Paul Doherty - The White Rose murders

'So Moodie was a supporter of the White Rose,' he said quietly. 'A member of Les Blancs Sangliers. But why should he kill Selkirk and Ruthven?'

Catesby shrugged. 'God knows! Perhaps he saw them as a threat. Perhaps Selkirk's verses contained information which he wished destroyed.'

'Do you really believe that?' I asked.

Catesby shook his head. 'No,' he answered slowly. 'No, I don't. Perhaps it was just an act of revenge.' He sighed. 'There's neither rhyme nor reason to Moodie's suicide.'

He sat down heavily. 'I don't know how Selkirk and Ruthven died,' he murmured, and looked up. 'Do you?' Benjamin shook his head.

'Moodie could have killed Irvine,' Catesby continued. 'He did leave Royston for a while at the same time as you, and a priest would be acceptable within the convent walls at Coldstream.'

'What does Queen Margaret say?' asked Benjamin.

Catesby shrugged. 'She mourns Moodie's death and has her own explanation of it.' He paused to gather his thoughts. 'Her late husband, James IV, at one time supported the cause of the White Rose and then deserted it. She believes James was not killed at Flodden.' He coughed, the sound shattering the eerie silence of the chamber. 'Queen Margaret believes,' he continued, 'that her husband was murdered at Flodden by a member of Les Blancs Sangliers who have since waged continuous war against those who advised her late husband, such as Selkirk and Ruthven.'

I sat back, surprised because what Catesby said made sense. Agrippa toyed with the tassels on his robes whilst Benjamin just stared into the middle distance, lost in his own thoughts.

'But why,' he asked eventually, 'would Moodie now kill himself?'

'Because,' Doctor Agrippa intervened, 'he probably thought that you or Shallot would have discovered something during your travels in Scotland and France to trap him.'

Again, Agrippa's conclusions were logical; after all, Moodie had arranged the deadly attack on me in Paris.

'How was your mission?' Catesby queried.

I shrugged. Benjamin just laughed.

'Let me put it this way, Sir Robert, if Moodie dreaded our return then he had very little to fear.'

Agrippa sighed noisily, I don't know whether from relief or disappointment.

'Ah, well!' Catesby rose. 'Soon this matter will be finished and Her Grace will leave for Scotland. She is very busy.' His boyish face lit with a smile. 'But I know she wishes to see you.'

Agrippa excused himself whilst Catesby took Benjamin and me across to the Queen's spacious chamber on the second floor of the Tower just next to St Stephen's Chapel. [Or was it St John's? I forget now.] Well, the fat bitch had made herself comfortable! She had a beautiful room, painted red and decorated with golden moons and silver stars. Tapestries hung on the walls and Turkey rugs covered the polished floor. Margaret herself was dressed in a tight-fitting, damson-coloured gown which emphasised her full, rounded figure whilst her golden hair was unbraided and hung down to her shoulders. She looked warm and comely but her eyes were still black as night and her face spoilt by that false, simpering smile. The Careys were also in attendance: Lady Carey glowered whilst her husband busied himself at the far end of the room, totally ignoring our existence. Melford the killer was there, lounging like an alley cat on a bench against the wall, whilst the bastard Scawsby was mulling a glass of wine for his mistress. He turned away as we entered, shoulders shaking as if relishing some private joke. Queen Margaret took us both by the hand, welcoming us back and handing Benjamin a small purse of silver coins.

'Your work on my behalf is much appreciated, Master Daunbey,' she simpered. 'I would ask you to stay longer, but His Majesty the King has invited me to a masque at Richmond.' She waved a hand to indicate the dresses scattered around the room; some of taffeta, others of damask or cloth of gold. The false smile spread. 'Time is passing and I must go.'

We bowed and left, Catesby showing us to the door. We wandered back into the freezing bailey. Benjamin leaned against a wall watching a butcher at the far end of the yard hack a haunch of beef into huge, steaming slabs, the blood pouring like red streams over the rough-hewn carving block.

'Roger, Roger,' he murmured, 'what is going on here? One minute we are involved in matters of state, murder, Yorkist conspiracies, and the next we are dismissed because Her Grace wishes to attend a masque!'

Catesby had told us we had our old chamber in one of the towers but Benjamin insisted that, before we retire, we should examine Moodie's corpse which had been placed in the death house, no more than a wooden shed built against the walls of the Tower Church, St Peter ad Vincula.

Well, believe me, I have seen corpses enough, bodies piled six, seven feet high, left to steam and rot on battle fields as far flung as France and North Africa. I have seen heads hacked off and stacked high in baskets, and more bodies hanging from the branches of trees than I have apples in an orchard. Nothing, however, is more pathetic than a solitary corpse lying on a cold slab in a disused shed.

Moodie may have been a priest but in death his body had been laid out like some broken toy to he on a shelf, the grimacing features half-hidden by a dirty cloth; the eyes still open, sightless and empty. Some attempt had been made to straighten the limbs and that was all. Apparently, he was to be interred in the clothes he died in, wrapped in some canvas sheet and either buried in the cemetery of a nearby church or the small graveyard on the other side of the Tower church. Two days dead, the body was beginning to putrefy and the stench made both Benjamin and myself gag. Benjamin muttered the Requiem, stared at the mottled-hued face and carefully examined the wrists of the dead man. The left was unmarked but the right bore a huge, deep gash which must have drained the blood.

'A painful way to die, Master.'

Benjamin shook his head. 'Not really, Roger,' he said, his voice muffled by the hem of his cloak which he held up to cover his nose. 'The wrist is cut and placed in warm water. They say death comes like sleep, a painless way to oblivion. The senators of ancient Rome often used it.'

I took his word for it and we left, glad to be free of the ghastly place. Outside Benjamin stared up at the darkening sky.

'The game is not over yet, Roger,' he murmured. 'Believe me, Moodie did not die in vain.'

He would say no more. We retired to our chamber, made ourselves as comfortable as our bleak quarters would allow, and later joined the rest of the household when they gathered to dine in the small hall. Queen Margaret had already left in a blaze of colour, escorted by Catesby and Agrippa, riding along Ropery, then Vintry Street into Thames Street, where she would meet a troop of her brother's royal Serjeants at Castle Baynard.

Catesby, if he had stayed, might have put a restraining hand upon the petty malice of his comrades. Previously they had ignored us: now they let their malice show. Carey (his wife had gone with Queen Margaret), Melford, Scawsby and the two killers from Clan Chattan, Corin and Alleyn, swaggered into the hall. To be truthful, I had forgotten about Earl Angus's gift to his estranged wife but the two Highlanders still remembered us. They smiled, displaying wicked-edged teeth, and once again I was reminded of hunting dogs studying their intended quarry. Benjamin and I sat at one end of the trestle board, they sat at the other, grouped together like stupid boys immersed in their own private jokes. The garrison had already eaten so we were alone. The servants brought platters of over-cooked, rather rancid meat, garnished with herbs, and once they withdrew and the wine circulated, Melford began talking at the top of his voice about sending boys to do men's work. The two Highlanders grinned as if they understood every word, Carey smirked whilst Scawsby gave that neighing laugh which made the blood beat in my temples. Coward or not, I could have plunged a dagger straight into his black treacherous heart. Benjamin ignored them, lost in his own thoughts, but at last Scawsby, his sallow face flushed with wine, rose and came to stand over me.