The Prince's Secret (The Royal Biography Cozy Mystery Series Book 2) (7 page)

<> Schnipps writes.

<> I type as I sit back in my desk chair answering his questions. I was just getting to the last of Mary Beaton’s tell-all when he started emailing me.

<> Schnipps writes, and I imaging this is the most emotion the man has ever demonstrated in his entire life.

<>

From across the miles and miles that separate Bourton-on-the-Water from Buckingham Palace, I can feel Schnipps give a shudder of delight.

<> he instant messages and I imagine him sitting in his luxurious office at Buckingham staring at his computer in a complete state of rapture.

<>

<> Schnipps twitters from across the internet.

<

..in so far as by diverse her previe letters writtin and subscrivit with hir awin hand and sent by hir to James erll Boithvile chief executor of the said horrible murthour, ..., it is maist certain that sche wes previe, art and part (complicit) and of the actuale devise (plot) and deid of the foir-nemmit murther of her lawful husband the King our sovereign lord's father.>>

From across the rainy country, I am positive I hear Schnipps squeal with delight.

<> Schnipps types back.

<> I respond. Crossing my arms, I lean back in my squeaky desk chair. Truth is, I haven’t told Schnipps everything. I haven’t told him what else is written at the end of the confessional. That part I am keeping a secret for now, and if I do share it, it will only be with one very special person.

“You want me to do what, Lizzie?”

Oh dear, was I wrong to tell the Prince about all of this? There were two reasons I decided to tell Alex:

a.) he was the one who helped me find the diary of Mary Beaton.

b.) I wanted to get his mind off the death of his brother.

“I need to find the final resting place of Jane, Countess of Erlington. She died in 1596. On her original tomb was a cherub.”

On the other end of the phone, the Prince is silent.

“She was buried at Holyrood Abbey,” I continue.

“Right, well there’s no one buried there now.” Alex is short and snippy. I was wrong to tell him of my quest.  It only serves to remind him of my failure to find anything regarding his brother’s death.

“How would I find out where her tomb was moved to?” I press.

“Really, Lizzie, what do you hope to find by all this?”

“They were friends Mary Beaton and the Countess. According to Mary, she gave the evidence that she had written the Casket Letters to Jane. The Countess was ill and promised Mary that she would…” Here I clear my throat and read directly from Mary’s pages that are up on my computer screen, “Take the proof with her to her grave.”

“Oh come on, Lizzie? And how do you know it’s inside the cherub?”

I read the next part of the diary which states quite clearly that the Countess had commissioned a hollowed out cherub for her tomb to hold what Mary Beaton called “proof of her transgression against Mary, Queen of Scots.”

“Oh, so that’s how you know,” the Prince gives half a laugh. “Alright, let me call the curator at Holyrood.”

“Wait, no. Will he report this back to Schnipps?”

“Probably.”

“That’s no good.”

“Why not?”

“Why not, why not? Because nobody is going to allow us to go search for ourselves once this information is out. In fact, they might not allow us to search at all. This tell-all…journal…whatever you want to call it will be sent off to be verified by some expert and it will be years before…”

“Before someone goes and tracks down this cherub?” Alex hazards.

“Right…tracks down the cherub and does a proper examination.”

From the other end of the phone, I believe I hear the Prince scratching his head. A second later I hear a female voice. This startles me so that I jump. I assumed the Prince was alone while I was explaining all this over the phone.

The voice speaks again, sounding like she is whispering something in the Prince’s ear. “Come back to bed,” she murmurs.

I go still as a rabbit. Where is he? I thought he was all tucked up in Buckingham Palace with his mommy and daddy.

“Sorry, Lizzie, I don’t think I can help you,” Alex responds, sounding very sullen. “You should give this information to Schnipps, it’s the right thing to do.” Click. He hangs up the phone.

Well, well, well…who would have thought there would be a fourth man to let down Mary, Queen of Scots? I bite down on my lip in disappointment.

I won’t let her down. Somehow, I’ll find the long-departed grave of the Countess. I’ll find the cherub, and “the proof” of Mary Beaton’s transgressions against the Queen.

After a few calls to the historical society in Edinburgh, I learn that the Countess of Erlington’s tomb was reinterred at the cemetery at Greyfriars Kirkyard on the southern edge of the old town section of Edinburgh.

I am just packing up my things and getting ready to drive for an overnight trip to Scotland when my doorbell rings.

“Lady Jones,” I exclaim with surprise at the sight of the woman on my doorstep. She brushes back a stray grey lock.

“I’ve something for you.” She thrusts out a piece of paper in my direction.

“What’s this?” I ask startled.

“Agnes Tannebaum’s address. She was Margery’s sister,” Lady Jones answers without a smile.

“Come in.” I motion.

She steps through the door looking both uncomfortable and highly irritated. No sooner do I shut it behind her than she snaps, “Look, I have no idea what happened back then --with the death of the Prince. I know Scotland Yard investigated it thoroughly and up until you showed me that piece of paper, which looked like an authentic memo, well, up until then I thought that this was a cut and dry accident. But when I saw that memo, I knew there was more to the story. If everything was cut and dry then why the need for ‘Top Secret’ stamped across the top? Like I said, it seems like an absurdity to stamp ‘secret’ on top of something you want to keep confidential, but who knows how they did things at Scotland Yard? All our classified information was encrypted somewhere and couldn’t be printed out at SIS. Anyway…it just seems strange to me. And who takes a memo typed ‘Top Secret’ and places it in the Prince’s files? That’s another question. Why would someone do that?”

I shrug. “Maybe it was in his memorabilia by mistake. I don’t know.”

“Well, I made some calls to some friends who worked on the case for Scotland Yard. Found out three out of four of them have died, God rest their souls. But my old friend Ted and I, we cooperated on cases for 15 years. Well, we got together for a drink and I told him about the memo. I didn’t tell him who had it or how I’d seen it. Anyway, Ted looked nervous, really nervous. Then he broke down and told me that things had gotten so heated over Prince Albert’s death, that Margery’s whole family received death threats.”

I sigh again. That doesn’t surprise me. Hidden behind their computers, people willy-nilly send out crazy, sometimes threatening messages. I heard the other day some actress received a death threat for tweeting in favor of her alma mater’s hockey team. Don’t even get me started about the hateful reviews people leave about my biographies on online sites.

Yeah, it’s easy to imagine that Margery and her family received death threats.

“Anyway, after Margery committed suicide and her parents died from serious bouts of cancer that were probably brought on by stress, Ted said he was assigned to put Margery’s sister in a program.”

“A program?”

“Yes, a program. Something like a witness relocation program. That is, the sister was given a completely new identity and relocated to…” She motions at the piece of paper she has just handed me.

I open it and read aloud, “564 High Street, Portstewart.”

“That’s right. She was given a house and a new identity. I asked Ted for her new name, but he said he never knew that part --he was just the one who found her and purchased a house for her. But the name she chose after she moved to Northern Ireland was only known to those who reissued her documents. Ted only told me this when I informed him it was the Prince who was searching for Margery --Ted felt distraught about that. If Margery told anybody what happened, it would have been her sister. But this information is confidential. I must have your word on that. It is to be kept between you, me, Ted and, of course, the Prince.”

I agree wholeheartedly and two minutes later I shut the door behind Margaret, scrambling for my cell phone.

“Lizzie, how are you?” the voice at the other end asks.

I’m not sure if we are the happiest two people to ever go on a road trip. It has taken the Prince a week to get out of all his charity engagements. He told everyone at Buckingham he wasn’t feeling well and asked to take a mini-break away from the crowds while recovering. That didn’t go over well with his mother, who wanted him in bed at Buckingham while he recovered.

“What will people think if you miss the National Breast Cancer Society Gala and go gallivanting off around the countryside.”

“I won’t be gallivanting. I’ll be resting, at a friend’s house in peaceful Scotland,” he told her, and sealed the deal by getting one of his old buddies from Eton to call his mother and assure her that “Alex will be fine, he’s staying with us in Oban, and we’re just having a few quiet days. Not to worry, your Royal Highness, nobody will ever know he’s here. He can get as much rest and relaxation as he needs.”

After that, the Prince slipped away. He drove his well-known Volkswagen GTI which is now parked in my garage, and then, after placing a very silly curly black wig over his own hair, we set off in my car.

Let me just point out that Scotland is not really on the way to Northern Ireland. However, when the Prince arrived at my house, he told me to close my eyes and hold out my hand. Then he placed a photo in my upturned palm. I opened my eyes to see a picture of a small white marble tomb with a cherub up top. The side of the tomb read, “Jane Mortin, Countess of Erlington, birth – (here the date was so badly damaged as to be illegible), death - 1599.”

“I don’t understand. Who took this photo?”

“The owner of the Earnest Ewe. Michael and I have been good friends for a long time, and I asked him if he might have time to check out Greyfriars for Jane Erlington. I asked if he found her tomb if he would let me know if there is a cherub attached up top. A day later, he sent this photo.”

“Bingo!” I shouted in pure excitement.

“Bingo!” he repeated my exclamation, caught up in my excitement.

“Right, well, I’ll head there in a few days. Right now we have a rather long drive to Northern Ireland, don’t we?”

“What say we swing by Scotland on the way? Got enough clothes and all for a slightly extended road trip?” Delighted by his suggestion and thinking him quite the sport, I hurried upstairs to pack a few more things.

Driving out of Bourton, I reflected on the fact that it was really nice of the Prince to put off his journey to visit Agnes Tannebaum for one more day. But as we struck up a conversation somewhere around Manchester, I learned that the reason the Prince was willing to put it off for one more day was because he wasn’t especially excited about visiting with Agnes.

“She wasn’t there when Albert died, so she doesn’t know what happened. She’s just Margery’s sister. What can she possibly have to tell me?”

His spirits seemed to go downhill after that and we drove on in silence, the Prince staring ahead with his jaw clenched tightly. Even when we stopped in Carlisle for a very late lunch, he couldn’t relax. Luckily, nobody even recognized him in his wig and sunglasses. As we ate some lovely Italian food and shared a half a bottle of wine, I realized I felt confused about the Prince. Here we were again, having a romantic moment. Yet the weight of what we were doing was taking its toll on both of us.

In addition, I confess I’ve been angry with the Prince ever since I phoned him and found him with another woman.

But wait a minute, he’s not my man. Why should I be angry? He is a 29-year old single man. He is allowed to sleep with whomever he wants.

Still…

“Exactly what is our plan of attack?” he asks, leaning into the table. Briefly, his expression changes, as if he is relaxing, shaking off his doom and gloom of our impending mission.

“Well, nothing intrusive or illegal,” I explain. “We’ll just go up to the thing and tap on it.”

“Is that American slang for something? Sounds a little vulgar,” he teases.

“No, I mean we’re going to tap on the cherub.” I tap on the table with my fist. “You know, to see if it’s hollow.”

“Hmm, and then what?”

“Well, I hadn’t really gotten that far. I just wanted to examine it. I suppose if it appears hollow, we’ll alert the authorities.”

His face is crestfallen at this last part.

“You mean we are driving way out of our way, to tap on a cherub in a cemetery --one of the most haunted cemeteries in the British Isles, by the way-- only to turn around and tell the authorities? And by authorities I assume you mean Schnipps, who I told you to inform in the first place?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I shrug and return to twirling my pasta. I haven’t really thought this through. What am I doing running around cemeteries tapping on tombs? None of this has anything to do with my biography of the Prince, which is coming along at a snail’s pace. I finish with my pasta, and feeling grumpy at being called out over my lack of a plan, I pull my crochet out of my bag, and busy myself making a tea cozy.

“You know, Lizzie, you are the only modern woman in the world who would crochet at a café while sitting across from the crown Prince of England.”

“How do you know?” I snap fiercely.

Wow, where did that flash of anger come from? I know where that came from, that was jealousy speaking. I am flat out jealous about the Prince spending the night with another woman and I can’t be reasonable about it.

“Are you an expert on every woman in the world?” I ask sharply.

Alex leans back in his chair, takes a sip of his wine and smugly replies, “As a matter of fact, I am an expert on every woman in the world. They all want the same thing. They want
me
.”

I actually drop my tea cozy in my haste to stand up and reach across the table to slap him.

Then I freeze. What have I done? I am stunned. Everyone is looking at us. I can’t believe I’ve given into passion. I pick my cozy off the ground, blowing bits of dirt off of it. I feel so foolish.

“Alright, alright,” he says, rubbing his face where I slapped him. “Let’s go tap that cherub.” He stands up with a stony expression and hurries inside to pay the bill.

I put my tea cozy away, and hurry off to retrieve the car from the impossibly narrow slot. I pick the Prince up right as he exits the café, and proceed to make the tires squeal, wanting to get away from the scene of my crime. We ride in silence --well one of us rides in silence, the other one occasionally sings old Bob Dylan songs, swaying back in forth in the passenger seat. It seems like time creeps by so slowly as we make our way across to the border with Scotland.

At some point, Alex stops singing and murmurs, “I never knew you cared so much, Lizzie.”

“I don’t,” I huff, and drive on, staring straight ahead.

*****

For propriety’s sake, I am back at the Earnest Ewe, while Alex takes a room under a fake name at the Sheraton. Our plan is to go to the cemetery an hour before it closes.

“Great, so we have time to take in a fine dinner at a farm-to-table restaurant just a stone’s throw from here,” he offers. Where he wore a stony expression before, now his face is smug once again.

A half an hour later, we walk into the
Slow Food Revolution
restaurant. The room is full of tables laid with a white cloths, fine crystal, and silver. There are potted trees in the corners, and the rest of the place is undecorated, with the exposed stone and wooden beams of the original structure providing a rustic and romantic atmosphere. The Prince informs me that several hundred years ago, this place used to be a barn. Although it’s the beginning of July, it’s a bit damp, and so a small wood burning stove puffs away in the middle of the room.

“We’ll take the short course menu,” Alex tells the waiter, “if that’s okay with you, Lizzie.”

I reply something to the effect that we are not here for fine dining, we are here for a short meal and then we need to be off to the cemetery.

“You mean off to the cemetery to search for the cherub, or because you are going to do me in. You were pretty angry at lunch,” the Prince smirks.

I flush with irritation. There’s something about the smirk. I just want to wipe it right off his face.

“I didn’t mean that we are off to the cemetery because I plan to do you in.  That would be ridiculous,” I reply icily, although the way he’s going, he may not make it through the night.

“It was a joke, Lizzie. When did you become so uptight?”

I don’t respond and stare down at my freshly printed menu.

“Vegetarian or non-vegetarian?” the waiter asks.

“Vegetarian,” Alex and I answer together.

The waiter rolls his eyes and mumbles something about the last great meat-eaters dying off decades okay.

“You know, Lizzie,” Alex mutters, buttering a roll. “You happen to be talking to an authority on ghosts.”

This remark is so unexpected that I choke on a bit of my Domaine Guizzard Curvee 400 that the Prince has ordered. I am still making slight choking noises as the waiter stops by with mouth-watering bruschetta with various toppings of roasted peppers, chick-pea spread, and caramelized onions.

“You don’t say,” I reply.

“You remember Bald Agnes?”

“The woman burned as a witch who is said to haunt Holyrood Palace?”

“Indeed” he answers, “and let me tell you Greyfriars Kirkyard is said to be full of haunts.”

I snort. I am a woman of science and facts. I am an historian. I don’t have time for nonsense.

“Hmm, I see your skepticism. You don’t know about the Mackenzie Poltergeist then?”

I snort again.

“Since 1998, when a homeless person broke into Mackenzie’s mausoleum for the night, Greyfriars Kirkyard has been the epicenter of an escalation of unexplained events. I know, I’ve heard tales and I looked it up in Wikipedia right before we left.”

“I see,” I scoff, sticking my nose in the air. “And what else did Wikipedia have to say about this ghost?”

“Well, they say, he’s no laughing matter.” Surreptitiously, the Prince googles the name of the ghost on his cell phone, holding the device below the table so no one can see what he is doing. Cell phone use, except for emergencies, has been banned in restaurants in the modern day United Kingdom. It’s a very smart idea. It’s refreshing to see couples and families holding conversations at the dining table rather than spending their whole meal time jabbing away at tiny cell phones.

“You’d better put that away or they’ll throw us out.”

“Your kind of a schoolmarm sometimes, Liz. Did you know?” he queries, still staring at his phone.

Ouch. Is that how he see me? A schoolmarm? There’s nothing less sexy than a schoolmarm.

“Okay.” Alex holds his cell phone up momentarily to his face and swipes a black curl out of his face. “Here it is. Wikipedia says: Between 1990 and 2006 there were 350 reported attacks and 170 reports of people collapsing. Visitors reported being cut, bruised, bitten, scratched and most commonly blacking out. Some complained later of bruises, scratches and gouge-marks on their bodies. Most attacks and feelings of unease occurred in Mackenzie’s Black Mausoleum and the Covenanters Prison. In 2000, an exorcist--”

“An exorcist?” I interrupt.

“Yes, an exorcist,” the Prince continues, “named Colin Grant was summoned to the graveyard to perform an exorcism ceremony; he was said to have picked up ‘evil forces’ and claimed that the forces were too overpowering, and he feared that they could kill him. A few weeks later, he died suddenly of a heart attack.”

“Poppycock.” As I say this I do hear a schoolmarmish tone in my voice.

“The city of Edinburgh closed off that part of the cemetery until an Edinburgh-based historian and author, Jan Andrew Henderson, persuaded the council to allow controlled visits to that part of the churchyard and in turn this developed into a nocturnal guided tour, which became a local attraction.” The Prince finishes reading and thankfully shuts down his iPhone as the waiter begins to glance our way suspiciously.

“Well, there you are, the poltergeist can’t be very scary if he’s now a local attraction,” I muse contemplatively.

“Yes, well, it’s a good thing for us that he is. You see, that part of the cemetery where the poltergeist resides is locked off from the rest, and that’s were Jane is. So what we are going to have to do is buy tickets to the nighttime historical tour and then slip away and hide somewhere.”