Death Magic: Bestselling CS Quinn's latest short read

by CS Quinn

  Copyright © 2015 CS Quinn.

  All rights reserved.

  Pageturners Ltd.

  35 Cambridge Road, Hove

  www.devoted-ebooks.com

  First Edition September 2015

  The characters in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  ISBN-13: 978-1517490904

  ISBN-10: 1517490901

  Printed in the United Kingdom

  Chapter One

  In Charlie’s experience most thefts were straightforward. A pickpocket, a robbery. Luggage snatched from a stagecoach. But this crime was different. The murder made no sense.

  He eyed the corpse, outstretched on the wooden floorboards. The long hair was matted with blood and her face was battered beyond all recognition. Glimpses of her hands and legs under the white nightshirt showed her to have been young.

  ‘If you can find the silver thimble,’ the man was saying, ‘you’ll find our maid’s murderer and prove my wife innocent.’

  ‘This is where your maid slept?’ Charlie asked, taking in the attic. He was trying to put his finger on what was wrong with the scene. His eyes flicked to the window. Charlie rarely passed beyond London’s thick protective wall and out onto the yokel mud-tracks beyond Ald Gate.

  Down on the street, Brick Lane workers were pressing clay, hauling bricks. A milkmaid with a black eye led a skinny cow door-to-door. Plain-dressed goodwives were going about their business. Two men were manhandling a reluctant ram to Bethnal Green.

  The man nodded. Fitzgilbert. His name floated back to Charlie through the haze of death. He had the beet-red nostrils and watery blue eyes of a habitual snuff-taker. There was something familiar about his ratty features that Charlie couldn’t yet place.

  ‘Her room was grand for a maid,’ observed Charlie, taking in the scattering of plain furnishings. There was a table, chair and a rug, moth-eaten to shreds. Many families of ten didn’t own as much.

  A piece of broken mirror had been set into the eaves. Charlie saw his own expressive brown eyes reflected back, narrowed in thought.

  Framed in the glass he could see a thick cluster of wooden crosses arranged by the window. His eyes switched to the chimney breast, where Bible passages had been chalked in a careful hand. Dust had been disturbed in the hearth, he noticed.

  He had that uneasy feeling again. There was more to the room than met the eye. He glanced at the desecrated face. The attack could have been a robbery, he supposed. Certainly there were violent villains in this part of London. He moved forward. The injuries to the face seemed more … personal. As though someone had taken pains to blot out this poor girl.

  ‘We meant to have more servants here,’ Fitzgilbert was saying. ‘But my wife’s condition … And now people say she murdered poor Nancy …’

  His voice cracked. Charlie put a hand on Fitzgilbert’s shoulder and saw his reflected self do the same. They made a strange pair – Fitzgilbert’s close-cropped hair and spotless white collar next to Charlie’s battered old gentleman’s coat and unkempt dark-blond hair. With the exception of Charlie’s bare feet, they looked like a Roundhead and a Cavalier from twenty years ago. As an orphan growing up in London Charlie had never got on with shoes.

  ‘They say you’re the best,’ Fitzgilbert went on, taking a shuddering breath. ‘The best thief-taker in London. Whoever killed our maid stole that silver thimble. If you find it, you catch the killer. I’m certain of it.’

  Fitzgilbert brought out a snuff box, flicked a precise quantity onto his thumb and took a heavy sniff. He squinted, sneezed three times in fast succession, then inhaled a second dose.

  Charlie’s eyes settled back on the disused fireplace. He moved towards the chimney. A little flurry of footprints patterned the dusty boards.

  ‘Everyone loved Nancy,’ Fitzgilbert said, wiping his nose with a plain handkerchief. ‘This was a terrible crime.’

  ‘Maybe someone loved her too much,’ said Charlie, stepping inside the hearth. ‘It’s a better reason to murder a girl than a thimble. Did she use the fire recently?’ he added.

  ‘Nancy hasn’t lit that fire since winter,’ said Fitzgilbert. ‘She was from Lancashire. Didn’t feel the cold.’

  Charlie took a tinderbox from deep in his buttoned coat and sparked the flint. The flare of light was enough. There was something hidden here. Pushed tight into the side of the brick chimney.

  He reached up and grasped hold. Dust and soot drifted downwards as he worked it free.

  An old shoe had been hidden high in the chimney.

  ‘This was put here recently,’ observed Charlie. ‘It’s not been damaged by fire or smoke.’

  Fitzgilbert was staring. They both knew what this meant. It was a common practice to place shoes in the chimneys of haunted houses.

  ‘Someone put this here to ward off evil,’ said Charlie. ‘Your wife?’

  ‘Elizabeth is extremely devout,’ said Fitzgilbert. ‘My wife doesn’t believe in charms and talismans. She won’t even dance a Maypole.’

  ‘Did anyone else come up to this attic?’

  ‘Only Nancy. It must have been she who placed it,’ conceded Fitzgilbert. He was looking at the shoe as though it were cursed. ‘But she never said anything to us,’ he added, ‘about fear of a haunting.’

  Charlie examined the shoe. It was old and worn. A woman’s, but much too expensive for a maid.

  The strangeness of the attic room was making sense now. Charlie’s eyes went to the little forest of crosses arranged by the window, the careful Bible script chalked on the walls.

  Nancy wasn’t devout. She was scared.

  ‘So your maid was frightened of something,’ he said, turning the shoe. ‘Or someone.’

  Chapter Two

  ‘I’ve never seen it before,’ insisted Fitzgilbert as he led Charlie back down the stairs and through the large house. Each room they passed was bizarrely plain. There were no wall hangings, no paintings, no rugs. Just a huge cross and a Bible in every room. It was more like a monastery than a home.

  It’s like Cromwell’s still alive, thought Charlie, remembering the monochrome London in the years after the civil war.

  ‘You’re certain you don’t recognise the shoe?’ pressed Charlie.

  ‘It’s not a style Elizabeth would wear,’ said Fitzgilbert firmly. ‘She favours sober dress. Plain black shoes. Buckles. This is … It’s a frivolous kind of thing.’ He looked warily at the shoe.

  They walked through the Fitzgilberts’ unadorned front door and Charlie felt Brick Lane’s clay soil between his bare toes.

  Up ahead women squatted, cutting at vast mounds of red earth with string to extract stones. Men slapped loaves of clay into moulds. The wide road east was paved with drying bricks and tiles like the scales of a great sleeping dragon.

  ‘A single old shoe to ward off witches and bad things,’ said Charlie, plumbing his memory. It was a common enough charm for Londoners, if they suspected an evil spirit.

  He weighed it in his hand. The curved little heel, the embroidered sides. Whoever it fitted might have answers. He opened the buttoned front to see if the toe-prints inside gave any clue. Within was a poorly woven corn dolly.

  ‘She was frightened of demons?’ he asked, examining the poppet. It was a rough approximation of a man with a stubbly beard. A crude cross had been strapped to the figure.

  Fitzgilbert stared at the shoe. His hand went reflexively to his own neatly bearded face.

  Behind them shouts went up. The workers were getting ready to light the kiln. Trays of bricks were ferried past in earnest. One of the brickmaker
s nodded his head in mock salute to Fitzgilbert.

  ‘Lord Sneezalot,’ he grinned, ‘let’s hope your father finds you a better wife this time.’

  Fitzgilbert frowned and muttered something inaudible while fumbling for his snuff box.

  Charlie put the facts together.

  Fitz. Illegitimate son of Gilbert.

  He’d thought Fitzgilbert looked familiar. The man carried the shame of illegitimacy on his scrawny shoulders, along with the same wiry black hair and ratty features as his philandering father. This explained why he owned an expensive half-timbered house yet wore plain, pin-neat Puritan clothes. And why he could afford a costly snuff habit. The Gilberts had interests in tobacco colonies and would find money to keep scandal at bay. Fitzgilbert’s case had suddenly become more interesting.

  ‘I never … Nancy never said anything about demons.’ Fitzgilbert was looking distractedly at the departing brickmaker. He worked snuff into his nostril.

  Charlie turned the poppet in his hands.

  A good Christian girl and an attic full of heathen charms.

  ‘How came your maid to have silver?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know. The vicar told us about it,’ Fitzgilbert replied, his red nose quivering. ‘He saw Nancy with it in church and was concerned she might have stolen it.’

  ‘Might she?’

  Fitzgilbert shook his head violently then sneezed. ‘Such a thing is impossible,’ he said. ‘Nancy was a good sweet Christian girl …’ The words caught in his throat.

  ‘A jealous lover?’ suggested Charlie.

  ‘Nancy had no interest in men,’ said Fitzgilbert. ‘She had none of that silliness you find in many girls.’

  ‘Anyone else who might wish her harm?’

  Another shake of the head. Fitzgilbert began dosing out more snuff.

  ‘What of Nancy’s vicar?’ Charlie asked. ‘Where might I find him?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ said Fitzgilbert testily. ‘Nancy worshipped in some secret commoners’ church. She once joked it should be Baptist, not Puritan, for all the damp inside. Our faith is sadly persecuted in London,’ he added bitterly. ‘My wife and I are forced to worship privately in my father’s chapel.’

  Charlie brought the picture of the girl’s corpse to mind. The features had been caved in, the frenzy of blows making it hard to discern a weapon shape. But at the sides of the face, the injuries were straight-edged and palm-width. Something with a flat heavy base like a candlestick, Charlie thought.

  ‘Why was your wife accused?’ he asked, watching Fitzgilbert carefully. In his experience, young maidservants and old masters went hand in hand with trouble.

  Fitzgilbert glanced nervously at the brickmakers. Several women had stood to watch their conversation. He raised his snuff-loaded thumb and inhaled the entire quantity. Charlie winced.

  ‘My wife speaks in tongues, Mr Tuesday,’ Fitzgilbert said, working his nostril to keep the snuff inside. ‘It’s a noble condition, well known in ancient, kinder times.’ He shook his head disgustedly, looking to the leather-aproned men loading kiln bricks.

  ‘The people here don’t understand,’ he said, lowering his voice. ‘They accuse her of terrible things.’ He made a succession of near-sneezes. ‘They call her witch.’

  Chapter Three

  Fitzgilbert was pointing up at the attic window.

  From this angle his house looked outsized and looming next to the small wooden dwellings near to Bethnal Green’s grassy expanse.

  ‘It must have been through the window,’ confirmed Fitzgilbert. ‘He got in that way. The front door hadn’t been broken open. Neither had the downstairs windows. But Nancy’s attic window was open. She never would have left it so.’

  The window casement was small, Charlie thought, for a robber burly enough to inflict such damage on a victim. He glanced along the muddy road. Corn dollies were strung in doorways. Livestock grazed. Rib-thin vagrants dozed under hedges. Over everything was the roar of the kiln, the shouts of the men and the red dust of the brickworks.

  ‘You believe a robber learned of Nancy’s silver thimble, broke in and stole it?’ Charlie surmised, looking at the tiny casement.

  ‘An apprentice saw from the street, Nancy’s blood spattered on the attic window.’ Fitzgilbert pointed at the diamond-paned glass, which was flecked with dried blood. ‘The boy started raving. We heard him from our bed chamber. A tanner or brick boy by his clothes. Horrid creature he was. Great mop of lice-ridden ginger hair,’ Fitzgilbert mimed. ‘Loud gutter-London accent.’ His face puckered at the memory. ‘He was shouting of my wife’s witchcraft. A mob gathered. They insisted on seeing inside the room. That was how we found Nancy.’

  ‘And they took your wife?’

  ‘Dragged her from her bed and took her straight to the Clink prison,’ said Fitzgilbert. The full horror of this seemed to be dawning on him. He buried his ratty features in his hands. ‘She languishes with felons!’ he cried.

  Fitzgilbert’s eyes had misted slightly. His trembling hands reached for the snuff box. ‘My poor wife. With age, she is less certain. Confused of things. But she is a gentle Christian soul who would never … Certainly, she couldn’t have done that.’

  Fitzgilbert was blinking rapidly, his eyes flicking to the attic window. ‘She couldn’t have done that,’ he repeated in a whisper.

  He seemed to be convincing himself. ‘So will you help?’ he asked. ‘I can pay well. But I must ask for discretion and speed. This must be resolved quickly for the sake of my family name.’

  He tipped snuff, sniffed, sneezed.

  Charlie hesitated.

  ‘I can only undertake to find the thimble,’ he said, meeting Fitzgilbert’s pale blue eyes. ‘I’m a thief-taker. I have no authority to find a murderer.’

  ‘Find the thimble and you’ll find the killer,’ said Fitzgilbert firmly.

  ‘If that’s the outcome, I’ll be sure the criminal is brought to justice,’ said Charlie carefully.

  He was thinking of the tiny attic window, high up and hard to enter. From what he’d seen, the girl’s murder was an inside job.

  ‘But if I find the thimble,’ continued Charlie, ‘and it isn’t in the killer’s possession, you must still pay my dues.’

  Fitzgilbert nodded, but he was thinking. Charlie put out his hand quickly, before the other man could piece together the subtext.

  If your wife isn’t innocent, I don’t want you to renege on payment.

  Fitzgilbert shook Charlie’s hand automatically.

  ‘I’ll make haste,’ promised Charlie. ‘I know who buys and sells silver in the City. I’ll ask some questions, find some answers.’

  Fitzgilbert looked relieved. ‘The sooner the villain is caught the better,’ he said.

  Charlie nodded in reply. But he didn’t add what he was really thinking.

  There’s a good chance she’s already behind bars.

  Chapter Four

  The Bucket of Blood tavern was Charlie’s favourite place in London. The half-timbered interior was warmed by a range fire and a steaming cauldron of meat puddings. Casks of good ale lined the broad central table, and barefoot boys milled among the cheerful drinkers, selling cakes and provisions. You didn't want for anything in the Bucket if you had money or friends. And it was the best place in the City for information.

  ‘The silver thimble hasn’t been sold,’ said the silversmith, shaking his head and taking a long swig of ale.

  ‘You’re certain?’ said Charlie, raising his voice over the din. The tavern was hosting a prizefight, and bare-knuckled boxers were slugging it out in the corner.

  ‘Not to anyone who deals in silver,’ said the silversmith. ‘That thimble hasn’t changed hands in London.’ He shook his grizzled head again. A little bear of a man, he wore a thick cambric doublet and matching blue breeches. Around his neck hung a medley of grimed silver wares: spoons, rings and snuff boxes.

  ‘The thimble might already have been sold at a market,’ suggested Charlie. ‘Or somewhere out
side the City.’

  The silversmith shrugged.

  ‘It’s possible. But the thief would have got a common metal price for it,’ he said. ‘Barely worth the risk of hanging.’

  Charlie thought back to the crime. Nothing suggested an opportunist or stupid thief.

  ‘Melted down?’ he suggested. ‘Fashioned into something else?’

  The silversmith shook his head with certainty.

  ‘Not a drop of silver gets melted without the Guild’s say-so. You’d need a furnace such as we have. I’d know if a thimble had been cast in its great red belly.’

  The silversmith, Charlie remembered, was prone to a poetic turn of phrase when drinking. Soon after came the singing. Charlie’s gaze lighted on a boy with a tray of pies.

  ‘Something to eat?’ he suggested, turning the few pennies in his pocket. It was important to keep the man sober.

  ‘I’d rather keep room for the beer,’ replied the silversmith genially, taking another deep swig.

  There was a shout from the crowd. One of the boxers had landed a particularly impressive blow. Blood splattered the sawdust.

  The silversmith winced. ‘Who did you bet on?’ he asked, eyeing the burly fighters.

  ‘The winner,’ replied Charlie, taking a long sip of beer. ‘Why would a maid own a silver thimble?’ he said, thinking out loud.

  ‘It was the fashion during Cromwell’s time to have them instead of engagement rings,’ said the silversmith. ‘Some Puritan folk keep the tradition.’ He leaned back to observe the fight. ‘They won’t have jewels or trinkets or useless things.’

  ‘I didn’t know that,’ said Charlie, wondering if Fitzgilbert had.

  ‘The betrothed girl gets a thimble,’ explained the silversmith. ‘She uses it to sew her dowry clothes.’ He grinned, revealing a silver denture plate welded with dead men’s teeth. ‘No one can accuse the bride-to-be of frivolity, for her betrothal gift was put to good use,’ he concluded.