Revelation

'No. She's all right. But she has a Master Bealknap in her lodgings. He collapsed on her doorstep. Margaret says he's at death's door.'

'Bealknap?' I asked incredulously. 'But he barely knows Dorothy.'

'That was the message, sir. It came half an hour ago. Margaret asked you to go over there as soon as you returned.'

'I'll go now.'

I opened the door and hurried back down the path, walking rapidly round to Lincoln's Inn, where candles were being lit in the windows as darkness fell. Margaret let me in, her plump face anxious.

'What is going on?' I asked.

'I heard a knocking at the door early this afternoon, sir, and when I answered I found this man in a barrister's robe collapsed on the doorstep. The mistress got the cook to put him to bed. He said you knew him—'

'I'm in here,' Dorothy called from the parlour.

'I'd better go back to him, sir,' Margaret said. 'He's in a bad way.' She hurried away with a rustle of skirts. I went into the parlour, where Dorothy was standing by the fire, studying the discoloured section of the wooden frieze.

'I must get this section redone. It was so poorly repaired, it irritates me now I spend so much time sitting here.' Her face was pale, and I sensed she was making an effort to stay calm. 'Thank you for coming, Matthew.'

'What has happened? Why is Bealknap here?'

'Margaret found him collapsed on the doorstep. Asking for help. She called me. He was lying there white as a sheet, gasping for air.' There was a slight tremble in her voice. I realized the sight must have brought back the memory of Roger, lying by the fountain. Damn Bealknap, I thought.

'Margaret said you've put him to bed.'

She spread her hands. 'What else could I do? He said he was dying, asked for my help. Though I barely knew him, and liked him no better than you did.'

'He knew a woman would not turn him away.' I frowned. 'I will go and deal with him.'

'Matthew,' Dorothy said quietly. 'Do not be too harsh. I think he is very ill.'

'We'll see.'

THEY HAD PUT Bealknap in a bedroom; from the schoolboy-sized tennis racquet on a wooden chest I guessed it was Samuel's old room. Margaret was leaning over the bed, trying to get Bealknap to drink something from a cup. He lay in the bed in his shirt. I was shocked by how bad he looked, his face against the pillows as pale as death in the light of the candle on the bedside table. He was conscious, though; he stared at me with wild, terrified eyes.

Margaret turned to me. She looked distressed. She, too, had seen Roger's corpse. 'I'm trying to get him to drink some weak beer,' she said.

'Leave us,' I said gently.

She put down the cup and left the room. I looked down at Bealknap. It was a strange thing to see him so close up, and so helpless. His disordered yellow hair was thinning, a large bald patch at the crown. Some of the drink Margaret had given him had spilled around his mouth. He looked utterly helpless, and his frantic stare showed he knew it.

'Why have you come here?' I asked quietly. 'You know what this household has suffered.'

'I knew — Mistress Elliard — was still here.' His voice was faint, his breath rasping. 'I knew she was kind. I have — no one else — to help me.'

'Anyone would help a fellow barrister in a state of collapse.'

'Not me. Everyone hates me.' He sighed, closed his eyes for a moment. 'I am finished, Shardlake. I cannot eat, the food just passes through me. Dr Archer said the last purge would wear off, but it has not. And I bleed sometimes, I bleed down there.'

I sighed. 'I will arrange for Dr Malton to come and see you here.'

'I think it is too late. My vision blurs, I feel faint all the time.' With a great effort, he pulled a skinny hand from beneath the covers and grasped my wrist. I tried not to flinch at the unexpected gesture. 'I have never believed in God,' he whispered, still fixing me with his agonized gaze. 'Not since I was a child. The world is a battleground, predators and prey. The rules and conventions of the law only disguise the fact. But now I am frightened. The Catholics say if you confess your sins and repent at the end, God will receive you into Heaven. I need a priest, one of the old type.'

I took a deep breath. 'I will have Dr Malton fetched now, and he may know a priest who will confess you. But I think, Bealknap, with proper treatment you may come round. I will send Margaret back in.' I tried to rise, but he still held me fast by the wrist, his grip surprisingly strong.

'You believe, don't you?' he asked.

I hesitated. 'I have no — certainty. I have not had for some time.'

He looked surprised. 'I always thought you did. All your concern for rules and ethics, the way you always looked down on me, I thought you were one of the godly folk.'

'No.'

'Then why help me now? When you hate me? I have done some hard things to you. Because you looked down on me as though I were a louse, not a man.' A brief flash of anger in the pale eyes.

'You are still a fellow human being.'

Bealknap seemed to think for a moment. He bit his lip, showing long yellow teeth. Then he said, 'The priest may not come — in time. At least I can tell you about one sin, tell you what I did. Though I do not know why he asked—'

'What do you mean, Bealknap? You are making no sense.'

He closed his eyes. 'Near two weeks ago. After you lost me the case involving that marsh cottar. The next day a man called at my Chambers. His name is Colin Felday.' He paused for breath. 'He is a solicitor, he hangs around the Westminster Sanctuary looking for clients and I am one of the barristers he brings them to. Not a — respectable man, one of those you would disapprove of.' He tried to laugh, but the cracking sound turned into a cough. He opened his eyes again, full of fear and pain. 'He said he had a client who would pay good money for information I could give him about you.'

'What sort of information?'

'Anything I could give. About your work habits, where you lived. Even about what sort of man you were. About your man Barak. I told him you were a starchy prig, bitter about your fate as a hunchback. I said you were a persistent lawyer. Like a damned terrier dog. And no fool.' He tried to laugh again. 'Oh, no, never that.'

I stared down at him. This was the killer, it must be. This was how he had found out about me; this solicitor had perhaps written to Roger at his instruction. 'Who is Felday's client?' I asked sharply. 'What is his name?'

'He said he could not tell me that. Only that he wished you no good. That was enough for me.' His eyes were full of anger now. This might be a confession, but I saw there was no real contrition. Only terrible fear at the prospect of death.

'I think Felday's client has killed five people,' I said. 'I have been hunting him. And he has been hunting me. He sliced my arm open, and hurt Barak's wife badly.'

Bealknap's eyes slid away. 'I didn't know that. No one can blame me for that.' I smiled wryly at the reappearance of the old Bealknap; somehow I knew then he would survive.

'Where does Felday live?' I asked.

'Some cheap lodgings by the cathedral. Addle Hill.'

'I will have Guy fetched here,' I said quietly. 'And I will ask about a priest.' Bealknap nodded weakly, but did not open his eyes. His confession had exhausted him, or perhaps he could not meet my eye now. I left him, closing the door quietly behind me.

DOROTHY WAS sitting in her chair by the fire, Margaret on a stool opposite her. They both looked drained. 'Margaret,' I said. 'Could you bear to go back and sit with him? I think if he gets some liquid into him that would be good.'

'Is he going to die?' Dorothy asked bluntly after Margaret left the room.

'I do not know. He thinks he is. I am going to have Guy fetched here. Bealknap wants a priest too, one who can confess him.'

She gave a mirthless laugh. 'Bealknap never struck me as a believer in the old ways. Or in anything save lining his pockets.'