The Gilded Lily (21 page)

Titus Ibbetson pushed his wig further back on his head, exposing his pale freckled forehead. He had bought a second jug of ale and it sat in front of him. He had drunk most of
it, but he prided himself on being able to hold his liquor. He looked disapprovingly at the table next to him where a group of untidy young men were raucous with drink. They were armed with short
swords and one of them had scars cut into his forearm in the manner of a sailor. They eyed him covertly and whispered and laughed amongst themselves. He ignored them, frowning into his tankard. Why
was it that men of such a class were always so ugly? He stared morosely at one of the men with protruding teeth and a complexion pitted by the pox, before pouring more ale.

He took a draught of the thin yeasty liquid. He needed a drink. He still could not come to terms with the fact that Thomas was dead. When he had lost the trail of the Appleby sisters he had gone
back to Coventry to fetch Isobel, and then returned to Netherbarrow to see Thomas buried. A bleak occasion with few mourners and the wind like a blade, whipping round the headstones. Afterwards,
everything was made more complicated by the fact that the gaol could no longer account for the whereabouts of Alice, Thomas’s wife, and there was no will that they could lay hands on. There
was delay after delay. The inefficiency of the Westmorland legal system when they could give him no answers and seemed to be doing nothing angered him even more.

In the meantime he had spent long days sorting through the remains of Thomas’s things, hoping to find some clue as to where Ella Appleby might have gone. It had shaken him that there was
hardly an item of value left. No coin, no silver. Thomas’s watch was gone, and his gold seal. On their twenty-first birthday their father had given them matching seals – rubies,
engraved with their initials – and though he turned out every drawer in the house looking for the seal, it was nowhere to be seen.

When he opened the closet to search through Thomas’s pockets, it had given him a peculiar sensation – the clothes looked so much like his own. Except that his own were hung in neat
rows. Thomas’s clothes were bundled together as if they had been hurriedly thrust inside. His dark working suit, almost an exact replica of Titus’s own, drooped off its hanger, his two
Sunday outfits crammed one over the other dangled lopsidedly from the hook. His shoes were discarded in an untidy heap of unmatched pairs. A mound of dirty undergarments and shirts had been jammed
into a drawer. When he opened it the stench made him retch. It took him aback. No woman had cared enough to make sure his house was in order. A lump came to his throat. That slattern of a housemaid
must be responsible. He closed the drawer again, unable to bring himself to touch it.

He sat down on the bed, now stripped bare of its bedding, and stared into the closet. Unused for some time, by the look of it, were Thomas’s bespoke riding boots, the black and tan leather
polished to a high sheen, their wooden trees still inside. They were too good to waste. He dragged them out, removed the trees and levered them on. They were a perfect fit. The soles were hardly
worn; Thomas must have been saving them for some special occasion. And now that occasion would never come. Christmas had been and gone without him. Titus stood in his brother’s best boots and
bit back the tears.

‘Damn you to hell.’ He spoke to no one in particular, but strode out of the house with the fire of it still stoking his belly. He rode away, digging those boots into the
horse’s flank until it was galloping and foam flew from its mouth.

Now he wore the boots all the time. He glanced down at them under the table. They were scuffed and muddy, but he would wear them out before he gave up looking for those girls.

He would recognize the girls again if he saw them. The younger one particularly. Even in the twilight in the filth of Bread Street he had seen that raw patch on her face, like a map stretched
over her eye. If only he had been younger and fitter, he might have caught up with them, but they slipped out of sight, and finding them in the stews of London was like looking for a woodlouse on a
ship.

Tracking down the Appleby sisters was going to take time, he realized, so in the end he had fetched Isobel and now he was prepared to stay in London for as long as it took. Thomas’s cook,
Mistress Tansy, had helped him make an inventory of what was missing from the house so he could trace any goods that might be Thomas’s. He glanced at the next table. He supposed he’d
better get on with it, even though these men looked like they hadn’t a peck of common sense between them.

‘You seen two girls round here? One with a port-wine stain on her face?’

The men looked up, but then ignored him and carried on their conversation. Aggrieved, he placed a newly printed notice on the table in front of them and, following it with a finger, began to
read it to them.

‘
Reward
,’ he said loudly, ‘
for the apprehension of two savage sisters, serving maids, who on the 28th October last, did murder their employer in cold blood
, and
so forth . . .
Furthermore, they stole a quantity of silver plate, jewellery and other items –
’

He checked to see that his audience were listening to him. ‘Have you seen them? Two serving maids from the northern counties, one with a great red birthing-mark?’

The men shook their heads, suddenly ill-tempered. ‘No. Never heard of them.’

‘They’ve not been in here,’ the pock-marked man said. ‘We’d have seen them, sure we would. We’re in here every night. Have you tried asking in the tannery?
They was taking on girls not so long back.’

‘Yes,’ said another, ‘and you could always ask at Old Feverface’s. She has nearly twenty girls in her shop.’

‘Fever face?’

To Titus’s irritation they laughed raucously, sharing the joke between themselves.

‘This is a serious affair. You have a duty to help me,’ said Titus, trying to establish some order, ‘it is a matter of the law.’ But the men ignored him again and carried
on whispering and nudging each other.

Titus felt anger rise up inside his chest. Stupid feeble-minded drunks. He picked up their jug and slammed it down on the table, so the dregs sloshed out. The men jumped and sat upright. The
sailor stood up, his fists out. ‘Waste our good ale, would you? I’ll teach you to waste our ale—’

‘The hell you won’t,’ Titus said, springing to his feet. ‘Tell me where I can find this Mrs Feverface. If you do not, I will send for the constable and have him clap you
all in the cells for drunken behaviour.’

‘Now just hold on a minute, mister.’ The cellarman appeared from behind the bar.

The sailor made a lunge with his fist.

Titus dodged it. He was panting now, in a great rage. ‘I have warned you.’

‘Don’t, Ted, he might mean it. We can’t afford to fight with the likes of him.’ One of the others staggered to his feet and placed a restraining hand on his
friend’s arm. ‘It’s the perruquier’s, sir. Madame Lefevre. Under the sign of the wig stand, round the corner.’

With that Titus swung back his fist and slammed it straight into the sailor’s face. His knuckles made a satisfying crunch against the man’s nose. The man swayed and toppled. Titus
felt as if there was quicksilver running through his veins. He stalked out of the door, hearing his own blood pounding in his ears.

The next day Sadie waited again till Ella had left before creeping down the stairs, carrying her clogs in her hand, so that Dennis’s mother, Widow Gowper, would not guess
there were two girls and not one. She had got Ella dressed and ready in whispers. Otherwise, Dennis’s ma might think the girl upstairs was touched in the head – talking to herself. Ella
had told her to stay indoors, but Sadie was determined to ignore that, she needed to say goodbye to Corey and Pegeen. Corey had been good to her since Ella left, sitting next to her in their snap
time, sharing her bit of bread when Sadie had none. If she got there early she might be able to talk to them before Madame Lefevre arrived, tell them she would not be coming back and not to ask
questions.

Once outside, Sadie shook her head so her hair fell over her eye and pulled her hood well down over her face. As she hurried along, it seemed as if everyone was staring at her. She hugged the
buildings, walking under the overhangs, darting in and out of the shadows. She said a silent prayer every time she heard footsteps behind her, her shoulders hunched in case any moment someone might
spin her round and see the stain on her face that marked her out.

Outside the fruiterer’s was a mounting block with a rail behind it and she stopped short. There was one of the notices tied to it with string. It flapped slightly in the wind, but she was
sure it was the same as the one the constable had given Ella. The sight of it filled her with dread. As she passed, she grabbed for it and ripped it down, crumpling it under her cloak. By the time
she reached the corner of Cheapside she had a thick wodge of paper balled in her hand. But she knew it would be nigh on impossible to take them all down.

What if Madame Lefevre had seen one of the notices and the constable was already lying in wait for her there? Her palms were sweating as she squeezed the pieces of paper together, looking to her
right and left as she went down the street. Just before the turning into Friday Street she saw Corey hurrying along, her head bent low against the biting wind. She stuffed the ball of paper into a
crack between some shop shutters.

Several other girls pushed past her on their way to the wig shop, bantering good-naturedly. Sadie hurried over to greet Corey.

‘Mornin’,’ Corey said.

Sadie took hold of her arm. ‘Come away, Corey. I’m after talking with you.’

‘What’s the matter?’ Corey’s eyes searched hers.

‘I’m giving notice.’

‘Let’s get inside into the warm then you can tell me.’

‘No, I’m not coming in.’

‘But why? What’s up?’

‘I can’t tell you, but I just wanted to—’

Something caught Sadie’s eye and she looked up. It was Mercy Fletcher, bouncing down the street in her black bonnet, and with her was a loutish-looking Puritan lad in a black wide-brimmed
hat, likely her brother, Jacob. His face was set in a scowl. Mercy caught sight of Sadie and something in the way she stared just a fraction too long made the hairs rise up on the back of
Sadie’s neck.

She knows, Sadie thought.

‘Look, Corey, I have to go now,’ she said, flustered, unhooking her arm from Corey’s.

‘Wait a minute, tell me—’

At that moment she saw Mercy point and Jacob pulled off his hat and broke into a run.

‘Sorry—’ Sadie turned on her heels and ran as fast as she could back up Friday Street. She heard Corey’s shout – ‘Sadie!’ But she did not stop. The
street was busy and there were crowds of young folk going down to the brewer’s and the lime-burner’s, in groups of two or three, arm in arm or gossiping together, and carts and drays
with the morning milk, but they were all coming towards her and it was like swimming against the tide. Her hood fell back but she put her head down and one hand over her face and, thrusting through
the chests of those coming the other way, kept running up Wood Street. When she thought her lungs would burst she stopped and turned, scanning above the carriages and crowds for the blond head of
Jacob Fletcher. But there was no sign of him. She slumped back against the wall of the vintner’s and wiped her forehead.

Ella was right. They were all looking for her now. A dread engulfed her. She hauled the hood back over her head and retreated into its gloom. She took the long way home, in and out of the back
alleyways, like a wary fox, eyes skinned for Mercy and her brother.

When she got to Bread Street she paused again to check nobody was behind her, looking up and down the street. It felt faintly absurd, to be skulking like a criminal. It was only then it dawned
on Sadie that in other people’s eyes that’s what they were, for they had done nothing but run since the day they left Netherbarrow.

She swung the front door open and pushed it shut behind her, leaning against it a moment as she realized she was shaking from head to foot. Her legs were trembling as she dragged her way back
upstairs. She turned the key carefully in the padlock to open the door, lest it should chink and alert Ma Gowper.

When she closed it on the world behind her she lay down on the bed and listened to her heart beating, terrified they might have followed her home. Titus Ibbetson, the constable, or Mercy and
Jacob Fletcher. And now those notices were up, who else might be out there looking for a girl with a face like hers? Outside, a horn sounded from one of the barges and, startled, she leapt up. When
she realized what it was she lay down again, pulling the shawl close over her face like a comforter, stroking the rough texture of the darned patch with her fingers, smelling the wet wool of
Westmorland. Eventually she slept.

When she woke up it was dark and for a moment she was disorientated; she had forgotten what day it was, even where she was. When she remembered, a new wave of fear washed over her and in a panic
she felt for a rushlight and struck a flint, blowing on the burning tip of the wax until it flared then settled into a tiny flame. In its meagre glow she splashed her face with water from the pail,
ran her fingers through her hair to tidy it. On the table the mirror winked, left lying there by Ella, surrounded by a scatter of bone hairpins.