Andrew Taylor - The King’s Evil

I shifted in my chair. ‘Should I send to Watford tomorrow, sir, to enquire about newly arrived preachers? I could write directly to Mr Williamson’s correspondent there. And I myself could call on this Mr Turner at Barnard’s Inn about the mortgage. Also, I have arranged to go back to Clarendon House to question the servant who—’

Suddenly the whine stopped.

‘Hakesby,’ Chiffinch said.

I stared open-mouthed at him.

Chiffinch regarded me coldly. ‘Hakesby,’ he repeated, wrinkling his nose. ‘I know the name is familiar to you because you yourself mentioned the man to me not a year ago. The surveyor-architect who has an office near Covent Garden. Well respected by his peers, I understand. And, as you and I both know, a man who has previously been of interest to me.’

I recovered as quickly as I could. ‘Yes, sir, I remember him well.’ I was on dangerous ground for Chiffinch had helped to arrange my meeting in the Banqueting House with Lady Quincy. He might reasonably expect that it had jogged my memory about Hakesby as well as Cat. He had known that Cat had found a refuge with Hakesby at the end of last year.

‘Did you know that this man was the architect working on Lord Clarendon’s pavilion?’ Chiffinch said in a silken voice.

‘Yes, sir. Mr Milcote – Lord Clarendon’s gentleman – chanced to mention it this morning, but I thought it—’

‘Did it not occur to you that there might be a connection?’ Chiffinch’s tone was heavy with sarcasm. ‘We already knew the Lovett woman was working under an assumed name as Hakesby’s servant, and that the King was content it should be so as long as she didn’t make trouble. He is not a vengeful man. When Lady Quincy told him that Alderley was threatening Mistress Lovett again, he was even content that you should warn her of the fact. Some might think that he’s too tender-hearted, but it is not my place to question his decisions.’

I tried to put the matter in the best light I could: ‘I thought it unlikely Mr Hakesby would take a woman to a site where he was working.’

‘This woman is the daughter of a Regicide: and by all accounts, she’s a fanatic like her father – a madwoman who hates her cousin Alderley so much that she stabbed him in the eye. He was lucky to escape alive. And she tried to burn down the house about their ears as her uncle and aunt slept.’ For once in his life, Chiffinch sounded genuinely shocked. ‘That a woman should do so foul a thing to her family, to the cousins who sheltered her,’ he went on. ‘Why, it beggars belief and turns it out of doors. And her cousin Alderley is now found drowned, probably murdered, in the very place where Hakesby is working. Does it not strike you as significant?’

‘I grant it’s a curious coincidence, sir.’

‘A coincidence? Would you have me think you a fool or a traitor, Marwood? There’s only one possible conclusion.’ He opened the folder before him and took out a sheet of paper. ‘I received a letter this afternoon.’

He slid it across the desk to me. He watched me, sipping his wine, as I read it. There was neither date nor address.

Honoured Sir,

Mr Edward Alderley lies drowned in Lord Clarendon’s new Pavilion at Clarendon House. He was murdered by his Cousin, Catherine Lovett, the Regicidal Spawn and Monster of her Sex. You will find Her hiding in the House of Mr Hakesby in Henrietta Street, by Covent Garden. Mr Hakesby has often been at Clarendon House of late, and the She-Devil with Him. Hakesby holds the Keys to the Pavilion.

A Friend to His Majesty

The handwriting was clumsy but by no means illiterate, as if the writer had sought to disguise it, perhaps holding the pen in his left hand. I turned the letter over. There was nothing on it except Chiffinch’s name. The person who had written it had known to address the letter to him, not to a magistrate or some great man charged with public order. Outside Whitehall, few people knew of the importance of Chiffinch, the man who arranged the King’s private affairs. And fewer still could know that the King had charged him to look into the death of Edward Alderley.

‘It was handed in at the gate,’ Chiffinch said. ‘I have enquired, but no one knows who brought it.’

There was a ringing in my ears. ‘Is the woman Lovett in custody, sir?’

‘Unfortunately not,’ Chiffinch said. ‘Officers went to arrest her this afternoon, but she had gone. Her flight is as good as a confession of guilt.’

I nodded, as if in agreement. Dear God, I thought as the implications sunk in, this damnable letter taken together with her flight could bring her to the gallows.

‘They’ve brought in Hakesby,’ Chiffinch was saying. ‘But he’s not much use to us or to anyone else. Doddering old fool. We’ll find her, of course, and it won’t take long.’

From my point of view, the situation was growing worse by the moment. ‘Can we find out who wrote the letter?’ I asked.

‘How do I know?’ Chiffinch snapped. ‘But it doesn’t much matter. Once we lay hands on Catherine Lovett, we have the evidence to hang her. Perhaps Hakesby, too, as her accomplice. It’s possible that he arranged for her to disappear, or even had a hand in Alderley’s murder himself. After all, she must have needed help. She may be a she-devil but when all’s said and done she’s only a woman. She probably hired ruffians to do her dirty work for her.’

He didn’t know Catherine Lovett as I did. I bit back the retort that if all women were like her there would be some doubt as to which was the weaker sex.

Chiffinch refilled his glass and leaned closer across the table. ‘On the other hand, Marwood,’ he said in a lower voice, ‘there’s another side to this. The King desires that the matter should not cause a stir. Lord Clarendon’s future is much on his mind, and a scandal of this nature could upset a number of delicate negotiations he has in train. And there are people who would seek to make mischief if they could. It’s no secret that the Duke of Buckingham, for example, is no friend to Lord Clarendon, or to the Duke of York. He would use this scandal to further his own ambitions.’

He paused to drink. He set down his glass and stared at me. There was worse to come. His frankness was an ill omen.

‘So,’ he said, silkier than ever, ‘there are two things you must do to serve the King. One is to see to it that the Lovett woman is laid by the heels as soon as possible. And the other is to move Alderley’s body away from Clarendon House and its garden.’

I felt as if I were falling, with no more control over my destination than an unborn baby has. ‘But where to? How?’

‘Better if I leave that to you, and to Lord Clarendon’s gentleman. Milcote, I think you said. A capable man, I’m told, as I would expect – my lord doesn’t suffer fools gladly. I should encourage him to play the principal part, if I were you.’ He opened a drawer, took out a purse and tossed it to me. ‘Use that if you need money, though you must account for it afterwards.’

‘Sir, do I understand that you—’

‘Understand this, Marwood: move that body. It must not be an embarrassment to Lord Clarendon. Or to the King. Put it in some discreet spot where anyone could have gone. Mark you, the needs of justice will still be served, and the woman will still pay the price of the murder she has committed, either by her own hand or through hired instruments. It’s merely that we shall arrange the circumstances a little more conveniently for other people.’

‘But if Alderley’s body is moved elsewhere, what will connect it to Catherine Lovett?’ I said.

‘Come – you’re being obtuse. Someone must have killed him, eh? And, as I’ve already said, it’s well known that she hates him, and that she tried to kill him in his own house last year. And her flight is a tacit admission that she was responsible for his death. Besides, once the judge hears who her father was, there will be no difficulty in the court reaching the right verdict.’