jhn
rtr
shw
qsi
jbx
egq
yin
udh
azd
hag
fcm
dyp
ivy
am
He shoved it in his pocket, thinking it told him one thing for certain: that if the Piccadilly Company was sending or receiving coded messages and then burning them, it was embroiled in something untoward. It was not something that honest people tended to do.
He relocked the door and was about to walk down the stairs when he heard someone coming up them. The person was carrying a lamp, and it cast a shadow on the wall. Chaloner froze in alarm when he recognised the unmistakable bulk of Brinkes — he was about to be caught prying by a man who made his living by violence and murder.
Chapter 4
Chaloner was reluctant to fight Brinkes, because he did not want the Piccadilly Company to know it was being monitored. Unfortunately, there was no time to pick the lock on the door again, so he ran silently up the stairs to the next floor. Not surprisingly, Pratt’s rooms were locked, and as he bent to try the handle, his sword scraped against the wall. It was a careless mistake, and he heard Brinkes falter on the floor below. There was a brief pause and then footsteps as the man came to investigate.
With no other option, Chaloner continued upwards to the attic. Luckily, that door was open, so he stepped through it quickly.
The woman sitting in the window spun around in alarm. She was pretty, with brown hair and clear skin, and she recognised him as the man who had seen her watching the street because she smiled. He interpreted it as a sign that she would be willing to help him, so he put his finger to his lips, and had only just managed to duck behind the bed before the door flew open.
Brinkes stood there, one meaty hand clutching a lamp and the other holding a dagger. When he began to stride towards the woman with barefaced menace, Chaloner swore softly, seeing he would have to do battle after all. He started to stand, but sank down again when she began to speak.
‘Do you have a dog?’ she asked in a curiously childish voice. She beamed at Brinkes, an expression that bespoke vacuity, and Chaloner realised with a start that there was something amiss with her wits. ‘James has a dog. A black one. Have you seen it? It is missing.’
‘Your husband is dead,’ said Brinkes, stopping in his tracks to regard her warily. ‘And so is his dog. Do you not remember being told? But never mind that. Did anyone just come in here?’
‘I like visitors,’ declared the woman, rocking back and forth. ‘But I do not have many.’
‘Christ,’ muttered Brinkes. Like many folk, he was unsure how to deal with disturbed minds. Unsettled, he began to back away. ‘Lock the door when I have gone. There are a lot of unpleasant people in this part of the city, and you do not want them coming in.’
The door closed, but Chaloner waited until Brinkes’s footsteps had gone all the way to the ground floor before moving. He stood and smiled gratefully at the woman.
‘I like visitors,’ she announced brightly. ‘My name is Ruth Elliot, and my husband is called James. He has a dog, and it is missing. Have you seen it?’
Chaloner frowned. James Elliot was the name of the man who had fought and killed Cave. ‘When did your husband die, mistress? Yesterday?’
‘He has not been to see me all day, and my brother told me he was dead.’ Then her troubled expression lifted, and she laughed. ‘But it cannot be true, because he was alive on Sunday.’
A miniature line-engraving had pride of place on the table, so Chaloner picked it up. The likeness had been made when Elliot was younger, but the eyes and black wig were the same. Also, Lester had mentioned a Ruth who would be heartbroken if Elliot were harmed, although Chaloner doubted it was the shock of her spouse’s death that had turned her wits: the array of medicines on the cabinet, and the dolls lined up on the bed, suggested they had been awry for some time.
He regarded her thoughtfully. It was a curious coincidence that Elliot’s wife just happened to live in the place that was the object of one of his three investigations. Or was it? There was a connection of sorts, in that Elliot had killed Cave, a man who had travelled home from Tangier on the same ship as the three scouts. And Harley, Newell and Reyner were involved with the Piccadilly Company, which met downstairs.
‘You watch the people who use the rooms below you,’ he said, coming to kneel next to her and trying to gauge her level of intelligence. ‘What do you see?’
‘I do not like them,’ she declared. ‘James said he will stop them from coming, but he forgets.’
‘What do they do?’
‘They talk,’ replied Ruth, pouting. ‘They discuss gravel.’
‘Gravel?’ echoed Chaloner warily.
‘I do not like gravel. I fell over in some once, and it hurt my knee. Look.’
She whipped up her skirts and showed Chaloner a minute scar. Gently, he pulled them down again, hoping she would not do the same to Brinkes, because the leg was shapely.
‘Who are the people you watch? Do you know their names?’
‘Oh, yes! Mr Fitzgerald the pirate. And Mr Jones with the red ribbons. And Mr Harley. And Mr Reyner. And Mr Newell.’ She sang the names rather oddly.
‘What about the others?’
Ruth shook her head and shrank away from him, her expression darkening. ‘They frighten me, and my brother told me that they killed James’s dog. But I do not believe that people would kill dogs — it must have run away. Have you seen it?’
‘Do not look out of the window any more,’ advised Chaloner, standing up. ‘These people will not like being monitored.’
‘But James told me to do it,’ said Ruth, wide-eyed. ‘He told me it was important.’
Chaloner was disgusted that Elliot should have encouraged such a dangerous habit, and wondered what he had been thinking. He took his leave, first ensuring that she locked the door after him, then exited the Crown by its back door, to avoid Brinkes, who was lurking at the front one.
Once outside, he aimed for the Gaming House. It was far earlier than the appointed ten o’clock, but he wanted to watch Reyner arrive, to ensure he was alone. He fingered the papers he had forged earlier, which he hoped would be convincing enough to persuade Reyner that a pardon and two hundred pounds would be his in exchange for information. He felt no guilt over the deception: anyone complicit in the deaths of Teviot’s garrison — and considered them ‘replaceable’ — deserved no better.
Because it was a cold night, the grounds were deserted. Moving silently, Chaloner made his way to the line of trees that divided the bowling green from the formal gardens, intending to use them as cover while he awaited Reyner’s arrival.
He was almost there when he saw a dark shape lying in one of the rose beds. Abandoning all efforts at stealth, because he knew it no longer mattered, he ran towards it. He reached the inert form and felt for a life-beat, not surprised when there was none. He rolled the body over. Reyner’s throat had been cut.
A brief search of the grounds revealed that Reyner’s killer had long gone, so Chaloner returned to stare at the body, disgusted with himself for not pressing the scout to talk earlier. He wondered how he was going to find out what had happened to Teviot now, because Harley and Newell would be far more difficult to crack. He sighed, supposing he would have to pursue the charade of the fictitious official inquiry.
Unwilling to answer the questions that would arise from informing the Gaming House owner that there was a corpse among his roses, Chaloner left, assuming the body would be found the following morning. He was wrong.