‘Mr Espinosa!’ There can be no mistaking the young clerk’s long locks, black eyes, and air of earnest watchfulness. ‘I am surprised to see you, Sir. I’d have thought you’d be hard at work in your counting-house.’
He does not answer, beckoning me with his finger on his lips. Puzzled, I follow him to a small courtyard behind the building, which must be a shop, though its doors and windows are boarded, and the yard itself has a gloomy air.
‘What is it, Sir? I think I had better be on my way.’ The place is dirty and confined, and I shiver to think what Liz would say if she could see me here in the company of a man I barely know.
His face is grave. ‘Forgive me, but I must warn you, Miss Amesbury. That fellow who beat the negro is Mr Tuffnell’s right-hand man. He’s feared across Bristol for his ill temper, and I enjoin you to be wary of him.’
‘Wary? What can he do to me?’
Mr Espinosa speaks with greater urgency. ‘Miss Amesbury, you held Mr Roach to account, and he is likely to bear you a grudge for it. Believe me when I say that he would tie a boulder to your feet and toss you in the harbour if he could do it unobserved.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ I jut my chin to show defiance, though my heart beats fast.
Mr Espinosa bites his inside lip. ‘When I advised you to beware of Mrs Buckley I was right. Was I not?’
I feel my cheeks redden. ‘Well, I thank you for your trouble, Sir. I will watch my back.’ A thought strikes me. ‘Mr Espinosa, it was your voice I heard just now, quoting from the Book of Psalms. Why do you advise me to take care when you yourself are reckless?’
He snorts faintly. ‘Mr Roach didn’t know it was I who spoke. When you have lived a little longer in this city you will learn that subtlety is the best, indeed the only way, to defend one’s principles. Provoking a figure such as Mr Roach is unlikely to serve the interests of those subordinate to him.’
‘Sir? You do talk very long-windedly.’
‘I mean that openly attacking Mr Tuffnell’s man is likely to cause more suffering to the negro. Told they are unfair, people will go to any lengths to prove it.’
‘I think I understand. All the same, I don’t regret doing what I did.’
For the first time during our encounter the young clerk smiles. ‘You are brave and kind, Miss Amesbury. Only you must strive to temper those qualities with judiciousness.’ He sees me hesitate, and amends his words good-humouredly. ‘In a word, be careful.’ Then the clerk replaces his hat, and checking in each direction to ensure no one observes him, walks away, leaving me to make my exit from the yard.
The rowing-boat is at its mooring, but all are gone when I emerge. I am glad to find the place deserted, and I tell myself sternly that I must not come here again, however long and dull my search for work may prove.
Chapter Nine
Saturday, 27th October, 1703
Later I changed tack, as sailors say, and called at back doors instead of street ones. Then, over supper, I was made to listen yet again as Liz and Bill agreed it was a crying pity our cottage burned down when it did. Better the disaster had been before a quarter day, as I should have been certain to find work if I had come to Bristol at Michaelmas. Or Christmas. Or Lady-day.
My plan to sift Liz over Davy Roxall’s death is hopeless. The weather grows foul so we are rarely without Bill, and I doubt Liz would confide in me in any case. When I asked her in a whisper what she had done with the knife used to kill the lad she bade me be quiet, and said she had given it to Mr Elliott, out of reluctance to call upon the magistrates herself, and doubted the knife could throw light on the matter, being the kind used for flaying by housewives as well as butchers, skinners, tanners and so forth, and having no mark upon it that could help the magistrates find the man who left it in the bothy.
Sorry though I am to give up my wish to track down the murderer, it does not seem a likely prospect, now a day or two has passed. Indeed, when I look at the matter with cold reason I would be putting myself in mortal danger to follow such a course. There needs no proof that whoever did the deed will stop at nothing.
And yet I wish I could bring the guilty man to justice somehow. It may be the memory of my dead brother, but it grieves me to think that the slaughterer of those boys goes unpunished when other men hang for far less bloody crimes.
Running out of doors to call at, and wishing these notions were not jangling in my head, I do not turn my nose up at conversation with a ragged girl who falls into step with me on Corne-street. Her feet are bare, her face is smudged with ash, and she has a long, thin loaf of bread wedged under her arm.
‘You’re new,’ she tells me.
‘From Wiltshire.’ I nod eastwards.
‘Is that same as London?’
‘Nearly.’
‘You hungry?’ She must be simple, for she brings forth the loaf and tears it into two. ‘Go on, I got it for nothing. I cleaned out the ovens for the baker.’
The bread is dry and stale but the flavour good, and it is filling. Liz did not feed me this morning; the fire was out and she was late for Mr Elliott.
‘I don’t know when I last ate white bread. Thank you, young Miss.’
She tears off a bite. ‘He puts chalk in his flour,’ she tells me cheerfully.
‘They will fine him then.’
‘Not he.’ The girl crosses bony fingers. ‘He’s like this with the aldermen. Bum-mates with ‘em. Where you working?’
‘Nowhere particular.’
Her sharp little face is shrewd. ‘Get yourself to the quays. They’re always looking for folk to fetch and carry. There’s work for maids now. Mothers won’t let their lads out of their sight. You’ve heard about the murders, have you? Seven boys in one year with their throats cut.’ Her eyes gleam. ‘Most of the sailors come into port were pirates once upon a time. Any hole is good enough for them.’
‘I heard it was a pedlar doing it.’
‘Truth is, no one knows who’s doing it. Meanwhile, I earned three pence from errands yesterday.’ The maid is certainly not right in the head, for she rummages in her bosom and shows me the coins with no thought I might rob her.
‘I don’t know Bristol yet. Perhaps they wouldn’t trust me with their letters. You had better keep your money safe, young Miss.’
‘Pah! They will.’ She stuffs the coins back inside her dress. ‘Here’s a tip for you. Ask for Mr Wharton. Tell him you know Jane.’ She taps her pointy nose. Then, as quickly as she sidled up to me, she is off, darting through the crowds around the market stalls.
I doubt if much good can come of advice from such a queer little creature. But the bread she shared becomes a fading memory as the day wears on, and by midday I reason that running errands is just what I should like to do, by way of learning the lanes and paths around the city, and earning money while I knock on doors.
Hardly have I gone a dozen yards along the waterfront when I spy a gentleman in a black coat and stove-hat, his mouth pursed in annoyance. His chin is clean-shaven, and he holds a paper which he flicks against his coat-skirts.
I curtsey to him, and the brown and white pointer in the doorway of his warehouse springs up as I approach.
‘Can I carry that letter for you, Sir?’
‘You might, except I don’t know you. Do I?’
‘No, Sir.’ I make my voice higher than usual, hoping he takes me for younger than I am. ‘My name is Coronation Amesbury, Sir. Late of Erlestoke Parish in Wiltshire, now of All-Saints, Bristol.’
‘Well, Mistress Coronation.’ He speaks with a half-smile, soothing the dog’s head to quieten it. ‘My errand-boy is sick and I have this letter for my wife who lives at the Hot-wells. Could you bring me back a receipt to prove you didn’t lose my letter the minute my back was turned?’
‘How much will you pay me?’
‘A penny on your return,’ says the factor drily. ‘There may be other letters need carrying later, so don’t set your price too high.’ He frowns. ‘Oh, very well, be off with you. I can find ano
ther willing soon enough.’
Just then a street-seller threads his way past with a tray of warm yeast buns, and my mouth waters.
‘No, Sir. Thank you, Sir. I am glad of the work.’ I put out my hand and the gentleman gives me the letter, a tightly folded sheet of yellow paper with the scarlet seal new and bright upon it.
The address is in a clear hand, but he assumes I cannot read.
‘To Mrs E. Wharton, Crossways House, the Hot-wells,’ he says, pronouncing carefully. ‘Go west towards the River Avon, the house is a quarter of a mile beyond the city gates. Next to a green bordered by old beech trees.’ He narrows his eyes, sceptical. ‘You don’t have the least notion where I mean.’
I straighten up, offended. ‘I’m quick, Sir, I shall find it.’
He smiles despite himself. ‘Be sure you do.’ And he turns to a waiting carter and begins an earnest discussion over a delivery of hogsheads expected over an hour ago. I leave the carter blaming the cooper for the delay, and Mr Wharton cutting in to say he wants none of his excuses.
The road west out of the city is quieter than the one I came in by, and I hope the Hot-wells cannot be far when, half a mile or so after the quays, a sign points to another watering-place. ‘Jacob’s-wells’ brings to mind Mr Espinosa, and I wonder whether there may be other ‘Sons of Israel’ as Mr Osmund styled them, living here in Bristol. I have seen none, so perhaps Mr Espinosa fled ill-treatment in London only to find himself friendless again, excepting his master Mr Sampson.
I conjure a picture of Mr Sampson. A brooding, heavy-built gentleman with a crusty manner and a soft spot in his stern old heart for Mr Espinosa. Or perhaps he bullies Mr Espinosa and owes him two years’ wages, and sends him to London in all weathers and especially when the roads are bad.
I am spinning stories as fast as Mrs Jervis spins her wool. Most likely Jacob’s-wells is a quarter Jews have made their own, just as in Wiltshire charcoal-burners have their cluster of dwellings at Lane-ends, and the bargees make settlements along the River Avon. In which case Mr Espinosa may be affianced to a pretty Jewess with eyes as dark as night and the two of them are soon to set up in Jacob’s-wells in a neat house with glass windows and a brand-new feather bed.
I avow I would be very happy it were so, though I hope the lady is deserving of so pleasant and kind a gentleman.
Puzzling this out puts in the time until I leave the city walls behind and reach a stretch of green bordered by neat orchards, some apple trees but mostly pears. A trio of old men sit beneath a beech tree, puffing pipes and holding their feet out to the sun, and a straggle of children play under the eye of a bigger girl, a baby on her knee rolled so tightly in a shawl that nothing shows of it but a tuft of fierce black hair. I feel a pang of homesickness, it being much like Erlestoke on a quiet morning and most unlike the city just behind me, and the baby bringing to mind my brother as a babe-in-arms.
‘Do you know which is Mrs Wharton’s house?’ I ask the girl. A number of four-square houses face the river, and one or two are new-built in a grander style, with great windows and tall flights of steps. She points to a cottage of red stone, ivy and woodbine clinging round its porch, the chimney pouring smoke. Not a simple cottage but not a gentleman’s residence either, as is proved when the lady herself answers my knock.
She is young and slight, with dark hair showing under a white cap, and wears sprigged calico, yellow and green, with a green petticoat and a light green neckerchief and checked green and yellow shawl. A baby crows somewhere within the house and an older child sings a ballad out of tune. The walls of the passage are freshly painted and the flags covered with thick clean rushes; after dingy All-Saints’-yard I am quite dazzled.
‘From Mr Wharton, Madam,’ I say. She takes the letter eagerly, tears it open, and although it cannot be many hours since she saw her husband, her eyes fill with tears as she scans the message. Then she folds the paper and keeps it in her hand.
‘Will there be an answer, Madam? I am bid bring a receipt.’
‘No answer.’ She tears the corner from the letter and marks it with a pencil hanging at her waist. ‘This will do as proof you found me.’ She glances once more at the contents of the letter before sighing and tucking it in her bosom. Her face takes on a wry cast. ‘Don’t say you are waiting for me to read my message aloud, child?’
I turn pink as I remember Liz’s accusation yesterday. ‘Excuse me, Madam, I hope you don’t think I wish to pry. I only wondered what the “E” is for.’
She ignores this. ‘There is nothing in my letter I need to hide, it is perfectly dull to anyone save myself. Mr Wharton kindly writes to reassure me that a dear friend of mine is safe and well. She left for London some weeks ago.’
After this pointed frankness I am hardly able to meet her eye.
‘Mother! Mother, hurry!’ A high-pitched cry rings through the house, as if the child who warbled so cheerfully has met with an accident.
‘Heavens.’ Mrs Wharton grabs her skirts and races down the passage, and after a moment’s doubt I follow on her heels. The screams grow louder; I fully expect to discover her little son smothered in flames from the kitchen fire, or standing in a pool of blood.
We burst in to find a boy of five years or so struggling to release his baby sister from a wooden feeding-chair, her head trapped between the hoop that holds her in and the seat itself. Her face is grey.
‘Darling!’ In a single movement Mrs Wharton moves her son aside and seizes the child, contriving to pull her gently out, though her little arm is entangled as well as her head and shoulder. Her body is lifeless and her mother wracked with fear, though she is calm enough to shake the child and tap her cheek and begin blowing on her face in a desperate effort to rouse her. The boy sobs lustily, and perhaps the sound is what brings the baby back to life, for she gives a sudden piercing cry, throws out her arms, and in the next moment the kitchen fills with the clamour of two howling children, added to which Mrs Wharton bursts into happy tears and I find myself gabbling words of comfort, taking it upon myself to fetch a chair for Mrs Wharton then lifting the boy into my arms, where he falls on my shoulder and weeps as naturally as if he has known me many a year.
When at last the baby is quiet and her brother lets me dry his tears, Mrs Wharton, still trembling, bids me sit.
‘How lucky you were here to help us,’ she says, dabbing her own face and laughing a little at her confusion. ‘Won’t you stop a little longer, Mistress, and let us recover?’ She draws a few deep breaths and kisses the baby on the crown of her lace-capped head, trying despite her shaking hands to calm herself. ‘Master Harry and Baby Emma were about to take their morning milk. I’ll write my husband a note, so he knows why you were delayed. Does that answer your fear of being thought a laggard?’
She tries to sound light-hearted but her face is clammy, and I do not like to leave her so soon after her fright, so I thank her and watch while she goes to the cupboard and brings out a jug and three wooden bowls, and divides the milk between them, taking care to fill each equally. Then she fetches a china feeding-cup and pours the contents of one bowl into it, all the while gazed upon by her little daughter, who seems to have suffered no lasting effects from her mishap, and gulps her milk as soon as the cup is in her grasp.
It is my first chance to look about, and I note that the kitchen fire is fallen into an ashy orange glow as though lit hours ago. Apart from a strange-shaped candlestick on the window-ledge there is nothing that does not remind me of home, though the house is bigger than our cottage. The little garments airing by the fire are embroidered with the same designs my brother wore, flowers and suns and moons and stars picked out in red; and the well-stocked shelves glimpsed in the pantry are those of any housewife. For a moment, though Bristol is where I wish to be, I would give much to be back in Erlestoke for an hour, aged five years old and waited on by my mother in her own neat kitchen.
Mrs Wharton places down the bowls, and her son follows his sister’s example and sets to swallowing greedily,
contemplating me with grave grey eyes over the rim of his vessel. The milk is fresh and thick and sweet, and I empty my own bowl quicker than I intended.
‘So,’ Mrs Wharton says, plying her jug again and shaking her head to dismiss my refusal of another helping. ‘I was asking if you were from Gloucester. I suppose I should first have asked your name.’
It is plain to me that Mrs Wharton is lonely, or why would she be so well disposed towards an errand-girl?
‘Coronation Amesbury, Madam. I took a long journey of my own a day or two ago. I joined the London stagecoach at Calne.’
‘And my friend was on the London stagecoach in September, going the other way.’
‘Forgive me, Madam. It is hard to say farewell to those we love.’
She stares, as if deciding whether or not she can speak openly to one of my station.
‘I am a Jewess,’ she says finally, picking up her son’s empty bowl and gazing into it. ‘My friend Hannah was Jewish too, and we were happy in each other’s company. There are few of our tribe in this part of the kingdom—indeed more blackamoors live in Bristol than Jews do.’
‘Tribe, Madam?’
‘It is a word Gentiles use when speaking of Jews.’ She sounds a little bitter.
‘I know nothing about Jews; I never met any where I grew up.’ I am about to say that I have met a Jew since leaving Erlestoke, but the baby begins to hiccup, and Mrs Wharton, still nervous, turns her attention to the child. Mopping the baby’s milky hands and chin with the hem of her bib she says tonelessly:
‘You may wonder why we live so far from the city. It’s safer for us here. Our simple neighbours are less inclined to call names after my children or leave unsigned notes beneath the door suggesting I go elsewhere. My husband is not a Jew, you see, and this is what some dislike, his being married to a woman who doesn’t share his faith.’
‘They should mind their own business. Bristol folk are a mix of Welsh and Spanish and all sorts, so why do they heap insult on you? From ignorance.’
A Pair of Sharp Eyes Page 8