by Hilari Bell
“Who just happened to hear of you from a gossiping deputy, and then just happened to find out that you’ve been questioning the servants? No. Someone you spoke to today is trying to stop us from asking more questions—which means one of them is guilty.”
“Then they’ve not revealed it.” I sighed.
“Hmm. Speaking of coincidences, I’ve got another for you—Judith tells me Tristram Fowler is a law clerk employed by the Tanners’ Guild.”
I moaned. “We have enough tanners—we don’t need any more. You don’t really think…”
We looked at each other and spoke together. “No.”
“All the same,” Fisk went on, “things are stacking up against him. Before Max was disgraced, he’d never have been considered as a suitor for Lissy. And I doubt she’d have looked at him twice, before he showed such dedication in the face of adversity.”
“That’s preposterous. He’s too…too forthright. There’s a devious mind behind this tangle.”
Fisk’s expression lightened. “Judith has a devious mind.”
“Be serious.”
“Why couldn’t it be Judith? She has access to Max’s study, too, remember?”
Fisk will argue nonsense simply for the pleasure he takes in debate, and I knew better than to let him suck me in. Still…“What about motive? She has no reason to harm her own family.”
“Maybe she didn’t want to marry what’s-his-name, and did it to make him back out. Or maybe what’s-his-name did it because he didn’t want to marry Judith! Now that’s a motive!”
I had to laugh, and Fisk allowed the discussion to return to serious matters. But although we discussed these puzzles all the way back to the house, we found no answers.
My second dinner in the Maxwells’ household was more comfortable than the first. Fisk told me there was no need to dress for dinner—and when I saw the thick brown pottery and tin flatware that had replaced porcelain and silver, I realized why. Our pretense of not noticing the changed dishes was aided by the presence of the children, who were evidently accustomed to dining with the family at casual meals.
Mistress Lissy hurried in just as the meal was about to start, and even a stranger could see she’d been with young Fowler, for her whole face was aglow. But the first subject that came up for discussion was horseback rides. Mistress Becca’s imperious demands for a precise date were finally squelched by her father’s statement that we’d tell her when we were ready, and if she pestered us anymore, he’d decide she was still too young and withdraw his permission.
With so lively a start the conversation flowed easily, and I was pleased to see that even lost in the rosy fog of first love, Mistress Lissy cared enough to draw out the brother she hadn’t seen since she was ten.
Trimmer served us, but only to the extent of bringing the pork roast, vegetables, bread, and pickles to the table. All too shortly Mrs. Trimmer took the children off to bed. Then Anna served tea while Mistress Judith and Lissy cleared the table.
’Twas then, with the children gone, that Maxwell cleared his throat and said, “I should probably tell you that I went to see Ben Worthington today and borrowed enough to keep the household till the end of Hollyon. After that…” He sighed, and Anna’s hand shot out to cover his.
“We’ll be all right, whatever we do.”
Mistress Judith nodded sharply and said, “Very practical.”
Mistress Lissy said nothing, no doubt wondering how best to explain to her suitor that he had only a month to propose.
Fisk and I said nothing either, but our eyes met across the table in the realization that we’d been given a deadline. “I suppose if we’re making any headway, he can borrow more,” Fisk murmured. “Though if we haven’t figured it out by that time, I doubt—”
“Sheriff Potter to see you, Sir,” Trimmer announced gloomily. “Again.”
The sheriff, as seemed to be the custom in this informal household, had already followed Trimmer into the room. Lamplight gleamed on his bald pate as he smiled, but the casual glance he cast over the company missed nothing, and my lips tightened in dislike.
Maxwell’s brows rose, though he smiled in return. “If you continue to show up at dinnertime I’ll start thinking it’s a hint. Sit down, Rob. Anna will get you some tea.”
“Thank you, but I’m here on business tonight. I actually wanted to speak to Master Fisk and his friend.”
’Twas clearly a request for us to go somewhere private with him. We all stiffened except for Fisk, who leaned back in his chair, as relaxed as a cat. “Well, you’ve found me. Ask away.”
Sheriff Potter took off his cloak and sat down. “I think I’d like tea after all. It’s bitter out.” He didn’t fake ease as well as Fisk did. The rest of us didn’t even try, but exchanged worried glances. Anna made no move for the teapot. “I wondered if you could tell me where you were last night, Master Fisk.”
“I probably could.” Fisk stopped there, hoping Potter would leap in with a revealing question, but the sheriff was a master of the strategy of silence. ’Twas Fisk who finally asked, “What time are you interested in?”
“Oh, about one or two hours after midnight.”
A puzzled crease appeared between Fisk’s brows. “Before the fire started? I was in the Irony from just after dark to the time the bell sounded.”
“And have you witnesses who’d swear to that?”
“Several.” Fisk sounded even more cautious. “Ham, the tapster at the Irony, for one, if the sheriff’s office still takes his word like you used to.”
Potter nodded, and I felt my shoulders sag with relief. Whatever it was, Fisk had an alibi.
“And Master Sevenson.” Potter nodded to me. “Can Ham swear to your whereabouts too?”
“No,” I said. “I was—” Fisk’s boot connected with my shin beneath the table, hard enough to make me wince.
Potter’s lips twitched, but his smile vanished as Fisk demanded, “Why do you want to know?”
“Some men my deputies spoke to saw a man with a scar like your friend’s hanging around Morna’s place before the fire.” He touched two fingers to his jaw, in the place where a collision with a broken branch when I was twelve had left me with a scraping scar. “Morna never saw him, but when we found those empty oil casks in the rubble, well, I started wondering.”
He sat back with the smooth smile I was coming to hate, laying his little trap of silence. But I didn’t blunder into it this time, for my blood had chilled.
I had no alibi. And Potter had trapped Fisk into admitting it, for the witnesses who would clear Fisk would swear I’d not been with him. My scruples against lying vanished, and my mind raced frantically for something, anything, to say in my defense. Not that it would help. An unredeemed man has no legal rights. If Potter chose to think me guilty, his deputies could drag me out and hang me from the nearest tree. My pulse beat thick and sluggish. “I was here—”
This time Fisk’s kick was even harder, and I grunted and glared at him. What use to delay? I had no alibi, and—
“This was before the fire started?” Mistress Anna’s voice broke the tense stillness. “Then I can testify to Master Sevenson’s whereabouts, though I can’t name the exact hours.”
A ripple of astonishment passed around the table, and Potter’s eyes narrowed.
“It was windy last night, you’ll remember?” she went on. “One of the shutters came loose and was banging against the wall downstairs. Very annoying. After a while I went down to close it and encountered Master Sevenson on the same errand. Since we were wide-awake by then, we fell into conversation and talked, oh, an hour or more, I’d guess. Then we went up to bed, and the fire bell started ringing just as I was dropping off to sleep, maybe fifteen minutes after I left him. And it kept me awake, too. So Master Sevenson couldn’t be the man your witnesses saw, could he?” And she smiled—not at me, but at her brother, whose answering smile held a lifetime of love and conspiracy.
The thundering rush of relief all but deafened me,
and I barely heard Potter speak, though his voice was no longer soft. “What room was this shutter in, Master Sevenson?”
“In Max’s study,” Mistress Anna inserted swiftly. “The one on the far right. The latch has been loose for several months.”
“And can your husband confirm any of this?”
Maxwell had looked increasingly flustered as he watched his wife lie to the law. Now he opened his mouth to reply, but Anna cut him off too. “No, he was asleep till the bell woke him. He got up and went downstairs then, but Master Sevenson and I were both abed.”
Maxwell, helplessly, nodded confirmation. Lissy was wide-eyed but silent, and Mistress Judith’s face was set like stone.
Potter knew Anna was lying, but as long as she stuck to her story, there was little he could do. “Then I’ve wasted your time.” You’ve wasted mine, his tone said. “I’ll leave you now.” His voice was smooth again, and ’twas quite clear he’d no intention of abandoning the matter.
“Wait a moment,” said Fisk.
I considered kicking him, for I wanted the sheriff gone, but before I could launch the blow, Fisk continued, “As it happens, I have a few questions. These men who identified my friend—did they describe anything else about him? Height? His hair? His clothes?”
“No.” Potter hesitated, then glanced at Max and went on. “In fact, I wanted to talk to them, but when my deputies went back to question the men further, they couldn’t be found. Sailors, maybe, who went back to their ships.”
“Maybe you should investigate that, Robin Potter,” Anna put in. “Instead of persecuting my brother and his friends.”
“Or,” said Fisk, “men paid to implicate Michael, whose stories wouldn’t stand up to close questioning. Frames are fashionable in Ruesport this year, aren’t they?”
“Speaking of investigating”—Potter’s glance included both of us—“I’ve had a complaint that you two are bothering people.”
“Complaint from whom?” ’Twas Maxwell who asked, honest surprise in his voice.
I assumed ’twas the kitchenmaid’s mistress, but Potter replied, “Yorick Thrope.”
“Thrope? What business is it of his?” Maxwell demanded.
“Maybe he doesn’t like Master Sevenson.” Potter rose to go.
“Or maybe,” said Fisk, “he likes his job. He must have pretty good connections to have heard about our asking questions so fast. Did he order you to stop us?”
“Yes,” said Potter. “He did.” But he said nothing more.
The grin Fisk cast him looked almost sincere. “Just one more question. Do you have a deputy or clerk who’s in his early thirties and going bald? Brown hair?”
“Yes.” Potter pulled on his cloak. “I can think of three men who answer that description. And no, I won’t give you their names. Good night.”
And he departed, leaving behind him the kind of silence that comes after some shattering crash. Silence…and complicity.
CHAPTER 8
Fisk
Max took one look at Mrs. Trimmer’s avid face hovering in the slightly open doorway that led to the kitchen and began talking about the town’s preparations for Calling Night—firmly.
Anna and Lissy helped him change the subject, but Judith sat silent, her face creased in thought, and Michael was still chalk white with fear. That was something of a relief, for I’d begun to wonder if he had the sense to be afraid of anything.
As soon as the tea was finished, Max announced that he and Anna were going to bed, “Since we got so little sleep last night.” His voice was dry enough to turn mud to dust, but Anna only smiled and said she’d come as soon as she rinsed the teapot.
Michael said he’d help her, with considerable determination. If Anna could cope with Becca, she could handle Michael with no trouble at all, so I yawned and went upstairs to bed.
Michael was still fuming next morning. “How under two moons does a man that hard come to have a name like Robin Potter?”
We were on our way to visit George Little, the smith whose brother Max had ordered hanged, and the weather was just right for such an errand. Yesterday’s warmth had vanished, and the puddles had turned to sheets of ice that reflected the bulging clouds. It was bitter cold, and the Millside’s steep streets were treacherous, but working folk can’t yield to weather.
“Probably his father, or his grandfather, or his great—”
“Was a potter. But Robin? His parents were insane.”
“He was only a baby when they named him. He was probably cute.”
Michael snorted. “That man was never a baby. And he could never, ever be cute.”
I grinned, stretching cold muscles. But as Jack Bannister once told me, men need to talk about things that frighten them. The Gods know I do it. “He’s new since my day—and frankly, we’re lucky. Old Sheriff Havermen was a senile toady. He’d have followed Thrope’s orders and told us to clear out.”
“’Twas curious”—Michael sounded more reasonable now—“that he didn’t even ask us to stop, much less…what he could have done.” He pulled his cloak closer, and I wondered again what his journey here had been like. I found I disliked seeing Michael learn fear, no matter how badly he needed the lesson.
“I think it’s several things. One, he doesn’t like Thrope. Two, he likes Max and hopes we’ll find something. And three…”
“What.”
I hesitated, for this is something I seldom say, but…“I think maybe he’s a fair man. We haven’t done anything to be thrown out of town for. Which should cheer you up, because it means he probably won’t hang you without cause. If he liked Thrope and hated Max, it might be different, but as it is, I think he’ll cut us a bit of slack.”
“Just enough to hang ourselves, no doubt.” But Michael smiled as he said it, and I was glad to see him regaining his usual spirits.
“What I don’t understand is how whoever it is found out what we were doing fast enough to set up a frame. That fire happened the second night we were in town. They know too much.”
Michael looked thoughtful. “Many people know we’re here. The sheriff’s office. The servants we questioned. Mayhap one of them is guilty, and took the news to whoever framed Max. Hire an arsonist, bribe a few ‘witnesses,’ and the thing is done. We never spoke to the other kitchen maid. I think we should.”
I hadn’t spoken to any of the servants Michael had interviewed, and if nothing came of our investigations today, I would. Michael wouldn’t recognize a lie if it was marked with a signpost and announced by the town crier. But I only said, “Most arsonists won’t work with only one day’s lead time. Not unless you pay them extra. A lot extra.”
Michael shrugged. “So someone paid them more.”
“Hmm. Given the size of those bribes, whoever’s behind this has lots of money. But the timing still bothers me.”
“’Tis the fact that he’s trying to frame me for arson that troubles me. If not for Mistress Anna, I might be facing flogging or worse right now. None died, but a debt that can’t be paid in money is sometimes paid in blood. And I can’t even pay the price of a cowshed.”
Michael’s expression was shadowed again, so I answered lightly. “It’s more often repaid in labor. How do you feel about working for a brothel keeper for the next twenty years?”
He laughed, and I went on, “Next time you warn me that your Gift for sensing ambushes isn’t reliable, I’m going to listen. You sense matchmaking aunts, but not people trying to frame you for serious crimes?”
“I told you ’twas so.” Michael sounded unreasonably cheerful about it. “At least our activities are worrying someone. Mayhap we’re getting closer to the truth.”
“If someone is worried about us, then I take back what I said about him knowing too much. We haven’t learned anything.”
We rounded a corner and the smithy came in sight.
“That may be about to change,” said Michael softly.
I understood why his voice had dropped. The neighborhood wasn’t a bad one. Th
e other buildings on the street were made of the same rough dark timber and gray stone. But the smithy had an aura of its own—ramshackle, though I saw no signs of neglect. Melancholy and malevolent at the same time.
“Maybe it’s the weather,” I said. “Depressing.”
“Mayhap,” said Michael.
I shrugged my fancies aside and rapped on the door’s thick planks. It opened without sinister creaking, and a man with rough-cut black hair and a smith’s apron stood before us.
“This is Michael Sevenson, a knight errant, and I’m his squire, Fisk. We’re looking for George Little.”
The man stared. “You’re what?”
“He’s a knight errant, and I’m his squire,” I said patiently. Saying it was still embarrassing, but I was beginning to get used to that. I had to do something to bring Michael around, and crazy though it was, this looked to be my best bet. “His name is Sevenson, mine is Fisk. Are you Master Little?”
He stared some more and slowly reached a conclusion. His massive shoulders rose and fell. All of him was massive, which is no surprise in a smith, but the prospect of asking him questions he might not like held little appeal. I resolved to be tactful. I also resolved to squelch Michael when he wasn’t. Looking at this man’s huge arms and lowering brows gave me lots of motivation.
“Aye, I’m Little. Come in. You’ve got work for me?”
At least he hadn’t heard of us.
Heat billowed from the doorway. The coals in the forge were dull red, but the bellows beside them were large enough to bring them quickly to white heat. The workbench was littered with tools I didn’t even recognize, except for the anvil and a set of hammers that ranged in size from one a carpenter might use to one I’m not sure I could have lifted.
“So, masters, what do you need? Horses shod? My rates are low, ’less they’re biters—I get bit, the price goes up.”
“Actually,” said Michael, “we wanted to ask you some questions about your brother.”
