К Сэнсом - Revelation

Piers’ voice from the inner room was low, but sharp as a file. ‘You old black bastard, if that lawyer reports me for theft I could fucking hang –’

‘He won’t –’

‘How do you know? And now I’m reduced to being a beggar, living among the lowest dregs, running at the sight of a constable –’

‘No one is hunting you, Piers.’ Guy’s voice sounded unutterably weary. Then he added, ‘Why did you steal from me?’

‘Why not? Apprentices get paid a pittance and I worked my balls off for you.’

‘You could have asked for more.’

‘I wasn’t going to stay with you, anyway. I was going to find another position and the money would come in useful.’ He laughed, cruelly. ‘I was sick of your pathetic whining about how I should have more sympathy for people.’

I stepped silently to the inner door, wishing Barak was with me.

‘I tried to teach you some moral sense,’ I heard Guy say, his voice near breaking. ‘To be a good man.’

‘While I did your dirty work, cleaning up the mess left when you opened up stinking bodies. And I knew you would like to open up my body, my arse anyway –’

‘Never …’ There was distress in Guy’s voice now.

‘I want money. I want all you have. Then you will write me a reference, I am going north to find a new place.’

‘I will give you money, Piers. But a reference, never.’ Guy’s answer was firm.

‘Then I’ll cut your heart open, see if your blood is brown like your face –’

I drew my dagger from its sheath and pushed the door wide open. ‘No, Piers,’ I said quietly. ‘That you will not do.’

I saw that Guy was sitting on a stool, his back against the wall. Piers held a long knife to his chest. The boy’s face, so often mild and expressionless, was red and twisted with anger. It was also smeared with the dirt of the streets; the handsome well-dressed apprentice looked very different now. His eyes widened with fear as I entered, then narrowed again as he saw I was alone.

‘Not got your bodyguard with you today, hunchback?’ he asked. ‘I’ll do for you as well, and it will be a pleasure.’

‘No. If you strike at Guy, I swear to God you will not leave here alive. Guy is right, you are under no threat. He took back the silver you stole and which I found; there is no evidence against you. Go now, get out of here and never come back. I promise you that is the best offer you will get this side of the grave.’

I felt utterly focused, full of cold anger. Having faced Cantrell, this nasty little creature seemed like nothing. My tone and the way I stared firmly into his stony, lifeless eyes must have made an impression, for Piers lowered his knife.

‘Step away from the door, then,’ he said.

‘Throw the knife down first.’

He hesitated, then laid it on Guy’s workbench. I stood away from the door and he walked past me, into the shop. There he bent quickly, lifted the copy of Vesalius and ran out of the door. His footsteps disappeared up the street. Guy took a long, shuddering breath.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I am not sure that he would have killed me, I do not think he had the courage for that. But I am glad it was not put to the test. Thank you.’

‘He has your Vesalius.’

‘Yes, he will get a good price for it. Well, I shall put the money he stole and you returned towards buying another.’

‘I was not sure if it was wise to come,’ I said. ‘I am very glad I did.’

He nodded. I saw his brown hands, lying in his lap, were shaking. ‘Piers knocked at the door an hour ago,’ he said slowly. ‘When I answered he pushed his way in, then drew his knife and brought me in here. Always when he worked for me he would smile, be quiet and deferential. But his face and voice today – the coldness, the anger.’ He shook his head. ‘I am sorry I did not contact you, Matthew, but I was still angry. You should have come to me first. I would have agreed to his being questioned, you know.’

‘I am sorry.’

Guy smiled faintly. ‘Well, I think today you have more than made up for it.’ He lifted a hand. ‘Take that stool there,’ he said. ‘I do not feel quite able to get up yet.’

When I had seated myself he looked at me silently for a long moment. Then he asked, ‘Cantrell is dead?’

‘Yes.’

‘Tell me what happened, how it ended. If you feel able to.’

He sat listening as I told him about the siege of Goddard’s house, my realization that Cantrell was the killer; the desperate hours in the sewers underneath Catherine Parr’s house.

‘I had not realized you had been tested so terribly,’ he said quietly when I had finished. ‘And you must let me look at your back before you leave.’

‘I would be grateful. It still pains me. What was Cantrell, Guy? He killed seven people to fulfil the prophecy of the vials of wrath, two more along the way and, perhaps, his own father too. I think of him at Roger and Dorothy’s lodgings, repairing that frieze, perhaps alone with her. Managing to seem like a normal human being. It chills my blood. I have been lying in bed, thinking and thinking, and I cannot fathom why he did those things. At the end he seemed confused, deranged, wild – not the calculating creature I expected. But he was not possessed, he genuinely believed he was doing God’s work.’

‘I do not know what he was,’ Guy said quietly. ‘I wish I did. No more than I know who Gilles de Rais truly was, or Strodyr. Some wild disturbance happened in their minds, made them less like humans than ravening beasts. Perhaps one day study will enable us to understand those darkest corners of the human mind which they inhabited. Perhaps not.’

‘Yet I feel that Cantrell was connected to the blast of wild, brutal fanaticism that is sweeping through the land; so that England devours its own children. It gave him, at least, an excuse for what he wanted to do.’

Guy nodded sadly. ‘We are in the middle of a bitter conflict between two religions. It has driven men to extremes, to the impious arrogance of believing they alone can comprehend the vast mysteries of Scripture, let alone the mind of God. Such people are incapable of understanding even their own minds, for they confuse their own needs, for certainty or power, with God’s voice speaking to them. I am only surprised that more are not driven to stark madness. I try in my poor way to follow the much harder path of humility. Facing squarely the terrible mysteries of suffering and cruelty in God’s world, doubting whether through prayer you have understood God’s will or His voice or even His presence. Yes, I believe humility is the greatest human virtue.’

I shook my head. ‘I think I am beyond belief. I have had to read the Book of Revelation over and over in this last month. It appals me. I read its cruel barbarous message and I despair.’

‘No,’ Guy said firmly. ‘Do not despair, Matthew. Do not let Revelation curse your life too. And now, let me have a look at your poor back.’

I LEFT Guy’s with a sense of peace, a fragile contentment, but peace nonetheless. Guy had rubbed fresh oils into my burns, and my back, too, was easier. And so I rode back to Lincoln’s Inn, where I had an invitation to visit Dorothy. To her also I had sent a note from my sick bed, saying Charles Cantrell was dead. She had replied asking if she could come and visit me, but I did not want her to see me ill in bed so requested that I might visit her when I was better.

Margaret opened the door and welcomed me in. ‘Your guest has finally gone,’ I said with a smile, for in her note Dorothy had said Bealknap had left.

‘Yes, the afternoon you came, in a great hurry. He barely stopped to thank the mistress.’

‘For Bealknap to give thanks to anyone would for him be like having teeth pulled. Do you know if he has sent any money across?’