Lamentation (The Shardlake Series Book 6) (81 page)

I
TOOK THEM BOTH INTO
my office and told them what had just happened. I said, ‘This means Stice must be dealt with tomorrow.’

‘What grounds are there to lift him?’ Barak asked. ‘He hasn’t done anything illegal, and Rich won’t be pleased.’

‘That’s a matter for Lord Parr. I will look for him at this great banquet at Hampton Court tomorrow afternoon. My last assignment for Treasurer Rowland. From what I gleaned from the instructions, it will be just a matter of standing round with hundreds of others,’ I said bitterly, ‘showing d’Annebault how many prosperous Englishmen with gold chains there are. Though most are struggling with the taxes to pay for the war, while many thousands more that he will not see struggle simply to exist.’

Barak raised his eyebrows. ‘You sound like one of the extreme radicals.’

I shrugged. ‘Anyway, I should be able to find Lord Parr then.’

‘What if you don’t? Among all that throng?’

‘I will.’ Then all the anger that had been building in me in these last few days burst out and I banged a fist on my desk, making the glass inkpot jump and spill ink. ‘I’ll find what Rich and Stice have been up to. Damn them, spying on me for months, kidnapping Nicholas, cozening me into working for them. I’ll have no more of it! I’m tired to death of being used, used, used!’

It was seldom I lost my temper, and Barak and Nicholas looked at each other. Nicholas said tentatively, ‘Might it not be better to leave the matter where it is, sir? Your faithless steward is gone. Anne Askew’s book is taken abroad, the Queen’s book vanished. And it was taken by different men, not Stice. There is now no trace of the men who killed Greening and those others in his group.’

‘And no evidence at all they are connected to Rich,’ Barak agreed. ‘Quite the opposite.’

‘There has always been some – some third force out there, someone who employed those two murderers,’ I said. ‘But we have never been able to find out who. Whatever Rich and Stice’s reason for spying on me – as they have been since well before the book was stolen – it may be nothing to do with the
Lamentation
; but it
is
to do with the Queen. Brocket said he was told particularly to watch for any contact between us. For her sake I have to resolve this. And, yes, for mine!’

Nicholas looked at me seriously. ‘Do you want me to come to the house tomorrow?’

Barak nodded at him. ‘There is no guarantee Stice will be alone tomorrow.’

‘Lord Parr has sent a man to watch the house, he’ll know who’s coming and going.’

‘You should still have somebody with you, sir,’ Nicholas persisted. I looked at him; the expression on his freckled face was sincere, though I did not doubt that his youthful taste for adventure had been stirred again.

Barak said, ‘Well, if he goes, I’d better go too, to keep an eye on you both.’

I hesitated. ‘No, you have both done enough. I’m sure I can persuade Lord Parr to send some men.’

‘But if you can’t – ’ Barak raised his eyebrows.

I looked at them. I realized that from the moment I had sent Brocket with the message I had wanted them to offer to come. And both of them had made their offer mainly from loyalty to me. My throat felt suddenly tight. ‘We will see,’ I said.

Nicholas shook his head. ‘I wish we could have discovered who was behind those men who stole the Queen’s book.’

Barak laughed. ‘You’re doing a lot of wishing, long lad. It doesn’t look like Rich but it’s not impossible. Or it could be Wriothesley, or either of them acting on Bishop Gardiner’s orders.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘But I don’t know. The Lady Mary could even be involved, with that so-called fool Jane; though I doubt that now. Or even the Seymours, working against the Parrs.’

Barak raised an imaginary glass. ‘Here’s to the King and all his family, and all his grand councillors, and the great Admiral d’Annebault. To the whole bloody lot of them.’

I
RETURNED HOME TIRED
, and with a guilty conscience. It was my feeling of being used that had caused me to lose my temper, but what was I myself doing if not using Barak and Nicholas?

The house was quiet, the late afternoon sun glinting on the window panes. A rich man’s house; in many ways I was lucky. I thought of Martin Brocket and poor Agnes, now no doubt riding hard northwards, kerchiefs round their mouths against the dust. At least the money I had given Agnes should ensure them decent mounts. I would have to rely on Josephine and Timothy until I could find a new steward.

Josephine was in the kitchen, preparing the evening meal. ‘They are gone?’ I asked.

‘Yes, sir.’ I could see she had been crying. She added, a little hesitantly, ‘Sir, before he left, Master Brocket went to the stable, to take leave of Timothy.’ I frowned. Martin had never had any time for the boy before, thinking I spoiled him. ‘I don’t know what he said, but I saw Timothy afterwards and he was upset, he was crying and wouldn’t say what about. Then he ran back to the stable. He will be sad that Agnes is gone. He has – not been himself of late.’

‘I have had – well – cause to be displeased with Timothy. I meant to speak to him today. I will do it now.’

She looked relieved. ‘I think that a good idea, sir – if I may say,’ she added hastily.

I smiled at her. ‘You may, Josephine. You are in charge of the household now.’ Her eyes widened with a mixture of pleasure and apprehension.

I went to the stable. I could hear Genesis moving inside. I took a deep breath as I opened the door. ‘Timothy,’ I said quietly, ‘I think we should have that talk – ’

But there was nobody there, only my horse in its stall. Then I saw on the upturned bucket where the boy habitually sat a scrawled note addressed to
Master Shardlake
. I picked it up. I unfolded the note apprehensively.

I am sorry for what I did, my spying on you that day. I was bad. I never meant harm to you, sir. I swear to Lord Jesus. Master Brocket says he and Mistress Agnes are leaving and it is all my fault, it is because of what I did. I do not deserve to stay in your house so I go on the road, a sinner in lammentation.

A sinner in lamentation. The misspelt word jolted me. But its use was common now, in a land where more and more believed they had great sins to lament before God. I put the note down, realizing that my terseness with the boy had done more damage than I could have imagined. Martin had delivered the note to the tavern for me, I was sure, but then he had taken his anger and bitterness out on a child. The foul churl.

I crumpled the note in my fist. Then I ran back to the house, calling to Josephine. ‘He is gone! Timothy. We must find him!’

Chapter Forty-eight

J
OSEPHINE WENT TO FETCH
her fiancé, young Brown. He was happy to help look for Timothy and he and Josephine went one way, I another, to search all the surrounding streets, up beyond Newgate. But although Timothy could not have been gone more than an hour, we found no trace of him. Only when it grew dark did I abandon the search, returning to a deserted house where I lit a candle and sat staring dismally at the kitchen table. I cursed Brocket, who had deliberately humiliated the boy. I realized that I had come to think of Timothy almost as my own son, just as I had come to see Josephine, in a way, as a daughter. Perhaps that was why I had been so hurt by what Timothy did, and had in turn hurt him, by letting my anger fester. Foolish, foolish, I. It would have been better for us all had I looked on them only as servants.

As I sat there, hoping Josephine and Brown would return with Timothy, Bealknap’s words as he lay dying came back to me:
What will happen to you?
Almost as though he had foreseen the disasters that would come.

Then I drew a deep breath. I remembered again how, last autumn, Bealknap had made those uncharacteristic overtures of friendship; for a while seeming to be always hovering nearby, as if wishing to engage me. And then he had fallen badly ill – in the first months of the year, that would have been; at just about the time I took Martin on. I had thought Martin’s spying was connected with the heresy hunt. But what if Bealknap, too, had been trying to spy on me? Perhaps Stice had first recruited him and then, when Bealknap’s efforts to worm his way into my confidence failed, and he fell ill, Stice had gone looking for another spy and found that my new steward had money worries.

I ran a shaking hand through my hair. If Bealknap had been spying on me, that would explain his deathbed words. But who could have had an interest in me as long ago as last autumn? The heresy hunt had not yet begun and I was not even working for the Queen then.

My reverie was interrupted by the sound of a key turning in the kitchen door. Josephine and Brown entered, looking exhausted. Brown shook his head as Josephine slumped at the table opposite me. ‘We can’t find him, sir,’ he said. ‘We asked people, went into all the shops before they closed.’

Josephine looked at me. ‘Timothy – he has good clothes, and surely anybody who saw that gap in his teeth would remember it.’

Young Brown put a hand on her shoulder. ‘There are many toothless children on the streets.’

‘Not with Timothy’s smile.’ Josephine burst into tears.

I stood up. ‘Thank you for your help, both of you. I am going to Jack Barak’s house now. He may have some ideas.’ He would, I was sure; he had been a child on the streets himself once. ‘With your employer’s permission, Goodman Brown, we shall resume the search at first light tomorrow.’

‘O
FFER A REWARD
.’ That was Barak’s first suggestion. I sat with him and Tamasin in their parlour, nursing a jug of beer. As always, it was a cosy domestic scene: baby George abed upstairs; Barak mending a wooden doll the child had broken; Tamasin sewing quietly by candlelight, her belly just beginning to swell with the coming child.

‘I’ll do that. When we go out tomorrow. Offer five pounds.’

Barak raised his eyebrows. ‘Five pounds! You’ll have every lost urchin in London brought to your door.’

‘I don’t care.’

He shook his head. Tamasin said, ‘What is Josephine’s fiancé’s first name? You always speak of him just as Brown.’

‘Edward, it’s Edward. Though I seem to think of him as just young Brown.’

She smiled. ‘Perhaps because he is taking Josephine away from you.’

‘No, no, he is a fine lad.’ I thought of his uncomplaining willingness to help tonight, his obvious love for Josephine. She could not have done better. Yet perhaps there was some truth in what Tamasin said.

She said, ‘I will go out tomorrow with Goodwife Marris. I’ll come to your house in the morning and we can divide the city into sections.’

‘No, you won’t,’ Barak interjected. ‘Going up and down the streets and stinking lanes. No.’ He put down the doll. ‘I’ll talk to some people; plenty of the small solicitors and their servants would be happy to look for the boy for five pounds.’ There was still amazement in his voice at the size of the sum I was prepared to lay out. ‘Have you paid the latest instalment of your taxes?’ he asked me.

‘Not yet. But remember I got four pounds from Stephen Bealknap.’ I frowned slightly, thinking again of his deathbed words.

‘Make sure you find him,’ Tamasin told her husband. ‘Or I will be out looking the next day.’ She asked me, ‘Is tomorrow not the day you go to Hampton Court?’

‘Yes. But I do not have to be there till five in the afternoon. I’ll search for Timothy till I have to leave.’