Frost Fair

by Edith Layton

  “Aye,” Will said, “I do too.”

  “You do?” she gasped. “What do you think it was?”

  “I don’t know,” Will said, “but I’ll find out.”

  “But if you don’t think his heart gave out or he had a brain spsam…it might have been murder, after all.”

  “Aye. But ‘might’ isn’t a word I can act on. I didn’t come with you just for the Fair today, Mrs. P. I want a word with your friend Mr. Abernathy, and I want you there with me. You know him and you know herbs, and his name has come up once too often for me.”

  “Mr. Abernathy,” Maggie said. Her face grew so pale her freckles faded to mauve. “Poison? You think it might be…? It might,” she said in horror as she thought about it. “But, you let the viscount go home thinking he was safe!”

  “He’s safe enough for now,” Will said, patting the hand she had on his arm. “I’ve got my lads watching his house, as usual. I know where everyone is, and they’re all in place. In fact, his lordship’s downstairs maid sent word that he went for a drive with his brother today, leaving the house at eleven. I knew that before I came to your shop. I’m not worried. I doubt anyone will attempt the two of them together, or by the broad light of day. But I did come here for more than the fun of the Fair, Mrs. P.”

  “Well, Mr. Abernathy’s tent’s at the end of the Fair,” she said. “That’s why I told the children to meet us there at five, when it’s time to go. So you’ll have your chance then.”

  “I want to speak to him now.”

  All Maggie’s taste for the Fair fled. “You know,” she said as they began to walk faster, “any number of herbs can cause such things.”

  “And he’s been selling them all,” Will said.

  Then they walked even faster.

  *

  Mr. Abernathy had no customers in his lonely tent at the end of the row. But he wasn’t happy to see the ones he’d just got. He scarcely looked at Maggie. He was too busy glaring at Spanish Will.

  “I need to talk with you,” Will said.

  “Ho! Spanish Will himself. When you need to talk, I need to listen, is it?”

  “It is. But settle yourself. I’m not looking into any crimes on your part—just yet. I need to know about herbs.”

  “Pull the other one whilst you’re at it. Mrs. Pushkin could tell you about herbs. What is it you want from me?”

  “Knowledge,” Will said. “Any idea of what could kill a man after sending him into a fit of shouting and writhing first?”

  “Ha,” the apothecary said without humor, “shouting and writhing, is it? That’s an easy one. Getting a bill from his physician, for a start.”

  “I am incredibly amused,” Will said in dangerous tones. “Now again, what have you got for me?” He took out his occurrence book.

  “Aye, well, ‘writhing’?” Abernathy said sourly. “That would be your foxglove, your mistletoe…aconite, too. Then you have your…”

  At the end of five minutes, Will had the names of fifteen deadly herbs entered in his book. When the apothecary finished describing them, Maggie shook her head.

  Mr. Abernathy laughed sourly. “Aye, Mrs. Pushkin knows before I say it.”

  “They’re common enough. It depends on how they’re used. You could have asked me,” she told him reproachfully.

  “But now I can ask Mr. Abernathy another question,” Will said smoothly. “Now, I want him to tell me how much of any of those he’s sold lately. And perhaps, to a stranger?”

  “Am I the only apothecary in London town?”

  “No,” Will said, “but you know what I’m asking about, you old devil. The baron died in Spitalfields and well you know it. Where he died is where I begin.”

  “It’s never that,” Abernathy scoffed. “Some poisons take hours. He could have dined with the king the night before and got it then, if he got it at all.”

  Will snapped his book shut. “Fine. If you like, you can test your memory whilst you kick your heels in Newgate, it’s all the same to me.”

  “Hold, hold,” the apothecary grumbled. “Lately, you say? Well, I haven’t sold much at all lately, sitting freezing my ballocks off in this curst tent at the edge of nothing. But before? When the old man died? Wait. Hold. I did have a run on my belladonna. You remember, Mrs. Pushkin.”

  “I don’t mean drops for prettifying whore’s eyes,” Will said in disgust.

  “Nor do I,” Mr. Abernathy said, “because now I think on, I sold the last of my stores to a young gentleman. Back at my shop it was, before this damned fiasco of a Frost Fair. I’d only a little left for Mrs. Pushkin, remember, Missus? Yes, and the gent was a stranger too. Now I think back, it was an odd thing. I told him it was deadly stuff and to have a care—you can ask anyone, I always say that. He said not to worry, his mistress wanted it for her eyes. But he bought enough for a Sultan’s harem. Maybe he was more ambitious than he looked.” He cackled.

  “Still—there’s a thought,” Abernathy mused. “You want an herb to set a man writhing? Belladonna’s the one, your lady. Set a man winding like a snake, though I hear he’ll do a piece of bowing too before he goes. Odd thing that… Because they do bow like they’re meeting the king, when all they’re doing is getting acquainted with King Death himself. First, you see, they get all excited…”

  “Who did you sell it to?” Will roared.

  The apothecary’s bony shoulders went up in a shrug. “Never saw him before. A young man, a gent.”

  “Would you know him again?”

  “Oh, aye,” Abernathy said with a slow, ugly smile, “’cause I saw him again, didn’t I? He bought more just the day before yesterday. Said his mistress dropped the bottle and spilled the whole of it. But you know that. Or should. Because after he bought it, Mrs. Pushkin came in to see me. Then when she left I saw he was still here. More than that, he was hob-nobbing with you and her and another gentry cove, just outside my tent.”

  Will and Maggie startled the apothecary by their sudden flight. But Will stopped on the ice outside. He caught Maggie by the wrist. “It’s bad enough as it is, there’s no sense making it worse,” he said. “No need to break an ankle on this damned ice. Stop running. We don’t know for certain.”

  “He made dinner for his Uncle before he died!” Maggie gasped. “He spoke with us and the viscount the other day, just here, outside Mr. Abernathy’s tent. We do know!”

  “But not for certain. A young gent? Could be anyone. Think on! It could have been the lieutenant. He was here that day. Might even have been his lordshhip’s cousin, Sir James. A fribble can become desperate too… No matter. We can stop the viscount before another dinner comes round, whoever it is. Calm yourself. We don’t know he’s in any danger at all. Misliking an old uncle, and one you think will leave you a fortune to boot, is never the same as going up against a brother. No, brothers are different. There’s family loyalty and love, and suchlike involved. So us rushing off and acting crazed now won’t do a thing but harm. We know nothing. We suspect everything. That’s a different matter.

  “We find the viscount. He should know first. Even if it’s only what we suspect.” Will began walking Maggie away from the tent toward the embankment as he spoke, his voice mild and reasonable. But he walked quickly, even so.

  Maggie tried to still her wildly fluttering heartbeat by force of pure reason. But her pulse was racing so hard she felt as though she had taken the vile herb that killed the baron. “I have men here, everywhere,” Will went on in his slow deep voice. “They’re invisible to you, as they’re meant to be. We’ve hours yet. It’s only noon time. Now, let’s find Maldon.”

  Will stopped to have a word with a starveling boy, another with a loutish man, an old woman and a man playing a tin trumpet. Then he helped Maggie across the ice, up the embankment stair. He spoke with another man loitering there and sent him running in another direction. Only then, he called a hackney cab.

  But when they got to the viscount’s house, they discovered he hadn’t returned to his townhouse. H
is servants, those Will paid as well as those who remained loyal to their master, had no idea of where he and Mr. Arthur had gone.

  “Little villain,” Will swore, as they raced back to the hackney again. At Maggie’s look of confusion, he added, “I pay a street rat to keep watch, usually the cleverest of the lot. But he’s gone too. Where’s the man got himself to? He went off with his brother in his phaeton. Where did they go? His brother! What a lobcock I am.”

  He shouted at the driver, directing him to Arthur’s rooms. “If he’s not there, we’ll go to the mother’s,” he told Maggie.

  “Then start making the round of his clubs? Gentlemen go to their clubs of an afternoon, Mr. Corby.”

  “No, not this one, not today. I’ve men watching. I’ll pass by and ask anyway, in case he just got there. Gentlemen go everywhere of an afternoon. I’ve eyes and ears everywhere, never fear.”

  He began to think aloud, running through his options. “He might have left his brother off, he might had took him along. So I have to think of where he’d go in either case. Gents don’t go to their convenients by day, and he isn’t a man to gamble until the sun sets. He’s not known for loving cockfights or ratting or dogfights. I’ll ask if he was seen at his boxing salon, or shooting salon, or fencing… This is all folly, you know,” he said more gently, seeing Maggie’s wild-eyed look. “We’ll find him before dinner. We don’t even know if it’s needful that we do.”

  The boy Will had set at Arthur’s house was gone. But so was Arthur, so the lad must have followed him as he was supposed to do. Will had a moment to regret setting such a young one on the man’s trail. The lad had been a good hound, following him to the Fair the other day. But Will had seen Arthur there too, for all the good it did him. The boy hadn’t said exactly where else at the Fair the viscount’s brother had been that day. And he hadn’t thought to ask him, Will realized, a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach.

  “My master is gone,” Arthur’s man said loftily, once he’d been sufficiently threatened by the name of the law—and Will’s clenched fist. “As is his brother. I cannot say where, for they parted immediately after nuncheon.”

  “Nuncheon?” Maggie breathed.

  “To be sure. Mr. Arthur entertained his brother this afternoon. Both seemed very pleased at the menu, if I do compliment myself by saying so. We had veal ragoo’d and chicken pie. Aspic, shaved ham, sliced beef, a kidney pie that their late uncle, the baron, was quite fond of, poor gentleman. A good claret, an excellent Rhone, a…”

  “When did they leave?” Will interrupted.

  “An hour past. As I was saying, the viscount was very content with his meal…”

  “I believe you, did you hear nothing of his direction?” Will growled. “Come, man! Servants do few things better than listening, especially since their masters forget they have ears. Where was he bound? It would be to his benefit if you told me. He may be in danger.”

  The servant’s nose went up. “I cannot say. I would, of course, if I could, given the circumstances. But I did not listen, nor could I hear. I was busy in the kitchen. Especially since my master specifically asked me to take away the dishes and wash them promptly today, as he’d heard there were vermin in the building again. He requested that I scour them most particularly. He is a fastidious man. The only thing I can tell you is that I saw the Viscount Maldon when he was leaving. He seemed pleased, as I said. And seemed, if I may venture to say, also extremely happy, almost excited, about wherever it was he was bound. He was smiling widely too. A good thing to see at last, especially in light of the unfortunate circumstance of his uncle’s…”

  But he was talking to air. Because the fierce runner and the red-haired woman were already gone from the doorway and running down the stair.

  “Where?” Maggie wailed, “where can he be?”

  “We’ll go to his mother, it’s on the way. Though I doubt he’d be excited to go there, unless…” Will didn’t finish that sentence. The fishwife’s eyes showed white all round. “I’ll stop and ask my man near St. James Street on the way too. You may have to go back to the Fair and pick up the others. Then go home. I’ll scour London—all night if I must. We’ll find him. He might even have decided to go to the Fair. God knows it seems everyone else in London is there.”

  The coach clattered on the cobbles, hoofs and wheels pounding hard and fast as their heartbeats. They were both thinking what would happen if a man took ill at a mad scene like the Frost Fair.

  He’d be mistaken for drunk…not that it mattered, Maggie thought. If he’d eaten what his uncle had, it didn’t matter at all. There were specifics for it. There was nux vomica, purges of all sorts. But there was no cure. It would likely be too late. And no one would think to try to provide one even if it weren’t.

  But poisoned? The viscount? It was true the elegant, reserved nobleman was about as different from her as he was from Mrs. Gow and Mrs. Gudge. It was amazing that they’d even met. In the normal way of things they never would have done. But she’d come to know him. She appreciated him treating her as though she might be his equal in any way, even though they both knew the world would never expect it of him. She enjoyed his mocking humor and admired his courage under the whip of pain. She’d seen the look on his face when he’d heard his uncle had bought a child. Nor could she forget the look in his eyes that night at the masquerade—in fact, it warmed her many a night since. But to think of him cold, blue and lifeless as his uncle had been on her doorstep? Impossible. She would not. She could not. But she did.

  “Will,” she said, so panicked she forgot formality, “don’t coddle me. Do you think he would try so soon after his uncle?”

  She didn’t have to explain who “he” was. Will was wondering the same. He had only questions as answer.

  “I don’t know. If he thought we believed his uncle died of a heart spasm at that brothel? If he was sure we didn’t know about his connection to Abernathy? If that even was him at Abernathy’s tent in the first place? But if he needed the money that badly, or hated his brother for reasons we don’t know? Or if he’s mad? How can I say? How can I know? It may be nothing. It may be all coincidence. We may laugh at this yet.” But still, he yelled at the driver to go faster.

  The viscount wasn’t at his mother’s house, nor was his brother. Nor was the viscountess herself. She’d gone to take tea with friends, her servants said. And neither of her sons had shown their noses, nor were they expected to today.

  The Viscount Maldon had not set polished boot on the pavements of St. James Street either, Will’s man reported when he stopped the coach and leaped out to ask him. Nor had his brother, Sir James or Lieutenant Pascal been seen there. Will told the man to spread the word. If anyone saw the viscount, they should tell him Spanish Will said he was to go to a physician immediately, and send word to him from there.

  The hackney raced on toward the Thames.

  The Fair was more crowded than ever because the afternoon was so balmy. Everyone had come to see what might be its last day on earth. Will and Maggie reached the river stair and leaped over the improvised channel in the ice, ignoring the attendant bargeman’s outstretched hand and outraged cry. Will’s face was enough to make him stand back. The channels were wider today, the ice at the edges had a porous honeycombed look. All the ice on the river seemed to be sweating, making their passage harder. They slipped often, and slid if they tried to run.

  They tried, though. They pushed aside revelers and shouldered their way through the dense crowds.

  “Mr. Corby! Mr. Corby!” a voice kept piping, coming nearer until they could hear it clear over the drums, and music, whistles and laughter.

  Will spun around. The sharp-faced boy he’d set to watch the viscount was racing up to him. When he stopped, so did the boy. The lad doubled over, putting both hands on the ragged knees of his britches, blowing hard, catching his breath. But he was young and excited, so he raised his head and spoke quickly.

  “I run all the way—from his house,” he panted. “H
e bubbled me…then he tole me…to find you at the fish shop…’n give you a message. But you was gone…when I got there. So,” he gulped more air, “I caught on the back of a hack and rode the rest of the way…’til I dropped off here. I asked everyone where you was. I found Our Bill near the sword swallower…he said I should ask Wee Charlie…over near…”

  “Stop telling me how you found me!” Will shouted so loud other fairgoers looked around. “The Viscount Maldon? You’re talking of him?”

  The boy nodded, his thin chest working like a bellows.

  “What did he say? Where is he?”

  “He said as to how he’d be going with his brother for to eat…his nuncheon…but he’ll be at Old Abernathy’s tent at four…or half past and that…you was to wait for him there. And he’s gonna gimme a golden boy for telling you, he said!”

  “Here’s another,” Will said, flipping the coin to him, so relieved he was incautious of his own money for the first time in years. He looked at Maggie, allowing himself a meager smile. “Well, one thing’s working right. Come.”

  They went fast as they could, but it wasn’t that fast. The throngs weren’t easy to part, not even for an angry runner and a woman who knew how to use her elbows. When they finally neared the end of the last row of tents, they saw a little group waiting in the center of the ice aisle there. Flea’s huge form was unmistakable even from afar. He and Maggie’s servants were on time, waiting for them.

  Maggie had a stitch in her side, but refused to tell Will, lest he slow up—or worse, leave her behind. The apothecary’s tent flap was closed. She hoped he hadn’t left. It wasn’t likely. He’d spent good money on the Fair and wouldn’t leave until all chance of profit was gone. It might only mean he had a customer inside.

  As she neared, Alice and Annie turned, as did Davie and the little blond brothel girl, holding Flea’s hand. Jack stood in their midst, interrupted while obviously telling them another story of his adventures. But there wasn’t a sign of the viscount.