C. Sansom - Dark Fire

'Did they ever mention the term Greek Fire?' I watched her face. She hesitated before replying.

'Not to me. I tell you, I wasn't interested in what they did up here.' She shifted uneasily in her chair.

'You spoke of experiments, sometimes out in the yard. Did they have an apparatus, a large thing of tanks and pipes? Did you ever see anything like that?'

'No, sir. I'd have noticed. All they took out to the yard were flasks of liquid and powder. That's not what the earl's men have turned my house upside down looking for, is it? I thought it was some papers.'

'Yes, it was,' I said mildly. Her eyes had narrowed warily when I mentioned the apparatus. 'But there was a big metal construction as well. You are sure you know nothing of that?'

'Nothing, sir, I swear.' She was lying, I was sure. I nodded and stepped to the fireplace. The stoppered bottle lay where I had left it, but to my surprise the thick liquid on the floorboards seemed to have evaporated; there was nothing left but the barest stain on the floor. I touched it; the floor was quite dry. I hesitated, then picked up the little bottle, still half-full of the stuff.

'Might you have any idea what this liquid is, madam?'

'No, I haven't.' Her voice rose. 'Greek Fire, formulae, books, I don't know what any of it means! God's wounds, I don't care either!' Her voice rose to a shout and she covered her face with her hands. I picked up the bottle and wrapped it carefully in my handkerchief, then slipped it into my pocket, suppressing a momentary stab of fear that it might be Greek Fire itself, that it might explode into flames.

Goodwife Gristwood wiped her face and sat looking at the floor. When she spoke again it was in a cold whisper. 'If you want to find who might have told the killers about my husband, you should go to her.'

'Who?'

'His whore.' Barak and I looked at each other in surprise as she continued, her voice like a thin stream of icy water. 'The woman that keeps the brewery told me in March she'd seen Michael in Southwark, going into one of the whorehouses. She enjoyed telling me too.' She looked at me bitterly. 'I asked him and he admitted it. He said he wouldn't go again but I didn't believe him. Some days he'd come home drunk, smelling like a stewhouse, goggle-eyed with sated lust.'

Barak laughed aloud at the words. Goodwife Gristwood rounded on him. 'Shut up! You churl, laughing at a woman's shame!'

'Leave us,' I told him curtly. For a moment I thought he would argue, but he shrugged and left. The goodwife looked up at me, her eyes fierce. 'Michael was besotted with that vile tart. I raged and shouted at him but still he went to her.' She bit her lip hard. 'I'd always been able to manage him before, stop him getting too involved with mad schemes, but then Samuel came and between him and that whore I lost him.' She looked again at the awful spray of blood then stared at me, her eyes fierce. 'I asked him once if his lusts were all he cared about and he said the tart was kind to him and he could talk to her. Well, you talk to her, sir. Bathsheba Green at the Bishop's Hat brothel at Bank End.'

'I see.'

'They do what they like over in Southwark, outside the City's jurisdiction. This side of the river she'd have her cheeks branded, and I'd do it for them.'

Despite her vicious words I felt sorry for Jane Gristwood, alone now with nothing but this big decaying house. I wondered what she had felt for her husband. Something more than the contempt and bitterness she expressed, I was sure. Certainly she would make what trouble she could for the whore.

I looked into her eyes and again had the sense of something held back. I would return when I had found this Bathsheba Green.

'Thank you, Goodwife Gristwood,' I said. I bowed to her.

'Is that all?' She looked relieved.

'For now.'

'Talk to her,' she repeated fiercely. 'Talk to her.'

AS I WALKED DOWNSTAIRS I heard voices from the back regions; a man's murmur then a woman's sudden giggle. 'Barak!' I called sharply. He appeared, sucking an orange. 'Susan gave me this,' he said, tucking the half-eaten fruit away in his codpiece. 'Fresh off the boat.'

'We should go,' I said curtly, leading the way outside. I blinked in the afternoon sun, bright after the gloomy house.

'What did Madam Sour-face have to say?' Barak asked as we untied the horses.

'More without you there baiting her. She told me Michael was seeing a whore. Bathsheba Green, of the Bishop's Hat in Southwark.'

'I know the Bishop's Hat. It's a rough place. I would have thought an Augmentations man could have afforded a better class of nip.' We mounted the horses; I adjusted my cap so some shade might fall on my neck.

'I was asking Susan about the family,' Barak said as we rode away. 'Goodwife Gristwood tried to rule the roost, but her husband and his brother paid little heed, apparently. They were thick as thieves. Both after a quick fortune, she said.'

'Did she know of Michael's dalliance at Southwark?'

'Yes. Said it turned the goodwife bitter. But you could see that, pinched old raven.'

'She's lost her husband, has nothing in the world now except that ruin of a house.'

Barak grunted. 'Apparently Gristwood married her for her money when she was nearly thirty. There was some scandal in her family, Susan didn't know what.'

I turned to look at him. 'Why do you dislike her so?'

He laughed, in a tone as bitter as Jane Gristwood's own. 'She reminds me of my mother, if you must know. The way she was after you for information about the house the moment we were in the door, and her husband lying in his gore upstairs. My ma was like that, married our lodger not a month after my father died. I quit the house then.'

'A poor widow must look to her future.'

'They do that all right.' He pulled his horse a little ahead of me, ending the conversation, and we rode on in silence. I kept raising my hand to remove the sweat that was falling into my eyes. I was not used to criss-crossing London like this. The heat was baking the rubbish in the streets, releasing all its vile humours. Beneath my doublet my armpits were damp with sweat and my breeches felt as though they were stuck to Chancery's saddle. This was a trial for him too: he was finding it hard to keep up with Barak's mare. I resolved that in future we would travel by water when we could. It was all very well for Barak and his horse – each was a decade younger than Chancery and me.

BY THE TIME we arrived back at Chancery Lane the sun was low. I told Joan to fetch us some food. In my parlour I dropped gratefully into my armchair; Barak collected some cushions together and sprawled inelegantly on the floor.

'Well, where are we now?' he asked. 'This day's nearly done. Then only ten more.'

'We've had more new leads than answers so far. But that's what I'd expect at the start of an investigation as complicated as this. We must visit that whore. And I think the goodwife is still holding something back. Is your man Smith staying with her?'

'Till otherwise instructed.' He retrieved his orange and sucked it noisily. 'I told you she was a nasty old crow.'

'It's something to do with the apparatus. I don't think they kept it the house.'

'Then where?'

'I don't know. Some warehouse? But there was nothing about any other property among their papers.'

'You looked?'

'Yes.'

I took the bottle from my pocket and handed it carefully to Barak. 'There was a pool of this stuff on the floor. It's almost colourless, has no smell, but if you taste it you get a kick like a mule.'

He unstoppered the bottle and sniffed the contents carefully, then put a little on his fingers. He touched it to his tongue and made a grimace, as I had. 'Jesu, you're right!' he said. 'It's not Greek Fire, though. I told you, that had a fearsome stink.'