Constant Lovers

by Chris Nickson

  ‘When were you last by here?’ he asked Johnson.

  The farmer looked off into the distance, picturing his movements.

  ‘Late yesterday afternoon,’ he answered finally. ‘I’d been down to Kirkstall Forge with a couple of scythes for mending. I came back up the bank. I’d have seen her if she’d been here then.’

  Nottingham thought. It was a long stretch of time, but this was open land, not like the city where people were always around.

  ‘You didn’t hear anything last night?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Johnson gave the corpse a last sad look and hurriedly strode off out of sight, the dog close at his heels. The Constable found him around the corner, standing silently, packing tobacco in a clay pipe.

  ‘She’s nobbut a lass,’ he said mournfully. ‘Who’d do that to someone like her? Leave her like that?’

  ‘That’s what they pay me to find out,’ Nottingham told him. ‘Have you seen any of her clothing? Anything at all?’

  ‘Nowt,’ Johnson answered. ‘Just her, like that.’ The Constable could see that the man’s hand was trembling, clutching tight on the brittle pipe stem.

  ‘Have some people look around,’ he suggested. ‘There might be something.’

  ‘I will,’ Johnson agreed.

  ‘Do you have a coroner out here?’ Nottingham said. Outside the city boundary, this was beyond the writ of Edward Brodgen, the Leeds coroner.

  ‘Usually the master does it, but he’s gone, like I say.’

  ‘Have his deputy pronounce her dead. Can you find someone to bring her to the jail?’ he asked. ‘I’ll need her there.’

  ‘I’ll get Elias and his cart. He does all the hauling round here.’

  ‘Cover her properly,’ Nottingham warned gently. ‘We don’t want all the world staring at her.’

  ‘Aye,’ Johnson agreed, his voice barely more than a whisper. ‘Aye.’

  ‘And if you find anything, bring it to me. Anything at all. It could be important.’

  He walked away, leaving the farmer to his thoughts, and mounted the horse for the ride back to Leeds. His spine hurt from the constant, jarring movement, and he looked to the distance, happy to see the outline of the city, the roofs and spires that meant home.

  Like it or not, it seemed that looking for the girl’s killer was going to be his job. She obviously wasn’t local to Kirkstall; someone would have known her immediately. Nor did she have the air of the country girl about her. Her skin was too white, too smooth; she’d never spent much time exposed to the sun. When they brought her to the jail he’d look at her hands, but he was willing to wager there would be no calluses.

  She came from money. Everything about her said that. Very soon someone would report her missing and then he’d be under pressure to find the murderer. The mayor, now in the last months of his office, would carp and command. Never mind the poor who died from violence, this would come first.

  But there was nothing more he could do until he inspected her body properly. He hadn’t paid attention to see if she wore any rings, or had marks on her fingers from them. There would be a few things she could still tell him, even in death.

  He sighed, willing the horse back to its stable so he could plant his two feet on the ground. The heat had grown during the morning, and even the small breeze simply stirred the warm air around.

  Soon enough, though, Leeds was around him, the noise and press of people, the full, awful summer perfume of the city filling his nostrils. Strangers often found the place unnerving, roaring loud, busy and crowded, but the familiarity of it all comforted him. Smiling, he walked back along Boar Lane, glancing up at the buildings, the inviting scent of ale seeping from the open door of an inn.

  Sedgwick was waiting at the jail, the remains of a beef pie on the desk in front of him, his coat thrown across a chair. Nottingham poured a mug of small beer and drank eagerly.

  ‘Any joy with the thieving servants?’ he asked.

  ‘No. I’ve told people to look out for the lace handkerchiefs. I don’t think there’s anything else we can do for now. If this lot have any sense they’ll have moved on by now and be trying it somewhere else.’

  ‘How many criminals have sense?’ Nottingham asked. ‘We’ve got something bigger now. We have a murderer to find.’

  ‘Oh?’ Sedgwick fixed his stare on the Constable.

  ‘They called me out to Kirkstall. A girl stabbed at the abbey.’ He poured more beer and drank. ‘From a quick look at her, I’d say she’s from quality.’

  Sedgwick made a sour face. He knew what that meant.

  ‘Someone’s going to be bringing her in later. Once we know a little more I’ll tell His Worship.’ The mayor would need to be informed.

  ‘If we’re looking for a murderer we could use someone else to help,’ the deputy pointed out.

  ‘I know.’

  Until the spring they’d had someone, a young cutpurse named Josh who’d turned into a promising Constable’s man. But he’d left, and Nottingham couldn’t blame him for going. His girl had lost their baby and died, and Josh had been beaten bloody by a pair of thugs. There’d been precious little to keep him in Leeds.

  Since then he’d talked to a few prospects, but there’d been no one to equal the lad they’d lost. He’d had intelligence and energy, he listened well and was used to being invisible, unnoticed. Finding someone that good was hard, but the Constable wasn’t going to settle for less.

  ‘I need to find the right person,’ he said. ‘You know anyone?’

  Sedgwick shook his head. ‘None of the men are up to it. They’ll do what you need if you prod them but nothing more than that.’

  Nottingham grinned. ‘Maybe we’ll be lucky and solve this one in a day.’

  ‘Aye, and maybe someone will have left me a fortune in his will.’ The deputy stood and stretched loudly, his arms extending almost to the ceiling. ‘Do you want me to check the Hall later?’

  Every Tuesday and Saturday afternoon undyed cloth was sold at the White Cloth Hall. Like the morning market on Briggate it was held in near silence; only the sound of whispers and footsteps echoed around the stone wings of the building. There was never any trouble, but they went when they could, just to walk around and remind people that the law was watching.

  ‘Yes, I suppose we’d better put in an appearance,’ Nottingham answered. ‘I’ll wait here for the body.’

  Left alone he slipped next door to the White Swan for a fresh jug of ale and a pie from their kitchen. It would be at least an hour before the carter arrived with the corpse and he’d no intention of going hungry while he waited.

  The mutton was stringy but the gravy was rich and spicy, soaking deep into the pastry. The ale tasted refreshing, cool from the deep, dark cellar where a stream ran through the earth. He sat back on the bench, resting his head against the wall, and closed his eyes.

  Tomorrow his family would all be together. Emily would have the day off from her post as a governess in Headingley, and walk into Leeds to be with them. Mary would be cleaning the house now, although it was already spotless, ready for their daughter’s arrival.

  The girl seemed to have settled happily into her position. There was a new air of gravity and maturity replacing the wild ways of last autumn when she’d seemed uncontrollable. She loved the two young girls in her care, and responsibility agreed with her, smiles and sharp eyes replacing the bleak silences of winter.

  But that season had been a bad time for them all. After Rose had died, slipping away to a wraith in just a week, their lives had simply crumbled. Slowly, painfully they’d managed to look ahead. And now, with Emily gone, he and Mary were gradually becoming used to life alone again, cast back on themselves.

  It had been a tenuous easing back to old familiarities and intimacies. They were finding each other again, reminded of the pleasure of each other’s company once more. With the good weather they’d taken to walking together, just as they had when they were younger, letting their grief evaporate in the
long, warm evenings.

  The grating squeak of a cart turning the corner on to Kirkgate roused him from his thoughts and he glanced through the dust on the window. The man had made good time from Kirkstall. He gulped the last of the ale and rushed into the street.

  The carter had stopped in front of the jail. He was a squat, bearded man, dressed in breeches and shirt, an old leather apron bulging over his large stomach, sleeves rolled up to show brawny, tanned arms.

  ‘Got summat for you,’ he said, gesturing idly at the bundle in the back of the wagon. The girl had been covered with a dirty sheet, but there was no mistaking the fact that a body lay underneath. ‘I’ll help you get her in.’

  She was an awkward load, but together they managed to ease her through to the cell the city used as a mortuary.

  The carter wiped his hands on the apron. ‘Nasty business, that.’

  ‘Do you know who she was?’ Nottingham asked.

  ‘No.’ The carter answered. ‘Not local, though, I can tell you that.’ He paused, head tilted to one side. ‘Oh aye,’ he remembered, ‘I’ve summat else to give you. Come with me.’

  The Constable followed him out to the cart. The man reached under the seat and brought out an object in an old sack.

  ‘The knife,’ he explained. ‘We had to take it out to wrap her. Bugger of a job it was, too. The blade was twisted and caught, didn’t want to come.’

  He climbed up to the wagon and flicked the reins lightly. The horse started to move. The man didn’t bother to look back.

  Removing the sheet, Nottingham could see her properly for the first time. The flies had gathered around her mouth and nose and he had to keep brushing them away. Already there was the smell of decay about her, sickening and sweet like overripe fruit.

  She was smaller than he’d first thought, no more than five feet and dainty, with the easy slimness of youth. Eighteen, he thought, possibly twenty, but no older than that. She had blue eyes and even features, a girl who was pretty, but with looks that stopped shy of beauty.

  He lifted her left hand, turning it over to examine the palm. It was exactly as he’d thought; the skin was soft and pale, she’d never had to work in her life. Her fingernails were clean, not bitten or worn to the quick. He held up the ring finger to the light, noticing a paler band of flesh, the sign of a wedding ring taken from her. There was a small, faint scar, shaped like a C, in the triangle between her thumb and forefinger.

  Her feet were tiny, the toes all straight, with no indication they’d ever been forced into shoes that didn’t fit. Finally he pushed her on to her side and exposed the wound in her back. The maggots were already there, tiny white creatures crawling and feasting around the gash. He flicked them away with a fingernail, bending to look more closely. There was just one cut, and judging from the position it would have pierced her heart.

  Gently he laid her back down and closed her eyelids. There were small bruises on her upper arms as if someone had held her too tightly, keeping her helpless. So perhaps there had been two of them, he thought, one to hold her still while the other stabbed.

  Nottingham ran his hands over the dress, feeling slowly along the seams for anything that might be hidden there. Moving down, his fingertips touched something, a pocket cleverly concealed in the fabric. He opened it carefully and took out a piece of paper, folded several times into a tiny square. He opened it up and held it to the light. A note in a man’s handwriting: Soon we’ll be together and our hearts can sing loud, my love. W. Was that just a keepsake she kept close to treasure or something hidden for a reason, he wondered?

  He stood back, staring down at the fragile body. Someone had loved this girl, raised her, seen her go when another wedded her. She’d come from a family with enough money that she’d never wanted for anything. People would miss her very soon.

  At the desk he picked up the sack and shook out the knife. Blood had dried on the edges of the blade in veins like rust. It might have been made for cutting meat in the kitchen, but it had still cost someone deep in the purse, an expensive weapon for a killing. This didn’t look like a random murder by thieves. If it had been, they wouldn’t have left her where the body would be found so easily. There was more going on here.

  He sat back, steepling his fingers under his chin. Girls of quality didn’t disappear in the West Riding. Especially wives. Today, tomorrow at the latest, he’d have word that someone was frantically searching for her. Then he’d have a name and he could start seeking the person who’d done this.

  The easy, languorous mood of early morning had vanished and in its place Nottingham felt a growing tension. From long experience he knew that most murders were solved quickly; the more time went by, the harder his job would become. Half a day had passed already since she’d been found. He needed to know who she was.

  He was still wondering, half expecting someone to arrive and give the girl a name, when Sedgwick returned.

  ‘Hot out now,’ he commented, shedding his coat to show large patches of sweat darkening his old, darned shirt. ‘Starting to get close.’

  ‘Any problems?’ Nottingham asked.

  ‘Nothing. The heat must be making them lazy.’

  ‘Just wait until later. Saturday night, plenty of drink and the temperature – there’ll be trouble enough.’

  The deputy nodded his agreement, pouring the last of the small beer.

  ‘Did they bring her in?’

  ‘A little while ago.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She grew up around money, no doubt about that. And she was married, by the look of it.’ He pushed the knife across the desk. ‘Take a look at that.’

  Sedgwick hefted the blade, balancing the handle on his finger. ‘That’s what killed her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s not cheap. So either the killer’s rich or he panicked a little.’

  ‘The carter said the blade had caught in the bone. They probably couldn’t pull it out. There must have been two of them. Someone else was holding her; there’s bruising on her arms.’

  ‘But we’ve no idea who she was?’

  ‘None at all. Go and take a look at her, see if the face is familiar.’

  The deputy vanished for a few moments and came back out shaking his head.

  ‘Then we’ll have to wait until someone claims her,’ the Constable continued. ‘Go on home, John; they’ll be keeping you busy tonight.’

  With a bright grin Sedgwick drained his cup, gathered up his coat and left, vanishing into the warmth of the street.

  Three

  No one came for the girl that day or the next. Emily arrived home as the Sunday morning bells at the Parish Church rang eight; she’d set off early from Headingley, her shoes covered in dust from the road. She carried herself with pride and confidence these days, Nottingham thought with pleasure as they all strolled together to morning service.

  Later he heard the laughing burble of voices from the kitchen as she prepared dinner with Mary, the scent of cooking meat making him hungry. It was good to have the family together, however briefly it might be. He enjoyed having his wife to himself, to rediscover why they’d fallen in love and do it all over again, but this . . . it brought a different, deeper contentment.

  Emily was full of tales of her charges, Constance and Faith. She cared about the girls, that much would have been clear to a blind man, her eyes smiling whenever she talked about them. He listened, basking in her joy, thinking of her when she was small and still in apron strings herself, then a little older and gawky, her head always in a book.

  In the evening he walked her back into the city, her arm daintily crooked in his, the late warmth rising from the ground.

  ‘Are you happy?’ he asked as they crossed Timble Bridge and began the gentle climb up Kirkgate.

  ‘Yes, I am, papa.’ Her answer was heartfelt. ‘I love the girls, and the Hartingtons are very good to me. I sit with them at dinner, and they listen to my opinions.’

  ‘Then you’d better make sure you’r
e not too free in what you say,’ he advised.

  She blushed. ‘I’m always very careful, papa.’ She paused, and he could tell she was looking for a neutral topic. ‘They took me to see the oak last week.’

  ‘The oak?’

  ‘The big oak tree on the main road in Headingley. People say it’s been there for hundreds of years. Mr Hartington explained how important it used to be, how people met there to govern things long ago.’

  He smiled. Thoresby, the historian, had told him about the old shire oak years before, but he’d never paid much attention. In those days he’d been too busy surviving the present to concern himself with the past.

  They parted at the jail, and he waited by the door until she vanished up Briggate with a wave. Grown up and gone, off into her own life. He smiled and unlocked the door.

  He expected a note from Sedgwick, saying the body had been claimed and giving her a name, but there was nothing. He could smell her corpse, rotting by the hour in this weather, the stink of her decomposition clawing at his throat.

  The Constable was surprised, and worried. By now, surely, someone must have missed her and come looking. She couldn’t have lived too far away. Then his mind fell to the practicalities. The way her body was turning, if no one arrived tomorrow they’d have no choice but to put her in the ground, to tip her into a pauper’s grave before she became too rank.

  There was something wrong, skewed, about all of this. Why would someone leave her at the abbey where she was going to be found? Who wanted to kill her and leave her that way? And the biggest question – why was she still nameless? It was as if someone wanted her to be a mystery, to tantalize.

  It could have been her husband who’d killed her, he mused. If that were the case, no one would report her missing for a time. It was easy enough to spin tales to cover a wife’s absence. He gave a sigh; until he had information, everything was just a guess. He pulled a ragged old handkerchief from his breeches, put it over his mouth and glanced around the cell door at her face, so empty and lonely in death.