Stately Homicide Read Free Page A

memories of the medieval Jew who had gone by the name of Jurnet of Angleby 1 – ‘and so was he, wasn’t he?’ Jurnet jerked his head at the picture. ‘Queen’s brother. You can’t be more English than that.’
    â€˜That’s just where you’re wrong, then!’ Percy Toller smiled with the complacency of superior knowledge. ‘Half the queens of England – intending no disrespect, of course – frogs an’ dagoes, the lot of ’em. Not that this bloke was. English as roast beef, for all his looks. And Anne Boleyn, his sister, the same. She may have looked like bring on the castanets, but she weren’t only English, she was Norfolk, and you can’t say more English ’n that.’
    â€˜Fat lot of good it did her.’
    â€˜Lost her nob, you mean? I don’t know –’ The little man pondered judiciously: ‘I sometimes think they must have looked at things different in the olden times. I mean, nowadays, every time we step out of doors, who’s to say we won’t be run over by some ruddy juggernaut? Yet it don’t mean we stay in for ever, do it, on the chance it might happen. An’ every time we fly to Benidorm, how are we to know there’s not a bomb in the luggage compartment ready to go off an’ sprinkle us over the Costa Brava like cheese on a plate of spaghetti? It’s been done. But that don’t stop us booking up for next year the minute we take down the mistletoe.
    In olden days, I reckon, the only difference was that instead of lorries and bombs, it was plagues and having your head cut off. What I mean is, there’s always something. I reckon Anne Boleyn, knowing what that bugger Henry the Eighth was like, didn’t have to be told what she could be letting herself in for. And I reckon, give her a second chance, and she’d ’a’ done the same thing all over again. I mean, to be a queen, that’s something, even if you do end up with your head tucked underneath your arm.’
    Jurnet smiled at the little man, so spry in his light blue slacks, white shirt, and nautical blazer with a handkerchief folded carefully into the breast pocket. It was the first time the detective ever remembered enjoying a history lesson. He hoped the Open University appreciated what a treasure it had netted.
    He looked again at the portrait of George Bullen.
    â€˜ He didn’t do badly out of it, at least, if this place is anything to go by.’
    â€˜Executed 17th May, 1536,’ Percy Toller announced with unction. ‘Accused of carrying on carnally with his sister, if you’ll excuse the expression. His own sister – imagine! And her queen of England!’
    â€˜Anything in it?’
    â€˜Load of codswallop!’ The little man spoke with the certainty of one in the know. ‘Bad enough Henry give ’em both the chop, he didn’t have to go blacking their characters into the bargain!’ Abashed by his own vehemence: ‘Sorry, Mr Jurnet. It’s just that, looking as he does, so much like you, an old friend as you might say, it always churns me up to think of it.’
    â€˜Remind me to come to you for a reference next time I need one.’ Jurnet lingered, reluctant to break off human contact and move on from the vast, panelled Library to more rooms, more possessions, more yawns. ‘Bullen Hall been in the family ever since, then?’
    â€˜Ever since Queen Elizabeth. Now, there was a woman! Henry grabbed the estate, like he grabbed everything else he could get his paws on, but Lizzy, she had a soft spot for her ma’s family, and she give it back, to a man called Ambrose Appleyard that everyone knew was George Bullen’s son really, and so the queen’s first cousin, even if it was on the wrong side of the blanket. And Appleyards ha’ been at Bullen Hall ever since. Young Istvan Appleyard – Steve, that is, to his pals –’ the