The Medieval Murderers - The Lost Prophecies

There were a couple more questions.

What had happened to the cross, the one that had inflicted the head-wound on Henry Gifford?

No longer sanctified, it had been thrown into the moat, where it promptly sank.

And the book, the black book?

The Shaws did not want to know what had happened to it. The book, whose contents were unknown to them, had brought trouble to Combe. It had, presumably, led to the murder of their kinsman Cloke and to the frantic avarice of Gifford to possess it. Whatever the book was, it was not a sacred thing to be consulted and revered. Good riddance if it was down in the mud and muck of the house drains. Not that they were even aware of its title, but the Armageddon Text could stay in the mire until doomsday. It was I who had asked the question about the book’s whereabouts and I reflected that, because of Gifford’s explanation, we two players probably knew more about it than anyone else in the room.

And that was that. William Shaw directed half a dozen of his burliest serving men to accompany us a few miles along the road. The parting that we had with the Shaws was a formal one, neither warm nor cold. We were privy to their secrets but, even had we been inclined to, there would be little purpose in alerting the authorities to the demise of the priest. In fact, by helping him to his death, the Shaws had shown themselves loyal Englishmen and Englishwomen. They wanted no part in the seditious talk and rumours of plots which were swilling around this part of the country. The body of the priest, which was presently being washed and laid out, would be decently buried with the appropriate obsequies.

‘Decently.’ That was William Shaw’s word, and I think it applied to the whole household. They were decent people, well-to-do, God-fearing, honest and honourable and law-abiding, except insofar as they observed the older religious practices.

Shaw gave Abel a couple of sovereigns not so much as a way of buying his silence as in gratitude to my friend for helping to fish Gifford out of the kitchen drain. Mary Shaw expressed the hope that my uncle would still be alive by the time I got to Shipston on Stour. (I confess I’d forgotten my uncle and namesake in all the excitement.)

We rode out of the valley scarcely twenty-four hours after we’d arrived at Combe House. We had our escort of liveried servants, who rode fore and aft of us. I was glad of this as we retraced our passage through the belt of trees where we’d been ambushed the day before. There was no sign of the black-garbed men nor any trace of our companion Thomas Cloke, though I’d been half-expecting to see his body tossed casually into the undergrowth by the wayside. Surely, when they discovered that he wasn’t carrying what they were searching for, they would have no further use for his corpse?

As we reached the rim of the valley, Abel and I turned to look back at Combe. The house lay, jewellike, in its moat. The birds were singing while a breeze was combing the trees. The day was clear. You would not have thought that a murder had taken place so recently in the precincts of Combe nor that another man had met a violent end inside the house.

The main road was in sight. A band of travellers was trotting along, their passage raising swirls of dust. There were a dozen or more of them – all classes, to judge from their clothes – enough to deter all but the most violent robbers. This was probably the reason why they were travelling together in the first place. Anyway, Abel and I decided to take our chances by following in their wake. In truth, since no danger was in prospect, we wanted to part company from the liveried escorts and be about our own business.

So we cantered on, thinking we’d left the whole raft of priests, agents and recusants well behind us. At least I did. After a couple of hours our stomachs told us it was time for refreshment, and we reined in on a patch of ground, which, though surrounded by woodland, was not far from a scatter of cottages. We had bread and cheese and ale from Combe, so we tethered our horses while we sat on the grass and talked about everything that had happened over the last day and night.

It was then that Abel Glaze revealed his final surprise, the second of the discoveries he’d been about to broach to me in the chamber when we were interrupted by the Shaws.

He had the book with him, the Armageddon Text, the bloody Black Book of Brân.

‘Jesus, Abel, what are you doing with that?’

Abel had retrieved the book from his bag. It sat between us on the grass, a tainted thing. Abel’s pride in pulling off a neat trick had turned to unease when he saw my reaction.

‘I took it from the kitchen drain. When I was down there with that Gifford, what should I see lying next to his body but this what do you call it? This Armageddon Text? While everyone was busy getting the body laid out on the kitchen flags, I tucked the book under my doublet so’s no one should see it and climbed out.’

‘In God’s name, why didn’t you leave it where it was? That’s what the Shaws wanted. Or rather, they never wanted to see the bloody thing again. I don’t want to see it either.’

Abel looked so crestfallen that his long nose actually seemed to quiver.

‘I thought it was valuable.’

‘I don’t know about valuable, but it’s certainly dangerous.’

I looked around as if we might be being spied on at that very instant. We were in sight of the road, but there were no riders close. The party of travellers had passed into the distance. I started because I thought I detected a movement in a nearby clump of trees and bushes, but it was nothing, only a pigeon taking flight.

‘All right,’ said Abel. ‘I’ll leave it here. Throw it into those bushes.’

‘You can’t do that.’

‘But you just said-’

‘I know what I said. But you can’t discard the book now. We’re lumbered with it.’

‘Perhaps it’s fate, Nick.’

I was about to say what I thought of fate, and in a particularly pithy way too, when I was distracted again by a stir in the nearby trees. More pigeons taking flight.

But not only pigeons. From the shelter of the trees there emerged, with much rustling and crashing, a band of men. Black-clad men. And not four this time, but five. One of them went to stand sentry at the roadside, while the others approached us.

Abel and I had already jumped to our feet. We had no weapons. Our horses were tethered several yards away. As I said, there were a handful of houses in view but no sign of any of the occupants. In any case, I don’t think these tough and resolute-looking men would have been distracted from their purpose by the presence of a few locals. We were trapped.

All this flashed through my head, and probably Abel’s as well. But it wasn’t the principal thought in my mind. Instead, I stood there, mouth hanging open like an idiot, heart hammering away in my chest, the blood roaring in my ears. For striding towards us was the figure of Thomas Cloke. The dead man, whom I’d seen the previous day shot off his horseback perch and tumbling to the ground. The late Thomas Cloke who, out of cowardice or prudence, had slipped the Armageddon Text into Abel’s case. Not a ghost but a living, breathing, grinning piece of flesh.

Cloke walked with that familiar bounce. He was enjoying the looks of disbelief on our faces. He was wearing the same gear as on the previous day except for a clean shirt replacing the one that had been soaked in his own blood.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It is I, Thomas Cloke.’

The other three men stood slightly to his rear, suggesting that Cloke was their leader. Two of them were carrying muskets. At the edge of the road, the fourth man kept watch against passers-by. I glanced sideways at Abel. He looked too dumbstruck to speak. So I felt it was incumbent on me to make some remark, to say something halfway intelligent.