Murder by Misrule

  ***

  They rounded his building and passed through the gap. A man ran past them, returning to the hall, shouting, "Your Grace! Your Grace!"

  Francis's head whipped around. There had been no dukes in England since Catholic Norfolk lost his head for conspiring with the Scottish queen. Then he remembered: the Prince of Purpoole and his court of Misrule.

  He quickened his pace. "We must hurry. We'll have a crowd in a minute."

  No need to wonder how the news had spread. The privateer's son was stomping about the landscape, gesticulating wildly, shaking a piece of paper at the Trumpington boy. A few heated words carried toward them on the wind: "— a perfidious popish plot that my father —"

  It would seem that the vaunted loyalty of privateers was not altogether feigned. Still, there were appropriate times for expressions of patriotic fervor. This was not one of them.

  Glancing over his shoulder, Francis saw clusters of men standing at the windows of Colby's Building, watching the scene in the fields. He spoke urgently to Ben. "He must stop that shouting."

  Whitt called, "Tom!" He made a throat-slicing motion with his index finger.

  Clarady responded with a wide-armed questioning gesture. At least he stifled his ranting.

  They covered the few remaining yards and joined the other two. Clarady awaited them with his hands on his hips. Trumpington was pacing around the holly bush, peering at the ground as if searching for something. He straightened now to face the newcomers.

  "We only have a minute." Francis pitched his voice low. "I strongly advise that we keep the elements of our prior investigations to ourselves."

  Clarady winced, shamefaced. But perhaps his shouts had not been clearly heard. The wind was blowing from the east.

  "We mustn't alert the conspirator to our special interest in this matter." Francis turned now to look at the source of the trouble. The light was rapidly fading, their shadows stretching back toward the Inn. Even thus dimly revealed, the sight was repellent. The man had been enormous, barrel-chested with massive limbs. Yet now he lay slack and wasted on the ground. Francis's eyes skittered across the darkened midsection, glistening thickly in the twilight glow. He recoiled, tasting a bitter gorge, as if someone had forced a noxious potion down his throat. He shuddered and turned his back.

  He spoke to Trumpington. "Did you find anything?"

  "Me?"

  "Weren't you looking? Just now?"

  The boy shrugged. "Not really. Well, a little. It's too dark to see. There isn't anything, anyway. Sir."

  He seemed distracted. Francis could see no special reason for it in the situation at hand. Granted, the sight of this body was disturbing, more so than he would have expected. After all, the fellow had been a stranger. Why should the mere sight of a corpse elicit such a reaction? Or perhaps it was the sharp smell of fresh blood? The ominous effect of the lowering light? It was curious — and frustrating — how little control one's intellect had over one's visceral responses.

  He shook his head. This was no time for introspection. He turned to Whitt. "You mentioned a sack."

  Whitt said, "Yes, sir." Then to the others: "Isn't it here?"

  "No sack." Clarady sounded thoroughly disgusted. "The poxy traitor must have taken it."

  "It might still be out here somewhere." Trumpington frowned at Clarady. "We can make a thorough search in the morning."

  "Morning will be too late," Francis said. "The sack must have been received by the conspirator. Otherwise it would surely still be in the Fleming's possession."

  "He might have hidden it nearby," Trumpington said. "He might have wanted to hold it back until he got his money."

  "Did you find a purse?" Francis asked.

  The boy blanched. "I didn't look. I didn't want to put my hands . . ."

  Francis shuddered. "No, of course not. Hm. Well, I see no sensible reason to hide the goods before meeting with their receiver. We'll assume the sack is now in possession of our conspirator." He paused. "Do we know the Fleming's name?"

  The lads shook their heads.

  "No matter." He tried to think of other useful observations that could be made at this point. That the man had been stabbed, like Smythson, was probably relevant. The lack of frenzy could be the result of prior experience. If this were indeed the killer of Smythson and, he must now suppose, Shiveley, he was growing accustomed to violence. Which consideration leant greater urgency to the need to apprehend him.

  His thoughts were interrupted by Treasurer Fogg's voice booming across the field. "Hold the rest back! Let no more into the field until further notice."

  Francis spoke rapidly to his pupils. "We'll discuss this later. No one else knows yet of the probable connection between this death and the earlier ones. We must keep that to ourselves as long as possible to avoid alerting the killer. Don't volunteer any more than is necessary. Don't say anything about our previous investigations, Lord Essex's men, or the limner. Do not utter the word Catholic. And don't mention the sack."

  Fogg strode up, followed by half a dozen benchers and ancients, including Nathaniel Welbeck and George Humphries. "Bacon? What's the matter here?"

  Bacon said, "My pupils found this man as they were returning from — er, to the Inn."

  "Is that so?" Fogg turned his heavy glare toward the boys.

  "Yes, sir," Clarady responded. "I stumbled upon him, literally. He's dead. Stabbed."

  Whitt added, "We naturally called upon our tutor first. To advise us."

  Francis caught Whitt's eye and shook his head minutely. Too much information. Whitt grimaced; Fogg noticed. Francis's heart began to sink.

  "Why would you need advice?" Fogg asked. "You should have come directly to me." He moved in to inspect the body on the ground, the others close behind him. They recoiled as one from the terrible sight. "Ugh." He blew out a noisy breath. "Any idea who he is?"

  "None whatsoever," Trumpington replied, too quickly.

  The boy was studying his uncle's costume as if he himself had tailored it and feared to have erred in some essential detail. He seemed especially concerned about the cuffs and sleeves.

  Welbeck noticed the scrutiny. He preened himself, turning slightly this way and that. "I see you admire my new doublet."

  "It's very clean," Trumpington said.

  Francis thought that an odd comment, but it apparently held meaning for Welbeck. He replied, "Yes, indeed. Nary a blemish. You needn't concern yourself on that account."

  A domestic matter. Francis dismissed it from his attention.

  Humphries spoke. "I think it's odd that these two —" He tilted his scraggly beard toward Clarady and Trumpington "— are always on the spot whenever a Gray's man is found dead. Or a man found dead at Gray's."

  "What's odd about it?" Fogg asked.

  Humphries pulled in his chin. "Nothing. Nothing. It's just —" He cast his eyes about as if seeking support. No one offered any. "Here we have a man who has died suddenly, by violent means, and here again is Bacon with his . . . with his . . . with his piglets."

  "Ha!" Welbeck barked his approval of the insulting yet inane remark. "Good one, Humphries!"

  "I prefer 'Francis and his franklins,'" Francis said, unable to resist a challenge of verbal skill. Really, a man's facile tongue was as much a traitor to his better judgment as Gray's hidden conspirator was to the queen's peace.

  He earned a smirk from Welbeck and a small frown from Whitt, who perhaps did not appreciate the downgrading of his social status. No one else seemed to grasp the outmoded reference.

  "Have you any idea how this man came to die here, just outside our Inn?" Fogg asked.

  Francis drew a breath to answer but was forestalled by Welbeck. "Looks to me like a falling out among thieves."

  "Me too," Humphries said. "A falling out. An argument. Some sort of dis —"

  Fogg's brows beetled at him. "We know what falling out means, thank you, Humphries. Why here? There's nothing out here but Gray's."

  "Perhaps they were travel
ing north," Welbeck said. "On their way to Oxford."

  "Could have been Oxford," Humphries said.

  "Except that they weren't on the road," Fogg said.

  "They may have been avoiding the road," Welbeck said. "Avoiding notice. Thieves would think in such terms."

  "They would." Humphries nodded. "Certainly they would."

  Francis was not unhappy about the trend of their discussion. A hypothesis based on the behavior of thieves nicely covered the scanty facts and led to no undesirable further speculations. Like so much academical philosophizing, it was superficially plausible yet wholly divorced from reality.

  Fogg frowned, pushing his lower lip in and out. "I suppose that could be the case. Or these thieves may have been conspiring to commit acts of caption and apportation — larceny — at Gray's."

  "Security has grown lax," one of the benchers said, inaugurating a widespread grumble about nonspecific lapses of responsibility.

  Francis was about to interrupt them to suggest that the body be removed before the light failed, when he saw a band of men with torches passing through the gap. They marched across the field in formation, led by Lord Stephen. The torches drove the dregs of the day before them, replacing the omniluminescent gray of twilight with bronzy flares. They arrayed themselves around the group.

  "Mr. Fogg. Gentlemen," Lord Stephen said. He flashed a supercilious smile at his messmates then returned his attention to the Treasurer. "I assumed you would need assistance."

  "Very thoughtful, Your Grace." Fogg smiled. "The light is indeed most welcome."

  Lord Stephen beckoned one of his torch men to follow as he stepped toward the holly bush. He took a quick look at the body and cried, "Why, it's the Fleming! How came he here?" He cocked his head at Francis as if expecting an answer. Then he gasped and pointed at the eastern sky. "Don't tell me: tonight is the half moon. Am I right?"

  "My lord," Francis said, "if you —"

  "Do you know this man?" Fogg demanded.

  "Stephen," Clarady said, his voice low and tense with warning. "Say no more."

  Delabere frowned at him. He answered Fogg, "Of course not. How would I know him? He's a man of mean estate. Some sort of laborer, we assumed. Ugly, isn't he? But you should see his wife!"

  He grinned at Fogg and Francis felt his heart clench in his breast. Heaven help them, the fool was being charming. He'd found himself in the center of attention, before a group of senior men, and meant to impress them. He could never do so with his legal knowledge — for that he have none — so now he meant to display one of his few talents: gossip.

  "My lord," Francis said, "I must beg you to —"

  Delabere cut him off with a little wave, as if to say, Don't trouble yourself, I'll explain everything. "We went to interview the said wife for Mr. Bacon. You know, about the Smythson matter. And, of course, because Tom had fallen madly in love with her. As per usual." He rolled his eyes.

  "What Smythson matter?" Fogg looked sharply at Francis.

  "Stephen," Clarady said, "kindly shut your lordly trap."

  One of the prince's retainers stepped toward him, squaring his shoulders. "Mend your words when you address the prince, sirrah."

  Clarady flushed darkly at the insult.

  Delabere grinned nastily at him. "Well, she truly is a beauty. I might be inclined to have a go at her myself. But a limner? Really, Tom. Tradeswomen are more trouble than they're worth, I've told you time and again."

  Clarady muttered through his teeth, "One more word, Steenie, and I'll lay you flat."

  Delabere scoffed at him and cast a glance over his shoulder to indicate his coterie of devoted followers. Clarady's ability to influence the young lord had apparently come to an end.

  "What about this so-called Smythson matter?" Fogg demanded.

  "Yes, it's quite remarkable, really," Stephen babbled on. "This extraordinarily beautiful woman was standing in a window overlooking the lane where poor old Mr. Smythson was murdered. Can you imagine the luck? We're fairly certain she saw the whole thing."

  "She's a limner?" Welbeck said.

  "There was a witness?" Humphries said.

  "Well, we never actually asked her," Stephen said. "When it turned out that old Mr. Shiveley had done the deed — which was a surprise to me, I can tell you, I never would have thought it — we never bothered to ask Clara whether she'd seen him there that day or no."

  "Clara who?" Humphries said. "Where does she live?"

  "Clara Goossens, of Oat Lane." Stephen pronounced the O's with an exaggerated foreign accent.

  Clarady roared, "You weasel!" and lunged at him. He was pushed back by three of the prince's retainers.

  "What's wrong, Tom? Afraid of poachers? You'll never get near her, you know. She's guarded by an absolute dragon of a female surgeon, if you can imagine such a creature. Truly frightening." Stephen shuddered dramatically. He was enjoying himself to the hilt. "But it's simply too astonishing, really, just too amazing, that along should come her alleged husband — the Fleming, as we called him for want of a name, as if we cared to know it — to get himself killed in our fields, right here, on the day of the half moon, just as old Smythson predicted in his letter."

  "What letter?" Fogg turned his scowl on Francis. "What Smythson matter? What limner? Bacon, I demand an explanation."

  Francis leaned toward him, making a futile attempt to direct his words to Fogg alone. "Treasurer Fogg, I crave your patience, this is hardly the place —"

  "What had James Shiveley to do with all this?" one of the other benchers asked.

  A general clamor arose. Francis was pelted with questions from all sides. At the edge of the group on his left, he saw Clarady arguing furiously with Lord Stephen, bodily restrained by three of the lord's retainers. On his right, Whitt and Trumpington stood back-to-back, stammering non-answers to a spate of queries. The Fleming lay forgotten under his shrub.

  Francis closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.