53

Monday 22nd April

Sage flattened her hand against the heavy wooden door of the vicarage, banging again with some force, until her palm was stinging.

‘Please be there, please…’

A light yellowed the semi-circular window above the door, and she could hear Nick calling. ‘I’m coming, I’m coming.’ The door was pulled open so fast she stumbled forward a step.

She was only conscious of his arms reaching for her, pulling her against him, his warmth and strength. ‘Oh, thank God you were here,’ she said, into his chest.

‘Are you— you’re frozen. Sage, come in.’

‘I’m all right, I’m just cold.’ She shut the door behind her. ‘Is the phone on? I mean, have you had any calls?’

‘Not one. For two days.’

A noise from the darkened living room made her jump. ‘Who’s that?’ she asked, grabbing his dressing gown with both hands.

‘It’s Felix, he’s staying here. He wants to find out more about the carvings in the well.’ Nick reached for her again, deliberately, and she rested her forehead against his shoulder. His smell was already familiar, somewhere between his spicy soap and fresh bread, with a hint of minty toothpaste. ‘What happened?’

‘I think…’ It seemed less threatening at a safe distance. ‘I think someone’s been in my flat.’

Felix walked into the hall. ‘Are you all right?’

Sage nodded but couldn’t get the words out.

Nick guided her into the living room to sit on the sofa, still warm from Felix’s body. Sage pulled off her gloves; her hands were still tingling with cold.

‘You’re shaking.’ Felix draped a blanket around her shoulders.

‘It’s adrenaline,’ she said. ‘I realised… I think someone was in my flat, reading my letters, moving things around. I think it might have been Marcus. The baby’s father,’ she added to Felix. When Nick sat beside her she huddled into him. ‘He could have made a copy of the key.’

Felix sat in an armchair opposite her, his hands clasped between his knees. ‘Try and engage your objective head for a moment. When did you realise something was different?’

She thought about it, feeling Nick’s warmth creeping into her. His hand stroked her back, curving over her ribs and down her spine. She had to shake off the spell he was weaving.

‘I was so tired when I came in I fell asleep on the settee. When I woke up I realised something wasn’t right. I know how I left things this morning. A letter had been opened, and my pregnancy notes and diary looked like they’d been read.’ She struggled at the idea. ‘Things were just different. I’m not a very tidy person.’ She sighed as her body relaxed. ‘He might have read that note you wrote me, Nick. Maybe he’s been following me since we broke up. He might even have made those phone calls to you. Although I didn’t recognise the voice, I’ve never heard Marcus shout and the voice was so strained. And the police… God, I told them he’d talked to Steph.’

‘He could have disguised his voice, we know that.’ Nick squeezed her around the waist. ‘And the note was innocent enough.’

Felix frowned. ‘So the calls to Nick could be from someone who’s obsessed with you? There are weird parallels here.’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘Obsession is a motive for stalking, even murder. Maybe enough for someone to take Isabeau’s baby.’

That triggered some memory of Sage’s visit to the manor. She rummaged in her abandoned bag, snatched up out of habit when she fled the flat. She turned her tablet on. ‘I was shown a picture of Solomon Seabourne at the manor. I took a picture.’ She found the image, and held it out for Felix and Nick to look at, pointing at the caption. ‘Caeca invidia est. Jealousy is blind. It may have been done as a gift for Viola, since it’s still at the manor.’

The men leaned over the image. ‘Jealousy,’ Nick said slowly. ‘Is that what’s causing the phone calls, someone being in your flat?’

‘And the doll,’ Felix said. ‘If it was designed to frighten you, it worked. It’s a powerful motive.’

‘I mean, if Marcus could be stalking me because he wants me back, it means he’s irrational.’ Sage shook her head. ‘I don’t even want to think about it. I have to change my locks.’ She rested back against Nick. ‘Is it possible that this Agness wanted Seabourne? I mean, was she stalking him, and mad with jealousy at Isabeau?’

Felix nodded slowly. ‘Maybe she was. It would give a motive to the brutality done to Isabeau, if she took the baby.’

‘Jealousy: who was jealous of whom?’ Nick studied the image. ‘He was engaged to Viola. Surely if Agness was obsessed with anyone it would be her, not Isabeau.’

‘Isabeau was pregnant by someone, we know that.’ Felix held her gaze, his eyes dark green in the low light. ‘Terrible violence was done to that young woman. We can’t be sure who the father was, but maybe if Agness believed it was Seabourne she could have attacked Isabeau for the baby.’

She frowned. ‘Even if Isabeau was targeted because it was Seabourne’s child, wouldn’t he have arranged a Christian burial for the mother of his child rather than putting her in the woods?’

‘Not just any burial,’ Felix said. ‘She was covered in gold embroidery and gemstones.’

Nick put one arm around her as he sat back. ‘She was denied a Christian burial but she was recognised. You said she was buried in an expensive dress. A headstone, the bells in the church, the rosary. If she was a Catholic, she might have been denied a church burial.’

Sage snuggled into him for warmth, feeling the baby wriggle inside her. ‘Attacking a pregnant woman… I don’t even want to imagine it.’

‘I’ve looked up a few recent cases,’ Felix said. ‘Imagine a woman is obsessed with a man who isn’t interested in her. She believes that he’s secretly in love with her, everything he does confirms that. Most cases of foetal abduction involve erotomania: the sort of obsession that stalkers have, that overrides normal emotions.’ He grimaced. ‘The sort that leads them to do violent, terrible things like steal a baby.’

Sage touched her belly softly. ‘But killing a woman to steal a child?’ She shivered. ‘I suppose that is the extreme of obsession.’ She thought of Steph but couldn’t frame the words. She couldn’t believe Marcus would hurt anyone, but she couldn’t think of anyone else who had access to her flat. Her thoughts seemed to spin around in circles.

Felix continued. ‘Some women believe that their rival’s baby actually belongs to them, or that they would be a better mother than the biological mother. Obviously, we don’t know the sort of cultural influences in the 1500s. It could be a class thing or a religious dispute.’

Sage settled into the curve of Nick’s arm. ‘This is all speculation. We don’t know it was Agness, or that it was Seabourne’s baby.’

‘It was.’ Felix reached in his bag and took out a booklet: the book of letters between Viola and Seabourne republished by the historical society. ‘I don’t know if you’ve read this yet, but there are hints in the letters that survive – the originals, not the translations.’ He started to read. ‘Listen to this, from Viola to Solomon: “I grieve that your son is lost, but agree that darkness should lie undisturbed.” Is she talking about the grave of Solomon’s child and the woman who took him, in the well?’

‘She did say “your child”,’ Sage said.

‘“Your son is lost”, she says. I suppose the well would have been very difficult to excavate to get the woman and child out again.’ He turned over the booklet, looking at the reproduced portrait of Viola on the cover. ‘Am I the only one who’s impressed by this girl? She was a teenager when she wrote this letter.’

Sage squinted at the antique clock, its hands in shade. ‘Is it really one o’clock?’

Nick heaved himself off the sofa. ‘Ten past. We’ve got a busy day tomorrow.’

‘Oh?’ She took the hand proffered and let Nick pull her to her feet.

‘Felix wants to look at the county records, maybe find some more background on them all. And you’re staying here. Tomorrow we’ll go back to your flat and sort it out. We’ll get the locks changed and you can talk to the police.’

Sage managed a half-laugh. ‘I don’t want to go back.’

‘You can’t stay there. If this Marcus is stalking you, he may be dangerous.’

Even thinking of Marcus as a stalker didn’t make sense; he had always been so genial. When he was getting his own way, an inner voice whispered. And she remembered the pale face down the well. Someone had pushed Steph to her death. ‘And to you. You were the one getting the threatening phone calls, remember?’

‘So stay here to protect me, then.’ Nick smiled, and turned to Felix. ‘Night, Felix.’

Felix smiled at the two of them. ‘Go to bed, children.’

Sage found herself pushed up the stairs by Nick. He paused at the door to what was clearly his bedroom. ‘Do you want the spare room?’

‘No.’ She kissed him quickly. ‘I’m too tired and cold and spooked to sleep alone.’

He smiled, and ran a thumb down the side of her face. ‘Me too.’