Heresy (55 page)

“Peace, Adam,” I whispered back, removing his trembling hands from my clothes and feeling oddly insulted. “I have no use for your money, nor has anyone asked me for names. But if you will profess a forbidden faith, at least have the courage to be true to it—otherwise what is the point?”

He offered up a limp smile of gratitude, then opened the door for me. “My master is within,” he murmured, bowing his head.

In the wide reception room where we had dined so companionably on my first evening in Oxford, the rector stood facing the window that gave onto the grove, hands clasped behind his back. I glanced around at the empty dining table, remembering where Roger Mercer and James Coverdale had sat at that dinner, recalling the deep rumble of Mercer’s laughter. Perhaps the rector too was remembering as he looked out over the garden where Mercer had met his terrible death only hours later. Adam closed the door behind me with a click and slipped discreetly through the door to the interior room. Underhill still did not stir from the window; when he spoke, he kept his back to me, his voice flat and unnatural.

“My daughter would speak to you next door, Doctor Bruno.”

I waited, but nothing more was forthcoming, so I followed Adam
through the door to the rector’s private room, where Sophia and I had once talked of magic in what seemed like another age.

Now she stood alone by the fireplace, her hands resting on the back of one of the high-backed wooden chairs. Her long, dark hair was modestly tied back, though a few curling tendrils had escaped and hung about her face. There was still nothing about her figure, slight in a straight-bodiced dark-grey dress, to advertise her condition, save for perhaps a fullness about the bust, but her face seemed thinner, more pinched and drained, and her eyes were puffy with exhaustion and tears.

“The pursuivants caught up with us at a house in Abingdon,” she said, without preamble, and though her face looked fragile, her voice was as clear and strong as always. “They asked Jerome what he was. He answered that he was a gentleman and a Christian. Then they tore off his shirt and saw his hair shirt.” She hesitated for a moment to swallow hard, then took a deep breath and continued without looking at me, her voice steady again. “They arrested him as a traitor, shackled him, and took him away. I begged them to take me with him, but I was brought back to Oxford.”

“They shackled you?” I asked, horrified.

“No. They were surprisingly gentle. But then I did not resist them. I was taken to the Castle prison,” she said, finally raising her head and looking me in the eye, almost defiantly. Then she shook her head and seemed to crumple. “You cannot imagine it, Bruno, if you have not seen it. Or smelled it. People would not keep animals in such conditions. One low room they have for the poor women, with filthy straw over the floor that stinks of piss and shit, and the walls are so damp there is fungus growing there and the cold goes right inside your bones. I think I will feel that cold for the rest of my life.”

“They put you in such a place? But did you not tell them of …?” I faltered and indicated my stomach. She gave a small bitter laugh.

“Yes, I told them, despite the damage to my honour. Jerome said that I should not speak if I were arrested, save to acknowledge my name. Yet I
thought they might treat me with more gentleness than otherwise. But it seems it was all designed to frighten me. I was left in that hole for two hours, among the insane and the destitute, crowding around me, pulling at my clothes and hair, women covered in lice and sores and the stink of rotten flesh and human filth all around me—” Finally her voice cracked and I took a step toward her instinctively, wanting to put my arm around her, but she straightened up immediately and glared at me, and I realised with a guilty jolt that there was no comfort I could give: I was the enemy.

“Then what happened?” I prompted, trying to cover over my ill-judged show of emotion.

“My father arrived,” she said, shaking her hair back. “They had sent for him. It seemed he had been told that I was arrested in the company of a notorious Jesuit, but that I had secretly handed over certain damning documents to the authorities, suggesting that my loyalty lay with the forces of Her Majesty’s law after all. That being the case, and given the delicacy of my condition”—here she patted her own stomach with a sarcastic smile—“he was free to stand surety for my release.”

“Then—you did not contradict them?”

“I presumed it was you who had told them the story about the letters,” she said softly, her tone betraying neither gratitude nor anger. “You gave me a chance to escape, even at the last minute. And the sheriff did me a kindness, I think, in insisting I be thrown in the prison first. Had I not seen that, I might have been stubborn enough to insist on the truth, for Jerome’s sake. But two hours in that pit—” She broke off and shuddered, her hand straying absently to her belly in a gesture of protection. “I feared that even in that short time I would catch the gaol fever—the air was so dank and full of poisons. And I was afraid for the child,” she added, so quietly I could barely catch the words. “If its father must die, it should at least have the chance to live.”

“I’m glad,” I said, with feeling.

“I’m sure you are,” she replied. “It would not have done for your masters to discover that you lied to save a Catholic whore, would it? You played your part very well, Bruno, I never suspected you. But then, you never suspected me, did you? So perhaps you are not so clever as you believe.”

“I do not expect you to thank me,” I whispered. “You have every reason to hate me. But I only ever acted out of care for you. He would have had you killed, Sophia, on the crossing to France, I know it.”

“You say that only because Thomas put it in your head. Jerome would never have harmed me. He loves me.” A sob caught in her throat and she turned her face away to swallow it down, determined that I should not see the weakness of tears.

“He loved his mission more,” I said. “Well, it is fortunate that our opposing theories were never put to the test, and you are still alive.”

“Fortunate? Oh yes, I am fortunate indeed,” she said, her voice tight with bitterness. “I am to be banished by my family, the man I love will die in cruel pain and I will never see him again, the child I carry will be taken from me before I can even give it a name, and after that I will be interrogated by the authorities. If it pleases them not to detain me, I will be sent back to live with my aunt, perhaps in time to be married to some rough unlettered farmer or innkeeper, if one can be found who will overlook my sins. And who is the author of all this good fortune? Why, it is you, Bruno.” Anger flashed for a moment in her beautiful amber eyes, but she was too defeated to sustain it, and the fierce light quickly died.

“Perhaps when you hold your child in your arms, even for a moment, you may hate me less,” I said, looking steadily at her. She brushed a loose strand of hair from her face and met my gaze.

“I do not hate you, Bruno,” she said wearily. “I hate the world. I hate God. I hate religion and the way it makes men believe that they alone are right.”

“You sound like Thomas Allen,” I said, and instantly regretted what sounded like an attempt at levity. To my surprise, though, she gave a weak smile.

“And we have seen where that may lead. Poor, poor Thomas. No, life is too short for hating.”

“Your faith will not survive interrogation, then?”

She almost laughed then, her face briefly lighting up.

“My
faith
, as you call it, was only ever a way to please him. I would have worshipped the moon and the sun and sacrificed a cockerel to the Devil at midnight if that would have made him love me better.”

“I well remember—you asked my advice on it once,” I said. “But I would advise you not to say as much when you are interviewed.”

“No, Bruno.” She shook her head. “Have no fear for me on that account. When I saw that gaol today, I knew without doubt that I could never endure years in such a place for love of the pope. For Jerome, yes, but he would not be here to appreciate it, would he? And the child must survive. That is all that matters now.” She fell silent then and stared down at her folded hands for a long while. I didn’t dare to move. Eventually she reached into a pocket sewn into her dress and drew out a folded scrap of paper. Stepping across the room toward me, she took my bandaged right hand and pressed the paper into it, holding my hand between hers for a few moments while she looked intently into my eyes. Despite everything, my heart gave a foolish jolt and I was seized by a desire to take her in my arms. The cruelty of the fate that she described reminded me painfully once again of Morgana; I had sentenced a young woman of spirit and beauty to be crushed beneath the wheels of propriety and the injustice of it clutched at my heart. I still clung to the belief that I had saved Sophia’s life, but I would always live with a tiny kernel of doubt: What if Jerome Gilbert really had meant to escort her to safety in France? I would never be wholly sure and neither would she; that uncertainty bound us together, and I felt an overwhelming sense of responsibility for her. If there was anything
I could do to help her now, I determined that I would not let her down again.

“Write to me,” she whispered, glancing nervously at the door in case her father should overhear. “Tell me how he died, what he said on the scaffold. That is all I wish. This is the address of my aunt in Kent. I will be taken there tomorrow and I do not think I will ever return to Oxford.”

“Surely your father would not banish you for good?”

She shook her head, her lips pressed tight. “You do not know my father. If you could do this one thing …” She let the sentence trail away and squeezed my hand gently; I tried not to wince.

“I will.”

“Thank you, Bruno.” Her wide eyes roved over mine as if searching for something. “If you had only come to Oxford two years ago—how different everything might have been. Perhaps we …But it is no good dwelling on what might have been. It is too late now for me.” She leaned forward and kissed me softly on the cheek, so gently that I might have imagined the brush of her lips over my skin. She squeezed my hand once more and let go.

As I turned toward the door, my heart so heavy I felt stooped by the weight of it, she whispered, “Write!” I looked back to see her miming writing on the palm of her hand, her face stretched into a brave attempt at a smile. I nodded and turned my back on her for the last time.

When I closed the door behind me, the rector was still standing in the same position, silhouetted against the window, but he had turned to face the room and kept his arms folded across his chest, his small beady eyes fixed on me.

“So, Doctor Bruno, I have you to thank for delivering the college from a brutal murderer and a seditious Jesuit.” His tone was still oddly unemotional, as though all capacity for feeling had drained out of him. I could not tell if he was pleased by this or not, and the ambiguity of his words made me pause.

“You know, Rector, that the two were not the same person?”

“I know that Gabriel Norris—I cannot think of him any other way—is to be charged with the murders of Roger Mercer, James Coverdale, Ned Lacy, and Thomas Allen, and with treasonable intent toward Her Majesty’s person. I have learned, too, that there are other accusations made against him, perhaps of less interest to the Privy Council but nonetheless of considerable significance to my own family.”

Here he drew in a great shuddering breath that seemed as if it would wrack his very soul. Briefly his eyes met mine and I saw in them a weight of sorrow that I understood would burden him the remainder of his natural life. I also understood, in that moment, that Sophia had spoken the truth; there was a degree of coldness in the rector that would allow him to cut her off for good if he felt it necessary. In his eyes I saw the grief of a man who has already lost both his children. I wanted to intercede with him, to plead on her behalf, but decided to hold my tongue; my interference in the business of this college and especially this family was perhaps sufficient.

“I do not think we will see you in Oxford again, Doctor Bruno,” he said stiffly, holding out a hand for me to shake as he walked across to the main door, the boards creaking under his feet in the silence. “In the light of recent events, I regret not confiding in you sooner, but here in Oxford we are not accustomed to regarding foreigners as—well, you see my position.” He held the hand out more insistently and I reached to take it, whereupon he grasped my hand between both of his and fixed me with an imploring stare. Sophia had been fortunate, I thought as we looked at each other, that she had taken all her looks from her mother. Or perhaps not so fortunate; had she been less beautiful, her situation now might be very different.

“Among my many regrets, Doctor Bruno,” he continued, seeming to crumple slightly as he held tight to my hand, “I could wish I had been a more gracious host and friend to you. Had I known of your connections—
but I have much to reprimand myself for, as you may imagine. Perhaps if you have the opportunity to convey to the Earl of Leicester that I have only ever tried to serve him and the university to the best of my ability, that would not be too much to ask? I expect to hear from him concerning these events, and I am not at all sure of how he will receive the news.” His eyes grew wide with fear as he wrung my arm urgently, unaware that he was even doing so.

“I would help you if I could, but I’m afraid you mistake my intimacy with the earl—I have never met him in my life.” Seeing his disappointment, I quickly added, “But I’m sure that if I discuss these matters with Sir Philip, he will not be ignorant of your loyalty.”

The rector nodded solemnly and released my hand.

“Thank you. It is more than I deserve. You were a most worthy adversary in the debating hall, Doctor Bruno. I only wish we might have had the opportunity again.”

You have a short memory, I thought, as I smiled politely; I was your superior in substance and conduct, though it pleased you to ridicule me before the entire congregation of the university. But that humiliation seemed a trivial thing now.