It was on the tip of my tongue to ask how George of Clarence could destroy the King, but I thought better of it. My companion had already confided in me more than he should have done, and I could tell by his suddenly wary expression that he thought so, too, and was probably beginning to regret his frankness.
I stood up. ‘Your Highness may trust me. I hope you know that.’
He nodded, giving me his hand to kiss in farewell.
‘Let me know as soon as you have resolved this mystery, Roger.’ He added, half to himself, ‘Even then, it may be too late.’
I wanted to say, ‘Go to Mistress Shore, today, and ask her to intercede for the Duke of Clarence’s life. She won’t despise you for begging this favour.’ But I knew that he would never do so. He was too proud. For reasons of his own, he disliked the King’s leman too much to enlist her help without being able to offer her an inducement in return. So I merely bowed and promised to bring him word as soon as I had reached a conclusion regarding the death of Gideon Bonifant.
‘I’m depending on you, Roger,’ were his parting words.
Which was all very well, I reflected peevishly, as I made my way back to Bucklersbury and the Voyager, but if there was no proof to be had, all the dependence in the world couldn’t produce any.
It was a bitterly cold day, with low-scudding clouds and a sleety rain that stung the face and hands, and I flung what alms I could spare to the blue-faced beggars, shivering in their scanty rags. I found Adela huddled over the fire in our bedchamber, her long, thin hands spread to the blaze, but otherwise contented and cheerful. She had been dozing, for pregnancy made her extremely sleepy, and was quite happy to doze again when I had gone. But first she wanted to hear all that had passed between the Duke and me.
When I had finished telling her, she grimaced. ‘He’s asking too much of you, Roger.’
Her assumption that I might fail Duke Richard irritated me and blew away my own pessimistic mood.
‘Well, I shan’t learn anything new by wasting my time here,’ I answered briskly, and bent to kiss her. She laughed, but refused to tell me what it was that she found so amusing. Instead, she patted my cheek and instructed me to run along, just as though I had been Elizabeth or Nicholas. (I sometimes had the impression that she regarded me as another of her children.)
Having once again obtained her assurance that she could manage very well on her own for the next few hours, I promised that I should be back before nightfall.
‘Send to Paternoster Row if you need me, to the house of either Mistress Barbara Perle or to that of Gregory and Ginèvre Napier,’ I told her.
Paternoster Row, which, as I have already said, is where rosaries are chiefly made, is on the north side of Saint Paul’s churchyard. But interspersed with the shops are several private dwellings, one of which I instantly recognised, four storeys high, the carved timbers of its gable picked out in scarlet, blue and gold. The upper windows were made of glass, three of them decorated with leaded trefoils and three with circles within triangles, both signs of the Blessed Trinity. This was the Napiers’ house, and I had last been inside it three years earlier, when I was investigating the disappearance of a brother and sister from their home in Devon. Circumstances, as I had told Master Babcary, had brought me to London to question Ginèvre Napier, who had been a friend of the children’s mother.
Before renewing my acquaintance with Mistress Napier, however, I first wished to speak to her next door neighbour, Barbara Perle, but realised that I had no idea if her house were to the left or to the right of the Napiers’. I was still trying to decide which dwelling to approach first, standing well back in order to view them better, and unconsciously edging further out amongst the traffic, when the rattle of wheels and the sound of people shouting assailed my ears. The next moment, I was caught unceremoniously around the waist and dragged out of the path of a runaway horse and cart.
‘That was a close run thing,’ panted my rescuer, a stocky youth with a broken nose. ‘You want to watch what you’re doing, Master. You could’ve been killed.’
I acknowledged the fact and grasped his hand in gratitude; but it was not until after more passers-by had come to congratulate me on a narrow escape from death that a feeling of unease began to possess me. Despite my well-wishers’ assurance that such accidents were commonplace in London owing to the general carelessness of the drivers, I was unable to rid myself of the suspicion that someone might deliberately have tried to kill me. No one seemed to have taken particular note of the carter’s appearance, or be able to describe him, but considering the speed at which he had been travelling, this was hardly surprising.
I told myself that I was being foolish. Running me down would be a risky method of trying to dispose of me, and as far as I knew, the Babcarys owned neither horse nor cart. And yet, surely by now the murderer of Gideon Bonifant should have made some move to stop me enquiring further. .
‘Have you come to interrogate Mistress Perle?’ a voice asked in my ear, and swinging round, I found Christopher Babcary standing at my elbow.
‘Where have you sprung from?’ I asked.
He looked at me, obviously surprised by my belligerent tone, and indicated the basket he was carrying.
‘I’ve been delivering her coronet to Mistress Shore, in the Strand,’ he answered, preparing to move on. ‘If you want Barbara Perle’s house, it’s that one, there.’ And he pointed to the one to the right of the Napiers’.
I thanked him mechanically, and stood staring after him as he turned away and continued walking along the street.
Fifteen
The skinny young maid who answered my knock informed me that the mistress had stepped out for a moment or two to visit a sick neighbour, but that she would return before long if I cared to come inside and wait. I accepted the offer, following the girl up a flight of stairs to a parlour on the first floor, a room similar in size and content to that of Master Babcary’s house. On the face of it, there would seem to be little difference between his and Mistress Perle’s respective fortunes.
The maid bade me be seated, but then, instead of leaving to continue with her household chores, she lingered, looking at me with suppressed excitement, plainly desirous of talking to someone.
‘Do you know what today is, sir?’ she asked shyly.
‘The Feast of Saint Sebastian?’ I hazarded.
‘It’s also the Eve of the Feast of Saint Agnes,’ she said, her eyes sparkling with anticipation. ‘They do say that on this night, if you do what you’re told, you’ll dream of your future husband.’ She giggled nervously. ‘I hope he’s as handsome as you.’
‘And what is it that you have to do?’ I enquired, laughing.
‘It’s not a joke, sir,’ she reproved me. ‘Young girls like me do see things in dreams, you know. First of all, I have to fast throughout the day — though that’ll not be easy — and I mustn’t let anyone kiss me, not even a little child. Then tonight, before I go to bed, I have to take a hard-boiled egg, scoop out its yolk and fill the hollow with salt, then eat it, shell and all. After that, I’ve to put on a clean nightgown and walk backwards towards the bed — I can’t turn round and look at it, or the spell will be broken — and I must say this verse.’ She screwed up her face and, with a great effort of memory, recited.
‘Fair Saint Agnes play thy part,
And send to me mine own sweetheart,
Not in his best or worst array,
But in the clothes of every day.’
The sound of the street door opening and closing recalled her to her duties.
‘That’ll be the mistress now,’ she said hurriedly. ‘You won’t mention anything about what I’ve been telling you, will you sir? She’d say it’s all nonsense and the waste of a good egg, but I say you never know! I’d like to see the man I’m going to marry, whoever he is.’