The Medieval Murderers - Hill of Bones

Hattie gaped at Doll. ‘I had you for a whore, young lady. It seems you are something else altogether.’

Doll laughed out loud. ‘I had you for a trollop, Hattie Vaughan. Now I am not so sure.’

At that moment, another man burst through the tent flap. It was the naval officer Doll had seen accompanying Hattie along with the now deceased Italian gentleman by the name of Sacchi. The navy man seemed hot and rather unnerved, speaking hurriedly and with somewhat slurred words.

‘Are you safe, Your Majesty? I came to relieve Sacchi, but he is nowhere to be seen.’ He stared at Doll Pocket and Joe Malinferno. ‘Who are these people?’

‘Lieutenant Houghton!’

The old woman gave him a stern look, but it was too late to hide the truth now. Doll and Malinferno had heard what the man had called Hattie. It suddenly dawned on them who the old trollop was. She was no less than the errant Queen of England, Caroline of Brunswick.

Caroline, after a failed marriage to the Prince of Wales, as he was then, had retired abroad to a life bent on embarrassing England and the royal household. Openly taking a string of lovers, she had travelled Europe causing scandal. In retaliation, the Prince – no mean philanderer himself – initiated secret commissions and open smears to discredit her. The Princess of Wales, using a string of villas in Italy, finally settled down to the extent that she fixed on one of her lovers – Pergami by name – and was most often seen in his company. She was congenitally unable to moderate her behaviour, however. Servants were known to report to the Prince’s spies that ‘the princess is very fond of fucking’, having seen her in public with her hand inside Pergami’s trousers. Or having observed him emerging from the Queen’s chamber dressed only in his shirt.

Close to accepting a divorce, everything changed for Caroline, when her father-in-law died. She was now Queen, and horrified the government of the day by suggesting she should return to England to take up her place on the throne alongside her husband. Malinferno was familiar with a few Radicals whose sympathy lay with the Queen. And at a time when the common mob was agitating for better conditions, the government was afraid that Caroline could be a rallying point. To many, she was an injured queen and a weak woman, who needed the mob’s help to fight against a tyrant king. When she had finally arrived in London the cry was ‘The Queen for ever, the King in the river.’

Malinferno was sure he had read in The Times that she had escaped the incessant pressure of the mob by hiding in a mansion on the Thames. He was surprised to have found her at an exotic soiree on Solsbury Hill. He bowed his head to the tired woman sitting on the edge of the grand bed, that was tilted at an alarming angle.

‘Your Majesty, forgive me for not recognising you. The Times reported that you were at Brandenburg House in Hammersmith, on the edge of London.’

Caroline sighed. ‘Indeed I was, and the countryside suited me. But those infernal watermen of the Thames made a trade of offering trips to get sightings of me walking in the gardens. When the Duchess of Avon mentioned her little soiree on Solsbury Hill, I determined to escape in secret, and have a few days unobserved. It seems I failed, however, and that there is a spy and agent provocateur in the camp right now.’

As the Queen spoke to Malinferno, Houghton had drifted over towards the crate. He placed a hand on the edge and leaned on it in a nonchalant pose. Caroline noticed this, and turned to him.

‘I would not get too close, if I were you, Nicholas.’

The unenlightened Houghton looked down at his hand, expecting that he was being warned the wood was dirty or wet. He began to brush his hands together, and looked down at the crate. His eyes widened at the contents of the box, and he slumped against Doll Pocket in a faint.

‘Oh, not again.’

She groaned as another man’s head landed on her bosom, and in a not too gentle way, dumped his prostrate form on the grassy floor of the tent.

Caroline smiled sadly. ‘I would hazard a guess that he is a naval man who has not been much under fire, then.’

Doll laughed. ‘Nor will he be much help in present circumstances, it appears. I suppose Your Majesty is innocent of the crime concerning the body in our crate, then?’

Malinferno felt his face burning at Doll’s boldness, and began to apologise for his companion’s social gaffe. ‘Majesty, I am afraid Miss Pocket is unused to-’

Caroline interrupted him before he could go any further. ‘Stuff and nonsense, sir. Miss Pocket has asked the most necessary of questions in the circumstances. And I think you should both still call me Hattie, while I am incognito. Hat Vaughan was a name Sir William Gell gave me when we… we needed to be discreet, if you get my drift. It will suit the situation well for now.’

Houghton groaned and began to revive, sitting up with his head in his hands. Making a valiant effort to repair his reputation, he tried again to take control.

‘Majesty, let me deal with this. I… oooh.’

Having made the mistake of taking one more look at the crate, he almost swooned away again, collapsing this time on the edge of the great bed. The Queen poked at him and, getting no response, slid past him to examine the contents of the crate. Though she gave a sharp intake of breath, she managed to control her reactions this time. Malinferno could see she was made of sterner stuff than the naval officer, who sat with his head between his knees.

‘Perhaps then you could answer Miss Pocket’s question, Your-Mrs Vaughan. Are we to eliminate you from the list of potential murderers?’

The old woman looked grim. ‘I can only give you my word that I am innocent. I believe Miss Pocket saw me leave the marquee in the company of both the deceased, and…’ she poked Houghton with her finger again. ‘… the lieutenant here. We came back to the tent that the duchess had so kindly vacated for me, and I retired, leaving Signor Sacchi on guard outside the entrance.’

‘And the box was there all the time?’

‘Yes. I was led to understand that the duchess had it brought to her tent after your… enlightening lecture. Neither she nor I had any qualms about being next to a corpse. In fact, there was something quite thrilling about sleeping with a pharaoh.’

Malinferno was about to advise her that the mummy was probably not that of a pharaoh, but of a priest or rich trader. But he could see she was keen to talk, and he let her continue.

‘I fell into a deep sleep that was broken only by some noise that intruded into my dreams.’

‘What sort of noise, Hattie? Can you describe it?’

It was Doll’s turn to carry on the interrogation, and Malinferno marvelled at her ability to act quite normally in the presence of such a notorious figure as Queen Caroline. In only a few days, this woman standing before them was effectively to go on trial in Parliament. A Bill was to be presented in the House that accused the Queen of conducting herself with ‘indecent and offensive familiarity’ with Bartolomeo Pergami, and of carrying on a ‘licentious, and adulterous intercourse’ with him. The end result of a vote in the House in favour of the Bill would be to strip the Queen of her title and prerogatives, and dissolve her marriage with the King. Now, she seemed more concerned with establishing her innocence as concerns the murder of one of her paramours. Pergami had been left behind on the continent, but it appeared there were others in her entourage who kept her amused. Sacchi had obviously been one of them, and it would have suited her to have him silenced.

The Queen’s description of what had woken her was inconclusive. Was it a scraping sound or a groan? Was it someone murdering Sacchi, or heaving his body into the crate? Caroline fiddled with the pink turban that lay on the bed, and plonked it on her head. It sat at an odd angle amidst her tangled, thinning hair.