I chose ale. I had heard too many hair-raising stories from men who had tried the fiery water of life so beloved by the Irish — and also the Scots by all accounts — to wish to addle my brain and lose concentration. The Irishman was disappointed, but good-naturedly ordered the landlord to bring me a beaker of ‘cat’s piss’.
‘We’ve met before,’ he said, ‘some years back now. Briant of Dungarvon.’
I recalled him at once. I had encountered both him and his partner when I had been searching for the truth concerning the disappearance of Margaret Walker’s father.
‘I remember,’ I said. ‘You and Padraic Kinsale.’
‘Padraic’s dead,’ he answered shortly, and from his tone I knew better than to ask for details. ‘So! This man who’s been arrested,’ he went on, ‘is he really innocent?’
‘I’d stake my life on it,’ I assured him fervently. ‘Unhappily, our sergeant is-’
‘A dolt!’
I demurred. ‘Maybe I wouldn’t go that far.’
‘All lawmen were born with brains the size of a pea,’ he said viciously. ‘That’s why they’re lawmen.’ He took a gulp of his whisky. ‘So, what do you want to know about this ship that was moored in Redcliffe Back?’
I took a deep breath. ‘Was she a slaving ship?’
I expected a wall of silence, possibly a request to leave. But having once decided that he could trust me, Briant of Dungarvon was seemingly prepared to be frank.
‘As far as I know, the Clontarf was mainly a slaver, but that isn’t why she was here. At least, not this time. The man you saw speaking with this Robin Avenel wasn’t the captain, either. It must have been the mate. The captain disappeared after rowing himself ashore at Rownham Passage some few weeks ago. A search by his shipmates at the time proved fruitless. I think this visit must have been a second attempt to discover what might have happened to him.’
‘Oh, I can tell you that,’ I said, and proceeded to do so.
Briant of Dungarvon was not the only man to listen with interest to my story. I did not bother to lower my voice and it soon attracted the attention of others, not only the three men seated at our table, but also those at neighbouring trestles. When I had finished, there was a general nodding of heads, sucking of teeth and scratching of backsides, which seemed to be their way of expressing belief in what I had told them.
A big Irishman with an accent so thick I could barely understand what he was saying announced that he wasn’t surprised. Hadn’t he always predicted that Eamonn Malahide would come to a sticky end? (Well, that was the gist of it, anyhow, but more forcefully expressed.) Many of my other listeners vociferously agreed. I turned to Briant for enlightenment.
‘I thought you slavers stuck together. De mortuis nil nisi bonum, etcetera.’ I could have added: ‘Brother outlaws, condemned by Church and State.’ But I didn’t.
If I had hoped to discompose him with a display of my limited learning, I was disappointed. Somewhere inside that rough exterior there was an educated man. I would have given much to know his history.
‘There are rotten apples in every barrel, chapman. You may not like what we do for a living, but we do have a code of conduct. We abide by certain rules. And the first and foremost of those is, never take people’s money and then betray them to their enemies for yet more gold. A man who does that deserves everything he gets.’
‘And this is what Eamonn Malahide did?’
‘In this particular instance, I cannot say, but certainly on several occasions in the past. It was only a matter of time before he himself was betrayed and he ended up as you’ve described, with a knife through his heart.’
‘Who was he deceiving this time?’ I asked eagerly, but the Irishman shook his head.
‘I’ve told you, I don’t know. I had as little to do with the man as possible.’ He glanced at the faces around him. ‘Does anyone here present know?’
But no one did. And enquiries in the further corners of the room, among those who had not listened to my tale, or not heard it properly, produced no additional information. Eamonn Malahide seemed to have been given a wide berth by his fellow slavers. But at least I now understood a little better the reason for his death. Someone had warned Elizabeth Alefounder and Rowena Hollyns that Eamonn Malahide was about to play them false. What about was still a mystery, but I hoped to find that out in due course. It explained their treatment of myself when they had mistaken me for him, and his subsequent speedy despatch at Rowena’s hands.
But the women had obviously not known of his perfidy for any length of time before my arrival, or they would have left Rownham Passage and the ‘murder’ house without waiting to encounter their betrayer. So who had warned them?
I suddenly remembered Edgar Capgrave telling me that Robin Avenel had left on the morning in question by the Frome Gate some two hours after his sister, and had returned an hour or so before her. He must have carried the news. But why had the two women not come back with him? It had to be that something or someone had delayed their departure …
Briant of Dungarvon dug me sharply in the ribs.
‘Have you finished asking questions then, chapman? Because if so, we’d like you to be on your way.’ There was a vigorous nodding of heads. ‘We’ll pass your message on to the crew of the Clontarf whenever we come across them.’ He added in a lower tone, ‘And if I should learn anything more from them, I’ll send a message to Humility Dyson. He’ll call on you at home. Don’t come here again. You might bring the Law trailing in your wake.’
I shook my head. ‘The Law knows better than to interfere with the “Irish trade”.’
‘There’s always one mad, zealous fool with his eye on promotion,’ Briant retorted, adding with a face-splitting grin, ‘And for your information, my friend, across the water we refer to it as the “Bristol trade”.’
On which half-friendly, half-admonitory note, we parted. Briant called for more whisky and resumed his interrupted conversation with his companions in the lilting and, to me, totally incomprehensible Irish tongue, while I slipped quietly from the alehouse, breathing a sigh of relief that I was still alive and unharmed, and headed for the public latrine.
Having rid myself of the effects of fright and too much ale, I went back to Broad Street and, for the second time in two days, knocked on the kitchen door.
It was too much to hope that I should again be able to avoid Dame Dorothy, the dragon-like housekeeper, but my luck was in. It was the intelligent, if dour-faced Jess who answered my summons.
‘Oh, not you again,’ she groaned, starting to shut the door, a move which might have succeeded had I not swiftly shoved my foot into the gap. ‘Go away! I nearly lost my place here yesterday after spending all that time with you in the garden.’
‘Just one more question, that’s all,’ I pleaded. ‘It won’t take long, I promise.’
A face appeared over her shoulder. The freckle-faced girl hissed delightedly to her fellow kitchen maids, ‘It’s Jess’s admirer!’
There was a chorus of giggles and several more faces joined the first, eager and bird-like, twittering with anticipation.
‘Anything in your pack, chapman?’ asked one with a significance of tone that caused an immediate snigger. I felt myself blushing and cursed silently.
Jess rounded on them furiously, giving the nearest girl a vicious prod in the chest and sending her and the others staggering back into the kitchen.
‘Oh, get on with your work, do!’ she cried. ‘And if the dragon returns, tell her I’m in the jakes. Again!’ She pulled me round to the back of the privy and addressed me, hands on hips. ‘What is it this time? It had better be something important. And be quick about it!’
‘Can you remember as far back as the beginning of the month?’ I asked. ‘Saint Elmo’s Day, I think it was. Mistress Alefounder went out very early in the morning, just after dawn. A couple of hours later, Master Avenel went out as well. Do you have any recollection?’