Precious Bones Page 16

  “How can I help you, Ms. Blake? Is there a dashing vicar in the plot of your new book?” he asked with a smile.

  “I just might have to add one now. Actually, I’m working on a new book that’s set during the reign of Elizabeth I. I’m researching the churches of the area and trying to trace any records that might’ve survived from the period.” I knew I was being vague, but I wanted to see what he would say.

  “I’m not an authority on the Tudor period, but I can tell you with certainty that our little church had not been built until the beginning of the seventeenth century. St. Swithin’s used to be located a few blocks away in Cannon Street, but it had been bombed severely during the war, and was eventually demolished and replaced with that rather ugly office building. You must have passed it on the way here.”

  “Yes, I have and it is rather ugly. Thank you, Mr. Burns.” I began to rise from my chair when the vicar waved me back down.

  “Wait, I have an idea. I have only been at this church for about a year. The vicar who was here before me had been at this church for over forty years. He’s a lovely old man, and he fancied himself an amateur historian. He was full of obscure facts about this area and the churches hereabouts. He retired and moved in with his daughter. I believe she lives in a village close to Brighton. If you hold on a moment, I’ll get you the address. If you don’t mind making the journey out there, he would be very pleased to see you.”

  “I wouldn’t mind at all. As a matter of face, my sister lives near Brighton, so two birds with one stone and all that.”

  “Splendid. Let me get you that address.” He looked on his cluttered desk until he found an old-fashioned address book, and wrote out the name and address for me on a scrap of paper. I thanked him and walked back out in the sunny morning. I would most certainly pay a call on Mr. Markham. What did I have to lose?

  Chapter 50

  The reverend resided in the village of East Chiltington, about eight miles northeast of Brighton, so I decided that I would pay a visit to Camille, then borrow her car and drive out to see him. I didn’t think it would be polite to just show up, so I looked up his number and telephoned for an appointment. The old man was thrilled that someone wanted to come over and talk about his passion, and we fixed a time to meet on Friday afternoon. I called Camille to give her a heads up and felt very pleased with myself.

  “Would you like to come with me, Adrian? You can finally meet my sister and maybe we can make a weekend of it.”

  Adrian leaned back in his chair, pushing away his plate of pasta. “I’d love to come, but my mother is flying in from Miami on Friday morning. She’s staying at my flat and wants me to take her to the country to visit my grandparents. She hasn’t seen them since last Christmas, and I’m in for a heartwarming family weekend. I was hoping you might want to come with me. You know my grandfather, or course, but I would like for you to meet my gran and my mum. She is quite a character.”

  “Will her husband be joining her?”

  “No, they seem to be in a middle of a tiff, so she decided to teach him a lesson, and pop up to London for some family fun and shopping.” He rolled his eyes and I laughed.

  “How old is your mum anyway? She doesn’t sound very matronly.”

  “My mum’s only forty-seven. She had me at eighteen, after getting knocked up by my dad in the back of a car after a rock concert. Sometimes she still thinks she’s eighteen and favors anything short, tight, and leopard printed. After an undisclosed number of plastic surgeries in Brazil, she’s starting to look more like my sister than my mother. You’ll love her!!!!” Adrian put his plate in the sink and wrapped his arms around me. “Promise me you’ll never wear leopard print, at least not where people can see it.”

  I put my hand over my heart. “I swear that I will never wear anything in leopard, tiger, cheetah, or even zebra print. I’ll be the model of decorum, and wear nothing but my tweeds and pearls over my hot pink thongs and leather bras.”

  “That’s what I like to hear. Now about that thong…..” I ran squealing from the kitchen as he chased me up the stairs to the bedroom and threw me on the bed. There’d would be no writing tonight.

  Chapter 51

  I got off the train and walked to Camille and Ken’s office. It wasn’t too far from the train station, and I liked strolling around Brighton. Maybe I would have time to visit the Royal Pavilion before going to meet with Vicar Markham. I hadn’t been there in years, and I was feeling the urge to walk through the magnificent rooms and enjoy the whimsical art and furnishings of the museum. It would help calm my nerves before seeing Mr. Markham. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting him to tell me, but I was hoping to learn something that would help, one way or another.

  I pushed open the glass door and walked into the office. A perky receptionist named Susan asked me if I had an appointment, but then recognized me and buzzed through to Camille, alerting her to my presence. Ken poked his head out of the examining room, blowing me a kiss and promising to see me later, then disappeared back inside. Finally, Camille came dashing out.

  “Sorry, love. I was with a customer. How do you politely tell a middle-aged woman that the frames she loves make her look like Harry Potter?”

  “You don’t. You just order them for her, and tell her she looks fabulous,” I chuckled. We left the office laughing and walked over to the nearest pub.

  “Sorry, I don’t have much time. My next client is in an hour. We can just grab some lunch and then I have to dash. Will you come back for dinner after your appointment? Ken can put some steaks on the barbecue. It’s nice enough to eat outside, I think. Too bad Adrian couldn’t join us. I’m longing to meet him.”

  “Adrian’s shopping for leopard print catsuits today. Don’t even ask,” I said as my sister gaped at me over her menu. “So what’s good here?”

  “Oh, everything. I have a mad craving for tomato soup.” She made a point of looking away, and then started rummaging in her purse.

  “You hate tomato soup,” I said suspiciously. “Oh -- not again, Camille.”

  “I’m afraid so -- due in April. We are desperately hoping for a girl this time. Three boys are more than enough.”

  “I’d say. Well, here’s to your girl.” I raised my glass of wine in a toast and Camille lifted her glass of water. “Cheers.”

  We had a pleasant lunch and then I walked Camille back to her office and went to explore the Pavilion. I felt a thrill of excitement as I saw the turrets and cupolas of the palace. It always reminded me of the Taj Mahal, and I thought once more of how much I would like to visit India some day. There weren’t too many people about during lunchtime and I leisurely walked from room to room, taking my time in front of the pieces I particularly liked. The oriental motifs of the rooms made me feel as if I’d stepped into another world, and that was exactly what I needed to calm myself before the interview with the vicar. I told myself that I was being a fool for being so nervous, but I couldn’t help myself. I had a strange feeling that he was going to tell me something important.

  Finally it was time to go, and I got into Camille’s car and set the GPS. I would be at my destination in less than a half hour, traffic permitting. It took me longer than expected to get out of the city, but once I left the outskirts of Brighton, I reached the village very quickly. It wasn’t very large and had a nice, lived-in quality to it. I drove through the main street past the Norman church and several pubs, until I turned down a side lane and arrived at the address. The cottage was small and neat, built of gray stone and probably dating back a few hundred years. The rose bushes underneath the windows were still in bloom and filled the air with a heady perfume.

  I took a deep breath and rang the bell. I had to wait a few minutes before the green-painted door finally opened, to reveal a very old man. I estimated him to be close to ninety, but he held himself with military erectness and ushered me into the front room, offering me tea. I gratefully accepted and offered to help, but Mr. Markham held up his hand in protest and invited me to sit down
on the couch. The room was a lot more modern than I would have expected, and I sat down and looked across at a Picasso print hanging over the television. I imagined poor Mr. Markham would have preferred a nice crucifixion scene, but his daughter had other ideas.

  Mr. Markham came in a few moments later bearing a tray laden with a teapot, cups, milk and sugar, and some kind of sponge cake. He asked me to pour out and I did my duty, feeling like some Victorian lady in a period piece.

  “I had a call from Colin the other day. He’s a good lad. He took over as the vicar at St. Andrew’s after I retired. He was nearly bursting with excitement. Said one of his favorite authors just wandered into his church asking for information. Well, you sent her to the right place, my boy, I told him. No one knows more about the churches of Blackfriars than I do. A little hobby of mine,” he added, as he reached for a piece of sponge.

  “Mr. Markham,” I began.

  “Please, call me Eustace. I’ve been Mr. Markham for far too long.” He took a noisy sip of his tea and looked at me through horn-rimmed glasses, full of expectation.

  “All right, Eustace then. I’m writing a novel set in Elizabethan England, and my characters reside in Carter Lane, Blackfriars. I’m trying to find as much as I can about the area during those days, especially the churches. I like to be accurate.”

  “Of course, of course. The churches of Blackfriars did not fare very well after the sixteenth century, I am afraid. There was, of course, St. Ann’s at the bottom of Carter Lane. That would have been the parish church then; there was also St. Swithin’s in Cannon Street. St. Swithin’s was built in the thirteenth century and dedicated to St. Swithin. It was the final resting place of Catrin Glyndwr, wife of Edmund Mortimer and daughter of a legendary Welsh leader. She was taken hostage by the English in 1409 and held at the Tower. She died mysteriously with no cause of death ever recorded.

  The church had been destroyed in the great fire of 1666, along with eighty-five others, but was later rebuilt in the seventeenth century. It had been heavily bombed during a raid in 1940, and the site was eventually cleared and sold for commercial building. Now, St. Ann’s was consecrated in 1597, just a few years before the death of Elizabeth, so I don’t know if that’s any help to your research. It had been built on the remains of a monastery destroyed during Henry VIII’s dissolution of the churches. The master mason who was in charge of building St. Ann’s was a local man who lived right down the street. Thomas Thorne, his name was.”

  I felt my heart drop into the pit of my stomach. There it was, a name I had been looking for, casually dropped into the conversation. I felt breathless with excitement and hoped that Eustace could tell me more.

  “That’s very interesting, Eustace. As it happens, one of my characters is a mason. Was anything else known about this Thomas Thorne?”

  Eustace beamed with pleasure. He obviously enjoyed talking about this, and I was making him a very happy man. “There is indeed, my dear. There is indeed. It seems that our Mr. Thorne was a closet Catholic. Life wasn’t easy for Papists in those days, not with all the plots brewing against the Queen, and Mary Stuart always a threat; just waiting in the wings to take the throne should any harm befall Elizabeth. It was even said that Thorne had some connection to Anthony Babington, who was executed for plotting to murder the Queen.”

  “That’s fascinating. Is anything known about his family?” Eustace looked overjoyed at my question.

  “It had been mentioned that Thorne’s sister was involved in a dalliance with Anthony Babington, despite the fact that he was married. She vanished on the day of the execution and slipped right through the fingers of Walsingham’s men who were going to arrest her for collusion. The assumption was that she was sent out of the country by her brother. It’s very likely that she was with child by Babington, and they were trying to protect her. The Queen’s men looked for her high and low, but she was never found.”

  “Did he have any other family that you know of?” I was desperate for mention of Constance and Richard, but didn’t want to ask outright.

  “Not that I know of. The information about the mason’s religion and connection with Babington was mentioned in an obscure letter found among the papers of Robert Cecil, who was one of the Queen’s top advisors. The Bishop had concerns about a Papist building a Protestant church, and cited Thorne’s connections to Babington and someone named Richard Carlisle, as an example of his perfidy. Now, by the end of the sixteenth century, Cecil was most likely already plotting to put James VI, Mary Stuart’s son, on the throne after the death of Elizabeth. James was a Catholic, and wouldn’t look kindly on Catholics being persecuted so openly, so Cecil just let the matter drop. I never came across anything else on Thorne or his family, but I believe some of the parish records may have survived the fire. After St. Ann’s burned down, the parishioners were merged with St. Andrew’s-by-the-Wardrobe. If you are particularly interested in that family you can check there.”

  Mr. Markham held out his cup as I poured him more tea and handed him a second slice of the sponge. He seemed a trifle tired, so I let him enjoy his tea in peace while making a show of taking down notes on what he had told me. In fact, my mind was going a mile a minute. I didn’t really need to go to St. Andrew’s-by-the Wardrobe. I already had the proof I needed. Eustace had mentioned Tom, Richard, and a sister involved with Babington. That was enough confirmation for me. I thanked the vicar profusely for his help and rose to leave.

  “Thank you, Eustace. You have been invaluable to my research.”

  The old man rose from his chair and took my hand in both of his. “No, thank you my dear. It’s not very often that someone is interested in what an old man has to say these days. When I even make a stray comment about history, my daughter just rolls her eyes to the ceiling and raises the volume on the telly. It’s good to know that someone is still interested in that old stuff. Good luck with your book. I’ll be sure to read it when it comes out.”

  Chapter 52

  By the time I pulled into the driveway of Camille’s house, the sun was just beginning to dip below the horizon, and the first stars were lazily appearing in the sky. Streaks of gold and fuchsia streaked the purpling sky, and the temperature was beginning to drop, reminding the world that winter was on its way. Connie was in the kitchen cutting vegetables for a salad, and Ken was outside wearing a light jacket and a cap preparing the steaks.

  “So, how was your visit? Any joy with Mr. Markham?” asked Camille as she tossed the salad skillfully.

  “Actually, yes. He told me precisely what I needed to know.” I hadn’t told Camille why I was visiting the old vicar. I just told her that I was doing research for the book and Mr. Markham was knowledgeable about the period. I had no secrets from my sister, but I felt strangely reluctant to talk about my “memories.” They were mine and mine alone. Only Adrian knew of my forays into Tudor England, and I decided it was best to keep it that way.

  My nephews, Jeremy and James, came running into the kitchen and threw themselves at me, covering me with kisses sticky with the candy they managed to sneak before dinner. I looked at their sweet faces and suddenly felt a pang of longing. I always knew I wanted to have children in the future, but I never felt a physical yearning to be pregnant. I suddenly tried to imagine what it would be like to hold my own child in my arms, and the fantasy filled me with happiness.

  I saw Camille watching me across the island of her kitchen. “You want a baby, don’t you?”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “I know that look. I’ve seen it many times before. Funny how you never got that way with Tristan.” Now that she mentioned it, I realized she was right. I thought of having children with Tristan, but it was never anything concrete, just something to do in the distant future. With Adrian it was different. I wanted it now, and I wanted it more than I cared to admit. Shaken by this revelation, I walked out into the garden to get a breath of air and avoid my sister’s knowing smile.

  Chapter 53

  I decided to s
pend the night at Camille’s house. There was no reason to rush home and if I was honest with myself, I really didn’t want to be alone. The revelations of Eustace Markham left me slightly shaken. I suspected all along that the people I was seeing were real, but hearing their names spoken out loud was still a shock. I spent a pleasant evening with Camille and Ken. The kids were excited to have me visit, and we played hide and seek and “ring around the rosy” before they finally got tired enough to go to bed. I was weary myself and was glad when Camille went to put down baby Jason. I fell asleep in the guest room before my head hit the pillow.

  I left Brighton after a leisurely breakfast, and had only been home for a few minutes when my doorbell rang. I wasn’t expecting Adrian until Sunday evening, since he was still with his mother in the country visiting his grandparents. I thought of ignoring the bell, but the ringing became more persistent, and I went to open the door with an irritated sigh. Tristan was standing on my doorstep looking nervous.

  “May I come in?” I stood aside to let him pass and invited him into the living room. I took a seat on the sofa, but Tristan remained standing, leaning on the mantel of the unlit fireplace. He stood quietly for a few moments just looking at me until I finally had to ask him why he came.

  “I broke it off with Joanna,” he announced, as if expecting to get a medal and a wreath of laurels for his head.

  “And?”

  “And I want you back. Cassandra, I made a terrible mistake, the worst mistake of my life. Please give me another chance. I wasn’t certain I wanted to spend my life with you, but now I am.”

  I looked up at him standing there. He was still as handsome as ever, dressed in a pair of jeans and a blue button-down shirt the exact color of his blue eyes. I could see that he was terribly nervous and it probably cost him a lot to come here and grovel, but I had to admit that I felt nothing. There was no sense of satisfaction in knowing that he had dropped Joanna and wanted me back. A few months ago I was planning a life with this man, but now all I felt was indifference. He seemed shallow beneath his polished veneer, and I felt a sudden pity for him.