‘Actually, he sold it for a song, as it was too heavy to hang around anyone’s neck like his usual amulets. His dupes prefer the little angel texts — kimiyeh — sealed in silver cases that they can wear to ward off evil humours and illnesses. He did say this stone had the same miraculous properties.’
Falconer looked at what Saphira still held in her hands. ‘Heavy? That little thing?’
Saphira smiled and held the dark stone out for him to take.
He lifted it from her open palm. ‘Oh! I see what you mean.’
The smooth stone was heavier than it should have been. He swept aside the clutter on his table, and set it down. Only as big as the palm of his hand, from one angle it resembled a ship with curving prows at both ends, a cabin amidships and a small keel below. But then, as he walked around the table, it changed and became in his eyes a gliding bird, its curved wings outstretched like a swallow’s. The keel became the bird’s head and the cabin its tail. But he thought he saw that because of his own burning obsession. Falconer was consumed with a desire to solve the mystery of flight and to soar like a bird himself. He had got as far as building kites that he tossed off the tallest tower in Oxford — at Oseney Abbey. But when they plunged to earth and smashed, he decided not to risk his own life to one of them just yet.
‘Has it been worked by hand? Or is its shape natural?’
Saphira’s question caused Falconer to look closer at the stone. He could see some markings on its surface. He got out his eye-lenses and put them on his nose. Falconer was short-sighted and had been astonished when, a few years ago, an artisan had offered him these ground-down glass lenses to see through. He had first held them up to his eyes on a simple V-shaped frame. But now he had made his own frame with side hooks that went over his ears. He peered through the lenses at the marks.
‘Could these be Hebrew letters?’
He pointed them out to Saphira. Though he could read Hebrew himself, he wanted her confirmation. She leaned over the stone, her head close to his with a stray lock of red hair suddenly spilling out of her modest widow’s snood. She paled a little at what she saw. When she spoke her voice betrayed an uncertain note.
‘They may be. It looks like HaShem, meaning The Name. But Covele often paints signs on the stones he sells as talismans.’
She stood up, tucking the stray lock back in her snood. Falconer frowned, knowing the Jewish proscription on saying the name of God out loud.
‘Yes, but this is not painted on. It looks as if it is ingrained in the stone. Where did Covele get this, anyway? Did he say?’
‘From an old woman with a scarred face in Norwich. He remembers it clearly because, when he was in the town earlier this year, a sudden flash of lightning struck the main tower of the Christian church towards the north so hard that it sent stones flying in every direction. There was much gossip about what evil it might portend. So Covele left as soon as he could for fear of an attack on the Jews of the town. I believe the month was June. The old woman who sold it was happy to be rid of the stone because it carried with it stories of strange events — some of them not particularly welcome, though some had said it cured all evils. She had kept it for nearly forty years and said that no good had ever come of owning it. The old woman was so glad to be rid of it in the end that she sold it to Covele for next to nothing. I only bought it as a curiosity because I thought you might like to see if it contained those strange patterns inside it that you like to find in stones.’
Falconer tapped the dark stone with the metal hilt of a knife that lay on the table. It almost rang like a bell. ‘I don’t think this will shatter like those other stones. It sounds as if it is made of iron.’
Saphira took the knife and tapped it too. ‘The story that came with it from Norwich was that it had fallen from the sky already shaped as it is. But isn’t that just myth? It is not possible, surely?’
‘Don’t be so fast to pour scorn on the idea of sky-stones. Almost a hundred years ago Gervase of Canterbury wrote an account of five eyewitnesses who saw something odd where the moon stood in the sky. They spoke of a flaming torch, and fire, hot coals and sparks. Others have seen falling stars in the sky and even claimed to have found stones such as this. I can understand why the ancients venerated them.’
He pointed at the object now lying between them on his table. Suddenly, it seemed to both of them to have taken on a mysterious aura, which it formerly did not possess. Saphira felt a deep sense of foreboding and almost regretted bringing it to William’s attention.
‘Where is it?’
Sir Thomas winced at the petulant sound of the King’s voice. He turned to face Henry, a fixed and obsequious smile on his face.
‘Your Majesty?’
He feigned lack of knowledge of the matter to which Henry referred, when in reality he knew exactly what he meant. The King hobbled over to his chamberlain, leaning heavily on the stick he now needed to get about. He was sixty-five, but the years had not been kind to him. No longer robust, he surrounded himself with doctors and other quacks, who gave pronouncements on his every bowel movement. Which was not saying a great deal, as Henry, King of England, was constipated. He screwed up his face, and Sir Thomas was not sure whether it was in anger at being crossed or from trapped wind.
‘The stone, damn you. The stone.’
‘Sire, if I can draw you back to the matter in hand. We must pass judgement on these townspeople. They must be punished.’
Henry shook his head in frustration. It was true. He had journeyed all the way to Norwich because the mob had broken into the town’s priory and burned the church to the ground. What the cause of the riot had been now seemed to be unclear in most people’s minds, but the result had been unequivocal. Property had been destroyed and precious gold items stolen. The townsfolk of Norwich had to pay the price, and Henry would make sure they did. But he had not been in the town long when he had heard tales of a strange stone. Though its reputation for attracting evil had been revived by the lightning strike on the church, he had been drawn to it by the assertion that it could cure all ills. The information fitted well with other hints he had received from abroad about a magic sky-stone. The problem was, he had been here two weeks already, and he couldn’t find the stone. He was tired of the whole business.
‘That bolt of lightning foretold the truth, then. Evil in the form of a riot has followed in its footsteps. Who do we have in gaol right now?’
Dalyson fumbled among the papers that lay piled on his desk and extracted the relevant list. He made a quick calculation.
‘Thirty-four men and one woman, sire. They came to plead their case and were held at your pleasure.’
‘Then hang them all, and burn some, too. They will be the example for the others. You can extract monies from the rest to pay for their crime.’
Dalyson nodded and picked up his quill pen to note down the King’s justice. But the King had not finished. Twisting the seal ring that adorned the finger of his right hand, he piped up petulantly.
‘And find me the stone.’
Covele was furious. He had recently returned to Norwich in his usual guise of a travelling German Jew, with a pileum cornutum — a spiked straw hat — on his head, only to find that everyone was looking for the sky-stone. He had sold it to that red-headed woman in Oxford, knowing her lover was fond of curiosities. And he had made a tidy profit on it, too, bearing in mind it had then seemed worthless. Now it was said the King himself desired it. His luck seemed to have been cursed ever since crossing paths with Saphira Le Veske and William Falconer. For it now looked as though he needed to turn right around and walk all the way back to Oxford again, to find a way of wheedling the sky-stone out of those two. But first he needed to rest, and he sent out his son, Hak, to perform two errands. One was to let it be known that he had the sky-stone — a little lie, but one he would rectify soon enough. The other was to fetch some food from the widow living down the lane from his lodgings.