Heresy

I was interrupted in my pursuit of this new trail by the sight of a figure running towards me through the trees from the direction of the college; I stepped forward in the hope that the coroner had arrived to relieve me of my duties, and was surprised to recognise Sophia Underhill, dressed in a thin blue gown with a shawl around her shoulders, her hair flying out behind her. She halted a few yards away, looking equally surprised to see me.

‘Doctor Bruno! What – what are you doing in here?’

‘I was – waiting for your father,’ I said, taking another step towards her in the hope of guiding her away from the two corpses.

‘They said Gabriel Norris shot down an intruder,’ she said, her face flushed with the drama of the moment. ‘Is he still here?’ Her eyes were bright with eager anticipation as she looked around wildly, but I noticed she was twisting her hands together in agitation in the same manner as her father.

‘Not quite.’ I almost smiled; despite the rector’s best efforts, it seemed the tale was already growing in the telling. ‘You have not spoken to your father?’

‘He is at morning prayers in chapel – I heard the news from two scholars who were running there late,’ she said, peering past me to where the shapes lay in the dense grass. ‘Of course we heard all the noise from our windows but I never imagined – is that the thief’s body there?’ She seemed keen to take a look; I planted myself firmly in her path.

‘Please, Mistress Underhill, you must keep back. It is not a sight you should see.’

She tilted her head and stared at me defiantly.

‘I have seen death before, Doctor Bruno. I have seen my own brother with his neck broken, do not treat me like one of these pampered ladies who has never been out of a parlour.’

‘I would not dream of it, but this is worse,’ I said, holding my arms out absurdly as if this might obscure the sight. ‘Well, not worse than one’s brother, I don’t mean – I mean only, it is very bloody, not something a woman should see. Please trust me, Mistress Underhill.’

At this she snorted, and placed her hands on her hips.

‘How is it that men think women are too frail to look on blood? Do you forget we bleed every month? We push out babies in great puddles of gore, do you imagine we hide our eyes when we do that, in case it offends our delicate senses? I promise you, Doctor Bruno, any woman can look on blood with more fortitude than a soldier, though men think we must be treated like Venice glass. Do not be one more who wants to wrap me up in linen and keep me in a box.’

I was surprised by the ferocity of her argument, and conceded that she had a point; even so, I had been charged with protecting Mercer from prurient eyes, so I stepped forward again until I was standing directly in front of her, only a few inches away. It was disconcerting to find that she was almost as tall as me.

‘I would not dream of it. Nevertheless, Mistress Underhill, I beg you not to go any closer – this body is badly mutilated. I fear it would be distressing, however strong your constitution.’

She stood her ground for a moment longer, and then her instinctive propriety dictated that she step back. The defiant expression was replaced by one of anxious curiosity.

‘What happened, then?’

‘A man was savaged by a wild dog. Norris shot the dog, not the man.’

Her brow creased.

‘A dog? In the garden? Wait –’ she shook her head, flustered, as if she had her questions all in the wrong order. ‘Which man?’

‘Roger Mercer.’

‘Oh, no. No!’ she repeated, one hand clasped to her mouth, the other to her breast. ‘No!’ Her eyes darted about wildly, resting nowhere, then she sank slowly to the ground, her skirt billowing around her, her hand still pressed to her mouth; I was unsure if she was about to cry or faint, but her face was drained of all colour. ‘Oh God, it can’t be.’

I crouched beside her and laid a tentative hand on her shoulder.

‘I am sorry. You were fond of him?’

She looked up at me with a fleeting expression of puzzlement, then nodded emphatically.

‘Yes – yes, of course – this is my home, the senior Fellows here have been like family to me these past six years,’ she said, her voice shaky. ‘I cannot believe something so horrible could happen here in college, just below our windows too. Poor, poor Roger.’ She glanced past me to the heap in the grass and shuddered. ‘If only …’ she broke off, pressing the edge of her thumb to her mouth again.

‘If only?’ I prompted.

But she merely shook her head and cast her eyes around again frantically. ‘But where is Master Norris?’

‘Your father sent him to change. His attire was apparently unsuitable.’

She gave a soft, indulgent laugh then and I felt a sudden unexpected pang of jealousy. Was she fond of the dandyish young archer?

‘A dog, though?’ she mused, running her hands through her hair as if thinking aloud, her expression troubled again. ‘Where did it come from?’

‘The gate to the lane must have been left open during the night – it looks as if some stray found its way in and was so starving it would set upon anything,’ I said, as evenly as I could.

Sophia’s eyes narrowed.

‘No. That gate is never unlocked. Father is paranoid about vagabonds and trespassers getting in at night, or undergraduates using it to meet the kitchen girls – he checks it every evening at ten before he retires. He would no more forget the gate than he would forget his prayers or his work. That cannot be.’

‘Perhaps he left that task to the porter last night, as he had to attend to our supper,’ I suggested, thinking how absurd it was that I should be defending the improbable falsehood when I wanted to compare her suspicions with my own. ‘I hear the porter is an unreliable old drunk.’

She looked at me then as if she were disappointed in me.

‘Cobbett is an old man, yes, and he likes a drop now and again, but he has been at the college since he was a boy and if my father had entrusted him with such a task he would rather die than let the rector down. He may be only a servant to you, Doctor Bruno, but he is a kind old man and does not deserve to be spoken of with contempt.’

‘I am truly sorry, Mistress Underhill,’ I said, chastened. ‘I did not mean—’

‘You had better call me Sophia. Whenever I hear Mistress Underhill called, I look around for my mother.’

‘Your mother did not hear the commotion this morning?’

‘I don’t know, she is in bed.’ Sophia sighed. ‘She is in bed most of the time, it is her chief occupation.’

‘I think she carries a great weight of sadness since your brother’s death,’ I said gently.

‘We all carry a great weight of sadness, Doctor Bruno,’ she snapped, her eyes flashing. ‘But if we all hid under the counter pane pretending the sun no longer rose and set, the family would have fallen apart. What do you know of my brother’s death, anyway?’

‘Your father made a brief account last night. It must have been unbearable for you.’

‘It would be unbearable to lose a brother in any case,’ she said, in a milder tone. ‘But I was given unusual liberties while John lived, because he spoke up for me, he insisted that I should be his companion in all his pursuits and treated as his equal. Without him, I am forced to behave like a lady and I must confess I do not take to it at all.’

She laughed unexpectedly then and I was greatly relieved, but her laughter trailed off into silence and she began plucking at the grass distractedly.

‘I suppose your disputation today will be postponed because of this?’ she asked, gesturing vaguely towards the mound of Roger Mercer’s body as if she did not much care either way.

‘No indeed – your father is determined not to disappoint the royal guest. We shall go ahead as planned, he says.’

Her face lit up with anger again – her temper was as changeable as the weather over Mount Vesuvius, it seemed – and she rose to her feet, brushing down her dress with quick, furious strokes.

‘Of course he does. No matter that someone has died, terribly – nothing must interrupt college life. We must all pretend nothing is amiss.’ Her eyes burned with fury. ‘Do you know, I never saw my father shed one tear when my brother John died, not one. When they brought him the news, he just nodded, and then said he would be in his study and was not to be disturbed. He didn’t come out for the rest of that day – he spent it working.’ She spat this last word.

‘I have heard,’ I said hesitantly, ‘that Englishmen find this mask necessary to hide what they feel, perhaps because it frightens them.’