Ever since the Powder-treason and the attempt to blow up the Parliament in the November of ’05 the authorities had shown a new determination to root out the plotters in the Catholic families as well as to hunt down their priests. Rather than face the Pursuivants, more than a few were making their escape to safety overseas. I’d no idea whether Nicholas was a member of a Catholic family or a fugitive priest, though something in his garb and manner suggested the latter. Nor did I know whether Captain Case was a sympathizer with the old religion or was merely being bribed to ferry this individual to St-Malo. It also occurred to me that perhaps Nicholas was on the Argo without the shipmaster’s knowledge. Possibly it was another of Jonathan Case’s enterprises. Or even Henry Tallman’s.
Whatever the answer, it was best that Jack or I stayed ignorant, not so much out of fellow feeling as to avoid trouble. Why, as Jack said, we’d never even met the man. We returned to the great cabin, passing on our way the lad who’d served at table. He was carrying some leftovers of food and a jug of wine, awkwardly cradled in his arms. Perhaps he was taking them forward to share with his fellows. Crumbs from the rich man’s table…
The aura of pipe smoke still hung in the air together with the odours of food and drink, but of our fellow diners there was no sign. I assumed that everyone was tucked up in their beds, Jonathan Case in his privileged quarters at the far end of the great cabin, and Tallman in one of the alcoves, with Colin Case having disappeared elsewhere, although I had heard no steps behind us on deck. A little oil light still burned near the compass, but the candles had been snuffed out. There was nothing for it but to turn in, though I did cast a curious eye at the cabinet containing the sacred stone or, more precisely, I ran my hand over its intricate lock. As I did so, something snagged against my fingers. It was a piece of thread. I rolled it into a little coil and tucked it into a pocket.
Jack and I squeezed into the tiny, neighbouring alcoves and drew the curtains. I could almost stretch out at full length. The wind was getting up again, and the ship groaned and creaked around me as if it were alive. I was aware of the river water just below my berth. Above it was a tiny port that was closed with a kind of shutter. I did not open it. What was there to look at? The Argo was swaying gently but this was not reassuring, not like being rocked in a cradle. The straw mattress was less uncomfortable than our lodgings in the hold on the night before, but the pinched sides of the berth were reminiscent of a coffin and I thought of my bed at Mrs Ellis’s in Tooley Street. Then I wondered how we were going to account for our absence to the Globe shareholders. We’d be fined, for certain. I was reluctant to go to sleep for fear of waking up and finding that we’d set sail once more.
But I did sleep in a fitful fashion. Once I awoke with a start, imagining we were under way. There was a grinding sound and distant, raised voices. But although the Argo seemed to be, as it were, shivering with cold, we were not actually moving. I slept again. The next I knew I was tearing aside the curtain and stumbling away from my little recess and up the steps and out of the great cabin into the open. The sun was just lightening the sky with glaring streaks of red. There was not a living thing on deck apart from a cat slinking along. Gog or Magog? The cats were free to come and go. I recalled Colin Case declaring that the Argo would not be leaving until the day was well begun. I breathed in clammy draughts of morning air and saw isolated threads of chimney smoke rising from the dwellings that marked Gravesend.
The day looked to be a fair one even if the sky’s red message was hardly a good omen. For shepherds or sailors, that is. Not that I cared much about shepherds — and even less about sailors. I’d go back and rouse Jack Wilson and we’d make our exit from the Argo without bothering to say any goodbyes. Then we would either wait in Gravesend for the long ferry or, perhaps, hire horses to return to London. We had enough money for that, Jack and I. Jonathan Case had not mentioned again the letter to ‘old Dick Burbage’, but by this stage I did not trust him or believe anything he said. Would rather never see him again.
But see him again I did, and in the worst of circumstances.
I went through the entrance to the great cabin. Reaching the bottom of the steps, I paused. Coming from the outside, I could not see clearly at first, but the door to the inner cabin appeared to be open. This was where Dr Jonathan Case was sleeping, usurping the captain’s place. But no, the physician was up and about. There was a figure stooping over the bed that took up most of the space of the little chamber. The figure was outlined against the red light of dawn. As I’ve already mentioned, the occupant of this room was fortunate enough to have a window that offered a fine view from the stern of the boat, that and a bigger bed to sleep in.
The figure remained where it was, stooping slightly. Something about the pose made me uneasy. I coughed and shuffled my feet, and the figure raised its head. It wasn’t Jonathan Case but Jack Wilson.
‘Nick?’
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Come here.’
I crossed the few paces to the doorway of the tiny cabin and saw a terrible sight. Dr Case lay sprawled on his front on the bed, his feet by the tiny window and his head nearest the door. His prone body was washed by the red light of dawn as it poured through the casement window. Oddly, the casement was open.
However red the sun, its light was pale enough in comparison to the blood which had issued from a great rent in the centre of Case’s back and which covered his nightshirt. Case’s hands were clasping at the bedcovers, while his head was jerked back so that he seemed to be resting on his chin. His eyes were cast up in his head, and his mouth was gaping as if he were about to scream or laugh. But he would never make another sound in this world. I noticed a great egg-like swelling on his forehead. The skin had split and there was dried blood on his forehead. I glanced up in the direction of the doctor’s dead gaze and saw what appeared to be more blood on the beams of the low ceiling.
‘In God’s name-’
‘I found him like this, Nick. I got up and the door was partly open and I was curious to have another peek inside the captain’s quarters. I found him like this.’
Jack sounded calm but somehow weary, too, while I heard a slight tremble in my own voice. A tremble of frustration as much as fear. I foresaw hours and hours of complications before we would be permitted to quit the Argo. I glanced at Jack’s hands. They were clenched tight, like the dead doctor’s. My friend was grasping not bedclothes but, in his right hand, something more solid. I touched the back of his hand. In surprise, he dropped whatever he was holding. It landed on the bed by the dead man. I picked it up and felt the surface of the sacred stone, the sky-stone, polished smooth apart from those queer little incisions which might be letters.
‘That was on the floor,’ said Jack.
‘How did the doctor die?’
‘That is obvious, Nick. There is a great hole in his back and there is also a knife on the floor. Look. Someone was probably attempting to steal the stone.’
‘Then why is the stone still here?’
‘I don’t know. What I do know is that Dr Case has been attacked with great force. With fury.’
Rather than examine the gaping wound, I peered more closely at the knife where it lay on the floor. On the blade were markings that could be dried blood. I did not want to pick up the knife; it seemed inadvisable, and I was already holding the sky-stone. Instead, I averted my eyes from the body and went to examine the open window. Why was it open? Did Jonathan Case have a taste for the night air? That was unlikely. Of all people, physicians are the ones who know that the night is full of unwholesome vapours.
‘Could someone have come through there?’ I said. ‘The base of the frame has been damaged. The wood is cracked and splintered, as if someone had attempted to force his way in.’
Jack didn’t bother to look. He shrugged and said, ‘Anyone who succeeded in that would have to be very small, almost a child.’
It was true. The window aperture was about a foot and a half square. I’d observed that most of the mariners on the Argo, even the slighter fellows, had well-developed arms and shoulders, the result, no doubt, of years of hauling and carrying and climbing. Nevertheless, I tried the window space for myself. I could get my head through but reckoned I would have got stuck had I attempted to go further. Besides, how could anyone reach the window? Below, perhaps fifteen feet or more below, swirled the dirty river water. No way up from there. Above my head was the overhang of the after-end of the poop deck. A nimble man — a sailor, say, particularly if he was secured with a rope — might have been able to descend to this level if he had a mind to spy on Dr Case as he was preparing for bed. But it would have been almost impossible for an intruder to have made an entry through the casement window even if the damage to the frame suggested that someone might have tried. Moored directly behind us was the herring buss which had collided with the Argo yesterday. I wondered if anyone on board had witnessed anything, but there was no sign of life on that deck either.
Without more words, Jack and I moved out of the tiny cabin. One of us, I’m not sure which, instinctively
