Jake Conley Mysteries Collection - Books 5-7

Chapter 5-2

father?“I might ask the same question of thee, my son” Thomas replied in the same tone. “I’m here for private prayer and contemplation, but thy purpose, with sword and armour, seems far from godly in this holy place.”

my son“Let’s not bandy words about godliness, lest unseemliness violate the Lord’s abode—for I am a god-fearing man as are we all in my company. Captain Michael Bullivant at thy service and at the service of Parliament. There is no time to waste, Vicar. We seek the traitor, Sir John Briggs. Hast thou seen him? Mayhap he hath begged thee for sanctuary?” The grey eyes seemed to bore into the clergyman’s soul, “’Tis a crime against the law of the land to harbour a traitor—a crime punishable by death.”

Thomas took a deep breath. “As thou canst see,” he said, relieved at his voice not betraying his inner turmoil, sweeping his arm around the church, “there are no traitors here. Thou art welcome to search every nook and cranny, but I fear the only living creatures thou “ll find are mice and bats.”

The Captain held the clergyman with unblinking eyes seeking the slightest sign of untruth. He grunted, dissatisfied, but turned to stride along the nave, his steps echoing from the barrel-roof above. He stepped outside to bark orders: “Five, inside. Search every inch of this church. Thou, climb the tower and don’t miss anything. Fletcher, Smith and Parry, search the churchyard and have an eye for the yews, a man can hide inside them, right enough.”

Jake cringed against the wall, deciding whether it was safer to stay frozen there in the shadows or to run. He decided on the former as it wouldn’t attract attention.

As the roundhead spoke, he bent down and Jake saw him pick up a smooth river stone, grunting at its weight as he passed it from hand to hand. Determined, he clattered back down the nave and marched past the altar. Before Thomas realised his intention, Captain Bullivant smashed the stone with all his force into the face of the two-hundred-year-old statue of the Virgin Mary. The first blow broke the nose off the statue and the second defaced the area around the right eye. Thomas rushed over to the soldier and grabbed his arm in order to prevent him delivering the third blow.

“Sacrilege.”

But the soldier’s muscles were as hard as iron. He thrust the vicar aside, into a pew end, knocking the breath out of his body.

“Idolater.”

The roundhead smashed the rock down again and now the statue was faceless. “Pray the Lord, Vicar, to see the Light and that the day cometh soon: I swear when this war is won no papist shall defile our faith.” A weak beam of light defied the dull day and shone through the stained-glass window. Glancing up, the Captain saw the backlit azure image of the Virgin and heaved the stone at it. It struck the rich tracery and fell to the floor. “Lucky for thee and this temple of idolatry that I have more pressing matters,” he scowled at Thomas, who was rubbing what was sure to become a huge bruise. Oblivious to the glare directed at his back, the soldier turned away and gathered his men. Having ensured that there was no sign of the fugitive, they left without a backward glance.

Thomas knelt before the defaced statue and dedicated an Ave Maria to Her. Then he began to think. He stood up and again rubbed his painful side. A frown furrowed his brow. He moved with decision to the door and slipped out of the church, locking Sir John inside.

Ave MariaJake wondered what to do. Retrocognition had brought him for a reason, but what? He decided to follow the vicar as he walked home. The evening was drawing in and the breeze had a cutting edge. Once indoors the vicar had time to lay and light a fire before he heard the sound of hooves. Jake heard them too and hid at the back of the house, pressing an ear to a window. The vicar had expected them. Crouching, he stretched out his hands to the crackling flames as three parliamentary soldiers burst in. Thomas leapt to his feet. “What in Heaven’s name—”

“Check upstairs.” Two ironsides mounted the stairs. The officer was young, Jake decided about twenty-five, whose sharp eyes scanned the room before he walked into the kitchen. The Vicarage had a door to a small cellar where the vicar kept some kindling and logs. The officer paused on the threshold. “Fetch a candle.” No sooner had Thomas complied than the cornet drew his sword, candle in the other hand, he descended the short flight of stairs. Satisfied that the cellar hid no fugitive, he reappeared, asking the other two soldiers: “Nothing, eh?”

The men shook their heads.

“What is the object of thy search?”

“Who…not what,” the cornet replied.

Who“I’ll give Captain Bullivant his due, he’s nothing if not scrupulous.” Said the vicar.

“Ay, Sir John’s horse was found nearby, so we must search the church again.”

Unsurprised, Thomas pulled a coat over his cassock and unhooked the church key. The three soldiers mounted their horses and kept them at walking pace beside the clergyman, Jake, heart in mouth, trailed the quartet unnoticed before returning to his previous vantage point.

Hidden in the dark in a dank hole, Sir John sat on a stone ledge he’d found before Thomas sealed him into complete blackness. He shivered, drawing his cloak about him, his breathing shallow because he loathed the musty air, but also because his nerves were frayed. The darkness heightened his hearing. After what seemed an eternity, he was startled to hear a key scrape in a lock. Thomas had come back. How he’d berate him for not having thought of a candle—but then, maybe it was a mercy as there was too little air. He froze as steps echoed in the church, too heavy to be Thomas’s, some of them passing over his head. The fox was in his lair, but should the hounds sniff him out…there would be no escape. He listened to the steps moving away, aware that he was light-headed from both lack of air and holding his breath. He sucked in the stale air, screwing up his nose while straining to hear. The footsteps were leaving. The Lord be praised the danger had passed. In the name of mercy, he would soon be out of this burrow, breathing pure air again.

Outside, satisfied at their inspection, the soldiers remounted and the cornet spoke in a severe voice belying his youth: “If it comes to thy notice that the traitor Sir John Briggs is lurking hereabouts, “tis thy bounden duty to inform the military, forthwith. On pain o’ death, clear, vicar?”

“Quite clear. Have no fear on that score. I bid thee good night, cornet.”

Thomas had the satisfaction of turning his back on the three soldiers before enacting the farce of locking up the church again as they looked on. They wheeled their horses and rode off in the direction of Covenham St. Bartholomew.

Jake, from the shadows, watched Thomas Monson sit down on a tree stump, draw his collar up over his neck and wait in the damp and the twilight. He waited for about a quarter of an hour before unlocking the church again. Inside it was now quite dark, but he had no need of light to find his way. Even so, to Jake’s satisfaction, he went to the presbytery for a candle and a flint. The flickering candle lit his way along the nave. Resting it on a pew, he heaved against the solid oak of another bench in front, grunted at the stabbing pain in his bruised side, before sliding it forward a yard against the next in line. Kicking aside a kneeler, Thomas exposed a brass handle in a paving stone. Grasping it, he hauled with all his might and the stone lifted, its ancient hinges squealing. Jake could only admire the ingenuity.

So that’s how he did it. Brilliant!

So that’s how he did it. Brilliant!The vicar called, “Out with thee, Sir John.”

“By all the saints and martyrs, Tom, what kept you? I was beginning to worry about spending the whole night in the company of ghosts. This pit freezes to the marrow.” The two friends pushed the pew back in place and replaced the kneeler over the trapdoor handle. “Tom, I could hear them walking back and forth over my head. Had they found me it would have been a sorry end for the both of us. I should never have put an old friend in this position. I beg thy forgiveness.”

“The Good Lord kept us safe, John. Think no more on it.”

“Is there pen and paper?”

“Ay, in the presbytery, why?”

“Come then, for there are things that must be done.”

Jake could not see them but still heard their voices amplified by the silent church.

Sir John Briggs sat down at the table. With his tongue between his teeth and a frown of concentration, he began to draw a map. Satisfied, he sprinkled sand on his effort in order to dry the ink. He ran his left hand through his beard, fixing Thomas with green eyes, and Jake heard, “Listen Tom, damn it, thou hast saved my life and art as good a friend as a man e’er could wish for.” He raised his hand. “Hush! Today I lost my son in battle and I am proud that he died for his king. Heed me well; more’s the pity,” he said, “there is not one righteous and loyal soul in my family to follow me. Tom, I may not be long for this world, there will be more fighting and bloodshed before our blessed King Charles shall restore his realm to peace and prosperity—”

“Amen, to that.”

“…I am as mortal as the next man. Place the map in safekeeping Tom. Jake frowned and bit his lip.

He’s drawn a map and given it to the vicar.

He’s drawn a map and given it to the vicar.“…Should news reach thee that I have gone to meet my Maker, then follow the map and it will lead to an object of great worth. I buried it before the battle. Tom, it hath been in my family for time immemorial.” Jake caught his breath,

Now, I’m on to something. He strained to hear.

Now, I’m on to something. “There is no better man – no, I will not be gainsaid. That’s settled. Now I need a horse, I expect those blackguards have taken my Flame.” He sighed, “She’s a fine horse.”

They left the church. As he locked up for the last time that day, the Reverend Thomas Monson pondered on their strange conversation. Fighting a lump in his throat, he watched the golden plume of his friend’s hat disappear into the gloom, bobbing to the rhythm of his nag’s canter.

He was never to see him again. Of course, neither he nor Jake could know that, at that moment. Sir John Briggs fell, slain at the successful relief of York led by Prince Rupert, eight months later, on 1 July 1644.

Nor was Jake to know, for the time being, as his retrocognition was about to end, that the reverend lived in sorrow through the regicide and the exile of the dead king’s son. The clergyman’s only son was also in France. As those of many others, Thomas Monson’s fortunes changed with the Commonwealth. As a papist sympathiser he was stripped of his living. Therefore, driven by desperation, he used the map to recover the precious heirloom. It was of no use to him. An object of incalculable worth and astounding beauty, it could only bring trouble and probably death in those turbulent times. So, he reburied it under its marker. Of course, he wrote to Charlie in France, but he couldn’t tell him of its whereabouts; Cromwell had spies everywhere and there was no doubt that letters, however trustworthy the bearer, were an unacceptable risk. So, he concealed the secret of the treasure’s whereabouts in a riddle, in a way most suitable to a man of the cloth. First, he sent word of the buried treasure in a letter to his son couched in general terms. Later, he sent a small package: a box made of bone carved by his own hand; inside, lay a short verse from a psalm indicating the hiding-place of the priceless object. That was the selfsame verse nestling in Jake’s pocket. In the spring of 1656, Thomas Monson died and was buried in a pauper’s grave.

* * *

Louth, Lincolnshire, 2021 AD

Louth, Lincolnshire, 2021 ADThe air around Jake stopped vibrating and he reached for his coffee and cake as though nothing had happened. He could remember the fact of the treasure and the name of the vicar so the mystery trail they’d set off on might lead to a fortune in the end. That would provide an explanation of why someone had shot at him. For now, he needed to share what knowledge he had with Alice.

There was a lot to tell, but he showed her the scroll and its box and expounded at some length about the Civil War scenes he had witnessed. When he had finished, Alice, who had listened attentively without once interrupting, drew a logical conclusion.

“You wouldn’t have had the retrocognition experience if it hadn’t been relevant to your inquiry. You were touching the scroll when it come over you, so it’s bound to be the handwriting of that vicar. It looks like he was leaving a clue for someone, perhaps his heir, to find whatever treasure was hidden. Pity you didn’t find the map he spoke about—even if it still exists. It’s up to us to decipher the Biblical reference.”

“It looks like I’ll have to buy a Bible then because the context of the verse might be important.”

“Why buy one? I’ve got a copy of the Authorised Version at home.”

“Are you suggesting driving down to Warwickshire to pick up a Bible? We can buy one here and it’ll be cheaper than the diesel to go there and back.” Jake said.

“Look, I’ll be honest with you, it’s not just for the Bible. When we set off, I forgot to pack my pills and if we’re staying in Louth for a while, I’ll need more clothes and cosmetics. We can spend one night in our house and then come back. What do you say?”

“Never stand between a woman and her cosmetics.”