Sword and Song

by Roz Southey

  I added my signature, sealed the note and wrote Hugh’s direction on the front of the sheet, then went in search of a servant. It was a surprisingly difficult task; the footmen had all withdrawn, along with the dirty dishes, from the dining room, where two or three gentlemen were pondering the possibilities of a game of cards. Not a maid in sight, nor the butler. Finally, I spotted a footman crossing the hall; eighteen years old at most and a magnificent six feet tall. And whether because of his extra height, or a consciousness of my ambivalent position, he looked down on me with more than a touch of insolence.

  He took the note from me between forefinger and thumb as if it was dirty, assured me he’d find a messenger to send it off at once and waited, with unending patience, until I took the hint and dug in my pockets for a coin. His mouth twitched as he saw the slightness of my offering. I’d been here half a day and I was already aware I hadn’t brought enough money with me. And Heron had suggested the other guests had come here to save money! I daresay he himself would adhere rigidly to his customary policy of offering no vails to servants; his resultant unpopularity would bother him not at all.

  I went back, reluctantly, to the drawing room. It was plain when I got there that no one was in the mood for music. Too much had been drunk, and a great deal stronger than tea. Two gentlemen were openly snoring; the plump gentleman was wooing the red-headed woman who’d caught Alyson’s attention. Even Casper Fischer was flirting outrageously with one of the older ladies of the party. I wandered about the room aimlessly, inspecting pictures without seeing them, glancing out into the hall where the insolent footman was now conversing with Edward Alyson – our host had apparently decided after all that it was not polite to desert his guests.

  Of Claudius Heron there was no sign. Nor of Esther.

  I didn’t imagine they were together; they don’t particularly like each other. I wondered if either of them might be outside on the terrace. The windows in both drawing and dining rooms gave access on to the terrace; I pushed them open, and closed them quickly behind me as I saw one of the ladies shiver melodramatically.

  The setting sun was laying down bands of pearl-pink and green across the sky; above dark hulks of trees, the evening star glittered brightly. I leant on the terrace railings; below, the formal garden stretched away to a hint of gleaming water, and thence to shadowy woods and meadows against the translucent sky.

  Someone moved at the far end of the terrace. A blur of pale dress and paler hair. Esther Jerdoun.

  I hesitated, then walked towards her. She was holding a glass of wine; a cobweb-thin scarf thrown over her arms and shoulders protected her against the chills of the evening. She waited, silent and still, watching me, intimidating me.

  We stood, looking at each other. Then she moved suddenly, restlessly, looking away from me. “Mr Patterson.” Her tone was flat, expressionless.

  “Mrs Jerdoun.” The title is, of course, purely honorary; the lady is not married. Although she has made clear, in a way no lady would usually contemplate, that she would like to be. And I’d refused her. No, I’d done worse than that; I’d pretended not to understand, in order to avoid a confrontation.

  I’d been afraid I might lose the argument.

  We stared out at the darkening sky.

  “I have been talking with Claudius Heron,” she said at last. “He tells me the constable’s girl has been killed.”

  This was not the sort of subject any lady should know about. I should change the subject at once. I nodded. “She was killed by a customer.”

  “Women in her profession must run such risks almost daily,” she said with a trace of anger.

  “I don’t think it’s as bad as that,” I said. “They get beatings and rough treatment, yes. But not many are killed. Relative to their numbers, I mean.”

  That was hardly the point, I thought; such considerations would mean nothing to Bedwalters. For that matter, they meant nothing to me.

  We stood on the elegant terrace of the elegant, if old-fashioned, house, a woman of high social standing and wealth, and a young man of neither, contemplating the sunset. I was trying to think of an unexceptional topic of conversation and thought Esther must be doing the same. I should have known better. After a moment, she said, expressionlessly: “I take it you have not changed your mind.”

  I grimaced inwardly. But I knew I’d done the right thing; all I had to do now was stand by my decision. “No,” I said, and stared out into the darkness, realising that once again, despite my last rebuff, she’d summoned the courage to approach me and that, once again, I’d rejected her. Damn, damn, damn.

  She said nothing more. I heard her steady, even breathing in the silence of the twilight. From the drawing room behind us came the sudden splutter of laughter.

  “You must know why I think the way I do,” I said, despite myself. “You must know it’s impossible for us to – ”

  “I had not marked you down for a coward, Mr Patterson,” she said.

  I caught my breath. She knew, must know, how that accusation would rankle with any man. She was trying to provoke me. “I am not a rascal who’d destroy a lady’s reputation,” I retorted.

  “My reputation is my affair,” she said coldly.

  Another silence. A nightjar called; someone in the dining room dropped a glass with a crash.

  “There appears to be nothing more to be said,” Esther said.

  “No.”

  She did not move.

  Belatedly, I realised she expected me to go and leave her to her solitude. Despite everything, I did not wish to go, to move from her presence, to lose that tiny regular intake of breath, that delicate scent she wore, the rustle of her dress as she shifted slightly.

  I pushed myself away from the railing. “I – I do believe I shall go for a walk in the gardens,” I said as if we had been having the most innocuous of conversations. “Such a lovely night.”

  “Indeed,” she said emotionlessly, and stood aside to let me go down the steps to the garden below.

  The last light was sufficient to show me my way down the gravel walk. I strolled along, making a show of inspecting the bedraggled, overgrown flowerbeds, exhibiting my careless nonchalance should anyone be watching from the house. As I reached the middle of the garden, I cut across to the fountain sitting in the very centre and inspected its dry basin full of dead leaves. As I did so, I risked a glance back at the house. The drawing room was ablaze with light; I saw the multi-coloured backs of the ladies. Candles still burned in the windows of the dining room where the gentleman had settled down to their cards. Alyson was laughing with them as he dealt. Upstairs, two or three rooms seeped light from behind curtains.

  The terrace was empty.

  I walked on. Beyond the garden was a stretch of lawn, then an ornamental canal, gleaming brightly in the last of the daylight. The canal had once had stone walls but many of the stones had crumbled into the water and the banks looked slippery and dangerous. One or two patches of mud lingered, presumably from the last rains. A gentle slope led up to a stone bridge; I leant on the wide parapet and looked down into stagnant, weed-filled water. It stank.

  Beyond the bridge, a path led into a small wood. I pottered along it, through the gloomy trees, along a path broad and pale, brooding about Bedwalters and Nell and the murderer who had struck so coolly, so brutally. That glimpse I’d had of the world that ran alongside our own worried me – it always portended danger. But the murderer – the apprentice – must be miles from town by now – the chances were we would never know who he was.

  I came to the kitchen garden wall and a path that led towards the house on one side and the village road on the other; I stood and kicked at the earth of the path. This was no good. For all I knew the ladies were demanding to know where I was; I had a living to earn and had better go and earn it. I strode back through the wood.

  As I crossed the bridge over the canal, I realised more time had passed than I’d anticipated. The drawing room looked empty, and gloomy, most of the candles
snuffed out; I saw a female servant cross the window gathering up tea dishes. The dining room was well-lit still but apparently empty.

  I would not sleep. I knew that already. A strange bed is never particularly comfortable and there were too many mysteries to worry over, too much concern for Bedwalters and Nell. And as for Esther...

  I’d just put my foot to the bottom step up to the terrace when the last candle in the drawing room was blown out. I stood in sudden darkness for a moment, cursing – the dining room candles further along cast no light here. If I didn’t hurry, I was likely to find the servants had locked me out. I groped for the stone balustrade at the side of the steps –

  And felt warm flesh beneath my hand.

  The world slipped away from me in a burst of pain.

  7

  And the servants are insolent! I’d not have a single one of them in my house.

  [Letter from Retif de Vincennes, to his sister, Agnés, 18 June 1736]

  Voices eddied around me like water, an indistinct ebb and flow of words. Someone said in annoyance, “... but I wanted to talk about the woodland.” I tried to protest: no, I’d walked through the wood safely – I was attacked on the steps. A soothing voice murmured; a warm hand was heavy on my shoulder. Alyson said, “No, no, my dear Ridley. Poachers are much more exciting!” My head was briefly full of midnight skies and stars in another world.

  The hand pressed down on my shoulder. I prised open my eyes, winced at bright light and squeezed them shut again. Someone said: “He’s awake.”

  Candle flames flickered when I opened my eyes again. Blotches of darkness resolved themselves into gentlemen: the plump gentleman – he was the one who’d mentioned the woodland; the red-faced man who’d been too friendly with Esther; Claudius Heron, in shirt sleeves and waistcoat, looking at me with the oddest expression, a mixture of resignation and concern. His was the hand urging me to be still.

  Edward Alyson bent over me with a glass of brandy in his hand. “Drink this, Pattinson. It’ll make you feel better.”

  I doubted that. I doubted anything could take away the headache pounding behind my eyes. I struggled to sit up, clutching the pale back of the couch on which I lay. Leaving, I saw with horror, a vivid smear of blood.

  I felt for my head. My hand encountered a ridiculously large bandage wound round my temples.

  “You fell,” Alyson said, like a man encouraging a child to remember. “You misjudged the steps in the dark and tumbled down.”

  “They were slippery,” the plump gentleman – Ridley – grumbled. “We’ve had far too much rain recently.”

  I had not stumbled or slipped. I remembered putting my hand on top of someone else’s on the balustrade. I remembered a blow to my head. I started to say exactly that, but Heron intervened. “It was nothing of the sort,” he said curtly. “I know what I saw.” He glanced at me. “I heard a noise outside, looked out of my bedroom window and saw someone standing behind you. Not that I could tell who it was – it was too damned dark.”

  He overrode a faint suggestion of servant from Ridley. “Do servants generally go around hitting guests over the head?” He nodded at me. “I shouted to warn you but I was too late. Nevertheless, the fellow must have heard me – he took fright and ran. So I hurried down to rescue you.”

  That was embarrassing, I thought: to have to be rescued on my first night at a gentleman’s house. But Alyson was in high spirits, explaining to the others how he’d met Heron in the hall, as he came back from the library, and hurried out with him to help me. Belatedly, I saw a little pile of books on the table beside the sofa; Alyson must have been looking for bedtime reading, although, given his obvious affectionate relations with his wife, I was surprised he had time to read.

  “A pity it didn’t happen earlier,” Ridley said, as if I’d been inconsiderate. He rubbed his plump stomach. “If we’d still been playing cards in here, we’d have seen it all.”

  “Poachers!” Alyson said, with more gaiety than I appreciated. “They were hunting for my rabbits, saw Pattinson here, thought he might have a guinea or two in his pocket and went after him instead!” He grinned, like a little boy given a longed-for present. “This is exciting – London has nothing on this! Poachers, my God!”

  “So near the house?” Ridley said horrified.

  “Men like these are always daring,” Alyson said.

  “They didn’t dare in my day.”

  It was hot in the room. I lay back, sipping Alyson’s dreadful brandy, and let them argue. I could tell by Heron’s expression that the idea of thieving poachers didn’t convince him, but the only other possible reason for the attack was that it had some connection with Nell’s death. And that was no better than the poacher theory; what fool would travel seven miles out of Newcastle to attack me, particularly when it must be obvious I’d not the slightest idea who’d killed Nell?

  Unless... I toyed with the idea of one of the servants being the killer. They’d only arrived the day before Alyson, the day of the murder. Perhaps one of them was the villain? He’d killed Nell, hurried off to take up his new post, then been horrified to see me among the guests; he’d panicked, tried to get rid of me...

  It didn’t sound convincing. If I’d been a servant in that situation, I would simply have run.

  I surfaced from my thoughts to find that Heron, as usual, was taking charge. “Patterson will be a great deal better off in his room.”

  “Of course.” Alyson ushered his other guests out; they went grumbling. Heron took the brandy glass from my hand. He slung my arm around his shoulders, heaved me up. The room tilted alarmingly then steadied.

  “I’ll see Patterson to his room,” Heron said. “Don’t feel obliged to stay up, Alyson.”

  Alyson flushed. “I don’t neglect my guests!”

  I looked on as they stared each other out, and was tempted to grin. Alyson was very affable, and conscientious in his wish to be the complete host, but he didn’t have the casual assurance and confidence of Heron. Of course the latter was around forty years old, Alyson’s senior by nigh on twenty years, and it was inevitable he had greater authority, but it was clear that Alyson didn’t much like his ruthless display of it, or appreciate being dismissed in his own house.

  “If you’re recovered, Patterson,” Heron said. Not a question, an order. I smiled at Alyson, thanked him for his assistance, apologised for making so much trouble. At my side, Heron muttered with impatience. I thought him unfair – Alyson clearly meant well. I rather liked him.

  I submitted to Heron’s guidance; he took a firm grip on my elbow and steered me out of the room, picking up a nightlight from a table at the foot of the stairs. My head was clearing and I navigated the uneven steps and creaking landings without too much difficulty. All the same, I was glad to see my bed.

  Heron pushed me down on to it, looking about him with disdain in the faint candlelight. “I wouldn’t house a dog in a room this small.”

  I’d thought the room spacious; it was twice the size of my own lodgings and ten times more luxurious.

  “What happened?” Heron demanded. He set the candle on the bedside table, pushed it safely away from the edge.

  I eased myself against the pillows, outlined what little I could remember. “I think you probably saw more than I did. Didn’t you see his face at all?”

  He shook his head. “By the time I’d thrown up my window and called out, he was off. You were merely two blurs.”

  “But you recognised me.”

  “By your walk. And I knew you were in the gardens – I saw you strolling down towards the canal earlier.”

  “Poachers?” I asked meditatively.

  “Nonsense,” Heron said. “Not unless there is a particularly stupid breed of them in these parts. Poachers avoid all human contact on their expeditions.”

  “Then it must surely be someone connected with Nell and Bedwalters.”

  He strolled across to the nearest window, peered out. “That seems extremely unlikely.”

  �
��The servants are all new. Who knows what they might have got up to in Newcastle?”

  “Lawyer Armstrong hired them – he is a cautious man and would not accept anyone in the least dubious.”

  I was so tired I could have fallen asleep sitting up. “There’s one man no one knows – the American, Casper Fischer.”

  Heron let the curtain drop, leant against the wall. “Why should he kill a streetgirl? And he’s too old, surely. You told me the other girl saw an apprentice. Fischer is much too old to be mistaken for an apprentice.”

  “Then I’ve no ideas left,” I said in exasperation. My head was starting to thump again; the respite had been brief. “It must have been poachers after all – or a wandering vagabond intent on stealing what trifles he could find.”

  “Perhaps,” Heron said.

  He stood impassive and silent in the half-shadows of the room; I said awkwardly. “I haven’t thanked you properly for – rescuing me.”

  He pushed himself upright. “Perhaps, like Alyson, I feel starved of a little excitement.”

  I’d noticed before that he didn’t accept gratitude well. He added, “You will of course note that I have long ceased to urge you not to get involved in these matters.”

  I winced.

  “Exactly so,” he said. “I recognise futility when I encounter it. But I still think you should be careful, until we have at least some idea of what is going on here.”

  I stared into the candlelight. “I still think Nell’s murderer is long gone from the area. London, at least.”

  He nodded. “I’m inclined to agree.”

  He offered to help me undress and climb into bed properly but I was too tired to budge and declined. I was asleep almost before he was out of the door.

  I slept fitfully, plagued by the headache and hampered by the bandage round my head which prevented me from getting comfortable. At one point, I thought I heard the arrival of a carriage, the rattle of wheels on gravel, the muted greetings of servants. But sleep overwhelmed me again and when I woke, heavy and unrefreshed, I was inclined to think I’d been dreaming.