Philip Gooden - The Salisbury Manuscript

She should have made a dash because the strange young gentleman crossed to where she was standing in a couple of strides and, before she could react, seized her left hand and held it up in front of her face.

‘Where did you get this? This ring? Who gave it to you? Or did you steal it?’

Jenny shook her hand free from Tom’s grasp. ‘Steal it! I never. . he. . said. .’

‘Yes? He said. Who said? What did he say?’

‘It was given me by — by a friend.’

‘When was it given to you? A day or two ago?’

‘Maybe.’

‘Then you had better tell me who your friend is, Jenny. The last time I saw that ring it was inside a glass case in a house belonging to a dead man. You’ve heard of Canon Slater, you must’ve heard about his murder?’

Jenny turned pale. She staggered. Afraid that she was about to faint, Tom put an arm round her and guided her towards a chair. He wondered whether he should go and get Helen. He wondered whether he was making a terrible mistake. Yet even as he looked again at the ring on Jenny’s finger while he was helping her to sit down, he was certain that it was the very one which he’d glimpsed in Felix Slater’s study. The ring was tarnished, yes, but what really distinguished it was the irregular zigzag pattern, incised into the soft metal not using a modern implement but something which was primitive and ages-old.

Tom knelt down in front of the chambermaid. She shook her head when he asked if she wanted a glass of water. She wouldn’t look at him. He stood up once more.

‘Listen to me, Jenny,’ he said, striving to keep his voice low and even. ‘I believe that you accepted that ring in good faith, as a token from an admirer perhaps. You’ve more or less admitted that you were given it only a day or two ago. Now, I don’t know where your friend got the ring from. Perhaps he received it in good faith also. But I need you to tell me about it, because I think that this — what you are wearing on your finger — has come from the house of a dead man. I recognize it.’

At this, Jenny extended her left hand, palm outwards, and stared at it as if it belonged to someone else.

‘He said it was like an engagement ring, only not official,’ said Jenny. She spoke even more quietly than Tom had, as if she was talking to herself. ‘He said it was old, and said how it had been a whatd’youcallit? — a hairloom — passed down through the generations. He said I must wear it in private where only I should be able to see it. . and I didn’t wear it private and look what has happened.’

‘Are you engaged then?’ said Tom. He was waiting to work round to the identity of the man who’d given her the ring.

‘Not official engaged,’ repeated Jenny, still staring at her hand, now curled up in her lap. ‘I think he must’ve been joking with this ring. He’s give me joking presents before, toasting forks and such.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Tom, but remembering the inexplicable burglaries in the cathedral close.

Jenny looked up at Tom for the first time. There was a shrewdness in her look now, a shrewdness and something else besides. ‘He give me the ring ’cause he was paying me back. He got something beforehand.’

Tom felt uncomfortable. Perhaps sensing this, Jenny continued, ‘It’s not what you think. I already give him what you think, and give it him for nothing. And do you know, mister, here’s a funny thing. . '

‘Yes?’

‘I didn’t mind giving it him for nothing.’

Tom saw that they were getting bogged down in detail. ‘I don’t care very much how you came by the ring but I believe it to be the property of a dead man,’ he said.

Jenny turned her gaze from him. ‘I’m sure it’s an honest gift,’ she said after a time.

‘So where did the ring come from?’

‘I don’t know where it come from, mister, but it was Adam gave it me.’

And she went on to explain that Adam — a quite well-spoken chap rather older than Jenny and one who’d knocked about the world a bit, by his own account — had tipped up in the city a few months ago out of nowhere. Now he did some unspecified job in another part of Salisbury. A labouring job, maybe, because he had scratched and dirty hands often. Though he seemed to be too clever to earn his living with his hands. He was a bit mysterious, didn’t give much away. He befriended Jenny after drinking one night at The Side of Beef, he soft-soaped her.

When they’d got more confidential (which was Jenny’s word), they’d sought out places where they might. . you know. Adam claimed that he couldn’t risk his reputation with his employer by taking her back to where he worked and lodged while she, Jenny, was accommodated on the top floor of the hotel when she wasn’t staying with with her aunt and innumerable nieces. So they had to look out for open-air spaces, for cosy nooks or flowery meadows. Luckily it was summer and there were plenty of both to choose from. Then, with the cooling of the weather, came a cooling in the friendship. Until a few evenings ago when Adam appeared in the back yard of The Side of Beef, with a particular request.

Here, the bravado which had been in Jenny’s tone up till now dribbled away. Eventually Tom got her to admit that Adam’s request had been to tell him the floor and number of the room occupied by a visitor from London, a young lawyer. Also, she was to turn a blind eye during the next few minutes while he went and had a poke around. In fact, instead of turning a blind eye she might keep watch for him. In double fact, if he could borrow her pass-key for an instant he could slip in and out, and no one the wiser. He meant no harm, he said. Just wanted to have a peek at the gent’s room. In return, he promised Jenny that she would receive something. . a present. . a surprise. And it was true, wasn’t it, no harm had been done to the gentleman’s belongings, only they were left somewhat disarranged.

‘S’pose you’re going to tell Mr Jenkins, sir?’ said Jenny after she’d finished her recital.

Tom shrugged. He didn’t know. He ought to inform the landlord about the chambermaid but at the moment there seemed bigger fish to fry.

‘Well, go and tell him then,’ said Jenny with a return of the old defiance. ‘Mr Jenkins asked me for what I give Adam and I couldn’t abide the thought of him even laying a hand on me — which he’s tried to do often enough. He’s had a down on me ever since. Go and tell him and see if I care.’

‘Go and tell who what?’ said Helen.

She was standing at the door to Tom’s room.

‘I grew bored with waiting, Tom. I was starting to think you’d found another dead body or drowned yourself in the bath or something. And I have had an idea about Atropos. But first, who’s telling who what?’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Tom. ‘I’m not going to tell anyone anything, Jenny, as long as you tell me a single thing in exchange. This fancy-man of yours. Is he just Adam to you or does he have another name?’

‘Why, yes, he is called Eaves,’ said Jenny. ‘Adam Eaves. Which I thought was funny, if you think about it. Adam Eaves.’

‘The gardener at Venn House,’ said Tom. ‘The man with the shears.’

‘Atropos,’ said Helen.

‘Atropos who cuts short the thread of human life.’

‘What are you talking about?’ said Jenny.

Later it struck Tom as odd that in all the time he had been asking Jenny about her fancy-man, she had not sneezed once. If she had caught the cold from one of her nieces, he knew now the person she’d passed it on to: the gardener who’d sneezed violently before giving them his lopsided grin. The gardener who’d certainly been responsible for thieving innocuous kitchen items from the other houses in the close and who had, with an almost equal certainty, thieved away the life of his master, Canon Felix Slater.