“The River Fleet?”
“Naw,” sniggered the boy. “The gaol. Anyways, I were snooping around that big grand house when this big fellow in mighty odd clothes, he grabs me and I thought as how he were gonna drag me off to the constable. But instead he says he needs a message took to this big house in Holborn. ‘Tis a long walk in the cold,” he said, so he promised me two bright pennies if I did as I were told, and kept quiet about it. A deadly secret, he says it were. So he writ this note, and I brung it here. That’s all, master, and naught else.”
“So you were caught while creeping around to see what you could steal. Which house in the Strand?”
Once this was explained and exclamations of innocence sworn to, Richard marched into the smaller hall, where the usual table of women was buzzing with suspicion. As Richard approached, Alba stood, clasping her bedrobe to her chin one handed, the other hand to her forehead.
“Is it true, then?” she exclaimed in doomed whispers. “Dearest Jemima has run away?”
“You’ve not seen her? She’s made no explanation of where she intended going, or why?”
Ysabel took a deep breath, still clasping her wine cup. “I woke alone, sir. Dearest Jemima shares the bed with me, and Katherine sleeps on the truckle. I must have slept deep, since I heard nothing in the night. But neither Jemima nor Katherine have been seen since the dawn showed their absence. It’s a puzzle, and I’ve no answer.”
Leaving a dishevelled panic behind, Richard marched back to where Thomas and the beggar boy were waiting. “Keep the child here,” Richard ordered the steward. “Feed him and give him a warm corner to sleep.” He turned back to the boy. “I will pay you well, if what you’ve told me proves accurate and helpful. You may stay on here as a page if you wish, and be properly looked after. In the meantime, don’t move.” To Thomas he said, “Coming with me, Tom? Or choose the coward’s diplomacy?”
“I’m coming,” Tom said, half grinning. “It’s adventure, or danger? No matter. I’ll come anyway.”
Within the time it took to change shoes for boots, light doublet for padded velvet, strap on baldric, scabbard and sword, grab cloak and hood and order the horses saddled, both Richard and his friend were out on the snowy road and riding south into the wind.
The blizzard was building behind the heavy dark clouds. It burst upon them as they neared the Fleet. It slowed and delayed, but did not stop them
Chapter Fifteen
“The Strand, then?”
“Of course.” Richard’s words flew on the air as if riding the wind. “Can you guess the rest?”
“The wicked cousin Cuthbert?”
“The wicket father Edward.” Richard’s head was low, the horse’s neck protecting his face from the wind while leaning into the speed. “Jemima received a note telling her that her father is not drowned but alive, and fleeing from the law. If this is true, then there’s danger enough. If it is not true, then the danger is from the cousin. Having learned that we’ve disproved his ownership of the house, he may have planned to abduct or even kill the girl.”
Thomas looked up, surprised. “He’s the killer in the attic then?”
“That remains to be seen.”
Their speed and the whistling winds made speaking difficult and hearing more so. Then the clouds tipped, sank to the treetops, and split. The snow cascaded. No longer the fluttering silver gloss of the day before, it now howled in slanting cuts of ice, smashing through branches and against windows, glass rattling and wooden beams creaking.
“Watch out,” yelled Thomas, and grabbed at Richard’s reins. Both horses swerved, and neighed, terrified. A towering brick chimney pot, as tall again as the little house itself, toppled, crumbling its sooty ruin to the snow banks below. The house shook and it beams creaked and swayed. The chimney bricks tumbled from roof, shattering tiles, and hurtled below. A frightened man peered from his doorway. Thomas and Richard rode on, the wind in their eyes and their horse’s mouths foaming.
It was then over The Fleet, down to the more sheltered roads of tall buildings, and into the Strand when they slowed their pace. The wind continued to whistle and squall and the snow raged, closing off all but the distance they could reach with one arm, Richard’s hand moved to the hilt of his sword. “We are there. But I’ll not present myself openly at the door. Lead the horses. I’ll look first around the back of the house. I need to see what they have in the stables.”
Thomas nodded, silent. He did as asked, following quietly as Richard, head down, trudged down the snow covered path, hedge lined, and towards the gardens where the land sloped down to the river.
The open flurry of the Thames was a squeal of flying snow and windswept tide. The banks were white and solid with ice. No boats trafficked, no fishermen nor wherries nor carriers. But in the small stable block, there was busyness, horses kicking at their stalls and two grooms arguing. Richard walked in with Thomas and the two horses at his back. The grooms stared, frightened.
“So what exactly.” Richard said, “is the problem? The arrival of your previous master? Or of his daughter’s return?”
“You be a friend then, knowing all that?” demanded one of the men.
Thomas gestured to the two tired and sweating horses, snow still flecked in their manes and tails. “There’s a place for these two? Unsaddled, brushed down, fed and watered. But then saddled again, for we’ll be riding out within the hour.”
One of the grooms rushed to obey. Richard regarded the other. “You came with Edward Thripp on his return? Or you work here?”
The man looked towards the house. “Depends on who’s asking,” he mumbled.
“A friend, and not the law,” Richard nodded. “But I’ll be no friend if you try to lie or refuse to answer.”
“’Tis not like them gents tell us their business,” the groom replied, keeping his voice low. “But I bin working here nigh on five year. Then six month or so past, ‘tis said as how the master done drowned with all his ship, and the young Master Cuthbert, he be the new owner. I weren’t proper pleased but it weren’t naught to me, so I stayed on. There be less work, so fair enough. But then two nighst afore last, there’s this rattle and gallop and the old master comes hurtling in with three other dirty fellows with knives in their belts and their hats in their eyes. I were tending them tired horses when we heard a mighty fight going on in the house. Then all were quiet and we heard no more till a few hours back just after dawn, when Mistress Jemima, she comes runing in with the old nurse, all out o’breath and looking sick. She ain’t got no horses and goes straight to the house.”
“We ain’t heard naught for some hours after,” explained the other groom, wandering over. “T’was mighty silent and mighty strange, being a dead man who weren’t dead, till one o’ them three dirty fellows what arrived with the old master, he comes out to the stables and orders horses saddled and brought around to the front. We done that o’course, but heard no more after. and now there’s you two young gents, what I don’t recognise, what comes to us in the stables to ask questions – ‘stead o’ going to the front door like most folk.”
“Suspicious,” agreed the first groom.
“Suspicious it is,” agreed Richard quietly. “And I have suspicions of my own. But your explanation has helped, and now I shall make you far more suspicious by attempting to enter the house through the kitchens.”
“Or even a window,” sniggered Thomas, who was enjoying himself.
“Or the chimney,” agreed Richard.
The grooms stared after them as the two men strolled, avoiding windows, to the back door by the pantries and kitchens, and disappeared inside. The house was quiet, its walls banked up with snow and great white billows of new fallen ice crystals along window sills and doorsteps. The hush had once again swallowed the wind as the blizzard calmed. Now the wind was a low scatter along the ground, lifting and heaping the snow and once again covering foot prints and paths.
Inside the hush was as great as outside, but deep in shadow. Having little
idea of the lie of the house, Richard moved with care, Thomas close behind. There was more movement in the kitchens where the fire was high and pots were hanging on their hooks over the flames. The bubble of pottage interrupted the voices of two men.
“I shall do as you say, sir,” one said. “But I reckon I’ll obey the master first, since I’ve been his cook for a five year, and have knowed you, sir, for less than five month.”
Both Richard and Thomas recognised Cuthbert Thripp’s nasal complaints. “The house is mine now. You will obey the man who pays you.”
“But if the old master ain’t dead after all,” objected the cook, waving a large wooden spoon, “then I don’t see as how this house can be yorn, sir. Tis inherited, you done said, from your uncle, sir. But if that same uncle ain’t dead – ”
Thripp stamped one foot. “He’ll be in gaol soon enough. The house will still be mine. If you argue with me, I shall have you whipped and dismissed. In the meantime, my uncle will soon be leaving and won’t be coming back if I’ve anything to do with it. So one last meal, and see to it quickly, man, before I lose all patience with you, the rest of the staff, my wretched uncle, that stupid girl and everyone else.”
“But seeing as you might not be the master, sir, and the real master, he might not leave after all – ”
“This is a last warning,” Thripp screeched. “Now do as you’re told.”
Richard sauntered into the heaving condensation of the low ceilinged kitchen, held a kerchief to his nose, smiled politely, and said, “Now, I wonder, Master Thripp, who has murdered who this time. And firstly, where exactly is Mistress Jemima?”
“Oh, Lord have mercy,” whimpered Cuthbert, turning with a deep blush of anger. “It’s you. You’ve no right here, sir. None at all. The household is in chaos and I’ve no time for visitors, lawyers nor legal matters which, frankly, are none of your business, sir. I’d be obliged if you’d leave before I’m obliged to have you thrown out.”
“Oh, I very much doubt you could manage that,” smiled Richard. His smile was more pronounced than usual, but did not reach his eyes. “I need explanations or I shall call the sheriff before I search your premises. The attic first, perhaps.”
Cuthbert Thripp appeared to shake as the pent up fury of the previous days finally reached a level beyond his ability to control. “How dare you, sir? How dare you! I am a man who has been living a peaceful and lawful life within my own peaceful and legal home, when robbers, pirates, whores and madmen come riding onto the premises – ”
Richard turned to Thomas. “Search the house, Tom. Every chamber, every corner. And including the attic. Call for her, and let none of the servants interrupt you. Indeed, they may prefer to help you, since it sounds as though they’re more loyal to the old master rather than the new one.” He swung back to Cuthbert. “It is not a matter I intend to discuss at this stage, but I assure you, it has been proved beyond doubt that your claim on this building was false, and it should have remained with Mistress Jemima. But since it now appears that the original owner has returned, that is irrelevant. Where is he, and where is she?”
“She’s gone.” Thripp glared, arms crossed. “Both of them left. As for the pirate himself, he’s a criminal on the run from the Chief Constable of the land, and can claim nothing at all.”
“Just moments gone, I have heard you discuss with your cook,” Richard nodded to the plump man with the wooden spoon who stood silent and amazed in one corner, “during which you admitted Master Thripp’s presence in the building. Wanted by the law, he may be, but he is also wanted by his daughter, and myself. Lead me to them.”
Cuthbert did not move. “What I said to my own cook was – my own business, sir. Both have gone to escape the justice they should be facing.”
It was a very small scullery boy with burned fingers who interrupted. “The lady went running off, sir, that she did. Wiv them big burly fellows in dirty velvets and torn lace. Gone some hours back. But the old master, him and the lady’s nurse, they be here still, sir. Waiting for dinner.”
Cuthbert’s shoulders slumped. “Very well,” he said, sighing with resignation. “My uncle is upstairs. He is hiding. And my foolish cousin rode off with the three pirates who will no doubt rape, beat and kill her half way down the highway to the south coast.”
“Oh, Lord,” muttered Thomas.
“Get Edward Thripp for me,” Richard demanded. “And at once.”
“The attic.” Cuthbert shook his head.
Richard strode from the kitchens and out into the corridor leading to the principal staircase. A faint smell of boiling chicken wings in cabbage water followed behind. Thomas hurried after. The stairs creaked and Thomas called out, striding from one bedchamber to another and along the narrow dark corridors. Cuthbert, scurrying from the stairs to Thomas’ side, begged, “If you would be more circumspect, sir, remembering the servants who gossip, and the household of Lord Besslethwait only a few strides to out right, and who hears any voice raised from the premises.”
“To purgatory with Besslethwait,” said Thomas, slamming doors behind him.
But Richard walked directly to the upper level where the opening to the attic was a removable plank in the ceiling, accessed only by ladder. There was no ladder, and the entrance was closed. Richard stood in the square landing below, gazing up. He then removed his sword from its scabbard, reached up and tapped lightly on the ceiling.
“Master Edward Thripp,” he called without raising his voice. “I am not a representative of the law in any fashion, and I have not come to disorder your return to life in any manner either orthodox or unorthodox. But I am Richard Wolfdon, the host and owner of the house where your daughter has been staying. I have come to find her, and offer assistance, should she need it.”
He waited, gazing up, his sword back in its scabbard but his hand to the hilt. At first there was no answer nor any sound. Then a faint scraping, as of someone standing and coming towards the trap door. Finally it was a woman’s voice.
Katherine Plessey said softly, “Oh, sir. It is very kind of you to come after her. But she is gone, you see. And on her orders I remained here with Master Thripp, who is a little unwell, sir, and in need of help.”
“Then bring him down here,” demanded Richard. “And enough of the hiding. I need to know exactly where Mistress Jemima has gone, and who with.”
Finally a man’s voice, almost a low growl, and blurred with a distinctly drunken sniff. “I’m accountable for my daughter, sir. Not you. And she is safe.”
Thomas and Cuthbert had joined Richard, and Thomas had brought a ladder. He set it in place with a bump and a clatter, and Richard immediately climbed up, lifted and pushed aside the planked trap-door and disappeared into the dark shadows of the attic above.
“Oh, mercy,” whispered Katherine. And within moments, the three figures climbed back down the ladder and reappeared in the corridor below. Katherine, clutching her skirts, came down first and immediately afterwards Richard climbed quickly downwards, then stood gazing up at the final appearance.
Edward Thripp was not a tall man, not a short man, neither fat nor thin, and not particularly impressive. His hair needed cutting and his face needed shaving, but he was broad shouldered, heavy calves and wearing an ear to ear scowl. He wobbled a little on the ladder, and landed with a thud.
“Used to ladders,” he muttered, consonants’ slurred, “but on shop, you know. Damned house doesn’t move. Most disconcerting.” Staggering slightly, Master Thripp steadied himself against the wall and glared at his visitors. His eyes were bloodshot and his face, heavy-boned, was darkened by stubble but also by grime while his clothes were a mismatch of filth and torn luxury. “Well,” he said, straightening his back, pushed himself off from the wall and declared loudly, “we’d better start with wine. And plenty of it.”
“What an excellent idea,” agree Thomas. He turned to Cuthbert. “Two jugs, perhaps?”
Cuthbert glowered. “I’m no servant, sir, to be sent on errands. But I shall
call a page. And this discussion had best take place in the lower hall, where we have less chance of being overheard.”
It was therefore grouped around a small sparking fire of damp logs that the four men sat, with the nurse at a little distance, watching from the shadows. Richard stretched his legs to the fire, looked around at the small shabby comfort, drank inferior wine from a wooden cup, and smiled at the man he had often called pirate, and sometimes murderer.
“Master Thripp,” he said. “So you didn’t drown. This must have been an enormous relief to your daughter. But I am, naturally, surprised to see that she’s deserted your companionship already.”
Cuthbert stared into the flames, slurped his wine and refused to look at anyone else. Mistress Katherine, however, spoke first. “Sir, for my dearest Jemima, this has been the most exciting day of her life.” She turned to Jemima’s father. “She wept for so long, sir, when she heard of your accident. I feared she would be ill.”
“Humph,” said the man in question. “My little girl’s a good girl. Does what I ask.”
“I am aware, sir,” Richard interjected, “that this is none of my business, but I cannot help asking why, after reconciling with her beloved father, your daughter so quickly chooses to leave your side once more. I might also ask, since she was, after all, a guest in my home and therefore officially under my protection, you chose to send her such important news by secret note in the middle of the night?”
Thripp coughed, snorted, spat into the open hearth, drank, and coughed again. “I don’t know you,” he said, raising his voice over the crackle of the fire. “Neither of you gentlemen, turning up uninvited, though I’ve heard of Dickon the Bastard. But there’s no bastard can order me to tell my story to strangers. Is that what you’ve come for?”
Looking up, Cuthbert suddenly interrupted. “We all know your story already,” he said with a sniff, “and know how disgraceful it is. Piracy, thievery, and the murder of young women too. Now fabricating your death and pretending your ship and cargo sunk, just in order to creep back and keep all the goods for yourself. But soon you’ll be forced to confess to the sheriff, so you may as well confess to these others.”
The Deception of Consequences Page 17
