The Corn

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  Sighing, Valerian Lydiard leaned back. “You put it so crudely, Kallivan dear.”

  He once again turned his back and stared out of the window, his hands clasped behind him. “I might choose to be far more explicit, should I wish,” he murmured to the raindrops forming on the mullions. “But in the meantime, madam, you will concentrate on the assassination of your husband and your step-son while I concentrate on my legal right to the throne.”

  Lady Lydiard was clearly disappointed. “Well, sir, you’ve explained my rights, and you call that a massive kindness. But I admit I expected a good deal more. I expected that you’d kill my husband yourself, or at the least, find and pay the killer.”

  The thin man tightened his lips, almost a grimace, but his lover could not see it. “You call yourself a strong woman,” he reminded her. “You claim skills. Intelligence. Determination. Yet you expect me to carry the full weight, while you sit snug and await the benefits? But let me remind you that your puling husband needs to believe that you still care for him and will gladly help him.”

  “I’ve already helped. Yet he shows no gratitude.”

  Sir Kallivan turned once more to face her. His almost colourless eyes had narrowed. “Shall I do it all then, as if you are incapable,” he suggested, soft voiced, “as I would with one of my – younger women?”

  “No. We have to work together.” Valeria shuddered. “I’ll tell Godfrey that my interest continues.”

  He regarded her a moment, his hands tightly clasped, long fingered, long palmed, the knuckles white. “Tell him tonight,” said Lord Kallivan.

  It was a long way from the castle across the city to where the alleys ran crooked and narrow, and the cobbles gave way to beaten earth and its muddy stench.

  Larger than any of them, massive-shouldered and half-naked, the man straddled the central gutter and pointed. “Hold the bugger face down till he tells, till he bloody admits it.” And he stood looking down, his two huge boots firm in the muck.

  The small man yelped, ending in a stifled splash as his mouth disappeared below water level. The gutter overflowed around him. Refuse, animal faeces, blood trickling down from the Shambles and the now melting snow was clogging London’s lower lanes whilst the drainage into the river would not run entirely free until it rained.

  Symon turned to the other four. “So? You gonna watch this bugger drown? Or you gonna tell?”

  One, stocky and unshaven, stepped forwards, peering down. “Don’t care if he lives or dies. No profit to me.”

  Symon grinned. “Then reckon ‘tis your turn, my friend, and see if there’s some other bugger cares for your livin’ or dyin’.” He turned to his companion, his foot was heavily planted on the drowning man’s rump. “Time to change over, Nob. Reckon we grab that one and let this’un run after all.”

  Both lifted their feet. The small half-drowned man crawled to his knees, shook the streams of urine and mire from his face, gazed around him in disbelief, scrambled upwards, and without a backward glance, ran up the alley and was gone into the shadows.

  Symon’s companion had grabbed the unshaven man who had claimed not to care. Struggling, he began to curse. Symon bent down, staring into his adversary’s frantic eyes. “Don’t you waste your time fighting now, little turd. I knows you, and you knows me. Only choice you got is to tell me quick.”

  The man told.

  “The bugger’s name’s Bembitt, he said in a hurry, coughing filth back into the gutter. “He come to me and says how some whores took over a shop wot ain’t hers, and he needs to know how she done it. So I went and found out. Didn’t know you was in on it, did I now?”

  It was afterwards that Nob followed Symon back up towards the bustle of the market. Nob, a little out of breath, said, “Well he told, and he paid, and he admitted. But you let all the buggers go anyways. So wot now?”

  Symon shook his head, a tousle of black curls around the bald, snow-flecked crown. “Don’t matter no more,” he said. “Never did. Wot the bugger told, I knowed already. Was important to tell, that’s all. Can’t have no bugger think to get away with secrets in my domain. T’was sommint I done, and no sod’s gonna undone wot I done. The fool didn’t know it were me, but he do now. That’s wot I wants knowed. Now I can put it right.” Loping back up the wind-blown alleys, Symon seemed content. “Then I lets the bastards go free to spread the tale of what I does, and how there ain’t no gainsaying it,” he continued. “You remember that, Nob. I does business my way, and my way tis the best way, what always works.”

  “It surely does,” said Nob quickly. “Don’t you worrit ‘bout me, now, Master Symon. I ain’t gonna turn tail, nor do no double crossings.”

  “Just as well, then,” said Symon. “’Cos I’ve got a job for you.”

  Symon wore a long shirt, loose and falling open at the neck. Once it had been a grand shirt, bleached linen sewn into neat tucks over the shoulders, and with braided ribbons to fasten at the neck. It no longer looked so fine. Stripes of mud and old blood, trickles of dinner once eaten and beer once drunk decorated the linen, while the copious hem was ragged and torn. Beneath the arms, the material had stained dark and worn threadbare. Black body hair curled through one large hole. Symon also wore heavy leather boots, wooden soled and ankle high, which emphasised the size of his feet. It did not appear that he was wearing anything else. Unusually tall, muscled from jaw to toes and shoulders like tree trunks, Symon walked with a strangely menacing elegance. The prominence of his knees was hidden beneath the shirt’s bedraggled hems, but the bloody scars which marked his calves presumably began higher up.

  The remains of the snow, the bitter wind slicing through the Corn valley and the cloudy threat of oncoming sleet, had no effect on Symon’s apparent comfort. He neither shivered nor complained. But he did look around, and then say, “It’s a tavern we needs, Nob. Ain’t no point talking where we can’t see them what overhears.”

  “A tavern? Yeh, I reckon tis a mighty good idea. Be a mite warmer too,” hoped Nob.

  “Tis even warmer in them Demon-lands, they says,” Symon nodded. “But I ain’t got no interest in going there, neither. But in the tavern, we sees who takes an interest, and be they toasty warm nor mouldy frost grimed, I’ll be knocking heads together if some bugger tries to listen.” Symon grinned. “Now, forget yer silly shivers. Come on, Nob. Reckon you can buy me a beer.”

  “Tis the lass wot sewed up Toby, ain’t it?” Nob nodded conspiratorially. “You done got her that shop and now you knows some bugger took it back. Now you gonna put it right?”

  “When I does’ sommint,” Symon nodded, “It stays done. Reckon you knows that. If some bastard undoes wot I done, he pays. And he pays high.”

  Limping and very sore, it took Feep a long time to walk back to his old home and used his only coin for the wherry. Once having arrived, he staggered upstairs to see Symon. The boys were glad to see their friend again, but Symon was not.

  “You done walked fer miles, lad? Sick an’all?”

  “I had to,” Feep said. “Tis about Mistress Freia, and I reckon that be more important than aught else.”

  The explanations over cups of ale were prolonged. Then Symon returned the coin Feep had used and arranged his return to the apothecary’s shop by cart.

  On the following morning, Symon gave orders, sat back, and waited. Bembitt was brought to him at the island tavern and was pushed inside. Reluctant and frightened, Bembitt was aware of his possible danger, and knew of Symon’s reputation.

  “T’were you as bloody threatened a lady friend o’ mine, Symon said across the little table of wine drips, peering and furious, his nose and the heavy-lidded glare of his eyes directly into Bembitt’s face.

  Heaving backwards, Bembitt discovered two of Symon’s men standing behind him, blocking escape. He muttered, “I had an arrangement with that woman. A partnership. And I knew – well, I found out. I mean about your illegal property dealings, and how you gave that young woman that shop.”

  “You knows naugh
t about me,” Symon said between his teeth. “But I tells you this right now, fucking coward as you is, threatening a little girl, cos she ain’t much older. You go poking them fingers in my business again, I promises this, you won’t have no fingers left to poke.”

  Bembitt shivered, although the tavern was warm. “I understand,” he whispered, as he most certainly did.

  “You takes not one ha’penny from Mistress Freia.” Bembitt nodded frantically. Symon continued, still hissing between his teeth. “You won’t be nor entering her shop nor talking from outside.” Again, Bembitt’s head bobbed, eyes wild. “And,” Symon finished, “you does anyfing at all behind me back to hurt that lass, or agin me, then I can make a proper bloody promise. I shall chop off both yer arms and throw the rest o’yer in the Corn wiv three bricks hung around yer neck.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Symon was back home and snoring when Freia came to look for him. Now well aware of the business carried out on the two lower floors, Freia first peeped in, taking a very deep breath before calling out for Master Symon. A small group of boys clustered to the door. They asked their questions at the same moment, so she understood almost nothing, and instead said, “It is Master - I need to see. Symon. I believe he lives upstairs. Is he in?”

  The boys stared. One said, “Master Symon don’t see no females, he don’t. Nor we don’t let folks in, lest he tells us them folks is expected.”

  Then a plump and round-faced child wiped his nose on his sleeve, sniffed and said, “Is you the lady wot took Feep in, and patched him up?”

  “I’m no lady,” said Freia with a twitch of a smile and a pat to her newly respectable skirts, “But yes, that would be me. Feep now lives at my home and helps in my business.”

  “You runs a Molly Shop too then?” inquired the boy.

  “Certainly not.” Freia pushed inside. “I run an apothecary’s, and now I need to see Symon. He will not be angry if you allow me upstairs, I hope.”

  The stairs were narrow, rickety and dark although it was mid-afternoon. She knocked lightly on the one door standing closed before the top step and waited. The snores reverberated from within and she knocked again. It was on the second attempt that a grunt and splutter interrupted and eventually, the door creaked open. Symon’s very large nose popped through the gap. Then the door slammed shut again in a hurry. “I ain’t got no clothes on,” Symon called from within. “You’s mighty welcome, mistress, but one moment first, and I shall be proper.” Once more the door squeaked open, and Symon, fully clothed, stood within the widening shadows. “Tis an honour, mistress, that it is, though this ain’t no decent place to bring a female, nor can’t offer any place to sit nor any ale to drink. But tell what you wants, mistress, and I shall see it done.”

  Freia remained in the doorway. “I really must apologise for waking you up. Master Symon. And I really don’t want to be a nuisance, and I have so much to thank you for already. But, you see, I am a little frightened. Indeed, I am very worried, and I don’t know anyone else to turn to.”

  Symon’s big face softened. His small bright eyes crinkled, his flat cheeks billowed, the heavy frown lines faded, and his mouth stretched into what Freia imagined was a smile. “Now, now,” said Symon. “Some bad folks frightening my little lass, then? We can’t have that, can we now? You come in, mistress, though I’s sorry you’ll have to sit on the bed, being as I ain’t got no stools nor chairs. And now, you tells your good friend Uncle Symon all about it.”

  He stood, leaning back against the wall as Freia explained the situation, but after a few minutes, Symon took advantage of her brief pause, to explain his own situation. “You told me, you see,” Freia had murmured, “that I’m the sole owner of that building, the rooms above and the shop below. Yet now this man I so very much dislike and distrust – well, his name is Bembitt. But you won’t know him.”

  “I knows him well, mistress,” Symon said. “I has to tell you, lass, I’s no important gent nor got no title nor got no special rights. But over the years I done taken charge – you might say – o’ this area wot they calls the Lower City, and I controlled – well – I has to be honest, right nor wrong, I controls the gangs. So Master Bembitt is a fellow I done met plenty o’ times. Indeed, I helped him get a job once, wot he weren’t qualified nor much good at it, I reckon.”

  “Valet to his majesty the king,” Freia interrupted.”

  “Yeh, that be it,” Symon nodded. “He done me a favour, so I done one fer him. But now sounds like he fished about and found how I got papers fer the shop I gives you, lass, and found it ain’t right proper legal. Well, he ain’t proper legal neither, and I intend telling the bugger to leave well alone. You won’t see him no more.”

  With a sigh of relief deep enough to echo around the ceiling beams, Freia sank back against the wall behind the bed. “That’s absolutely – wonderful, and thank you so very, very much,” she said.

  “But it ain’t all,” Symon told her, “which is why I ain’t done come to visit you yet. ‘Cos when I found wot Bembitt were up to, I done found anovver business wot Bembitt were planning.” Now Symon took a deep breath and his chest swelled beneath the torn shirt. “Fact is, mistress, when Bembitt done poked his nose into my business fer yer shop, there’s folk wot done tell me. I went straight to knock the bugger down and tell him to keep his grubby fingers away from my grubby fingers, right and proper. So he tells me the bugger’s bin paid to knife a couple o’ blokes more important than he is hisself. Now it ain’t in the Lower City, tis in the Upper City, but I don’t reckon on letting some bugger wot’s bin prying into my business go getting paid fer murder in them lordly places. Thought as how he done me a favour, like saying sorry fer one fing and offering me anovver. He says as how I can do the knifing and he’ll pay me. But I’s the commander, see, and I don’t do the knifing. I ain’t no little shit knifer, begging pardon fer the language.”

  Gradually having become accustomed to Symon’s manner of speaking, Freia smiled and thanked him many times over. But she also said, “It’s not a nice thought, Master Symon, that you can kill someone for money. It doesn’t surprise me concerning Bembitt, since he’s such a vile man. But do you know which lords?”

  “I ain’t doing no jobs fer that bastard,” Symon repeated. “But it don’t mean I’s gonna rat on the bugger neither.”

  She apologised. “It’s just that I knew some lords once,” she said softly. “I used to live up north in Lydiard, and I knew Lord Lydiard. But most especially, I knew his son Jak. I – well, I admit – I was in love with him. I still am. Please, can I ask you, beg you in fact, never to take any knifing jobs against the Lords of Lydiard, especially Lord Jak?”

  It was sometime later that Symon accompanied his visitor back down the multiple creaks of the narrow stairs and to the front door of the Molly Shop. Freia said, “I am exceedingly grateful, Master. You are more than kind.”

  “Now, you’ll not be worriting no more, Mistress Freia,” Symon informed her, peering down from his considerable height into her small frown. “’Tis done, and now you be safe. When there be summit wrong, ‘tis Symon will see to it.”

  The small boys who had at first appeared downstairs were no longer there clustering around the doorway. Instead, there was a thin woman, wiping her hands on her apron. Her hair was loose, though some attempt had once been made to pin it up and signs of pins and coils escaped their russet tangles. She curtsied, a little bob of the knees in Symon’s direction, and said, “If I’d knowed, Master, that you was entertainin’ – I’d have brought ale. Tis not often, that is, so I’d take it the occasion is special.”

  “Mistress Jussa,” Symon explained to Freia, “what runs the shop.” He grinned. “We calls her Betsy, though it ain’t her name. The first old bugger as done it, she were Betsy, so the lads uses the same name fer evermore.”

  Outside it was sleeting, a steady drilling pound as the icy winter rain beat against the earth and rolled into the central gulley. The rain sluiced over the shallow step, trickl
ing within the doorway. Freia gazed at the nervous woman, looked then at Symon, and thought of Feep. Jussa smiled. Symon had not given Freia’s name. Freia put her head down, pulled her hood as far as she could over her eyes, and headed off into the sodden city pelt.

  The first sleety wet days of true winter swelled the river to a torrent, and it flooded. A dirty smelling brown ooze slid under the base of the apothecary door, and Freia shut the shop for the day. It rose higher and she shut for another day. It was a ten-day in the end, for there were the floating corpses of mice, a small bloated piglet and a leggy heave of black beetles clinging to the flotsam. It took some time to scrub the smell from the floor and renew the fresh herbs, bringing back the aromatic welcome.

  Bembitt had no intention of crossing the man who could both ruin or end his life, but he kept an eye on the shop which he had once thought would be half his. It was three days after the threats from the fearsome creature who ran all the gangs in Lower Eden, that Bembitt risked visiting the apothecaries.

  “Now don’t go getting nasty,” he told Freia. “I’ve no intention of buying anything, nor stealing anything. The share of the profits I should rightly receive – well, being a kind and generous man, I will sacrifice my dues. I accept I’m no longer in the partnership we had arranged, and I won’t start trying to manage the business.”

  “You couldn’t. You don’t know tansy from arsenic or nutmegs from acorns,” Freia glared at him.

  “But I know a pretty girl from a sour and churlish one. I once thought to marry you. Perhaps I still will one day. But if I do, I’ll school you into obedience and a sweeter temper.”