The Mammoth Book of Historical Crime Fiction (33 page)

“Why did you ask the captain to shake the men’s hands?”

Zuliani’s face broke out in a superior smile.

“I wanted to be sure which man was Tiepolo. Tell me something, Katie, what was your natural movement every time you descended the stairs in my house?”

The girl paused for a moment, then grinned.

“I always put my hand on the bottom newel post, where the cast iron lizard sits.”

“Exactly. I always did it, even as a child. I reckoned Tiepolo would have done it too, especially as he was groping through the flames with the asbestos hood over his eyes. He would have reached out for the bottom newel, and the metal would have been very hot. I am sure that, if you looked at his hand, you would see, burned into the flesh, the image of a salamander.”

Hide and Seek

Tony Pollard

Dr Tony Pollard is one of the world’s leading battlefield archaeologists and is Director of the Centre for Battlefield Archaeology at the University of Glasgow. He also works as a forensic archaeologist and led the team that discovered the graves of hundreds of First World War British and Australian troops at Fromelles in France. He regularly appears on television and radio and was co-presenter, along with Neil Oliver, of the popular BBC TV series
Two Men in a Trench
(2002). He has written widely on archaeology and history for popular and academic audiences and is co-editor of
The Journal of Conflict Archaeology
. His first novel,
The Secrets of the Lazarus Club
(2009) is a thriller based around the life of the famous Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

For the following story, however, we go back to the months following the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, and the search for the conspirators.

Nicholas Owen had been in tight spots before, most of them of his own making. But it is one thing to build a priest hole, quite another to hide in it. If they did not find him, he promised himself, then the next would be made with an eye to comfort. Owen had lost count of the number of these secret chambers he had constructed over the years, but that was not to say that they were all alike. Every hidey-hole, just like the houses in which they were concealed, had its own character, its advantages and disadvantages. Whether inside a fireplace, beneath the stairs, under floorboards, within the hollow core of a wall or behind a tapestry, they differed in size, shape, airiness, level of illumination, ease of escape and method of entry. While each of these factors was always a consideration during conception and execution it was perhaps in rendering the last of them that Owen had proven himself the absolute master. Every commission required him to approach the challenge of concealment afresh, to impart a unique flourish and avoid the tricks and traps of his last. In repetition were sown the seeds of capture, torture and death.

No matter how well designed, there was always the risk of discovery, either through betrayal or thanks to the talents of one of the small number of priest hunters who turned a hefty profit from seeking out these hiding places and bagging their occupants. Every time the secrets of a hole were exposed, so the task of creating a new one became all the more difficult. With every discovery, the hunters learned something more about the habits of their prey. Like dogs pursuing a fox’s scent, they knew where best to look inside a house and how to recognize the tell-tale signs that a priest was hiding behind what to the uninitiated appeared to be a wall devoid of aperture, or a fireplace with nothing more than a fire in the grate.

An architect will always strive for perfection, but, however cramped his present conditions, Owen knew better than anyone that, when lives of his brethren were at risk, comfort was not a priority. What was there to be gained if, in creating it by making the chamber larger or diverting light from a nearby window, locating the entrance became easier for the hunters? A chink of light here or too wide a wall there was all that was needed to give the place away to a practised eye. In any case, a little cramp in the legs or a crook in the neck was nothing to a man born with a twisted back and known as Little John, thanks to his permanent stoop. But it was just this peculiarity, which God had chosen to bestow on him, which marked him out as ideal for the task. This was, after all, more than a mere profession; it was a calling, as strong as that which drove the many priests – who at times had cause to make use of these sanctuaries – to keep the Roman Catholic faith alive. It was his absolute belief that God had chosen him, just as he had chosen Noah to build the Ark, to serve as the architect of these hidden places. No one was better suited to spend days on end working in confined spaces. There were times, however, when he had to remember that not everyone was as small as he, and it was true that one or two of his creations were a little cosier than they could have been.

For the whole of Owen’s lifetime, and longer, it had been a crime to be a practising Catholic in England. It hadn’t always been so; during her brief reign, Mary Tudor had put fire and sword to bloody use in her determination to return the nation to the bosom of a mother church so cruelly defaced by her father, Henry VIII. But things changed again when her Protestant sister and rival Elizabeth came to the throne in the year of our lord fifteen hundred and fifty eight. Thus it was, that under Queen Bess Catholicism was outlawed; priests and Jesuit missionaries were regarded as enemies of the state and those who refused to deny their faith could be put to death. As a result, Catholicism was not only driven underground but also into the walls and under the stairs. But, just as the Romans had realized so many centuries before, it took more than persecution to kill a faith. And now there was James, the king from north of the border, of whom there were, at first, hopes of a more enlightened rule. His mother, Mary Queen of Scots, had after all been a devout Catholic. But within just a year the persecutions returned and it was the recent ill-fated attempt to put a stop to this reign of terror that caused Owen to be here now – a fugitive in a hide of his own handiwork.

It was the twenty-first day of January in the year of Our Lord sixteen hundred and six. Two months earlier, on a cold November night in London, Guido Fawkes had been discovered lurking within the cellars of the House of Lords in the company of dozens of barrels of gunpowder and a lighted lantern. The taking of Fawkes brought an end to what they were now calling the powder treason – a plot by disheartened Catholics to kill the king and as many members of parliament as were present in the house during the state opening. Other plotters, including their ringleader, Sir Robert Catesby, had been taken since, while others still were already dead. Owen was one of the few remaining at large and, despite his lowly ranking within the scheme, he had been tasked by its leaders with a heavy responsibility, and it was that which sat between his feet, confined within a leather sack – just as he was, between walls of timber and stone.

If failing anatomy and hard labour caused him some discomfort, this was nothing when compared to the agonies of torture. He knew all too well what the rack could do to a man, having before now been tied to the state’s favoured instrument of torture. His crime then had been to speak out against the arrest of a neighbour for attending a mass; but even under torture he refused to speak out against his fellow Catholics. In truth though, he had been on the verge of breaking when his freedom was purchased by a wealthy local family for whom he had built several holes in the past. This time though, if taken as a traitor and failed regicide, torture would merely be the first of many horrors to be faced.

As yet there had been only a little discomfort, though he was grateful for the blanket helping to shield him from the chilled air blowing in through a fissure in the exterior wall. But only half a day had passed since the hammering on the door. Now he would see how good his work had been.

*

“We have them,” said the first of the two horsemen to arrive in front of the red brick house. Tired but still restless, Noyce’s mount shifted on the carriage-way just inside the ornate gate posts. Removing his broad-brimmed hat he bent forward across his horse’s flank, studying the ground. The heavy wooden gates were slightly ajar and the gravel was scuffed and mounded – the legacy of a half-hearted attempt to drag them closed, but, with the house still a good distance away and their pursuers closing in behind them, their quarry had given it up as a bad job.

Hindlip Hall was a rambling pile with ivy-covered walls and towers, projecting wings, too many windows to count and spiralled chimney pots stacked high above the roof. Gathered behind the riders were foot soldiers, armed with half-pikes and muskets. Their easy posture and the patches of rust on their helmets and breastplates marked them out as something less than the king’s élite.

“Hiding like rats in the walls,” said Sir Henry Bromley, the well-dressed and even better fed local Justice, as he drew up alongside Noyce on a sweat-flecked bay.

Noyce’s horse threw back its head, stamped a hoof and through flared nostrils pushed smoky breath into the cold air. The sudden movement prompted the man standing closest to them to take a step back and almost drop the partizan he was carrying. He was the captain of militia, a gangly fellow with a thick grey beard in need of a trim and men in want of orders. “What a peculiar breed of coward they are, these Catholics. They dare try their hand at killing our king but then hide behind the wainscoting. You are correct Sir ’enry, vermin all of ’em.”

“That may be, captain, but they are clever vermin,” replied Noyce. “I have been hunting these people and their like for years. It will be a job of work to pull them from their holes, have no doubt of that.” He turned to look doubtfully at the slouching soldiers behind him. “We must hope that your men are up to the task at hand.”

“They will be, sir, once they’ve got their wind back. It is not an easy thing for infantry to keep up with cavalry.”

“Well, now you have arrived,” interjected Sir Henry. “You can instruct your men, winded or not, to surround the house. It would not do for our rats to leave the trap before we have closed it. There are outbuildings to the rear. Billet your men there. One of them is a smithy. When the house is secure I will require the services of the blacksmith.” He patted the side of the horse’s neck. “He has shaken loose a shoe on that damned forest track. Now, sir, be good enough to deploy your men.”

The captain strode towards his charges, bellowing orders. He was eager for his men to prove themselves to the intimidating outsider. Although he had never had cause to visit these parts before, the reputation of Mr Jonathan Noyce – the most successful priest hunter in all of England – preceded him and, among other things, it was well known that he did not suffer fools gladly. “Half of you spread out across the front of the house,” yelled the captain. “The rest of you close the circle from the rear. If anyone tries to leave the house stop them, but hold your fire for god’s sake. The king requires these people alive.”

He was pleased with his closing remark; it sounded professional. But his orders brought only disorder. Where there had been a suggested lack of military precision there was now chaos, as some of the men collided with their neighbours, while others seemed uncertain whether they were to move or not. Only the intervention of the sergeant and his bill-staff, which was applied liberally to shoulders and backsides, brought the mêlée to order.

As the soldiers moved off at a trot, Noyce reached into a saddlebag and pulled out a parchment, which he unrolled and began to study. “Now, tell me Sir Henry, who is the woman of the house?”

Sir Henry let out a laugh. “Perhaps, sir, we should postpone such niceties until we have completed the business at hand.”

“You mistake my intent Sir Henry,” replied the priest hunter, clearly irritated at the remark. “The house may have a master, but I’ll wager it is ruled by the mistress. Experience has taught that the women are oft times more devout than their spouses, and protective of priests as they are of their own children. Now who is she?”

“Why, she is … she is Habington’s wife of course. I think her name is Mary,” said a cowed Sir Henry. Then, eager to make amends for his gaff, he added, “My sources tell me that her husband is away from the house.”

“Then by God, she has full reign. Mark me sir, she is harbouring our prey. The woman is as much an enemy of the king and the Protestant faith as any of those men sheltered within her walls.”

“True, it is well known to be a Catholic household, but they have never given me any cause to interfere in their affairs. Unlike some, they have not been foolish enough to flaunt their beliefs.”

“What say you to harbouring failed assassins of the king? Cause enough for a little interference, would you not say?”

Sir Henry, let out a snort of indignation. “We should save our trouble and put the place to the torch. Smoke them out or let them roast. The fires of hell will be familiar to them soon enough.”

Noyce rolled up the parchment and slapped it against the palm of a gloved hand. “Do you know what this is?”

“I have no idea of its contents sir, though I would be pleased enough to read them if you felt it would advantage our cause.”

“That will not be required,” said Noyce as he repacked the document. “It is a king’s warrant for the arrest of all of those known or suspected to have taken part in the gunpowder plot, or to have given the traitors aid or succour. It states that the greatest care is to be taken, in servicing said warrant, and is most specific about the importance of collecting any evidence which may prove guilt or innocence.”

“
Evidence
,” scoffed Sir Henry. “There will be enough of that spilling from their treacherous tongues once they are strapped to the rack.”

“You wish to question the
king’s
warrant sir? I should not need to explain to a King’s Justice that hard evidence is much preferred to testimony gathered under torture. And we are hardly likely to pull much of worth from the charred ashes of the house, are we?”