The Poisoned Chalice (27 page)

'So was the king!' Benjamin retorted.

'Let us examine things carefully,' Agrippa interrupted. 'Master Daunbey, please?'

My master leaned forward. 'Let us describe how things happened,' he began. 'And only later explain why. For eighteen months,' he continued, 'there has been a spy called Raphael at the heart of the English council. Master Falconer, through one of his most trustworthy agents, learned his name was Raphael. This was in Holy Week when, Sir Robert, you were here at Maubisson.' He waved a hand. 'Please don't give me your protestations that you were working with Falconer. Of course he told you about the spy. After all, you are the king's friend and head of the chancery which deals with French affairs. You passed this information back to your masters at the Louvre Palace and Monsieur Vauban arranged the death of Falconer's agent.

'Now Falconer became immediately suspicious about this and concentrated on the name Raphael. Before you left for England you probably noticed his change of attitude towards you and decided on a very clever way of removing this dangerous clerk. Remember, it was Holy Week when you left: Falconer, like everyone else, was observing the Church fast, abstaining from meat and wine. But once Lent was over, he would celebrate. He would use his liturgical cup, the Easter goblet, and you smeared that with a very special poison.'

Benjamin looked down at his own cup and swilled the lees of wine round the bottom. 'It must have been a unique kind of poison, though quite an easy feat for you with your interest in chemicals and alchemy. I suspect the juice of Ergot or what the herbalists call
"Claviceps Purpurea".
You see, even Ergot or Mandrake will eventually kill, but rather slowly. Their primary effect is to cause the victim to hallucinate. They feel incredibly happy and believe they can do anything they wish.' Benjamin stared across at Dacourt. 'The wine you shared with Falconer, Sir John, was untainted, but Falconer's cup was not. After you left Falconer fell under the influence of the strong concoction smeared on his cup. He loved birds, loved to study them in flight. It was a warm, spring evening so he went to the top of the tower.' Benjamin shrugged. 'Did he slip or maybe even try to fly? Whatever, with the cup clenched in his hands, he fell to his death.' My master smiled. 'It's not too fanciful. Any man who has drunk too much wine knows how the mind plays tricks.'

'Nonsense!' Clinton, his face now white as a sheet, sprang to his feet and stared round. 'What nonsense is this? Even if I did that, how would I know Falconer would fall to his death?'

'Oh, that was an unexpected gain,' Benjamin replied. 'If he had not and had stayed in his room, the dream effect would have worn off. He would have fallen into a coma and died in his sleep without any visible sign of poison. His death could have been dismissed as due to natural causes. After all, the wine was untainted and who would think of examining the cup?' Benjamin stared at the top of the table for a while. 'Yes, you were very clever, Sir Robert. Oh, please do sit down, I haven't finished yet.'

Clinton slumped back in his chair. I kept my eyes on Lady Francesca. She now sat next to her husband, head bowed, clasping and unclasping her hands.

'Very clever,' Benjamin murmured, 'to poison someone by playing on their fantasies. And most subtle of you to arrange it from scores of miles away.'

'And the Abbe Gerard?' Dacourt barked, now recovering some of his bluster.

Benjamin held up a hand. ‘I can say no more than that the abbe's death was easy to arrange. Once again it was Lent; the abbe, too, was fasting. He received gifts, one of them a flask of wine from Sir Robert sent just before he and Lady Clinton returned to London. Now the good abbe opened the wine after Easter Sunday, once Lent was over. It was only a small jar, perhaps two or three cups at the very most. Under the influence of the poison in the wine, the same poison Falconer drank, the good abbe turned to his constant absorption with the miracles of Christ, particularly the miracle of Jesus walking on water.' Benjamin stared at Clinton. 'As the abbe's friend you would know all about that, wouldn't you, Sir Robert?' Benjamin didn't wait for an answer. 'The good abbe, while hallucinating, went out to the carp pond and tried to walk on water. He was an old man and the shock of the cold water, not to mention the effects of the poison he had drunk, would have killed him in minutes. He struggled but was weak and so quietly drowned. Murder was not suspected, the body removed for burial. The cup he drank from fell into the water with him and was cleansed, whilst the wine jar was thrown out like any piece of rubbish. Once the abbe was dead, Vauban and the Luciferi began to search for the book.' Benjamin paused and smiled to himself. 'But the old priest was astute. He really valued that book, so he hid it.' Benjamin looked straight at Clinton. 'Oh, yes, Sir Robert, I have the book in safe keeping.'

Do you know, I have confronted many murderers, men and women, who have dabbled in the blood of others. They have the arrogance of Cain, who could challenge God and proudly declare that he didn't know where his brother was. Nevertheless, there's a point when such arrogance will suddenly crumble as the murderers realise they have lost control of the game. So it was with Clinton. He stared at Benjamin, mouth half-open, like some weak, senile man devoid of wit and reason.

'I found the book,' Benjamin repeated. 'And I have seen what is written in it. Your first wife's surname was Harpale and, if you play with the letters of her name, as Falconer tried to, you can form the word Raphael.' Benjamin smiled coldly. 'I'm sure,' he continued, 'a scrutiny of papers and letters addressed to your wife would establish that you used such an anagram as a term of endearment towards her.' He coughed and drank some wine. 'Isn't that so, Roger?'

'Yes, yes,' I confirmed, though I still watched Clinton, especially his hands. 'Once Falconer had established that the spy used the term Raphael, you decided to silence the Abbe Gerard. You knew about his book. I suspect he had shown it to you with the name Harpale written in the back. Who knows? He may even have remembered that you called your first wife Raphael.'

Lady Francesca now began to cry quietly, her whole body shaking with sobs.

'Of course,' I continued remorselessly, 'others had to be silenced. Drunken Waldegrave, who might have learnt more from Falconer than you thought. His was an easy death to arrange. You went across to see him one night when he was in a drunken stupor and smeared his robes with pig's blood. The sottish priest did not resist. Perhaps he was incapacitated by something more powerful, like a sleeping potion. Once his robes were stained with blood, you took him across to Vulcan's stable, opened the door, threw him in and bolted the stable shut. The war horse, fiery by nature and trained to kill, was alarmed by this sudden intrusion and the smell of blood, and pounded poor Waldegrave to death.'

'And Throgmorton?' Dacourt suddenly spoke up.

'In a while,' I continued. I stared where Millet was still crouching on the floor like some toper unable to move. 'I think, Sir John, you should remove Sir Robert's dagger and help Master Millet to his feet. Perhaps some wine might ease his discomfort?'

Dacourt obeyed with alacrity. Clinton gave up his dagger unresistingly. He just stared down the hall, lost in his own thoughts, as the old soldier helped a still-weeping Millet to an empty chair.

'Throgmorton,' I declared, 'was a busybody. A good doctor but he liked to spy on young girls and any woman who caught his fancy, including the Lady Francesca.'

Clinton's wife looked up sharply. Her face was ravaged by fear and tears; her skin had turned white and puffy like dough, her eyes red-rimmed. I glanced at Benjamin, for we had agreed not to reveal certain matters to all the company. 'At Fontainebleau,' I continued, 'Throgmorton saw something strange in Lady Francesca's chamber and, like the busybody he was, intended to declare it to all and sundry. On our journey back to Maubisson, Sir Robert asked Throgmorton to look at his horse's leg whilst Venner and he served the wine and food.'

'But we all drank that wine!' Peckle exclaimed.

'Of course we did,' Benjamin replied. 'Don't you remember, Sir Robert courteously filled each goblet and handed it out? Now,' Benjamin picked up his own goblet by the rim, 'Sir Robert handled each cup like this. If you look at his right hand, you will notice the heavy rings there. I suspect one of these has a miniature clasp which can be pulled back by the thumb, revealing a cavity where poison can be secreted. That is how he poisoned Throgmorton's cup. A few grains of some deadly poison and Throgmorton is dead within hours.'

Benjamin rose and went down the table. He pulled out his dagger and gently pricked the back of Sir Robert's neck.

'Sir Robert, your right hand, please?'

Helped by Dacourt, Benjamin grasped Clinton's unresisting hand, forcing it down on the table, palm up. The silver rings on the three fingers glinted in the candlelight. Benjamin touched the ring on the middle finger, telling Dacourt to push the candle closer.

'You see, Sir John, a small clasp! If you pull it back -there!'

Clinton struggled to drag his hand away but Dacourt held his wrist tightly and pulled the ring off. He passed it around for examination. It was a subtle design of hollow metal which, when the clasp was pulled back by the thumb of the same hand, would release a small sprinkle of deadly powder. Clinton would have released the poison just before he passed the cup down to Throgmorton.

'Of course!' Dacourt exclaimed. 'That's why he asked Throgmorton to see to the horse. Clinton wanted to make sure we all had our wine before the doctor was served!'

Clinton, ashen-faced, stared around.

'This is nonsense!' he mumbled. 'Complete nonsense!'

But his voice faltered and he sat slumped like a beaten man. Lady Francesca sobbed, then Clinton's demeanour suddenly changed. He glanced sideways and grinned as if he had remembered some secret joke.

'What about Venner?' Millet croaked. He flung his hand out towards Clinton. 'That bastard accused me of his death!'

'Oh, that was the clumsiest of Sir Robert's murders,' I remarked. 'You see, before we left for the Tour de Nesle, I came down to this hall and declared that I knew the names of both Sir John Dacourt's wife and Millet's dead sister. Clinton began to suspect that we had also found out about his first wife's surname, perhaps even about Raphael himself, so he launched a two-pronged attack: a secret message was sent to Vauban so that bastard could invite us to our deaths at the Tower, whilst Clinton carefully arranged for Millet to emerge as the guilty party. That wasn't difficult. Millet's nocturnal journeys to Paris, his pursuit of young dandies at the French court, the coincidence that both he and his sister had names of archangels . . .' I made a face. 'The rest was easy. Certain items were placed in Millet's coffer; Venner was given a poisoned drink; and Sir Robert's and Lady Francesca's wine was poisoned. But Venner would not drink from that. He had been poisoned earlier and his corpse left in Clinton's chamber.'

'How do you know?' Dacourt abruptly asked. 'That

Venner didn't drink the wine?'

'Because the poor fellow only ever drank watered wine. But Sir Robert didn't care about that. He hoped we would be torn to death at the Tour de Nesle, and Millet would get the blame, whilst he would continue to pose as the noble English envoy who had narrowly escaped death.'

Agrippa, who had hardly moved throughout the entire scene, suddenly leaned forward and tapped the pommel of his short dagger on the table.

'Now,' he said to the hushed group, 'we come to the question of why.' He rose to his feet. 'However, gentlemen, that is not for every ear. Sir John, Master Peckle, Master Millet, you must withdraw.'

'I will not!' Dacourt bristled back.

'Sir John, if you do not,' Agrippa replied quietly, 'you will never leave this chateau alive. I do not ask you to go. I beg you to, for your own safety!'

The old soldier sighed deeply, shrugged, and walked quietly down the hall, Peckle and Millet following. Agrippa made sure the door was closed behind them.

'Now, Sir Robert,' he announced, 'we shall tell you why you are a spy, a traitor and a murderer, as well as what made you smile a few minutes ago. Master Daunbey?'

Benjamin moved to sit beside Clinton like some priest ready to hear confession.

'I shall tell you a story, Sir Robert,' he began. 'About a young courtier, a soldier and a scholar, a friend of the king. Now this courtier loved his royal master and faithfully served him. He was sent on this errand and that and, when he returned, he and his beautiful wife were often together at the court of the king. What this diplomat did not know was that his royal master had an eye for a pretty face, no real feeling of friendship, and a raging lust which had to be slaked. The king seduced his friend's wife, treated her like a trollop, some courtesan from the city, and the courtier found out. All the loyalty, all the friendship, curdled and died. In the rottenness which was left, a black hatred and a deep desire for revenge were born.'

Clinton suddenly put his face in his hands. When he took them away, I felt a twinge of pity at the dreadful look in his eyes. There was no hatred, nothing except a silent, eerie deadness as if his very soul had shrivelled up inside him.

'This diplomat,' Benjamin continued, 'plotted a terrible revenge. He removed his wife to their family home, treated her most solicitously, yet all the time he was secretly poisoning her, so that she died a painful, lingering death, not from some abscess or tumour but due to the grains of poison he sprinkled in this dish or that cup. Once she was dead, or perhaps just before she died, this diplomat went to the French enemies of his king and offered to betray every secret he could. He would call himself Raphael, a mocking use of his wife's maiden name as well as the term he had once used about her, for Raphael is an angel of great beauty.' Benjamin looked down the hall, following Sir Robert's gaze, as if the murderer could see the ghosts of his victims moving through the shadowy darkness towards him.