My thoughts went back to my conversation with John Overbecks in the Green Lattis on the Tuesday morning of the preceding week. We had been talking about the loss of our French possessions overseas, with particular reference to the Conqueror’s duchy. My ignorance of geography being what it was, I had lumped together all the places he had mentioned and imagined that most of them were in Normandy.
But what did it matter that Fougères was in Brittany? Why had my unconscious mind considered the fact of sufficient importance to force me wide awake? There was no reason that I could fathom except that Brittany had run like a thread throughout all the terrible events of the past ten days, from the first moment, when I had seen the stranger step ashore from the Breton ship. Spying, subversion, Jasper Fairbrother’s unlikely involvement as a Tudor agent, Timothy Plummer, counter-spies sent down from London — why did I feel that all these strands in this tale of four murders were irrelevant? That they were like so many false trails strewn across my path to divert me from the truth?
Something moved in the darkest recesses of my mind. Something, some knowledge, buried deep, but slowly rising to the surface, was bringing revelation in its wake. I had only to lie still, to hold on, to wait patiently and all would be revealed. .
The stirrings and whimperings in the cradle were getting louder. I struggled in vain to ignore them, to will Adam back to sleep. But it was useless, as I had known it would be. A pair of crumpled fists appeared above the sides of his crib, accompanied by an almighty roar that declared it to be my son’s breakfast time, and woe betide anybody who came between him and his food. Adela, still half blind with sleep, was already climbing out of bed, staggering across the room to pick up our vociferous offspring and pacify him before we and our neighbours were rendered permanently hard of hearing.
Hercules, too, was suddenly up and about, landing, as usual, with a thump on my chest and starting to lick my face. Fending him off and cursing silently, I lay back against the pillows, trying desperately to recapture that moment when I had felt so close to a solution. But it had vanished like the wraith it was, and I was left frustrated and bad-tempered, yet more determined than ever to discover the truth and bring the culprit, or culprits, for these murders to justice.
Adela and I were halfway through breakfast, when a knock at the door was followed almost immediately by the appearance of Richard Manifold.
Adela frowned her disapproval and muttered something under her breath about encroaching ways. (Or not under her breath, but just loud enough for our visitor to get the gist of her words.) The sergeant flushed painfully and murmured his apologies. I very nearly felt sorry for him: it was obvious to me, at least, that he had come to make his peace, particularly with Adela, whose good opinion he valued rather more highly than mine. He also, as I have said before, valued a friendly hearth and a comforting meal at the end of a day’s work, when the hard drinking and forced conviviality of the city taverns began to pall. And with the added knowledge that our circumstances this coming autumn and winter were likely to provide him with an even more comfortable billet than heretofore, he was anxious to make friends with us again.
At my invitation, he joined us at table and I poured him a cup of ale from the jug, ignoring my wife’s reproachful look.
‘Roger,’ he said awkwardly, ‘I trust there’s no hard feelings for what happened yesterday. I had no choice but to arrest you, once John Overbecks had revealed the contents of Mistress Ford’s new will, and once those contents had been verified by Attorney Hulin. Fortunately,’ he added even more stiffly, ‘you were able to exonerate yourself.’
I could guess, by the semi-official manner in which he spoke, that he felt acutely ill-at-ease. Adela’s unforgiving silence offered him no relief, and I realized with some amusement that I was the one who would have to ease his embarrassment.
I clapped him on the shoulder. ‘You could have done nothing else,’ I agreed, and smiled gently at Adela to deflect her indignation. ‘Besides,’ I added with a touch of irony, ‘I knew there could have been no personal animosity in your actions. You’re too good a sheriff’s officer to let feelings of your own cloud your professional judgement.’
He slipped me a resentful glance, then grinned reluctantly, raising an imaginary sword in the manner of a fencer acknowledging a hit. He knew when he was beaten and held out his hand.
‘Friends?’
‘Friends,’ I agreed, each of us conveniently ignoring the fact that friendship was something we had never felt for one another.
He accepted a second cup of ale and said, ‘I’ve come to pick your brains.’ He grimaced. ‘As you can imagine, the murder yesterday of Mistress Ford has brought demands for an immediate solution from my lord sheriff, the mayor and every city elder of note. Never mind that, up until now, urgency has not been a feature of this string of deaths. Jasper Fairbrother? Too many suspects, and anyway, who cares that Bristol has been rid of a notorious troublemaker? The stranger? A suspected Tudor spy, and, in a city almost unanimous in its support for the House of York, again who cares? Walter Godsmark? One less bully for the populace to worry about, and, in any case, an undoubted accident. But Cicely Ford, not merely respected, but almost universally beloved, well, that’s a different story. Our only suspect is in the clear’ — another sidelong glance, accompanied by the glimmer of a smile — ‘which leaves me with a head as empty as Adela’s pitcher is likely to be if we go on drinking at our present rate.’
‘And you want to know if I have any ideas on the subject?’
He nodded and refused my offer of a third cup of ale.
‘It occurred to me that you might have some thoughts on the subject. You’ve always been a nosy beggar, and you’ve earned a reputation for being able to solve these sorts of problems.’
Adela, who had so far said nothing, got abruptly to her feet and began to clear the dishes from the table.
‘Perhaps you’d care to continue this discussion elsewhere,’ she suggested coldly. ‘I have work to do, and then I must go to market. I shall need some money, Roger.’
I gave her a hug and a kiss. ‘Sweetheart, I know you think I ought to be working, but four deaths in ten days requires some consideration. If they’re connected, as I’m more than inclined to believe they are, our murderer is getting much too confident. And who knows who may be next if he, or she, considers them a threat?’
‘Oh. . Very well. Just keep out of my way, that’s all,’ she answered grudgingly.
I guessed that her unwillingness to let me go with Richard Manifold had less to do with lack of money — she knew that I had done good business at Saint James’s Fair — than with a reluctance to allow her former admirer to benefit in any degree from my thoughts and ideas. The sergeant obviously still had an uphill task to reinstate himself in my wife’s good graces.
But the truth was that I, too, needed someone with whom I could exchange opinions; someone who would test my theories (not that I had many) with counter-arguments; someone who secretly thought me a conceited idiot, but who would listen to me in case I produced a golden nugget of wisdom amongst the dross.
It was Richard’s suggestion that we go to the Full Moon, close by Saint James’s Priory, rather than to the Green Lattis, where we were more likely to encounter friends who would wish to join us for a drink.
Early as it was, the tables at the Full Moon were already crowded with rowdies from the fairground, and I spotted the familiar figure of Philip Lamprey, making the most of his marital freedom before returning to London and Jeanne. I managed to avoid his eye and manipulated my companion on to a bench in a dark corner of the ale room, where I was able to draw back into the shadows. Neither the sergeant nor I was anxious to cloud our intellect with yet more drink, so we were happy to sit unobserved, while an uncooperative pot boy continued to pick his nose and scratch his crotch undisturbed.