‘Tomorrow’s Sunday. Wherever you are, don’t omit to go to church if at all possible.’ I gave my promise. ‘And take Hercules with you,’ she added.
The dog looked up from the bone he was gnawing and gave me a leery stare. He could hear the rain and wind as well as I could and was obviously not eager for a closer acquaintance with either.
I shook my head. ‘Not this time.’ I could see that Adela was about to argue the point when I was struck with inspiration. ‘With all these robberies going on, you’ll need him to guard you.’
‘He can sleep on my bed and then I’ll feel safe,’ Elizabeth announced, a statement at once hotly contested by Nicholas and Adam, who both maintained they had a superior claim to Hercules’s protection.
I left them wrangling and went upstairs to put a clean shirt in my satchel, wrap myself in my thickest cloak and hood and then return to the kitchen to pick up my pack and cudgel.
‘Where will you go?’ my wife asked as she kissed me goodbye.
‘I thought I might walk as far as Keynsham again.’ It hadn’t been my intention, but the words just seemed to form themselves naturally in my head.
‘Don’t forget to bring us back presents,’ my daughter reminded me, breaking off in mid-argument to slide from her stool and put up her mouth for a kiss.
I stroked her soft cheek. ‘Be a good girl and help your mother while I’m away.’
A slightly mutinous set to her lips made my heart sink and I said sharply, ‘Now, Bess!’
‘Let things be, sweetheart,’ Adela whispered, drawing me towards the door. ‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ she urged when we were out of earshot. ‘She’s at a difficult age.’
Gloomily, I agreed. But sometimes it seemed to me that females were always at a difficult age however old they might be. I thought for a moment that it was on the tip of Adela’s tongue to demand a definite day for my return, but she refrained. She knew only too well the wanderlust that gripped me every now and again.
I hugged her and stepped out into the storm buffeting its way down Small Street. I had intended to continue straight on to the Redcliffe Gate, but at the junction of Broad Street and High Street I hesitated, then walked a little way along Wine Street to Master Callowhill’s house.
FIFTEEN
The servant who answered my knock, a stout body with a gimlet eye, took one look at me and my pack, said sharply, ‘Nothing today, my man!’ and made to close the door.
I stuck my foot in the narrowing gap and asked to see Master Callowhill.
‘Be off with you!’ she retorted angrily. ‘Neither the master nor the mistress deals with the likes of you.’
‘Just tell Master Callowhill that Roger Chapman would like a word with him,’ I snapped.
I had no great hope that this information would carry any weight and was preparing myself for battle when, to my astonishment, she immediately stepped back and held the door wide.
‘Oh, him!’ she grunted, beckoning me in. ‘Wait here. I’ll fetch the master.’
Nothing could have shown me more plainly that the reputation I was gaining throughout the city was no figment of my imagination. The perception of me as someone who was in Richard’s pay, first when he was Duke of Gloucester and now that he was king, was growing. My prolonged absences, both last year and this, the rumours that I had been engaged on secret work for him, had confirmed a steadily increasing belief, no doubt fostered by Margaret Walker and her precious friends, that I was someone to be reckoned with, if not actually feared. It accounted for a certain change in attitude amongst my friends, some of whom had definitely become more reserved in their dealings with me, whilst others, mainly the ones I liked least, were more ingratiating.
I was not kept waiting many moments. Master Callowhill emerged from one of the doors on the right-hand side of the hall, the white cloth tied around his neck indicating that he was still at breakfast.
‘Master Chapman!’ His tone was effusive. ‘Come in! Come in! You’re abroad early. We’re still eating I’m afraid. But come and share a pot of ale with us.’ He laid a broad arm across my shoulders, practically propelling me into the dining parlour where his wife and children were seated around a laden table, and refusing to take no for an answer.
I felt uncomfortable and stupid in my old clothes and looking, I was sure, like a drowned rat. But no one seemed to notice anything amiss, Mistress Callowhill giving me a courteous greeting, the daughter of the house rising from her stool to bob me a curtsey, the elder of the two boys hurrying forward to relieve me of my pack and cudgel and the younger one offering me his seat.
‘Now,’ Henry Callowhill said as soon as a maid servant had appeared with a clean beaker for me and he had filled it from the pitcher in the middle of the table, ‘let me guess why you’re here. Rumour has it that this gang of robbers also attacked your house the night before last. You wish to know, as I do — as we all do — what measures the City Fathers are taking.’
Mistress Callowhill gave a visible shudder. ‘It’s dreadful! Dreadful! So many houses broken into in one night! Ours! Yours! Lawyer Heathersett’s! Master Foliot’s! And now we hear Alderman Roper suffered a similar fate yesterday evening.’
I gave a startled glance in the wine merchant’s direction.
My host nodded. ‘Our servant, Molly — the one who opened the door to you — has a sister who works for the alderman and who was round here at first light this morning to tell Molly the news. It seems that not only did these villains search as much of the house as they could without waking the sleeping household, but they went so far as to disturb the body of poor young Peter Noakes which was lying in its coffin. In case, one can only suppose, there was anything of value hidden underneath it to be buried with him. You may not have heard, Master Chapman — ’
‘Yes,’ I interposed. ‘Yes, I had been told by Mistress Ursula that the alderman had returned from Tintern with his nephew’s body the day before yesterday.’ I put down my beaker and, leaning forward for greater emphasis, asked, ‘Master Callowhill, what was stolen from this house?’
His wife answered before he had a chance to reply. ‘Everything was all over the place,’ she shrilled indignantly. ‘You never saw such a mess. Cupboards emptied! Drawers emptied! Stuff strewn everywhere. Coffers — ’
‘But what was actually taken?’ I insisted, stemming her flow of words without compunction.
There was a silence, broken finally by Henry Callowhill, who said slowly, ‘Well, now that I think about it. . nothing. At least. . nothing of any value or one of us would have discovered its absence by now.’ He frowned. ‘How very odd!’
‘Very odd indeed,’ his wife corroborated. She turned to the children. ‘Are any of you aware of anything missing?’
They shook their heads and suddenly the elder boy saw the funny side of things.
‘Whoever heard of robbery where nothing was stolen?’ He started to laugh and his siblings joined in.
I waited for their merriment to subside before turning to Master Callowhill once more.
‘Lawyer Heathersett — or, rather, his clerk — tells the same tale. The place ransacked but, so far as can be ascertained, nothing taken. It would be interesting to know if Alderman Roper has found anything missing.’
‘You think this may be of some importance, Master Chapman?’ The wine merchant regarded me enquiringly.
‘Master Callowhill,’ I said earnestly, ‘has it not occurred to you that these break-ins and attempted break-ins have all been at the houses of people who were at Tintern? Yours, the lawyer’s, Master Foliot’s, mine and now at the home of poor Peter Noakes.’
My host looked startled. ‘Sweet Jesu,’ he breathed. ‘You’re right. And that must mean. .’
I nodded. ‘That someone thinks Peter Noakes did discover something and that one of us, knowingly or unknowingly, may well have whatever it is in our possession.’