The Medieval Murderers - The Lost Prophecies

‘You’ve been planning this a long time, Master Cloke?’ I said, even managing to strike a casual note.

‘A combination of planning and the willingness to seize an opportunity,’ he said. ‘When I heard that you and Abel Glaze were to visit the Midlands, we thought it would be a good moment to put a particular… plan into effect.’

Cloke glanced down at the black-bound book where it lay neglected on the grass. The book that he’d secreted in Abel’s bag. The book that was surely part of the mysterious plan he referred to.

‘We?’ said Abel, finding his voice. ‘Who’s we ?’

‘A certain group connected with the Council,’ said Cloke. ‘A private group.’

He meant the Privy Council. More specifically, he meant those agents of the Council under the direct control of Robert Cecil. Little Cecil, recently ennobled (again) and now the Earl of Salisbury. Wrynecked Cecil who had his fingers in more pies than you could count. Crookback Cecil, who ran a network of spies and intelligencers in the name of national security. I had encountered Robert Cecil once at the time of the Essex uprising in Queen Elizabeth’s dying days. The thought of those days – and of Cecil in particular – was enough to make my guts do a little dance. I tried to keep this from showing on my face, but no doubt Cloke was accustomed to the reaction prompted by any mention of the Council.

‘I thought you were our friend, Thomas,’ said Abel. ‘I thought you enjoyed being in our company and attending our plays.’

‘I did not object to your company and I am a devotee of the playhouse. But some things are more important than friendship, Master Glaze.’

‘You are not even Thomas Cloke,’ I said. ‘Tell the truth – your name is not Cloke.’ Abel turned to look at me. The other man said nothing so I ploughed on, more confident in my theory. ‘The Shaws were surprised when I told them that their kinsman was a playgoer. He is not, but you are. So who are you, Master…?’

‘Never mind,’ said the man we’d thought of as Thomas Cloke.

‘Is there really a Thomas Cloke?’ said Abel, and then, realizing the question was foolish (since the Shaws had willingly acknowledged Cloke as their kinsman), he asked instead: ‘What has happened to the real Cloke? Is he dead?’

‘Alive and well, as far as I know,’ said the man who wasn’t Cloke. ‘I took on his name as a means of getting close to Combe House. Cloke is indeed a cousin to that nest of recusants.’

‘But you could not get too near the house or the family, could you?’ I said. It was all becoming clear to me. I had to struggle to keep the admiration out of my voice, admiration at the neatness of the scheme concocted by the ‘private group’ of the Council. ‘For some reason you wanted to convey that item to Combe, but you had to make yourself scarce before you got there. Otherwise they would have recognized you – or not recognized you as Cloke.’

‘Very good, Nicholas.’

‘You pretended that your companions now, these gentlemen, were actually your pursuers. You put on a good act of being fearful so that when we were ambushed – and you were apparently killed – we’d accept it without question.’

‘Good again, Master Revill.’

‘So what did you use for your imaginary wound? The fatal wound?’

‘You recall our chat in the Knight of the Carpet? The two of you had just come offstage from playing in The Melancholy Man . You did a good death scene, Nicholas, you with your bladder of sheep’s blood and all that writhing about. Well, what did you think of my death scene, eh? The shot that rings out in the woods, the pool of blood that spreads across the chest of the victim, the way he huddles over his horse’s neck, the manner in which he falls helplessly to the ground. I used sheep’s blood too. Convincing, eh? Do you think Master Shakespeare and the other shareholders would give me a place with the King’s Men?’

‘No,’ said Abel. ‘There’s more to being a player than dying well.’

‘Sir!’

It was the man stationed by the road. He gestured in the direction we’d come from, to the south-east. I noticed the way he addressed Cloke as ‘sir’. The other three stiffened and one of the musket-holders took a sudden interest in his weapon.

‘Why did you go to such lengths? What was it all about? Was it on account of that book there?’

I asked partly out of genuine curiosity but also to distract ‘Thomas Cloke’ from whatever he planned to do with us. He spoke with great certainty and command. He was quite different from the man I’d encountered in a couple of taverns, quite different from the idle follower of the players. But he was human enough to be proud of his trickery. And the longer he talked, the greater the chance of some travellers passing.

‘On account of that book? No, not directly. The Armageddon Text – as they are pleased to call it – is useful to smoke out renegades and traitors. There was one such in Combe House.’

‘Henry Gifford?’ said Abel.

‘That was one of his names, but he was no more a Gifford than I am a Cloke.’

‘You know the priest is dead, then,’ I said.

‘We have heard. We did not stir far from Combe last night or this morning. We became… aware… that a man had died in the house. But he was no priest. Or if he was, it was merely a cover for worse work. Gifford was an agent for our old enemies.’

‘Old enemies? The Spanish? I thought we were at peace with them. A treaty was signed last year.’

The Council man smiled slightly as if in pity at my ignorance or naivety. ‘Oh, we are at a formal peace, Nicholas. But there are elements on their side who are conspiring with sects over here…’

‘So the whole business was a means of smoking out this Gifford?’

‘You have hit on it. We knew that the Armageddon Text would be irresistible to Gifford… for reasons I do not wish to enlarge on. It smoked him out, as you said. What we could not have counted on was such a happy result after the smoking-out. That Gifford would perish in Combe House. One less of them!’

‘Cloke’ snapped his fingers to reinforce his last words. The man at the roadside called out in greater alarm. He unclasped his raised hand twice to show that a substantial number of travellers was moving up the road.

‘Now if you’ll just surrender the Armageddon Text, Abel,’ he said. ‘It is a dangerous volume, ripe for sects and factions.’

Abel bent down to pick up the black book. It had grass stains on the wooden cover, to join the other marks of use. My friend handed it to our erstwhile companion, who said: ‘We will leave you now. You have played your part as true Englishmen, whether you meant to or not. But, Nicholas and Abel, do not enquire into this matter any further. There is a very serious threat to our land, but with the help of this black volume we shall smoke out more of the traitors.’

The individual we’d known as Thomas Cloke vanished into the trees together with his retinue. A couple of minutes later, another large party rode past the clearing, and Abel and I remounted and trotted off in their wake. I can’t speak for Abel, but it took many miles before I stopped looking over my shoulder and grasping my reins tight. Had we seen the last of the Armageddon Text? I devoutly hoped so.

There were a couple of sequels to our excursion at Combe House, one private and sad, the other public and terrifying.

After Abel and I parted company, I reached Shipston on Stour in time to see my dying uncle and his wife Margaret. She was profuse in her thanks for my arrival. He, poor fellow, was scarcely in a condition to recognize me or anyone else. But he was a Revill, and a Nicholas to boot, and he was my father’s true brother. With a moist eye, I saw the likeness in his drawn face. He clutched my hand and mumbled some words before I was shooed out of the room so that a priest could administer the final rites.