A Missed Murder

by Michael Jecks

  Ramon clearly thought the same, because as Raphe stood back, staring with fascination at the mangled remains of the man’s hand, Ramon snapped out an order, and he and the remaining man strode from the room. Ramon glared at me on his way out, but, to be absolutely honest, I was past caring what he might think. The explosion had been so devastating that I just felt drained. I pulled the dog from the wheel on my pistol and placed the thing in my jack again. It still had its charge, and I wondered how I could empty the thing. I looked about me, wondering if there was something that I could use to pull the ball out, but as I gazed around, my eye lit on the doctor with his patient. The fellow looked yellow and miserable.

  My room had looked better, too. There were black, sooty powder burns on every surface, and the mists had not completely dissipated either. There were still swirls and eddies of fumes, as if my fire had a blocked chimney, but the smell was not as pleasant as the applewood that we had been burning the last few days. And then there were the red smudges where bits of the henchman had been spat against the walls, floor and furniture. When I looked about me, I could see that one of my pewter plates had a fresh dent just off-centre, and there was something near it which I truly did not want to look at too closely.

  Ugh. If only that were all. I became aware, while sitting in my seat, that there was an uncomfortable lump under my buttock, and when I lifted my backside to investigate, I found I was sitting on a blackened thumb.

  That was enough. With my stomach attempting to bring up my last meal, I hurried from the room and out to the road, calling over my shoulder to Raphe to clean up the damn mess as I went.

  Outside, I stopped, bent over, hands on thighs, and took several deep breaths. I still felt very queasy, and the fumes in the room had made me light-headed as well, which meant that I was suffering from the double effects of inhaling that smoke and the sight of blood. It was enough to make a man want to spew.

  ‘Master Jack?’

  I groaned. ‘Humfrie, not now. I’ve just had Ramon in there trying to spit me on his rapier, and one of his men is spread evenly over my walls and ceiling. I really don’t need …’

  ‘You need to hear this, Master,’ he said with certainty.

  Humfrie took me to his house. I hadn’t been there before. It was a good, new house built in the gap between two older buildings on a plot which had become vacant when the house between the two had collapsed. His house had been built to fill the gap, and it looked to me as though it had been squeezed tight, with the beams at steeper angles than the houses on either side, and a roof that was considerably higher than the others, since it had an additional storey over theirs.

  ‘Come in,’ Humfrie said, and held the door for me.

  He led the way inside. The door gave way into a corridor, which was a fairly long passageway. I think the place had originally been built to be used as a shop, for there was a large chamber to the right which fronted the roadway. Other house owners would have rented this space out, but Humfrie was a very private man, I suppose because someone involved in so many illegal activities would be reluctant to share his front door with another tradesman. Still, we continued along the passageway until we came to the parlour behind the shopfront. Humfrie pushed the door wide and stood back, and I walked in.

  ‘Hello, Jen,’ I said, and then recoiled, scrabbling at my breast for the gun. ‘God’s Wounds! It’s her, Humfrie!’

  Inside, as I entered, Jen was pouring ale from a costrel into a mixture of cups and a tankard. It was not her, but Agnis, who sat wide-eyed and clearly terrified at the side of the table facing me who had made me yelp with alarm.

  Humfrie closed the door and looked at me reproachfully, pushing the gun’s barrel away and down with the palm of his hand. ‘You need to be careful with that thing. Have you seen what gunpowder can do? Put it away, Master Jack. Agnis has a story to tell you, and I think you should listen.’

  I reluctantly took my seat on the bench that was offered to me, and put the gun on the seat beside me. I wasn’t going to put it away – not yet. And then Humfrie frowned at me and pointedly glared at the gun. Without enthusiasm, I picked it up and shoved it under my doublet again. ‘Well?’

  Agnis looked up at Humfrie and Jen before starting, but then she fixed her eyes on me. ‘I didn’t know, Jack. I’m really sorry, but I didn’t guess. When he came to me and told me his name was Blount, and would I bring a note to you saying it was from him, I thought little of it. At first I thought it was a practical jest at your expense, and he let me believe that. But then, later, he told me he was actually an agent for Sir Thomas Parry, and I saw no reason not to believe him. He swore that if you or I were to get into trouble, he would save us.’

  ‘Hah!’ I exclaimed. ‘You’re telling me that was Blount? He wouldn’t put himself out like that. If there was no advantage to him, he wouldn’t lift a finger.’ Saying that, I had a sudden recollection of removing a digit from my seat, and the thought brought back my earlier attack of nausea.

  ‘He gave me the note and told me to give it to you. Then he told me I had done well. He seemed very content with things, and kept saying I had done very well and we made a good team. Later he told me that although I had done well, I had to help you to perform your task. He told me to help you to find Michol, and that evening, when we got to the tavern and saw him there, he told me to give you the gun, and get inside the tavern to warn you when the men were coming out.’

  ‘You are just pulling the wool over our eyes,’ I burst out. ‘I know who you really are, Mistress Agnis! You are a spy for the French, and a thief!’

  ‘But, Jack, how could you think that?’ she demanded with her hands outspread. ‘What have I done but save you when you have been in danger?’

  She did have a point. After all, I’m no expert, but I had always believed that a spy would act as a seductress, tempting poor fools into her bed with the offer of delights rarely imagined. Agnis had instead pushed me away at every opportunity. Most of the time she’d let me understand she viewed me as little more than something found on the sole of her shoe.

  Jen nodded to her. ‘She’s not the sort Blount would have taken on. Look at her, Jack. She isn’t cut out for this sort of work. She fell for his patter, that’s all. He played her like a gittern. You can’t blame her, just because he was persuasive.’

  ‘Blount? He’s not that persuasive,’ I said, but then I had to admit that Blount had always known how to convince me to do his bidding. It was less that he was pleasant and charming, and more that he was perfectly happy to be a bully and threaten people into doing his bidding. I had experience of that myself.

  ‘Well,’ I said uncertainly, ‘what about her manner? She grew more and more confident, especially when she was handing me the gun and showing me how to use it!’

  ‘Blount made me more confident. He told me I was doing so well, and after we found Michol, he was delighted and told me to bring you the gun. But he had me leave it without a ball.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘It had some powder, but no slug. It was to make noise, but not kill someone.’

  I gaped. The thought that I had been sent to kill someone – with an unloaded weapon! ‘Ramon could have killed me! Hold! If Blount didn’t want me to kill anyone, why did he send me there?’

  She had the grace to look embarrassed. ‘He said you were expendable, but it was important that the French thought they were in danger, without running the risk you could hurt the wrong man.’

  ‘What about me? I was expendable, you say?’ I was for a short while struck dumb by the perfidy of my master, and was about to speak again when there was a sudden draft of cold air. Smoke from the fire was blown into the room, making Agnis and me cough, although from the way that Jen and Humfrie were unaffected, it seemed to be not an uncommon event.

  Jen looked disgusted. ‘You left the bleeding door open again!’ she said to Humfrie, who pulled an apologetic grimace and hunched his shoulders.

  With a loud ‘Pah!’ Jen pushed past me and Humfri
e, and strode out along the passage.

  Agnis was still looking at me with despairing eyes. ‘You do believe me, don’t you?’

  ‘Why did you agree to put me in danger? I trusted you,’ I said sadly.

  As I spoke, there was a loud slam of the front door, which almost made me leap from my skin.

  ‘It’s what he told me to do,’ Agnis said. ‘Blount told me to.’

  ‘Well. This is nice. Can I join the party?’

  I span to hear those words. Willyam had appeared in the doorway, and he held a very fine-bladed knife to Jen’s throat, the tip under her chin. With a quick push and little effort, he could send it up into her brain from there. Jen, to her credit, looked absolutely incandescent. Her face was much the same as it had been once when I refused to buy her a trinket she desired: a cold fury that, if her expression was aimed at me, would have had me fleeing the place in an instant.

  You’ll be surprised to hear this, I dare say, but I was shocked. Yes, seriously. For once, I wasn’t scared or alarmed, but simply stunned, to think that Willyam could be involved in these affairs. I had seriously believed that this was something cooked up by Agnis, and she was trying to put the blame on to Blount because it was what spies did, and in recent months I felt I had come to understand how spies behaved pretty well. But the sudden appearance of Willyam was a serious blow to my confidence on that score.

  ‘Will?’ I said dumbly.

  ‘Yes, Jack, and ask your friend Humfrie to move into the room more, where I can see him,’ Willyam said easily. ‘That’s nice, Humfrie. Now, go and sit next to pretty Agnis, will you?’

  ‘But … Willyam, what are you doing?’ I managed.

  ‘Oh, haven’t you worked it out yet?’ he sighed. ‘It’s all about the money, Jack. It always was.’

  ‘Eh?’

  He gave me a pitying look.

  I was thinking hard. ‘You knew about Blount and Parry? That I worked for them? How could you know that?’

  ‘Jack, you’re talkative when you’re drunk,’ he said.

  ‘Why, Willyam? What did you think you’d gain?’ I asked, while Agnis fulminated.

  ‘Only money. I am going to take over Thomas Falkes’s gambling halls. He’s not here. He has no need for them now.’

  My aching head was starting to spin. ‘Gambling?’

  ‘I’ve been planning this for six months. Why do you think I made the effort to get to know you? A fool who in his cups cannot remember who he is, and thinks that the height of elegance is a pair of tight-fitting hosen?’

  That was hurtful. ‘So you are the man who knocked me down in the alleyway?’

  ‘The night your Spaniard died? That was irritating. I guessed you had entered the alley, but I didn’t know why. I knew why you were friendly with the Spaniard, or at least with his purse, so I followed you, thinking to learn what attracted you, and heard voices. When I heard you talking to Humfrie, I guessed you were employing him. And then it all became clear: you had paid him to kill for you. When you left him, I slipped into a doorway, but you came back slowly, as though you were suspicious, and kicked something that made an unholy row. It was all I could bear. There was a bar of metal nearby, so I struck you down with it. Then I took the Spaniard’s purse, and his life.’

  He paused, nodded to me. ‘I’m sorry for the lump on your head, but I did not want you to see me. The money was to come in useful. Anyway, I wanted Falkes’s businesses. They’re worth a fortune to the right man. Falkes is dead, and won’t return, so his ventures are all up for grabs. It would take little to stop me. I can take over Falkes’s empire.’

  ‘You think you could take it all? You think you’re bright enough to run all his businesses?’ I scoffed.

  He wasn’t upset at my tone. He grinned. ‘I already have Mal on my side. He sees it as being perfect for him. A little increase in his payment, to help him with his new status as a husband. With him at my side it’ll be easy enough to get the rest of the men to fall into line. If you would deign to consider a proposal, Humfrie, I would be happy to employ you, too.’

  ‘Really? On what terms?’

  Willyam grinned expansively. ‘Well, my friend, we can talk about the same terms you had with Thomas, if you want? If you would like to discuss them, we can easily come to an arrangement.’

  ‘Humfrie!’ I cried. ‘You can’t trust him! You know that! Listen to him! He’s devious, lying, cheating …’

  Looking at him, Humfrie nodded slowly, considering, before throwing me a speculative look. ‘And him?’ he said, with a jerk of his head in my direction.

  ‘Humfrie!’ I pleaded.

  Willyam shook his head. ‘Jack is not going to be able to participate in our new venture. He’s a bit too stuck in his ways. What do you think, Humfrie? Could you work with me?’

  ‘I can work with anyone,’ Humfrie said.

  Will gave a broad grin and took the knife away from Jen’s throat. ‘Then I have no need of your daughter,’ he said, propelling her with a gentle shove in Humfrie’s direction.

  ‘Hold!’ I said. ‘What will you do with me and Agnis?’

  ‘I can’t very well have you running about London telling others about me and what I’ve been getting up to, can I?’ Willyam said. ‘But I won’t do anything to you if you promise to hold your tongues.’

  ‘You’ll let us go?’

  ‘Certainly I will. But Humfrie won’t.’

  ‘Me?’ Humfrie said. He turned to look at me again.

  ‘Yes,’ Willyam said, and motioned towards me. ‘Kill him and the wench. When you have done, you’ll have a job with me. Be quick.’

  Humfrie nodded and cast a look at me, then he shook his head. ‘I’ll need your help. Leave my daughter here. You don’t need her.’

  ‘How do I know I can trust her?’

  ‘What’s she going to do, Willyam? Run to Falkes? Run to the Beadle?’

  Willyam nodded, but reluctantly, so I thought, before he and Humfrie ushered us out.

  I cast a beseeching look at Jen, but she shrugged with a kind of twisted grin. And that was all.

  Humfrie held the door, and I stared at him with horror. I knew this man, I had hired him and trusted him, and yet now he was content to see me taken out to an unspecified place of execution. I didn’t like that idea. It was not in the spirit of feudal loyalty that I felt I had a right to expect.

  ‘Humfrie,’ I began tentatively.

  The only response was a rather forceful shove in the back, and a cruel snigger from Willyam which, bearing in mind how much wine I had tipped down his throat in recent years, was as unkind as Humfrie’s push. I hobbled on.

  After me came poor Agnis, and then Humfrie and Willyam.

  ‘I am sorry it’s come to this,’ I said.

  ‘I just don’t understand!’ Agnis said.

  ‘You see, Willyam of Whitechapel has always had big plans.’ I was just getting to think, and I didn’t like what I was starting to see plainly for the first time.

  ‘Oh, aye,’ Willyam said. ‘I’ve plans, all right. I’ll soon be more important than Falkes ever was. He thought himself so high and mighty with his important friends, but I will be taking over all his ventures in the city. I’ll be richer and more powerful than he ever was.’

  ‘You think so?’ I said.

  ‘Yes. Shame you won’t be there to see it,’ he said.

  I was frowning. ‘That house. You found me, after Agnis took me to that room. You knew I was at the Mermaid, didn’t you?’

  ‘I was following Mal. I didn’t know you were going to try to shoot someone.’

  ‘But you had Persian pyrites that night in the tavern,’ I recalled. ‘Did you have that to work the gun? Did you give the gun to Agnis?’

  ‘No,’ Agnis said. ‘I told you, that was Blount.’

  Willyam shrugged. ‘The pyrites? No, I picked that from a fool’s pocket in the street.’

  ‘Why would he have had a purse of pyrites?’ I wondered.

  ‘Stop talking,’ Humfrie said, an
d I did.

  Humfrie had a good idea of the place he wanted to take us, and led us down past the printing houses with their pamphlets and folio editions on shelves, and down past the inns and taverns, to the wharves. With a shock, I realized that Humfrie had brought us to the very same wharf where I had inadvertently killed Jeffry. That, I thought, was proof of very poor taste. Bringing me to be murdered at the very place where a soul was already waiting for revenge seemed to me to be exceedingly unkind.

  I would have said something, but as I realized where we were going, Humfrie gave me a shove in my back, and I almost fell. I turned to give him a piece of my mind just as he pushed again, and this time my heel caught a stone, and I went over, yelping and holding my bad ankle. It was a toss-up whether my ankle or head hurt the most just then.

  ‘Come on, get him up!’ Willyam said.

  There was an edge to his voice, and I realized with some surprise that he was every bit as anxious as I had been on that day when I accidentally pushed Jeffry into the water. Or when I fired the gun at Ramon. Or …

  ‘Get up!’ Willyam said, and I rolled over to try to get some purchase. As I did so, I realized I still had the gun in my doublet. It was such a glorious thought that I froze for an instant, mentally thanking Humfrie for his foolishness in commanding me to put it away in his house. He might be forced to regret that decision! It was still there, a massy weight at my belt. Well, at the first opportunity I would bring it out and use it to good effect. And then I wondered whether he had expected all this to happen and wanted me to have the gun on me? I threw him a glance and saw only the same, imperturbable fellow. But was there a flicker in his eye?

  I rose. ‘Don’t worry, Willyam, I’m sure you’ll be able to cope with the sight of all the blood. Not that you’ll be producing it, of course. You know, the only thing harder than seeing your own blood is seeing the blood of a man you have killed. Of course, it’s probably harder to see a woman you’ve murdered, unless you’re a coward!’

  As I spoke, I rose and began to increase my pace slightly. I wanted to get out of Willyam’s reach, although I still could not be certain of Humfrie. I just had to hope that he was on my side. He had his knife, and from experience I was well aware that the man knew how to use it. Willyam, on the other hand, would be easier to deal with. Even if I missed my shot, I could run faster than him. Well, usually, anyway. When I didn’t have a twisted ankle.