The clerk and I were alone, though another of the Coroner’s men was trying to dissuade a knot of people from approaching. The news of the body had not spread far yet. But it soon would.
Why did it have to be here – so close to Clifford’s Inn, to the Fire Court and Fetter Lane? I looked back at the corpse. It had been buried, if that was the right word, in a large, dark-brown cloak originally made for a man. But where it had been pushed aside you could see what she was wearing beneath. Some thin material, probably silk and certainly expensive; yellow in colour, almost golden, but badly stained with blood. The blood was rust-coloured now, but when it was fresh the contrast with the yellow must have been dazzling.
Yellow as the sun, red as fire …
For a moment I heard my father’s weary voice on the last evening of his life, as he recounted his strange, fantastic dream. The dream that had turned out to have so many unexpected correspondences with reality.
A sense of foreboding crept over me. Yellow as the sun, red as fire … Had he been trying to describe the dress the woman had been wearing? But how could he have seen this woman in the ruins? As far as I knew he hadn’t come here.
Unless he had seen her in Clifford’s Inn.
‘Jackson says she’s a widow,’ the clerk said. ‘And wealthy, too.’
‘Jackson?’
‘The Coroner’s coachman. He used to work for the woman’s uncle before he came to his worship. But he’s wrong, if you ask me. I know an old whore when I see one. This wasn’t one of your tuppenny knee-jerkers, mind. Soft hands. Handsome gown. She’d been one for the gentlemen, though you wouldn’t think to look at her now.’
‘Turn her head,’ I said.
‘What?’
‘I want to see the other side of her face.’
He shrugged. ‘If you say so.’
‘I do say so. Put her on her back.’
He spat on his hands and crouched beside the body. He thrust his hands and forearms underneath the shoulders and the waist. He made a half-hearted attempt to heave the body over. He glanced up.
‘Easier if you’d lend a hand, sir.’
‘No.’
I stared at the clerk until he looked away. I had shown him my warrant from Williamson, countersigned by Lord Arlington, and he dared not oppose my authority.
He applied himself a little harder, or at least with a great appearance of effort. The trunk of the body flopped over. He dragged up the legs and, careless of decency, left them splayed, with the gown and the smock below hoisted above the knees. Finally he pushed up the head, bringing the face towards the sky.
The smell grew worse. I gagged.
Underneath the woman’s left breast was another rust-coloured stain of dried blood. Her face and her dress were smeared with ash. The left eye was still there, thank God. The ground beneath the body must have protected it from predators. It was closed.
I closed her eyes, I owed her that at least.
My father’s words filled my mind. They were a reproach. He had done his duty to the dead. But I had not done my duty to him. I had not even believed him.
Ignoring the smell, I jumped down to the cellar’s floor and stooped beside the woman’s head. That’s when I noticed the second patch on her face: a miniature coach and horses galloping towards the left-hand corner of her mouth.
With a coach and horses too. Oh, vanity, vanity.
The shock of it hit me like a blow. My father had spoken nothing but the truth to me, and in my folly I had ignored it and condemned him as an old man in his dotage. Who was the fool now?
Oh, vanity, vanity.
Shock comes in waves, like the sea. While I braced myself against the impact, part of my mind ran on undisturbed, dealing with my appointed task.
‘I’m told her name may have been Hampney,’ I heard myself saying.
The clerk nodded. ‘We’ve sent for her uncle. We’ll soon know.’ He pointed towards Fetter Lane. ‘That could be him.’
A coach was drawing up by the side of the road. As I watched, a tall, thin old man clambered out, followed by two women. A younger man came round from the other side of the coach.
‘There’s Thomas with them,’ the clerk said. ‘The Coroner’s man.’
The elder woman stumbled. The younger took her arm. The two men and the two women advanced into the ruins. The older woman was limping; perhaps she had landed awkwardly as she descended from the coach and twisted her ankle. She leaned heavily on the younger woman.
‘Leave the body on this side,’ I ordered. ‘If she’s the old man’s niece, he shouldn’t see her like this, with an eye missing. Not at first. And cover her up with the cloak. Make her decent, as far as you can.’
The clerk scowled at me. But he shrugged and obeyed.
The urge to parade his knowledge triumphed over his truculence. ‘He’s rich as the devil,’ he murmured, eyeing the little party picking their way through the ruins towards us. ‘So they say.’
‘The uncle? What’s his name?’
‘Poulton.’
‘The cloth merchant? Late of Dragon Yard?’
‘That’s him.’
All lines converged on the Dragon Yard case and the Fire Court at Clifford’s Inn.
Then came another shock to add to the others: the younger woman was Catherine Lovett.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
There are languages without words.
You may speak volumes with symbols, Cat knew, or gestures or hesitations or even silences. Your clothes may say what you cannot, and your eyes may plead, cajole or command.
These languages had never come naturally to her, but she had acquired a knowledge of them almost against her will in the days when she had lived in affluence and believed that her fate was to marry a courtier. Her Aunt Quincy had been a mistress of the sidelong glance or the twitch of a white, softly rounded shoulder.
‘Patches,’ said Mr Poulton. ‘And paste. She looks like a woman of the court or those painted whores at the theatre. How could she have sunk so low?’
‘And that gown …’ murmured Mistress Lee, clinging to his arm; it was not easy to say who was supporting whom. ‘Her hair …’
Cat said nothing. What could you say to death? Besides, it was not her place to say anything. She was here against Poulton’s will, because Mistress Williams desired to lean on her arm as they came across the ruins; and perhaps the old woman had wanted the support of one of her own sex, too.
‘Patches,’ Poulton murmured. ‘Badges of sin.’
They seemed not to realize, Cat thought, that patches had their meanings, as precise and finicky as the chop-logical definitions of a scholar.
‘Oh my poor Celia …’ Mr Poulton sat down abruptly on the top of a wall. Tears coursed down his cheeks.
Mistress Lee sat and took his hand in both of hers. Cat stood to one side, watching, listening. The Coroner’s clerk threw a glance at her and gave her a wink. Cat ignored him. At least the dead woman could no longer feel. Someone had valued her so little that they had dumped her here, carrion for the crows, a prey for the ghoulish. Even worse than death was the callousness of the living.
‘Is that how she was found?’ Mr Poulton asked.
‘More or less, your honour,’ the clerk said smugly. ‘We made her look decent.’
‘Decent?’ said Mistress Lee in a faint voice. ‘You call that decent?’
The clerk lowered his voice. ‘There are … wounds, mistress. As I was telling Lord Arlington’s man, the lady must have lain here for days.’
Mistress Lee whispered, ‘No …’ and looked away.
Poulton’s head snapped up. ‘My Lord Arlington?’ he rasped. ‘What’s this to do with him?’
‘He sometimes sends for further information when we report a body in the ruins, sir.’ The clerk pointed down the slope to Shoe Lane. ‘His man’s over there.’
Cat followed the direction of the finger. A man in a suit of mourning stood with his back to them, talking to the Coroner’s servant who had brought them
from Mr Poulton’s. She knew at a glance, and with a jolt of shock whose nature she did not care to analyse, that it was James Marwood.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
‘Madam,’ I said, bowing to the elderly lady and the man beside her. ‘Mr Poulton?’
Seated on the remains of the wall, they barely acknowledged my presence. I did not look at Catherine Lovett. She was standing to the side, watching me.
‘Sir,’ I persevered, ‘my name’s Marwood. I am come from my master, Lord Arlington.’ I took a step forward, forcing the clerk to move aside. ‘My lord commands me to convey his compliments of condolence.’
‘Who did this?’ Poulton said.
‘I don’t know, sir. The justices will spare no effort to find out, and nor will my lord.’
‘What good will that do? Even if you find the monster who did it, it won’t bring back my niece.’
The lady took Poulton’s hand and squeezed it.
‘How long has she lain here?’ he burst out. ‘Why is she dressed like a … like that?’
No one spoke.
‘What was she doing?’ he went on. ‘Was she sleepwalking among the ruins when she was set upon? Was she alone?’
‘Can we at least cover her face?’ the old woman said.
‘Of course,’ I said, turning to the clerk.
He shrugged. His upper lip rose, increasing his resemblance to a ferret. ‘What with?’
I took out my handkerchief, which was made of fine lawn edged with black; it was designed for display rather than use and, according to my tailor, it was absolutely indispensable for a decent appearance of mourning. I shook out the square and laid it over Mistress Hampney’s head.
‘Sir,’ I said, ‘forgive me, but may I ask a question? Had the lady been away from home? Had you seen her recently?’
Poulton’s companion snorted. ‘Chance would be a fine thing.’
He touched her arm and she fell silent. ‘My niece didn’t live with us. Until the Fire she lived in Dragon Yard, in the house she had shared with her husband. Afterwards, she found it convenient to lodge with a lady in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Mistress Grove.’
‘You offered to take her into our house, sir,’ the old woman said. ‘You pleaded with her. But she was always headstrong. Ever since she was old enough to walk.’
‘Elizabeth,’ he said, his voice a low growl. ‘Peace.’
‘Then when did you see her last?’ I asked.
‘At church, the Sunday before last.’
‘What will happen now?’ the lady said, refusing to be repressed.
‘There must be an inquest, mistress,’ I said. ‘And then the family may take away the body and bury it.’
‘Indeed, sir,’ said the Coroner’s clerk, appearing at my shoulder and trying to seize the initiative, ‘if you will permit me to say so, that is my—’
‘Men will see her,’ Poulton said, stumbling over the words. ‘They will see her like this. It is not seemly.’
‘Sir, the Coroner will see that her body is treated with all respect.’ I wondered how true that would be, especially if the character of the Coroner’s clerk was any guide to his master’s. ‘It’s best you leave us now. The body must be removed.’
‘I should stay with her. I … I owe it to my sister, her poor mother.’
‘You will distress yourself needlessly if you stay.’
‘And me,’ the lady put in, tugging Poulton’s arm. ‘You will distress me, too. You needn’t think I will leave you here alone.’
Poulton looked about him, a dazed expression on his face. He detached the old woman’s hand from his arm. With painful slowness he knelt by the body. He peeled back the handkerchief and kissed his niece’s cheek, his lips brushing the skin just above the coach and horses. He rose, even more slowly, to his feet, ignoring my attempts to help him. He took the old woman’s arm and they walked a few paces towards Fetter Lane. She was still limping, and this time Poulton noticed her lameness and supported her.
She stopped and looked back at Cat. ‘Young woman,’ she said to Cat. ‘Thank you. You mustn’t go back to your master alone. The streets are too dangerous.’
Cat curtsied. ‘It’s broad daylight, mistress, and the streets are crowded. I’ll come to no harm.’
‘No, no, no,’ Poulton said, his voice cracking on the last syllable. ‘I will not permit it. Look what happened to my poor niece.’ He stared wildly about us. ‘There may be a monster abroad. I shall give you something for a hackney.’
‘May I help, sir?’ I asked.
Mistress Lee said, ‘This young woman needs to be conveyed to her master at …?’ She threw a glance at Cat.
‘Mr Hakesby,’ Cat said, staring straight ahead at Fetter Lane. ‘In Henrietta Street, by Covent Garden.’
‘I’ll make sure she’s escorted there, mistress,’ I said. ‘You have my word.’
I dropped a coin into the outstretched palm of the man who had escorted them from the coach. He hastened after them.
I turned to the clerk, who continued to hover at my elbow, his lips tightly compressed and his single eyebrow crinkled into a frown. ‘Lord Arlington particularly wishes that the body should be treated with the utmost respect, as if it were that of his own sister.’ I paused to let the words sink in. ‘You will take care that it is so. What’s your name?’
‘Emming, sir. But the Coroner—’
‘The Coroner will not want to disoblige Lord Arlington, any more than you do.’ I held his gaze until he looked away. I turned to Cat. ‘Come.’
She scowled at me but obeyed. We walked in silence through the ruins until we were out of earshot.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said quietly. ‘It can’t be easy for you to play the servant.’
‘Better to play the servant than the whore,’ she snapped. ‘But whatever that poor woman did, she didn’t deserve to die like that.’ She hesitated. ‘You were gentle with the old man and his housekeeper. That was well done.’
I looked at her. ‘I haven’t always been gentle with old men.’
‘Your father?’
I let the question hang but of course she was right. ‘Why are you here? I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw you.’
‘Thanks to you, Mr Hakesby saw an opportunity for work. Mr Poulton is a rich man, and Dragon Yard is a big site, and on Cheapside, too. I was at his house when he heard the news.’
‘Who is the old woman?’
‘Her name’s Mistress Lee.’
‘Poulton seems to depend on her. I thought at first—’
‘That she was his wife?’ Cat said. ‘She carries herself like a wife. But their servant said she’s his housekeeper. She’s lived in his family for many years.’
We looked at each other. I dare say that Cat and I were thinking the same thought: that there was a certain irony in the old couple’s disapproval of Celia Hampney’s conduct.
‘Did you examine the body before we came?’ she said.
‘I had the clerk turn the woman over before Mr Poulton saw her.’ I hesitated, a sense of decorum affecting me at the last moment. But Catherine Lovett was such a strange creature that to talk to her was not like talking to a woman – or to a man, for that matter. ‘The right-hand side of the woman’s face had been mutilated after death. The eye was gone.’
‘Crows?’ she said, in a matter-of-fact way that was a thousand miles away from the clerk’s prurience a few minutes earlier.
‘Probably.’
Poulton and the housekeeper were clambering into the coach in Fetter Lane. Cat and I hung back, not wanting to catch up with them. There was a small crowd opposite the Half Moon tavern, staring at the activity around the corpse. Theophilus Chelling was among them. It looked as if he was bobbing up and down in his excitement.
‘The patches upset them,’ I said. ‘Almost as much as anything else. “Badges of sin” – that’s what the old man called them.’
‘There were more than one?’
‘On the other side of the face. A heart.’
&n
bsp; ‘Where?’
‘At the outer corner of the eye.’
‘Il y a une langue des mouches.’
I stared at her. ‘What?’
‘It means the flies have a language. It’s what my Aunt Quincy used to say.’ Cat looked up at me, and I saw mockery in her eyes. ‘Did she never say that to you? You talked a good deal with her, I think.’
I shrugged and felt the colour rising in my cheeks. ‘Never about flies. Why flies? There were flies around the body.’
‘Not real flies. My aunt lived in France at one time. Les mouches – it’s what the French call beauty patches. The point is, sir, they have their meanings for those who can read what they say.’
‘The shape of the patch?’
‘And its position and its name. For example, a patch that masks a blemish is known as la voleuse, because it steals away a blemish, and perhaps steals truth away with it.’
‘And this lady’s patches?’
‘A patch at the corner of the mouth is called la coquette. It invites compliment or even a kiss. Then she has the coach and horses there – and at a hand-gallop towards her lips. You do not need me to parse you the sense of that. As for une mouche at the corner of the eye, that is called la passionée. In the shape of a heart, too. All in all, I know what my aunt would say about such a woman and her intentions.’
She gave me another mocking glance. At one time, I had desired her Aunt Quincy beyond reason, beyond everything.
‘What would my Lady Quincy say?’ I said.
‘She would say that there went a woman who was happy to give her lover everything.’
Fifty yards ahead, Poulton’s coachman touched the horses with his whip and the coach wheels ground into motion, gradually picking up speed.
‘I must go back to Mr Hakesby,’ Cat said. ‘You needn’t trouble yourself to take me there. I’ll manage perfectly well by myself.’
The Fire Court Page 13
