Gregory House - The Queen's Oranges

She gave the slightest twitch of a shrug and Ned got the message. Of course, gifts and bribes, the grease on the wheels of commerce. Any potential reward would naturally be from the Royal Exchequer. Their reputation for speedy payment was legendary-you could expect Judgement Day to happen first.

Meg Black gave a simple nod at his recognition and continued. “When the cargo is checked at any port, all you have to do is get the cooperation of the local customs collector. A share in the cargo usually does it.”

And Ned had thought a lawyer’s contract was complex. This arrangement of evasion was beginning to look more convoluted than a right of lease to three tenants, five sub tenants, and six owners. “But how can you afford to pay for all the…the ‘gifts’?” Ned knew that bribes were a fact of life. However a gentleman tended to avoid the word ‘bribe’. ‘Gifts’ sounded much more honourable.

“That’s worked into the shipping costs. On average it costs one twentieth of the normal duties and taxes for any shipment, though it’s usually a good idea to pay up most of the duty on wool, cloth and grain, for at least a third to a half of the shipment. The officials, however, take the prissage duties on wine very seriously. Its one tun given over out of a cargo of twenty tuns, unless of course they are offloaded before the ship reaches the docks.”

Ned just shook his head in bemusement. No wonder merchants could be so well off. Maybe he was in the wrong profession. But somehow although it provided valuable background to the chicanery of trade, it still seemed unlikely to have been the cause of such a vile double murder, or so hinted his daemon.

At his clear aghast-ness, Meg gave one of her mischievous smiles and pressed on. “Well Ned, that isn’t the difficult part. Albrecht and I have to juggle the different weights and measures accepted in the English, Hanse, Imperial and French ports.”

Meg Black tapped the open ledger meaningfully to draw his attention. If that last part on duty evasion wasn’t complicated enough to strain a man’s brain, the calculation of shipping weights was a truly arcane art. Her tables of notations went on for several pages. To Ned it made less sense than the legal Latin-French he frequently had to struggle through. None the less he nodded acquiescence. As Meg explained the squiggly ciphers, he wasn’t going to thought a lackbrain.

“The accepted standard for any cargo is a tun, based on the wine tuns shipped from Bordeaux. As you know, that holds two hundred and fifty two gallons.”

Once more Ned nodded. Any fool who’d walked into a tavern knew that. The massive barrels were arranged behind the tavern keeper’s counter.

“Now, by city and royal statute, that is supposed to be a tontight, and is equal to twenty hundred weight-each hundred weight being one hundred and twelve pounds.”

Now at last this was something simple. Ned understood that part at least. Perhaps like lawyers, merchants just used strange terms to maintain the secrecy of the trade.

Meg Black’s eyes sparkled with just a hint of malice, or was that mischief, before continuing. “That’s not all. A tontight should also be equal to a ton mascull or two pipes of sack wine, or four hogsheads, or six tierce, or two butts, or three tarcyons, or forty pieces of figs, or twenty two kintails or finally, half a measure of Andalusia.”

Ned shook his head in bewilderment at the list, and feeling overwhelmed, tried to change the discussion. According to both his angel and daemon, now was perhaps was not such a good time to become acquainted with the arcane practices of trade.

“So Albrecht handles all these matters?”

This received a simple nod of assent from Mistress Black. The shifting of subjects to somewhere familiar definitely worked. Colour had come back to her cheeks and her eyes shone almost smokey sapphire in the warm yellow light of the lantern. Extremely attractively really.

Ned took a deep breathe. It was time to venture on to more treacherous ground. Trade may have been the background to murder. However he had the feeling he was missing something. Actually his shoulder daemon reminded him that on past evidence, Meg Black rarely gave the exact truth he needed, unless that was, she had no other choice. “Ahh, umm, Albrecht, ahh, didn’t have any disputes or grievances with Joachim, ahh, did he?”

Meg Black’s eyes narrowed and the shadow of wrath threatened a precipitous reappearance. Ned quickly gave his reasons before the consequences of such a question proved personally painful. “Any inquest will ask the same questions. If they’re stubborn or truculent, they’ll even find against him just out of spite.”

At that explanation Meg Black’s potential anger subsided and she shook her head. “No. Any merchant from the Steelyard would give evidence that Albrecht and Joachim were friends and business partners for over ten years. No problems or jealousies.”

Well at least that possibility was out of the way, although Ned could probably come up with several darker motives for a falling out between friends, if he had too. That was the easy part of his questioning. Now he took a deep breath. It was time to delve into the previously unmentioned ‘secrets of trade’.

***

Previously Ned had skirted full knowledge of the dangerously, illicit trade that Meg Black pursued so whole heartedly. However, if he wanted to save Mistress Black and his good self from the Lord Chancellor’s singular attention, he had to become a willing accomplice. The difficulty lay in once he asked, well then there could be no turning back. Their ‘situation’ would have irrevocably changed, acquiring a more serious demeanour. It was not that he could claim ignorance of the penalties, or that he had been dragged in unwittingly. Ned’s more selfish daemon tried to point out that giving Meg to Lord Chancellor More would be a sensible career move, putting him firmly on the path to power and wealth. It was ironic that betrayal was so well rewarded, since to stay true to friends in this kind of situation led to close questioning and ‘religious instruction’ by Racking. Some of the lads at the Inns said that wasn’t so, hinting instead that Sir Thomas More preferred to employ the lash for truculent prisoners. Great, what a choice! Judas’s silver or his arms and legs got stretched!

Ned was almost a gentleman and he did still hold some honour despite how his lord or uncle treated him, so he while his conscience held firm he asked, “What of the illicit smuggling? Who handles that and how is it done?”

Meg Black spent a few moments considering the question. Ned could see that she was giving him a very intense consideration, trying to probe his motives. Examining his fingernails, he made a play at gentlemanly indifference. In truth he didn’t feel overly brave or noble. His shoulder daemon kept on asking him where was the sort of courage exhibited by men like Philips or Father Bilney. He shrugged this off. The subversion and degradation of his soul wasn’t worth the price of his shoulder daemon’s vision of Utopia.

It was fairly reluctant, but slowly in a soft voice and after almost an eternity of hesitation, Margaret Black began her introduction to the secret trade of book smuggling. “The first stage is our agents in Bruges or Antwerp. They source the books from printing houses. Officially the printers have to clear anything they produce with the censors of the Archbishop, but since most is now done in our language, they really couldn’t care. Then we work out the proportion of bound books to loose bundled sheets. The books cost more, but the sheets are easier to hide.”

Ned considered this first step. It seemed easy enough, a simple merchant’s transaction. You could do the same wandering through the printers’ stalls by St Paul’s. However you were extremely unlike to pick up such radical literature. Bishop Stokesley of London kept a very close eye on the few printers and sellers in the city. “So how are they secreted?”