The Medieval Murderers - The First Murder

Alan Dole was, like his brother, a spare individual. But where Christopher’s thinness seemed to be the result of some undisclosed sickness, Alan’s lank frame was a reflection of his vigour. He was rarely still. He constantly looked for ways to expand his business. He possessed an intense stare. At the moment he was fastening that stare on Christopher. They were standing face to face. Alan Dole started speaking without any welcome or preamble.

‘The word about town is that this was written by Shakespeare.’

‘What is it, Alan?’

‘Don’t pretend you don’t know, Christopher. It is a play. It is called The English Brothers . It appeared among my stock and I have no idea how it got here.’

‘You have many books in your shop.’

‘And I know the provenance and price of each of them,’ said Alan. ‘I know all their shapes and smells – except this one… which smells fishy.’

‘Written by Shakespeare?’ said his brother.

‘That’s the rumour. But we are all aware of the hostility you feel towards Shakespeare.’

‘I wouldn’t know anything about this play.’

‘That is most surprising of all,’ said Alan, ‘because when I look through it, I find your handprint. I mean, the style of Christopher Dole, his tricks and turns of phrase.’

‘Perhaps I have imitators.’

‘Don’t flatter yourself. More conclusive is that within these pages are fragments of an older play, to do with Cain and Abel.’

Christopher grew uneasy. Instinctively, his eyes flicked to the chest, barricaded behind piles of books, from which he had filched the manuscript of The Play of Adam . Alan noticed.

‘Ah-ha. I thought so. Where is the manuscript now?’

Never much good at standing up to his more forceful sibling, Christopher gave a partial version of the truth.

‘I might have borrowed it to have a look at it, just to see how they did things in the old days. Perhaps William Shakespeare also obtained a copy and included portions in that play you’re clutching.’

‘There is only one manuscript,’ said Alan. ‘And I have it. Or rather, I had it. It disappeared some time ago but I never suspected you, Christopher. You bloody fool.’

This seemed an excessive response and the playwright, realising that argument was futile, made to go. Outside flakes of snow were starting to dribble from a low-hanging sky. He wouldn’t get any money from Alan now. He’d be more likely to obtain cash from the falling snow.

‘Just a minute, brother. You do not realise the ill reputation of that old play.’

‘No doubt you’re about to tell me.’

‘There was a seal on it, wasn’t there? An unbroken seal?’

‘Possibly,’ said Christopher.

‘It should not have been broken.’

Christopher was struck by Alan’s tone. In it there was not just anger or indignation but something that sounded close to fear. Alan continued: ‘If you’d examined the outside of the scroll before breaking the seal, you’d have seen a warning.’

‘A warning?’

‘Yes, you parrot, a warning. Written by a prior. If memory serves, it went like this: “In that this scroll contains Holy Writ, you shall not suffer it to be destroyed. Yet neither shall you break the seal upon it, lest fools and knaves make of it swords to slay the innocent and infect man’s reason with the worm of madness.”’

As he was reciting, Alan closed his eyes. Christopher was impressed that his brother recalled the words so exactly. Moreover, he began to feel the first tremors of alarm.

‘The story goes that it was composed for a priory in Oseney near Oxford and that a murder took place before it could ever be performed. There are other tales of murder – in Wales, in Ely – all linked to presentations of “The Story of Cain and Abel”, which you have been so foolish as to include in this – what’s it called? – The English Brothers .’

‘I never thought you were superstitious, Alan.’

Christopher Dole tried to keep his voice calm and even amused, but the fact was that, like most people who make their living in the theatre, he was the superstitious one. If he’d known of this warning beforehand, he’d never have picked up the manuscript, let alone copied out parts of it. But he’d been too eager to break the seal, to unroll the manuscript and then snatch gobbets of it for his own use. Eager to fill up the pages of his own play as fast as possible, with most of his attention being on those satirical jabs directed at King James and his favourites, and intended to bring down trouble on the bald pate of the man from Stratford.

‘I am not one for old wives’ tales,’ said his bookseller brother, ‘but these bad-luck stories don’t spring from nowhere. I tell you, this old piece can bring misfortune or worse. You were foolish enough to write a play in the hope of somehow damaging Shakespeare, but you were downright foolhardy to include a cursed text in it.’

‘Well, The English Brothers will never be performed on stage,’ said Christopher. By now, he’d given up any pretence that the play was not by him.

‘Performance on a stage does not matter. Printing and publishing is a kind of performance, isn’t it? A sort of utterance. You still have the manuscript?’

Christopher nodded. He wondered whether he should destroy it, since the thing apparently brought such dangers with it. But it seemed that Alan was able to read his thoughts for he said: ‘If you have the manuscript in that little upper room of yours, then go now and return here with it. Don’t attempt to get rid of it. Worse luck will follow if you do. You know how the thought of destroying a book is abhorrent to me.’

More likely, thought Christopher, his brother was calculating what he might get for the original manuscript of The Play of Adam . He said nothing further. He nodded, turned on his heel and quit the shop. Although still early in the afternoon, dusk seemed already to be drawing in. The snow was falling sporadically. The upper reaches of St Paul’s were hidden in the murk.

The chill struck Christopher to the bone. He pulled his thin coat tighter about him and trudged his way through the city and back to his lodgings. There was nowhere else to go. Head down, approaching the front door, he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder. He looked up. It was Stephen, the disagreeable son of his landlady.

‘Why, Christopher, this is well met. I am on my way out.’

Not for the first time, Dole noticed how close-set were the young man’s eyes. Even in the gloom they had a bird’s glitter to them, a kind of malice. He shrugged Stephen’s hand from his shoulder and did not reply.

‘You have a visitor.’

‘Who?’

‘How should I know? I do not pry into other people’s business.’

Christopher made to move past the insolent, lying youngster and get into his lodgings. Stephen said: ‘I invited him in, seeing as the day is turning nasty. I directed him to your room and told him to make himself at ease up there. He has the appearance of a proper gentleman.’

Christopher hadn’t imagined he could be any colder than he was but a fresh chill broke out along his body. He paid no attention to Stephen’s parting words – ‘Aren’t you going to thank me for being nice to your visitor?’ – and entered the lobby. He paused for a moment at the bottom of the stairs before starting up them. He felt dizzy and nauseous. Laboriously, he climbed to the top floor. There he hesitated again. A glimmer of light was showing under the lintel of his door. All at once, Christopher’s apprehensions fell away to be replaced by anger. The unknown stranger must have lit a candle, one of his meagre supply.

The playwright did not have the advantage of surprise since the stranger would have heard his steps, but he turned the handle of his own door and pushed it open with as much force as he could muster. The first thing he saw was that the occupant had lit not one but two candles. The second was that his visitor was indeed a proper gentleman, or at least a prosperous one. He was sitting on Christopher’s stool, which he had positioned against the wall so that he might rest his back against it. His arms were folded and his legs were fully extended and crossed at the ankles.