Edward Marston - The Counterfeit Crank

‘Get some sleep while you can, Tom,’ he counselled in a whisper.

‘I like to watch,’ said Nicholas. ‘Who are these people?’

‘Friends of Master Beechcroft’s or Master Olgrave’s. They eat well.’

‘By the sound of them, they’ve already drunk well. How long will they stay?’

Griddle yawned. ‘I’ve never stayed awake long enough to find out.’

The banquet was under way. Almost thirty people were seated at the long table and all them were relishing the occasion. Three musicians played in the background and their lively airs caught the spirit of the evening. The food was rich, the wine plentiful and the guests blandished by the women in their gaudy plumage. Seated at the end of the table, Joseph Beechcroft and Ralph Olgrave looked on with satisfaction.

‘How much have we made this evening?’ asked Olgrave.

‘A handsome profit. When men are drunk, their purse strings are much looser.’

‘They get their money’s worth, Joseph.’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Beechcroft, looking down the table to see one of the guests fondling a swarthy young woman with large, round breasts spilling out of her bodice. ‘I think that Master Greatorex will be pleasuring Joan Lockyer tonight. He cannot keep his hands off her.’

‘Is it not strange?’ said Olgrave with a grin. ‘Master Greatorex would never dare to venture into the stews of Clerkenwell Street, where Joan and her sisters ply their trade, yet he’ll play with her paps for hours in here.’

Beechcroft smirked. ‘Bridewell is a palace, remember.’

‘And we are its kings.’

A servant filled their cups with wine and Olgrave joined in the noisy badinage. His partner was more circumspect. While he was delighted that yet another banquet was such a success, he remembered what had happened the last time that the hall had been filled with guests. When there was a lull in the general hilarity, he turned to Olgrave.

‘The girl still worries me, Ralph,’ he confided.

‘Forget her, man. She belongs in the past.’

‘Not while she’s still alive to accuse us.’

Olgrave sneered. ‘Who will listen to the word of a beggar?’

‘Nicholas Bracewell did.’

‘And he’ll pay for his folly, Joseph. When that Welsh friend of his has been dispatched,’ he explained, ‘Gregory will follow the book holder to his lodging, for that’s where Dorothea will be hiding, I feel certain. Gregory has orders to kill them both.’

‘Good,’ said Beechcroft, reassured. ‘He’s a ready assassin.’

‘The fellow has never let us down before.’ Olgrave let his gaze travel up and down the table. ‘Now, then, which of these fine ladies shall I take tonight?’

‘Choose two, Ralph. There are more than enough to spare.’

‘One is all I need before I go home to my wife,’ said the other, as his eye settled on the youngest woman in the room. ‘Nan Welbeck tempts me, I must confess.’

‘She’s clean and fresh enough.’

‘And more than willing. There’ll be good sport for both of us, I fancy. Nan is no Dorothea Tate,’ he added with a lecherous cackle. ‘I’ll not need Gregory Sumner to hold her down for me.’

Bruised and bloodied, Gregory Sumner sat in a chair in the lawyer’s office. His legs were bare, he wore no shoes and his hands were still tied behind his back. Owen Elias was a menacing presence behind him but it was Henry Cleaton who asked all the questions, and who noted the answers down on a sheet of paper. Sumner was amazed at how much the two of them seemed to know about the death of Hywel Rees and the violation of Dorothea Tate. Involved directly in both crimes, he did his best to shift the blame entirely on to Beechcroft and Olgrave. Encouraged by an occasional sharp prod from Elias, the man tried to save his own skin by incriminating others and new facts tumbled out of him.

Henry Cleaton read carefully through what he had written down.

‘We have enough,’ concluded the lawyer. ‘Let’s take him before a magistrate.’

Ned Griddle slept as soundly as the others in the room until the breeze picked up and brushed his face and hair. He came awake to see that one of the windows was wide open. He turned instinctively to the man who had slumbered on the mattress beside him but Tom Rooke was not there. Griddle sat up and rubbed his eyes. Even in the gloom, he could see that the newcomer was no longer in the room. Casting aside his tattered blanket, he scampered to the open window and looked out. A scraping sound took his gaze upward and he gaped in wonder. Silhouetted against the night sky, the crooked beggar who had earlier had his arm in a sling, and a patch over his eye, was now moving with remarkable agility along the roof.

Nicholas Bracewell had no fear of heights. His years at sea had accustomed him to climbing the rigging even in the most inclement weather, and his time in the crow’s nest of the Golden Hind during a heavy swell had prepared him for anything. It was a fine night and he was clambering over a solid surface. He felt completely secure. All that he had to do was to find an open window through which he could re-enter the building. Sling, eye patch and anything else that might encumber him had been cast off so that he could move freely.

He first climbed to the apex of the roof, to take his bearings and to survey the whole building. With the sketch of Bridewell in his mind, he tried to work out where Ralph Olgrave’s bedchamber was situated. Dorothea had said that it was somewhere above the main hall. Nicholas edged his way forward in that direction. To his left was the forbidding outline of Baynard’s Castle. Down below, the River Fleet gurgled along before merging with the Thames. To his right was Greyfriars, the ancient monastery now converted into living quarters, its church renamed, its function changed forever. Ahead of him, across the water, Anne Hendrik would be asleep in Bankside. Nicholas had no idea where the girl was.

Easing himself down the angle of the roof, he reached one of the gables and felt his way around it. The window was locked. It was the same with the next gable and the one beyond it, but a fourth proved more amenable. Not only was the window wide open to admit fresh air, a candle had been lighted in the room, enabling him to see that it was unoccupied. In a manoeuvre he had used hundreds of times at sea, he grabbed the side of the gable and swung himself in through the window as if descending to the deck of a ship. Nicholas was back inside the building.

After taking a quick inventory of the room, he padded across to the door. It was locked and would not give way to his shoulder. He would need another point of access. Before he went in search of it, however, he looked around the room more carefully. A large table stood in the middle of it with two chairs beside it. Ledgers, books, papers and a series of letters were stacked neatly side by side. Using the candle to illumine the items on the table, Nicholas realised that he must have stumbled into the room that was Bridewell’s counting house.

He picked up a piece of paper and saw that it was a receipt for money paid in rent at the workhouse, clear proof that those who ran the place were breaking the terms of their contract. Nicholas’s curiosity was whetted. He leafed his way through some of the other documents and found further evidence of the misuse of Bridewell. Sitting on one of the chairs, he opened a ledger and saw that it was the account book for the institution. He studied the most recent entries. Income and expenditure were listed in parallel columns, but there was no mention of any rental money. Instead, the income appeared to come entirely from what was manufactured by the inmates and sold at a commercial price.

When he flicked back through the pages, Nicholas saw a convincing record of what seemed to be a legal enterprise that fulfilled all the requirements enjoined by the city authorities who leased the workhouse to Beechcroft and Olgrave. Anyone looking at the accounts would congratulate the two partners on the way that they had kept the institution, and balanced loss so punctiliously against profit. It was obvious to Nicholas that what he held was a counterfeit ledger, carefully devised to appease any inspectors who might pry into it.