Jacob Winterberry stood at the end of a long, well-polished table in a rich room; intricate plasterwork on the ceiling and ornate oak wainscoting on the lower portions of the walls seemed to tell much about his wealth. He still wore his funeral clothes; perhaps, thought Shakespeare, such somber dress was his daily attire.
A clerk was reading from a bill of lading. “Guinea coast. St. George del Mina, aboard the
The clerk stopped, as if noticing for the first time that there was another man in the room.
Winterberry looked up and met the newcomer’s eyes. “Ah, yes, Mr. Shakespeare.” He said the words in a businesslike fashion, no welcoming smile or greeting hand proffered. He met his clerk’s eyes. The clerk quickly gathered together his quills, documents, and ledgers and hurried from the room, bowing low as he went. “Now, what would you ask me?”
Shakespeare noticed that a large book lay before Winterberry on the table. Winterberry followed his eyes and put his right hand squarely down on the book. “Yes, Mr. Shakespeare, it is the Holy Bible, which informs everything I do and everything I say. Every portion of my trade with the wider world is done in Christ’s name, to bring the word of God to those benighted savages still cloaked in darkness.”
“Would you like to swear on it now, that you will answer my questions truthfully?”
“I live by the Book every day of my life, Mr. Shakespeare. I do not need to prove to some lowly officer of the Searcher that I speak the truth.”
“You are a proud man, Mr. Winterberry.”
“If I am, then I do repent it and beg the Lord’s forgiveness, for pride is a deadly sin.”
Shakespeare thought he had never seen such a stern, closed face. He did not know this man, but he knew he did not like him. “You had reason to murder Amy Le Neve and Joe Jaggard.” He said the words as a statement, not a question, hoping for some reaction, some fissure in the rock of Winterberry’s features.
“You were at the funeral, Mr. Shakespeare. You heard what Sir Toby Le Neve said. The Jaggard boy murdered Amy with poison and then took his own life in like manner. That is the sheriff’s verdict and the matter is closed.”
“That is not the belief of the coroner, I understand, nor of the Searcher of the Dead.”
“Well, then, they must take up the case with the sheriff and try to have it reopened. As for me, I consider the matter now to be between those two young people and their Maker. I pray they can find salvation, though the Lord will have to be very forgiving.”
“She was your wife, Mr. Winterberry. Can you dismiss her death-her murder-so lightly?”
“She was a purple strumpet, Mr. Shakespeare. She chose the World, the Devil, and the Flesh, and she was struck down as all such idolatrous harlots will be struck down.” Winterberry spoke with barely a pause between words. The words were angry, but the voice was quiet and cold. “With her painted face, she was too vain to realize that she would, within the blink of an eye, be screaming for all eternity in the fire.”
Winterberry’s face was still a mask of stone, but Shakespeare noted that the veins on his hand were raised and white as he pressed down hard on the Bible.
“Then why marry her?”
Winterberry raised his hand from the Book. He crossed his arms. His voluble voice became quieter. “I wanted a wife, Mr. Shakespeare. Someone to manage my domestic affairs and home and bear my children under God’s divine order. Do you have a wife?”
Shakespeare thought of Catherine and Mary, at present somewhere a few miles to the north of here on the first stage of their long journey through the heart of England to the little market town of Masham, in the desolate shire of York.
“I had never had time for such things, being precluded by my business and my calling. Where to find one unsullied by the world? All around me I saw the ensigns of lust, sloth, and gluttony. I saw foul abuses-women daubed like butterflies. Observe the butterfly, sir, how she flutters all pretty about the garden, then alights on a dog turd.”
“You thought her young and untouched?”
For the first time, Shakespeare imagined he saw a human emotion behind the mask, a crushed sadness about the eyes. “Indeed, I did hope her to be a virtuous woman. I have known Sir Toby many years. I thought a daughter of his would be pure and young enough to bear me children, and I wished to help Sir Toby, whom I knew to be in difficult straits. Even in the tents of the unclean, I thought our match would mock the malice of the enemy. I was wrong. Satan had already sunk his bladed nails into her.”
“So it was not her pretty face, her young flesh, or the proud name she bore that attracted you to her?”
“You accuse me of lust and avarice. Why should I listen to this?”
“Then it is untrue?”
“It was what I took to be her purity, sir.”
“And when you discovered she was not pure?”
“This is intolerable, Mr. Shakespeare. You berate me like the Antichrist.”
“Why did you ride away without looking for Amy that night?” He did not answer.
“Could it be that you knew what had happened to her, that she already lay bloodied and murdered? You had followed her and bludgeoned her and Joe. Is that how it was?”
“No, Mr. Shakespeare, that is not what happened. I did not search for her because I knew that she had gone with
“You observed her leaving the bridale with Jaggard?” Shakespeare saw dour fury in Winterberry’s eyes, very close to the surface. Could it be triggered to violence, or was he in control?
“Yes,” Winterberry said, spitting the word. “Yes, I saw them moving as the chariot wheels of Satan to their damnable, abominable bed of grass and their vile carnality. I saw them go where they might rut like the beasts of the field. Why would I search for her, Mr. Shakespeare? I would rather pluck out my eyes than let them fall on such a vision of hell.”
“What did you do then, Mr. Winterberry?”
“Do? What should I do?”
“Most men would have stood up there and then and ridden off into the night. You stayed, though.”
Winterberry hesitated. “I was confused. I could not comprehend what I was seeing. We had been married in her father’s church a mere two or three hours earlier! Now she is buried there, beneath the ground where we stood and made our vows.”
“It seems extraordinary to me that you neither followed them nor left the bridale.”
Winterberry bowed his head as if crushed. “Yes. I see that now. But then… Mr. Shakespeare, I did not know of such things. I still do not.”
“Did you leave the bridale at any time?”
“No.”
“Could anyone who was there testify to that?”
Winterberry regained his composure. “There was dancing and music and merriment. There were venal sins, horrible in their abomination: gluttony, greed, lust such as you might find in the circles of hell. I saw bottle-ale, Satan’s device to keep us from the narrow path, and fumes belching from the dark chasms of their bodies. How would they note me or my movements through such a cloud of mist and error?”
Shakespeare closed his eyes for a moment. “How many were at the bridale?”
“Twenty, fifty, I know not and care less. It was something to be endured. I have had enough of these questions. Begone, Mr. Shakespeare, before I have you marched from here.”
The darkness was brewing, but Shakespeare carried on regardless. He had already goaded him to doubt, could he now provoke the man to thunderous rage? “I have but a few questions more, Mr. Winterberry. When the hue and cry went up, you could have told someone what you had seen.”
“And trumpet my shame to the world?”
Shakespeare almost felt sympathy for this strange, cold man. He was severe, almost frantic, in his religion, and yet he was a man, too. And what man would know how to deal with the adultery of his bride?
