Secret Lament (17 page)

[
Newcastle Courant
24 April 1736]

Julia was pregnant. Somewhere there was a man who had bedded her and fathered her child. Someone who didn’t want to acknowledge the child. Someone who was married or as
good as. Someone who wanted to get rid of her. Ord? The pair had met in late March; it was now mid-June – he could have been the father.

“Are you sure?” I asked Mrs Baker.

“I’m the mother of five children myself,” she said comfortably. “I’m sure.”

“Did her mother know?”

Mrs Baker laughed. “Not her! I told you, she doesn’t see anything she doesn’t like. And his highness certainly didn’t know. Can you imagine how he would have reacted if
he did?”

She threw open the door. I hesitated, feeling a little daunted, then went in.

The room in which Julia had lodged was small, with one window that gave an unattractive view of the next house across a narrow alley. I went straight across to the window; starlings cocked their
heads at me from the sill and flew off in a flurry of annoyance as I threw up the sash.

The alley outside was one of those dank places where the sun never penetrates even in weather as hot as this; a cat was slinking along and paused, one foot raised, to stare up at me. The alley
was scarce wide enough for two persons to pass, and to put up a ladder to the window would have been well-nigh impossible. The faint lingering possibility that Julia’s elopement was
traditionally romantic died. Julia must indeed have gone out of the front door – which confirmed the spirit’s evidence.

I turned to glance over the room. Mrs Baker was still at the door, looking both interested and expectant. A narrow bed with a great wooden headboard and foot, and a heap of neatly made
bedclothes, was topped with a beautiful pastel-shaded patchwork quilt. A small table to one side of the bed held a candlestick with a half-burnt candle; a set of drawers stood on the other side of
the room, an old-fashioned bowl on top full of dried flowers. A travelling trunk rested by the window, covered by a shawl; a stool had been pushed against the wall beside it.

And the clutter! Mrs Baker had been understating the case when she referred to disorder. Every available surface was covered with knickknacks and ornaments. A scatter everywhere of scent
bottles, all half-used, combs, brushes, a cheap trinket or two, hair ribbons of every hue. A book on top of the trunk had a ribbon in it as a bookmark – surprisingly, it was a book of
sermons. I flicked through it. It had been for show; half the pages were uncut.

A paper or two: the
Lady’s Miscellany
, a copy of the latest
Newcastle Courant
. The latter was folded with the inner pages displayed and I saw a paragraph ringed. I bent to
read it.

Julia was to sing in the concert? It was the first I had heard of it. And not a mention of her mother. I wondered what Claudius Heron had thought when he read that paragraph. Or the Signora for
that matter. Perhaps that had been another of the things she thought it politic to ignore.

Mrs Baker coughed gently. “If you don’t mind, sir, I have one or two things to do in the kitchen… ”

I was startled. “Oh. Yes. Of course.”

She smiled and gave me another of her significant looks. Her gaze rested for a moment on the travelling trunk.

I waited until I had heard her steps recede down the stairs. I was already feeling guilty. It was one thing to have a look at the room – I was probably not the only person Mrs Baker had
shown the room and most of the others would have had only the most prurient interest. But it was quite another thing to go rooting amongst the dead girl’s private possessions.

The worst of it was that Mrs Baker plainly trusted me not to take anything, but if I saw Ord’s letters I would certainly abstract them. Not only had I agreed to return them to him –
I needed to know how far the affair had progressed. I wanted to know if Ord indeed could be the father of Julia’s child. That fact would have ruined his chances with Thomas Saint and his
daughter and been ample reason to want to be rid of Julia. Of course I could only know such things by reading the letters and that was hardly civilised behaviour, but Ord’s behaviour to me
was not very civilised either. And neither was murder.

I dragged the shawl off the travelling trunk and dumped it with the books and papers on the patchwork quilt. The trunk had a key in the lock but was unlocked; I threw back the lid.

A miasma of scent rocked me back on my heels; I waved my hand in the air to be rid of it. Another shawl lay across the top of the trunk, as if it had been laid there to protect what was
underneath. I lifted it off – and saw, lying on a froth of white material, a yellow ribbon embroidered with blue flowers, each with a spark of brightness at the heart.

I ran the ribbon through my fingers. At one end it was stiff with a spot or two of blood. I saw in my mind’s eye that still body on the ground, gauzy fabric rucked about her, one thin
layer drifting over her head. I had drawn back the layers of muslin and seen Julia’s dishevelled hair…

Yes, there had been one of the yellow ribbons in her hair. In one side of her hair. On the other side, the hair had hung limply.

Julia must have had two ribbons in her hair. The murderer had taken one as a souvenir.

I bit back the nausea in my throat and laid the ribbon carefully aside. If Julia’s attacker had been after monetary gain he would have taken both ribbons; to a poor man they would have
represented riches. Could the man I had seen bending over the body later have taken it – an opportunist thief who had not had enough time to take both ribbons? No, I remembered distinctly
that there had only been one ribbon when Corelli and I first found her.

I must hurry before Mrs Baker returned. I lifted out the delicate dresses made of yards of fabric, expensive embroidery, spotted with pearls or edged with lace. Each would have kept me for
several months. Undergarments, stockings, more ribbons. Under a chemise, I felt something hard.

I dragged out a wooden box, long and thin with charming if awkward carvings on the top. Just the sort of place a young girl might keep personal treasures. I eased back the lid.

The box was full of newspaper cuttings.
We hear Miss Mazzanti is to honour us with her presence… The latest sensation is a certain Miss M ---- whose virginal beauty and charming
innocence…
Half the regional papers of the country were there – from Bath, Oxford, Exeter, Leeds…

At the bottom of the box, beneath all the cuttings, were the love letters, in a little bundle wrapped with pink ribbon. Nine letters, the folds pressed flat. I hesitated to pull the bundle apart
to check that they were indeed from Ord but luckily a few words were visible; I read –
your ever loving
… . and recognised Ord’s hand.

I slipped the bundle into my pocket.

Mrs Baker was humming over a bowl of dough; flour dusted her arms and the apron she had donned over her purple dress. She smiled knowingly at me as I came back into her hot
kitchen. I had put back Julia’s dresses as tidily as I could, and left everything there except the letters, but the consciousness of their presence in my pocket was making my face burn.

“Funny, isn’t it?” Mrs Baker said. “How one little girl can fascinate so many. I even had the psalm teacher in here earlier on.”

“Proctor?”

“Wanted to see the girl’s body. Well, I thought he’d say a prayer over her, or sing a psalm, but no, he bursts into tears and weeps and wails till I thought the whole street
would hear.” She turned the dough out on to the floured table; the sunshine laid long fingers across the wood. “I had to ask him to go.”

Poor Proctor, still feeling guilty at leaving Julia to her fate. I slipped Mrs Baker a coin or two in thanks; she beamed at me and I saw myself out.

The sun was behind the houses as I left Mrs Baker’s and the street was already in twilight. I was wondering what to do next. It was too early to go to Esther. I would creep in the back way
when it was fully dark; to arrive early would run the risk that she had visitors or was perhaps entertaining friends to dinner. Finding somewhere to read Ord’s love letters would be best; I
would look for a tavern and read them over a beer.

But oh dear God – what a furore there would be if Ord turned out to be the murderer! Would Bedwalters dare to do anything? But wait – how did the attacks on Mazzanti fit in with all
this? Surely Ord could not have carried them out – he was certainly in Newcastle at the time of the attacks in London and York.

I turned to go down the Side to the Keyside, to one of the sailors’ taverns. The streets were full of people, both purposeful and idle, walking home with baskets, or gathering idly to
chat. A merchant climbed down from his horse to lead it up the hill.

Someone grabbed at me.

The idea that comedians are men and women of loose morals is not at all correct; they are god-fearing decent people.

[
Reminiscences of a theatre manager
, Thomas Keregan (London: published for the Author, 1736)]

I swung my fist – a couple of women close by scattered in alarm. “For God’s sake!” I drew back.

Ned Reynolds was breathing heavily. “Charlie! For God’s sake, don’t desert me too!”

I stared at him. He was dishevelled, in crumpled and stained clothes, smelling of drink, yet plainly stone cold sober. Behind him, an alley led to a flight of steps climbing the Castle mound,
house doors on either side. On the bottom step was a jug of ale and a tankard.

I shuffled Ned back into the alley, sat him down on one of the steps. “I’ve been looking for you all day. Where the devil have you been?”

“Hiding,” he said with bitter self-contempt. “Trying to pretend nothing’s happened. Trying to get drunk. I’ve heard about the way you solve mysteries, Charlie.
Well, this one’s no mystery. Anyone can see what an idiot I am!”

“It’s a mystery to me,” I said firmly. I had never seen Ned like this before, confident, brash, ruthless Ned reduced to a self-pitying heap. “Why the devil were you
courting Julia? And don’t tell me for her money, because I’ve never known you care about that. Nor for respectability – when did you last meet a respectable actor?”

He laughed shakily, then his face crumpled. “Richard,” he said thickly, burying his head in his hands. “To protect Richard.”

I sat down beside him, pitched my voice low so that casual passers by climbing the hill could not hear.

“Julia found out about you?”

He snorted in derision. “She didn’t need to dig too far. Devil take it, Charlie, does everyone know? Have we been that careless?”

“No one in the company would give you away.”

“One did,” he said dryly. “Guess who, Charlie.”

I sighed. “Richard himself.”

He nodded, rested his elbows on his knees and stared at the cobbles. “She befriended him, chatted away to him, told him all about her triumphs. He adored her, Charlie – he was
starstruck, told me all her
bon mots
as if they were pearls. And of course, since she told him all her secrets, he told her his – or hinted at them at any rate.”

“And then she tried to blackmail you.”

He nodded. “Not overtly, of course. She started to hint that she was interested in me. At first I thought she was just trying to annoy her father – whenever she was with a man,
he’d rush into a fury and try and run the fellow off.”

I poured myself beer, into Ned’s tankard. “She was his sole source of income.”

“The Signora’s too old, I take it.”

“Not in voice, but in looks, yes.”

He nodded. “Well, after a while I realised she was serious. She said she wanted me to marry her. That’s how she put it. Not that she wanted to marry me but she wanted
me
to
marry
her
. When I laughed at her, she turned nasty. She said that if I did as she told me, she would keep quiet about Richard. She even said that once we were married, we could do as we
liked and she’d pretend she didn’t notice, that she’d turn a blind eye to what was
going on
.” He laughed bitterly. “Do you know how much contempt you can get
into just a couple of words, Charlie?”

“She was pregnant,” I said.

He straightened sharply, stared at me as I drank the dregs of his beer. “Devil take it, the little… ” He laughed again, unwillingly. “And she called
me
immoral. I
don’t fall into bed with anyone who asks, Charlie. It’s Richard or no one. And that girl wanted to foist a bastard on me! Who’s the father?”

Ord’s letters hung heavy in my pocket. “I have a good idea but I don’t want to say before I’m sure.”

A woman with a toddler on her hip climbed wearily past the entrance to the alley, wiping her sweating face; a boy of thirteen or so came running down the steps and leapt past us. We let them get
out of earshot.

“So,” I said, “to cut a long story short: Mazzanti forbade the marriage, Julia insisted, you had no choice and you arranged to elope.”

“Elope?” Ned echoed blankly. “No.”

“You didn’t arrange to meet her outside the lodging house at midnight?”

“Devil take it, no!”

I’d swear he was telling me the truth. It must have been Ord after all, for all his denials. What in heaven’s name had Julia been playing at? Engaging herself to one man then
promising to elope with another?

“When did you last see her?”

“At the theatre in the afternoon.”

“Was she as insistent on the wedding as ever?”

He thought for a moment, staring out at the Side where the shadows lengthened, and the last sun touched the upper windows of the houses. “As far as I can tell,” he said finally.

“You were her last resort,” I said. “She had someone else in mind, someone, I’m afraid to say, rather richer than yourself, and probably the father of her child. But if
he didn’t come up to scratch, you were there to fall back on.”