Chris Nickson - The Broken Token

And dangerous to those in power, Nottingham thought cynically. Yet it didn’t fully address Saturday’s events.

“But as you said, the people he came to help didn’t want to hear him, either. Why do you think that was?” he asked.

“The nature of man is essentially conservative, Constable, surely you’ve noticed that in your work?” The Reverend gave a short, broken smile. “People like the familiar, the routine of the church. The followers are content to follow, it’s what they know, they’re comfortable with it. But if people like Morton repeat their message often enough, at some point people will start to question things. Once that happens, the future becomes a lot less certain.”

“Mr Morton’s future became very certain,” Nottingham said flatly.

“Just because I didn’t want him preaching, that doesn’t mean I wanted him dead.” Anger bristled like lightning across Cookson’s face.

“I never said it did, sir,” the Constable replied softly, defusing the tension. “There’s one other matter I’d like to bring up with you.”

“What’s that?”

“The girl who was with him.”

“A prostitute, from what I’ve heard,” the Reverend dismissed her.

“That’s right. She needs to be buried.”

Cookson looked up questioningly.

“Surely a pauper’s grave is adequate?”

“I’m paying for the funeral,” Nottingham announced without explanation.

The vicar looked as if he was about to say something, then stopped and nodded.

“Very well,” he agreed gracelessly. “Have her brought over and I’ll have someone take care of it.”

He hadn’t expected more from Cookson. The Reverend was a wily man, one who hoarded power, spending it only when absolutely necessary. He relished his position in the city, so well established that he had no need to flaunt it. Nottingham didn’t care if he delegated Pamela’s funeral as long as she received a decent burial, and he felt no qualms on his insistence.

The whores were plying their trade outside the taverns on Briggate. With no market, the street seemed almost quiet, the thick trudge of cartwheels on cobbles and the yells of drivers the main backdrop. The air smelt of dung and smoke and offal, the smell of Leeds that Nottingham had known all his life.

Just past the Ship, where a passage opened like a crack in the wall to a teeming court, he stopped to talk to a prostitute who was idly watching the passing men. Polly had a proud face. At twenty she’d been doing this for seven years, but there was still a mischievous spark in her eyes. The life hadn’t beaten her down yet.

He stood so that his shadow fell across her face, and she turned, suddenly aware of his presence.

“Mr Nottingham,” she said with a smile that looked surprisingly happy. “Out for some morning fun wi’ a lass?” Her wink was so deliberately outrageous that he couldn’t help but grin at her.

“Doubt my missus would like that too much, Pol.” His voice became serious. “I’m looking for a little help.”

“Go on, then,” the girl replied. She pulled a threadbare shawl tighter around her shoulders as a light breeze began to funnel down from the north.

“You heard about the girl who was murdered the other night?”

Polly’s expression saddened.

“Show me someone who doesn’t know about that by now, poor bloody cow. It’s been all over the place since yesterday morning. What’s so special about her, then?”

“She was our maid once, a long time ago.”

He saw the initial disbelief in her eyes and kept staring at her until her expression softened again.

“Pamela, wasn’t it?” she said, and he nodded. “I used to see her. Quiet girl, you’d hardly know she was there. You’ve got to put yourself forward in this game if you’re going to make any money.”

“Do you know where she lived?”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry, luv, I don’t.” She shrugged. “No reason, you see. Do you want me to ask around?”

“Please, yes.” He brought a penny from his breeches pocket. “If you find out, send a boy to find me.” He was about to walk off when her voice stopped him.

“Mr Nottingham? I didn’t know her, but I’m sure your Pamela were a good lass.”

He smiled sadly.

“She was, Polly. She was that.”

He talked to several contacts, whores, touts and con men, before walking back to the jail. He’d have the information soon, he knew. Pamela might have had very few friends, but people knew her face, and someone would know where she lived. All he needed was a little patience.

Back at his desk he wrote a note to Rawlinson, releasing Morton’s body, and arranged for an undertaker to prepare Pamela’s corpse and carry it to the church.

More than twenty four hours had gone by since the murder and he was no further along than when he’d first seen the bodies. By his calculations he had another day before the Mayor would demand results. He needed some bloody answers.

It took two full hours before a boy ran breathlessly into the jail to give him Pamela’s address, longer than he’d expected in a city of seven thousand people. He threw the lad a farthing before striding out up Kirkgate and crossing Briggate in the shadow of the Moot Hall.

The place was a step up from Queen Charlotte’s Court, but only a small one. Unpaved, it stank of night soil the residents had thrown out. Long ago, Nottingham mused, this would have been part of the garden of a grand house. Now the only thing it grew was people, bunched together like weeds in a neglected, overgrown lot. He’d spent half his childhood living in places like this.

If anyone had ever cared for these buildings, that time had been far in the past. A couple seemed to be collapsing in on themselves, propped up by scavenged pieces of wood. The others seemed little better, held together by a mixture of faith and despair.

The boy had told him the front door of the house he wanted was white, but that was a generous term. What remained was a grimy, tired grey, and the wood was so warped that opening it became a battle.

Downstairs in the cellar, he’d been told, the third door, and he went, the smell of unwashed bodies, illness and hopelessness around him. He knew places like this all too well. You could leave them but they never left you, sticking inside the body and the mind forever, like an itching burr, and squeezing out hope. Nothing good could ever happen in this kind of place.

He tried the handle of the third door, surprised when it opened; most residents of places like this had precious little but locked up what they had. Anything Pamela had owned would be the property of others by now.

He came face to face with a burly man nearly as tall as himself. His blue eyes were filled with wildness, and a bushy, uncombed beard cascaded on to his chest.

“Who are you, eh?” It wasn’t so much a question as an accusation, the words delivered in a long slur as his alcohol breath filled the room. A nearly-empty jug of gin sat on the floor next to a straw-filled pallet, the room’s only furniture. Nails had been hammered into the walls, and an old coat, worn through at the elbows, hung on one.

The man came closer.

“I said, who the fuck are you?”

Nottingham raised his palms in conciliation and smiled cautiously.

“I think I have the wrong room.”

In the face of an apology the man seemed to deflate.

“Unless the bastard’s let it to you, too.”

“How long have you been here?” the Constable asked, suddenly suspicious.

“Since last night.” He gestured expansively, legs wobbling. “All mine, until next week when I can’t pay his rent.”

“And where’s the man who runs the house?”

“Upstairs.” The man paused, scrambling down to his knees to drink greedily from the gin as if it were nectar. “Top two floors.” He paused again. “The king’s palace,” he added enigmatically.