He did not advance straight to the hall but spent some moments observing its environs from what he judged a safe distance, looking for any sign that men of the watch were lying in wait. He saw nothing that raised his suspicions, only the everyday hustle and bustle. Mrs Puddinge urged him forward, afraid that Aylesford might take this final opportunity to prevent them from reaching their goal, and at last he bowed to her impatience, and to his own, and led her across the crowded thoroughfare, weaving with practised ease through the noisy flow of pedestrians, carriages and carts, Mrs Puddinge clasping his arm with one hand while, with the other, she lifted her skirts above the appalling filth of the cobblestones.
Quare more than half expected to hear a shouted demand to halt, or to feel a hand clamp down on his shoulder from behind, but no one interfered as they climbed the steps to the front doors. The entrance of the hall was open to all, and thus there was no need to knock; he pushed one of the double doors open and strode into a gloomy, cavernous space, like the nave of a cathedral, in which stalls for the sale and repair of clocks and watches did a brisk business by candlelight and what drab illumination filtered through tall lancet windows high above, the glass of which, though daily cleaned by apprentices, seemed always coated with coal dust and grime.
A swell of murmurous voices echoed in the chill air. In lulls of conversation , Quare heard the ticking of a host of clocks, a welcome sound under the circumstances even though there was scant agreement between them, like a roomful of pedants talking past each other in urgent whispers. Here, too, the Charleys could have been waiting, but even if they had been – which did not seem to be the case – they could not touch him; the Worshipful Company had been granted certain privileges in its charter, prerogatives that it clung to as jealously as it clung to its hoard of secrets, if not more so, and by those terms it was the Worshipful Company, not the city watch, that, at least initially, exercised legal authority over its own members within the environs of the guild hall. Even had the watch been present, and tried to question him, the guild would not have permitted it. He was safe here, among his brothers, his family. He felt a weight slip from his shoulders.
‘The moneychangers in the temple,’ said Mrs Puddinge in a low voice beside him as they crossed the space to the far side, where another door barred the way to the inner reaches of the hall.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Quare glanced down at her, surprised at the vehemence in her tone. She was surveying the stalls with evident disapproval.
‘That’s what Mr Puddinge called them,’ she told him with a self-conscious smile. ‘He thought the guild hall should be free of commerce, that at least here, within these walls, the Worshipful Company should be more, well, worshipful .’
‘Sounds like a man after my own heart, Mrs P.’
She gave his arm a companionable squeeze.
‘Strange,’ he said, dropping his own voice. ‘Everything seems so normal, does it not?’
‘Yes, I was noticing that,’ she agreed. ‘Do you suppose Mr Aylesford was lying about everything? That no one has died after all?’
‘We shall soon learn the truth of it,’ he said.
As they crossed the floor, Quare saw a number of journeymen and apprentices known to him, men and boys he would ordinarily have stopped and spoken to, for this antechamber of the guild hall was a great place for gossip and socializing. But now the urgency he felt in communicating what he had learned of Aylesford, along with his need to know Master Magnus’s fate, impelled him past his acquaintances with nothing more than a nod and a searching glance. He found it odd, however, that not one of his fellows attempted to address him, and that few of them would meet his gaze … and when they did, there was an unaccustomed hardness in their eyes, a kind of reproach that filled him with misgivings. Behind them, he heard fresh whisperings, like dry leaves stirred up in the wake of a breeze. The skin at the back of his neck prickled. Mrs Puddinge seemed to sense it, too, for she grew silent and tightened her grip on his arm.
They drew up to the inner door, and Quare knocked – admittance beyond this point was reserved to guild members. The door opened, and a liveried servant asked him his business, his powdered face expressionless; even his voice seemed dusted with powder.
‘I’ve urgent business with Master Magnus,’ he said. ‘He’s expecting me.’
The man bowed and stepped aside. Quare could not tell if this action constituted an implicit refutation of Aylesford’s claims or not. He made to enter; then, considering, paused on the threshold and turned to Mrs Puddinge. ‘I’m afraid you can’t accompany me any further, Mrs P,’ he said. ‘But if it will make you feel better, I’ll ask the masters to send another journeyman to escort you safely home.’
‘Very kind of you, I’m sure, Mr Quare,’ she said, ‘but I didn’t come all this way just to turn back now. I mean to see justice done.’
‘But—’
‘I’m known here,’ Mrs Puddinge stated. ‘As the widow of a master, it’s my right to enter the guild hall. Why, I’d like to see anyone try to stop me!’ This with a challenging glare at the liveried servant, who showed as much reaction as if she had addressed a brick wall.
Quare shrugged and gestured for her to precede him, not at all convinced the servant would not step up to bar her way. But she bustled past the man without difficulty.
‘Come along, Mr Quare,’ she commanded, glancing back over her shoulder.
Marvelling, Quare stepped through the door.
At once, to his utter surprise and confusion, strong hands took hold of him. It was the servant, and another, indistinguishable from the first, who had been lurking, unseen, behind the door, which now swung shut with a bang.
‘What is the meaning of this?’ he demanded, too shocked even to struggle in the grasp of the two men. ‘Release me at once! When Master Magnus hears of this—’
Mrs Puddinge interrupted him. ‘Master Mephistopheles can’t protect you now, Mr Quare.’ Reaching forward, she deftly unbelted his rapier and its scabbard. Then, addressing the servants in an imperious tone he had not heard from her before: ‘Fetch him along, you two. We mustn’t keep Sir Thaddeus waiting.’
6
Gears Within Gears
QUARE FELT AS if he had entered into an oppressive dream as the two servants frogmarched him through empty corridors. Mrs Puddinge preceded them in frosty silence, navigating the maze of the guild hall with an assurance that bespoke considerable familiarity. Quare held his tongue as well; in truth, speech was beyond him. He’d walked these hallways just yesterday, feeling himself judged and found wanting by the dour-faced portraits looking down from the walls. Now that gloomy gallery seemed to regard him with outright hostility. So, too, the servants who had bent his arms behind his back and held them in a grip of iron as they impelled him – rather more roughly than necessary, he thought – in Mrs Puddinge’s wake. What was happening? Why was he being brought to the Old Wolf in a manner more befitting a criminal than a journeyman of the guild? And how was it that Mrs Puddinge, of all people, had ordered the servants to lay hold of him … and been obeyed without hesitation?