S Parris - Heresy

"It hardly matters now," Bernard said, before piously adding, "God have mercy on his soul."

Jenkes gave me another long, hard look, then appeared to decide in my favour.

"Well, then, Doctor Bruno-let poor Mercer be proved right. You have found yourself among friends. Come tonight-at half past midnight. Use the rear door, through the inn yard, not the street door. Humphrey will be there-say the password and he will admit you. Wear a cloak with a hood, keep it drawn over your face and take care you are not followed."

"Will there not be watchmen at the north gate? Surely they will want to know my business at that hour."

"Give them a groat and they will not give two shits for your business," he said, his eyes flicking again to my belt. "But have a care for your purse walking the streets so late. Have you a weapon?"

I replied that I did not carry one. He picked up the little silver-handled knife from the workbench and held it out to me.

"Take it for tonight. It is only small but it cuts through leather well enough-I am sure it could do some damage if you were set upon. Better than an empty scabbard, anyway."

"Thank you-but in any case I will not need my purse for such a meeting, will I?" I replied.

"Oh, but you must bring your purse tonight," Jenkes said, his expression suddenly concerned; seeing my look of suspicion, he leaned in with a sly smile. "For I do not give away my books for nothing, Master Bruno, not even to my brother Catholics."

My heart quickened. "Books?"

"You are interested in a book, are you not? A Greek book, brought out of Florence by Dean Flemyng a century ago, bequeathed to the library of Lincoln College, removed by our friend Doctor Bernard here during the purge by the Royal Commission of '69. Am I correct?"

"Do you have this book?" I whispered, hardly daring to breathe.

He replied with the same slow, infuriating smile.

"I do not have it here. But I have held it in my hands, and I can direct you to it. I'm sure we can work out an arrangement that will suit us both, Doctor Bruno. Be sure to bring your purse."

"You said the book did not exist," I said, turning to Bernard with a note of triumph.

"I said so for the sake of those fools gathered around the rector's table that night," he said, dismissively. "It would have raised too many questions. Underhill is a puppet of the chancellor and the Privy Council-he would not know the value of such a book, but I did not wish to awaken his old anxieties. If he had his way, he would purge the library until there was nothing left upon the lecterns but the Bishops' Bible and the volumes of Master Foxe." For a moment I thought Bernard might spit on the floor, so bitter was the contempt in his voice as he spoke the name, but he restrained himself. I wondered what Jenkes had meant when he said that Mercer's loose tongue would have had them all killed.

"We must not detain you any longer, Doctor Bruno," Jenkes said, turning back toward the shop and reaching for the keys at his belt. "You will be wanting to catch up with your friend Florio. By the way-it goes without saying that you do not breathe a word of our conversation to anyone. I am the only one who can tell you who to trust in this town where matters of religion are concerned. You understand the dangers, I'm sure."

I nodded, as he unlocked the door to the street and I saw with some relief that the rain had finally begun to thin.

I turned back to see him standing in the doorway, arms folded across his chest, with an air of satisfaction.

"And the book?"

"I will tell you all about the book when we next meet."

"You have forgotten one thing," I said, in a low voice. "The password."

Jenkes's pitted face creased into a lopsided smile.

"Why, you have already been told, Doctor Bruno," he whispered, before mouthing the words, "Ora pro nobis."

Achill wind chivvied the dark rain clouds in drifts across the sky, revealing a higher layer of pearl-grey cloud as the rain thinned and finally ceased altogether. I walked through the muddy lanes back to Lincoln barely aware any longer of my damp clothes chafing at my skin, my head caught up in whirling thoughts. As I passed under the tower archway I heard the bell tolling its melancholy summons to Evensong, but I was unprepared for the sight that greeted me as I emerged into the quadrangle. Groups of students and Fellows stood huddled together around the entrance to the staircase that led to the library and the chapel, staring up at the windows, all seemingly transfixed by something. An eerie silence hung over the quadrangle, the men gathered there exchanging only muted whispers and frozen glances. The air was taut with unspoken fear. I slowed my steps and approached the nearest knot of students to find out the reason for this sombre congregation, when Richard Godwyn pushed his way through to greet me unsmiling, relief etched on his face.

"Doctor Bruno, the rector has been asking for you," he said in a low voice. "Come."

Taking me by the elbow, he guided me through the staring crowd to the entrance that led up to the library and chapel. At the foot of the stairs stood the stocky kitchen servant who had been set to guard the stairway to Coverdale's room earlier; he glanced at us and nodded brusquely. Godwyn led the way up to the chapel and tapped gently on the door with his knuckles; it was opened immediately by Slythurst, who scowled at me, but stepped aside to let me pass. Instantly, I recognised the smell of blood. Rector Underhill rose from one of the wooden benches nearest the door and clasped my wrists with both hands, staring into my eyes with desperation, his own red-rimmed above sunken cheeks.

"God is punishing us, Bruno," he whispered, his voice cracked. "He is heaping burning coals on my head for my sins of omission. Even here, in our consecrated chapel." He stepped aside, his grip still tight around my wrist, and I witnessed the cause of the rector's latest distress. At the foot of the small altar a body lay slumped. I stepped slowly closer; blood was spattered across the rushes on the floor and up the white altar cloth, and even from the other end of the chapel I could see that the body had a shock of red hair.

"Nothing has been touched," the rector croaked. "I wanted you to see. I came into the chapel just before five to prepare for Evensong and found…" His voice trembled and he sat back down heavily on a nearby bench.

I knelt by the body, my teeth tightly clenched. Ned, the young Bible clerk, lay on his back in his shirt and breeches, his eyes bulging unnaturally wide and protruding toward the ceiling in a fixed expression of terror. It took a moment before I realised why his stare was so hideous: his eyelids had been cut off. I bent closer, holding my breath in disbelief. This was not the only mutilation of the boy's face; a wide gash had been cut down both cheeks, so deeply that the blade appeared to have pierced right through his face, and his mouth was swollen and bloodied, thick rivulets of blood coating his downy chin. The boy had barely been old enough to shave.

"The altar," Underhill whispered, nodding toward it.

I looked up and recoiled instantly; a dark red fleshy lump sat in the centre of the altar, blood seeping from it to form an ugly stain on the white cloth.

"Oh, God," I breathed, for I knew what I was looking at. Gingerly I prised Ned's lower jaw open to reveal the stump of his tongue. The movement unleashed a fresh flow of blood down his chin and I jumped back instinctively, though I knew he could not possibly be alive.

"This happened very recently," I observed, turning to the rector. He nodded, passing his hands over his face.

"Ned came every day at around four to make the chapel ready for Evensong at five," he said, his voice still barely audible. "That is the Bible clerk's principal duty. Anyone would have known to find him here. The chapel is not kept locked. They must have hidden and waited for him. Poor boy." He shook his head. "But you see what they have done to him, Bruno?" He looked up at me expectantly.