The Medieval Murderers - The First Murder

Malinferno was about to replace the caricatures on the stack of papers, when Bromhead, noticing what his friend had seen, whispered in his ear, ‘Doll will make a fine Queen, do you not think?’

Malinferno was puzzled. ‘I thought she was to be cast as Eve.’

Augustus waved his hand at the cartoon in Malinferno’s hand, his face reddening slightly. ‘Did I not explain in my note to you?’

Malinferno brought out the piece of paper given to him by Mrs Stanhope. He realised that his landlady, in tucking it securely into the pocket of her pinafore, had folded it several times. Malinferno had omitted to open the last fold, and beneath it he read the explanation for Bromhead’s words. He looked his friend in the eye.

‘You are to give The Play of Adam a topical twist to suit the present mood for matters royal?’

Bromhead pulled a face. ‘Yes. It was the only way I could get the play accepted. I tried several theatres without any luck, before Will Mossop suggested that each scene should be brought bang up to date by having the characters resemble the royals. So Adam himself will look like Baron Pergami; the snake will be King George, and Eve, Queen Caroline. Each scene will be performed in that way. The Prime Minister and the Attorney-General will appear in “The Fall of Man”, and Cain and Abel will be George and Pergami once again.’

Malinferno laughed out loud. He realised now why all the pretty girls had been rejected in favour of Doll. They had all been too young to bear any passing resemblance to the Queen, who was over fifty, and overweight. He wondered when the truth would dawn on Doll, and he cast a glance over at where she and Mossop were talking animatedly. As he looked on, he saw her face cloud over, and annoyance spread across her normally buoyant features. She stormed over to where Malinferno and Bromhead sat.

‘I am to play Eve, because of my apparent resemblance to the Queen, Joe.’

Malinferno tried to keep a straight face. Both he and Doll had seen Caroline at closer quarters than most of the common crowd. Only a few months ago, they had been embroiled in a murder and scandal at a soirée on Solsbury Hill. The Queen had attended incognito under the name Hat Vaughan, and they had both received personal thanks from her when they had saved her already tarnished reputation from further scandal. The consequence was that neither could tell anyone of their intimacy with Caroline, having been sworn to secrecy. But they both knew that the Queen’s unusually liberal lifestyle had told on her. Doll had at first taken the buxom and blowsy lady for an aging trollop, employed to amuse the titled gentlemen at the soirée. It was only later they had learned she was the Queen. Now Doll was being selected because of her likeness to Caroline.

Malinferno strove to find words to soften the blow.

‘I am sure it is because of your shapeliness and not because of any reference to her age. The leading lady of a play must still be a great beauty, Doll.’

Bromhead’s great leonine head nodded vigorously in agreement. ‘Indeed, Doll. You will portray her obvious charms… ’ he described two orbs with cupped hands, ‘… so well, and win over the mob in the pit, hungry to view great beauty.’

Doll narrowed her eyes, trying to guess whether the two men were mocking her. Satisfied they weren’t, she dipped her eyes in an exaggerated show of modest concurrence with their sentiments. She turned back to Will Mossop, who looked anxiously on. He had, after all, sent away all the other actresses, including apparently one to whom he had already promised the part of Eve.

‘I will do it, Mr Mossop.’

Malinferno could already detect in her tones something of the prima donna, and sighed. She would be insufferable if this mad scheme came off, as well it might. The coronation, so very recent, was already being performed in pageant form at Drury Lane with Robert Elliston impersonating the King so well that it played to full houses. Mossop was all smiles.

‘Excellent, Miss Pocket. We begin rehearsing tomorrow.’

‘So soon?’

‘Oh, yes, the play must open in two weeks’ time, if we are to benefit from the topical nature of its presentation. And tomorrow is when you will meet Mr Morton Stanley – your Pergami.’

Malinferno didn’t like the broad wink that accompanied this declaration from the theatre manager. He felt this Stanley fellow would be another seeker after Doll’s attention. His comfortable position as Doll’s paramour seemed to be under siege from all sides.

If Malinferno had witnessed on the following day the meeting at the Royal Coburg of Doll and Morton Stanley, he would have been really worried. The actor bore a striking resemblance to Baron Pergami, being around thirty, over six foot tall, and with a splendid physique and black curly hair, which extended down into luxuriant muttonchop whiskers. Doll, still new to the ways of theatrical folk, almost swooned away when Stanley gave her an exaggerated bow, and lifted her hand to his full red lips. Her normal perceptiveness was swamped by his manner, or she would have noticed his obvious vanity. He twirled his moustachios, and Doll simpered like one of the young girls she had seen auditioning for the role she was now to perform. Then a deep and resonant voice came from the depths of the auditorium.

‘Ah, I see you have won over another beautiful lady, Stan.’

The young actor’s face contorted into a mask of sheer hatred at the sound. He turned away from Doll to peer into the darkness of the rows of seats, and spoke in a baritone voice.

‘I wondered who Mossop would get to play the part of fat King George. I might have known it would be you, Percy.’

Doll watched as a rotund, and cheery-faced man made his way down the central aisle of the ornately decorated auditorium. The man Morton called Percy did indeed resemble the King, or at least the popular caricatures of George, being portly and red-faced. He lumbered up the steps leading on to the stage, giving Doll a bow and a buss on the back of her hand. He winked conspiratorially at her.

‘Perceval Tristram at your service, madam. But beware, beautiful lady, Stan will break your heart, take it from me.’

Stanley’s face darkened, and he strode off into the wings, calling for Will Mossop.

Malinferno, meanwhile, had called on Augustus Bromhead in his rickety tenement in Bermondsey. The tall, narrow building, squashed between its newer neighbours was a structure from an older age. In fact, its foundations were built on the footings of an even older building. Bromhead’s cellar revealed part of the arched ceiling of the crypt of Bermondsey Abbey. The antiquarian revelled in the thought that his very residence was piled up on the foundations of something so old. It matched his own life, which was built on the quest for the keys to ancient Britain. It was no accident that his study lay at the very apex of the old house, for he saw himself as at the peak of antiquarian studies. He worked surrounded by a very blizzard of old manuscripts and printed books, perched on a high stool to bring him to the height of his sloped work desk, a former accounting bench. Malinferno sat in a more comfortable armchair by the high gabled window that let the sallow light of fog-bound London into the attic room. He had in his lap the printed version of The Play of Adam , purchased from Dole’s Printers. In front of Bromhead the precious original manuscript itself lay open. He had stopped at a point where his fingers had felt a rough spot on the reverse of a page. Peering closer he thought he could see the remains of red sealing wax. The wax had all but gone, leaving only a roughened red patch, but he could also see some faded writing. He turned back the page and read what was written on the correct side. Puzzled, he ran his finger down the page again, before calling out to Malinferno.