King Richard's Bones Read online

  KING RICHARD’S BONES

  Elizabeth Aston

  Chapter 1

  “Here we go again,” said the Controller. “Of all our charges, you have to let Richard III escape. Again.”

  She had summoned the head of the Directorate of Unruly Spirits (Terrestial) Section 16c/England, and was giving him a grilling. Since she had been trained by the Dominicans, this wasn’t a happy experience for him.

  “Every time he goes back to Earth, he causes trouble.”

  The Director had taken the precaution of taking a quick look at the records before he met the Controller. “Last time wasn’t the problem,” he said morosely. “Henry VIII was the real problem.”

  “As were his dealings with Elizabeth, with Cromwell, and with Pitt the Younger. At least then we knew where he was, but this time you’ve been incompetent with his tagging and you’ve lost him. With the recent news, Unruly Spirits should have been on high alert.”

  “There was no reason at all to think that he would break out like this.”

  “On the contrary, there was every reason to think so. The moment his bones were dug up, you should have known there was going to be trouble.”

  “I explained the situation with regard to his bones to him, in a perfectly reasonable way.”

  “Clearly not.”

  “He isn’t an easy subject to deal with.”

  “He’s not a subject, he’s an anointed king.”

  Chapter 2

  “Who are you?”

  Sam blinked, rubbed his eyes and looked again at the stranger standing in front of him. Short, with dark, intense, melancholy eyes. Wearing a classy suit; what the hell was this guy doing here, in Leicester, in the security room?

  It was Sam’s job to keep the site safe and make sure there were no intruders, but what kind of an intruder turned up in the middle of the night, as if out of nowhere?

  The man replied, “That’s a incivil way to start a conversation, with a question.”

  “It’s not a question, it’s a challenge. You shouldn’t be here. How did you get in? This is a restricted area, no one is allowed on site without a pass, and no one at all is allowed in at night, let alone into the security room. You don’t have a pass, do you? You don’t work here, you haven’t come back for something you’ve forgotten or anything like that?”

  “No, I don’t work here, but I can see you do.”

  “I’m a security guard.”

  “What is there to guard?”

  Sam shrugged. “Good question. A pile of bones, as it happens.”

  “Do they need guarding?”

  “Yes, some crazy group has threatened to kidnap them and so they’ve laid on extra security. They’re a king’s bones.”

  “Bones of a dead king, one supposes.”

  “Of course of a dead king. Otherwise his bones wouldn’t be here.”

  “With the wonders of modern science, anything is possible.”

  Sam shook himself. How had he got through the door, which was locked?

  “How did you get in here?”

  “You do ask a lot of questions. I just dropped in.”

  “Well, you’ll have to drop out again, or I’ll call the control centre. These are restricted premises.”

  There was something about this unwanted visitor that perturbed him. And the suit puzzled him. People who worked here never wore suits; jeans and jackets were the standard uniform. He had an authoritative look to him. Could he be from the security company, checking up on him? In which case he might have a key, and so have been able to let himself in. Yet the door to the cabin had a loud squeak, how could he have opened it without his noticing?

  The man’s dark and penetrating eyes were fixed on Sam’s face, and he shifted in his chair. “Please go,” Sam said. “If you’ve come to check up on me, here I am. Nothing to report.” He waved a hand toward the monitors–

  –and froze. They were black, with strange, zigzag lights flashing across them. What a time to have a malfunction. He tapped the keyboard, but it made no difference.

  “Do you need those on?” the man asked. “It seems more convenient to turn them off for the moment. Of course, they will not record my presence here.”

  As he spoke, he seemed to fade, until he was little more than a pale shadow

  Sam shook himself. Was he asleep and dreaming? Had the night watching caught up with him and disturbed his senses? Hallucinating? Was he losing his wits? Do some arithmetic, he told himself. He added up the figures of today’s date and divided it by seven, no problem.

  Right, time to alert central control that something was up. He touched the alarm key. That would send a signal through to the security headquarters who would immediately get back to him and then they could deal with the situation.

  Nothing happened.

  The shadowy figure was taking on a solid shape once more. “I’m afraid everything electronic is suspended.”

  “You’ve turned the power off.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Please just go away,” Sam was raising his voice now. “Whoever you are, just go away, or I’m going to be in deep trouble. Go out the same way you came in, okay?”

  “Keep calm, haven’t you ever seen a ghost before?”

  “A ghost?” The man was clearly deranged. Humour him. “You mean you’re dead?”

  “Exactly.”

  “So who do you think you are?”

  “I am the spirit of Richard III.”

  “The king they dug up in the car park? The one whose bones I’m supposed to be guarding?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re here for a nice haunt?”

  “I’m paying a visit to this Earthly realm to reclaim my bones.”

  Chapter 3

  The news that his long-lost grave had been found and his bones uncovered had been passed on to Richard in a whisper by Section 16c’s Librarian. He was an anarchic soul who was happy to let the king secretly watch the screens with which he documented what was happening in the Earthly world.

  “Such a relief they now have television, so much easier than when we had to send out the Recorders,” he said as he leaned over to press the replay button.

  Richard watched the press conference and the triumphant announcement of the discovery of his grave and his bones. Then the Librarian told him an unholy scheme had been hatched to re-inter his bones in Leicester Cathedral.

  Leicester Cathedral? No, that was too much. He hadn’t gone to all that trouble, slipping out of the Department to feed silent information into the minds of Ricardians and archaeologists, only to have to stay for ever in Leicester. He’d said quite clearly he wanted to be buried in York. And now these people presumed to say that his kingly remains should lie in Leicester for eternity–not that any of them believed in eternity. That was the problem.

  Reburied with a multi-faith service, forsooth, whatever that might be.

  You’d think these present day Englishmen and women would pay some attention to his own desire to be buried in York. He was a prince of York, he was a northerner through and through. Where else should his mortal remains spend their eternal rest?

  But oh, no, these modern clerks, like all such people across the centuries, thought they knew best, and they had decided that Leicester was the place for him. As if he had any connection with Leicester whatsoever except that he had been murdered nearby.

  Would they do that to one of their own citizens, insist that the victim of some savage murder must be buried close to the place of his or her death? They would not.

  The Librarian had told him th
at there were organisations and indeed distant descendants of his own family who were protesting vehemently about the proposed reburial in Leicester. “Unusual for a dead king to arouse so much emotion,” he’d said.

  Richard had gone to the Director, but his just objections to this dismal plan received short shrift. Richard had long suspected the Director of being a Tudor admirer; Henry VII’s tight-fisted rule by bureaucracy and terror would appeal to him.

  “There is a religious principle here,” Richard pointed out. “You aren’t allowed to ignore that.”

  The Director regarded him with animosity. Richard had been given too much leeway, in his opinion, and it annoyed him that he knew more about the rules and regulations of the Department than most of the officials who worked there. Kings were bad enough; intelligent, well-informed kings were a disaster.

  Richard said, “The cathedral where they plan to lay my bones wasn’t built when I was alive, let alone consecrated.”

  “It’s a Christian building. You know perfectly well that England has long been a Protestant country. You have to put up with what’s on offer.”

  “I do not. I’m a Catholic king, and I’m entitled to a burial in properly consecrated ground.”

  “You don’t understand present day realities. Everything is very ecumenical now, and it’s up to the university and city authorities to decide. And anyhow, it’s only your bones, it’s not as though your immortal soul will reside in Leicester.”

  “Thank God for that,” said Richard, piously crossing himself.

  “So I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do about your request. As you know, we can’t interfere with mundane matters, and as far as the Section is concerned, when your bones are laid to rest once more in a Christian establishment, then there will be no need for you to remain here. We shall hand you over into the care of your Case Worker and that will be that.” The prospect seemed to give him considerable satisfaction. He added, meanly, “In any event, it’ll be better than the car park.”

  Time to hatch a plan. He had justice on his side, and could take his case up all the way up to Cassiel, who had the ultimate responsibility for kings. Only they’d make sure there were plenty of obstacles in his way. Better to circumvent the bureaucrats and take matters into his own hands. His bones needed to be laid in York, in holy ground, to await the final day of resurrection and judgement.

  There was no way, when the Last Trump sounded, that he was going to jump out of some hole in the wall – or wherever they chose to put him – in Leicester.

  Chapter 4

  This guy really was delusional. Unless…after all, the reason Sam was on security duty was because some nutters had threatened to steal the bones, claiming they shouldn’t be reburied in Leicester. What a fuss about nothing, who cared what happened to your remains when you were dead and gone?

  “So tell me, what’s it like to be a king?” he asked. What a stupid question. He went on hastily, as a random quotation came into his head, “Let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings.”

  “Shakespeare,” the man said, sounding rather irritable. “And that comes in Richard II. He got a much better press from Shakespeare than I did. I’ve a bone or two to pick with Shakespeare if I ever meet up with him.”

  He winced as he said the word bone, and Sam thought he’d better change the subject. “So you’ve been around here for a few centuries?”

  When had Richard III been king? Sam couldn’t remember, but it was a long time ago.

  “I died in 1485.”

  Sam wished the man would sit down, if he wasn’t going to go.

  The thought was hardly in his mind when Richard obligingly sat down.

  “Did you just read my mind?”

  Richard gave a slight bow,

  “Anyhow, I don’t want you looming over me, whoever you may be.”

  “I could hardly loom, you must be a head taller than I am.”

  That was perfectly true, the man was a slight individual, certainly a good few inches shorter than Sam, who was himself not that tall. “It’s not so much the height, it’s something about you that makes me feel uncomfortable when you’re standing there.”

  “In my day, no one sat in the presence of a king. Not if they valued their skin. I suppose times have changed.”

  “I suppose so,” Sam said, and then remembered the episode of West Wing when that woman hadn’t stood up for the President, and regretted it.

  Richard said, with real interest in his voice, “Tell me about yourself. You seem a young man of ability and intelligence. Why do you work as a guard?”

  “It’s just temporary work. I’m a student, a music student. I do this kind of work in the vacation, to earn some cash. My dad’s a policeman, and he helped me get work.”

  “A musician? An admirable calling. I myself was fond of music. When I had the time for it.”

  Sam wondered how a mediaeval king spent his days. Biffing people, executing them, passing fiendish laws, throwing peasants on the fire and carousing, he supposed, and then he brought himself up short. He wasn’t going to buy into this tale.

  “You say your father is a policeman, so you don’t come from a musician’s family? It is often a gift passed down through the generations.”

  “My mum plays the piano. She taught me. It turned out I had a good ear and so I became a cathedral chorister, that’s what started me off really. Now I play the cello.”

  “The violoncello? A most pleasing instrument, although not one that existed in my day. Is that it there in the corner?” He gestured toward the cello case propped up in a corner of the office. “Perhaps you could play for me, I am fond of music.”

  “It’s just an empty case, it’s a new one that I’m taking back with me when I finish here.”

  “A pity. So, you were a boy singer? Where did you sing?”

  “York Minster.”

  The man appeared quite delighted. He gave Sam a smile of peculiar sweetness. “So you are a citizen of York, a man of Yorkshire, as I once was. But if you live in York, why are you here in Leicester?”

  “There’s been some kind of a flap, and they needed round-the-clock guards. They security firm I work for were short of people and asked if I’d be prepared to come here. It suits me okay, I’ve got a mate here I can kip with. But this is my last day, I have to be back in York tomorrow. I’m doing some coaching and a concert.”

  “You’re travelling to York tomorrow?” The man seemed even more delighted. “Then I have a favour to ask of you, you are the very helper I need.”

  Helper? What help did a ghost need?

  “I need help to remove my bones. I can’t move them myself, you see. Ghosts can materialise and wield influence and we have some powers – ike with these screens and cameras of yours – but I can’t so much as lift a pebble from the ground. Regulations, you see. So I’m paying a visit here to find a mortal who will help me.”

  “Help you? Are you joking? Listen, these days no one with half a brain believes in ghosts, not outside films and TV shows. Ghosts are things to scare kids at Halloween, and appear in stories you read aloud on dark nights to frighten your friends.”

  “If there were such things as ghosts, what would you expect them to do?”

  Sam thought for a moment, and then said “Banging, rattling, moaning and groaning. Oh, and it would get suddenly cold and I’d have a sense of dread.”

  As he finished speaking there came a banging sound from the outside of the cabin where he was sitting. The windows rattled.

  Sam laughed, “Lucky for you the wind got up just then.”

  The door burst open and then slammed shut again. A wind rushed through the inside of the cabin, sending the papers on the desk flying.

  As Sam reached out to retrieve them, he felt a blast of icy air. Then came a rustling and an eerie wail that sent a further shiver down his spine
.

  The man had vanished while all this was going on, but there his was again. “That kind of thing?” he enquired.

  Sam said doggedly, “It’s just a trick of the mind.”

  The visitor said nothing, but his dark eyes were amused.

  “All right,” Sam said. “Let’s go along with the fantasy. Suppose you are a ghost, what then? What are you doing here?”

  “I told you, I’ve come for my bones.”

  “You want to check out your skeleton. Bit creepy, but I can understand it. There you are, and there, tucked away in a drawer, are your bones.”

  “No, I haven’t come to check out my skeleton. I’ve come back to take my bones to York. They plan to bury them here in Leicester and I won’t have it.”

  “Isn’t this all very materialist? Doesn’t it mean you’re tied to this life if you’re worried about your bones?”

  “No such thing. I was buried in a hurry, my body just dumped in the ground unceremoniously by a bunch of frightened friars. No blame to them, they had the usurper’s hordes hunting everywhere so they could wreak a final vengeance on my mortal remains. But now they’ve uncovered my grave and plan to rebury me, I want them to lie in York and not in Leicester. There they can rest in peace until the Last Judgement.”

  The guy wasn’t only delusional, he was a religious nut.

  “Aren’t they planning to bury the bones in the cathedral here? What’s wrong with that? I mean if you’re a religious person, surely that’s all right? Lots better than a car park. Oh, wait a minute, I suppose you’re a Roman Catholic.”

  “I am Catholic, yes. Are you a Protestant?”

  “Church of England, so not anything, really.”

  “If you were a singing boy at a cathedral, raised by the church, you must believe in something.”

  “No way, not in the sense you mean. Nobody believes in anything much these days, we’re more rational now. I don’t believe in God and the afterlife, all that sort of thing. When you die, you stay dead.”