The King's Evil

by Andrew Taylor

  When I was alone, I walked slowly from one chamber to another. The rooms had been untidy before, and crowded with too many things; but now they were chaotic, with drawers hanging open, cupboards bare and Alderley’s belongings strewn across the floor.

  Alderley had left few papers behind him – or if he had, the Bishop had taken them. I had a particular desire to discover anything that concerned Alderley’s marriage contract. Perhaps his new affluence had turned his thoughts to marriage. Had he found an heiress worth wooing? Not Lady Quincy, surely? The very idea was distasteful to me. But the Prayer Book forbad a man to marry his father’s wife. There was comfort in that, and in Lady Quincy’s own intelligence; she was not a woman to throw herself away, though perhaps she might sell herself if the price were right. But nothing Edward Alderley could have offered her would have been enough.

  The more I looked, the more the chaos worried me. The Bishop had been either in a desperate hurry or simply indifferent to the fact that he had made his search so obvious. And then another possibility: perhaps he had wished to send a message, to me or to anyone else who followed him here on behalf of Clarendon or the King: that he was invulnerable, that he had no need to make the slightest effort to conceal his visit.

  A large leather satchel was hanging from a hook on the back of the closet door. It was empty. It occurred to me that Cat was probably her cousin’s heir, morally at any rate, and quite possibly legally as well if Alderley had not made a will.

  Wherever Cat was, and whoever found her, she would need money sooner or later. I threw into the bag any small portable items that could easily be sold: a set of silver forks in the French style with three tines; a jar containing nutmeg; two collars made of lace, finely worked; a bracket clock; one of the new pocket watches, this one in a gold case with the hands stopped at five minutes after four o’clock. Chiffinch would almost certainly disapprove of my actions, but Chiffinch need never know.

  I also put in the small portrait of the woman who looked like Cat, despite her old-fashioned clothes. Perhaps she would be grateful for this reminder of both the place and woman in the painting. True, the eyes had been mutilated but someone skilled in the art of painting should be able to remedy that.

  In the bedroom I knelt down to peer under the carved bedstead with its rich hangings. I found nothing but cobwebs and a chamber pot which, as I discovered when I moved it, had not been emptied for some time. I pulled myself back sharply, to avoid the flowing tide of urine.

  As I stood up, the heel of my shoe came down heavily on something on the floor. There was the sound of splintering wood. I glanced down. A shawl was lying in a heap near the foot of the bed. I twitched it aside, which revealed a small silver box. I picked it up. The lid hung drunkenly from the base, attached by a single hinge. My heel had done that. But someone else had already forced the lock with a knife or a chisel.

  ‘A small box,’ Clarendon had said to me an hour or two earlier. ‘Not much more than six inches wide, two inches high and four inches deep … made of a hard wood but covered with silver.’

  The silver was badly tarnished. I moistened my forefinger and rubbed the metal. An ornate pattern began to emerge, full of curves and arabesques. I had seen it before. It was identical to the design on the key on Alderley’s ring.

  I took the key from my pocket, inserted it in the lock and turned. Despite the damage, the mechanism still moved, though it could not travel its full course.

  Clarendon had been right: Alderley had taken the box. Now it was almost certain that the Bishop had found it. Which meant that whatever it had contained was probably in the hands of the Duke of Buckingham.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  IT WAS NOW Wednesday. I had not reported to Chiffinch for nearly forty-eight hours. I knew it would be unwise to put it off much longer.

  When I left Farrow Street, I took a coach to Whitehall. As chance would have it, Chiffinch was not there: he had ridden over to his house near Windsor yesterday afternoon and had not yet returned, though he was expected within an hour or two.

  A strange interlude occurred, a time of enforced inaction in the middle of the activity and anxiety of the last few days. I felt a desperate need to be active, though I had no idea how. I had a sudden memory of a singing bird that my mother had once kept in a cage. When the nights grew longer with the approach of winter, the bird stopped singing and grew desperate to escape. Instead of singing it flapped to and fro, dashing itself with blind force against the bars of its cage.

  I chanced to meet one of my fellow clerks from Mr Williamson’s office, who took me to a tavern in King Street for a glass of wine. To judge by his account, the Gazette had been plagued by one disaster after another in the last few days, caused by a combination of poorly edited copy, Mr Williamson’s bad temper and the distribution difficulty, which had yet to be resolved.

  When I returned to Chiffinch’s lodgings, he still had not returned. So I went to see how Hakesby was faring in the Scotland Yard prison. The moonfaced sergeant was on duty again.

  ‘I trust I find you in good health, sir,’ he said, rising from his chair as I entered and beaming not so much at me as at the memory of my generosity to him yesterday.

  ‘How does Mr Hakesby do?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, the gentleman’s no trouble, sir, I give him that. But precious little appetite.’ He pursed moist lips. ‘I can’t understand it. I’ve seen to it that he has the choice of the most admirable dishes, and I know that you gave him the means to pay for it. But he ignores them.’

  ‘Surely he’s eating something?’

  ‘Scarce enough to keep a mouse alive. In fact, he’s had almost nothing except the odd sip of water.’

  ‘You’ve pressed him?’

  Moonface put on an injured expression. ‘Of course, sir. Why, I couldn’t have been more particular in my attentions if he had been my own father.’

  I didn’t find that reassuring. ‘Has Mr Hakesby said why he won’t eat?’

  He shook his head. ‘Not a word. Not a syllable.’

  ‘You’d better take me to him.’

  The sergeant bustled down the passage in front of me, jingling his keys as a leper jingles his bell. I glimpsed other unfortunates in his charge as we walked along. Two of them called out to me, one begging for charity and one asking me to take a letter to his friends.

  The gaoler unlocked the door of Hakesby’s cell and stood aside to allow me to enter. The cell was gloomier than before. The window was small and high in the wall. It was at least glazed, but with tiny lozenges of old green glass that distorted the light. Thick vertical iron bars divided it into three. The air struck chill and damp.

  Hakesby was lying fully clothed on the cot, his knees drawn up towards his chest and his face turned to the wall. He gave no sign that he was aware of us.

  The sergeant cleared his throat, which caused a bubbling sound to arise from deep in his chest. ‘I’ll leave you then, sir,’ he said in a voice that was suddenly uncertain. He stared down at his prisoner. ‘It ain’t natural, is it?’

  I glanced at him and gave him a nod. I guessed that he was confused by Hakesby’s behaviour. It was outside his usual experience. It disconcerted and even disturbed him.

  He withdrew. The door slammed behind him; the bar scraped into its socket and the key turned in the lock.

  ‘Sir,’ I said softly. ‘It’s Marwood.’

  There was no reply. I suppressed a spurt of irritation: I had done my best for Hakesby; I had spent good money on him; and he repaid me by behaving like a statue.

  Not like a statue: a fit of trembling rippled through him. I leaned across him and looked down at his face. His cheek seemed hollower than before, and there was a drop of moisture on the end of his nose. His eyes were open. He was staring at the blank wall beside his cot, on which a previous occupant had scratched DEVIL TAKE THE PRIVY COUNCIL TO HELL and another MAY GOD HAVE MERCY ON MY SOUL.

  I touched his shoulder and shook him gently. He offered no resistance. He might hav
e been an inanimate thing. The only sign of life was the passage of air in and out of his nostrils and the slight movements of his chest.

  ‘You must eat, sir,’ I said. ‘How can it help anything if you starve yourself?’

  I straightened up and glanced about me. On the stool was a jug of small beer and a covered platter. I lifted the lid and found the end of a loaf and some hard cheese.

  Hakesby’s Bible was on the floor between the side of the stool and the bucket that served as a privy. That was disturbing, too, for Hakesby was a serious man, and one with Puritan leanings: someone who would value his Bible above all things. I picked up the book and laid it carefully on the chair.

  I returned to the bed and stooped over him again. ‘You must not abandon hope,’ I whispered. ‘The more I look into this matter, the more it appears to touch on affairs of state which have nothing to do with Cat.’

  I paused but he gave no sign that he had heard me.

  ‘But I have to find her. I must make sure that she comes to no harm. I will discover the truth about Alderley’s death and see to it that you are released, and your innocence made plain to everyone.’ I squeezed his shoulder as if to demonstrate the strength of my determination, though I knew these were empty promises. I hesitated, swallowing. ‘And then you and she may be married.’

  I waited. The only sounds were Hakesby’s breathing and the muffled cries of unfortunates in other cells.

  ‘I can do nothing,’ I said, ‘unless you tell me where Cat is.’

  A bout of shivering took him again. It occurred to me suddenly that it might not be the ague that caused it, or not that alone – he might simply be cold. I glanced about for something to throw over him.

  His cloak was hanging on a peg on the wall by the door. I picked it up. I was about to spread it over him when I saw that it was hanging in a lopsided manner. One side was heavier than the other. I patted it, and discovered a pocket sewn into the lining on the left-hand side, with the opening at the top secured by a flap. I undid the tie and drew out a notebook.

  I put it aside on the chair for a moment, and turned aside to drape the cloak over Hakesby. He gave no sign that he was aware of it.

  I took up the notebook again and flicked through its pages. There were a few loose sheets among them. The handwriting was almost illegible but I made out enough to realize that the notebook contained his working notes. There were measurements, brief memoranda of meetings and decisions, and of costs and quantities. There were also rough sketches, most of them annotated, of buildings and their details.

  Among the loose leaves was a letter written by Milcote, confirming that Lord Clarendon wished the old well to be retained, repointed, cleaned, and set apart from the rest of the kitchen. On a separate sheet, a carpenter had provided a list of the timber required to erect a partition for the well, together with an estimate of the cost.

  Another paper was a dog-eared sketch plan in pencil of a rectangular building with a gallery running at right angles across one end. Hakesby had annotated this in ink. I struggled to read what he had written. Suddenly the marks unscrambled themselves and became first letters and then words:

  Dr Wren his Design of the new Chapel at Jerusalem.

  I glanced over my shoulder at Hakesby’s back. ‘Sir? What’s this about Jerusalem?’

  There was no answer.

  I gave him a gentle shake. ‘Jerusalem – what is it? The city? Or what?’

  It was absurd even to entertain the possibility that some caliph or sultan or patriarch had commissioned Dr Wren and Mr Hakesby to build a chapel in the Holy Land. In that case, what could it mean?

  I didn’t expect him to answer, and he didn’t. He had retreated so far into his quivering silence that I could not hope to have the truth from him, or not at present.

  Jerusalem: on Friday evening, Alderley had called down to the Bishop, ‘Tell them about Jerusalem.’ It could not be a coincidence.

  I was desperate to be gone. I thrust the notebook and its contents in the satchel I had brought from Alderley’s lodgings. I banged on the door for the sergeant.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  MR CHIFFINCH LEANED back in his chair and stared up at the ceiling. ‘Alderley has been found drowned.’

  It was a bald statement of fact. He expressed neither satisfaction nor regret.

  ‘Really, sir?’ I said in an equally colourless voice. ‘I hadn’t heard the news.’

  ‘In a pond near the Oxford Road. Not far from Tyburn. He had been robbed, too – stripped of everything he had. It’s a dangerous locality, of course, almost as bad as Knightsbridge. The King has made it known that he is most concerned that footpads and highwaymen should operate with such impunity so near to London.’

  Chiffinch was still in his travelling clothes. He had only just returned from Windsor, he said, which was why he chose to interview me in his private closet at his own lodgings. He sat eating grapes while I stood near the door. I suspected that he was enjoying the elaborate charade that this was the first he had heard of Alderley’s death. It struck me that the ability to indulge your sense of humour in the presence of your inferiors was a sign of your power over them.

  ‘As to other matters.’ He spat the pips on to the floor. ‘The Lovett woman. Have you found her yet?’

  ‘No, sir. She’s vanished from the face of the earth. I’ve set a watch on her house.’

  ‘That’s no good. We want her under lock and key.’

  ‘But do you in fact need her now, sir?’ I said. ‘If Mr Alderley was left for dead after he was set upon and robbed on the highway …’

  We stared at each other in silence. There was an unsettling irony to the situation: Chiffinch wanted to find Cat to make her the scapegoat, and he was employing me as his instrument; I wanted to find her to save her life.

  He took another grape and studied it. ‘Because I’m not at all convinced of her innocence in this matter. In fact, the more I think of it, her flight seems a clear indication of her guilt. No doubt she bribed someone to do the work for her. One of those rogues who followed her late father, perhaps.’ He bit into the grape and chewed. ‘Not that it signifies who did the work for her – plenty of men in this city will murder a man for the price of a good supper with a whore to follow.’ He spat out the pips. ‘And, for that matter, plenty more will stand up in court and swear they overheard her plotting the murder.’

  ‘I have new intelligence that puts a different perspective on this, sir.’ I wanted to move the conversation from Cat as soon as I could, for he seemed determined to see her hanged by fair means or foul. ‘It touches on the Duke of Buckingham.’

  ‘Buckingham?’ Chiffinch paused in the act of lifting another grape to his lips. ‘I told you he would try to make mischief from this if he could.’ He let the grape drop from his fingers. ‘If he has a hand in this you must proceed with great care. Are you sure of your facts?’

  I was sure of nothing. ‘I can only tell you what I have uncovered. Alderley had a drinking companion on Friday evening, a man known as the Bishop who apparently has a connection with Wallingford House and therefore with the Duke. Mr Milcote believes that the Bishop is also one of those who arrange the demonstrations against my Lord Clarendon in Piccadilly. I’ve seen him there myself. I also caught a glimpse of him here in Whitehall yesterday afternoon, by the Great Gate.’

  Chiffinch frowned. ‘You mean he followed you?’

  ‘Perhaps. I’d walked down from Clarendon House, and come through the park. I mightn’t have noticed him – I wasn’t paying particular attention to other people.’ I hesitated. ‘Or he was here on other business.’

  Chiffinch and I looked at each other in silence. Neither of us pointed out that the Duke of Buckingham had been also at Whitehall yesterday, flaunting the fact that he had returned to the King’s favour. Neither of us needed to.

  ‘Who is this Bishop?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know, sir. Not yet.’ I rushed on before he could interrupt: ‘I’ve also learned that Alderle
y had recently acquired quite considerable sums of money. Just before he died, he paid off the mortgage on the house in Farrow Lane and bought new clothes. It’s possible that he was contemplating marriage, too.’

  ‘Who was the woman?’

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know that, either. But the very idea that he was considering it is interesting. It suggests that he felt his affairs were more settled than they had been. I imagine he intended to pay his addresses to an heiress.’

  Chiffinch nodded. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that it had been Lady Quincy who had held Alderley’s mortgage, something which she had unaccountably failed to mention to me. My jealous heart suggested that perhaps she had been closer to her stepson than she had admitted to me. But would it not be unfair, I argued to myself, if I were to mention this possibility to Chiffinch before I asked the lady herself about it? After all, I should give her a chance to explain. My pulse beat faster at the thought that I had a reason to call on her.

  Before it could occur to Chiffinch to enquire about the person who had held the mortgage, I said, ‘And there’s more, sir. You must see this.’

  I unbuckled the straps of Alderley’s satchel and took out the broken box I had found in his lodgings. I laid it on the table beside Chiffinch’s chair. I took the key that fitted it from my pocket and put that beside it.

  He said nothing but his eyes widened momentarily, a flicker of muscles. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘Lord Clarendon told me this morning that he has lost a box like this. He described it in some detail. He also said that he had discovered Alderley in his closet a week or so ago. Mr Milcote had brought him up to his private apartments to see the paintings, and then had been called away. Alderley told my lord that he had lost his way.’

  ‘Ah.’ Chiffinch dropped another grape into his mouth. ‘So Lord Clarendon thinks that Alderley stole his box?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Did he tell you what it contained?’ he asked, and pushed in another grape to join the first.