Revenger

Chapter 15

Joshua Peace stood back from the two bodies laid out before him on the slab of stone in the crypt beneath St. Paul’s. Their flesh was bloated and ruptured and gnawed by animals, yet he could see that they had been a handsome, well-formed couple. Even for a man as used to death as he was, it was sad to see two young human beings come to this. On the floor nearby stood an earthenware flagon, which had been found beside their bodies on the edge of a stream in the woods.

The stench of moldering flesh would have overpowered a lesser man. Yet as Searcher of the Dead, Peace was accustomed to the smell and went about his business, examining the bodies, looking for curious-shaped cuts that could have been made by a blade, examining their mouths for the telltale signs of burned lips or bitten tongues, sniffing them to determine the date of death. From years of experience, he was able to tell whether they were dead a day, a week, or a fortnight, depending on the season of the year.

Even in the heat of this blistering day, it was cool down here beneath the great cathedral. Peace worked alone and in silence, his soft shoes padding silently across the stone floor. He heard the creak of the oaken door being pushed open and turned to see who was there. He smiled in welcome.

“John Shakespeare. Well, well.”

Shakespeare gagged at the smell and covered his mouth and nose with his hand.

“Why, John, I have not seen you in a year or more. Do you not say good-day? How goes the world of learning?”

Shakespeare could scarcely breathe. He backed out of the room.

“Come on,” Peace said, laughing. “Let us leave these two unfortunate souls and go outside. I don’t want you bringing up your luncheon over my floor.”

Peace covered the bodies with their winding sheets, then took off his surgeon’s apron, hung it on a hook, and together they wandered over to the Three Tuns for a tankard of ale.

“So what brings you here, good friend John?” Peace was a little older than Shakespeare. His head was almost devoid of hair, save for a rim of fine brown locks along the sides and back. His face was questioning and full of wit. Amusement played around his eyes.

Shakespeare gulped in the fresh, warm air, trying to rid his lungs and nostrils of the foul stink from the crypt. “Why, the thought of a pint of ale with an old copesmate, Joshua,” he said.

“What else?”

“What else, indeed. I know you better than that, John Shakespeare.”

“Let us drink first to clear our throats and cleanse our souls.”

They settled down in a booth, away from the noisy chatter of lawyers and clerics and booksellers doing deals. As a taproom wench brought them ale, Shakespeare came to the point. “It may not be within your reckoning, but I thought to try you anyway. And if you cannot help, perhaps you might point me toward one who can.”

“I will do my best.”

“Would you be able to tell, Joshua, whether someone was being poisoned?”

“If you were to tell me that a man was doubled up in pain and convulsions beyond enduring, and that he was puking blood the color of dark rusty filings of iron, and shitting a flood, then yes, I could tell you that he might well be suffering poisoning, especially arsenic. But it could just as well be caused by some miasma in the air, or by bad food or water-particularly if others were similarly afflicted. A foulness or blockage in the bowel could cause similar effects to poisoning-the pain, the vomiting, the wish for death.”

“And what if the symptoms were more general and lasted for weeks?”

“Yet more difficult to say, for the poison may be delivered in small doses to give the impression of natural causes. As the patient wastes away, a physician might think it to be some strange disease or an evil in the blood. As Paracelsus said, ‘The dose makes the poison.’ He meant, of course, that everything will kill you if you take too much of it. What sets a poison apart is that it will kill in relatively small amounts-perhaps small enough to slip into food or drink without the intended victim noticing.”

“And what if the person seemed to be going mad, seeing strange flying creatures with lights in their wings?”

“Interesting. Wolfsbane poisoning can bring on strange imaginings and disturbances of the mind. It is accompanied by a tickling or burning sensation in the tongue, perhaps. And sickness and pain.”

Shakespeare nodded slowly. He felt a chill, his suspicions seemingly confirmed.

“I see from your face that I am the harbinger of bad news, John.”

Shakespeare grimaced. “Indeed. But, Joshua, how might one counteract this?”

“Remove the intended victim from those that would kill him. Ensure that all food and drink is prepared by one you trust, and pray to God that no damage has already been done.”

Well, that was now in the hands of Sir Robert Cecil. He should have the means to save her. In the meantime, Shakespeare would send urgent word of this conversation.

Peace stayed him with his hand. “Before you go, John, it is interesting that you talk of poison, for the two bodies on the slab in the crypt were thought to have killed themselves with poison. It was believed by the constable and sheriff and those that knew the young girl that they took their lives by arsenic because they could not be together.”

“A sad story, Joshua.”

“But untrue. Someone has gone to a lot of trouble to make it seem that they killed themselves.”

“Well, then, you have a mystery to solve.”

“And an extremely interesting one, for the girl is Amy Le Neve, daughter of Sir Toby Le Neve.”

The name brought Shakespeare up with a start. Sir Toby Le Neve was known as a fine general, had been an aide-de-camp to Essex on his recent expedition to bolster Henri of Navarre in northern France. More than that, he had been present at the summer revel at Essex House.

Shakespeare sat down again. “Joshua, tell me more. What are the circumstances of these deaths?”

“They were found by a stream in the forest of Waltham out by Wanstead in Essex. Not my jurisdiction, but the Essex coroner is an old friend from Cambridge days. He was unhappy about the deaths and came to ask me to take a further look at the bodies. I had them brought here along with the flagon that was found with them. It has a large quantity of arsenic in it-enough to kill a dray horse-mixed with wine. There was also some arsenic in their mouths. It is nasty stuff. No scent, no taste.”

“Then how do you know it is arsenic?”

Joshua Peace gave the guilty smile of a schoolboy. “I fed a little to my neighbor’s cat. It was a wretched brindled animal, infected with mange, and would have been done for by the plague men soon enough anyway. It is undoubtedly arsenic.”

“So why do you not think it was the poison that killed them?”

Peace downed the last of his ale. “If you can bear to come to the crypt with me, I will show you.”

As they walked back toward the cathedral crypt, Shakespeare saw a woman selling pomanders. “Herbs and blooms to ward off the pest,” the woman cried. “Pest pomanders a penny.”

Shakespeare bought one and held it close beneath his nose as they entered the crypt. It was of limited use, but gave him just enough strength to stave off the nausea that threatened to overwhelm him. Peace pulled back the shrouds and Shakespeare gazed on the two bodies. They were covered with injuries and bite marks. In their faces were bloody pulps where once sat bright, hopeful eyes. Yet even in death, bruised and snapped at by vermin, the girl’s face retained its youthful innocence. The boy’s naked body did not even have the pallor of death. His muscles had tone and the skin that was not torn glowed with a healthy tan that almost made him seem alive.

“Do you know who the boy is?” Shakespeare said, and immediately regretted speaking, because the bile rose in his throat and he brought up an acid wash of ale over the stone floor.

Peace laughed. “Do not concern yourself, John. I have worse eruptions to contend with here. And yes, the boy’s name is Jaggard. Joe Jaggard. More than that, I have no idea who he is. I examine bodies, nothing more.”

Being sick eased Shakespeare’s discomfort. He still held the sweet-smelling pomander close to his face and stepped nearer the bodies. “So how did they die?”

With his left hand, Peace gently raised the girl’s head from the slab and held it forward so that they could both see the back, which was thickly matted with blood. Peace pushed the three middle fingers of his right hand into the hair and Shakespeare saw that beneath the blood was a deep indentation in the skull.

“Could that not have happened when she fell? Could an animal not have done that to her after death?”

“There would have been no bleeding after death. Now, look at this.” He lay the head back on the slab, then walked around to the left side of the boy’s head. His temple was caved in. Peace put the same three fingers into the bowl-shaped hole. “Almost identical to the girl’s injury. This is what killed them or, at least, rendered them unconscious so that arsenic could be forced into their mouths. I still don’t believe the poison killed them, however, for there would have been signs that their bowels had been purged-and there was none. They were both bludgeoned once with a club with a very heavy, rounded head. These wounds could not have been self-inflicted. If they did not die immediately, then they must have been left unconscious and died within two or three hours. No one could survive such blows. I would venture to say that whoever did this must have come upon them and surprised them. They probably did not even see their killer. The poison is an inept afterthought, a desperate attempt to make it seem they took their own lives.”

“Why did the constable and sheriff not note these head injuries?”

“There are many injuries on the bodies. The corpses had become carrion. Their flesh was clawed and bitten. And the girl’s thick hair disguised the true nature of her head wound. With the presence of the arsenic flagon, they simply didn’t look any further. More than that, I believe her parents wanted no ado. They wanted her buried and forgotten. Perhaps they were ashamed-either at her being found naked with this boy or because they felt dishonored by her self-destruction.”

“What of their clothes?”

“No sign of them. Either the killer took them, or they might have been stolen away by a vagabond. The girl’s gown would have been of fine quality. Such items are worth much gold.”

Shakespeare was thinking fast. This was nothing to do with him; he was already neglecting the Roanoke inquiry and needed to get word to Cecil about the wolfsbane. Yet these killings worried him. There was the link to Essex and there was something else, jangling in his mind. The name Joe Jaggard. Arthur Gregory had spoken of a murdered boy named Jaggard. Not just any boy, but a lad with connection to Charlie McGunn. A boy who had been seeking Eleanor Dare on his behalf.

He knew what Walsingham would have said: leave no dunghill unforked. He looked once more on the tableau of death in the wintry crypt. “Whoever did this must have been a man of immense power, to kill them with one blow each.”

“I don’t think so,” Peace said. “Given the right weapon, any man or woman of reasonable strength could have inflicted these injuries. These two young people had been swiving. It is not beyond the bounds of likelihood that on a warm summer’s day it made them nod off to sleep, which would be why they were left so open to attack. Certainly if they had not been caught unawares, that lad would have been strong enough to defend himself against most men. He had the build of a pugilist.”

“Thank you, Joshua. I must go.”

“One more thing. If your friend is being poisoned with wolfsbane and if he or she is already having vivid imaginings, it might already be too late…”