‘Heyden is a skilled intelligence officer,’ said May tightly. ‘Of course he knows how to jab a blade into his victims with the minimum of damage.’
‘Then show me the blood,’ ordered Wiseman, handing him the knife. ‘If that is the murder weapon, it will be stained with gore, as will the killer himself. Can you see even the smallest speck of red on it – or on him?’
‘He cleaned it,’ argued May, not ready to concede defeat. ‘He had plenty of time.’
‘Cleaned it with what?’ pressed Wiseman. ‘There is no water here, and you cannot wipe blood off clothes anyway. It leaves indelible marks – and believe me, I know.’
May was sullen. ‘Your “evidence” is circumstantial. It proves nothing.’
‘On the contrary,’ said Wiseman. ‘It makes a powerful case for Heyden’s innocence. And there is more. If he did kill Willys, then why did he return to his own cell – to sit and wait for the alarm to be raised? Why did he not take the opportunity to escape? The guards had gone, so there was no one to stop him.’
‘He wanted to confuse us,’ claimed May. ‘He–’
‘Oh, you are certainly confused,’ agreed Wiseman, drawing an amused titter from the watching courtiers. He looked away, as if he could not be bothered to waste time on the likes of May. ‘Finally, there is the angle at which the blade penetrated Willys.’
There were exclamations of revulsion as he inserted a thin piece of metal into the hole, to demonstrate the path the murder weapon had taken through the body. It ran from left to right, and was obvious enough that Chaloner wondered whether someone had made sure it had looked that way on purpose. He glanced at May and saw satisfaction stamped on his face, as if he had hoped someone would notice.
Bristol knelt by the corpse to assess the evidence for himself. He stood, and regarded the surgeon thoughtfully. ‘This means Willys was struck by a man who held a dagger in his left hand.’
‘Precisely,’ drawled Wiseman.
‘Heyden can use his left arm as well as his right,’ said May immediately. ‘I saw him in France once, fighting double-handed to fend off traitors.’
‘But he cannot do it at the moment,’ said Wiseman. He took Chaloner’s hand and demonstrated how the splint prevented him from holding the knife. ‘It is physically impossible for him to grip a blade with sufficient strength to deliver a killing blow, so he would have resorted to his right. Lord Bristol has already established the killer was left-handed, so Heyden cannot be the culprit.’
It was Bristol who asked the question that was uppermost in Chaloner’s mind. ‘Then who is?’
It was not every day the Court was treated to the spectacle of a murder and a man who knew how to interpret clues, and the guardhouse was quickly packed with people, all clamouring questions. Chaloner saw several familiar faces among the many he did not know. At the very back of the crowd were Johnson and Lisle. Lisle was beaming, delighted by his colleague’s clever performance, while Johnson glared sulkily, jealous of the adulation that was being heaped on his rival.
Next to the surgeons, Brodrick and Temple stood in a way that suggested they had arrived together. Chaloner wondered why, when they clearly detested each other, and hoped they had not been plotting. Lady Castlemaine stood near the front, but when she learned Bristol was not going to run anyone through, she pulled a face that registered disappointment, and shouldered her way outside again.
Eaffrey and Behn were there, too. Behn asked, in a loud voice intended to carry, whether Heyden could have hired a left-handed killer. Before Eaffrey could think of a response, the elderly equerry remarked that Behn was a silly young goat to make such a stupid statement. People started to laugh, and the question was forgotten. With a start of surprise, Chaloner recognised Scot’s pale eyes among the equerry’s maze of wrinkles, and smiled when his friend winked at him.
Meanwhile, Bristol and his party were still quizzing Wiseman about his deductions; the surgeon answered with a patronising haughtiness that was only just short of insolence. Bristol was quietly angry – not that he had been deprived of a suspect, but because he had been manoeuvred into accusing the wrong man and made to look rash and volatile. And May was livid because Chaloner had been exonerated.
Chaloner listened to people’s comments, questions and observations, carefully analysing them in the light of what he had heard and seen himself. It was clear someone had either taken advantage of the incident with the horse, or had engineered it to provide a diversion. If the latter was true, then it had worked brilliantly: all the guards had raced outside, leaving ample opportunity for the killer to do his work. Chaloner had heard voices, which told him Willys had conversed with his killer, and Wiseman’s evidence indicated that Willys clearly had not thought he was in danger, or he would not have allowed himself to have been stabbed from behind. The thump had been Willys’s body falling to the floor, and then the murderer had calmly walked away, leaving Chaloner sitting in the cell next door as the prime suspect for the crime.
So, who had knifed Willys and, perhaps more importantly, why? Was it someone who wanted Clarendon’s faction accused of murder, to bring the Earl himself into disrepute? It was certainly the kind of ill-conceived stratagem Temple liked to concoct. Then there was May, delighted with Chaloner’s predicament, and deeply disappointed when Wiseman had exculpated him. Could May have returned to the guardhouse after he had been released? And finally, there was Holles, who always claimed to be the Earl’s man, but who nevertheless had been oddly willing to believe Chaloner’s guilt. It was also Holles who had overlooked the dagger in Chaloner’s boot, which had then later been produced as evidence against him. Had the colonel intended that to happen? Chaloner had considered him an ally, but in the shifting sands of White Hall allegiances, he suddenly found he was not so sure.
Clarendon arrived at last, breathless and elbowing his way through the courtiers to reach his spy. ‘I have only just been told what has happened. Holles swears he sent a servant with a message, but it never arrived and now the fellow is nowhere to be found.’
‘Is that so,’ said Chaloner flatly.
‘You should not have challenged Willys and May to a fight,’ chided the Earl. ‘Thurloe will blame me if you die, and you were reckless to endanger yourself. Did you kill Willys, by the way? I shall not be angry if you did. He was an odious fellow, always trying to damage me.’
‘No, I did not,’ said Chaloner firmly, determined to quash any lingering doubts along those lines. ‘I did not even know he was in danger.’
‘You will have to unveil the culprit, Heyden, or May will avenge Willys by sliding a sly dagger into your ribs. Do you think you can solve the mystery?’
‘I will try,’ said Chaloner unhappily. He did not see how he would succeed – although he understood how the killer had claimed his victim, learning his identity was another matter altogether.
He washed the paint and powder from his face – there was no point in maintaining the disguise now – and left the guardhouse. Outside, folk still milled about. Alice and Temple were with Johnson, and their serious faces suggested business was being transacted. When Chaloner eased closer, to hear what they were saying, Alice hauled the two men away, but she was not quite quick enough to prevent him from learning that Johnson had placed a hundred pounds at Temple’s disposal. It was to be invested with the new owner of Webb’s ship. Chaloner looked around, and saw Behn standing nearby. The Brandenburger’s smile of satisfaction indicated that Temple was operating on his behalf, and Chaloner found himself hoping with all his heart that the ship would flounder before it could reap its grim cargo – and that they would both lose every penny they had ploughed into the filthy venture.