The Relic Murders

claret and pluck at golden capon. Great Elizabeth will lean across and tweak my cheek.
    'Come, Roger,' she'll whisper. 'Bring me the next chapter of your memoirs. Let me see those times again!'
    And she will! Murder beckons me down time's sombre gallery, back into the golden, sun-filled, bloody autumn days of 1523 when King Henry, that murderous imp, still ruled England and Cardinal Wolsey, his brain teeming more than a boxful of vipers, tried to rule the king.

Chapter 1
    After that bloody business at the Tower in the summer of 1523, Benjamin Daunbey and I, now released from the services of Cardinal Wolsey, returned to our manor outside Ipswich. Benjamin took over the management of the estate and the running of the school he had set up for the ungrateful, snotty-nosed imps from the nearby village. I, of course, true to my nature, returned to villainy as smoothly as a duck takes to water. I was bred for villainy. I was reared on it. People shouldn't really object. I am not an evil man. I just like mischief as a cat does cream. 'Ill met by moonlight!' You could wager your last farthing that I was. When Benjamin slept, I'd quietly slip out to meet young Lucy Witherspoon. She was a comely wench who worked some time in the White Harte tavern and, at others, as a chamber maid for the Poppleton household across the valley. I have mentioned these Poppletons before: spawns of Satan! The family was dominated by a woman I called the Great Mouth, Isabella Poppleton, and her cantankerous, flint-faced sons led by Edmund. She hated me and I reciprocated in kind. May her lips rot off!
    Now Lucy and I would spend those early, balmy autumn nights lying in the cool grass beside the river. Lucy was a lovely lass who, when I cradled her in my arms, would whisper, 'My cup overflows with happiness!' It was a quotation she'd learnt from the wall of the parish church. She said it always tickled her fancy and, I suppose, I did the same. When she left, with my sweet words ringing in her ears and a silver piece in her purse, I'd stay to pick mushrooms, herbs and plants. I still had a deep, abiding desire to be a great physician and make my fortune with miraculous cures. I'd always be back by dawn, sleeping like an angel in my bed, and would awake later in the day to wash, shave, dress and plot fresh mischief.
    Benjamin. Well, I loved Benjamin deeply – a scholar, a swordsman and a gentle soul – but a slight coldness had grown up between us. The cause (isn't it always?) was a woman: the marvellous Miranda, daughter of Under-sheriff Pelleter in the city of London. Oh, what a tangled web, the eternal triangle! Benjamin loved Miranda: Miranda loved Benjamin: Roger loved Miranda: Roger loved Benjamin: Benjamin loved Roger. However, here's the rub! Here's the soreness! Here's the canker in my soul, the hatred in my heart! Miranda did not love Roger!
    My little secretary sniggers. The scurvy knave says love's not a triangle. If he's not careful I'll take my sword, prick his bum and take him down to the crossroads to my triangular gallows. What does he know of love? The little tick brain! The want wit! Monsieur Muckwater! Triangles, squares, rectangles? Love knows no shape. Whatever, I loved Miranda. I loved her hair, her eyes, her mouth, her body, her soul, her spirit. Oh, she was kind: 'Good Roger,' she called me. 'My dear friend.' But Miranda's eyes hungered only for Benjamin. And here's the second rub. Old Roger Shallot, by some nimble footwork, by playing the counterfeit-man, by devious trickery and subtle wit, had arranged for 'dear' Benjamin to be sent on an embassy to Italy, whilst I, poor Roger, was to stay at home looking after the farm. However, when the time was ripe, I'd foray into London to lay siege to Miranda's heart. Oh villainy! But can you blame me for loving? I, whom few people loved, had a heart bursting with that sweet fragrance and all of it was centred upon Miranda.
    Now Benjamin may have been a scholar but he was no dullard. He spent his days preparing to leave, drawing up instructions, yet I would catch him watching me with his dark, soulful eyes.
    'You'll not go to London?' Benjamin declared one afternoon when I was helping him place clothing in a chest.
    Now I am a born liar but I couldn't lie to Benjamin. 'Sometimes, master,' I replied, turning away. 'And you'll not see Miranda?'
    'Master, master!' I knelt down to buckle up some saddlebags, deciding to make light of it. 'You've heard, master, the story about Lord