Giordano Bruno Thriller Series Books 1-3: Heresy, Prophecy, Sacrilege

‘I went to do so, but as I was crossing the quadrangle I was seen by Doctor Coverdale and Doctor Bernard, who were standing by the stairs to chapel. They stopped me and asked what I was doing with such a weapon in college. When I explained, Doctor Coverdale told me that I could leave it outside his door on the landing and he would see that it was safely locked away.’

‘Did Doctor Bernard hear this exchange?’

‘He was standing right beside Doctor Coverdale, so I presume so.’ Thomas looked puzzled.

‘Could anyone else have overheard?’

‘I don’t know. There were a few people in the courtyard coming and going, but I don’t recall anyone stopping by us. What is the problem, Doctor Bruno, if I might ask?’ He was twisting the dirty cloth now between his hands, his face searching mine keenly.

‘Oh – there is no problem,’ I said airily. We looked at one another in awkward silence for a moment.

‘Doctor Bruno,’ Thomas said, stepping closer and lowering his voice, ‘I hope this will not sound presumptuous, but there is something I would speak to you about urgently. It is a matter of some importance, and I do not know who else I may confide in here.’

The hairs on my neck prickled; could it be that Thomas knew something of the murder?

‘Please – speak freely.’

‘I meant – somewhere private.’

‘Are we not alone here?’ I asked, looking around the empty room.

He shook his head and pressed his lips into a tight line, twisting the cloth between his hands.

‘Away from college, sir. I would not have us overheard.’

I hesitated. I did not really have time to spare – my priority was to find the boy who had called Coverdale out of the disputation – but the expression of pained urgency on Thomas’s face convinced me that whatever he needed to unburden must be serious.

‘Very well, then. Have you broken your fast this morning? Perhaps we could find ourselves a tavern where we might eat and talk at more leisure.’ I realised that I had not eaten in all the consternation over Coverdale’s murder.

His face slackened.

‘Sir – I’m afraid I do not have the means for visiting taverns.’

‘But I do,’ I said, ‘and surely you may eat with me if I invite you?’

‘I’m afraid it would not do your standing in Oxford any good to be seen with me, sir,’ he said dolefully.

‘To be honest, Master Allen, my standing in Oxford is not worth a horse’s shit at the moment,’ I said. ‘But to hell with them – let us enjoy a good breakfast, if we can find one, and take the consequences afterwards, and you may tell me what is on your mind.’

‘You are kind, sir,’ he said, following me through the door, which he stopped to lock behind him.

As we drew near to the tower archway, I stretched up to look at James Coverdale’s blank window, though it was too high to see anything.

‘Are you all right, Doctor Bruno?’ Thomas asked, following my gaze, his angular face politely solicitous. ‘You seem disturbed this morning. Has something happened?’

I looked at him, gathering my scattered thoughts. Thomas had not yet heard the news of Coverdale’s murder, but by the time we returned the college would be abuzz with rumour and speculation. If he knew anything of value, I would need to take advantage of these few unguarded moments.

‘No. No, I am fine. Let us go.’

We walked in silence down St Mildred’s Lane towards the High Street. Though Thomas was a good five inches taller than I, he walked with such a hunched posture, as if hoping to make himself less noticeable, that we appeared almost the same height. His worn air of defeat made it impossible not to feel pity for the boy. As if reading my thoughts, he turned his face briefly to me, his hands wrapped deep in the sleeves of his frayed gown.

‘It is good of you to take time to listen to me, sir. With the difference in our positions, I mean.’

‘If we are to talk of positions, Thomas, let us not forget that you are the son of an Oxford Fellow and I am the son of a soldier. But I have little interest in such distinctions – I still dare to hope for a day when a person is judged by his character and his achievements rather than for his father’s name.’

‘That is a bold hope,’ he agreed. ‘But to most people in this town, sir, I will always be the son of an exiled heretic.’

‘Well, I am an exiled heretic, so I win.’

He looked me in the eye then, and smiled properly for the first time since I had met him, before his face turned sombre again.

‘All the same, you are a friend of kings and courtiers, sir,’ he reminded me.

‘Well, after a fashion, Thomas. If you mean King Henri of France, he likes to surround himself with philosophers, it flatters his intellectual vanity. Kings do not have friends in the same way as you or I.’

‘I have no friends at all, sir,’ he responded, his voice subdued. There was a long pause while we both looked for something to say. ‘In any case, you are friends with Sir Philip Sidney, and that is something.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed, ‘I am fortunate to count Sidney a friend. Is that why you wished to speak to me – so that I might petition him for your father’s sake?’

Thomas was silent for a moment, then he stopped walking and fixed me with a serious expression.

‘Not for my father’s sake, sir. For my own. There is something I must tell you, if you will promise me your discretion?’

I nodded, intrigued. At the place where St Mildred’s Lane met the High Street, we paused and looked to left and right along the rows of uneven timber-framed houses and the pale stone fronts of the college buildings; at this hour the street was almost deserted, the sky reflected undisturbed in the still water pooled in cart ruts.

‘The Flower de Luce is just along the street,’ Thomas said, gesturing to our left, ‘but it is expensive, sir.’ He pulled anxiously at the hem of his gown.

‘Well, no matter,’ I said brightly, reaching to my belt to cup the reassuring weight of Walsingham’s purse against my palm as we began to walk in the direction he had indicated. ‘But I do not know the taverns of Oxford. Tell me, do you know anything of an inn called the Catherine Wheel?’

I glanced innocently at Thomas as I said this; the fear that flickered over his face was unmistakeable, but he quickly assumed a neutral countenance.

‘I believe it is a bad sort of place, sir. In any case, we students are not allowed to pass beyond the city walls. We would be severely disciplined if we were caught.’

‘Really? But that is strange – I took a walk yesterday and I was sure I saw a young man in a scholar’s gown passing through one of the gates.’

Thomas shrugged.

‘Probably one of the gentlemen commoners, then.’ His voice was not bitter, merely resigned, as if he had long ago accepted that the rich lived by different laws and it was fruitless to hope for change.

‘Like your master Gabriel Norris?’ I asked.

‘I wish you would not call him my master, sir. I mean, he is, I suppose, but it is a humiliation to be reminded of it.’

He had stopped outside a whitewashed, two-storey building that fronted the High Street, its exterior obviously well cared for and clean. Inside, the tap-room was just as neat and cheerful, everything that the Catherine Wheel was not, and a sharp savoury smell of roasting meat pricked our nostrils the moment we closed the door behind us. A smiling landlord, apron stretched tight over a belly so vast he looked as if he were near to giving birth, bustled over and ushered us to a table, at the same time reeling off a list of dishes so varied that I had forgotten the first by the time he had finished. We ended by ordering some cheese and barley bread, with a pot of beer each. Thomas looked about him with as much disbelief and delight as if he had been suddenly given the freedom of the city.

‘Well, then, Thomas,’ I said, gently, ‘what is it you wish to confide?’

Finally he raised his head and regarded me with a weary expression.