Free from all Danger

by Chris Nickson

  ‘No, sir.’

  Dead without a name, all her past slipped away.

  ‘Call her Rose if you like.’ He blew out the candle. ‘I’ll wish you goodnight.’

  Rob listened, watching the constable’s face. He looked drawn and serious as he sat in front of the fire with his shoulders slumped. The man had lost weight; it started once he retired. His wrists had become bony and his face was gaunt. Before too long he’d appear older than his years.

  ‘Are you still going to tell me it’s coincidence?’ Nottingham asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ He wasn’t sure what to think. There seemed to be something the boss wasn’t saying, some undercurrent of anger or despair he couldn’t penetrate. ‘Let’s think about it in the morning.’

  Emily was lost in the book she was reading, away in the world of Gulliver’s Travels. She probably hadn’t heard a word. Maybe that was just as well.

  ‘The cutpurses struck again,’ Lister said. ‘A couple came in just before I left. This time took a woman’s reticule and cut her arm. It was the Underwoods.’

  Nottingham grimaced. Underwood was a wool merchant, not on the corporation yet, but aiming for election. He’d be loud in his complaints about law and order.

  ‘How badly hurt was she?’

  ‘Nothing really, only a scratch. But we need to catch them, boss. They’re becoming dangerous.’

  ‘We will.’ He looked up. ‘We certainly will.’

  Another night of broken sleep. The dead girl’s face kept rising in his mind as if she was surfacing through the water. He’d wake for a minute, just long enough for her image to disappear, then drift back to his rest.

  Lucy had the oven warm, and he breathed in the comforting smell of baking bread. Nottingham took the heel of the old loaf and some cheese before pouring a mug of ale.

  ‘Those cutpurses I heard you and Master Rob talk about last night,’ she began.

  ‘What about them?’ he asked as he ate.

  ‘I think I’ve seen them a few times when I’ve been buying things from the market.’

  The constable cocked his head. ‘Go on.’

  ‘They’re careful. Sly. I watched them follow a man for a few minutes. As soon as he met someone else they melted away.’

  Lucy had spent long enough living wild when she was younger. She had the eye to notice something like that.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’d like to spend some time in town, would you?’

  ‘Keep my eyes open, you mean?’ She was grinning widely.

  ‘And tell one of my men if you spot anything.’

  ‘I suppose I could, if you’re asking. It’s market day, you can bet the pair of them will be around.’

  Every Saturday and Tuesday, before the market came the cloth market. It had been that way for more years than anyone could remember, probably before there were even records. The constable made his circuit, watching as the weavers set out their cloth then vanished into the inns for their hot Brigg-end shot breakfast. They’d certainly need something warm this morning; frost had turned the ground white again as he walked into Leeds, leaving the cobbles shiny and slick.

  The girl he’d called Rose was waiting at the jail. Her body was stiff now, bitterly cold to the touch. Seeing her in daylight he had no doubt: she’d been murdered. Hit with something to subdue her, then drowned.

  She’d clung hard to life; her hands and nails showed that. Her killer would be marked. He leaned against the wall, studying her, turning as the door opened and Rob walked in.

  ‘No age at all, was she?’

  ‘She probably came here thinking she’d make her fortune,’ the constable said bleakly.

  The deputy walked around the corpse, examining her from all angles.

  ‘Why?’ he wondered.

  ‘I’ve been asking myself the same thing,’ Nottingham answered. ‘I don’t know. But Jane, her, Kidd.’

  ‘I still can’t see any link to the moneylenders.’

  The constable pushed himself upright and shook his head

  ‘I’m not sure what I know any longer. Come on, we have work to do.’

  Nottingham left, but Rob lingered, staring again into the young, dead face. She was probably only a year or two older than Lucy, all the cares and trials stripped from her face now. He slammed the palm of his hand against the stone wall, letting the smack echo, and walked out.

  He’d lain awake in bed, tossing and turning under the blanket. Finally Emily couldn’t take it any longer.

  ‘You might as well tell me,’ she whispered. ‘We’re not going to get any sleep until you do.’

  Rob stared up into the darkness and put his arm around her shoulder. He didn’t want to do it, but he knew he had to let it out. His put his mouth close to her ear and whispered.

  ‘It’s your father.’

  With a sudden movement she pulled away, resting on one elbow.

  ‘What? What is it? Tell me.’

  He did, and it felt like sacred relief to finally say it, to talk about the man’s strange idea that one person could be behind the spate of murders in Leeds.

  ‘Well?’ Emily asked when he finished. ‘Could he be right?’

  ‘No.’ For a moment, moonlight leaked through the shutters and he could see her outline next to him. ‘He’s not. Don’t you think I’d know if there was anything like that? I keep trying to tell him, but someone put this idea in his head and he won’t let it go.’

  ‘Papa’s not a fool.’

  ‘I know he’s not.’ He exhaled slowly, trying to trace a path to the right words. ‘It’s as if he believes there’s another Amos Worthy waiting and planning. But there isn’t. There can’t be.’

  ‘Give him time, Rob. He’s coming back to the job.’ She stroked his hair and settled herself against his shoulder. ‘Please.’

  And now, as he closed the door of the cold cell, for one tiny moment he wondered if he wasn’t the one who’d been wrong.

  The constable was already issuing a crisp series of orders to the men.

  ‘Waterhouse and Dyer, I want you to go to every house on Lady Lane. Ask if anyone remembers a woman there yesterday evening. Young, dark hair, homespun dress. She’d probably have been wearing a cap and looking very nervous and cold.’

  They left. At least the boss had picked two with brains for that job, Lister thought approvingly.

  ‘Carter, Naylor, I want you at the market,’ the constable continued. He described the two young cutpurses. ‘I have someone there looking, so be ready if you hear a shout. And if you see them yourselves, arrest them. The boy has a penknife, though: be careful.’ He held up his bandaged hands. ‘He’ll use it, too.’

  ‘If he pulls that on me I’ll make him wish he’d never been born,’ Naylor snorted.

  ‘Don’t be so cocky. He’s quick and he’s vicious,’ Nottingham warned.

  That left two to patrol the town. Once they’d gone, Lister said, ‘What about us, boss?’

  ‘We start thinking.’ He leaned back in the chair and steepled his hands under his chin. ‘How many pimps do you know?’

  ‘Five,’ Rob answered after a few moments.

  ‘Do you talk with any of them?’

  ‘Only one.’ Joshua Bartlett. A stained, messy bull of a man. But he’d passed on plenty of good information in the past.

  ‘Find out if anyone’s been threatening him.’

  Lister grinned at the idea. ‘He’d beat the brains out of anyone who tried.’

  ‘Ask him, anyway. He might have heard things. Let’s see what we can discover, shall we?’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘See if there’s anyone from the old days who might know a few things.’

  Another visit to Joe Buck brought only two names. Dinner time had arrived before the constable tracked down John Wood at the Turk’s Head, settled on a bench in the far corner where he could watch people come and go.

  He seemed to have shrivelled. Wood had never been a large man, but now he looked to have sunk in o
n himself. In his time he’d tried plenty of things – run girls, broken into houses – and failed at every one of them. But Buck said Wood knew some of the pimps.

  The constable carried a cup of ale across and placed it in front of the man. Wood’s eyes darted around.

  ‘I don’t want anyone seeing me with you.’ His voice was quiet and urgent. ‘I don’t want anyone thinking I’m in trouble with the law.’

  ‘Then you’re too late.’ He took a sip from his own mug. ‘I’m already here.’

  ‘I’ve got an honest job these days.’

  ‘Work?’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘That must have come as a shock to you.’

  ‘I’m employed by Mr Warren now.’

  Warren? He knew that name. Then he placed it. The bookkeeper who’d dined with Stanbridge the night he died. Interesting.

  ‘What do you do for him?’

  ‘Turns out I’ve got a mind for numbers.’ Wood grinned, showing a set of brown teeth. ‘Hadn’t expected that, had you, Mr Nottingham?’

  ‘No,’ he admitted. But he wouldn’t have expected anything at all from the man.

  ‘Goes to show, doesn’t it?’

  ‘What do you hear, when you’re not adding columns of figures?’

  ‘Me?’ Wood blinked with surprise. ‘I told you, I’m an honest man. Got a woman and everything.’

  It was hard to believe that anyone could find Wood attractive, with his bulging frog eyes and thick nose. But the world was a strange place.

  ‘And no ear to the ground? Hear anything about pimps these days?’

  ‘Not any more. Left it all behind.’ There was the ring of truth in his words. The constable changed tack.

  ‘Tell me something, John. How honest is Mr Warren’s work?’

  ‘Look at it yourself if you like.’ There was a note of offence in his voice.

  ‘Maybe I will.’ Nottingham pushed himself up, knees aching. ‘I wish you well of life.’

  The market was still busy, people crowding around the stalls at the top of Briggate. Men and women hawked their wares, voices competing. Everyone had the best goods, the best prices. The constable stopped for a minute, eyes searching for Lucy, for his men somewhere in the press of people, and for the boy and girl who were becoming too dangerous.

  He didn’t spot any of them and moved on, glancing through the clean windows of the Talbot as he passed: there was barely room to stand. In the old days only a bloody cock fight would have drawn so many. It looked as if Harry Meadows had made the right decision in changing the place.

  The man he wanted wasn’t in any tavern. A few more yards and he could make out the sound over the noise and bustle. The scrape of a bow over catgut floated from the market cross at the head of the street. Con the blind fiddler playing his tunes. A jig to set feet moving faster, an air so gentle it could pull softly at the heart. A battered old hat lay between his feet, the coins inside glittering; a market meant good money for any man who played so beautifully.

  He waited as Con let the last note fade before he approached. The man turned his head just as if he could see and smiled.

  ‘That sounds like Mr Nottingham.’

  His voice was cracked and rasping, but full of good humour. Con always had a sweet smile and a ready laugh. He’d arrived in Leeds not long after Nottingham first became constable, and somehow decided to stay. He had to be sixty now, still thin as a sapling, fingers every bit as nimble as a young man’s. He’d been spry with his tunes back then but over time he seemed to discover a deeper quality in his music. It moved directly from his soul to his fingers.

  The constable laughed. ‘Well met, Con. You haven’t lost your hearing.’

  ‘Everyone’s tread is different. I’ve told you that before.’ He put up the instrument, lightly plucking a string with his thumb. ‘With you in charge again and old Jem back in town it’s starting to feel like better times.’

  ‘I wish that was true,’ Nottingham said.

  ‘I know.’ Con nodded his head. ‘We all lose the best things, don’t we?’

  He’d never seen Con with a woman, never even heard of one. For a few years a boy led him around. But he disappeared and since then the man had managed alone.

  ‘Times change.’

  ‘And yet we’re still here, Mr Nottingham. The Good Lord has his own ways of working.’

  ‘Do you still hear bits of this and that?’

  People seemed to think that if Con was blind, he must be deaf to their words, too. They gossiped, they garbled their secrets where he could hear them and he passed them along.

  ‘Not so much these days,’ Con replied. ‘People have become—’

  The scream cut him off and Nottingham started to run. From the far side of the market, he thought. People had stopped as if they were frozen, heads craning round. He pushed through them, shouldering them aside, the cudgel already gripped tight in his hand.

  ELEVEN

  A space had opened up around the man on the ground as people pulled back, horrified. He was awake, groaning, face ghostly pale as one hand tried to cover the wound in his side. Blood had leaked, staining the silk waistcoat. His wig had slipped on to the cobbles. The woman kneeling at his side picked it up and pushed it under his head as a pillow.

  George Armistead. The manager of a cropping mill where they cut the nap off the wool to finish the cloth.

  The constable squatted and stared down at the man.

  ‘We’ll help you,’ he said, gazing up at the crowd. Where in God’s name were his men?

  ‘It was a boy and a girl,’ the woman with Armistead began, and he already knew the rest of the tale. Then someone else was next to him, plump fingers taking charge of everything.

  ‘It’s not deep,’ Lucy said as she examined him, then gave a reassuring smile. ‘And it’s in your side, nothing too dangerous. Don’t you worry. We need someone to help him home.’

  One of the stallholders found an old door and laid it next to Armistead. Very gently, a pair of men lifted him on to it.

  ‘Send for the physician. I’ll come and talk to you later,’ the constable said to the woman as they carried the man away.

  ‘I never saw them,’ Lucy told him as she watched them leave. Like a wave, people flowed back into the empty hole, chattering loudly. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s hardly your fault. It’s impossible to see anything here. Will he survive?’

  ‘Him? He’ll be fine. It’s only a gash, and that’s mostly in the fat.’ She pursed her lips. ‘He has plenty of padding. He could probably walk home if he’d a mind to.’

  ‘His wife said it was a boy and a girl.’

  Lucy looked at him sharply.

  ‘That’s not his wife. Her name’s Sophie Marsden. Acts like Lady Muck.’ Her mouth twitched into a grin. ‘He’s going to have an interesting time explaining her to his missus.’

  ‘It won’t help us find the pair who did this.’ He could feel the sting of the boy’s knife on his palm. This was the third time he’d used the blade. If they weren’t caught soon, the lad would kill someone.

  By the time Carter and Naylor arrived, Lucy had gone, basket over her arm. The constable talked to a few who’d witnessed the attack. The girl had stopped the couple while the boy started to cut the man’s purse. Armistead tried to stop him and the lad had lashed out with his penknife before the pair darted away.

  ‘Sorry, boss,’ Naylor said. ‘We were on the other side of the market.’

  As soon as the man opened his mouth, Nottingham could smell it. He turned to Carter.

  ‘Say something.’

  ‘What?’ He looked confused. ‘He’s telling the truth, boss. We couldn’t get through the people.’

  ‘You’re dismissed. Both of you.’

  They looked at him, not believing his words.

  ‘I told you to patrol here,’ the constable said. ‘Not spend your time drinking. Any questions?’

  The men glanced at each other. Naylor reddened and looked down at the ground.

  �
��It won’t happen again,’ he said.

  ‘No,’ Nottingham agreed. ‘You’re damned right it won’t. You don’t work for me any more. Mr Lister will pay you what you’re owed. Now get out of here.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Go.’ For a second he wondered if they’d defy him, then Carter’s shoulders slumped and he turned away. With a glare, Naylor followed. If they’d been doing their job, the boy and girl could have been in jail now.

  Lister could hear the girl sobbing softly upstairs. But Joshua Bartlett didn’t even seem to notice. He sat in front of the roaring fire in his dirty shirt and breeches with a mug of ale clamped in his large hand.

  ‘You’ve had no threats? None of your girls, either?’

  He snorted. ‘Not unless someone has a death wish.’

  Bartlett was a large man, with a barrel chest and a blacksmith’s muscles. Long dark hair covered his neck, a mat of it on his chest, and a pale scar stood out on his chin. He did well enough to afford a small house by Mill Hill, out on the western edge of Leeds. Plates covered with scraps of food sat on the table. A mouse scurried quickly across the far corner of the room.

  ‘Did you hear about the murder last night?’

  The man raised his tankard, staring into the blaze. ‘What about it?’

  ‘A pimp. That’s on top of three who’ve vanished in the last few weeks.’

  Bartlett snorted. He was a man who relished violence; it was his answer to everything. But he was clever enough with it not to be caught. And people knew better than to complain to the constable about him.

  He was a man with his tiny empire, three girls who either earned him money each day or wore their bruises. Once their bloom had faded, he found others to take their place. But he wasn’t ambitious – all he wanted was not to have to work, to keep a little money in his pocket and some ale in his belly.

  The sobbing upstairs grew quieter.

  ‘Anyone tries it with me or my lasses, they’ll be the ones who vanish,’ he warned. ‘And you can take that as a promise.’ He tipped the mug up and drained it. ‘Was that it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He was glad to get away from the house, with its perfume of rotting food and the woman’s crying. After that, the stink and the noise of Leeds swept over him like pure relief.