Dark Stars (The Thief Taker Book 3)

by C. S. Quinn

  ‘Your father wrote that Thorne was in a Temple of Death?’ said Charlie. ‘That’s his writing?’

  ‘It must have been his joke,’ said Macock. ‘He could have fits of humour. The Temple of Death is where the Cipher resides, is it not? He must have only meant Thorne had become a cryptographer.’

  Lily turned to Charlie, puzzlement rippling her pretty features. ‘The Temple of Death. It’s a real place? In a forest? Surely not.’

  Charlie was thinking. ‘It would be a clever way to hide something,’ he said. ‘Tell the truth in such a way that no one believes it. A temple of death. It’s a fantasy, isn’t it? What fool would genuinely look for such a place? It’s just the kind of subterfuge a spy master would invent.’ He thought for a moment. ‘London is surrounded by woods. Perhaps they built some prison or holding place for cryptographers they couldn’t risk escaping. Then gave it a frightening name and let rumours do the rest.’

  ‘That’s a lot of potential places,’ murmured Lily.

  Charlie nodded, thinking of the Thames’s wooded south bank, the thick and robber-infested forests from King’s Cross to Hampstead Heath. Trees ran from the Tower of London to the new brickworks near Aldgate.

  ‘Too many to search,’ said Charlie.

  Squirrelling the problem aside, he turned his attention to the issue at hand.

  ‘You’re sure everything was burned?’ asked Charlie. ‘All Thorne’s works?’

  Macock nodded. ‘If the Crown ordered it, my father would have complied. He was a stickler for rules. But at a guess I’d say Thorne’s ideas impressed my father enough to try a short print run. Quite a feat. My father was a difficult man to please,’ he concluded with an expression that hinted of personal experience.

  Charlie looked thoughtful. ‘So we have Thorne, the King’s astrologer,’ he said. ‘A codebreaker. But he also published a work on the old Roman gods.’

  ‘Surely no king would employ a pagan as a codebreaker,’ said Lily.

  ‘There’s one man still alive who would know for sure,’ he added. ‘The Cipher. It seems they were likely held together during the war.’

  ‘You’ll not find the Cipher,’ opined Macock. ‘He’s kept safer than all the gold in the Tower of London.’

  ‘We must find Ishmael Boney then,’ said Lily. ‘Surely he must have left clues.’

  Macock spread his hands with the defeatist air of a man who had already mentally spent Ishmael’s royalty payment.

  ‘Gone without a trace,’ he opined unsentimentally.

  ‘Even hidden men have their weaknesses,’ said Charlie. ‘You say Ishmael Boney made a lot of money selling almanacs this year.’ He looked at Macock, who nodded in agreement. ‘Which means he would have been looking for places to spend it,’ continued Charlie.

  ‘Such as?’ asked Lily.

  ‘If Ishmael Boney is flesh and blood, perhaps an expensive brothel. Mother Mitchell might know something,’ he decided.

  ‘The old madam?’ Lily wrinkled her nose. ‘You’ll need a fat purse of gold to make her talk.’

  ‘I grew up in her household,’ said Charlie with a grin. ‘She’s a soft spot for me. Although,’ he added, ‘she’ll probably still want payment.’

  Chapter 19

  Barbara Castlemaine was staring into Buckingham’s writing desk. The tavern sounds echoed up from the floor below. She looked to check Buckingham was safely in the adjoining room and that she couldn’t be seen.

  Lying atop a stack of letters was the lock of girl’s hair, tied with muddy ribbon. Lady Castlemaine lifted it out.

  The hair was deeply matted, as though it had been submerged in a dirty river. It was old, brittle with age, blood as well as mud caking the tresses.

  She put it down, puzzled. Did Buckingham secretly pine for some long-lost love? Perhaps a girl killed in the Civil War? Lady Castlemaine knew of no such liaison.

  Her eyes dropped to the papers. Astrological, she thought, not understanding the symbols. Something tugged at her mind. She thought there’d been some news of girls drowned recently.

  She began rifling the other contents of the drawer. Papers. Letters. She scanned them. Love letters from various women. All names she knew or had guessed. Nothing of interest.

  She leafed through more handwritten letters, her large violet eyes flicking over signatures. One was signed ‘Sally Oakley’. Lady Castlemaine remembered her vaguely. She’d been part of the pack of those hoping to reinstate the King back in Holland.

  Another bore a man called Thorne’s name. Lady Castlemaine frowned at this. She’d heard of the astrologer. He’d been executed by the old King. She had a sudden memory from her girlhood. It had been . . . in one of the grand houses, she thought. Before the war. She and her mother had accidentally chanced upon Thorne in the gardens, crumpled in two, his thin body heaving in guttural sobs. He might have been eighteen then, she thought.

  ‘Why is he crying?’ she’d asked as her mother had drawn her quickly away.

  ‘They burned his friend today,’ said her mother, fanning herself with theatrical vigour. The way she said ‘friend’ implied something unpleasant.

  Her mother leaned closer, fan still pumping. ‘It was a great scandal,’ she confided. ‘The family paid a large amount of money to save Thorne from trial.’ She paused for dramatic effect. ‘Sodomy,’ she breathed. ‘Their fine name will never be recovered. The church refuses Thorne entry.’

  Barbara’s eyes fluttered in horror.

  The woman nodded slowly. ‘They say he keeps to his room,’ she added. ‘Inventing things. Weapons. He was always clever, but I think it’s turned to bad. He reads books on Roman gods over and over.’

  Barbara’s eyes crinkled in confusion. ‘Roman gods?’

  Her mother studied her face. ‘You’re too young to know about such things,’ she decided. ‘The Romans had a taste for his kind. Thorne’s kind.’

  Barbara felt a blush rise up. She didn’t fully understand but was too embarrassed to ask. It was a full five years before her mother gave the answers.

  Her eyes landed on the matted lock of hair again, and this time she had an uneasy feeling. It seemed to her the blood was more obvious now. If it was a lover’s hair, would it not have been washed and brushed clean?

  Lady Castlemaine replaced the bloody hair, along with the letters. Then she tugged at the second drawer. Locked. Why would Buckingham leave his love letters, worth a fortune to a blackmailer, unlocked, but lock something else away?

  She turned, her eyes settling on Buckingham’s discarded breeches, slung in the corner of the room. His purse lay nearby. Could the key be inside?

  Suddenly she felt strong fingers tighten around her neck. She threw up her hands instinctively, but the pressure was too great. She felt herself dragged, choking, across the room.

  Buckingham threw her on the bed.

  ‘You,’ he accused, settling his weight on top of her, ‘have been looking where you shouldn’t.’

  Lady Castlemaine was trying to disguise her shock.

  ‘I am entitled,’ she said, ‘to know whom you write to. A woman must know who her lover is in love with.’

  For a moment she thought she’d pitched the tone wrong. That he suspected her. Then his face shifted and he laughed.

  ‘I like you jealous,’ he said. ‘It suits you.’ He moved back on to the bed, taking her hand.

  ‘You must not go looking again,’ he said.

  She shook her head.

  ‘You’d be unwise to test me,’ he added. ‘I’m a different man from the one you knew.’

  ‘Different?’ She caught something in his tone.

  ‘A story for another time.’ He leaned closer and kissed her neck. ‘Open your hand.’

  She obeyed. In his hand, she now saw, was a small velvet purse.

  He opened it and tipped the contents into her little white palm. She gasped as seven large creamy pearls rolled out.

  ‘They are perfect,’ she breathed, her large eyes on him. ‘Perfect.’ She closed
her fingers tightly on the gems.

  ‘Pirate treasure,’ he said. ‘Will you keep your word?’

  He pushed her back into the bed, and the pearls clattered one by one to the dusty wooden floor.

  Chapter 20

  Charlie’s welcome at Mother Mitchell’s grand town house was not a warm one. The elderly madam was clearly drunk. This, combined with the loud noises echoing from the house, made Charlie think he’d visited in the midst of some kind of party. Lily, a previous employee of the old madam, had opted to wait a tactful distance from the door, but Mother Mitchell’s keen eyes spotted her loitering near the fashionable brick houses further down the street.

  ‘She owes me money,’ growled Mother Mitchell, directing a squinty death stare towards Lily. ‘Better she waits further away,’ she added, balling her fists. ‘Or I might just forget my kind heart and have her killed.’

  Catching the furious brothel keeper’s expression, Lily slipped down a side street, looking not the least concerned at the annoyance she’d engendered.

  Charlie followed Mother Mitchell hurriedly inside the house before things turned ugly. The old madam had once been beautiful, but now worked determinedly to contrast herself against her young harem. Hard, greying ringlets, unplucked eyebrows and a prominent moustache framed her handsome features. A habit of pipe smoking had thickened her voice. The once famed figure had swelled to formidable bosom and hips, all clad in enough silk and ribbons to leave no doubt as to her authority and income.

  ‘Lily Boswell is trouble, Charlie,’ rumbled Mother Mitchell as she waddled along her sumptuously clad corridors. ‘Didn’t I warn you? Ran from my house with one of my best payers. In a rented dress,’ she fumed, this last insult obviously hurting the worst. ‘You had Maria before,’ continued Mother Mitchell. ‘Why couldn’t you keep her? I like her. She’s stable. Good for you.’

  ‘She wanted things I couldn’t give her,’ said Charlie. He’d never admitted to anyone how deeply Maria had broken his heart. His unresolved past had stood between them, paralysing his ability to commit. Charlie had stupidly imagined she’d wait.

  Mother Mitchell waved a dismissive hand. ‘So you say,’ she said, obviously unconvinced. ‘You could still win her back. You were the only man she loved. I could see it in her. Loyal. Not like that gutter girl.’

  ‘Maria is married now,’ said Charlie, cutting her off before she could launch another attack on Lily. ‘So I hear.’

  ‘Not yet,’ countered Mother Mitchell. ‘Still a few days.’

  ‘How on earth,’ asked Charlie, baffled, ‘would you know that?’

  Mother Mitchell opened her mouth, then shut it again. ‘I good as raised you here within these walls,’ she concluded darkly. ‘I brought you up better than to fall for a thief with a pretty face.’

  She took out a long silver pipe from her hanging pocket, packed tobacco, lit it using a candle from a nearby gold candelabra and drew.

  ‘Still taking on crimes for poor folk?’ she asked, puffing.

  ‘When they need my help.’

  She gave a grunt that sounded like disapproval, but Charlie knew better. For all her talk of gold and profit, Mother Mitchell secretly liked that he caught felons for Londoners less fortunate. Though she enjoyed less that Charlie let some petty criminals escape hanging.

  ‘Be sure you take enough gold from nobles too,’ she remarked. ‘Any word from Rowan?’ she added, puffing out a stream of smoke.

  Charlie hesitated. The pause told Mother Mitchell all she needed to know.

  ‘Try and forget,’ she advised with uncharacteristic gentleness. ‘He may show up yet, but worrying won’t bring him faster. You know your brother.’

  Charlie nodded. Ever since they were boys, Rowan had caused him grief. He suspected his older brother knew far more than he let on about their early childhood before their mother died. But Rowan had never quite forgiven Charlie for being orphaned with a key whilst he got nothing.

  ‘What was he selling when you saw him last?’ asked Mother Mitchell. ‘Fake black powder?’

  ‘Plague protectorates,’ said Charlie.

  ‘A better trade,’ surmised Mother Mitchell. She paused to hack phlegm from deep in her lungs. ‘Men buying black powder are dangerous,’ she added, ‘but those sold a poor plague protectorate will not return to make trouble.’

  There was a shriek, and a half-dressed girl flew through a door, giggling breathlessly. She ran clutching her skirts high to reveal bare white legs, pursued by a laughing young man in silk breeches and an open shirt. The man tackled the girl around the waist, and they both fell drunkenly on to the thick red rug of the hallway. The girl smiled enticingly and they kissed.

  Mother Mitchell eyed them for a moment, clearly making some cost calculation.

  ‘What are you here for?’ she asked, frowning at the canoodling couple.

  ‘Ishmael Boney,’ said Charlie. ‘He’s missing and I need to talk to him.’

  ‘You thought Ishmael would come here?’ she supplied. ‘Rich man that he is nowadays.’

  Charlie nodded.

  Mother Mitchell considered for a moment, then beckoned he should follow her. He expected her to lead him away from the loud revelry of the party room. But instead she beckoned him towards a large walnut-panelled door. Charlie raised his eyebrows.

  ‘You’re taking me into the party room?’

  Mother Mitchell nodded, puffing on her pipe.

  She really must be drunk, thought Charlie as she twisted the handle of the huge door. Mother Mitchell never let anyone have for free what could be paid for.

  The door opened and noise rolled forth. A heavily painted girl was sat on the lap of a bewigged man, both murdering ‘Greensleeves’ on a gilded harpsichord. Girls in various states of undress were everywhere. Men were lounging on cushions, drinking from gold cups, eating sweets.

  The stench of rancid grapes hit Charlie like a slap. In the centre of the room stood a faux-Grecian fountain, through which cheap red wine gushed. One youth was bent backwards, crimson liquid splashing over his nose and open mouth. Two friends were cheering him on.

  ‘Finest burgundy,’ said Mother Mitchell smoothly, noticing Charlie’s expression and nodding to the flow of low-quality wine.

  Charlie, who remembered watering down Mother Mitchell’s cheap smuggled imports with vinegar, smiled to himself.

  She placed her smoking pipe on a table, filled herself a glass and took a wincing sip.

  ‘Good stuff,’ she said. ‘Lively. How do you like my new Celestial Room?’ she added, pointing out the sun constellations writ large over every wall.

  ‘As always,’ said Charlie, taking in the gaudy star murals, ‘your house is the latest fashion.’

  Two men danced past them to the enthusiastic shouts of the onlookers.

  ‘I give my customers what they want,’ said Mother Mitchell proudly. ‘Almanacs are all London talks of. My girls spend all their money on them.’

  ‘Is this why you brought me here?’ asked Charlie. ‘Did Ishmael Boney help you design this room?’

  Mother Mitchell shook her head. ‘Ishmael Boney has never been here,’ she said. ‘Though I’ve extended invitations. Mr Boney is interested in something more specialist than I provide.’

  ‘What?’

  She shrugged. ‘If I knew, I’d offer it. Ishmael Boney would be a great attraction at my house. All the fine lords talk of him. He’s a great favourite with the King,’ she added.

  Charlie logged this.

  ‘Then why bring me to this room?’ he asked, confused.

  She winked. ‘I can’t help you with Ishmael Boney,’ she said, ‘but there’s a girl in here knows a little of astrology. Maybe she can help you.’

  Charlie sighed inwardly. A street girl with a penchant for the zodiac could hardly compare to a famous astrologer.

  ‘She’s over there,’ added Mother Mitchell, ‘on the stage.’

  Charlie turned to see a modest stage with a velvet pelmet stood in one corner. Acting on it
were seven girls, each costumed as a star god or goddess. A chubby Saturn had a purple cape drawn low over her face and carried a scythe. She was throwing a red cloth over the silver-painted face of a moon goddess in diaphanous white robes.

  ‘Nobles love the almanacs,’ explained Mother Mitchell. ‘We act it out for them, make it an entertainment. Though I’ll lose a pretty penny with this coming eclipse,’ she added, smoothing the expensive silk of her dress. ‘The men will play good husbands and my girls will fall to hysterics.’

  Charlie was automatically looking for Venus, who was usually depicted naked, holding an apple. He identified Mars in her short leather skirt and Roman helmet, then the sun, gold crowned and glorious in a low-cut yellow dress. His eyes lingered on her features. It was a face he’d once loved.

  The symmetrical blue eyes, blonde hair and straight nose. Suddenly Charlie realised why Mother Mitchell had allowed him in her hallowed Celestial Room.

  The sun goddess was Maria.

  Chapter 21

  Charlie made to look away a split second too late. Maria’s blue eyes landed on his and widened in alarm. A slow blush crept over her face. Then she stepped down from the stage and strode towards him, moving upright through the drunken people. Charlie shot an accusing look at Mother Mitchell.

  ‘Maria knows about astrology,’ said the portly madam innocently. ‘She helped me design this room. And it’s time you young people talked,’ she added.

  Charlie was about to tell Mother Mitchell exactly what he thought of her suggestion when a sudden eruption of shouts sounded from the other side of the room. A blonde woman threw her glass of wine at a chubby girl in a jet-black horsehair wig. Furious, the raven-haired victim grabbed a chunk of the girl’s blonde hair and began wheeling her around. Men began shouting encouragingly.

  Mother Mitchell hurried away to intervene, her silken bulk cutting a path through the drunk girls and leaving Charlie alone with the scantily clad Maria.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Maria demanded, tugging self-consciously at her low-cut dress.