The People's Will

Chapter X



SATURDAY BEGAN MUCH as friday had done, with a short walk to Maksimilianovsky Lane, a nod to the dvornik at number 15 and a march up the stairs to apartment 7. This time the door was opened by a familiar face – familiar from a photograph and from one passing glance in the Summer Gardens the previous day.

‘Mihail Konstantinovich Lukin, I presume,’ said Luka, opening the door wider to allow Mihail in.

There was no one else in the apartment. Mihail had half expected to see Dusya there, or one of the two men he had observed leaving the previous day, but he was alone with his half-brother.

‘How do you know my name?’ asked Mihail. The answer was obvious enough. He had told Dusya his name; somehow she had seen him.

‘How do you know my address?’ countered Luka.

‘We have a mutual friend.’

This much appeared to pique Luka’s interest. He gestured towards a chair, which Mihail took.

‘Tea?’ Luka asked.

‘Thank you.’

Luka went over to the samovar, which was already hot, and drew two glasses. Mihail glanced around the apartment. The sitting room, on to which the front door opened, was quite large, with two further doors opening off. Three or four cheap watercolours provided the only real decoration. The room was well furnished with seating for over a dozen people, either on the divan or on a number of padded chairs or even more hard ones, none of them matching. Mihail knew that one thing these revolutionaries did like to do was meet and talk, and this place seemed quite suited.

What the room lacked was any hint of written materials. The shelves on the walls were empty. There was a desk but apart from the samovar its surface was bare. He could not see in the drawers, but guessed that they would be the same. There would be no clues if the place was raided by the Ohrana.

‘And who is that?’ asked Luka, sitting on the divan and leaning back. He seemed calm – almost amused.

There Mihail was at something of a loss. The identity of the mutual friend – mutual acquaintance – was simple enough: Iuda. But Iuda was a creature of so many aliases that it would be a challenge to hit upon the right one. ‘Iuda’ itself seemed unlikely and though Tamara had told Mihail of others – Richard Cain, Vasiliy Denisovich Makarov, Vasiliy Innokyentievich Yudin – there could be many more besides, by any one of which he might be known to Luka.

There was, of course, another connection between Mihail and Luka – another who was closer than any friend: they shared a mother. But Mihail had decided not to reveal that – not until he knew just where his brother stood with regard to Iuda. He thought back to what he had heard Dmitry and Iuda say, back in Geok Tepe. There was very little, just Dmitry’s words: ‘We know you’ve befriended him … much as you befriended me.’ Iuda had befriended Dmitry when he was just five years old, and had been his hidden guardian as the boy had grown into a man. How close was the similarity with Luka?

‘I take it you know you’re adopted,’ said Mihail, approaching the issue obliquely.

‘Of course.’ If Luka was surprised at Mihail’s knowledge he hid it well. ‘My parents never lied to me about that.’

‘What happened to your real parents?’

‘My father died in the cholera epidemic in ’48. My mother went mad. They had to take me away from her.’

It was brutally close to the truth; perhaps it would have been kinder for them to invent a lie.

‘Any brothers or sisters?’ asked Mihail.

Luka shook his head. ‘My parents couldn’t have children of their own.’

‘It must have been lonely.’

Luka allowed a little of his irritation to seep through. ‘Look, what’s all this about? You said we had a mutual friend.’

Mihail continued with his line of attack, a plan forming in his mind.

‘I’m an only child too – and brought up just by my mother. But I was lucky enough to have a benefactor.’

‘And who was that?’ Was that a little flicker of acknowledgement in Luka’s eyes? Had Iuda played that same role for him?

‘He was shy about using his full name – he liked his good deeds to remain anonymous.’ It was wild guesswork – a parallel of the way Iuda had worked on Dmitry. ‘I usually just call him “Uncle Vasya”.’ Of the pseudonyms that Mihail knew, Vasiliy was the only repeating factor.

Now Luka showed an even greater reaction. He leaned forward in his seat. ‘Vasya? Vasiliy?’

‘That’s right. I can tell the name means something to you.’

‘Perhaps. Tell me more about him.’

‘Well, he was a friend of my mother’s,’ explained Mihail. It was all extemporization now, but it did not matter – Luka was hooked. This was mere reeling in. ‘I don’t mean there was anything like that going on; Vasya’s not like that. But he saw immediately that I missed my father, and tried to take on the role – when he was in town.’

Luka nodded, sharing the experience.

‘He used to buy me toys, and books when I was older, and tell me of history and of the world.’

‘What does he look like?’ Luka asked eagerly.

‘Striking. You wouldn’t fail to recognize him. He’s quite tall – a little taller than me. And he’s got blond hair; it’s very distinctive. He wears it long – at least for a man of his age.’

‘Anything else?’

‘His eyes; grey. Some people think they’re cold, but not when you get to know him.’

Luka nodded, his hands at his mouth, hiding his joy. ‘It’s him,’ he said. ‘The same man. Vasiliy Grigoryevich Chernetskiy.’

Another alias to add to the list. ‘How do you meet him?’ Mihail asked, trying to reflect his brother’s joy.

‘My story’s much the same as yours – except that Vasya knew my father rather than my mother. But whenever Papa had to go away on business, Vasya always kept an eye on us. And I know that Papa once got into debt, and Vasya made him a loan which saved him. He’s got money – from land, I presume – and he knows how to do good with it. The country would be a better place with more like him.’

Mihail nodded. ‘You’re not wrong.’ In some ways it would be sad to finally prick the bubble of the man’s affection for Iuda; in others a joy. It would have to be done sooner or later.

‘And so … what?’ asked Luka. ‘Vasya told you about me? Said you should look me up?’

‘Not quite. I’ve known about you for some time. But as fate would have it, Vasya and I found we would both be travelling to Petersburg at the beginning of the year. We planned to meet up and then call on you together.’

‘You mean …’ – Luka was excited now – ‘he’ll be here soon?’

Mihail allowed his face to fall. ‘That’s just the problem. I’m quite unable to find him. He should have arrived in the city before me, but I’ve been to the hotel where he said he’d be staying and his club, and there’s no sign. I wondered if he’d contacted you.’

And there it was: the reason for Mihail’s coming to Petersburg; the hope that there might be some thread of a connection whereby he could find Iuda.

Luka threw himself back on the divan and raised his hands in despair. ‘I’ve heard nothing. He hasn’t even written to announce his visit, which would be usual. You think he might be in trouble?’

‘That’s my fear.’ It was more than a fear. Iuda was Dmitry’s captive. There was no reason to suppose he had escaped, but there was plenty to suggest they had come to Petersburg – not least that Luka himself lived there.

‘What can we do?’

‘Keep our ears to the ground. You know Petersburg better than me. Does he have an apartment here, or anywhere else he might be able to stay?’

Luka thought, perhaps for a little too long, then shook his head. ‘Nowhere that I know of – nowhere fixed.’

‘He mentioned a place on Great Konyushennaya Street.’ It had been Aleksei’s home once, but Iuda had managed to acquire it, along with Aleksei’s wife and son.

Luka shook his head. ‘No, he sold that years ago – and even then he never lived there.’

‘Then all we can do is wait. If he is here and something has happened to him, you’ll hear of it I’m sure.’

‘How shall I get in touch?’

‘Here’s where I’m staying.’ Mihail handed him a card with the address of his hotel. ‘And I’ll find you here if I learn anything.’ He stood, preparing to leave.

‘One more thing, Mihail Konstantinovich,’ said Luka, standing also. An edge had crept into his voice.

‘Anything.’

‘You said we had a mutual friend – in Vasya – but it seems we have another.’

‘Another?’

‘Dusya.’

‘Dusya?’

Luka tutted. ‘Don’t play the idiot. We know you followed her yesterday. I saw you in the Summer Gardens.’

‘Ah!’ Mihail tried to blush, but did not know if he succeeded. ‘You saw me. That’s a pity.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, I don’t know how much Dusya may have told you, but we met on the train from Rostov a few days ago. I couldn’t help but find her a very attractive young lady – she did nothing to encourage it, I assure you. You’ll imagine my surprise when I saw her paying a call on the very house where I knew you to live. But all the same, I felt the desire to become reacquainted with her.’

‘And so you followed her. Why not just speak to her?’

‘That would have been wiser. But Vasya’s disappearance has got me worried. When I saw her with you – not that I knew then who you were – I realized she already had a beau, and I gave up all inclinations in that direction.’ Mihail paused. He should have reacted to the apparent coincidence earlier. ‘I hope she’s not going to come between us. Vasya would be so disappointed.’ Mihail resisted the urge to chuckle – that last comment was below the belt.

Luka held out his hand with a smile that didn’t quite convince. ‘I don’t see it being a problem.’

They shook hands and with that Mihail departed. There was no immediate lead to Iuda, but he had not expected one. Luka, however, was not a man without associates. If Iuda was anywhere in Petersburg, perhaps the People’s Will would hear of it. If not, there was always that other connection, through Dmitry. It was unlikely that Luka even guessed at the existence of his uncle, and Mihail was not going to overplay his hand by mentioning it just yet.

He turned on to the street and headed back to his hotel. It was getting on for lunchtime. He passed the tavern where he had eaten the previous day, but chose not to partake of its cuisine again. There must be a hundred better places to eat in the city. As he walked past the door, a man stepped out dressed in a heavy brown overcoat and with his ushanka tied tightly under his chin. He looked down the street away from Mihail, but then set off in the opposite direction, bumping into Mihail heavily, almost knocking him over in the slippery snow. Both men apologized and continued on their way.

It was only a dozen or so paces later, as Mihail replayed the minor incident in his mind, that he recalled the slight unnecessary pressure to his chest. He turned, but the man had vanished. He ripped off his glove, slipping his hand into the inside pocket of his jacket, where he had felt the pressure. With relief he found that his notecase was still there. He pulled it out and opened it. None of his paper roubles were gone. It was inconceivable that a pickpocket could have taken them and replaced his empty wallet, but still he’d felt the urge to check. He returned it to his pocket, and it was then he noticed the extra slip of paper that had been planted there. The man had possessed the skills of a cutpurse, but he had used them not to take but to give.

Mihail opened up the note and discovered that it was a summons; a summons from his father.

Once he had begun to send his own messages, and listen to those that came back, Iuda managed to gather a clearer understanding of what was going on – not just in the Peter and Paul Fortress, but in the whole of Petersburg.

There were at least twenty inmates who were in some way connected with the People’s Will, plus others arrested for more normal crimes and a few from organizations with similar goals to the People’s Will, but quite independent. None of these were allowed to know the code – least of all the other revolutionary groups – though Iuda had no doubt that a few would have been smart enough to crack it. He had managed it in only a day, and there were plenty who’d been incarcerated here for longer than that.

Nor was it outside the realms of the imagination that the authorities understood something of the code – indeed it was almost essential that they did. While prisoners within the fortress could communicate with relative ease, it would be of little benefit to anyone if messages couldn’t be got out and in. At some point in the chain there had to be a corrupt guard to act as courier to the wider world. But that meant that the inmates had to be circumspect; beneath the surface of the simple code of tapping there were other layers of subterfuge. Pseudonyms were used rather than real identities – both for revolutionaries and their intended targets. Iuda had been familiar with most of it at one time but his long incarceration by the Turcomans had left him out of touch. Even so he could tell that something momentous was afoot, and that before long there would be another attempt on Aleksandr’s life.

But that was not Iuda’s most pressing concern; he was becoming thirsty. He had not fed since Dmitry and Zmyeevich had provided him with the meagre feast of the boy in Moscow. Before that there had been nothing since Geok Tepe. The sentries at the fortress delivered food twice a day, but it was of no use to him. He wasn’t yet on the point of becoming weak or lethargic, but the time would come. He needed to get out.

He had faced a similar problem with the vampire he kept prisoner beneath his father’s church in Esher. His first instinct, on discovering that what he’d captured was not human, had been to kill it. He was still young enough to have an instinctive sense of what was good and what was evil, and to have a revulsion for the latter, but his first problem had been to devise a mechanism. He knew little of vampire lore. He’d heard tales that daylight could harm them, but while some stories said it would bring death, others were quite clear that it would merely weaken the monster. During the day the creature lurked in a dark corner of the crypt and so Richard never had the opportunity to experiment on the effect light might have on it, except to make the observation that it was afraid of the sun. But even as he realized the difficulties he might have in killing the creature, he also began to question the need for it. His father’s attitude continued to hold sway; the rat and the butterfly were not killed for killing’s sake, but in order to study them. If more could be learned from a live specimen than from a dead one, then life should remain.

He boarded up the small window by which he’d trapped the monster and instead gained access to it through the church. His father never went down into the crypt, and Richard now stole the appropriate keys so that he would not be able to, even if the whim took him. The entrance was hidden behind the triple-decker pulpit that stood almost midway down the nave, overlooking the Chamber Pew where the local nobility – the Pelham family – could worship in isolation from the masses. Richard’s father could preach directly at them, either from the top tier when he delivered his sermon, the middle when he read the lesson or the bottom when he had more secular announcements to make regarding the parish. It was from behind this bottom level that steps led down to a wooden door, and beyond that there was an iron gate leading to the crypt. Richard could sit between the two and converse with his specimen in complete safety.

It was two days before he got any reply to his questions.

‘Yes, I am a vampire.’

His English bore a heavy French accent, though Richard had already suspected his nationality from the manner of his dress.

‘Your name?’ Richard asked.

‘Je suis Honoré Philippe Louis d’Évreux, Vicomte de Nemours.’

‘You’re staying at Juniper Hall?’ Richard stuck with English.

‘Not any more, it seems.’

Richard smiled. ‘But you were?’

The vicomte nodded.

‘How long have you been a vampire?’

‘Twelve years.’

Richard noted it down in his journal. ‘And before that, you were a normal man?’

‘Oui.’

‘And how did the transformation take place?’

Richard copied down every detail of Honoré’s story, occasionally interrupting to ask questions but generally allowing him to tell it in his own way. That battered exercise book was to become the first volume of Iuda’s vast collection on the study of the vampire. He spent every moment he could down there, learning of Honoré’s strange life. His father scarcely noticed his absence. Only Susanna made any comment on his recent unusual behaviour, but he told her nothing. There had been a time when he might have been tempted to take her into his confidence, but since their kiss he had felt wary of her – afraid of the power she might have over him.

It was after two weeks that the issue of Honoré’s sustenance had arisen. It came in the middle of their normal interrogation. Honoré had never asked anything of Richard and when the words came from him, it was more of a plea than a demand.

‘Feed me.’

Richard had already been considering the issue. There was a series of possible solutions, each with increasing risk, and the increasing prospect of excitement.

‘Will animal blood do?’ Richard asked.

Honoré shook his head. ‘I’ve tried it. I can force it down, but it does nothing to relieve my hunger. Perhaps others can stomach it, but not I.’

‘How much do you need?’

The vampire shrugged. ‘Whatever I can get. A little regularly – a lot occasionally.’

‘Would my blood do?’

‘Certainly. Come over here and press your neck against the bars.’

Richard chuckled. ‘I mean if I were to draw a little and give it to you.’

‘Where would be the pleasure?’

Richard drew out his double-bladed knife. He no longer needed it to mimic the vampire’s teeth, but he had grown fond of it – proud of the fact that its wounds were his unique signature. He drew one blade across the palm of his left hand, then smeared the oozing blood on to the flat of the metal. He held the bloodied knife with an outstretched arm, approaching Honoré with utmost caution.

The vampire snorted. ‘When I said a little … You’d do better to save your strength, Cain, and use it to catch me bigger prey.’

Richard doubted whether his strength was up to the task, but he had his cunning. He stole a bottle of his father’s wine. Brandy would have done the job better, but it would be missed, whereas the cellar beneath the rectory was plentifully stocked with wine.

It took another two days before he found a suitable victim. Honoré asked him constantly how he was progressing but Richard told him to be patient. Eventually he saw the man, a vagrant wandering down the Portsmouth Road. Richard watched as he plodded along and then eventually settled down for a night’s sleep. Richard sat down beside him and began to chat, eventually offering him the wine. The tramp drank eagerly, but Richard had underestimated his capacity for alcohol. He had hoped that an entire bottle would render him insensible, but it merely made him talk more, and with less coherence.

In the end, that made things easier. Richard would have had trouble carrying the unconscious body back to the church, but all he now had to do was tell the vagrant that he knew where more wine could be found, and the drunken fool happily walked to his own death. Richard led him down under the church and then pointed through the locked gate while pretending to look for the key.

‘It’s all in there,’ he said encouragingly. ‘Have a look.’

The tramp peered forward, his beard pressing against the iron bars.

Honoré struck.

Richard sat a little way away and took notes. There was nothing that the tramp could do once the vampire had got hold of him. Honoré’s hands clasped him by the back of the head, pulling him close so that his neck lay bare against the bars, allowing Honoré to drink. The man’s hands scrabbled against the stone walls and his legs kicked wildly, but with ever-decreasing vigour as his blood drained away. Soon he was unconscious. The vampire let go and the vagrant slumped backwards on to the floor, his head hitting the stonework with a crack.

‘I need the body,’ Honoré hissed.

Richard considered. The only way he could hand over the tramp’s body would be to open the gate, but that would be an idiotic risk. And yet he yearned to discover what the vampire would do. He wished he’d been able to further restrain his captive. He had a heavy chain and a padlock ready, but he could think of no safe way to get close enough. He decided to do the best he could with the hand he’d been dealt.

‘Step away from the gate then,’ he said. ‘Get right back, but where I can see you.’

The vicomte complied. Richard kept his eyes fixed on him as he unlocked the gate, prepared for any attempt to rush forward, but none came. He managed to drag and kick the tramp’s body forward, noticing a slight groan, indicating that some life remained. Once he had got the body through he slammed the gate closed and locked it. Honoré scurried forward and dragged the tramp away into the shadows. Richard never discovered what it was that he did with it, or with the bodies of the other victims Richard went on to provide. Later he learned, through both observation and personal experience, that for many vampires the taste of human flesh was sweeter even than that of their blood.

Richard left Honoré to spend the night alone with his repast, but he did not go to sleep. He spent the whole night reading, comparing his recent notes of how he had seen a vampire feed with some of his earliest on how a spider devours a fly, noting down the similarities and the differences. It was all quite fascinating.

He kept his specimen locked down there beneath the church for two years, feeding it regularly, but not extravagantly. It was not always easy to find passing itinerants who would not be missed, but Richard was not without imagination. His friends from school already knew that an invite to the church to see something gruesome was worth responding to. Richard made them promise to tell no one, not even where they were going. That way, when they failed to return no suspicion would fall upon him. Honoré always kept back from the gate when Richard opened it, allowing his schoolfriend to walk inside and disappear into the blackness. Often he saw nothing of their fate, happy merely to sit on the steps down from the pulpit and listen to their screams.

But through it all, Richard could only hide his terror. The more he learned of Honoré the more he understood how dangerous a creature he was holding captive – how lucky he had been to capture it at all. Honoré gave no hint that he was planning to escape, but Richard knew that it must be so – it was what he would have done.

As time went by, Richard became more ambitious, providing victims not simply to sate Honoré’s thirst but also to settle his own personal scores. Of all the boys at his school, the one he hated most was Charles Armitage. They had been friends once, but at some point in his life Charles had made the decision that social success was best achieved by joining the crowd and deriding Richard’s quiet interest in the natural world, rather than sharing it. The worst of it was his hypocrisy – while he would goad Richard in public, he was fascinated to talk of nature’s glory when they were alone. It was to be his undoing – though it was almost Richard’s too.

Richard tempted him down to the crypt as he had the others. He walked to the gate and checked to see where Honoré was. After a moment he saw his eyes, a safe distance away in the shadows, glinting in the light of Richard’s lamp. Richard opened the gate and beckoned Charles forward, promising him a thrill far greater than anything he had seen previously in the deadhouse. As he spoke he caught a movement from the corner of his eye. It was only then that he realized his mistake. Whoever’s eyes he had seen, they were not Honoré’s, nor was there any life behind them; he had given the vampire enough material to produce a convincing replication.

Honoré moved quickly and slammed the gate against Richard, trapping him between it and the stone wall and knocking the wind out of him. The pressure was released and Richard slumped to the floor. The vampire stood above him, fangs bared. Richard tried to crawl away, but he made little progress. Even so, Honoré allowed him to move, confident that he could not escape. Richard knew that if he could just make it to the church above, where daylight streamed through the clear windows, then he would survive. But Honoré knew that too. Before Richard even made it to the bottom step, the vampire leapt, pinning him to the ground and gazing into his eyes, his foetid breath infiltrating Richard’s nostrils. Even at such a moment, Richard wondered how that stench might be related to the creature’s diet, and how he might devise an experiment to understand the connection better.

‘You should have killed me, Cain,’ he snarled.

He opened his jaws wide, revealing his fangs, and raised his head in preparation to bring them down on Richard’s neck. Richard turned away and tried to close his eyes, but still his curiosity forced him to look – to try to learn even in the moment of his own death. But Honoré did not strike. His head fell back. A whimper escaped his lips and he froze for a moment, his eyes closed, as though in thoughtful contemplation. An instant later he collapsed into Richard’s chest. Behind him stood Charles, a huge piece of masonry in his hands which he had brought down on the vampire’s head. It would have caved in a man’s skull and killed him in a moment, but Richard already knew enough to doubt the effect would be the same here. In seconds he was up on his feet, pushing Honoré’s body off him, and confirming as he did so that the creature was not dead.

‘Quick!’ he snapped at Charles. ‘Drag him back in there.’

Whatever presence of mind had allowed Charles to find the chunk of stone and bring it down on Honoré’s head had now deserted him. He stood shaking, his arms dangling loosely by his sides, tears welling in his eyes.

‘Now!’ shouted Richard, moving to grab Honoré’s feet and haul him back into the crypt. His action spurred Charles into movement and soon they had dragged the vampire’s inert body through the open gate. Richard bent down close to examine the wound at the back of his head, and saw that it was already healing. As he peered, Honoré emitted a groan.

‘Jesus Christ!’ whispered Charles.

Richard looked up at him. ‘Thank you,’ he said. It seemed the natural thing to do, but there was no sincerity to it.

‘How could he …?’ mumbled Charles. Then, with greater conviction, ‘We should get out of here.’

‘No!’ snapped Richard. He saw in the moment an opportunity, but not one that would be available to him for long. He dashed through the gate again and back towards the stairs, Charles in tow, but he did not ascend. In an alcove he found what he had left there, the chains he had wanted to use on Honoré. Back in the crypt the creature was beginning to stir, but Richard acted swiftly. Soon the chain dug tightly into the vampire’s throat, fastened with a padlock, its other end secured to the bars at the window through which he had first been thrust into his prison.

Charles had been of no further help, and was eager to leave. ‘He’s waking up. Let’s go.’

Richard was calmer. ‘It’s safe now – now that he’s bound. Let’s watch.’

Richard stood by the gate and did as he’d suggested, Charles beside him. He knew perfectly well that it wasn’t a safe place to be. He’d made sure that the chain was long enough for Honoré to reach every corner of the crypt. He also made sure that Charles was a little further into the crypt than he was. The two boys stood, watching with different mixtures of terror and fascination as the vampire came to. His eyes fell upon Richard and he leapt to his feet, then stopped and raised his hand to the chain at his neck, sensing it for the first time.

‘You’re wise to chain me, Cain,’ he said. ‘But you’d have been wiser to kill me.’

‘Perhaps one day I shall,’ replied Richard. ‘Or perhaps one day I’ll free you. For now I want you alive. And for that you must feed. Bon appétit.’

Charles didn’t even notice that Richard had stepped to the other side of the gate. It was only when he heard the lock turn that he understood what was happening. He had proved a useful ally – an indispensable one – when Honoré had attacked Richard, but there was no chance that he would keep what he had seen to himself.

Richard at least did his friend the courtesy of not staying to watch his end. Even after he’d locked the wooden door and begun ascending the steps he could hear Charles’s muffled voice shouting after him.

‘Richard! Richard! Richard!’

It didn’t last long.

Honoré never attempted to escape again, and their previous routine resumed. Richard fed the vampire and questioned him, and received the answers he sought. It was during their conversations that Richard first came to know of Zmyeevich, though that was not the name by which Honoré referred to him. It was thrilling enough to know that vampires were not rare, certainly not in Europe, but more fascinating still to learn of one so old and so powerful that he struck terror and obedience into every one of his kind. Honoré spoke of Zmyeevich’s hatred for the Romanov family, but knew nothing of its origins.

When Richard was sixteen his father summoned him to his study. Richard guessed what the conversation was to be about and was excited by the prospect. At last he would be free.

‘Sit down, young man,’ his father began. ‘As I’m sure you’re aware, you’ve reached the age in life when a gentleman of a certain status and intellect should be looking forward to going to varsity. We haven’t spoken of it recently, but we both know that it’s always been my intention for you to go up to Oxford, just as I did.’

Richard remained silent; his father preferred a speech to a conversation.

‘Now, I won’t beat about the bush, Richard,’ the reverend continued. ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you that this is not to be. You won’t be familiar with these things, but a rector’s stipend isn’t very much. I’d hoped that my Navigational Engine would make me a rich man, but with all the changes the Admiralty wants me to make … well, it’s turned out to have cost me more than the return is ever likely to be. So I’m afraid I can’t afford Oxford. We’ll have to sort out something else; an apprenticeship maybe – something decent – in London perhaps.’

He paused, but Richard said nothing.

‘You do understand, don’t you?’ For a moment there was the hint of an apology in his tone, but it was too late for that.

‘Yes, sir,’ whispered Richard. And with that their meeting was at an end.

Richard fumed. His instinct was for revenge. He was tempted to take his father down to the crypt there and then and thrust him in with Honoré. Better still, he would do the dirty work himself, with his double-bladed knife. But even then he knew that vengeance was a tepid dish. He was too young ever to have seen hangings at Tyburn, but it was not the only gallows in London. He had looked into the eyes of the convicted and known that their deaths would not change the world one jot. The people who jeered in the square might find their spirits momentarily lifted by the swinging rope, but they would not sleep any safer in their beds. Richard had no objection to men’s deaths – be they guilty or innocent – but it was wasteful for a death not to have a practical purpose. Thus to kill his father would be a mere gesture – an admission of defeat. It would not get him to Oxford.

It took four months for Richard to devise a way to give his father a useful ending. He’d turned his mind to methods by which he might raise the money he needed. An early thought had been that his father was simply exaggerating his penury, but a quick examination revealed he had been telling the truth. Moreover, if he were to die, Richard would get very little. Even the house they lived in belonged not to Thomas Cain but to the Church of England.

But then he found the answer. In nearby Ewell there lived a dowager by the name of Lady Agnes Truslove. She and her brother had been the children of a parish vicar and had been orphaned at a young age, thus preventing the brother from going up to Cambridge. He’d been forced to enter the army and had been killed at the Battle of Plassey. She, however, had married well, and was now a rich widow and had used her husband’s vast fortune to establish a fund to assist the education of those who could not afford it themselves. The one criterion was that beneficiaries of the fund must themselves be orphaned sons of the clergy.

Richard was no orphan, but things could change – could change very rapidly if he put his mind to it. He would have liked to effect the transformation from son to orphan himself, but there might be those who were suspicious. There had been sufficient deaths and disappearances in the village that tongues were already wagging. It would be better if he were a long way away and in company when it happened.

He put the bargain to Honoré.

‘Why don’t you just send him down here, like the others?’

‘Because there must be a body,’ Richard explained. ‘If he merely disappears then I may not get the money – certainly not quickly.’

‘So you propose to let me go, and as a last favour to you I kill your father, leaving you in the clear?’

‘That’s about the size of it.’

‘Why should I do you any service?’

‘Because I’m letting you go.’

‘Excuse me, no.’ Honoré shook his head. ‘You will already have let me go. I will be free to do as I please.’

‘You’ll be hungry and he’ll be there, quite unprotected.’

‘So will many people in the town. Why should I do something for you, my gaoler of two years?’

‘I could have treated you worse. I fed you, didn’t I? And not just anybody.’ Richard felt his throat tighten as he spoke.

‘This is true.’

‘So will you do it?’

‘Release me and you will find out.’

It was the best Richard could hope for. A direct yes he would have taken for a lie anyway. If Honoré didn’t keep up his end of the deal then Richard could always commit the deed himself and forget about the alibi. But Honoré was a member of the French aristocracy. Surely he’d have some sense of honour, as the name suggested.

Two weeks later the opportunity arose. It was after evensong one Sunday. As Thomas’s flock departed, one of their number, Mrs Tregaskis, suggested that Richard should join her and her family for dinner. Her intent was, and had been for some time, to pair off Richard with her daughter Beatrice. Richard had no interest in the girl, at first because of Susanna and now because of his hoped for departure to Oxford. But the circumstances were perfect. He explained to his father, who was quite happy to let him go. Everyone in the church saw father and son part, with the father in perfect health.

Then Richard slipped down to the crypt. He stood close to the iron gate and peered inside, holding his lantern high to penetrate the shadows, but saw no one. He turned the key in the heavy lock and swung it open. Still there was no sound and no movement from within. He took the key to the padlock that fastened Honoré’s chains and flung it into the darkness, listening to it clatter across the stone floor.

‘It’s tonight, Honoré,’ he said. ‘Thank you and adieu.’

‘Au revoir,’ came a voice from the shadows.

Richard turned away and as he did so the light of his lantern fell briefly upon what looked like a face, white like the full moon against the darkness. But it could not be – not that face. He looked again and it was gone.

He hurried back up to the church and departed in the Tregaskises’ carriage to enjoy a pleasant dinner at their house in Leatherhead. Soon after the meal he complained of an upset stomach and a feeling of light-headedness, with only a partial need to affect the symptoms after what he had seen. Mrs Tregaskis insisted that he should stay the night, while the glint in Beatrice’s eye suggested she thought this was some sort of ruse on his part. It was, but not to the end she had in mind.

He accepted their hospitality with the proviso that a boy be sent to Esher to inform the Reverend Cain of his son’s predicament. The lad was dispatched and Richard retired to bed. The sun had not risen when he was shaken from his sleep to be told the tragic, horrible news of his father’s murder. Not an ounce of suspicion fell on him.

After that the rest of the plan fell into place just as he had known it would. Lady Truslove happily gave him the funds he required – and a little more besides in consideration of the awful circumstances of his father’s death. Richard never knew precisely how awful those circumstances had been. He heard descriptions of the wounds; it was obvious that Honoré had done his duty and then, presumably, gone his merry way. But Richard never went down to the crypt again to check, out of fear for what he might find there.

And so, just after Michaelmas 1795, Richard Llywelyn Cain arrived at the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford to begin the next stage of his education.

Honoré’s imprisonment, under Richard’s watchful eye, had lasted for two years, but in the end he had been able simply to walk free. In the Peter and Paul Fortress, Iuda planned to do the same, and was not prepared to wait nearly so long. But he would need help. There was only one man in Petersburg he could trust – and even then he had begun to fear that his trust might be misplaced.

He began to tap a message on the pipes, knowing it would be relayed across the fortress, transferred to some sentry or visitor who was able to walk freely out through the gates, and that soon it would be with its intended recipient. And soon after, Iuda would have a visitor.