Paul Lawrence - Hearts of Darkness

The grille lay crooked, displaced from its mountings and carelessly replaced. I knelt upon the stone flagstones and held the flame to the surface. I peered into the water, desperate to find Josselin’s grey head, else nothing at all.

‘What do you see?’ whispered Dowling over my shoulder.

At first just blackness, as my eyes accustomed to the dark surrounds. Then something long and thick, dancing in the weak current. I pushed the torch down against the grille, and felt my heart break.

A woman’s red hair drifting softly up, reaching out, then falling away. I stared, unbelieving, unable to think. Dowling wailed, yet I barely heard his voice above the sound of blood pounding in my ears. Time slowed, as I watched, transfixed, the thick, red strands of Jane’s beautiful hair dancing in the still waters. Then a great fist squeezed my heart unbearably hard, sending waves of pain up through my chest and out of my eyes and nose.

Jane was dead. The baby too.

I let my head fall against the grate and fumbled with my fingers, pushing them through the grille, trying to touch the water. I felt Dowling’s arm fall across my shoulder pushing me down, felt his wet cheek against my neck.

The end of the world. God’s verdict upon my useless soul.

‘Withypoll’s little joke.’ Arlington’s voice echoed about the cellar walls. He nodded at the well. ‘He wanted to be here when you found her.’

I stared up at his charred features, unable to read the expression on his hairless face. I staggered to my feet, the cellar spinning about my head like a whirligig. Had I killed him in St Albans, none of this would have happened, which thought stabbed me in the heart once more. It was my fault Jane died. I reached out for his throat, watching his eyes open wide in fright.

‘It is not her!’ he yelled, lifting his arm with difficulty.

I stopped, trying to work out what the words meant. I swivelled on my heel and fell once more to stare through the lattice. I peered into

the water, but couldn’t see her face for hair. I tore the grate aside and threw it against the wall. Arlington edged closer to the door.

‘Hold him!’ I screamed at Dowling.

I reached into the well and found her chin. I lifted it gently upwards, uncertain if I could bear to look upon Jane’s beautiful dead face. But this woman’s face was rounder, her nose smaller.

I felt an immeasurable wave of relief course through my arteries, a wave of elation and joy. Then guilt. ‘Who is she?’ I croaked hoarse. Withypoll’s ‘little joke’.

Arlington wriggled from Dowling’s grip. ‘I have no idea. Nor do I care.’ He rubbed the back of his hand against his mouth. ‘Yet I do assure you that if you don’t return my letter by tomorrow morning, then I will place your housemaid in one well,’ he turned to Dowling, ‘and your wife in the other.’

Dowling twisted his shirt between his hands like he wished it was Arlington’s neck. I stepped forwards and poked a finger at Arlington’s head. ‘Then I would send a copy of your letter to every parliamentarian in England. They will hang you.’

‘I have thought on it,’ Arlington sneered. ‘The King will swear the letter is a forgery and none will dare argue otherwise. Memories of the last Republic are too recent.’

‘The King might avoid execution, but you wouldn’t,’ I said. ‘You would be his scapegoat.’

I met his gaze, stony eyes unflinching. So the lord decided not to be held ransom by the butcher and a clerk, whatever the cost. Dowling watched me too.

‘I can’t give you the letter,’ I replied, dry-mouthed.

Arlington shook his head. ‘Don’t say it, Lytle. Don’t make that mistake.’

‘The original is destroyed,’ I said. ‘I threw it in the river on the way to the Tower.’

His jaw dropped and his eyes narrowed. I met his stare easily, the hate in my soul providing me with all the strength in the world.

‘I will fetch you the copies,’ I said.

Arlington’s cheeks reddened. ‘The copies?’

‘Yes, your lordship.’ I glanced at Dowling, whose skin was grey as ash. ‘Which are in various places. I will fetch them all back to you tomorrow.’

‘Why did you make copies?’ Arlington asked.

‘You threatened several times to kill us,’ I replied.

‘How many copies?’ Arlington whispered.

‘Three,’ I lied, without thinking if three was better than two or four. ‘They are in a safe place. I will bring all three.’

‘You had better,’ Arlington said slow, brow furrowing. ‘How do I know how many copies you made? How do I know you don’t still have the original?’

I met his gaze, pressing all my fears down towards my toes. ‘As I said, your lordship. I will return all copies to you, tomorrow. I am your loyal subject.’

He sighed and his shoulders slumped. ‘You are much cleverer than I thought.’ Then his eyes flashed. ‘If you speak truth, I need have no fear. I might kill you without fear of reprisal, yet I would not need to kill you. If you speak false then you deserve to be killed, yet to kill you would be to sign my own death warrant.’ He cocked his head. ‘You pose me a riddle, and I cannot see the answer.’

‘I speak truth,’ I assured him.

His mouth smiled but his eyes did not. I fancied he would like nothing more than to see me floating face first upon the river.

I bid my soul be silent and hid my hatred. ‘I am sick of this whole business, your lordship. I just want to open an apothecary. I don’t want to work for you any more, nor have anything more to do with murder and treachery. We will give you the copies and walk away.’

Dowling held his breath.

Arlington rubbed a finger upon the new black plaster that bridged his nose. ‘I don’t think so, Lytle,’ he said slowly. ‘I would not be able to sleep at night for fear you forged an alliance with the King’s enemies, that you still kept a copy of the letter — the original, perhaps.’ He shook his head. ‘I will not be held to ransom by a butcher and a clerk.’

I failed, I realised. My hands trembled and hot tears gathered at the bottom of my eyes.

‘No,’ Arlington snapped. ‘I will keep you close, both of you.’ He looked to Dowling, giving me time to wipe the water from my cheek. ‘You want to be an apothecary, Lytle, then you will be a royal apothecary, an apothecary to the King. And you, Dowling, will be a royal butcher.’

‘What does that signify?’ I asked, a tremor in my voice.

‘It signifies that the King shall be your patron, and that every man shall know it.’ He smiled broadly, showing all his yellow teeth. ‘I shall be your patron, besides. You have no shop, Lytle, so the King will lend you money to establish your business, and again every man shall know it. You will attend Whitehall, and attend me, and I will be watching you. Every single day.’

He would pay me to become an apothecary?

‘What say you, Lytle?’ his voice echoed loud about the walls.

He asked for my soul. ‘Very well.’

He smiled, flaking lips cracking on his blackened face. He rubbed

his hands together and gazed upon me like I was his favourite dog. ‘Then I will think on it, for I have not yet made up my mind.’

‘Tell us when you have made up your mind,’ I replied, voice flat.

The light in his eyes dulled a fraction and he seemed puzzled a moment. He turned to leave, footsteps marking his passage back out into the evening sunshine.

‘I will take his money,’ I said, lowly. ‘Until I punish him for the evil he has committed.’ Damn Arlington’s soul. I dared look back to the well. The dead woman gazed up with unblinking stare. I knelt down and we pulled her out.