Chris Nickson - The Broken Token

Nottingham had little more than a nodding acquaintance with him, but as far as he knew the man was honest enough — as honest as any man in business could afford to be. There’d never been any gossip about his character. He took his family to service every Sunday at Holy Trinity Church on Boar Lane and lived on the other side of the River Aire in a large new house he’d had built the year before on Meadow Lane.

The Constable knocked on the open door but didn’t enter. This was a merchant’s premises; he’d wait for an invitation.

Instead the man came out. He was short and running heavily to fat, his face blotchy red and jowly under a freshly-powdered wig. Rawlinson’s coat was of expensive pale broadcloth, only the best, fashionably cut without being ostentatious, the lapels carefully pressed flat against his chest, cuffs fastened with discreet gold buttons.

“Mr Nottingham,” he acknowledged with a small, imperious nod. “What can I do for you?”

“I believe you’ve had a Mr Morton staying with you, sir.”

A fleeting look of astonishment and annoyance crossed Rawlinson’s eyes.

“I do,” he admitted cautiously, “but what business is it of yours?”

“Everything that happens in Leeds is my business, sir.” Nottingham allowed himself a short smile to accompany the formal politeness.

“Happen it is,” the merchant conceded grudgingly. “But if you know the answer, why are you asking the question?”

“You can vouch for the man?”

“Of course I can,” Rawlinson said dismissively. “Daniel Morton is a man of strong Christian convictions. My wife and I invited him here from Oxford to preach.”

Nottingham gave a sage nod.

“I know, sir. I had to stop a crowd injuring him on Saturday at the Market Cross.”

Rawlinson stiffened, his pride bristling. “I was very disappointed by that. I hoped those without privilege might have welcomed his words.”

“I wouldn’t know, sir.” It was the blandest answer the Constable could manage.

“What’s this about?” the merchant asked suspiciously. “Has there been more trouble? Has someone else attacked him?”

“Yes, they have.” Nottingham paused. “I’m afraid he’s dead, sir. Someone killed him last night.”

The colour fled from Rawlinson’s face. He seemed to deflate, all the substance vanishing from his body, and he reached out to steady himself against the stone of the building. He was a man who inhabited a world where violent death didn’t exist, and where tragedies came from God, not man.

“How?” he asked once he’d regained a little composure, and then, “Where?”

“He was murdered, over by the workhouse,” Nottingham explained briefly. “I’m sorry, Mr Rawlinson.”

There was incomprehension and pain on the merchant’s face. It was all beyond his understanding.

“Would you like me to escort you home?”

“No, no,” he answered unsteadily. “I’ll stay here.”

A long silence lingered between them before Rawlinson wondered in a wounded voice, “But why would anyone want to murder Daniel?”

“I don’t know that yet, sir,” Nottingham answered soberly. “We only found the bodies this morning.”

“Bodies?” The merchant looked up in surprise. “There was more than one?”

“There was a woman with him, a prostitute.”

Honest puzzlement crossed Rawlinson’s face.

“A prostitute? And she was murdered too?”

“Yes.”

“My God.” The words seemed to hiss out of the man.

The Constable waited before pressing on.

“I’m afraid I’ll need to ask you about Mr Morton, sir.” He knew the merchant would rather be alone, but the more he knew now, the sooner he could resolve the killings.

“Yes. Yes, of course.” Rawlinson sounded like a man suddenly distracted by images of mortality.

“When did you see him last?”

“Yesterday evening, I suppose,” he answered. Nottingham could see the man piecing events together and trying to draw omens from them. “He was with us for supper about eight. He said he was going for a stroll afterwards.”

“And you’d no idea he hadn’t returned?”

The merchant shook his head, looking dazed.

“We retire early, Mr, Nottingham… and then I was at the cloth market by dawn. I assumed he was still in his bed then.”

“Had he received any specific threats that you knew of, sir?”

Rawlinson barked a grim laugh.

“Oh aye, there were plenty of those. More than he told me, probably. But he said they weren’t going to stop him spreading God’s word. I admire that.” He stopped and corrected himself. “Admired.”

“How long had he been here?”

“Since Friday.” The merchant sighed. “My wife and I met him when we were visiting friends in Oxford. We heard him preach and we were both very moved.” He glanced up at Nottingham. “I take it you’re a Christian man?”

The Constable inclined his head slightly and smiled, hoping that would suffice. He believed, and attended church, but the last thing he wanted now was to discuss religion.

“Daniel was part of a very young group called Methodists,” Rawlinson explained. “We heard him preach three times while we were there, and he truly had a gift from God.” He smiled at the memory. “He could touch people in their souls. This city needs someone like that.”

“So you invited him here?”

“We did.” The merchant pulled a large white handkerchief of fine linen from his breeches and wiped his face. From being a man of heft and privilege, he now looked as if the slightest breath of wind would tumble him. “I felt privileged when he accepted. But you know what happened here when he preached.”

“Yes, sir,” the Constable agreed. It had been an ugly scene, as close to a riot as he’d seen in Leeds in several years. He still had the bruises.

“Daniel said the people didn’t want to listen, and the church here didn’t want a voice that might be louder and stronger than theirs,” Rawlinson continued. “The Reverend Cookson went to hear him speak, did you know that? He had the nerve to come to my house afterwards and tell me Daniel had to go, and that several merchants and aldermen agreed with him. He claimed Daniel was fomenting revolution.”

So Daniel Morton was despised not only by the poor he’d come to save, but by their masters too, Nottingham thought with growing curiosity. That made for precious few friends in the city.

“And was he talking revolution?”

“Don’t be so daft!” the merchant exclaimed with a withering look. “God’s love is hardly revolutionary, Constable.”

“I suppose not.” He hadn’t had chance to listen to Morton’s words on Saturday; he’d been too intent on keeping the man safe. But plenty of people had found no love in what the man had said.

“If there’s any consolation,” Rawlinson said with a wintry bleakness in his tone, “it’s that he’s with God now. He was a devout man. I don’t know why or how he ended up next to a prostitute, but I’m certain it wasn’t for the reasons most people will gladly assume.”

“I only hope I’ll be able to find out,” Nottingham answered with heartfelt sincerity.

It was only a short distance back to the jail on Kirkgate, not far enough to let his thoughts wander. The bodies would already be there, waiting on thick stone slabs in the back room they kept as a mortuary, and he needed to look more closely at them.

It wasn’t a prospect he ever relished. Murder in all its forms was common enough, and he saw the results. The souls might have gone to a better place, but too often it was obvious that the bodies had done all they could to cling to life. Nottingham found no pleasure in examining the wounds or the effect of poisons, and cataloguing the pain on the faces.