Secret Lament (29 page)

I had to bear a rant of five minutes or so berating me for every sin in the Bible, and every crime on the statute book. I had violated his privacy, the confidences of an innocent girl, the
sacred feelings of love and admiration. I was a villain of the worst kind, a debaucher of maidens, the sort of fellow who undermines all the most sacred tenets of religion and society.

“You knew I was looking for Julia’s murderer,” I said. “Did you seriously imagine I would not read the letters?” He reddened, opened his mouth for another outburst.
“Was she waiting for you that night?”

He came to a halt in the middle of his expensive, new, unused house that sparkled in the radiant sunlight. Red-faced and almost gasping for breath, he stared at me, then closed his eyes. I
waited. When he opened his eyes again, he was calmer, but his hands could not stop fidgeting, twisting round themselves, fingering the buttons on his coat, dipping in and out of pockets.

“I didn’t know what to do,” he said.

“What happened?” I spoke as calmly and flatly as I could, to keep him calm.

“She wanted to elope,” he said helplessly. “To Scotland, to marry.”

“And you agreed?”

The hands went into pockets, came out again. “Yes,” he said, almost inaudibly. “I – I thought I loved her.”

Those words almost made me despise him more than everything else. He was already beginning to deny to himself that he had truly loved her, was already resigning the episode in his mind to that
of a foolish infatuation.

“I knew from the moment I first saw her in London that I wanted her,” he admitted. “She was as a girl should be, modest, retiring, obedient to her parents. Not like an actress
at all. And her parents – damn it, Patterson, they’re not commoners. Mazzanti has aristocratic connections – he’s some relation to the Count of Ferrara.”

I didn’t even know if there was a Count in Ferrara and neither, I suspected, did Ord, but even if there was, I doubted that Mazzanti would be related to him. Ord was just trying to make
his actions sound more reasoned than they had been.

“And when she showed such quiet interest in me, when she so delicately indicated that she might not be averse to my approaches – ”

“You sent her letters,” I finished. “Did you also meet?”

“Only in public. Never anything else, Patterson! The most innocent of meetings. I wanted to marry her, for God’s sake!”

“Did you approach Mazzanti to ask for Julia’s hand?”

“He turned me away,” Ord said, bitterly. He was plainly not accustomed to rejection. “The day I left London he took me aside and said that he had other plans for his
daughter.” His voice hardened. “He said they didn’t include a member of the provincial minor gentry!”

That jibe had probably hurt more than anything else.

“I thought I had no chance left. I came home. Got on with my life.”

Wooed Lizzie Saint, I added mentally.

Ord was getting into his stride now, literally, walking backwards and forwards across the sunshine that striped the floorboards, as if all his pent-up energy was too much to bear.

“You had no further contact with her?”

He looked at the walls, the floor, the pictures – anywhere but at me. “She wrote me a letter at the end of last month.”

“From London?”

“Telling me when they would arrive and asking to see me.”

“Where is this letter?”

“I burnt it,” he said bleakly.

“After Julia died?”

“It was an innocent letter, Patterson,” he said angrily. “A sweet letter, like any young girl might write.”

Young girls know better than to make assignations, I thought. I did not say so – he would probably refuse to talk to me any more.

“So you saw her.”

“Only in public.”

“But you managed to make an assignation with her,” I pointed out. “For midnight on the night she died. You agreed to elope with her and get married.”

“I could not deny her! She put her reputation and her precious self in my care!”

I’d had enough; I said brutally, “She was with child.”

He stared at me with stricken face. He had not known.

“Were you the father?”

He shook his head numbly. “No, no, I could not have been. We never – I did not – ” He turned away so I could not see his face, rubbed his hand across his temple.
“She wanted to marry me for respectability’s sake,” he said heavily. “She wanted a father for her child. That’s all, isn’t it? There was no feeling, no love
– ”

I said nothing.

“I suppose the father is married,” he said after a moment.

“No doubt.”

Another silence.

“She was desperate to get out of that house,” he said, his mouth twisting. “She hated her father and despised her mother.”

Such an odd word to choose for a mother, I thought. “
Despised
Signora Mazzanti? Why?”

He shrugged.

“I want to get back to the point,” I said as patiently as I could. “I need to know what happened the night Julia died. You had arranged to meet her so you could elope but you
had to spend all evening in various taverns, drinking, to try and summon up your courage to go ahead with the affair. How near to her did you get?”

Ord swung round on me. He had recovered himself. His expression was sneering; his demeanour confident and swaggering.

“Two streets away. Then I met that damn singing fellow.”

“Proctor? He was keeping a vigil, to protect her.”

Ord snorted in derision.

“And then you decided not to meet Julia?”

“I came to my senses, thank God!”

“So you didn’t see her?”

“No.”

“Was anyone else around?”

“Two or three drunks in the street.”

Something was nagging at me. “What time was this?”

“Midnight.”

“Are you sure?”

“I heard St Nicholas’s church clock chime.”

Midnight. That was significant in some way. But why?

“So you went back to the nearest tavern and drank some more.”

“I went home,” he said.

“No, you did not.”

His head shot up at that. I was, after all, accusing him of lying. “You saw us carrying Julia’s body home, remember. You came with us to the lodging house. But you already knew she
was dead.” I thought I could guess what had happened. “After your first attempt to meet her, you went back to a tavern to drink, but you still couldn’t make up your mind whether
to go or stay. Eventually, you decided you would elope with her and started back. But on the way, you saw her body in Amen Corner.”

He turned away from me, pushed his hands into his pockets and stared out of the window at his new, bare gardens.

“You bent over her, then when you heard me shouting, you took fright and ran off. And that’s why you were so distraught at the Mazzantis’ lodgings that night. Not only was the
girl you loved and coveted dead, but you were afraid you’d been recognised in Amen Corner. You were afraid I’d seen you. That’s why you told Bedwalters you’d seen me wooing
Julia – if I then accused you of being the man bending over the body, it would look like a lie to try and discredit you.”

Without turning, he held out his hand. “The letters, Mr Patterson.”

I hesitated but there was plainly nothing more to be got out of him. His silence told me I was right. I took the letters from my pocket and held them out. His fingers snapped closed on them.

“They are all here?” he demanded. “You have not abstracted one?”

“There were nine letters,” I said. “And there still are nine letters.”

And then I knew exactly what was teasing me. Nine, damn it, nine letters!

Ord stared at me. “What the devil’s the matter?”

“Nine letters,” I said and started laughing. “Nothing. Nothing the matter at all!”

I knew who the murderer was.

Mr Walpole is convinced we should stay out of this war in Europe; he says it will only swallow up men and money, and bring us no profit. Mr Walpole is an excellent man; but he
is wrong.

[Whit Sunday Sermon preached by Revd Edwin Plumb, afternoon lecturer at St Nicholas’s Church, Newcastle, 13 June 1736]

Tiredness was beginning to catch up with me at last; I was yawning as I called in at Charnley’s bookshop for a parcel of books I had ordered from London. There was irony
in picking up a book of Corelli’s concertos, but I had also sent for a copy of the songs from
Camilla
. An old opera, but with some singable tunes in it; when I had sent for it, I had
thought I would have the direction of the winter concerts and the songs would come in useful then.

Well, they came in useful anyway. I told Charnley not to wrap up the books and strode up to Esther’s door in Caroline Square with the music boldly displayed: Mr Patterson, the music
teacher, come to give Mrs Jerdoun her lesson, sadly neglected recently.

Tom showed me into what he grandly called the estates room. It was a small room at the back of the house, with space for little more than a table and chair, and an array of bookshelves filled
with heavy tomes dating back twenty years. Leases, title deeds, correspondence – all the paraphernalia of Esther’s wealth, which the purchase of that ticket for the organ only served to
emphasise.

Esther was sat at the table, figuring some accounts; she threw down her pen as soon as I was shown in.

“I have been cursing you all day,” she said. “I cannot concentrate on these accounts for worrying about you.” Then she saw my expression. “You know who the murderer
is!”

I tossed down the music books down on the table. “I do. And I know how we can catch him.”

“A trap?” Esther said with a gleam in her eye.

“Tonight. If you care to help?”

“More than willingly,” she said, “What do you want me to do?”

I left the music with Esther despite her protestations that she loathed
Camilla
. “Such a silly plot!”

“All opera is silly,” I pointed out. “The characters always burst into song at the least provocation and at the worst moments. And in the Italian opera, they sing about opening
doors and buying oranges and all the rest of it.” I was adamant about leaving the books however. “It will lend credence to my visit.”

In truth, I did not want to have to carry the books in the disreputable part of town into which I was about to venture. I wanted to go home to sleep before springing the trap for the murderer
this evening but I had two things left to do. One was easily dealt with; I scribbled a note for Hugh, went back into Charnley’s and gave his boy a penny to deliver it. He is a reliable lad
and eager for money to support his eight siblings. He went off with a will, and I turned towards the Keyside.

I was looking for the sailors’ tavern where Corelli and I had ended our entertainment on the night of Julia’s death, just before we parted and I reeled off to encounter the ruffians
and find Julia’s body. How long ago that seemed now! The tavern was spit and sawdust, not very respectable, and I recalled that Corelli had rather liked it. The place was crowded and stuffy,
and I had to hunt through the sailors before I saw him, easing himself into a chair in a corner. He looked much the same as before but more sombre, more subdued. Two tankards of beer stood on the
table in front of him.

“I saw you coming,” he said, looking wearily up at me. “I reckoned you’d figured it out at last.”

He indicated the beer and the stool opposite him; I sat down, pulling the stool aside to accommodate a cluster of raucous sailors. I didn’t much like the ‘at last’ but I let it
go.

“Thank you for speaking to Hugh,” I said.

He shrugged. “Those ruffians would have got the best of you sooner or later.”

“They’ve been called off. By a better friend than I deserve.”

He nodded, not much interested. “And I wanted to make sure you didn’t tackle Julia’s death on your own. There’s more to it than you know.”

“You didn’t think to enlighten me?” I asked tartly.

He gave a wry smile, glanced up as a serving girl called across our heads. “I know I had to get out while I still could. My original idea was to catch a boat from Sunderland and take in
your dancing master on the way. But when I got to Sunderland, there were no ships sailing for three days.” He shifted the tankards on the damp table. “Ample time for a great deal of
thinking.”

I reached for the beer. “Did you manage to pass the information on?”

His gaze jerked to my face; he began to speak, fell silent.

“I mean,” I said to clarify my point, “the information you had on you when we discovered Julia’s body. The reason you had to make a speedy retreat – just in case
Bedwalters took it into his head to search us.” I smiled on his obvious annoyance. “You told Bedwalters you were a government agent keeping an eye on Mazzanti because he was suspected
of being a spy.” I shook my head, sipped the beer. “You’re the spy. And somewhere during that drunken spree of ours, someone slipped you some information, a paper of some sort. I
didn’t see it, I admit, but then I was a great deal more drunk than you were. What was the information about?”

He looked at me a moment longer, then grimaced, made a careless gesture. The noise in the tavern was briefly overwhelming; two or three men scattered as one Scotchman took a wild swing at
another. No one was paying the least attention to us. “Details of the regiments at Tynemouth, their officers, their strength, their armaments. And yes, I passed it on.”

“Who are you working for?” I said.

He laughed bitterly. “Whoever will pay me. At the moment, the Austrians.”

Hardly surprising, I thought, since half of Italy is ruled by the Hapsburgs. But I had thought they were supposed to be our allies.

He gave me a considering gaze. “Are you going to turn me in?”

I let him stew on that. “Why did you come back?”

He sighed. A horde of keelmen suddenly pushed through the doors, bright in their yellow waistcoats, and sauntered across to tables on the far side of the tavern. “I’m the one who
shot at Mazzanti,” he said.

“Good God,” I said, not expecting this in the least.

He leant forward, resting his weight heavily on his arms laid on the table; his tired face was sallow. “They say you should always start at the heart of the matter, don’t
they?” He sneered. “Only, there is no heart in the man at all, Patterson.” He smiled at me, and I saw all the bitterness of years in that smile.