by R J Lynch
Poor Law
By
R J Lynch
Book 2 in the James Blakiston Series
© John Lynch December 2018
John Lynch has asserted his has asserted his moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
Published by Mandrill Press www.mandrillpress.com
ISBN 978-1-910194-24-9
Chapter 1
The graves were unmarked, but he knew which they were. In truth, they were hardly graves at all. The bodies had been so young, and so undernourished, and anyway no pains were taken over the likes of them. Paupers’ children. The undeserving poor. Too lacking in God’s grace to know his blessings, here on earth or in the life beyond into which they were so soon projected. Of course, where there was no money there were no headstones, no crosses, no physical markers of any description but there had once at least been mounds where the earth had been heaped over the dead. Now the mounds were flattening, the earth sinking back into the spaces left when worms ate the flesh and the woollen shrouds decayed.
Buried in woollen, as the law required; better dressed in death than ever they had been in life because a woollen shroud was less expensive than the five pounds fine if no affidavit was recorded in the parish register. The cost of a pauper’s burial was born by the parish and the parish was not going to pay fines that could be so easily avoided.
The graves were not side by side; they had not died at the same time and others, equally unworthy, separated them, but he knew which they were. Oh, yes. He knew which they were.
He knelt now beside the grave that held the first child to die and laid a flower where he judged the heart might once have been. A single rose from the hedgerow. Red. The colour of blood. The blood of one of those who had destroyed his family. There would be more.
Blakiston was finishing breakfast when the message came. ‘Ned Greener,’ he said. ‘What brings you here so early, and in such hurry? Is all well at Chopwell Garth? Sit down, man, and break bread with me.’
‘I cannot, sir. Our Tom says you must come immediately.’
Blakiston raised his eyebrows. Placing his last piece of ham on his last piece of bread, he put the last of his cheese on top and the whole thing in his mouth. Then he washed it down with the last of his tea, as Ned hopped from foot to foot and looked repeatedly at the door. Blakiston wiped his mouth with a linen napkin sent in with his breakfast by the inn. ‘And now you may tell me,’ he said, ‘what is so urgent as to make Tom Laws so forget himself that he gives orders to his landlord’s farm agent? Even if I am soon also to be his brother-in-law.’
‘Margaret Laws is dead, Master.’
Blakiston cast his mind over the members of Tom’s household. ‘Margaret Laws? But there is no Margaret Laws.’
‘Joseph’s wife, Master. Joe that is Tom’s brother. She is murdered.’
Blakiston rose to his feet with such haste that his chair fell backwards to the floor. As he reached for his broadcloth coat, adjusted his wig and donned his tricorn hat, Ned restored the chair to its upright position.
‘Leave that!’ barked Blakiston.
‘But sir...a chair...’
‘Is only a chair. Get to the door so I can lock this place and we may be gone.’
Blakiston saddled Obsidian, the black stallion that was his only vanity. Ned was already astride the nag that still trembled from the unaccustomed speed of its journey from Chopwell Garth. When Blakiston rose into the saddle, Ned turned to lead the way.
‘Take care,’ said Blakiston, ‘or you will kill that poor beast. Ride beside me. I must hear this tale before we arrive.’
‘I shall tell you what I know, Master, but that is not much. Joseph Laws came this morning, and a more piteous sight I never saw. He had been in Carlisle on some errand and he did not reach home till the sun was up. He found Margaret dead on the floor. Strangled, Master.’
‘And what of the others in the house? The maid? The child? Margaret had a child, had she not?’
‘Aye, master. A boy, Samuel. As to the maid, I do not know. She was away out.’
‘You think she killed her mistress and fled?’
‘Who knows what women will do, Master? When Joseph returned home, she was not there; and that is all I know.’
‘So he has left the child with his mother?’
‘They buried her three month back. It was the consumption that took her, not four weeks after her husband died. Our Tom was that cut up about it.’
‘He was. I remember now. But the child can scarce fend for itself. Joseph Laws brought his son with him to Chopwell Garth?’
‘Nay, Master. He was in such distress he left the bairn alone in the house. Our Kate is gone to tend to it.’
‘Kate? Kate is alone? With a murderer about?’ Blakiston dug his heels into Obsidian’s flanks and surged effortlessly away from Ned’s poor mount.
When Ned reached the end of the lane to Chopwell Garth some time later, Lizzie Laws waited open-mouthed for him.
‘Mister Blakiston is here?’ Ned asked.
‘He galloped straight past,’ his sister replied. ‘You told him our Kate was alone at New Hope Farm, did you not?’
Still gasping from his pursuit of Blakiston, Ned could only nod.
‘Then that will be where he is.’
Blakiston found that Kate was not, in fact, alone with two-year-old Samuel for Susannah, the New Hope maid, was with her. That did not stop Blakiston from telling this young woman he loved so completely, but who to his anguish was re-examining her promise to marry him, that she should not be in such a place without company.
‘I had not realised I was invisible,’ said Susannah.
Blakiston turned his head. ‘Do not be pert with me. You are under suspicion in this matter.’
‘Me, sir?’
‘Yes, you. Where were you when this dreadful thing happened? Why were you not here, about your master’s business?’
Ample chest heaving, Susannah said, ‘I was visiting my mother. I do so every Friday night. It is an arrangement I have with Mistress Laws. Had with Mistress Laws,’ she corrected herself.
Blakiston stood closer to her. ‘Well, I cannot verify that with her, can I? And I’ll thank you to address me properly.’
The maid looked down. ‘Yes, sir. I am sorry, sir.’
‘Margaret is in the dairy,’ said Kate. ‘Would you like to see her?’
‘She was killed there?
‘She was killed here, in the kitchen. We have moved her body into the dairy, where it is cool.’
‘Did you not know I should have liked to see it where it lay?’
‘But here is her child. Would you have had us leave his mother in his sight? Let me take you to see her. Susannah will stay here with the bairn.’
‘I am the maid here,’ said Susannah. ’Am I to do as I am told by a farm labourer’s daughter?’
‘If that cause you distress,’ Blakiston said, ‘then I instruct you to remain. Are you content now? The body, Kate, if you please.’
To reach the dairy meant crossing the yard. As they did so, they saw Ned turn up the lane towards them.
‘That poor horse is on its last legs,’ said Kate. ‘But Tom will not hear of it going to the knacker as long as the breath of life is in it. He almost killed it when he attacked the press tender on its back, but he has a tenderness for it, for he believes it helped bring him and Lizzie together.’
‘Bring them together? But they had been married more than a year by that time.’
Kate looked as though she had more to say but thought better of it. ‘So they had. I do not know what I was thinking of.’
‘James! I have seen the body! It was Susannah Ward and I who carried it from there to here. With no man to shield us from the horror. Though the horror is in your mind only, for a body is but a body. Once the soul is safe in the arms of Our Lord, the body is but an empty shell.’ She smiled. ‘You were upset on my behalf that it was me who found poor Matthew Higson’s body, were you not? And that was nought but bones, while poor Margaret still looks like a plump farmer’s wife.’
‘Plump? I thought her a skinny thing.’
‘Yes. Well, you shall see.’
Ned had no need to rein in his mount, for when it reached them it simply stopped. ‘You had better give that wretched horse a drink,’ said Blakiston. ‘Before it falls to the ground beneath you. Then go into the kitchen and keep a close eye on that woman in there until Kate and I return. I shall wish to question her more deeply.’
In the dairy, Kate laid her hand on Blakiston’s arm. ‘James. May I speak openly?’
He looked down into the calm grey eyes she shared with the rest of the Greeners. ‘Of course, Kate. But first you may tell me why you do not wish to call me by my name, or act as though we are to wed.’
‘Oh, James.’ She took a deep breath. ‘It is only in front of others that I call you Mister. No-one could love you as I love you. And I know you love me. But you are gentry and I am not, and we have not yet fixed the date for the wedding...’
‘...because you will not...’
‘...and I am afraid it will never happen and then where will I be?’
‘But my love, of course it will happen, and as soon as you say the word.’
‘Really? And who will marry us? The Rector? You see? You do not answer, because you cannot. You and he were such good friends and now you do not speak to each other at church. And please do not tell me that is nothing to do with you and me because I know better.’
‘Mister Fawcett will marry us. The new curate.’
‘And I shall be happy. But will you? You are giving up too much by marrying me...’
‘...I am gaining the world, Kate...’
‘...and if you will not protect yourself then mebbes I should. And what about your family? Do they want you marrying someone who says “mebbes” when she means “perhaps”? What have they to say?’
‘My brother is delighted for me. If he is on shore when we wed, he has promised to be my Groom’s Man.’
‘And your sister?’
Blakiston said nothing.
‘You see? James, there is marriage and there is marriage. We don’t have to go in front of an altar. We can stand in the church gate, hold hands and leap together over a broomstick with the curate as a witness. That way I don’t get any right to what’s yours but in the eyes of God and the church we are still married.’
‘Kate. I want us to be husband and wife.’
‘But we would be.’ She smiled. ‘And even if I can’t get my hands on what is yours, you will still have the freedom to put yours on what is mine.’
‘Kate!’
She hung her head, but her smile came up to him through the white folds of her cap. ‘You see? I am too rude to be a gentleman’s wife. You would be better with Susannah Bent. And she certainly thinks she is the woman for you.’
‘Susannah Bent?’
‘Do you not see her in church on Sundays? Casting down her eyes and yet still looking at you? I never knew till I saw Susannah Bent doing it that you could flirt while seeming not to look at the person you are flirting with.’
‘Good Lord. I have been to dinner three times at the Bents’ house. The daughter sat next to me each time.’
‘And you never suspected a thing. James, you are too good for this world. And too innocent.’
‘Let us forget Susannah Bent. You are everything to me and she is nothing. And you said it yourself: there is marriage and marriage. And I want to know that the world respects our choice. And that will not come from leaping over a broomstick like a pair of witches. If I want it and you want it, what do the Rector and my sister matter? But, please. We can continue this later. A woman has been murdered, and you wished to tell me something.’
‘I did. I do. It is about the way you speak to Susannah Ward. Do you remember, when Reuben Cooper was killed, how certain you were that Matthew Higson had killed him? And how you went on believing it, until poor Matthew turned out to have been murdered himself? By the same hand that slew old Reuben?’
Blakiston coloured. ‘You believe I form my judgements too quickly?’
‘That is not for me to say. But Susannah did not kill Margaret. I would stake my life on it.’
‘I find her absence questionable.’
‘It is usual for a maid to be given an evening off each week.’
‘Yes. I suppose that is true.’
‘Susannah is loyal to this family. She came here as little more than a child. She skivvied here when our Tom was still living with his mother. I think she hoped that Joseph would one day take her for his wife, and she would become mistress of this farm when Tom’s mother died.’
‘You dig her grave more deeply with every word!’
‘No. She had accepted her disappointment. If you question her mother as to Susannah’s whereabouts last night...’
‘...and you may be sure I shall...’
‘...then I think you will find that Susannah was not with her at all. Or not all night, at any rate. She walks out now with Jemmy Rayne. Tom’s cousin. And Jemmy, you know, has a farm of his own.’
‘I know Rayne. He is a good man. He did an errand for me once to Staithes. It put me on the trail of Reuben Cooper’s killer.’
‘I did not know that.’
‘And I should not have told you, for Tom arranged it and he swore me to silence. You must forget what I have just said.’
‘I shall. But, you see, Susannah will be mistress of a farm of her own one day soon, and so she has no need to kill another farmer’s wife to clear her path.’
Blakiston’s voice was gruff. ‘You think she lay with Rayne last night?’
‘I believe she will be more careful than that. It is the farm Susannah wants, not the farmer. To be mistress in her own house, and not the maid. And she knows farmers. Once they have milked a cow, they move on to the next. But I see I have embarrassed you again.’
Blakiston’s face was indeed bright red. ‘Do not go dropping one of your curtseys, Kate. I do not believe I could bear it. What a calculating hussy she must be.’
‘No, James. Not all men are decent and loving like you. Susannah knows how many maids have been got with child by their masters, and then thrown out to fend as best they can. I am sure she will be as good a wife to Jemmy as Jemmy could ever hope. Once they are married. Shall we look at the body?’
‘You see I did not exactly mean plump,’ said Kate.
‘How long had she been with child?’
‘I cannot say. We knew nothing of it at Chopwell Garth.’
‘You did not see her often?’
‘Every Sunday, at church. But she went about in a loose bedgown that came down to her hips. The babe did not show.’
‘There were no visits between the two families?’
‘I will not say none. But they were few. Joseph is not a gadding about man, and neither is Tom.’
‘They like each other?’
‘Well enough. I never heard Tom say a bad word against his brother.’
Blakiston raised the dead woman’s arm. ‘It is stiff.’
‘She was limp when we carried her here.’
‘That is something that happens when people die. After a while, they become hard as this table she lies on. Then they soften again. If I knew how long it took, we might make some kind of guess as to what o’clock she was killed.’ He took the watch from his waistcoat pocket and looked at it. ‘It is now eight fifteen. I must remember that when I ask the doctor this question.’
‘Better ask the animal doctor. Doctor Barraclough knows nothing of the human body, except that his works better when it is filled with whisky. Or you could speak to the Rector. Priests see more dead people than doctors do.’
‘I believe you may be right.’
‘Except that now you do not speak to the Rector at all. Because of me!’
‘See how livid are the marks upon her throat. I do not think there is much doubt but that she was strangled.’
‘If you have seen all you want to see, I should like to undress her and lay her out. It would be respectful.’
‘Is that really a proper job for you, Kate?’
‘I hope you are not going to say that I am too young, or too innocent?’
Blakiston smiled. ‘Perhaps I was. I am sorry. It would not be decent for me to be here. I shall look at the place where she was killed, and question that ill-tempered woman.’
Kate watched him cross the yard towards the kitchen and wondered, for perhaps the thousandth time since he had proposed marriage and she had accepted, what the future could possibly hold.
Chapter 2
Blakiston knew that Kate had spoken no more than the truth when she suggested he jumped too quickly to conclusions. He had received the credit for finding the killer of Reuben Cooper and Matthew Higson, but as he had said to Rector Claverley, “I made many mistakes,” and one of those mistakes had been to prejudge what was important and what was not. “Next time,” he had said, “I shall follow everything until I know it has no bearing on the case, instead of deciding in advance what matters and what does not.” The Rector had smiled at the idea that there would be a next time, and Blakiston himself had expected that this “next time” would be investigating the secret he felt sure Dick Jackson carried within himself and not in yet another murder. But here he was. Excitement tingled his scalp. Someone was dead, unlawfully killed, and this time he would get to the root of the matter more quickly than he had before. This time, when people said he had done well, it would be true. This time, he would deserve the praise.
