The Heresy of Dr Dee

II

Rooker





September, 1560. Mortlake.

IT WAS TO be the last halfway-bright day of the season, but the scryer had demanded darkness: shutters closed against the mid-afternoon and the light from a single beeswax candle throwing shadows into battle on the walls.

‘And this…’ Dithering now, poor Goodwife Faldo looked at me over the wafer of flame and then across the board to where the scryer sat, and then back at me. ‘This is my brother…’ her hands falling to her sides and, even in the small light, he must surely have seen the flailing in her eyes ‘…John,’ she said lamely.

‘John Faldo,’ I said at once.

And then, seeing the eyes of my friend Jack Simm rolling upwards, realised why this could not be so.

‘That is, her husband’s brother.’

Thinking how fortunate it was that Will Faldo was out with his two sons, gleaning from his field all that remained of a dismal harvest. Had he been with us, the scryer might just have noted that Master Faldo was plump, with red hair, and a head shorter than the man claiming to be his brother.

Or he might yet see the truth when he uncovered what sat before him. It made a hump under the black cloth as might a saint’s sacred skull. My eyes were drawn back to it again and again. Unaware that the scryer had been watching me until his voice came curling out of the dark.

‘You have an interest in these matters, Master Faldo?’

A clipped clarity suggestive of Wales. Echoes of my late tad, in fact.

Jesu… I met his gaze for no more than a moment then looked away towards the crack of daylight betwixt shutters. The Faldos’ dwelling, firm-built of oak and riverbed daub, was but a short walk from Mortlake Church which, had the shutters been open, would have displayed itself like a warning finger.

‘The truth is,’ I mumbled, ‘that I’m less afraid of such things than my brother. Which is one reason why I’m here. And, um, he is not.’

The scryer nodded, appearing well at ease with his situation. Too much so, it seemed to me; the narrow causeway ’twixt science and sorcery will always have slippery sides and in his place I would ever have been watching the shadows. But then, that, as you know, is the way I am.

I studied him in the thin light. Not what I’d expected. A good twenty years older than my thirty-three, greying beard tight-trimmed to his cheeks and a white scar the width of his forehead. Well-clothed, in a drab and sober way, like to a clerk or a lawyer. Only the scar hinting at a more perilous profession.

He’d introduced himself to us as Elias, and I was told he’d been a monk. Were this true, it might afford him protection from whatever would come. Certainly his manner implied that we were fortunate to have his services.

‘And the other reason that Master Faldo is not with us?’

He smiled at me, with evident scepticism. I was silent too long, and it was the goodwife, alert as a chaffinch, who sprang up.

‘My husband… he knows naught of this. He’s working the day long and falls to sleep when he comes in. I…’ She lowered her voice and her eyelids, a fine and unexpected piece of theatre. ‘I was too ashamed to tell him.’

She’d already paid the scryer, with my money. I’d also been obliged to meet his night’s accommodation at the inn – more than I could readily afford, especially if I were to make a further purchase. Served me right for starting this game and involving the goodwife in the deception.

Brother Elias smiled at her with understanding.

‘So the treasure you want me to find… would be your wedding ring?’

Goodwife Faldo let out a small cry, hastily stifled with a hand. How could he possibly have known this by natural means? I stiffened only for a moment. It was no more than a good guess. He must oft-times be summoned to locate a woman’s ring or a locket. It was what they did.

‘What happened…’ Goodwife Faldo displayed her fingers, one with a circle of white below its joint ‘… I must have taken it off. To clean out the fire ready for the autumn? Laid it on the board, where you’re…’ Peering among the shadows on the board, as if the missing ring might be gleaming from somewhere to betray her. ‘And then forgot about it until the night. And it… was gone.’

‘You think someone stole it?’

‘I’d not want to think that. We trust our neighbours. Nobody here bolts a door. But… yes, I do fear it’s been taken. Been many years in my husband’s family, and has a value beyond the gold. Can you help me?’

‘Not me alone, Goodwife. Not me alone.’

Brother Elias speaking with solemnity and what seemed to me to be a first hint of stagecraft. Goodwife Faldo’s stool wobbling and the candlelight passing like a sprite across her coif as she sat up. Like many women, my mother’s neighbour was much attracted to the Hidden, yet in a half-fearful way – the joy of shivers.

‘I can only pray,’ she said unsteadily, ‘that whatever is summoned to help you comes from the right… quarter.’

This, I’ll admit, was a question I’d primed her to ask. No one should open a portal to the Hidden without spiritual protection. There are long-established procedures for securing this; I wanted to know if the scryer knew them.

‘Oh, it must needs be Godly,’ Elias assured her confidently. ‘If it’s to find this ring for us. However…’ his well-fed face became stern ‘…I must make it clear to you, Goodwife, that if the ring has been stolen and we are able to put a face to the thief, then it’s your business, not mine, to take the matter further.’

‘That’s, er…’ I coughed ‘…is another reason why I’m here.’

Me, the fighting man. Dear God.

‘And what are you, Master Faldo?’ the scryer said, but not as if he cared. ‘What’s your living?’

I shrugged.

‘I work at the brewery.’

The biggest employer of men in Mortlake. Tell him you work at the brewery, Jack Simm had said to me earlier. And then, looking at my hands. Dealing wiv orders.

‘And you…’ the scryer turned to Jack, ‘…were once, I think, an apothecary in London?’

‘Once.’

Jack stubbornly folding his arms over his wide chest as though to ward off further questions. Get on with it. The scryer cupped his hands over the black-draped object before him, drew a long breath, as if about to snatch away the cloth… and then stopped.

‘It’s not mete.’

Pulling his hands away from the mounded cloth, stowing them away in his robe.

A scowl split Jack Simm’s lambswool beard.

‘What?’

‘I regret it’s not mete for me to go on,’ Brother Elias said. ‘The crystal’s cold.’

Speaking with finality, where most of his kind would be smiling slyly at you while holding out their grubby hands for more money. Maybe it came to the same. Elias’s apparel showed he’d already prospered from his trade.

Yet I felt this wasn’t only about money. The air in here had altered. The hearth looked cold as an altar, the room felt damp. I became aware of the fingers of both my hands gripping the edge of the board as the scryer reached to the flagged floor for his satchel.

‘We should light a fire?’ Jack Simm said.

Halfway to his feet, angry, but Elias didn’t look at him.

‘If you want this to have results,’ he said quietly, ‘then I must needs go back to the inn and rest a while. I’ll return shortly before nightfall. That is, if you wish to continue with this…’

… comedy? Was that what he thought?

Did he suspect false-play?

Look, I wanted to say, if we’ve insulted your art, I beg mercy, but I feared you’d be a rooker. Back-street scryers, I thought all they sought was a regular income. That they had no aspiration to walk in the golden halls of creation and know the energies behind their art. I thought that all that mattered was that it worked. And if it didn’t, you faked it. I want to know where the fakery begins, to separate artifice from natural magic. I want to watch what you do, observe your methods. And… I want to know where to obtain the finest of shewstones.

Should I identify myself, accept a loss of face?

No. I held back, watching him shoulder his satchel and make his stately way to the Goodwife’s door, wondering if he’d return or vanish with my money.

‘Oh,’ he said mildly. ‘I have one question.’ He opened the door and the light washed over him. ‘Why am I summoned to Mortlake?’

From outside came the scurrying of birds.

‘Why Mortlake?’ the scryer said. ‘When Mortlake’s surely home to a man more qualified than I?’ He looked at each of us in turn. ‘Or is the good Dr Dee too busy conjuring for the Queen these days to waste his famous skills in service of his neighbours?’

Jack Simm glanced at me. I knew not how to respond.

‘Dr Dee,’ Jack said, ‘doesn’t scry.’

Hmm… not yet, anyway.