“Indeed, she got with child.”
Patch groaned. “Sos, what happened then?”
“When the prioress pressed her to disclose the identity of the father, she kept our secret. She used her knowledge of the prioress’s spending as leverage.”
“She blackmailed the prioress?” said Patch.
The monk ignored Patch. “Jane had the child. Of course, she could not keep it. The prioress placed the baby in a loving home and life returned to its routine.
“When the commissioner and auditors of Augmentations visited Davington, they saw little of value beyond the small land holding and buildings which could be stripped, torn down, and sold off to a wealthy nobleman with an interest. They began seizure of the property.
“Each of the nuns were given a small pension. Some chose to live with family, others went into service with the wealthy. Jane sought to find our son.
“I never expected to see her again. I never learned what had become of her, or to our son. It was not long after that the closing of Faversham Abbey began. And I found my way to London.
“But as God deemed, one day I saw the two of them at market. The years have changed her. They’ve changed me, I cannot deny that. I wanted to go to her. But my profound remorse held me back. Mayhap my shame.” Brother Ywan shook his head. “I followed them and discovered where they lived. Since then, I provide for them as best I can. That is what Luke was tasked to do. I had him leave money on her stoop.”
“Ye couldn’t bring yeself to go knock on her door and just gives it to her?” said Patch. Empathy and subtlety were never his strength.
“It is better that I don’t. I have no knowledge of their lives all these years. I am curious, but I do not deserve to know. Sometimes the pains of the past are better left alone.”
Meddybemps and Bianca remained quiet while Patch fidgeted in his chair.
What hardships does one undertake when one loves, thought Bianca? Love demands equal parts of joy and sorrow. Love is a balance between the two, but sometimes one weighs more than the other.
“We shall keep your story quiet,” assured Bianca. She turned to Patch. “I believe we have no further cause to question him.”
“Well,” said Patch, believing the man deserved some sort of punishment beyond that of a broken heart. “I will be keeping ye here for the night,” he said. “Tonight is of some importance in this matter. I prefer to be safe about it, than regrets it later. I’m sure ye see the sense in that.”
Brother Ywan made no argument against Patch’s request. “If it should prove my innocence in these horrid crimes, then I submit myself to being held.”
Patch had expected some resistance; most men took umbrage with being locked away. He led the monk into the cell that had previously been occupied by the drunk Malloy who spoke so ill of him.
“There is one more thing I must tell you,” he said, once Patch had secured him away. “I fear for Jane’s life.”
“Why?” asked Bianca.
“Our son…is a violent boy.”
Chapter 29
Patch instructed his minion, Cyndric, to keep watch over Brother Sedar, then left with Bianca and Meddybemps for Jane Clewes’s tenement. While pausing to let a farmer and cow pass, Bianca breathlessly explained that she had heard scratching from under the floorboards and had been led to believe the dilapidated building to be infested with vermin—most likely rats.
Now she wondered if she’d been naïve to think the condition of Jane’s quarters was to blame for something perhaps more sinister.
“Her son is formidable,” said Meddybemps as they neared the residence. “How shall we manage him if he should become upset?”
“Wells, there be three of us to one of him,” said Patch.
“Methinks it would take the king’s guard to subdue the likes of a lad as strapping as he,” said Meddybemps.
“We must simply be careful not to rile Jane in his presence,” said Bianca. She looked pointedly at Patch, who dismissed her warning.
“I worry nots,” he said blithely.
“Let me do the talking,” said Bianca. “Though if Fisk is being held captive, I’ve a mind to kick down the door.”
They did not see Jane sitting by the window watching the lane, so they had the element of surprise in their favor. Or so they hoped.
While Meddybemps and Patch watched out of sight, Bianca stepped up to the door and firmly knocked. There was no window at the front of the building to give anyone away, and soon they heard a creak and saw Jane Clewes peeping out.
“Jane,” said Bianca. “If I may have a word with you.”
The woman scowled and ran her eyes over Bianca.
“What is it that you want?” she asked. She must not have seen Meddybemps and Patch hunkering in the shadows. “Why have you returned?”
“Is Huet home?”
“Why is that your concern?” answered Jane, her eyes searching Bianca’s face.
“I have news concerning him.”
“News? What do you mean?”
“Please, if I may come in.” Bianca looked over her shoulder as if someone might be listening. She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “What I have to say must be said in private.”
“Say what you must, but you must say it from there. It will be heard well enough and by my ears only.”
Bianca needed to gain entry and, without Jane noticing, She slid her foot inside the doorframe to prevent Jane closing it. She further distracted by calling into the interior for Huet.
“He’s not here!” said Clewes, her voice shaking. “You must leave.” She made to shut the door, but Bianca shouldered it open, startling Jane, who stumbled backwards to avoid being hit. Bianca stepped inside, and Meddybemps and Patch hurried in after.
To her chagrin, Jane Clewes found herself facing the three of them.
“What is this?” she demanded. As she looked from one to the other, her bravado fell away and she became fearful. “I’ll get you the money,” she said, backing away. “There is no need to hurt me.”
“Nay, it is not that,” said Bianca. “Where is Huet?”
“He has run an errand for me.”
“Are ye harboring young boys?” demanded Patch.
“What?” answered Jane, struck by the question.
“We have reason to believe ye be up to no goods.” Patch placed his hands on his hips.
“Nay! What purpose would I have to take a boy?”
“Mayhap it isn’t ye who took the boy,” said Patch.
Jane regained her boldness. “What are you saying? Do not speak so twistedly. Say what ye mean!”
“I means, did your son lay hold of any boys? In particular, a lad named Fisk?”
“Certainly not!” said Jane Clewes. “What purpose would that serve?”
“We knows yer boy, this Huet is a brute and knows not his own strength. It is said he has some temper about him.”
“Who said this?” demanded Jane.
Bianca intervened before Patch could mention Brother Sedar. “He has been seen chasing boys through the streets.”
“He chased a lad through St. Paul’s,” added Meddybemps.
The former nun’s indignation could not cover an embarrassment over a matter beyond her control. She made the sign of the cross and offered a quiet prayer, her lips mouthing the words. When she finished she crossed herself a second time. “He has made many strides, but he is headstrong. I have done my best. He has a willfulness that, try as I might, I cannot curb.
“There is a sadness in him,” said Jane. “His childhood was spent doing work meant for a grown man. They thought him older because of his size and strength. ‘Tis a sorry shame they used him thus.” Jane’s eyes shone with sudden anger. “They treated him no better than an animal. I have tried to help him overcome his past, but I fear it will take years.”
With this admission, Jane’s shoulders began to shake. Her emotions now overwhelmed her. “I gave a sac
red vow, but our liege willfully changed the course of my life. He changed the course of many lives. What was, is no more. Perhaps some can live without duty, but I cannot. I resolved to find my son and rebuild our lives, together.”
Jane’s explanation gave insight into Huet’s history, but it mattered less to Bianca than finding Fisk. Perhaps Jane told the truth, but perhaps she believed she must cover Huet’s actions for fear of what might happen. Bianca had come to search the tenement. The strange scratching she had heard previously could well have been Fisk’s desperate attempt to get her attention.
Jane stopped talking and Bianca primed her ears, listening for the scratching. She stepped away from them, following a noise to a floorboard near the center of the room. Trampled rushes covered the floor and she pushed them away with her foot, then knelt beside a plank that wobbled when she pressed on it.
“Here,” said Bianca. “Help me.” She jammed her fingertips between the slats, and with Meddybemps’s help, the two grabbed hold of either end and began lifting it out of the worn nail holes.
Jane broke past Constable Patch in a hurry to reach them. “Stop! What are you doing?”
“I have to know,” said Bianca. “I heard the scratching again.” She and Meddybemps laid aside the board and peered into the dark space beneath the floor, as black as a dead man’s mouth. Bianca sat back on her haunches and surveyed the room for a lantern or a candle. Spying one, she pointed it out for Patch.
“This is an intrusion!” Jane Clewes shook with rage. She glanced over her shoulder at the door, then turned back. “Huet is due to return. Ye should not be here! I beg you, leave!”
Patch was handing the lit candle to Bianca, when suddenly something leapt out of the crawlspace, making Bianca yelp, then disappeared into a black corner of the room.
“’Tis a cat!” Patch exclaimed. “God’s blood--a cat!”
Bianca leaned over the opening in the floor and shined the candle down into the black space. It appeared empty except for a bowl of water. She blew out the candle and got to her feet.
“You are keeping a cat?” she asked.
Jane Clewes had already abandoned the hole in the floor and was attempting to coax the creature out into the open, ignoring them. Her effort was to no avail.
“See what you’ve done?” she cried. “If Huet comes home, he’ll want to play with it. He knows not his own strength!”
Bianca, Meddybemps, and Patch stared blankly at the nun and the terrified cat, then at each other.
Bianca apologized, feeling responsible and more than a little disappointed. The monk’s story had given her hope, but now she was no closer to finding Fisk than she was when he had first gone missing. While reprehensible, Geve Trinion had been nothing more than a despicable father. And Brother Sedar was too cowardly to do anything more for his son than give money anonymously, leaving Jane Clewes to fix a broken child. “Let me help you,” she said. She couldn’t bear the thought of causing more unhappiness for this woman.
Bianca went over to a small table against the wall, beneath which crouched a white and black cat, its mirrored eyes watching. “He is a well-favored fellow,” she said, admiring his handsome looks. She put her hand out for him to smell. “Have you a piece of cheese or meat?”
Jane Clewes brought Bianca a small piece of gristle left from the previous night’s meal. With some encouragement, Bianca coaxed the cat forward, and after he saw that she meant him no harm, she gently carried him to his owner’s arms.
The tension in the nun’s body fell away as she held her cat and stroked its fur. Bianca smiled at their compatibility and was reminded of her own raw sorrow losing Hobs. She understood the woman’s desire to love and care for another, even if it was a pet.
“I suppose we be done here,” said Constable Patch, removing his cap and scratching his sparsely-haired scalp. “We’ve matters to attend elsewhere.”
“I know you are disappointed,” said Meddybemps to Bianca. “But we shall find Fisk.” He knew his words could not put her mind at ease or release her from a burden she willingly undertook. He feared their search would probably end badly. It had been too long. The possible outcome hung in the air, though no one dared mention it.
But Bianca quashed her feelings of defeat. A pamphlet on a small table caught her eye and she picked it up. Mindful not to mention Jane Clewes’s previous life at Davington, she read aloud the title of the pamphlet. “Supplication Unto King Henry the VIII by Robert Barnes,” said Bianca. It was printed by Clement Naylor. She looked at Jane.
“There is no harm in reading,” said Jane defensively.
“Robert Barnes was a follower of Martin Luther,” said Bianca. “The king does not favor Luther’s beliefs.”
“He did when it served him to seek a divorce from Queen Catherine,” answered Jane. “I read so that I might understand. There is much I do not know about our king’s decisions to close the monasteries.”
Bianca raised her eyebrows. “Are you agreeable to Barnes’ words?”
“I see no point in answering that. Barnes defended himself against England’s bishops. They are the words of a man imploring for equitable discourse and consideration. But, our king does what he will regardless of what I or anyone else thinks.”
Constable Patch’s eyes shifted between the two as he relished the thought of a nun spouting a treasonous opinion of the king.
Bianca noticed Patch’s sudden interest. She set the pamphlet face down on the table.
“I think we are finished here,” she said.
Chapter 30
Bianca, Meddybemps, and Patch stood outside of Jane Clewes’s tenement. The story of Brother Sedar and Jane Clewes had no bearing on Fisk vanishing. Once again, Bianca had reached an impasse. The chimes of church bells announced the hour and soon the sun would set, portending night with its dreaded possibilities.
Although Bianca had no cause to think Fisk would be the next victim, the possibility still troubled her. Another boy had died a week after Fisk went missing, and there was no evidence linking Fisk’s disappearance to the church hangings. Still, if the murderer was following a pattern, then tonight was reason enough to be worried about what might happen.
Whether Fisk would be involved or nay, the murderer had not been caught, and until he was Bianca would continue to work to find the killer.
“I’m meeting my men before we go to St. Andrew-by-the-Wardrobe,” said Patch. “I hopes Berwick has the sense to post guards at the other churches and St. Paul’s.”
“It is a precaution worth the effort. While it seems that the murderer is making a tour of Castle Baynard ward,” said Bianca, “he could always repeat his crime at a previous site.”
“We don’t know what the perpetrator plans,” said Patch. “And Constable Berwick is a shiftless, lubberwort who can’t be bothered doing his job.”
“Since the murders happen in the small hours of the night,” said Bianca, “we have some time to prepare. I agree that St. Andrew’s seems the most likely place for the next crime. I will join you, later, Patch. For now, though, I need to eat.”
Meddybemps’s face cheered at the mention of food. He insisted that Bianca accompany him to the Cockeyed Gull. “They have a flavorsome egg and cheese pie. It will do you well to be around others for a spell. You must give your mind a rest.”
***
Borderlands—
Exhaustion demands payment.
John stared at the burnished horizon blooming over a distant ocean. His entire body ached from a consuming fatigue born from months of overwrought nerves and difficult conditions. Having made it this far, he knew his journey home might be within reach. Yet, he could not muster the strength to keep going.
He needed sleep and he needed food. Either one would be helpful, but unless he satisfied both, the final leg of his journey would be impossible.
In the distance, a shepherd’s shack stood in silhouette against the sky. From where he stood, no light glowed within the
humble bothy, meaning it might be empty. Then, too, night had not quite finished and a traveler could very well be inside, sleeping. Either way, the hope of rest and shelter was too tempting to keep away.
He had stopped long enough for a chill to set in, so he hurried on, keeping the hut in his sights and scanning the landscape for activity. The thought of sleep lifted his spirits and quickened his steps. He imagined a pallet and blanket, dried meat hanging from a beam, and kindling for a fire inside this little bothy, but the reality, he reminded himself, would be nothing like he imagined. In this impoverished land, such necessities were too valuable to leave behind. He braced himself for the inevitable disappointment as he trod ahead.
A crescent of sun burned over a ridge, and it would be a rare late winter day of light and sharp shadows. The clouds would quicken across the sky and there would blow a fierce wind that would fill his ears with a constant roar. Such a day would bring a shift in fortune, all for the good, thought John.
Nearing the bothy, he slowed and adopted a stealthy approach, his ears primed and his eyes straining to take in his surroundings. No dog was tied outside, no horse, no wisp of smoke escaped the chimney. Nothing indicated that there was a person inside. John circled the hut at a safe distance, looking for anything to warn him away.
He crept to within a few feet of the hut, then stopped and listened. Silence.
He approached the ramshackle door and pressed his ear against it. Silence.
He placed his hand against its wood and slowly pushed it open, holding his knife at the ready in the other. Inside, he found nothing but cool, dank air and the quiet of an empty hut. Glimpsing over his shoulder still leery for anyone about, he cautiously stepped inside.
It was just an empty room. There was no table or stool. No pile of straw to sleep on. A fag of kindling lay next to the hearth. Only abandoned spider webs hung from the rafters--not the wished-for smoked meat. A small tallow lay in a pile of ashes from a fire that had long since died.
But the room enticed. He could finally give over to the demanding pull of sleep. The growl in his stomach had not been answered, but because it had been ignored for so long, it had abandoned its insistent yawps.
The Lost Boys of London Page 25
