers. We are not plotters or conspirators, although some would like us to be. Such are the present times that we live under the shadow of suspicion and in constant fear of persecution like other houses in this part of the world.

‘Henry Gifford was here as a tutor to sister Muriel’s children. But he was principally at Combe to minister to our souls, in this very chamber where we are standing. He is – he was – a recent arrival in Combe, here only a matter of months. He replaced another . . . individual . . . who was a truly good man but who has been called to serve elsewhere. I will not conceal from you the fact that we did not care for Gifford. We felt obliged to give him shelter, however, because of what he was and who he represented.’

Shaw hesitated and glanced at his wife. She took up the story.

‘It is true that we have been harbouring a priest,’ said Elizabeth Shaw, speaking with more directness than her husband. ‘However, we came to believe that Henry Gifford had more worldly aims than the salvation of souls and the cause of the true religion. He talked easily about the death of tyrants and the ousting of lawful kings and encouraged us to talk of such things too.’

She glanced towards her son Robert. I remembered that he’d touched on the subject at yesterday evening’s meal. And that Gifford had quickly changed the subject.

‘Such talk is dangerous,’ said Elizabeth. ‘But it was not just talk. Gifford seemed to be in communication with other forces, external forces, who might prefer action to mere words. He received messages, visitors sometimes, that he would not tell us about. This is a quiet and godly house. We live secluded from the world.’

Gully was nodding vigorously. Elizabeth’s words were more or less what he’d said to me the previous day. Now William Shaw resumed.

‘We heard from a distant kinsman, Thomas Cloke, that he had an . . . object . . . of great value to deliver to us, or rather not to us but to Henry Gifford. That this was a secret affair was shown by the way the message was conveyed. Nothing was committed to paper, but all was done through hints and whispers. Then in due course you two gentlemen arrived here with Thomas. Alas, our fears were shown to be all too real by the attack on our very doorstep and the violent fate of our kinsman. Gifford seemed not at all concerned by the death but only troubled by the whereabouts of the . . . object.’

‘It was a book,’ said Abel. ‘We know about it. A book with covers made of wood and containing verses.’

‘Complete gibberish,’ I said before Abel could reveal more. ‘Couldn’t make head or tail of it. Meant nothing to us.’

But William Shaw and the others didn’t seem interested in our opinion of the Black Book of Brân or the implication of Abel’s words that we’d caught sight of it.

‘It brought matters to a head, the death on our doorstep,’ said the master of the house. ‘We held a family council, for we are, all of us, concerned in this matter. Gully joined us. There are no secrets between the Shaws and their steward.’

Gully looked resolute but also gratified at this compliment. He would surely have died to preserve this house and its occupants.

‘We talked long into the night,’ said Mary Shaw, the daughter. ‘We came to a fateful decision.’

I drew my breath in, sharp. Was she about to say that they had decided to do away with the priest?

‘We determined that he should leave Combe and leave straight away, on this very morning,’ said the son, Robert Shaw. ‘We came here to tell him so. We made a reasonable request.’

‘Merely that he should quit Combe,’ said Mary.

‘Quit our house today,’ said Robert.

I imagined the family arriving as a delegation at Gifford’s door. I would not have wanted to face them, so firm, so united.

‘Words followed,’ said the widow Muriel. It was the first time she had spoken. ‘Words followed and then blows.’

‘It was my fault, Master Revill, Master Glaze,’ said Gully now. ‘You should blame me and no member of the family.’

William Shaw put a hand on Gully’s arm, but the steward shrugged it off and continued.

‘I could not bear to hear Gifford say things against the family that was harbouring him. He called us traitors and apostates. He was holding the black book in one hand and the cross in the other.’

Gully raised both arms, clutching an imaginary cross and book in imitation of the priest. I noticed he referred to ‘us traitors’.

‘He was holding a large cross made of brass,’ said William Shaw. ‘It was stored in that cupboard over there. Henry Gifford was brandishing the sign of our salvation. He was speaking low and soft, but his voice was as full of venom as the sting of a snake. He kept on saying, “You shall not have it, you shall not have it”.’

‘The cross?’ said Abel.

‘Not the cross, but the book brought here by Cloke,’ said Elizabeth. ‘My husband asked him how he had laid hands on the thing, since Thomas had been shot and his goods and horse stolen before arriving at Combe. Henry Gifford claimed that the book was already in
your
grasp and that he had taken it from your bedchamber yesterday.’

‘That part is true enough,’ I said. ‘But the book was hardly in our grasp. Abel and I brought it to Combe without knowing it. Thomas Cloke had slipped it into one of our bags earlier in the journey – perhaps because he expected to be attacked.’

It was easy to be honest. I no longer felt in any danger from the Shaws and their steward. They were too busy accounting for their actions, as if we were justices. It was William who continued.

‘I approached Henry Gifford. Perhaps he thought I was about to take the wretched book from him. He became like a man possessed. He raised the cross higher in the air and made to bring it down on my head. I moved back in time and he missed but it was a wicked stroke. Then he held out the cross, half in threat, half in supplication.’

‘I came forward,’ said Gully. ‘I thought I could reason with Gifford. But as Mr Shaw says, he was possessed. The priest must have believed that I too was attempting to take the book from him, for he lunged at me and I stumbled and fell back on the floor. Then Mistress Mary here stepped forward to help me, and Gifford lashed out at her too.’

‘It is true,’ said the daughter of the house. ‘I tremble to remember it.’

‘I was angry now,’ said William. He was stroking his beard. His eyes were prominent. ‘There was a tussle and one of us wrested the cross away from Gifford and struck
him
a great blow across the forehead.’

‘It was I who struck him,’ said Gully, ‘and although I am ashamed that I should have put the instrument of our salvation to such an impious use, I trust that He who sits above and judges all our actions will absolve me of any murderous intent. I acted in defence of this family – and in defence of myself, of course.’

There was no defiance in the steward’s tone. Merely a plain statement of what had occurred in this chamber, the place where the family was accustomed to make its religious observances. Abel and I heard how Henry Gifford had staggered back, hardly able to see on account of the blood gushing from the wound in his forehead. It seemed that he was not so badly injured for, under the gaze of the distressed and distracted Shaws, he made a stumbling escape from the close-stool chamber, using the trapdoor and sliding down the stone chute that led to the drains and sewers of Combe.

He was still clutching the book as if his life depended on it. William Shaw likened Gifford’s disappearance to that of a rat creeping back into its hole, as if he would naturally retreat down the shaft rather than try a more orthodox exit. Perhaps he thought in his panic that the Shaws would try to stop him getting away from Combe.

Did they in fact try to stop him? No, said Elizabeth, they were horror-struck at the scene. Did they think they’d seen the last of him? Yes, explained William, since he had got his hands on the black book and no longer cared a fig for the spiritual welfare of the house, if he ever had. There were various secret exits from Combe, including a grille which covered the outlet from the drain under the kitchen and which might be removed to give access to the moat. From there a determined or desperate man could swim or wade his way to safety.

That was what they thought – and hoped! – had happened to Henry Gifford. He wasn’t so grievously wounded after all. He’d escaped from Combe House, clutching his precious book. They’d never see him again. They’d be left to the peace and quiet of their estate. At this time the family were still in their day clothes – they had debated into the night whether and how they should confront Gifford – and they now discovered that their garments were spattered with the priest’s blood. They discarded their clothes and put on their night attire.

But Gifford had not got away. Whether he was more badly wounded than they assumed, whether he’d harmed himself in his descent down through the drains, he had evidently tried to emerge inside the kitchen, via the flagstone. His life fading, he had managed to dislodge the stone but did not have the strength to push it away and climb out. So Gifford expired face down in the muck and slop of the kitchen drains.

His discovery was almost as much a shock to the Shaws as it was to the servants of Combe. But not quite as much. William had pronounced the death an accident, knowing that his people would not question his opinion, but he observed the suspicion on Abel’s face and my own. So they had decided to give this full account of the previous night, a resolution that was strengthened when they overheard my reference to a ‘house of murderers’.