‘That was unexpected. Come to inspect his new canal, perhaps,’ said Madeleine.
‘Or his ostriches.’
‘At least he must feel he can walk freely in the park.’
‘Freely yes, but not alone.’
‘Quite. Have you noticed how the male of the human species has recently adopted the habits of his counterparts among the animals and birds?’ asked Madeleine.
Thomas asked her what she meant. ‘In nature, Thomas, or perhaps you hadn’t noticed, it is the cock pheasant and the stag who like to show off their finery. The hen and the doe are more modest in their appearance.’
‘Quite so, my dear. I fear, however, that I hardly come up to standard in that respect.’
‘Nonsense, Thomas. You look as fine as any man in the park.’
Thomas felt himself blush. ‘Even His Majesty?’
‘Especially His Majesty.’
To hide his embarrassment, Thomas changed the subject. ‘When did you come to London, Madeleine?’
‘My father died five years ago. I came the following year, as soon as the estate had been settled.’
‘Did you say that your father was a parson?’
‘He was, as Joseph’s father was. A kind man, but not the strongest. Weak in both body and mind, I suppose. He found it difficult to stand up for what he believed in and against his enemies.’
‘He had enemies? Catholics, do you mean?’
‘No, not religious enemies. There were those in the village who treated him badly.’
‘Why would they treat a country parson badly?’
‘It’s in the past, Thomas. I’d rather not talk about it,’ said Madeleine, gently squeezing his arm.
In the park an ancient, one-armed beggar stepped out from behind a tree. ‘Spare a shillin’ for an old soldier, sir,’ the old man croaked, holding out a battered hat.
He was ragged and filthy, and not wishing to provide a new home for the man’s lice and fleas, Thomas’s first instinct was to ignore the wretched fellow. To his surprise, however, Madeleine pulled a coin from her purse and dropped it into the hat. He mumbled something which might have been thanks and disappeared back behind his tree.
‘He will only drink it away,’ said Thomas as they walked back.
‘I know. It was just the shock of seeing him here among all this wealth and finery. I ignore beggars in the streets.’
‘As you should. Charity may be a virtue, but begging is too close to theft for my liking.’ Thomas paused. ‘Poverty and filth alongside wealth and extravagance. Perhaps it will always be thus.’
‘Our new king certainly has much to do if it is to change. Yet the mood of the people is for change.’
‘And they must have it. Despite the war, London is thriving. Merchants and financiers are becoming rich. Some of their wealth should be used for the common good.’
‘And how is this to be accomplished, Thomas?’ asked Madeleine, slipping her arm through his again and smiling sweetly.
‘Good Lord, madam, that is a matter far beyond the wit of a humble fellow like me. Questions I can manage, it is the answers I find difficult.’
Madeleine laughed. ‘In that, sir, I believe you to be much like most other men.’
‘And women.’
‘And women.’
‘Chandle Stoner describes himself as a philanthropist,’ said Thomas thoughtfully. ‘I wonder to whom he is philanthropic.’
‘He also describes himself as a financier, so I expect his philanthropy is chiefly to himself.’
‘Madeleine, I should never have thought you so cynical.’
‘Then you must get to know me better, Thomas.’
‘Indeed I must.’
As they walked back beside the canal, Thomas looked up. Coming towards them but some distance away were Lucy and Arthur Phillips, arm in arm and deep in conversation. They had not seen him. He quickly steered Madeleine away from the towpath and into the park. He was not ready to speak to Lucy, nor was this the time.
Within thirty minutes they were back at the little house off Fleet Street. Seated on the plain chairs in the parlour, they each took a glass of Spanish sherry brought by the housekeeper. Thomas raised his glass to Madeleine. ‘To you. May life bring you everything you wish for.’
Madeleine smiled a little sadly. ‘If it’s not too much to ask for, may it do the same for you.’
One hour passed, then two, while they talked of this and that – food, books, London, the countryside, music – carefully avoiding politics, religion and philosophy. Even Montaigne was ignored while they explored each other’s tastes. A little before five o’clock Thomas rose as if to take his leave.
‘Thank you for your company, Madeleine,’ he said, ‘but now I must be on my way. I have much enjoyed our afternoon.’
Madeleine also rose, and took his hands in hers. ‘As have I. I hope there will be other afternoons.’ And, reaching up, she brushed her lips against his.
Thomas’s arms went around her. Feeling her relax and respond, he moved closer to her, his hands on her waist. Her hands reached for his shoulders and she pressed her lips to his. He breathed in the scent of roses. Then suddenly, without warning, she pushed herself away from him.
Thomas stared at her. There were tears in her eyes, and her hands were trembling. He was at a loss. ‘Madeleine, what’s wrong? Have I hurt you?’
Madeleine wiped her eyes with a lace handkerchief. ‘No, no. It’s my fault. Do forgive me, Thomas. I’m unused to such attention.’
Thomas stepped towards her and held out his hands. ‘I am not exactly practised myself.’
Madeleine laughed. ‘That I find hard to believe, Thomas Hill. A handsome and intelligent man of substance. Do the ladies of Romsey not come calling at your door every day?’
‘Alas, no. If you were to call, however, I would of course throw the door open at once.’ Again, he took her hands, drew her to him, and gently placed his lips on hers. This time, however, she did not respond: her back went rigid and she pushed him away. He went cold. Mary was wrong. This woman had been toying with him. He quickly released her.
‘Thank you for calling, Thomas,’ she said quietly. ‘I will show you to the door.’
Not waiting to be shown, Thomas turned and left.
He walked quickly back to Piccadilly, taking the same route as they had earlier. He noticed neither the bewigged gentlemen in their skirts walking with their spaniels, nor the urchins playing in the street, nor the traders hawking their wares. He passed Somerset House and Worcester House without seeing them and for once the smells of the city went unnoticed by his sensitive nose.
By the time he arrived at the Carringtons’ house he was hot and angry. Angry at Madeleine Stewart for rejecting him, angry at Mary Carrington for giving him false hope, angry at himself for his stupidity.
Unable to face the Carringtons, he went straight to his room. He sat at the table and, as he used to do when wrestling with a difficult cipher, he cleared his mind before allowing it to wander. He was a fortunate man, but there was one thing missing in his life. And now it would remain missing. Despite Mary’s encouragement, Madeleine Stewart had rejected him. Just as she said she had rejected the handsome soldier who wanted to marry her. That Thomas could understand. Soldiers seldom made good husbands or good anything much except soldiers. What was harder to grasp was why there had been no more suitors. The young men of Hertfordshire must be a feeble lot to have let Miss Stewart get away. But was she telling the truth? Perhaps there had been others and she had rejected all of them, just as she had rejected him. Perhaps there was more to her than met the eye. Perhaps, perhaps.
Here he was in London, a city he disliked, recruited by Joseph Williamson to deputize for the absent Dr Wallis and now involved in four murders and a possible nest of spies. He had visited coffee shops and barbers’ shops, alehouses and brothels – well, one brothel – and apart from rumours of a mysterious foreign murderer at large he had learned practically nothing. He had been attacked in the
street and had the remains of an ugly scratch on his face to show for it. What was more, his niece was enamoured of a young man who was not as virtuous as he seemed and he would have to do something about it.
And now Madeleine had spurned him. So much for retreat being cowardly. His advance had been repelled with ease. It was time to go home, agreement with Williamson or not. His Majesty’s adviser could find someone else to deputize for Dr Wallis. London was no place for Thomas Hill. His own bed in his own house was where he should be. Tomorrow he would tell Williamson his decision, suffer the inevitable rebuke and go back to Romsey. Decision made, he lay down on the bed.
When at last he went to sleep, he did so with Montaigne whispering in his ear. My life has been full of terrible misfortunes, most of which never happened. Was Madeleine Stewart a ‘terrible mis fortune’? She had certainly ‘happened’. Forget her, Thomas, go home and take Lucy with you. And you, monsieur, bugger off back to your cabbages.
CHAPTER 12
WHEN THOMAS WOKE, however, Madeleine was still there. Damnable woman. In the park, she had taken his arm, asked about his family, spoken about her own and hinted at a relationship closer than mere friendship. In St James’s, she had told him he was ‘as fine as any man in the park’. In her house, she had taken his hands, kissed him and smiled into his eyes. Then she had turned to stone. What was he supposed to make of all that? In the early hours of the morning, Thomas knew only that Madeleine Stewart had embarrassed him and he did not take kindly to being embarrassed.
Not bothering with breakfast, he set off for Williamson’s house soon after dawn. If he was still in his bed, that was just too bad. At that hour few other than milkmaids and pure collectors filling their buckets with dog shit were about, and he walked briskly along the Strand and Fleet Street to Chancery Lane. He knocked loudly on Williamson’s door, which was opened, to his surprise, immediately and by Williamson himself.
‘Good Lord, Thomas, you’ve made good time. I sent the messenger no more than half an hour ago,’ exclaimed Williamson, his head turned to the side to favour his lazy eye.
‘Messenger?’
‘Yes, man, messenger,’ and seeing the blank look on Thomas’s face, ‘Don’t tell me he missed you. Then how did you know about the letter?’
‘Letter?’
‘Thomas, it’s too early for games. Make haste, now. We must go at once to the Post Office.’ And with that, he swept out of the house and set off at speed towards Cloak Lane. Thoroughly confused, Thomas hesitated and then followed him.
At the Post Office they were met by Henry Bishop. ‘Joseph, Thomas. Good morning. I thought it best to ask you to come at once.’
They were ushered in and led straight to Bishop’s room. There Samuel Morland and Lemuel Squire were waiting for them. Morland looked even more irascible than when Thomas had last met him.
‘Ah, Samuel,’ said Bishop, ‘here they are. Have you the copy?’
Morland produced a sheet of paper from inside his coat and handed it carefully to Bishop, who handed it equally carefully to Williamson. Thomas wondered fleetingly if, like the silent clerks he had noticed on his first visit, this might be some sort of arcane Post Office ritual and whether, if Williamson handed it to him, he should hand it to Squire. Fortunately, Williamson kept hold of it.
‘Do be seated, gentlemen,’ went on Bishop, ‘and let us discuss what should best be done.’
Still having no idea what they were going to discuss, Thomas took a seat between Squire and Williamson around Bishop’s table and awaited developments. What he really wanted to say to Williamson would have to wait. This was probably not the time to announce he would be leaving London for Romsey that very day.
‘The letter is addressed to A. Silver Esq, Aldersgate, London, and was sent from Holland. We open every letter that comes from there. It arrived two days ago from Yarmouth,’ explained Bishop. ‘Lemuel was indisposed that day so his chief clerk put it on his desk, unopened.’
‘I opened it and had it copied as soon as I returned. Then it was sent on to the collection office in Star Court,’ said Squire. ‘I would normally have had the copy delivered directly to Thomas, but decided to show it to Mr Bishop first.’
‘Was the collector at Star Court not apprehended or followed?’ asked Joseph.
‘Unfortunately not. My warning was not, it seems, received in time.’
‘A pity. Is there any significance in the name Silver?’ asked Thomas.
‘Not that we are aware of. It is the code that interests us. It is entirely numeric. We haven’t come across that before, have we, gentlemen?’ Williamson inclined his head in agreement. Morland remained impassive. ‘Does that suggest anything to you, Thomas?’
‘When a new code or encryption appears, it is invariably because the contents of the message are too sensitive for an old one to be used. This is especially the case when the message is travelling along an established route.’
‘That is common knowledge,’ observed Morland drily. It was his first contribution to the discussion. ‘Can Mr Hill offer any other advice?’
‘May I see the copy?’ Williamson passed it to him. Thomas opened it and spread it on the table. There were eleven and a half lines of numbers, grouped in fours. Each number was separated by a stop and consisted of one or two digits. There were no three-digit numbers.
There were too many different numbers for the code to be a straightforward substitution. He noticed a number of repetitions and such a code would have been quite inadequate against a competent cryptographer. There was more to it and it would require hard work to find out what.
‘This is a complex substitution cipher,’ he said, almost to himself. ‘It can be broken, but it will take some time.’
‘How much time?’ demanded Morland imperiously.
‘A few days, I think,’ replied Thomas, still studying the letter.
Morland was unimpressed. ‘Come now, Master Hill, it is clear to anyone with eyes to see that these numbers represent not letters, but syllables and words. It is a code, not a cipher. That is why there are so many different combinations. How do you intend to break such a code within “a few days”?’
Morland was wrong. There were too many repetitions. Syllables and words did not feel right to Thomas, just as a bream biting on a hook did not feel like a trout. You could not be entirely sure until the fish was safely in the net, but you would wager a shilling or two as soon as you felt it bite. ‘Hill’s magic’, dear Abraham Fletcher used to call it – an uncanny ability to divine the nature of a code or encryption just by looking at it and by conjuring up an image of the encrypter. This message had been written by an educated hand with elaborate neatness. The encryption would be clever but straightforward. There was no point, however, in arguing with Morland.
‘Sir Samuel may well be right, gentlemen. It might be a code and complex codes can take time to unravel, especially with only one document to work on. I suggest that he sets to work without delay.’
‘That is one of Master Hill’s more sensible suggestions,’ said Morland, with a smirk. ‘If anyone can decode this, it is I.’
Williamson and Bishop exchanged glances. ‘We would prefer you to continue with the important work you are engaged in, Samuel,’ said Williamson tactfully. ‘Your new family of ciphers is keenly anticipated and much needed.’
Morland looked furious. ‘Nonsense. The decoding of this message is much more urgent than the new ciphers and I am by far the best man to do it.’
‘Do you not think that Thomas is as well qualified? He did break the Vigenère square and he knew the double vowel substitution cipher when he saw it.’
‘Tush. The vowel substitution is simple and he broke the square with a lucky guess.’
Just as they had at their last meeting, Thomas’s hackles rose. The second message encrypted with the square he had indeed decrypted with a guess – inspired rather than lucky, he liked to think – but the first one had been the result of a vital insight and logical thought. How dare this
unpleasant man suggest otherwise? With difficulty, he kept his tone measured. ‘Sir Samuel doubtless has his reasons for holding such an opinion of me, but he is mistaken about this message. It does not use codes for syllables or words and I can decrypt it within two days.’
A tiny smile played across Williamson’s face. ‘If Thomas says he can decrypt the letter within two days, I am inclined to believe him. What do you think, Henry?’
‘I agree.’
‘Then he must have the chance. You won’t let us down, Thomas, will you?’
I had better not, thought Thomas. Morland is a pig and I want to go home. ‘You may rely on me, gentlemen.’
‘Ridiculous,’ spluttered Morland and stormed out of the room.
Lemuel Squire, who had sat quietly and said nothing, took a pinch of snuff and sneezed loudly. ‘Really, that man is quite the rudest in London. I do apologize, Thomas. His behaviour was unforgivable. I shall go and tell him so.’ And he followed Morland out.
‘You are sure of this, Thomas, I hope?’ asked Bishop.
Sure? Not even half sure. A complex substitution cipher in two days? It would take all of Hill’s magic and a hatful of luck. ‘Quite sure, sir.’
‘In that case take the copy and start at once. There is no time to lose,’ said Williamson.
Then I’d better be right about it, thought Thomas, or I shall look a fool and Morland will love it.
‘How did you come to arrive at my door this morning, Thomas?’ asked Williamson, on their way back to Chancery Lane. ‘Was it mere chance or had you a reason for calling so early?’
‘I had a reason, Joseph. But now it must wait until I’ve decrypted this letter.’
‘Only a day or two, then? This might be just the stroke of luck we need. It could lead us to the heart of the enemy.’
‘To be sure. Only a day or two.’
The King's Return: (Thomas Hill 3) (Thomas Hill Novels) Page 11