Sacrilege

Chapter 8

Though Monsieur Fleury checked that the lane outside the weavers’ cottages was empty before allowing me out, I walked into the High Street with a sense of unease; it seemed I was picking up the fear that saturated that house. Without any clear idea of what to do next, I found myself turning in the direction of the cathedral. I decided to call on Harry Robinson, to see if he had heard the news of the apothecary’s murder and what he made of it. It was not yet nine. Outside the shop, a small crowd was still gathered, whispering with relish, hands clasped to scandalised mouths, the goodwives thoroughly enjoying this latest episode of town drama. I hurried past, keeping my head down, though no one paid me any attention. I noticed the girl Rebecca was no longer among them.

Who killed Sir Edward Kingsley? I half smiled to myself at the memory of Sophia quoting William of Ockham at me, as if she were the philosopher. I was fairly certain she could not share those jokes with Olivier; at least I had that on my side. If I had learned anything in the past couple of years, it was that the obvious solution was often far from the truth. She wanted me to find Nicholas Kingsley guilty of his father’s murder; it would be a neat solution, certainly, and a chance for revenge on a young man with few redeeming qualities. But to assume his guilt from the beginning would make me no better than Constable Edmonton, with his talk of rounding up vagrants.

Sophia. Damn her, damn her eyes and her mouth and her throat and the curve of her hip and everything else she could not disguise. What was I doing here? I should be in London, among my books, not miles away in a strange city, regarded with suspicion and hostility and mixed up in murders that had nothing to do with me. I, who had always prided myself against the weaknesses of the heart; how often I had mocked or pitied other men who had allowed themselves to be distracted from the pursuit of knowledge by delusions of love. On the one occasion, during my stay in Toulouse, when I had grown to love a woman I could not have, I had made a decision and left for Paris one night without saying goodbye, rather than staying to waste my time and hers in useless pining. How, then, had I allowed myself to fall under the spell of Sophia? Beauty, yes, but I had seen beauty many times before and resisted it. Perhaps it was a kind of recognition; I had seen in Sophia, even from our first meeting, a searching intelligence, a refusal to accept what she was told merely because it had always been so. She and I wanted the same thing: independence, the right to choose our own path and to ask questions, and we had both been born to a station in life that kept such freedom out of reach. Perhaps that was the root of my feelings for her; she reminded me of my younger self. The thought prompted a hollow laugh; was that not the ultimate vanity? “Sciocco,” I told myself, under my breath, bunching my right hand into a fist until the nails dug into my palm, as if the pain would bring me back to my senses.

In the Buttermarket, crowds gathered around the stone cross and the horse trough in the centre of the cobbles, the formidable towers of Christ Church gate casting their shadow across the coloured awnings of the market stalls. There was a great deal of animation in the buzz and hum of conversation, the townspeople clearly stirred up by the excitement of another killing in their midst.

Tom Garth stood solid as a stone column in his alcove under the gatehouse arch, arms folded across his broad chest. His expression when he saw me was even more hostile than it had been the day before, yet he nodded me through, holding out his right hand.

“Your knife, sir.” He did not meet my eye. “Are you here for divine service?”

I unstrapped the knife from my belt and placed it into his outstretched palm. “What time is it?”

“Holy Communion at nine, sir. You’re early.”

“I will call on Doctor Robinson in the meantime.” I hesitated. “You were very angry last night, it seemed.”

He looked away as if he had not heard me.

“At the Three Tuns,” I persisted.

“I have good cause,” he said eventually, still not meeting my eye. He turned my knife between his hands.

“Young Master Kingsley’s manners would try anyone’s patience,” I ventured.

“You seemed tight enough with him and his crowd last night, for a newcomer,” he flashed back, finally glaring at me, then appeared to regret having spoken and returned his attention to the knife.

“I wished only to take his money.”

Garth raised his eyes and looked at me with new curiosity.

“And did you?”

“To make money at cards, sometimes you first need to lose a little. To build the trust of your companions.”

Unexpectedly, Garth smiled. It transformed his large, crude features from their habitual suspicious frown to an expression of bright amusement.

“You lost, then.”

I acknowledged the truth of this with a laugh.

“I damned well did. But I’ll get it back next time.”

“I never heard a churchman talk like that before.”

“I am not your ordinary churchman.”

He nodded, as if to say that much was plain.

“Well, I wish you luck of it. Take all the blasted money you can from that whoreson, begging your pardon, sir.” He glanced at the cathedral with guilty eyes, as if it might disapprove of his language, and his face grew hard again.

“If he owes you a debt, can you not go to law?”

He shook his head, his lips pressed together.

“You would not understand.”

“Try me,” I said gently. “I know a little of English law.” A little was the truth; I lacked any knowledge to advise him, but I hoped to win his confidence.

He sighed, and glanced over his shoulder, biting the knuckle of his thumb.

“His father was the local justice, you know?” He lowered his voice, even though no one was within earshot.

“The man who was murdered here in the cathedral?”

He muttered an acknowledgement and looked down.

“What help could my family expect from the law when the man who owed us made the law?”

“Was it a large sum?”

He twisted his big body awkwardly and did not answer.

“The debt, I mean?”

“What that man owed my family …” He paused and twitched his head slightly, as if to dislodge a persistent fly. “It was a debt you can’t put a price on.” Another pause; this time he looked at me, as if considering whether I merited his trust. He leaned in slightly. “My sister died in his house, nine years ago.”

“You think he was responsible?”

He clenched his teeth.

“There’s one thing you learn quickly as the son of a poor man and that’s not to accuse rich men of what you can’t prove. I was only fifteen when she died. My mother near lost her wits over it. She used to stand with her hair all unbound and denounce him in the marketplace like a madwoman, till they put her in the stocks for it. Now she won’t even leave the house. That’s why people call her a witch. I thought I could make Sir Edward see reason, give us something for our loss. Soon learned otherwise, didn’t I,” he added, his voice thick with bitterness.

“What happened?”

“He said he’d have me arrested for malicious slander and extortion if I ever repeated those words or any like them. Then he had me beaten black and blue, teach me a lesson. Can’t prove that either, but I know he ordered it.”

“But why do you think your sister’s death was his doing?”

He sniffed and fixed his eyes on a point above my head.

“Strong as a horse, our Sarah. Never seen her take ill a day all the time we was growing up. She never died of no fever, whatever he said.”

“Did she see a doctor?” I asked, though I remembered that Fitch had said Sir Edward called the physician out to her at his own expense. Garth’s face darkened with anger.

“He had Ezekiel Sykes out to her, didn’t he, and all of Canterbury knows he meddles with what he shouldn’t.” He spat the words so fiercely that he had to wipe his mouth on his sleeve. I saw his hand was shaking.

“How do you mean?”

“He’s one of them …” He frowned. “I forget the word. You know—that tries to turn iron into gold.”

“An alchemist?”

“Aye, that’s what they say. Witch, more like.” Garth narrowed his eyes. “Why you so interested, anyway?”

I shrugged. “I took a dislike to this Nicholas Kingsley. He cheats at cards. I’d have been glad to see you teach him a lesson last night.”

He nodded slowly, still wary. “I lost my temper last night. I’d had a drink. Should know by now I’ll get nothing that way.”

I made as if to leave, then half turned.

“Do you mind the gate here every evening, Master Garth?”

“Aye.” His face closed up again; he seemed to be bracing himself for an argument.

“The night young Kingsley’s father was murdered too?”

“Wasn’t me killed him, if that’s what you mean,” he snapped, taking a step towards me, his nostrils flaring, almost before the words were out of my mouth. “It was the wife. Ask anyone. That’s why she ran the next day.”

I held up my hands as if to ward off misunderstanding.

“I didn’t mean to suggest … Then you must have seen her, surely?”

He slumped, the sudden flash of anger abated, and rolled his shoulders, his face uneasy.

“I saw her come in for Evensong, that I do remember. But I don’t recall seeing her leave, as I told the constable next day. First thing I know of it, Canon Langworth comes running up after supper like he’s seen the Devil himself, yelling that he’s found Sir Edward murdered.”

“But the other gates are all locked after Evensong, are they not? So anyone leaving after that time must have to pass you here at this gate.”

“Or hide themselves.” He leaned in confidentially. “These precincts are full of nooks and crannies, you must have seen. The canons do the rounds and lock the gates after the service when everyone has left, but anyone with unfinished business could easily tuck themselves away unseen. The church is as good a place as any.”

“But she would still have had to come out,” I persisted, “to have been at home when they came to tell her the news.”

“I don’t recall,” he repeated, more stubbornly this time, though his eyes were evasive. “Look here.” He tilted his neck to one side and then the other stiffly, as if it was causing him discomfort. “I won’t pretend I was sorry. It was no secret I hated him. And I can be quick with my fists sometimes, but I couldn’t do what she did. Strike a man from behind, in the dark, with a crucifix?” He shook his head. “That’s a coward’s way. Or a woman’s.”

I moved back towards him, alert.

“A crucifix? Was that what killed him?”

“So they reckon. They found it the next day, slung into the long grass in the orchard, covered in blood and brains. Big silver cross with a heavy base, one of those they have in the church.”

“So she took it from the cathedral, then?”

Garth rubbed the back of his neck.

“Must have. From the crypt, they said. It was the one used to stand on that little altar down there.”

I whistled.

“To kill a man on consecrated ground, with the cross of Christ. Mother Mary! Only someone with no fear of God could think of it.”

“Neither God nor the Devil,” Garth muttered.

“A man with no fear of the Devil would be a fool indeed,” said a new voice from behind me, smooth and polite. “Of whom do you speak, Garth?”

Garth flinched like a dog that fears a kick; I turned sharply to see John Langworth standing at the gatehouse entrance, wearing the same funereal black robe. He had appeared silently just as he had the previous day, like a bird of prey. In daylight his face seemed even sharper, the skin stretched tight over the bones so that, looking at him, I had the impression of seeing his naked skull as it would appear if his grave were opened years hence. Despite the warmth of the day, I shivered. Langworth seemed to trail the chill of the crypt around with him, as if the summer dare not venture too close to his person.

“Ah, and our Italian friend, Signor Savolino. Good day.” He gave me a thin smile and offered his hand. “Back to admire the glories of our church?”

“I had rather hoped to admire the glories of your library today,” I said, with forced politeness, shaking his cool hand. “Doctor Robinson has kindly offered to introduce me to the canon librarian.”

“Again, I fear we have little to excite a travelling scholar,” he said, inclining his head in an attitude of regret. “The great abbey of St. Augustine once boasted the finest library in England—some two thousand volumes. You may see the ruins of it outside the city wall, beyond the Burgate. A handful were saved from the flames and brought here, but nothing remarkable. Still,” he said briskly, as if pulling himself back from the past, “yours is a happier task than mine today. It seems another dreadful murder has been committed in the city only this morning. I must go and see what comfort I can offer the family. I’m afraid I shall miss divine service.”

I nodded and made as if to go on my way into the precincts. He swept past, his robe billowing at his heels. As he was about to pass into the market square, he turned.

“Oh—Garth! If you should happen to see any of the carpenters in the precincts, remind them of the casement in my back parlour, would you? I can never find any of the workmen when I need them. It would be convenient if they could do something this morning while I’m out.”

“If I see Master Paine, I’ll tell him, Canon Treasurer,” Garth called back, with a nod of deference. When Langworth had disappeared out of sight, he turned to me and rolled his eyes. “Thinks his broken window should be the master carpenter’s first priority,” he muttered, shaking his head.

I made a vague murmur of sympathy.

“Well, I will not trespass on your time any longer,” I said, smiling.

Garth squinted towards the street.

“Communion service’ll be busy this morning. Always is when there’s been a death. Best place for the gossips to get together.” He brandished my knife at me in its sheath. “Don’t worry, I shall take good care of this, sir, and see you by and by.”

I nodded and passed through the archway into the cathedral precincts, where I stood for a moment, allowing my eyes to adjust to the brightness of the day after the shadows of the gatehouse and trying to decide, with racing heart, where to go next. I had thought I might take the opportunity of being inside the precincts to visit the crypt again before I called on Harry, but Langworth’s departing words had given me a new idea. If the treasurer was out all morning and his house had a broken window…

My stomach tightened; it was almost too audacious, especially after Harry’s explicit warning about Langworth. But the treasurer’s friendship with Sir Edward Kingsley, together with the fact that he had found the body and raised the alarm, meant that he had to be regarded as a suspect, and if Harry was not willing to explore the possibility, despite being charged with watching Langworth, then I would not shy away from the prospect. I at least had no position in Canterbury to lose.

Sophia had mentioned that her husband kept the key to his mysterious cellar on a chain at his belt, yet Langworth had not returned any key to her along with Sir Edward’s other valuables. Had Langworth taken that key? If he was one of the magistrate’s close confidants, perhaps he had some idea of what was in the cellar. Was it something he needed to move, or keep hidden? Something that gave him reason to kill?

But hovering above all this was the figure of Lord Henry Howard. He trusted Langworth; did he trust him enough to make him custodian of the secret book I had seen in his house last autumn, before his arrest? That book—the lost book of the writings of the Egyptian sage Hermes Trismegistus, perhaps the only remaining copy in existence, the book Howard had believed would teach a man the secrets of immortality—was as precious to Howard as it was to me. I was certain he would not have risked leaving it among his own possessions, where the queen’s searchers might find it on the occasion of his arrest. And shortly afterwards, his nephew, the Earl of Arundel, had come into Kent to meet Langworth. Arundel had also been under suspicion over the conspiracy last autumn; Howard might have told him to entrust the book to someone far from the eyes of the queen’s pursuivants. If there was the slightest chance that Langworth knew the fate of that book, I was prepared to risk almost anything to find out.

I had no idea which of the houses around the edge of the precincts might be Langworth’s, nor how to ask without arousing suspicion. Neither did I want to walk past Harry’s house in case the sharp-eyed Samuel saw me through a window. I squinted to my left at the cathedral, pale and solid under the morning sun. Ahead of me, I noticed a man approaching from the eastern side of the precincts, pushing a barrow loaded with planks of wood; I quickened my pace and assumed an air of confidence.

“Excuse me,” I said as I drew level, “but I wonder if you can help me—I have to deliver a letter to the canon treasurer’s house, but I’m afraid I’m confused as to which one it is.”

The man rested his barrow on the ground, wiped his hands on the front of his dirty smock, and gestured the way he had come, through the middle gate.

“All the way round the end of the corona on the other side, opposite the treasury.” When he saw my blank look, he added, “The treasury is built on the side of St. Andrew’s chapel. Sticks out from the north side. You can’t miss the house—it’s the only one of three storeys on that side.”

“And will his servant be there to receive it, if he is not?”

“He keeps no servant. A woman from the town comes in to clean for him now and then, I believe. If he’s not there, you’ll have to come back later, or try one of the other canons.”

I thanked him, relieved, and watched as he hefted his load up again and set off towards the Archbishop’s Palace. Once he had rounded the corner, I glanced to my right and left; the precincts on the south side were still deserted. I could not walk around the end of the apse without passing Harry’s house. The only possibility was to go through the cathedral. There was a small door at the end of the southwest transept; I hurried across, tried the handle, and found it open. As silently as I could, I closed the door behind me and stepped into the sacred hush of the cathedral church.

Just as I had the day before, I experienced a slight dizziness, the sense of being suddenly dwarfed, as I looked upwards into the multiplying geometrical vaults that fanned out more than a hundred feet above me in all directions. Almost at once, I heard the echo of footsteps on the flagstones; I froze as they drew closer, and from the direction of the choir a ruddy-faced young man appeared in the plain robe of a minor canon, a pair of tall brass candlesticks tucked under his arms. He walked in haste with his head down; I pressed myself against the wall by the door and waited until he had passed. To my left, at the far end of the nave, I saw a number of men in clerical dress milling about, presumably preparing for the divine service of communion which would begin shortly at nine. I crossed the transept briskly and slipped out of the opposite door, the one I had entered the day before with Harry, beside the site of the martyrdom, and emerged at the corner of the cloister. Two men in black robes were approaching from the west side, but I turned purposefully to my right along the narrow passage that led alongside the Chapter House. I had learned over the years that the best way to avoid being confronted somewhere you don’t belong is to give the impression at all times of having every right to be there. So I held my head up and retraced the path I had taken with Harry until I saw ahead of me a rectangular building of one storey with a gabled roof, attached to one of the cathedral’s side chapels but of later construction, its windows secured with thick iron bars. I passed around this and almost opposite stood a narrow house, timbered in dark wood and three storeys high, each overhanging the one below. Beside it was a crooked row of smaller dwellings, all standing in the shadows of the ruined priory buildings. The great bulk of the cathedral blocked out the morning sun from the path on this side, and the windows of the treasurer’s house reflected the façade of the church, blank and impenetrable. I realised that Langworth’s door was very close to the spot where Sir Edward Kingsley’s body had been found. The dark stain was still visible on the path where Harry had pointed it out. Hardly surprising, then, that the treasurer on his way home had been the first to see his friend lying dead. But it was also extremely convenient.

I looked around. There was no one to be seen on this side of the cathedral, and I knew I must act quickly. Langworth had said that the broken window was in his back parlour, so I looked along the row of houses for any sign of an alley that would lead to the rear. There was a small path that disappeared around the crumbling arches of the priory infirmary; just as I made to follow it, a great peal of bells erupted from the tower above me, causing me to jump almost out of my skin. Catching my breath, my heart pounding in my throat, I moved as quickly as I could past the ruins and found myself facing the backyards of the row of prebendaries’ houses. These yards were no more than six feet across, separated from the path by a low wall. On the other side of the path more buildings backed onto these; I gave a quick glance to their windows, but decided I had no time to worry about who might be overlooking the treasurer’s yard. If I was lucky, everyone in the precincts would now be on their way to the service.

Emboldened by the knowledge that Langworth did not have a live-in servant, I scrambled over the wall and saw immediately the window he had complained about; its latch was broken and the weight of the leading was causing it to hang open. The casement itself, to the right of the rear door, was not large; a man like Tom Garth would not have stood a chance. Even for me it was an effort, but I was able to fold my limbs sufficiently to climb through and land, with dry throat and clammy palms, inside Langworth’s parlour.

The room was small, with a low wood-beamed ceiling, much like the inside of Harry’s house on the other side of the precincts. Little light entered from the windows facing the yard, making it all the more dingy and ominous. Langworth’s furniture was simple, austere even, like the man himself; there were no decorative touches, no ornaments. A high-backed settle of plain wood was placed near the hearth and against the right-hand wall a buffet displayed a few items of tableware, sufficient for one person; these were of silver, but unremarkable. If Langworth were siphoning funds from the cathedral treasury, he was not obviously spending them on fine living.

Where would a man like Langworth keep his most private correspondence? These old houses offered so many nooks and crannies for hiding places—loose bricks, floorboards, crevices in chimney stacks or under stairs—that I realised as I took my first step the absurdity of my ambition. The creak of the boards beneath my feet echoed through the house and I froze, listening for any telltale sign of movement. But the cathedral bells struck up another peal and after a moment I was satisfied that the house was empty.

The door of the little parlour where I had entered gave on to a narrow corridor leading to a small and basic kitchen, a staircase to the first floor, and, at the front of the house, a larger room evidently used as a library and study. Two cases of handsomely bound books stood against the wall, while a wide oak desk was placed before the windows, almost empty save for a pile of papers stacked neatly on one side with a book on top to weight them down, as well as an inkwell, penknife, and a block of sealing wax.

On my hands and knees, so that I would not be seen by anyone who happened to pass the front window, I crept over to the desk and cast my eye over the papers. Most contained columns of figures and details of expenditure on mundane items, the necessary outgoings of a cathedral community, with the occasional query in the margins. Nothing here of interest, but then I would hardly have expected him to leave any sensitive documents in plain view. There were no titles on the bookshelves to excite curiosity either; though they were fine editions, most were volumes of orthodox theology, classical literature, and approved Christian philosophy, such as you might expect to find on the shelves of any learned and pious official of the English church. Nothing contraband, nothing overtly controversial, nothing to indicate the Catholic loyalties that might tie him to Henry Howard. Here on the ground floor at least, any visitor could observe that Langworth’s personal effects were unimpeachable.

Creeping as quietly as I could manage, I climbed the stairs to the floor above. The bells had ceased and an anxious silence settled over the house, in which I imagined I could hear my own blood pulsing through my veins as I held my breath. At the top of the stairs I found myself on a small landing with only one door to my right, though directly ahead was a bare wall where it looked as if a doorway should have been. I pushed open the right-hand door into what proved to be Langworth’s bedchamber. The air held the faint musty smell that I associated with old men, but the bed was made and the floorboards swept clean. There was no other furniture save a wooden stand with a jug and bowl for washing. I looked around, feeling something was not right. The room was too small. This bedchamber must be directly above the study downstairs, so there ought to be another room on this floor over the back half of the house, above the parlour where I had come in. At some point, that room had been blocked off, the doorway plastered over.

On the back wall, beside the bed, hung a frayed tapestry depicting a lascivious version of the story of Susannah and the Elders. Though the colours were faded, the voluptuous curves of the nude bathing and the lustful eyes of the voyeurs were still lifelike enough to inspire less than virtuous thoughts. Quite a scene for the caustic treasurer to contemplate every night as he lay down to sleep, I thought, with a smile, amused by this indication of another side to him. But as I looked at the tapestry, I noticed not its design but its position, and on a sudden hunch I stepped forward and pulled it to one side. Concealed behind it was a door. I clenched my fist in triumph; this must lead to the back room which could not be accessed from the landing. Naturally, when I tried the latch, it was locked.

Over my years of travelling, in the course of which I had often found myself in the company of thieves, I had acquired a degree of skill in unfastening doors that people wanted to remain closed, but I had left my knife at the gatehouse and without it I could not begin any attempt at picking the lock. Then I remembered the penknife on Langworth’s desk downstairs; it was at least worth a try. I bolted down two at a time, forgetting all my earlier caution about soundless steps, and returned with the knife. The lock was not straightforward and it took some careful teasing with the end of the blade to discover where the key was supposed to rotate; a business made all the more difficult by the fact that my hands had begun to sweat, both from the heat and from fear of taking too long. Eventually, I found the sensitive point that triggered the lever, releasing the latch, and a wave of sweet relief washed over me; extracting the knife, I pushed open the door gently, bracing myself for some dark secret.

The room was empty. I felt my stomach lurch with disappointment, though I told myself not to be so foolish; why go to all the trouble of disguising and locking the door if there was nothing to be found? Only one wall had a window and this was covered by thick velvet drapes, so that barely any light entered. In the gloom I could make out little beyond bare boards and an empty fireplace. Yet I had a sense of apprehension, an instinct that I had stumbled upon something important, if I only had eyes to see. Something had been, and perhaps remained, hidden in this room, something Langworth did not want anyone to come across by chance.

I crossed to the fireplace; the hearth was swept clean and it was clear that no fire had been lit here for a long while. Crouching, I felt blindly inside the chimney breast—my friend John Dee used to hide caches of letters and secret books up his chimney and I wondered if Langworth had tried the same trick—but my groping was rewarded only with a cascade of soot and dried bird droppings. There appeared to be no recess inside that I could feel. I knelt to try and brush the mess away from the tiles of the hearth to conceal evidence of my search. I dared not draw back the curtains in case anyone glancing from one of the buildings behind the house should see the movement, but by now my eyes were growing used to the gloom. As I scattered the fall of soot with my fingertips, I realised that one of the earthenware tiles that formed the floor of the fireplace was loose. At its edge was a slight indentation that allowed me to slip the tips of two fingers into the gap and lift the tile; though it was heavy, it was evidently not sealed in like the others and lifted easily, with a loud scraping. I set it to one side, wiped my sweating hands on my breeches and felt inside the cavity that had been revealed. My fingers brushed the surface of a wooden box, and with little difficulty I eased this out through the opening. It was carved with a design of serpents and vines intertwined, small enough to be held between my two hands, and it was no great surprise to find it locked. After a bit of judicious probing with the penknife, the clasp sprung open. I moved to sit beneath the window, where I lifted the drape just a fraction, enough to allow a sliver of daylight to illuminate the contents.

At the bottom of the casket I found folded papers, and I had to fight to keep my hand steady as I reached for these; their contents must be valuable, since Langworth had taken such evident pains to hide them. On top of these papers was a bunch of keys, four altogether, of varying sizes, though two were quite large and had acquired the tarnish of age. I put them to one side and turned my attention to the letters.

The first bore a broken seal in scarlet wax with a device I did not recognise and, as I unfolded it, my heart sank; the letter revealed only a series of numbers, arranged in groups of differing lengths that must correspond to words, but impenetrable to anyone not in possession of the cipher, as the writer had intended.

I sighed. I should not have been surprised; at least the coded letter told me that Langworth’s secret correspondence was likely to be worth reading. Walsingham had a master cryptographer in his employ, Thomas Phelippes, a man of extraordinary abilities who could probably break this code in a matter of minutes just by looking at it. Though I had read a great deal about ciphers and seen a good many coded messages pass through the French embassy during the business there last autumn, I would not know where to begin in deciphering it and could easily waste hours in the attempt. I hesitated, holding the letter up gingerly between my thumb and forefinger. The paper was dog-eared and stained with what looked like drops of water on one side, as if it had been well-handled on its travels. I stared fruitlessly at the lines of numbers in the author’s tiny, neat hand. Where had it come from? I needed to make a copy—Langworth would certainly notice if I took the original, and if it should be damaged or destroyed while in my possession, crucial evidence would vanish forever—a mistake I had made once before, to my shame and Walsingham’s fury. But even supposing I had time to make a copy now, how could I get it to London? I would have to ask Harry’s servant Samuel to take it, and I doubted he would be in a hurry to do me any favours.

The letter was signed not with more numbers but with a symbol, which seemed to me oddly familiar, but though I ransacked my memory trying to place it there was no jolt of recognition. Silently, I cursed my own failure; I, who was renowned in Paris as an expert on systems of memory, yet could not pull this vital information from my own brain when it most mattered. I knew that those who corresponded in code, whether to deliver secret intelligence or illicit conspiracies, often used a symbol in place of a signature to authenticate their dispatches; when I wrote to Walsingham I used the astrological symbol for the planet Jupiter as my own mark. If the sign on the letter I now held in my hands was familiar, it was most likely that I had seen it on one of the letters that had passed through the French embassy and so, logically, Langworth must be receiving letters from someone who had been involved with the invasion conspiracy of the previous autumn. Knowing of his Catholic leanings, this was hardly a surprise; the question was: Who? Henry Howard, from his prison cell, or someone outside England? And who was his courier?

The most pressing question, though, was whether I had time to copy the letter before Langworth returned. I tucked it carefully into the leather pouch I wore at my belt and hesitated, weighing the keys in my hand. What secrets did they hold, I wondered, and did I dare remove them to find out? The house remained deathly silent. In the shard of light from the window, dust drifted gently.

Outside, the cathedral bells struck up a new peal, startling me out of my thoughts. If they signalled the end of the service, people would be spilling out into the precincts and it would be harder to leave without attracting attention. I looked down at the keys in my palm, willing myself to make a decision. Was one of these the key to Sir Edward Kingsley’s cellar?

It was reckless, I knew, but I was afraid I would not have another chance. I slipped the bunch of keys into my pouch too, closed the casket, and fiddled impatiently with the lock, my fingers made clumsy by haste, until I felt it click beneath the knife. At least if he found the casket locked Langworth might attribute the missing keys to some lapse of memory on his own part. I hid the box again under the tile and left the hidden room, returning to Langworth’s bedchamber and closing the door as silently as possible behind me. But this time I could not make the lock turn back into place, and the persistent clamour of the bells began to seem an alarm meant to warn me that time was short. Instead of easing the knife gently, as I knew I should, I tried in my haste to force it; the blade glanced off the bolt and caught the edge of my finger. A gout of blood splashed to the floor; stifling a curse, I sucked furiously at the cut and at that moment I heard the sound of a door opening downstairs, followed by voices.

Frantic, I glanced around the room. The only possible hiding place was under Langworth’s bed. I pulled the tapestry across the door, scuffed the traces of my blood away with my foot and, as quietly as I could manage, pressed myself prostrate on the floor and wriggled flat under the bed, holding my breath. The space under the bed frame was thick with dust, but the boards were warped by age and I found a gap between two of them wide enough to press one eye against. I was directly above the front room of the house, Langworth’s study. Below I could see the desk where I had found the penknife I now clutched in my bleeding fingers. As I watched, a packet was flung down onto the desk and the figure of the treasurer in his black robe crossed my line of vision.

“Well, then,” he said. “That is everything.”

“You are certain?” I could not see the face of his interlocutor and dared not move to try and see better. I remained frozen, pressed to the floor, making my breath as shallow as I could.

“Everything I could find,” Langworth replied. “It was not easy—the place was left in such disarray.”

“You did not attract attention, going there?”

The other man’s voice seemed disturbingly familiar. Langworth gave a cold laugh.

“The apothecary’s sister-in-law stands to inherit—she is a superstitious woman and would not set foot in a place befouled by murder until it had been blessed by a man of the church.”

“And now?”

“Tacere et fidere, my friend.” Langworth’s voice grew impatient. “The threads are all unravelled. We can only bide our time and wait for news. For now, the best thing we can do is to have faith, and keep our mouths shut.”

“We must experiment further, if we hope for success,” his companion said, lowering his voice. “There are other places to buy—”

“In time,” Langworth snapped back. “There have been enough deaths lately, the town is alert. They will blame a vagrant for Fitch and hang him at the assizes in a few days. Then they will forget. Meanwhile, have you not seen the tide of refugees fleeing the plague rumours?” He folded his long fingers together and cracked his knuckles. “There will be chance enough for experiments in the days to come. God will provide. Besides,” he added, moving back towards the desk and out of my sight, “nothing can be done while the Italian is here, prying. You saw him this morning, I suppose?”

“Not today. Was he here?”

The second man spoke sharply and as he stepped forward and I was able to glimpse him, my stomach constricted and I swear for a moment my heart stopped beating. It was Samuel, Harry Robinson’s servant. A chill washed my whole body, as if I had been hit by a cold wave, as I realised the implications of this: Langworth knew exactly who I was. When he greeted me politely by my false name at the gate, he had been mocking me; if Samuel was his confidant, he must have known my identity even before I arrived. The Italian. My careful pretence was meaningless; I already had an enemy in the heart of the cathedral, an ally of Henry Howard’s who must know my part in his patron’s imprisonment. This changed everything; I could no longer imagine that I was passing unnoticed through Canterbury. Langworth must be as suspicious of me as I was of him and would be waiting for an opportunity as we danced around each other, trying not to reveal our hands.

“I saw him by the gatehouse this morning, as I was leaving,” Langworth said, his voice sharp. “He said Harry was taking him to the library.”

“He has not called,” Samuel said. “Harry is at home. Perhaps he went by himself.”

“Well, let him occupy himself there if he wishes, he can do little harm,” Langworth said, dismissive. “It will serve to keep him above ground, at least. Watch him. What does Harry make of him thus far, out of interest?”

Samuel was now directly beneath me; I saw him shrug.

“Harry is wary of him.”

“And rightly so.”

“He fears this business with Kingsley’s murder is a pretext. There are rumours from London, you know, that the queen will send forces to the Netherlands.”

“Let us hope they are true. This is just the news our friends in Paris are waiting for.”

“They say Walsingham plans to dissolve the richest cathedral foundations to raise money for this war. Starting with Canterbury, to set an example.”

Langworth appeared again beneath my spy-hole.

“And the last thing Harry wants is for the foundation to be dissolved. Where else would he find so comfortable a situation?” His voice was cold.

“All Harry cares about is preserving things as they are. He fears the Italian is really here to find evidence of his own incompetence.”

“So poor Harry finds himself caught between the Devil and the deep sea,” Langworth mused, without a trace of sympathy. “The spy fears he is spied on by his own spymaster.” He gave a dry laugh. “What a fitting irony.”

“He has warned the Italian away from you,” Samuel added.

“I doubt that will stop him,” Langworth said, folding his arms and cupping his chin in his right hand. “Do not make the mistake of underestimating our friend Bruno, as my lord Howard did. He is devilishly clever and sly as a fox.”

“Nevertheless, if he is determined to unearth Kingsley’s murderer …”

“Yes. That could be awkward.” Langworth paced across the room and was again lost to my narrow field of vision. Samuel turned to follow his direction, and I found myself looking down onto the shiny disk of pink skin at his crown, barely covered by the meagre strands of black hair he scraped over it. I felt an instinctive revulsion. Langworth’s voice continued, from over by the window. “How much did the wife know, that is the question.”

“Nothing, Kingsley always said.”

“I’m not sure I believe that. She may have been sharper than Kingsley realised. After all, the damned fool didn’t even have the wit to look behind him on a dark night,” Langworth added, an unmistakable anger in his tone. “Walsingham would not send someone like Giordano Bruno here for the murder of a provincial magistrate, you can be sure of that. It can only be that the girl told him something significant—something she may have observed without Kingsley’s knowledge. And there are others at St. Gregory’s whose silence cannot be taken for granted.”

“The boy, you mean?”

Langworth snorted.

“Nicholas has eyes only for whores and cards. No, I am thinking of the housekeeper. If anyone has seen what they should not, it would be that beady old bird.” He fell silent for a moment, then clapped his hands together briskly, as if he had come to a sudden decision. “I had better pay another visit to St. Gregory’s. Before the Italian asks too many questions. Find Sykes for me—I may have need of his skills.”

“And then should I follow the Italian?”

Langworth paused, weighing up his alternatives.

“Damnation—I had forgotten that there is a meeting of the chapter today at one, and I have certain accounts that must be arranged beforehand.” He shook his head impatiently. “And I dine with the mayor tonight. No—St. Gregory’s will have to wait until tomorrow. Take a message to Sykes, tell him I want him here after Evensong. Watch the Italian, by all means, report his conversations with Harry. I have an idea of how to keep him out of trouble, if we need to.”

“And where shall I find you?”

“In the treasury. I shall go there presently, once I have put this in a safe place.” I could not see what he meant by “this,” but as he crossed the room again I saw that he had picked up the packet he had been holding when he first came in. “By the cross, this heat is too much.”

“We shall have a storm soon,” Samuel observed.

Langworth grunted assent and I heard the sound of the latch being drawn on the front door. I tried to swallow but my throat felt as if it were filled with dust; Langworth would be coming up here at any moment and would surely notice anything awry. I wanted urgently to check that I had rearranged the tapestry over the door just as it had been, but I dared not move a muscle.

“God will reward your loyalty, Samuel,” Langworth said, on the threshold.

“I hope not to wait quite so long,” Samuel replied, and both men gave a low, knowing laugh. The door closed, and my bladder tightened as I heard the first creaking tread on the staircase.

Langworth’s worn leather shoes passed directly in front of me as he crossed the room to the door behind the tapestry. I breathed out as silently as I could, watching the small bloom of dust that rose under my nostrils as I did so. I kept my lips pressed tightly together so that I should not sneeze. A bunch of keys jangled in his hand, then I heard the sound of one being fitted into the lock. One more heartbeat and Langworth would discover that his secret room had been left unlocked; one more—but before I heard the click of the key turning, there came a peremptory knock at the door from downstairs. Langworth appeared to hesitate, but the banging came again, more urgently. I heard him tut, then he threw the packet onto the bed and hurried down the stairs. It was only when I heard him lift the latch on the front door that I realised how much I was shaking.

“Dean Rogers. Good morning. To what do I owe the honour?” Langworth’s voice rose from the room below; he sounded surprised and not at all pleased to see his visitor.

“John—sorry to disturb, I’m sure you’re busy. It’s about the chapter meeting this afternoon.” The dean’s tone was apologetic. “I wondered if I might have a quick look at the accounts ledgers ahead of the meeting?”

“Well—I shall be presenting the accounts myself this afternoon—I’m not sure that it would be particularly—”

“If it’s not too much trouble,” the dean said pleasantly, but firmly. “I’m afraid I don’t have a head for figures, John, not like you, and there’s always so much to take in at these meetings. I thought it would be easier for an addle-pate like me to try and understand the expenditure before we get there.”

Clever old fox, I thought, smiling to myself as I recalled what Harry had said about the persistent rumours of Langworth playing fast and loose with the treasury accounts. The dean meant to put his treasurer on the spot. While Langworth began to explain at length why the ledgers might prove difficult to understand, I held my breath and slid as silently as I could so that my head was poking out from under the bed and glanced at the door behind the tapestry. Langworth had left the key in the lock, an iron ring with several others dangling from it. I eased myself out a little farther into the room, still flat on my stomach, praying that no creaking board would give me away. The heat in the room seemed to press about my face like a damp cloth; sweat dripped into my eyes.

“I do appreciate that,” the dean was saying, “but it would put my mind at rest before addressing the chapter …”

I crawled on my belly across the floor, one hand on the keys at my own belt so that they would not scrape on the boards, until I could reach up to the lock of the door into the back room. Hoping that my knife had not damaged the mechanism, I turned the key. To my relief I heard the bolt slide into place with a dull thud.

“The account books are all in the treasury, of course,” Langworth was explaining to the dean, his voice growing defensive. “I was on my way over there.”

“Then I shall accompany you,” the dean said, just as pleasantly. “Shall we go now?”

Langworth hesitated.

“Of course. Although I realise I have left my keys in my chamber—do go on ahead, if you wish.”

“No matter,” said the dean pleasantly. “I can wait a moment.”

Langworth’s heavy footsteps sounded again on the stairs; I scrambled back under the bed, my heart pounding in my throat, pressing a hand over my mouth as the dust scuffed up by my sudden movement itched its way into my eyes and nose. The counterpane that hung over the bed was still swaying when Langworth stormed into the room, unlocked the hidden door, threw the packet he had left on the bed into the back room, and locked the door again, muttering under his breath. I heard the flap of heavy material as he rearranged the tapestry and the metallic clink of the keys as he tossed them in his hand on his way out. Though I had fallen out of the habit of regular prayer, I offered a silent thanks to Providence for the appearance of the dean.

When I was certain that they had left the house, I crawled out from my hiding place, brushing the dust from my clothes, and crept back down to the study, again bending low so that I would not be visible to anyone passing the window. I hesitated by the desk as I replaced the penknife, first wiping the traces of my blood from its blade. There was ink in the inkwell, and paper. How long was Langworth likely to be in the treasury with the dean—long enough for me to copy the letter I had tucked into my purse? My hands were still trembling from our near-encounter. I forced myself to breathe slowly and deeply. Now that I knew Langworth and the other canons would be occupied at the chapter meeting that afternoon, I decided the lesser risk would be to take the letter away to copy and attempt to return the original later while he was out, trusting that he would not check the contents of his secret chest carefully in the meantime.

Outside, the sound of voices carried across from the cathedral. People were evidently abroad in the precincts; the service must have ended. I needed to leave Langworth’s house now, while I still had time; Harry would be expecting me for dinner soon and I wanted to return to the Cheker and copy the coded letter first—though I had no idea how I could send it to London, now that I knew Samuel could not be trusted. My jaw tightened at the thought of dissembling in front of Harry’s servant, as if I were ignorant of his treachery. I must find a way to speak to Harry alone, I thought, but I feared he would not believe me about Samuel, and I would lose his trust and goodwill if he knew I had defied his warning to keep away from Langworth. Worse still—and my mouth dried at the thought—I could not discount the possibility that Harry knew about Samuel. Perhaps he was even in league with Langworth, or at best turning a blind eye; it would not be the first time one of Walsingham’s contacts had betrayed his trust and, though I found it hard to believe of Harry Robinson, I knew I must remain wary. The hardest part of working for Walsingham was knowing whom to trust.

I cast a last glance over the desk and as I did so, it was as if something distant echoed in my brain, an instinct that prompted me to take a second look. I picked up the first of the papers—a balance sheet, with columns of numbers, scribbled calculations beneath. Under a couple of pages of similar notes, I found another sheet itemising expenditure for the month of May 1584, an unremarkable list of outgoings for a cathedral foundation: Alms; Bread; Candles; Dean’s kitchen; Eucharist (sundries)… I stared at the paper; something seemed odd about it. I almost laughed aloud as the realisation dawned. The list was alphabetical, and beside each item listed was a figure, set out as the number of shillings and pence paid. Could it be …? Where better to hide a cipher based on the substitution of numbers for letters than among balance sheets? Holding my breath, glancing all the time at the window, I took the stolen letter from my purse and checked the numbers at the top of the page: 1271584 76201536.

Matching the numbers against the figures in the expenses column, I tried to make sense of the first set, but no matter how I divided the numbers up, there was no combination of letters that made any sense. Frustrated, I bit my lip; I had been so certain of my sudden flash of insight. I tried the next long number. Seven … the only item on the list beginning with 7 was “Parish priests—7s 6d.” Seven and six—P. “Alms” was listed as twenty shillings, but there was no payment corresponding to fifteen, or one-and-five. I cursed under my breath and glared at the list as if to intimidate it into giving up its secrets. It seemed my imagination had overreached; this was nothing but an ordinary accounting sheet and I was being a fool. I was about to replace it when I noticed that “Incense” was set down at five shillings. Incense? Though I was not well versed in the theological disputes of the English church, I knew that the use of incense was a vexed question; some thought it too close to the ornaments of the Church of Rome, while others argued that it had never been explicitly prohibited and was therefore acceptable in Protestant services. I had not noticed any smell of incense on either of the occasions when I was inside the cathedral, so its inclusion on the list of outgoings struck me as odd. I scanned back over the list to see if anything corresponded to the number 1, and realised that I had overlooked “Repairs (sundries),” listed at one pound. That gave us P-A-R-I … Heart racing, I searched the list and found what I had hardly dared hope for—the payment for “Scholars” was 3s 6d. So if I was right, and this balance sheet was indeed the cipher, the second word at the top of this letter was “Paris.” What, then, was the first? I began again, cursing when every combination I matched against the balance sheet resulted in no recognisable word. I blinked slowly and tried to look at the numbers with fresh eyes, until I realised with a start that the last four numbers made sense together as a group: 1584. This first group of numbers, then, was not a word but a date—the twelfth of the seventh, 1584. A letter sent from Paris on 12 July—my instinct was right. In haste, I scrabbled on Langworth’s desk for a new sheet of paper and dipped his quill in the inkwell, hoping he would not notice it had been recently used. As quickly as I could, I copied the cipher, put my copy and the letter into my pouch again, and replaced the original balance sheet in the pile of papers, feeling triumphant. It was only then that I noticed I had been careless; a smear of blood from my cut finger marked the bottom of the cipher page. There was nothing I could do about it now, though, except to hope that he would not notice until much later.

I had to trust to luck in climbing out of Langworth’s back window, but fortunately no one passed along the path while I was making my escape and I emerged from behind the row of houses unobserved, as far as I could tell. The air felt thick and heavy with humidity and the blue of the sky had grown hazy with a thin gauze of cloud. Samuel was right, I thought; it seemed we would have a storm soon. I decided to take the letter I had borrowed from Langworth back to my room at the Cheker, make the copy, and decipher it as quickly as possible. I recalled Sophia mentioning that the Huguenot weavers travelled regularly to London to sell their cloth; perhaps one of them could be persuaded to take a letter to Sidney for a fee.