by Robin Blake
‘I gave my report to him and Mr Thorneley yesterday. They met Lord Derby after, to ask him if he could find some more money. But no. Lord Derby’s money’ll cover only my work so far. So that’s the end of it – the Corporation have cancelled the whole thing.’
Most people in Preston would feel greatly relieved, I thought, as they had little desire to see the Marsh disappear. Any profits accruing from such a dock would not be seen for decades of years, and besides it would be bound to go into the pockets of the burgesses not the people. For myself I was only sorry that we would be losing Joss Kay. His love of improvement made for exhausting conversation, but once he was teased away from the subject he became a delightful companion.
‘Can you not find some other work that might keep you amongst us, Joss?’
‘The Mayor says that, instead of the dock, they’re considering a bridge across the river from the wharf to Penwortham. He’s asked me to work on that, but I’ll not do it. I’ve got my full fee at last for the dock report and I’ve set my heart on America now. That’s where the best opportunities for improvement lie.’
The very next day he was gone.
* * *
From time to time I saw Ellen Kite and her brother at the Wednesday market, selling their cheap leather goods. I always made a point of buying some trifle or other – a packet of buttons, a dog collar for Suez, or a braided bracelet for Matty.
‘Do you have word of Kathy Brock?’ I asked one day.
‘Oh, she’s in London, Sir. Margery’s had some letters from her, and she’s working in a place called Covent Garden. Do you know it?’
‘Yes, I know it.’
‘And is it the sort of place a girl can do well for herself?’
I chose my words carefully.
‘It might be, Ellen. One meets many fine gentlemen in Covent Garden, and several ways of earning a living.’
I remembered how Kathy had spoken so sensibly of her great plans and ambitions, and hoped she had not simply settled for the life of a Covent Garden whore. But if she had, there was no purpose in alarming her fiends and family, so I changed the subject.
‘Now that the position of Searcher and Looker of Leather is for the time being vacant, Ellen, I hope the persecution of this stall has ceased.’
‘Oh, yes sir. No one bothers us now, not even Mr Mallender.’
‘That’s good. A dark cloud was hanging over the skin-yard, but it would seem it has entirely blown away and is unlikely to return soon. The dock project is killed off entirely. Captain Strawboy’s surveyor, Mr Kay, has gone away and the captain himself is back in the army fighting the French, so I hear.’
This was true, and the other forces that had combined to try to build the dock and thereby destroy the skin-yard were also much diminished. Strawboy’s uncle Grassington stayed clear of Preston, while, with the death of their leader, Scroop’s cabal of would-be projectors and improvers among the burgesses had been completely silenced by Joss Kay’s negative report. Even Grimshaw seemed a deflated figure, though I expected him to puff up again when a new opportunity to get rich came along.
Scroop’s rag-and-bone yard was now in the hands of his old foreman, Bartholomew Lock. He appeared in my office one morning that autumn to consult me about some legal questions pertaining to the continued administration of Scroop’s business affairs.
‘And do you inherit the late Scroop’s ambitions, Mr Lock?’ I asked, when we had cleared up the matter. ‘They were considerable, I think, even without Preston getting an enclosed dock.’
‘Aye, he had some fancy ideas, did Mr Scroop. He thought we should buy raw flax direct from Ireland for paper milling, instead of just selling our rags to the paper makers. And he got a mad idea of getting the farmers to spread bone dust over their fields to get better yields. He thought this would make him even richer than he already was, but I reckon it’s nowt but rubbish.’
Occasional word reached us of Basilius Harrod in his cell at Lancaster Castle. He was awaiting the next arrival of the assize judges, who would try him and decide his fate, and it was said he spent each day casting horoscopes to see how the planets and stars would align at the time of the trial. His former lover, the widow Helena Scroop, having consigned her husband’s business to the care of Lock, was last heard of living with her daughters in London. Harrod’s son Abel stayed on in the Water Lane house and I often saw him, as blank of expression and as slow of tongue as ever, sitting around reading in Sweeting’s bookshop. For an apprentice he rarely seemed to do anything that resembled work. Sweeting said that Abel appeared to be content, but it must be hard to know that he faced ruin by Crown appropriation if, as seemed inevitable, his father should be convicted of murder.
As for me, I soon became used to, and to much enjoy, my new responsibilities as County Coroner. More time was spent away from home as I travelled here and there to look at corpses, collect statements and recruit juries in the villages and small towns that were dotted around the Duchy. But my attorney’s practice in Preston still continued, so now I had a foot in both worlds – the town and the country.
Elizabeth said it suited me.
‘You are slimmer now, and you smile more, Titus.’
‘I am riding more. I like going about.’
‘It gives you even greater resemblance to Don Quixote than ever, my dearest. You and your Rosinante trotting up and down the world, righting wrongs and doing good.’
‘With Furzey as my Sancho!’
We laughed. It was late and we were setting the parlour tidy before we retired. I picked up Cervantes’s book from the sideboard – the second volume it was – and put it into her hands. Her eyes, beautiful and glowing, were a little tearful, which I took to be because of her laughter.
‘You are nearing the end of the book, then?’
‘I am at the end.’
‘So you know what happens?’
‘Yes, and I will tell you. It is time I told you.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘I mean that in the end Don Quixote discovers his Dulcinea at last, and they live together in his house happily, blissfully happily.’
‘What d’you mean, Eliza? No they don’t, I’m sure the Don—’
Elizabeth gently put a finger to my lips.
‘Shh! Don’t spoil it. Where was I? Oh yes, blissfully happily.’
She turned the pages of the book and seemed to be reading from it.
‘So they lived their days together in bliss, and slept together too at night with the greatest pleasure. But there was still one thing, one desire among all desires in the world, that remained unsatisfied between the Don and his lady. Until, that is, one evening, when Dulcinea was with him in their parlour, and they were preparing for bed. And I don’t know exactly why but that was the moment she chose to tell him that now at last their one remaining desire was to be satisfied.’
‘Go on,’ I said cautiously. ‘What actually did she tell him?’
Elizabeth was no longer pretending to read from the book. She put it down, took my hand and pressed it against her stomach.
‘She told him this: “Don Quixote rejoice, because soon, against all the expectations of the world, there will be a baby Quixote, or if not then a baby Dulcinea.” And just what do you think Don Quixote said when he heard that?’
I suppose my mouth fell open in surprise and then a kind of euphoria washed over me, a wave of joy indescribably remote from daily life. I saw that Elizabeth’s eyes had finally overflowed, and mine too were threatening to flood. I wrapped my arms around her tightly and whispered in her ear.
‘Don Quixote said that he was speechless and then proved himself wrong by telling her that he loved his Dulcinea more even than he loved his own life.’
Elizabeth’s tears instantly became laughter.
‘And, to that, Dulcinea quoted Sancho,’ she cried, wrapping her arms around my neck. ‘She told Don Quixote that she loved him too, even more than she loved her own eyelids.’
And so we kissed,
but it was not exactly a good-night kiss.
ALSO BY ROBIN BLAKE
The Hidden Man
Dark Waters
A Dark Anatomy
About the Author
ROBIN BLAKE is the author of the Cragg & Fidelis series, including A Dark Anatomy and Dark Waters, in addition to acclaimed works on the artists Van Dyck and Stubbs. He has written, produced and presented extensively for radio, is widely published as a critic. He lives in London. You can sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Map
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Also by Robin Blake
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
SKIN AND BONE. Copyright © 2016 by Robin Blake. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.minotaurbooks.com
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First published in Great Britain by Constable, an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group, an Hachette UK company
First U.S. Edition: October 2016
eISBN 9781250100986
First eBook edition: September 2016