The Medieval Murderers - Sword of Shame

But he had grown suspicious of the nightly soporifics and other remedies (which were perhaps the reason for his latest bout of illness) and, after many hints, had openly accused her when she was in his chamber the previous night following the visits of the Haskell cousins. An argument ensued, then a fight when Elias had struggled up from his bed, his bony arms flailing. As the dying Abigail told it, to defend herself, she had seized the sword from its place over the chimney-piece and struck her master a single blow on his forehead. He straightaway expired.

In a panic, she disposed of the body and the sword in the way that I had described (though without ever imagining that it was the housekeeper who’d done it). She wanted to remove the body and sword from the house, from her domain. Perhaps she thought that his death would be seen as a queer form of suicide, perhaps she was trusting to the superstition surrounding the sword to divert the blame from her. Perhaps her thinking was a strange mixture of sense and nonsense. She returned to clean up the bloodstains from the chamber as best she could, laying fresh rushes to obscure the marks. Of course she had had to change into a different over-dress as well because her clothes were stained. She had chosen a mourning black. Widow’s weeds.

And indeed from the strangled comments Abigail let fall it was apparent that she had once entertained hopes of marrying Elias Haskell herself but that the old man’s interest and favour had transferred to Martha on the death of the girl’s father. So the housekeeper had seen her chances of becoming mistress of Valence fade. Resentment had turned to slow-burning anger and the determination to salvage something from the wreckage. She knew her master’s habit of toying with his cousins in the matter of promises and bequests, but it did not seem to have occurred to her that he might be doing the same with her.

Whether there was any treasure or anything of real value in the house I did not discover. The next morning, after the death of the housekeeper, I rode away from Valence on Rounce. I was pleased to quit this strange house for good and intended to return to Cambridge before calling on the Maskells, who dwelt north of the city. I did, however, make Martha promise that she would visit me, should she ever come to London. She thanked me for my part in solving the mystery of her uncle’s death. I asked her what she was going to do with the sword.

‘I shall keep it,’ she said. ‘It was not the sword but Abigail killed him.’

‘And you will take care of Grant?’ I said.

‘I am fond of the monkey. I did not care for him at first but my uncle liked him and I believe he liked my uncle.’

‘Yes, I think so,’ I said. ‘The monkey did him good service at the end.’ Martha looked baffled but just then Mr Fortescue arrived at her side with some questions and I took advantage of her distraction to clamber onto my hired mount and ride out of the gatehouse.

In the latter stages of the housekeeper’s confession, Mr Fortescue the magistrate had appeared, in time to to hear her final self-incrimination before she expired. Her mode of death was terrible enough but perhaps preferable to the punishment visited on poisoners, whose crime is so heinous that they may be burnt as heretics are burnt. And it was not only her dying words, and her chosen suicide, which gave force to her testimony but also an item that was discovered in a pocket of her black mourning smock. It was the end of the sword’s cross-piece, the image of a dog’s head. It was generally assumed that she had picked it up when it had been broken off the sword during the tussle between her and Elias, and put it in her pocket. But I knew better. I’d seen this very object in the monkey’s cage the previous morning. I recalled the way in which the monkey had clamoured for admission to our session in the hallway and the way in which Abigail had shooed him impatiently off the scene. While that had been going on, I reckoned, Mr Grant had slipped the piece of the sword into her garment, a kind of pick-pocketing in reverse. It was his way of linking the housekeeper to the death of his master.

Nor did the genius of Grant stop there. I couldn’t help thinking that perhaps he had been trying to alert me to both of the tapestries which hung by the chimney-piece in old Elias’s room. Not only the image of St Christopher but also the picture of the murderous Judith, holding her upright sword. Abigail had enacted both parts, killing a man with a single blow from the ancient weapon and then carrying his body out of doors, in the attempt to sow confusion about the cause of Elias’s death. Yet Grant had witnessed all this and then done his best to tell me about it, as well as to provide evidence against the wrong-doer. Never let anyone say that monkeys are unfeeling creatures-or dull-witted ones.

London, 2005

The silver metallic-finish Porsche Cayenne eases its way down the fast lane of the M11 towards London. Insulated by his laminated privacy glass, and in an air-conditioned, pollen filtered cocoon, auctioneer John Lascelles never even notices the little village of Ickleton on his left. It is now wedged in between the motorway itself, and the access road to the M11 from the A11. He reaches into the refrigerated glove compartment, and pulls out a bottle of water, sipping one-handed from the nozzle. Red wine always leaves him with a dry mouth the following day. And even though the wine’s alcoholic effects have safely dispersed from his blood, he still feels parched. It was a good dinner party last night, celebrating with a few select friends the coup he has pulled off. Today, on the other hand, is going to be all business. The Porsche’s V6 engine ensures his smooth delivery to the outskirts of London.

Wallis Barker pushes down on the pedals of his heavy, black Raleigh bike, cursing the choking fumes of the congested traffic stalled on Chiswick High Road. A black-bearded tramp dashes into his path causing him to swerve. He pulls on the calliper brakes, and waves a fist at the madman. But the tramp has disappeared into the morass of stationary traffic. Barker momentarily considers catching the Tube at Chiswick Park, but that will entail him chaining his bike up, and risking it not being there when he returns. He decides to continue, and taps the ring-binder sticking out of the wicker basket on the front of his bike. Sure that his new information is still secure, he pedals off towards Kensington, weaving in and out of the traffic.

John Lascelles is always nervous before important auctions, and the one due to start at noon the following day is going to be one of the best. Lascelles can feel it in his water. He paces nervously around the sales room, looking at the items of arms and armour that will fall under the hammer. Each item is carefully displayed on purple velvet, and artfully lit from above. Even though he knows his staff have done a well-nigh perfect job, Lascelles feels fidgety. He stops here and there, once to move a European swept-hilt rapier a millimetre to the left, a second time to turn a sixteenth century mitten gauntlet, that resembles a dead armadillo, so that the light striking it does not dazzle the eager viewer. He does not have to make either adjustment, and is only putting off the moment when he is going to have the joy of feasting his eyes once again on the spectacular centrepiece of tomorrow’s auction.

The sword.

Wallis Barker is late. An accident at Hammersmith Broadway involving two cars and a dispute over road space has caused that part of London to grind to a halt. After an infuriating wait of fifteen minutes, he has been compelled to dismount, and push his bike along the pavement, closing his ears to the protests of the pedestrians crowded around him. He has finally got to Kensington twelve minutes after his appointed meeting time with John Lascelles, and still has to chain up his bike to the railings in front of the Victorian building. Hot and not a little bothered, he hurries up the steps of Lascelles Historica Specialist Auction House pulling at the bicycle clips on his ankles as he goes.