P. Chisholm - A Murder of Crows

Letty hopped down first and spoke to the scarfaced man in a worn jack standing at the door. Dodd eyed him with automatic interest since he was different from the one who had been there a week or so before. The man’s jack was Scottish with its square quilting and some of the details made him think of the East March surnames. The man nodded and turned to shout inside.

Moments later the handsome willowy young man came out with a mounting block for Lady Hunsdon to use, followed by Master Van Emden in his fine brown velvet gown, bowing low to Lady Hunsdon.

Dodd looked over his shoulder at her to see that she had magically transformed into a very haughty court lady. She held out her hand imperiously to him and he took it, braced, and managed not to grunt at the effort of helping her step down to the block where she took the young man’s proffered arm to step to the pavement. A page swept the flagstones before her clean of mud and some hazelnut shells from the people idly snacking as they gawped at the goldsmiths’ windows. Lady Hunsdon was already in full flow, her voice quite without the Cornish rounding it had when she was relaxed.

“Master Van Emden, I have heard all about your shop from my dear son. You recall that you were kind enough to advise Sir Robert regarding the goldsmith’s art a week or two ago and he was very complimentary about the beauty and fineness of your work. I desire you to make the Queen’s New Year presents both for myself and for my husband, Lord Chamberlain Baron Hunsdon…”

The play of expressions on Van Emden’s grey-bearded face was very funny. It started with understandable wariness at mention of Carey, then continued with delighted surprise to be finished off by a look of quite frightening greed. He settled into an ecstasy of respect as Lady Hunsdon paraded into the shop, followed by one of her Cornishmen, trailing clouds of wealth.

Shakespeare settled back in his saddle, took a small notebook from his sleeve and a small stick of graphite from his penner, and started scribbling. Dodd contented himself with looking about for half an hour, enjoying the sightseeing and idly planning his Great Raid. There were three or four of the goldsmiths’ windows which looked worth the trouble of breaking the bars for their contents and they would have to remember to bring a crowbar. Master Van Emden’s windows were perhaps the best, but the bars looked too solid to bother with. Dodd had decided that all the insight would need to be taken in a single morning before the City fathers could call out their trained bands to stop Dodd and his gang of men…

A little later when Dodd was starting to think seriously about beer, Lady Hunsdon emerged, followed by Letty holding a velvet bag that clanked, Master Van Emden, his young man and his page, all bowing in unison.

“By the end of the week, I has sketches for your ladyship,” the Master was saying, mangling his foreign English in his excitement. “Young Piers shall to Somerset House for your inspection the plans bring.”

“Splendid,” said Lady Hunsdon with great satisfaction, “I will look forward to it.”

The process of setting the ladies back on their pillion saddles was very hard on your back since you had to help lift with your shoulders twisted round. Dodd darkly reckoned Shakespeare had about half as much work to do with Letty as he had with Lady Hunsdon, who was no taller than her maid.

They carried on to an inn next to the Royal Exchange. Looking perky and happy as usual, Letty went in followed by a Cornishman. There was a pause and then she came out, frowning.

“He’s not there, my lady,” she said.

Lady Hunsdon frowned. “Is he not? Are you sure? Ask the landlord if he’s gone out?”

Letty went back in and returned a moment later. “Landlord said he’s gone, he’s not here any more.”

Lady Hunsdon held her hand out to Dodd who swung her down and then, on an impulse, jumped down from the horse himself, gave the reins to one of the henchmen to hold, and followed her into the inn’s commonroom to back her up if she needed it.

She didn’t really. The landlord was hunched and hand-washing with anxiety but he stuck to his guns.

“A thousand pardons, your ladyship, but e’s gone. I dunno where, just gone. That’s all I know.”

“We arranged to meet at this very inn this very day, oh…several weeks ago,” rapped out Lady Hunsdon. “Of course he isn’t gone.”

“He’s gone, your ladyship, or rather, I don’t know what’s happened to him and his bill not paid and he left his riding cloak and some duds here when he went.”

Lady Hunsdon’s eyes narrowed. “That’s ridiculous. Let me see his room.”

“I can’t your ladyship, beggin’ your pardon, but I let it again and I sold his duds to pay his bill wot he hadn’t, see.”

“When did you last see him?”

“More’n a week ago, ladyship, honest,” said the innkeeper. “He saw his lawyer and then he went out to a dice game, he said, and that’s the last I seen of him.”

“Didn’t you look for him?”

The landlord shrugged. “’Course I did, ‘e hadn’t paid his bill had he, but I couldn’t find him.”

Dodd’s eyes were narrowed too. There was something radically wrong here.

Lady Hunsdon made a harumph noise like both her husband and her son. Behind her, Letty was snivelling into her sleeve. The landlord invited them to a drink on the house and Lady Hunsdon agreed, sharp as a needle. They were shown to a back parlour with some ugly painted cloths hanging on the walls where Lady Hunsdon drank brandywine with a large spoonful of sugar, Letty drank mild, and Dodd had a quart of some of the worst beer he had ever tasted, thin, sour, over-hopped and not very strong. Lady Hunsdon said nothing, gazing beadily at Letty who was trembling and clearly trying not to cry.

Before they left, Lady Hunsdon beckoned the landlord and spoke quietly in his ear. A gold angel passed from the lady to the landlord and his demeanour changed.

“Sergeant Dodd,” she said, “would you be so good as to go upstairs with mine host and search the bedroom used by Mr. Tregian?”

“Ay m’lady,” said Dodd, not sorry to be leaving his beer unfinished.

He followed the landlord who seemed nervous. The private room was better than the common run, reasonably well-furnished with a half-testered bed, a truckle for the servant, and a couple of straw palliasses for pageboys or henchmen, a chest with a lock and a table and chairs. The jordan was under the bed, not only empty but clean. So the room hadn’t been let.

Dodd couldn’t slit the mattresses with the landlord watching but he could and did search methodically and carefully, working from one side to the other, like a maiden doing the cleaning. All he found was an old book of martyr stories on a shelf which was a little loose. Dodd jiggled it a couple of times and then looked at the join it made with the wall. It was definitely loose at one end. He peered at it from underneath and saw something folded and wedged up behind the wood of the shelf. With the tip of his dagger he teased it out and found two blank sheets of paper. Presumably they’d been put there to stop the shelf wiggling and he was about to throw them in the fireplace when he caught a faint scent of oranges from the papers. It was an expensive way of fixing a shelf after all.

He folded them carefully and put them in his belt pouch, then went on down the stairs. The ladies were ready to go so Dodd went ahead. Out of habit, he checked under his saddle and his girth, mounted then bent to hand Lady Hunsdon up behind him.

“London Bridge,” she ordered.

They carried on, shoving through the crowds, all of whom seemed to be heading for the Bridge, which was hard on the temper.

“Powerful lot of folk here,” said Dodd as he pushed on through an argument between three men and a donkey stopped in the middle of the path and all four braying furiously.