Heresy (31 page)

The stairs creaked unexpectedly under my feet, making the rector jump. Though there was little light in the stairwell, I could make out marks on the threshold of Doctor Coverdale’s room as I entered the door Slythurst had left open. Holding a hand out behind me, I bent to take a closer look and saw that the stains were smudged footprints leading out of the tower room. I touched a finger to one of the marks and it came away with a sticky, rust-coloured coating which, when I sniffed it, could only be blood, though it was not fresh. I turned to look at my companions with a grim expression; below me, the rector’s round white face, pale as the moon in the shadowy stairwell, flinched but nodded me onward.

The little door at the back of the tower room was also swinging open;
inside it, I found a narrow spiral staircase barely wide enough for a man to pass, curving to the top of the tower. Halfway up there was a small arched doorway, whose studded oak door had been left ajar by Slythurst in his flight from the sight within. The smell of death was unmistakable now, stinging my nostrils as I approached the threshold; the rector gave a little cry of fright as he cowered behind me. Taking a deep breath, I pushed the door open and stepped into the college strong room. Immediately I gagged and cried out at what I saw, and felt the rector’s hand grasp at the back of my jerkin as he jostled to see through the doorway. Here, then, was the answer to the mystery of what had happened to Doctor James Coverdale.

The strong room seemed more claustrophobic than the subrector’s room below it, though much of that had to do with the smell. The dimensions of the walls were almost the same, but the wooden-beamed ceiling was lower and the two windows, one facing into the quadrangle and the other toward St. Mildred’s Lane, were smaller and narrower, a single perpendicular arch letting in little light on this overcast day. Along each wall stood a number of heavy wooden chests of varying sizes, all painted with heraldic devices, girded with iron bands, and fastened with formidable padlocks—the coffers containing the college revenues. To the left of the window that faced into the college was James Coverdale. His wrists had been bound together and tied over his head to an iron bracket fixed into the wall for candles. He was naked except for his linen undershirt, and his head slumped so that his chin rested on his chest, which was drenched with blood, now matted and dried—he had not died in the past few hours, it seemed. But the most extraordinary aspect, the sight that had made me cry out in shock, was that he had been shot numerous times with arrows from a close range. Nine or ten stuck out from his torso at various points, giving him the appearance of a pincushion—or an icon. I knew immediately what I was witnessing; so, it seemed, did the rector, who tightened his grip on my sleeve so that I could feel his hand trembling. I glanced sideways at him as he stared in unblinking horror at the corpse of a second colleague in two days; his
lips were working rapidly and I thought at first that he was uttering a silent prayer, until I realised that he was trying to speak but could not make his voice obey him. When eventually he managed to pronounce the word, it was the one that had leaped instantly to my own mind:
“Sebastian.”

“Who is Sebastian?” said Slythurst impatiently. He was still lingering behind us on the stairs, his eyes averted, as if reluctant to enter the room a second time.

“Saint Sebastian,” I said quietly.

The rector nodded absently, as if in a trance. “‘
He was commanded to be apprehended, and that he should be brought into the open field where, by his own soldiers, he was shot through the body with innumerable arrows,’”
he recited hoarsely; I had no doubt that the words belonged to Foxe. “And look.” He lifted a trembling hand and pointed. On the wall beside the window, raggedly traced with a finger dipped in the dead man’s blood, was the symbol of a spoked wheel.

“And there is the weapon,” Slythurst said decisively, entering the room and pointing at the wall beneath the window, where a handsome carved English longbow, inlaid with green-and-scarlet tracery, had been left casually leaning beside an empty quiver decorated in similar fashion, as if the killer had placed it there calmly and carefully when his work was done.

“But that is Gabriel Norris’s longbow,” the rector croaked in disbelief. “I told him to have it locked away here the other morning, after he shot the dog.”

“Then we have our killer,” Slythurst asserted, nodding a full stop to his pronouncement.

I took a couple of paces toward the body, crouching to peer up at the face.

“These arrows did not kill him,” I said.

“Oh? You think he died of a fever?” Slythurst seemed to have regained his old manner remarkably quickly. I sensed his impatience with my presence in what he regarded as his domain.

“Quiet, Walter,” said Underhill sharply, and for once I was grateful to him. “Go on, Doctor Bruno.”

“His throat has been cut,” I said, and clenching my teeth I grasped Coverdale’s abundant hair and lifted the head so that the dreadful face was visible. The rector gave a little squeal into his handkerchief; Slythurst winced and turned away. The dead man’s eyes were half closed, a rag stuffed into his mouth as a gag, and his throat had been sliced straight across. The wound pulled open as I lifted the head, and from its sticky edges I could see that the incision was a botched job, though it had, in the end, achieved its aim; his neck was scored with the nicks and scratches of aborted cuts, as if the killer had taken several attempts to hold his knife steady and in the right place, suggesting that he was not a practised assassin.

“Who would have such a weapon?” the rector asked tremulously. “All the university men are forbidden to carry daggers in the city precincts—”

“A razor could have done it,” I said grimly. “Or a small knife, if it was sharp enough.”

“Then why shoot him like a boar afterward?” asked Slythurst, daring to step slightly nearer. “And the picture—is that a message?”

“The rector has already told you,” I said. “For show. This is a parody of the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian, just as Roger Mercer’s death was supposed to mimic the martyrdom of Saint Ignatius. I do not think you can pass this one off as an accident, Rector,” I added, turning to Underhill, who had sat down heavily on one of the sturdy chests, his face in his hands.

“What arrant nonsense!” Slythurst exclaimed, now fully over his initial shock, it seemed. “Roger is attacked by a dog and you read into that the mimicry of a martyrdom? What murderer would go to such lengths? I rather think your brain is fevered, Doctor Bruno.
This
, I grant you”—he gestured at the punctured corpse of James Coverdale hanging from the candle bracket—“is clearly some horrific violence against poor James by a madman, but these fanciful patterns will not help us catch a dangerous intruder!
I can only guess that someone tried to break into the strong room, James tried to stop him, and this was the result.”

He paused, breathless, hands on his hips as if daring me to challenge this hypothesis.

“A thief who stopped to paint pictures in a dying man’s blood?” I said, returning his insolent stare. “And none of the doors have been forced, nor have these chests been tampered with. You said yourself that both the strong room and the door to the outer room were locked when you returned this morning,” I reminded Slythurst. “Who would have had a key to the strong room?”

“The three of us,” Slythurst said, indicating the rector and the bloody corpse in the corner of the room. “Each of us has a key to open the strong-room door, but the principal coffers here have three padlocks apiece, so that the rector, the bursar, and the subrector must all be present to open them. We call them the chests of the three keys. The bulk of the college funds are kept in these. The trunks containing account books and deeds I can open alone.”

“A safeguard against embezzlement,” the rector added.

“So Doctor Coverdale must have unlocked the door himself and let the killer in,” I mused, “and his killer could have locked it afterward using Coverdale’s own key.”

“He must have been forced to open it at knifepoint by a robber,” Slythurst speculated.

“But that would have been fruitless if he could not then open the coffers on his own,” I said.

“A robber would not know that. Perhaps that’s why he was killed,” Slythurst said. “The thief flew into a rage because he did not believe James couldn’t open the chest. That must be it!”

He seemed remarkably keen to discount my theory that Coverdale’s death was connected to Roger Mercer’s, I thought, and wondered if that
was just because he could not stand to concede that I might be right in anything or because it suited him to throw up a false trail. After all, he was one of the two people with a key to the strong room.

“When were either of you last here?” I asked.

Slythurst glanced anxiously at the rector, who appeared lost in his own thoughts and was making every effort to avoid looking at the body.

“With respect, Doctor Bruno, have you been appointed to investigate this crime, that you should start questioning us as if you were the magistrate?”

“Oh, just answer him, Walter, he is trying to help us,” said the rector wearily, to my surprise. “For myself, I have not been up here since last Tuesday, when we took out the monies and papers for the college attorney. Is that right, Walter, was it Tuesday?”

“That was the last time we were all here together,” Slythurst agreed, shooting me a look of distaste. “I was last here on the evening of Saturday, just before the disputation, when James let me in to collect the papers I needed relating to the management of our estates in Aylesbury, together with some money for the journey and sundry expenses when I arrived. I left for Buckinghamshire first thing on Sunday morning and have not been near the strong room until my return just now, which you witnessed. There—am I in the clear?” he added, his eyes flashing with sarcasm.

“That is not for me to say.” I shrugged. “What time did you collect the papers on Saturday evening?”

“Just before the disputation, I told you, so I suppose some time around half past four. I wanted to have everything in order for my journey the next day because I knew the dinner at Christ Church would end late and I did not want to have to disturb James when I returned.” He flicked a brief glance then at Coverdale’s bizarre corpse and lowered his head.

I crossed the room back to the body with its protruding arrows and considered it again from various angles, touching my finger to the bloodstains on the shirt, which left a thick residue.

“This body could well have been here since Saturday night,” I said. “The blood is dry and the stiffness that sets in after death has already passed—he is beginning to rot. If the weather had been warmer the decay would be more advanced, we would not be able to breathe in this room. But I have remembered something—Doctor Coverdale was summoned early from the disputation, one of the students brought him an urgent message. I wonder then if he was lured back to his death.”

“I do recall that he did not attend the dinner for the palatine that night,” the rector murmured, “and I thought it strange because he had been looking forward to it—he likes to make an impression on men of state.
Liked.”
He corrected himself quickly, shaking his head. “Oh, God in heaven!” It was a cry of genuine anguish, though not, I felt, of grief for his colleague, and his voice rose to a frantic pitch. “You are right, Doctor Bruno, we shall not be able to keep the manner of this death secret. There will be a full investigation, the coroner and the magistrate will be called—the college will be ruined! I can think of several of our benefactors who will not want their names associated with a place of such iniquity—they will withdraw funds and give them to other foundations less blighted by evil deeds. This is truly the work of the Devil! To make a mockery of the Christian martyrs in such monstrous fashion.” He buried his face in his hands and I thought for a moment he was sobbing, but he was only trying to master his breathing.

“Well, it is the work of someone who can wield a longbow,” I said, pragmatically. “Though I think at this distance even I could hit a target that was tied to the wall and already dead, so we are not necessarily looking for someone with any great skill in archery. Whoever it was has staged this murder very carefully so that we would link it to the other.”

“So that
you
would link it,” said the rector. “Foxe, the false martyrdoms—this is your theory, Doctor Bruno.”

“It was suggested to me by someone unknown,” I reminded him.

“Yes, don’t you see? That paper you showed me, cut from Foxe.
This”—
he gestured wildly at the corpse in the corner—“has been done for your
benefit, knowing that you would understand the reference.” He stared at me incredulously, as if it were my theory that had delivered Coverdale to his fate.

“But the killer could not have known that I would be around at this precise moment to witness the discovery,” I objected. “Yet it does seem that he wanted to make sure you would not miss the martyrdom reference this time and fail to make the connection with Mercer’s death.”

“So it must be the same person?” The rector looked up at me, his eyes filled with anxiety.

“Norris owns a razor, you know,” Slythurst spoke up suddenly. “Shaves himself every day, if you please.”

I considered, rubbing my own beard. “A razor and a longbow. Someone is keen for the evidence to point to Norris, that seems clear.”

“You think it could not be him?” the rector asked, still looking up at me like a child craving reassurance.

“From the little I know of Norris, I cannot believe he would commit so showy a murder and then leave behind a weapon that points directly to himself. Besides, what could be his motive?”

“James hated the commoners, he was always railing against them. You heard him yourself at the rector’s supper,” Slythurst said.

“Hardly a reason for one of them to kill him,” I retorted. “On the other hand, someone who bitterly resented the presence of commoners might think to kill two birds with one stone, as you English say—to despatch Doctor Coverdale for some reason yet unknown and leave evidence incriminating Norris at the same time. There were marks on the staircase, footprints—if we had more light I could examine them, but I fear the rain will have washed away the trail outside by now.”