The King's Evil

by Andrew Taylor

  It was warmer in the kitchen, but she preferred to be up here, alone in the little chamber under the eaves that had once belonged to the old man’s son. The door was solid, and she could bolt herself in. Besides, there was nothing to attract her in the rest of the house, which was gradually turning into a ruin, and only a fool would venture into the camp itself unless they had no choice in the matter.

  She felt sleepy, and her mind drifted back to the commission at Clarendon House. Modernizing an old building like the pavilion was a tricky matter, as Mr Hakesby had pointed out to my lord; it would have been far simpler to pull it down altogether and rebuild it from scratch to match its near twin in the opposite corner of the garden. However well they did it, the result must be a mongrel building, particularly from the rear and side elevations, neither one thing nor the other. On the other hand, she thought, the mansion itself was a mongrel building, for all the money that had been spent on it. It was classical in its pediment and its symmetries but, in the native English manner, it lacked classical orders. Should they ever look down on it from heaven, Andrea Palladio would shake his head and Vitruvius would throw up his hands in disgust.

  The pavilion was a matter of sentiment, Cat had understood, a gift from an old man to his ailing wife. At the start, they had occasionally seen her ladyship herself. Later, when her health worsened, Lord Clarendon, wincing at the pain from his gout, had sometimes shuffled down the garden on the arm of Mr Milcote to inspect the works. But then Lady Clarendon had died, and he had come no more. Mr Milcote, my lord’s gentleman, came in their place.

  Cat’s mind shied away from Mr Milcote. She was increasingly worried by the conversation she had overheard in the cart yesterday morning, on their way to the farm. If Halmore had been right, the Duke of Buckingham was orchestrating the attacks on Clarendon House. Who was the Bishop, who was acting as the Duke’s agent? It had sounded as if he planned something else to harm Clarendon, something much worse. Perhaps he would incite the mob to break down the gates and set fire to the house itself. He might even attack Clarendon in person.

  She had liked Lady Clarendon, and she respected the Earl; good clients, who took an informed interest in the work and paid Hakesby’s bills on time, were few and far between. The house itself might not be architecturally perfect, but she had no wish to see it damaged. She wished there were a way to warn them.

  A woman screeched somewhere in the camp, reminding Cat that she could not stay here for ever – it was time for her to prepare the old man’s supper, if one could call the meal that. This was part of the price she paid for his hospitality.

  She went slowly down the creaking stairs, avoiding the third tread from the bottom, which was rotten, and went into the kitchen. Mr Mangot was already there. He was reading his Bible by the faint, evil-smelling glow of a rushlight, running his finger slowly along the lines of words. He still wore his smock, which was made of unbleached linen and too large for him. He was painfully thin and always melancholy.

  Cat made up the fire and set the pan of soup to warm. There seemed to be nothing else to eat here, apart from stale bread which they dipped in the soup to soften it. She had given Mr Mangot another five shillings this morning in the hope that he would buy more food.

  Outside in the yard, one of the dogs barked. The other dog took it up. Then they fell silent.

  ‘Is someone coming here?’ she whispered, slipping her hand into her pocket, where the knife was.

  ‘The carrier, probably,’ he said, without looking up. His voice sounded creaky with disuse. ‘They bark differently if it’s a stranger. He’ll see Israel first, then he’ll come here. He calls for orders on Monday evenings. He’s a pedlar, too – always got something to sell.’

  ‘Food?’ Cat asked.

  He shook his head, his finger still moving across the page.

  ‘Could he take a letter to London for me?’

  Mangot raised his head from the book. His eyes were so filmy that she wondered he could read at all. ‘A letter? You can ask him. Who’s it to?’

  ‘Your nephew.’

  He snorted. ‘Are you his sweetheart?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Just as well.’

  She glanced at the pot on the smouldering fire. The soup would take another quarter of an hour to heat through, at least. ‘I won’t be long.’

  She took a rushlight upstairs to her chamber and wrote a few lines to Brennan.

  Beg H to warn Ld C that the D of B bribes the mob outside CH, through a man they call the Bishop, who is their leader. The Bishop intends some future move against him that will cause C particular pain. H could write a letter, saying he’d heard tavern talk about it.

  She left the note unsigned. She folded the paper, torn from her notebook, and wrote Brennan’s name on the outside. She had nothing to seal the paper with. She wondered if it would do any good, even if it reached Brennan: he would have to persuade Hakesby to take it seriously – no easy task – and Hakesby would have to warn Lord Clarendon. It might be better if he went instead to Mr Milcote. She hesitated, wondering whether to unfold the letter and add a postscript. Then she frowned. There was unfinished business with Milcote; wiser not to involve him.

  There was a hammering on the door downstairs. She put the letter in her pocket and went down to the kitchen. The carrier was showing Mangot a packet of newly printed chapbooks, sermons and pamphlets. He looked up as she entered, revealing a wall eye, and appraised her swiftly, before turning back to the farmer.

  While the men were talking, she wiped the table and set out the wooden platters and cups. She stirred the soup, willing it to heat up more quickly. Mangot bought a pamphlet about a Papist plot to murder the King with a poisoned dagger as he was going to his devotions in Whitehall.

  When the carrier was packing up his stock, Cat asked him if he would take a letter to London for her. He agreed to deliver it to Henrietta Street in the morning. He charged her two shillings for the service, which they both knew was an extortionate price.

  ‘I want you to put it in the hands of a particular man, not a servant or anyone,’ she said. ‘He works for Mr Hakesby, at the sign of the Rose, and his name’s Brennan, and he has a thin face and ginger hair. He’s Mr Mangot’s nephew.’

  The carrier smiled at her, revealing a toothless mouth, and spat into the fire, narrowly missing the pot with the soup. ‘Then that’ll be an extra shilling.’

  She paid him reluctantly. As the carrier turned to go, the back door opened. A current of cold air swept into the kitchen, followed by the tall figure of Israel Halmore.

  A rabbit dangled from his right hand. It was already skinned and gutted. He tossed it on to the table, where it lay, lolling, in a parody of ease. ‘For the pot, master.’

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  AFTER I LEFT Whitehall, I went home. Margaret served my supper. I stabbed and slashed at the boiled mutton. I agreed with Chiffinch about one thing at least: Alderley had been murdered. How could he have reached the basement of the pavilion without someone’s help? Who had removed the cover from the well? Moreover, his naked sword had been lying on the floor. It had been perfectly dry. So had the ribbons around its hilt. The sheath, on the other hand, had been as wet as its owner and had clearly gone down the well with him.

  Which suggested that Alderley had drawn his sword before he had fallen, or been thrown, down the well. And why would a man draw his sword if not to defend himself or to attack someone?

  When I had eaten, I lit more candles and took the canvas bag that George Milcote had given me from my pocket. I laid out the contents of Alderley’s pockets: the two keys, the money, which was in a flat gambler’s purse lined with silk, and the bundle of wet papers. The papers were less saturated than I expected – the heavy wool of Alderley’s coat must have given them some protection from the water. They consisted of perhaps five or six sheets of no great size, folded once and held together with a ribbon. The outer sheet was blank.

  I cut the ribbon and tried to separate the papers. One
of them instantly tore. I gathered them up and took them down to the kitchen, where Margaret was clearing away the supper things and setting the room straight for the night. She glanced warily at me as I entered, for I had snapped at her earlier.

  ‘How hot’s the oven?’ I said.

  ‘It’s not – I haven’t used it since this morning.’ She wiped the sweat off her forehead with the back of her arm. ‘I’ve banked up the fire, master. Do you want me to break it open?’

  The oven was set in the wall within the fireplace, on the left-hand side. I leaned over the fire and put my hand inside. The bricks that lined the recess were dry and slightly warm to the touch.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Leave it as it is. These papers are damp. I’ll put them here overnight.’

  ‘What shall I do with them in the morning?’

  ‘Take them carefully out before you open up the fire. Put them somewhere safe.’ I glanced about the shadowy room. ‘In that bowl on the dresser.’

  I wished her goodnight and went back to the parlour, where I spent a few minutes examining the silver key by the light of the candles.

  Judging by its size and the quality of the workmanship, it had been designed for the lock of a small box or perhaps for the door of a cupboard set in a piece of furniture. I had seen nothing of that sort at Alderley’s lodgings, but then I had not searched his crowded apartments thoroughly enough to inspect all his possessions. I peered at the monogram again, but still could not come to any conclusion: the entwined letters were so twisted and ornamented that they could have been almost anything. Was that an ‘S’? Or a ‘P’?

  I went to bed. But the events of the day came between me and sleep. Threaded among these were troubling thoughts of Olivia, Lady Quincy. I lay on my back in the darkness of the curtained bed and tried to remember her features. I could not. But I remembered those of her African page perfectly, and the way he had stared so intently at me as if memorizing my face.

  The following morning, I was awoken at dawn by a scream downstairs.

  This was immediately followed by the sound of Margaret shouting. When she paused to draw breath, I heard the deeper tones of Sam’s voice. I swore, got out of bed and went out on to the landing in my shirt.

  ‘Hold your tongues, damn you,’ I bellowed down the stairs.

  There was instant silence. Then I heard Margaret’s footsteps pounding up the stairs. Behind her, Sam was speaking unintelligibly in an apologetic whine. When she reached the landing, her face was redder than usual. Her quarrels with Sam were not infrequent, and she usually had the better of him. She was carrying an earthenware bowl in her hand.

  ‘The numbskull,’ she said breathlessly. ‘The fool.’

  ‘What’s he done?’ I asked.

  ‘I’m sorry, master. Those papers—’

  ‘What happened?’

  She stopped a step below me. ‘I took them out, sir,’ she said, ‘like you told me, and put them on the table just for a moment while I saw to the fire, and what does that fool of a man do? He picks up one of them and uses it as a spill to light a candle.’

  She held out the bowl. Some of the papers I had left in the oven were there. There were also ashes.

  Sam hobbled up the stairs. ‘Master, how was I to know? The silly woman just left them there, a pile of scraps. I’m not a magician, am I? I—’

  ‘Enough,’ I said. I took the bowl from Margaret. ‘Go away, the pair of you. Bring me my water when it’s ready.’

  I went back into my chamber. While I waited for my hot water to wash in, I examined the remaining papers. They were bone dry and easy to separate. One was yet another bill, this one from Alderley’s glovemaker. There was also a tavern reckoning for food and drink, the paper stained with wine and the word ‘Paid’ scrawled across the bottom. The other two sheets were equally uninteresting – a badly printed political pamphlet inveighing against Lord Clarendon, and a bill advertising a performance of The Northern Lass at the King’s Playhouse last Saturday.

  That left the charred fragment, all that remained of the paper that Sam had used as a spill. It was the corner of the sheet, roughly triangular, and most of it was blank. Only four letters survived of whatever had been written there: a-l-e-m.

  Jerusalem? Here, perhaps, had been the key to Alderley’s last words to the Bishop: ‘… be sure to tell them about Jerusalem.’ But I was no nearer to solving the enigma because Sam—

  There was a knock at the door, and Margaret entered with the jug of water. She looked as if she were about to be hanged.

  ‘Sam’s a fool,’ I said. ‘And so are you for leaving the papers there for him to use. And so am I for letting this happen.’

  She gave me a wobbly curtsy and placed the jug on the washstand.

  I glanced at her woebegone face. ‘For the love of heaven, woman. We all make mistakes. It’s not the end of the world. Tell Sam my cloak needs a good brush, will you?’

  Margaret left the room at speed, looking as if she had been granted a last-minute reprieve. She and Sam had known the depths of poverty not so long ago, and I suspected that in the back of their minds there lurked the fear that one day I might send them back to it.

  I dressed and went downstairs. After I had breakfasted, I wrote a short letter to one of Mr Williamson’s private correspondents, a member of the network up and down the country that provided him with so much of his information, both publicly and privately. He was a man named Fisher, who kept a small tavern in Watford in the shadow of the church.

  I had often written to him on Mr Williamson’s behalf, and I knew that he would assume this letter was on my master’s business and not my own. I told him I had been commanded to enquire whether any independent preachers or the like had been making a stir in the town, and in particular talking of Jerusalem.

  Such men often talked of a New Jerusalem, a heavenly state that would exist in this country when all its inhabitants followed their godly paths of righteousness, as prescribed by the preachers themselves. Religion and politics were never far apart, and often, for all their sincerity, they were political agitators trying to sow the seeds of revolution.

  Edward Alderley’s father had once dealt with such people. It was possible that his son was doing the same thing. In which case, the affair of his death had acquired yet another unwelcome complication.

  I added a postscript giving Mr Fisher to understand that the matter was urgent, and hinting that Mr Williamson would esteem it a particular favour if he replied by express.

  I shouted for Sam. When he hobbled into the room, the sight of him gave me the familiar mixed sensation of irritation, frustration and, if I am to be honest, affection. He had served in the navy until a Dutch cannon ball had taken off his right leg below the knee. As a result, he walked with the aid of a wooden stump and a crutch. When he entered my employ, I had given him a respectable suit of clothes, so that he should appear before the world as the servant of a rising Whitehall clerk ought to appear. I insisted he shave once a week. But nothing I could do or say would make Sam look respectable. His hair was always awry, his clothes dishevelled and, worst of all, he had a raffish air that resisted all my efforts. He was sometimes the worse for drink but long experience had made him wily in this regard, and it was generally hard to prove this. But he had other qualities which I had come to value.

  ‘I brushed your cloak, master,’ he said. ‘Not a speck of mud on it. Good as new. I’ve done your shoes, too.’

  ‘Take this letter to the Post Office,’ I ordered, counting out some money for express postage and for the reply. ‘It’s urgent.’

  He said nothing but I could see from his expression that he thought the task beneath him. He held out his grubby palm for the money and the letter. He let out a melancholy sigh and left the room with them, closing the door with more force than was strictly necessary.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  A DOZEN OR so men and women had gathered outside the railings of Clarendon House. They were hissing and booing the visitors as they came and went. �
�Dunkirk House!’ they shouted to me as I waited for admission at the gates. ‘Tangier and a barren Queen! Dutch traitor! Impeach the rogue!’

  George Milcote, elegant in black, came out to meet me.

  ‘Are they always there?’ I asked him as we walked across the forecourt.

  ‘Sometimes,’ he said, glancing at them. ‘We drive them away, every now and then, but it tends to make them worse. Anyway, they come back before you know it, like head-lice.’

  ‘It’s strange they find the time for such diversions.’

  ‘You see the two at the back?’ Milcote stopped and pointed. ‘The man in a brown coat, and the fat one with the heavy old sword? I think they are the conductors of this. And the paymasters.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’ve seen them here before. Always at the back. There are alehouses nearby where you can buy a crowd if you have a mind to it. A few drinks, a few coins will do it, with the promise of more afterwards. Then they wait to see whether their master’s money has been well spent.’

  I stared at them for a moment. The man in brown looked faintly familiar, though I couldn’t place him in my memory. We walked on towards the house. The sun was out but it was still early and the main facade was in shadow.

  ‘Who’s paying for this?’ I asked. ‘The crowd, that is.’

  Milcote smiled at me. ‘That’s the question. I don’t know for sure but it’s probably someone who works for the Duke of Buckingham. My lord has other enemies, but most of them would not stoop to such tactics. But the Duke has a liking for underhand methods.’ Despite the smile, his voice was bitter. ‘Fortune has so showered her gifts on him that he considers himself above the rules that govern the rest of us. But you’d think he and his hirelings would have the kindness to leave my lord alone in his time of sorrow.’

  ‘Since Lord Clarendon resigned the seals of office?’

  ‘Since my lady died.’ His mouth twisted. ‘But one should not look for kindness from such rabble, or from the Duke of Buckingham, any more than from brute beasts.’