‘Oh, you will come to know this one. I believe it will be quite exceptional, and in quality much above the rest.’ Sir Thomas leaned in closer. ‘I have been helping Maria with her illustrations and . . .’
Maria. Marvell suddenly felt he had been hit in the stomach with a large stone. He stopped. ‘Tell me again,’ he said, ‘what her brother’s name is?’
‘Ellingworth,’ Thomas replied, as he stepped out of the way of a hawker with a basket of pies on her head. ‘His name is Elias Ellingworth.’
Sir Thomas continued to talk of how he would reform his way of life, and how his intentions were nothing but honourable, all the way up to Broad Street. By the time they had passed the Drapers’ Hall and the dancing yellow glow from the windows of the Black Fox was in view, Marvell felt sick to his stomach, his own appetite for the coming supper quite gone. When he followed Faithly through the door of the tavern, however, to be greeted by the sight of Damian Seeker’s great hound stretched across the front of the hearth, it was all he could do not to turn and run.
*
Elias’s sister was certainly pretty, but Lawrence was forming the opinion that she might be quite hard work. When the Ellingworths had arrived to collect him from Seeker’s lodging at the back of the little house on Knight Ryder Street, his first reaction had been one of surprise that anyone should know where Seeker’s fox-hole was, but he’d learned in York that it was futile to enquire into Seeker’s personal business or motivations, so he didn’t ask them. His next, almost simultaneous, thought was that they had come to enquire after his welfare, but he soon realised that he was mistaken, insofar as the sister was concerned, at least. Elias showed a natural concern for how he was feeling, whether he had slept, whether the burn from the rope on his neck gave him much pain, whether he could swallow, and so forth. His sister, however, once her tumultuous greeting from the dog was thoroughly acknowledged, appeared at first not to notice Lawrence at all. She spent a full minute looking around the small, spartan room, as if she had never been in anyone’s bedchamber in her life before. She walked over to the mantelshelf, and let her hand hover a moment over the old, dead red rose that lay there, something Lawrence, even in the bewildered state in which he had woken earlier in the day, had found incongruous.
‘I’d have tidied up a bit, thrown that out,’ he said awkwardly, picking up some of his own outer garments that had fallen to the floor, ‘but I thought he might be keeping it for something.’
‘You shouldn’t touch his things,’ she’d said, as if he was a scullery boy unaccountably let loose in an earl’s bedroom. ‘Enough that he takes a risk by letting you stay here.’
Had his throat not still been giving him some difficulty, Lawrence might have treated her to his views on who had put whom at risk, but he merely put a hand to loosen the linen band around his neck a little and said nothing.
Seeker, it turned out, had sent Elias a message, or ‘issued an instruction’, as the lawyer put it, that as he was unexpectedly constrained to be elsewhere that night, Elias should assume the watch over Lawrence’s safety.
‘It would astonish the man, no doubt,’ Elias said, ‘to learn that other people have friends, private lives, do not sit at home to be at the beck and call of the state. I am already engaged tonight to take supper with a client, and fortuitously he is known to you too – in fact, Seeker had me bring you to the Turk’s Head in order that you and he might meet – so I thought he could hardly complain if instead of staying here, watching you, I take you along there with me. If you think you are able for it, that is.’
Lawrence had not been sure whether he was able for it or not, and hadn’t much felt inclined to abandon the quiet warmth and relative safety of the small room for the darkness and unnamed dangers of London’s as yet unfamiliar streets. He’d been about to tell Ellingworth that he’d be just fine here for the night, alone with the dog, when the lawyer had added, ‘It’s not too far from here – the Black Fox, just up on Broad Street.’
And so here he was, ensconced in the most comfortable corner of the Black Fox, only the dog between him and the fire. Dorcas had insisted upon it, once she’d recovered herself. There had been an odd moment, just after they’d come in the door – Elias in front and Maria and the dog behind him – when a look of shock had registered on Dorcas’s face. She’d greeted Elias, and then looked at him, and he supposed at Maria beyond, and it was as if she’d suddenly forgotten his name.
‘Hello, Aunt,’ he’d said, as a prompt.
Still she did not seem instantly to register that he was speaking. He was about to say it again when she recovered herself. ‘Lawrence. And Mistress Ellingworth, is it not?’
Maria had given a ‘yes’ so muted Lawrence doubted Dorcas could even have heard it. The two women remained looking at each other, as if struck dumb. Elias was scanning the parlour for some sign of Thomas Faithly and appeared unaware of the strange encounter between the two women, but Lawrence found it peculiar to the point of unsettling. Yet London was not Yorkshire, he reminded himself. Maybe that was just the way things went here.
Dorcas eventually looked at him again, looked at him properly. ‘Lawrence! Dear Lord, boy, what has befallen you?’
He started trying to explain, but his voice failed him and so Elias stepped in to fill in the details. By the end of it, Dorcas was almost trembling with fury, which she then vented on the group of travelling wool-merchants occupying the nook nearest the fire. ‘You’ve had your supper and you’ve been nursing those tankards this last hour. Off with you, before I have you thrown out. My nephew needs to be in the warmth!’
The men had shot off without needing another telling, and Dorcas, still furious – at whom, precisely, Lawrence was uncertain – propelled him to the fire seat and demanded cushions. When she had got more of the detail of the attack from Elias, and assurances about Seeker’s safety – Seeker again! – she calmed a little, and fussed gently around him as if she were in reality his aunt, or even his mother. Lawrence shuddered a moment at the idea of the kind of tavern his own mother would have run, and settled into his cushions.
‘I should never have made you go down to Clifford’s Inn,’ she said. ‘If you’d been lodged here, that fellow would never have got past Will Tucker.’
Lawrence thought it better not to tell her that it had been in the Black Fox, under the very eyes of her admittedly imposing cook, that his assailant had first spotted him. Dorcas had treated him with a decided air of mistrust since the first time he’d set foot in here, but now all that was gone, and he was determined not to do anything to endanger her new-found concern for him.
‘Or if Seeker had been here,’ she murmured.
Lawrence was beginning to realise that Seeker was at the Black Fox more often than might be expected, and to suspect that it was not only the presence there of his daughter that brought him to the tavern. ‘Where’s Manon?’ he asked.
‘Oh,’ said Dorcas, looking around. ‘She must be in the kitchen. I should warn her of what’s happened. She’ll not want to hear it first in front of all these people.’
When Dorcas left, Maria moved up the bench to sit next to him. She glared at him for an unnatural period of time, as if attempting to read a particularly troubling proclamation nailed to a church door. Thomas Faithly had yet to arrive, and Elias, having spotted an acquaintance at the other end of the taproom, had got up and gone over to greet the man, thus leaving Lawrence at this strange woman’s mercy.
Lawrence shuffled forward a little. ‘Mistress Ellingworth,’ he began – there had been no indication from her that he might call her Maria. ‘There, ahem – there appears to be something about me that troubles you.’
She looked at him even more closely. ‘I can assure you, sir, there is not.’
‘Right,’ he said. But his head and throat were too sore to put up with such nonsense. ‘Well, back on Knight Ryder Street, you looked at me as if I’d just broken into th
e place, and now you’re staring at me as if you expect me at any moment to sprout horns. I’m new to these parts, so you’ll excuse me if I’m not familiar with what passes for manners round here.’
Maria’s look grew even more indignant. ‘Are you all like that?’
‘Who? Like what?’
‘From the north. Ill-mannered. You, Seeker—’
Lawrence cut in. ‘Aw, now, I hope you’re not going to class me along with Seeker. I mean, he’s not so bad, I suppose, once you get to know him a bit, but . . .’
This seemed to Lawrence to anger her all the more. He was at a loss, and in his exasperation abandoned all attempts at subtlety. ‘What is wrong with you, woman? What in the name of all that’s holy have I done?’
‘Done?’ she said. ‘First, I am told you are my brother’s pupil. Next I am informed that you are mixed up with dangerous assassins, who have pursued you almost to his very rooms at Lincoln’s Inn and that you are presently hiding out in Damian Seeker’s own lodging. And now, at last, you announce yourself to be the nephew of Dorcas Wells.’
Lawrence was saved from further uncomfortable interrogation by the arrival of Thomas Faithly, resplendent in a beautifully cut black velvet suit with pristine Flemish lace at collar and cuff. Lurking behind Faithly was another, less well-dressed man. On this other man’s slightly pudgy face was a look of alarm, which seemed to be directed mainly at Seeker’s dog. Lawrence sighed. It was going to be a long night.
But, half an hour later, despite his painful throat, Lawrence and the man with the pudgy face, who, it transpired, hailed from Hull, were thoroughly enjoying exchanging tales of mutual acquaintance and avoiding any too detailed mention of their connection to Damian Seeker. That this Andrew Marvell knew Seeker had become evident in the course of their conversation. That he didn’t wish to elaborate on the nature of their acquaintance struck Lawrence as being entirely sensible. Thomas Faithly’s concern after hearing of Lawrence’s experience was, to Lawrence, a reassuring reminder of home. But there was more than fellow-feeling in it – Sir Thomas appeared as eager as Seeker had been for a description of the assailant, and seemed particularly relieved that there had been only one.
After his experience of the night before, Lawrence was finding Thomas Faithly’s supper quite convivial. Whatever Dorcas had put in the warm spiced caudle she’d insisted he take for his throat, it was not very far on in the evening that he felt able to confide in Marvell his doubts about their friend Thomas Faithly’s romantic choice.
‘I mean, she’s a very fine-looking woman, of course. If that’s where your taste runs – dark eyes and ebony locks . . .’
‘Engines more keen than ever yet adorned a tyrant’s cabinet,’ murmured Marvell.
‘What?’ said Lawrence.
‘Oh, nothing of consequence, I assure you. So you are not seduced by such charms? You prefer a fairer blush?’
‘Ah, well,’ said Lawrence, not knowing what to say and looking down at his tankard.
Marvell leaned a little closer. ‘Your feelings tend elsewhere?’
Lawrence caught sight of Manon appearing from the kitchen. ‘What, me? No, no time for all that. Never mind me, though. What are we going to do about Sir Thomas? Look at him: he’s entranced. He’ll regret it, I’m certain of it.’
Marvell nodded in deep agreement. ‘But who is to tell him? I mean, we are not even supposed to know. Yet if Seeker should get wind of it . . .’
Lawrence was about to ask what on earth it could have to do with Damian Seeker, when Marvell said, ‘Ah, here she is, the green girl.’ Manon was in a blue gown Lawrence hadn’t seen her wear before, with plain white tucker and cuffs. Her hair hung perfectly, white blonde from beneath her cap, coming almost to the small of her back.
‘Green girl?’ queried Lawrence.
Marvell wrinkled his brow. ‘One – that is untouched by the cares and corruptions of life. One who is closer still, to another, purer, world.’ He nodded towards Manon. ‘That girl.’
Manon approached their table and had no interest in Lawrence’s attempted introductions, such was her concern about the attack on him. Elias, who knew her from his previous visits to the Black Fox, took a moment to reassure her about her ‘brother’s’ safety. ‘Damian Seeker, you see, takes an interest in it, and if Seeker’s for you, you have no need to fear.’
Manon didn’t appear to be listening to him. Her eyes never left Lawrence’s. ‘What if you had been killed?’
He tried to smile at her. ‘I wasn’t though, Manon. It’s like Elias says, the captain was there, and no real harm came to me.’
‘But he can’t always be there, can he?’
‘If only,’ said Thomas Faithly. ‘To get rid of the man would be the trick.’
This was greeted by a snort of amusement as Elias almost choked on his wine, a nervous laugh from Marvell and such a look from Manon that Lawrence wondered they did not all transform into pillars of salt. Lawrence had never seen her look so like her father as she did at that moment. Something in it seemed to suddenly chill the air, and the rest of the party fell silent. Only Maria, who was now staring at Manon, looked as if she might say something. She started to, but it was as though her tongue wasn’t working right, or whatever she’d thought she was going to say died somehow on her lips.
‘You’d best get back to the kitchen, Manon,’ Lawrence said, glancing towards Maria. ‘Aunt Dorcas will be needing you there.’ Manon nodded, as if she understood how close she might just have come to revealing herself. But as she picked up Lawrence’s empty trencher, Maria put her hands on Manon’s wrist. The attention of the others round the table was now taken up by a man who had sat down on the organ stool, and commenced a hearty rendition of ‘Old England Grown New’, in which he was joined by several of Dorcas’s other patrons.
‘You remind me of someone,’ Maria said, searching the girl’s face.
Manon’s eyes darted towards Lawrence for help.
‘Oh, she’s always getting that, my little sister. Just one of those faces that looks like lots of other faces. You go off now, Manon.’
But still Maria wouldn’t move her hand from Manon’s wrist. ‘Are you certain Mistress Wells is not your mother?’
‘I should think we should know our own mother,’ said Lawrence, his voice rising in irritation.
But Maria wasn’t looking at Lawrence. ‘And your father? Who is your father?’
Discreetly, Lawrence put his hand, covered by his napkin, over Maria’s and with a very firm grip removed it from Manon’s wrist. ‘Go back to the kitchen, Manon,’ he said, never taking his eyes from Maria’s.
Manon did so, quickly. She looked frightened. When she had disappeared through the door, Lawrence said, ‘I’ll thank you not to meddle in my family’s affairs again.’
‘She’s not your sister,’ said Maria.
‘What?’ said Lawrence.
‘She’s not your sister. Not your full sister, at any rate. You may have shared a mother, I don’t know, but I am certain that you are not Damian Seeker’s son.’
The others had now joined in with the singing. Lawrence leaned towards Maria and spoke quietly, so that none but she would hear.
‘I don’t know what your problem with me is, or with Dorcas. And I don’t know why you are quite so prickly about anything you imagine to be to do with Damian Seeker, but if you have any feeling for him – and I’m beginning to suspect you have – you’ll say not one more word about Manon. About my sister.’
Maria looked down at her wrist and Lawrence realised he was squeezing it more tightly than he’d intended to. He quickly released it with a mumbled apology.
The expression on her face was different now. The hostility was gone. ‘I’ll say nothing,’ she said at last. ‘But he’s not your father, is he?’
Lawrence sighed and shook his head. ‘No.’
The song came to an end,
to tumultuous applause. The face Thomas Faithly now turned towards Maria was glowing with enthusiasm, his eyes bright and his smile such as would have swept any other woman out of the clutches of any other man. And Maria was trying to smile back, Lawrence could see that. She was trying, but her eyes looked as if they had filled with tears. As Sir Thomas demanded another song, Lawrence leaned towards Andrew Marvell. ‘Elias Ellingworth’s sister,’ he said.
‘Yes?’ said Marvell rather warily.
‘She’s not – engaged elsewhere?’
Marvell swallowed and spent some time brushing crumbs from the table in front of him onto the floor. ‘Not that I’m aware.’
‘It’s just, well, she seems to take a bit more interest than is natural in Damian Seeker.’
Marvell opened wide his eyes, his mouth. Closed his mouth and raised his eyebrows. Took in a great breath. ‘Oh dear,’ he said, once he had exhaled again. ‘Oh dear.’
Lawrence felt exhausted now, and wondered whether Elias might agree to just leaving him at the Black Fox, where Dorcas had made it clear he would have a safely guarded bed for the night. He was about to suggest it when a young boy came bursting through the door of the inn, scanning quickly about him, until his eye fell on Thomas Faithly.
‘Sir Thomas!’ he said, pressing through the gathered patrons to reach him.
‘Yes?’ said Sir Thomas, clearly with no idea who the child was.
‘This come for you, to the Tobacco Pipes. Mother said I was to take it up here to you straight away.’
Sir Thomas took a coin from his pouch and thrust it into the child’s hand whilst taking from it the letter clutched there. ‘Wait!’ he ordered the boy, tearing open the seal. He read the contents once, then again, a look of confusion overtaking his face.
‘When did this arrive?’ he said, looking up at last. His face had paled and all trace of his former jollity was gone.
‘Not more than half an hour ago. Mother said I was to take it to you, and I run nearly all the way.’
The Bear Pit Page 22