by Sam Thomas
“I do not know what may fall,” she said. “Perhaps nothing, perhaps something.”
I questioned her more, but she maintained the same steadfastness and discretion that served her so well as my deputy; she would not say another word.
I rose early the next morning and with Martha in tow set out for Edward’s. I was still troubled by our argument at the Castle, and wanted to make amends as best I could. Our route to the Ouse Bridge would take us past the Three Crowns, and I wondered whether we would catch sight of the Wards on their way out of the city. I hoped not, but when we reached the inn, we found that a large crowd had gathered outside.
“Ah, no,” I sighed. “I do not think that I can hear another of Mr. Ward’s sermons.” I was considering what other route to take to the Bridge when I heard a voice shouting my name.
“Lady Bridget, Lady Bridget!” Tree weaved through the crowd, more excited than I’d seen him in some time. “Have you already heard? Is that why you’re come?”
“Have I heard what?” I asked. “We are trying to get to Micklegate.”
“If you are going to find Mr. Hodgson, he is already on his way,” Tree replied. “Wait, and he’ll meet you here.” He seemed pleased at my good fortune, but by now, he had completely befuddled me.
“Tree, what are you doing here?” I asked.
“Samuel had sent me into the city for ale,” he said. “I was here when I heard they found the bodies.”
“Tree, what is going on?” Martha demanded. “What bodies?”
“The people from the inn said that the murders have not yet stopped,” Tree replied. “They discovered two more corpses this morning.”
Chapter 23
“Oh God!” I cried. “How so? Could she not leave the city without spilling more blood?”
“There are bodies inside?” Martha asked.
Tree nodded. “That’s why Mr. Hodgson is coming.”
I was suddenly sure that Martha knew more about what was happening than I did. I looked at her closely, but her face remained a mask.
“Come on,” Tree said.
He grasped my hand and began to pull me through the crowd. When we reached the front of the inn, we found a beadle standing at the door and trying his best to ignore the shouts of those around him. Some wanted to know what had happened; others asked if yet another whore had died. More than a few men stood in their shifts; they must have been cast out of their rooms by the beadles. When the beadle saw me, relief flooded his face.
“Lady Hodgson!” he cried. “What am I to do?”
In truth, I had no idea, for I did not know what was happening.
“Keep them out until help arrives,” I said. “I’ll go in and see what is going on.”
“Yes, my lady,” he said. “They are up on the third floor.”
I glanced again at Martha, sure that she knew who “they” were, but she remained silent. We climbed the stairs to the top floor of the inn, and found another beadle standing outside one of the rooms. His face was as pale as a new-washed shirt, and he seemed no less happy to see me than his comrade downstairs. Without a word, he opened the door to the room and ushered us in. Even before we entered, the smell of excrement assaulted us. Inside, the smell was much worse, and I cried out in horror at the gruesome scene.
A man and a woman hung from the room’s center rafter. They both had sacks on their heads, and their hands had been bound in front of them. The ropes around their necks had been tied off at the center post of the window. I did not need to remove their masks to know who they were. I looked at Martha, wondering if she somehow had a hand in this, but she seemed as shaken as I felt. Neither of us spoke as we gazed at the bodies. Through the open window, I could hear the crowd outside the inn. The only noise from the room itself was the uneven creak of the rope as the bodies swung slowly back and forth. I was pulled from my terrible reverie by the sound of men climbing the stairs. Edward had arrived, I guessed. I stepped into the hallway to meet him.
Edward, Joseph, and a squad of constables and beadles appeared at the top of the steps and hurried toward me.
“What in the devil are you doing here?” Joseph snarled.
Edward raised his hand to silence his son.
“He asks a fair question,” Edward said. “And we will pursue it later. But now is not the time.”
Martha and I stepped aside so the men could enter the Wards’ room.
“Ah, blood of Christ,” Edward moaned when he saw the bodies. Martha and I slipped in behind him. Joseph crossed to the window and pulled ineffectually at the knot.
“Someone give me a knife,” he demanded. One of the beadles obliged, and together they cut the rope and lowered the woman’s body. A constable caught her, and laid her on the floor. Edward knelt and removed the sack from her head. Deborah Ward’s eyes had rolled up, so that she’d died gazing at the heavens. Her tongue, swollen with blood, protruded from her mouth and—like Praise-God—she’d nearly bitten through it.
“Ah, Jesus,” Joseph moaned when he saw her face.
“Come on, let’s get the other one down,” Edward commanded. Joseph and the beadle obeyed and a few moments later, Hezekiah lay next to his wife.
“My God!” cried Will as he came in to the room. Joseph gave Will a baleful look before turning back to the bodies.
I cast my eyes about the room, hoping to find some sign of what had happened. Two clothes chests sat against one wall of the room. The first had been closed and locked, but the other stood open. Inside I could see a fine wool jacket lying atop several linen shirts. I caught a glimpse of something peeking out from the jacket’s sleeve and bent down for a closer look. When I saw what it was—what I thought it was—I gasped and reached for it.
Martha proved more dexterous than I, and she snatched it up. She glanced at me as she slipped it into the folds of her apron. I started to protest, but she shook her head slightly, her eyes deadly serious. Now was not the time.
“What is it?” Edward asked. “Did you find something?”
“No, sir,” Martha said without a moment’s hesitation. “Lady Hodgson is merely overcome by the terrible sight.”
I could not tell if Edward believed her, but he returned his attention to the more urgent matter of the bodies before him. I ached to ask Martha what she had found, but knew that I could not do so until we were away from Edward and Joseph. I inclined my head to the door, and Martha nodded. We tried to slip out without attracting any attention, but failed miserably.
“Beadle,” Joseph ordered. “Make sure that Lady Hodgson and her girl are comfortable in one of the other rooms. Take my brother in there, too. I will speak to them in a moment.”
The beadle nodded and led the three of us across the hall. I did not relish the conversation that would follow when Joseph joined us, but saw no way to avoid it. Like the Wards’ room, the one across the hall had a large, comfortable bed—no straw mattresses here—and two fine wood chests against the wall.
The beadle remained with us, so we waited in uneasy silence for what seemed an eternity. I searched Martha’s face for some sign of her thoughts, but she seemed unaffected by the course of events.
While we waited, more men went in and out of the Wards’ room. The beadles brought two large canvases in which they wrapped the corpses, then they carried the bodies down the stairs. They dropped one, and we heard cries of horror and a voice roaring, “Well, wrap her back up!” I hid a smile behind my hand, and I thought I saw the corners of Martha’s mouth twitch ever so slightly upward.
I could hear Edward, Joseph, and others searching the Wards’ room. Men grunted as they moved the bed, and I heard a crash as they broke the lock off Mrs. Ward’s clothes chest. By now they certainly would have found whatever Martha had hidden in her apron. After they finished the search, Joseph came into the room where we waited.
“What happened in there?” Joseph hissed. His voice had a steel edge to it, and I knew that we would have to choose our words carefully if we were to escape the room un
scathed.
“I don’t know what you mean, sir,” Martha replied with such exaggerated innocence that what followed surprised no one.
“You’ll speak when I speak to you, drab,” Joseph snarled, his fists clenched. Will stepped forward, but a withering glance from his brother froze him on the spot.
“Lady Bridget,” said Joseph, barely controlling his fury. “Tell me what happened here.”
“Joseph,” I said. “I will tell you this once. I had nothing to do with the Wards’ deaths. How could any woman have bound and hung two people?”
A muscle in Joseph’s cheek twitched repeatedly as he worked to contain himself. I could not help noticing that he’d dropped one hand to the pommel of his sword, as if he longed to draw it and put us in our places.
“If I knew how you’d done it, you’d already be in the Castle,” Joseph replied. “And not in the care of your dwarf friend, either.”
“If you know I am innocent, nephew, why do you interrogate me?”
“I did not say you are innocent. I said I did not know how you killed them.”
“Be careful what you say, Joseph,” I said. “And remember to whom you speak. You are a constable, for a year perhaps. I am a gentlewoman by blood and tradition. Do not forget that.” I did not know how hard I could push back at Joseph, but I also could not allow him to batter us into submission.
“Given your fondness for justice and the law, I find that argument puzzling,” Joseph replied. “The law would insist on hanging a gentlewoman or her servant if she were guilty of murder.” He stared at Martha in order to make clear the nature of his threat. “Before you leave this room, you will tell me what happened. You might not have hanged them yourself, but I know you had a hand in it.”
“What do you mean?” Edward asked as he entered the room. “Are you accusing Lady Bridget of killing the Wards?”
If Joseph had been in control of himself, he would have recognized his father’s incredulity, but anger overruled common sense.
“Who else?” Joseph barked. “You saw her anger when we released Mrs. Ward. You know she is willing to sacrifice good order on the altar of her own idea of justice.”
I started to object, but Joseph pushed ahead.
“Did you think I would not discover Sarah Briggs, the whore you delivered of a bastard? Why didn’t you report her to the city, Lady Bridget? Why did you keep the news to yourself? What about your oath? What about the law? Oughtn’t she be whipped?”
Edward looked at me in surprise, hoping—I think—for a denial of some sort. I sought an explanation but found none. My mouth flapped open and closed, but I could find no words.
“Do you see?” Joseph asked. “The scene across the hall was how she dispenses justice. She has no concern for the law and none for order.”
“And you would prefer the tyranny of law without justice,” I replied at last. I’d had enough of Joseph’s panting after power.
“I’ll hear no more lectures from you,” Joseph spat. “I do not know what your role was in murdering these two, but I will not rest until I discover it and see you hanged, and if your slatternly maid was a part of it, I’ll see her on the gibbet beside you.”
I think that even Edward felt that Joseph had gone too far, but it was Martha who came forward first.
“So long as you’re talking of murderers, you should look to yourself, shouldn’t you?” Martha cried. “We may never see you hanged, but we will see you cast down from the power you love so much, and brought at low as Praise-God Ward. You’re no better a man than he was.”
With horrifying speed, Joseph drew his sword and slashed it across Martha’s face. She clapped her hand to her cheek and fell to the floor with a cry. Will roared, drew his sword from his cane, and charged at Joseph. He drove the crown of his head into his brother’s face. Joseph’s nose broke with a sickening crack. Blood spattered across both their faces, and Edward’s, too.
Joseph stumbled back, shaking his head to clear the blood from his eyes and screaming in anger. Edward cried out for them to stop, but neither would leave off the fight until the other lay dead. Joseph lunged at Will, his sword carving an arc toward his brother’s neck. Will deflected the blow and ducked under it, then swung his fist at Joseph’s wrecked nose. Joseph fell back on to the bed, spitting blood.
Edward hurled himself between his sons, but one of them—I could not tell which—knocked him back and to the ground. Now it was Will’s turn to attack. His sword swung wide of Joseph’s throat, but not by more than an inch. Joseph avoided another killing blow when he lashed out with his feet, kicking Will’s legs from under him.
Will stumbled back, his arms reeling madly as he tried to keep his balance. The tip of his sword clipped the floor and flew from his hand. As Will scrambled to find the handle of his sword, Joseph rolled off the bed and leaped to his feet. While the brothers regained themselves, I grasped Martha’s arm and pulled her to the side.
Will and Joseph rejoined the battle with a ferocity seen only in civil wars, swords and blood flying, the small wounds they inflicted on each other multiplying. I looked for Edward, but could not find him in the melee. At some point Will suffered a grievous cut on his crippled leg, and within moments he seemed to be wearing parti-colored trousers, half crimson, half tan. Despite this wound, Will lunged forward and cut open Joseph’s shoulder, and soon his arm hung by his side, useless.
It seemed an eternity before a small army of beadles crashed into the room, knocking the door clear from its hinges. They threw themselves at Will and Joseph both. Thoroughly exhausted by their fight, both men went down without a struggle.
I helped Martha to her feet, and as gently as I could, prised her hand from her cheek. A horrific welt stood out on her fair skin and blood oozed from the top edge, but the wound seemed far milder than the blow. Mercifully, Joseph’s goal had been to humiliate and disfigure, not to kill. He had struck her with the flat edge of his sword.
“Come,” I said. “We will find some water.” She nodded but said nothing.
By now the beadles had disarmed Joseph and Will and hauled them to their feet. Their wounds would need to be bound, but if they could avoid infection, neither would suffer more pain than he deserved.
“Oh, Christ!” one of the beadles shouted. “Jesus Christ! Murder! Murder!”
We all turned to see what the matter was. Only then did we notice a pair of legs sticking out from behind the bed. I cried out in horror when I saw what had happened. In the distance, I could hear Will’s and Joseph’s screams mixing with my own. Edward—my brother-in-law, protector, and benefactor—lay slumped against the wall, his eyes staring sightlessly at the ceiling above.
* * *
My memories of the hours that followed are indistinct at best. I remember seeing the front of Edward’s shirt saturated with blood. I saw that he died clutching his own neck, trying in vain to slow the flow of blood from the fatal wound. When they saw their father’s body, Will and Joseph cried out in unison, their bloody quarrel forgotten. They fell to their knees before their father and begged that their eyes might be deceiving them. They screamed even as the bailiffs dragged them to the Castle.
With both Will and Joseph in jail, it fell to me to care for Edward’s body. Martha and I laid him out on the bed and washed the blood from his neck and chest. So much blood. Someone, I know not who, brought us a woolen shroud and helped us to wrap him.
A while later—minutes? hours?—Mark Preston arrived with three other servants and they carried Edward’s body across the river to his church. They would bury him in the chancel the next morning.
Martha and I leaned on each other as we walked home. Hannah had heard the news, and she met us at the door. She helped us both from our blood-spattered clothes, brought us wine, and saw us to bed.
* * *
The next morning, Hannah, Martha, and I donned our mourning clothes and crossed the bridge to Micklegate Ward. Between his friends, colleagues, and representatives from the city’s most important gui
lds, Edward’s mourners numbered in the hundreds and his black-clad pallbearers included the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Members of Parliament. Nobody mentioned Will’s and Joseph’s absence, of course, but it could not have been far from anyone’s mind. Save Will and Joseph, I was Edward’s closest living relative, so I was given pride of place in the church. I sat in Edward’s pew, staring at the stained glass and trying to open my soul to the beauty of holiness. I imagine the minister preached, but cannot say that I heard a word of his sermon. Rather, I wondered what the Lord meant by all this, and what the future would bring.
As the service went on around me, I thought of the grief that fathers and sons brought upon each other. Though he did not mean for it to happen, Hezekiah Ward’s actions led to his son’s death. And I supposed that even from the grave, Praise-God had a hand in his father’s murder. For his part, by favoring Joseph over Will, Edward had stoked the rivalry between his boys. Obviously he never imagined it would lead to murder, especially his own, but it is a rare life that goes as planned.
After Edward’s burial, city officials summoned a jury to investigate his death. The Lord Mayor and jurors questioned both Will and Joseph, of course, but not for very long; it seemed unlikely that either of them would confess to murdering their father. But they kept Martha and me for hours. An Alderman had died, and the thought that his killer might escape justice drove the Lord Mayor quite mad.
The problem was that neither of us had seen who struck the blow that ended Edward’s life. I relived the afternoon’s events countless times, but could not see the moment when the blood began to flow in earnest. I had been too worried for Will to see my brother-in-law’s life pouring out between his fingers. His last sight had been his sons trying to kill each other. In the end, everyone agreed that either Will or Joseph had killed their father, but no one could say which of them struck the fatal blow. The Lord Mayor retired to consider whether the city would hang both or neither.
