2 A Season of Knives: A Sir Robert Carey Mystery (33 page)

‘Now,’ said Carey. ‘Firstly, what did you find out last night, Sergeant?’

Dodd blinked and rubbed his eyes. ‘Ay,’ he said with great effort. ‘Er…well, after I found Michael Kerr, I spoke to the men working on the roof by the Atkinsons’ house and asked if any of them had seen aught, and the foreman said they hadnae but they had found a bloody knife stuck deep in the new thatch and they were going to give it to the master.’

‘To John Leigh?’

‘Ay. So any road, I got them to give it to me and it’s in my room now.’

‘Excellent, Sergeant, well done. Anything else?’

There were a few women moving about the streets, maidservants who didn’t live-in going to their work.

‘Ah…Janet went to speak to Julia Coldale again, but got nothing but cheek from the girl, so she came away. None o’ Mrs Atkinson’s gossips saw aught; it was too early in the morning and they were too busy. Janet says none of them save Mrs Leigh thinks Kate Atkinson did the murder. Maggie Mulcaster was wanting to know was there anything they could gi’ ye to persuade ye to leave it.’

Carey sighed. ‘What did she say?’

‘She said she didnae think so and besides ye’re a courtier and verra expensive, but in any case she thought ye had enough sense to see she didnae do it, but it was a case of convincing the jury and ye hadnae set that up, Lowther had.’

‘Well, that’s something. Though Lowther still thinks it was Barnabus. Anything else?’

‘Then we went to Bessie’s to see if anybody there had heard anything, but they hadnae except that Pennycook’s left town and gone back to Scotland.’

‘Very wise of him,’ said Carey. ‘And that was it?’

‘Ay sir,’ Dodd saw no reason to fill Carey’s enquiring pause with the details of their evening in Bessie’s. ‘Janet says she thinks ye should arrest young Julia and frighten her into…’

‘Speak of the devil,’ said Carey softly. ‘Look there.’

It was hard to miss the girl’s wonderful fall of hair, even under her hat, as she walked quickly down the street ahead of them. Carey put his arm out to stop Dodd and then followed her cautiously. The girl went to the door of the Leighs’ house and knocked softly. The door opened at once and she stepped in.

‘What’s she up to?’ Carey said to himself, walking about under the spidery growth of poles and planks on the Leighs’ house. The workmen had pulled up all their ladders when they left the night before. Carey whistled very softly between his teeth.

‘Right, Dodd,’ he said. ‘Give me a leg up.’

‘Eh?’

‘Give me a boost. I want to get up the scaffolding.’ He was already unbuckling his sword.

Dodd sighed, bent his knee next to one of the poles and Carey climbed from knee to shoulder, to an accompaniment of complaint from Dodd, caught the horizontal pole of the first platform and heaved himself up.

Carey’s legs were kicking, so Dodd backed off a bit. It was the Courtier’s padded Venetian hose that were causing the trouble; they had caught on the edge of one of the planks. No doubt they were well enough for a life spent parading in front of the Queen, though Dodd with sour pleasure.

At last Carey was onto the first platform, a bit breathless. He let down one of the ladders and Dodd climbed up after him, bringing the sword belt, then he pulled the ladder back up to use it for getting to the second platform. Once there, Carey went to the boundary with the Atkinsons’ house and called Dodd over. He nodded at the place where Carey was pointing.

‘Ay,’ he said, suppressing a feeling of sickness at being so high over the street. ‘I was wondering about them marks.’

Carey went along the platform again. ‘Where did they find the knife?’

‘Just about here, sir.’

‘Right. Help me make a hole.’

‘But sir…’

‘Don’t argue, Sergeant. I don’t need a warrant.’

‘But they just had the roof done, sir.’

‘So they did, Sergeant.’

Carey had drawn his poignard and was digging away among the rushes. Reluctantly Dodd took out his own knife and helped. The hole was rather large when the Courtier finally hissed softly through his teeth and started pulling something from the thatch.

It was a man’s linen shirt, crackling and stiff with brown crumbling stains.

‘Och,’ said Dodd and then. ‘The silly bastard.’

Carey looked at him quizzically and gave him the shirt.

‘Why?’

‘Should ha’ burned it, that’s why. What’s he want tae keep it for?’

‘Couldn’t bring himself to waste a shirt. Or was going to but hasn’t had the chance yet.’

Dodd shook his head. Carey led the way back along the platform and started down the ladder, but Dodd stopped by the small window and peered in between the shutter slats.

‘Sir,’ he said softly. ‘Come and look at this.’

Carey came back, peered between the shutters as well. It was hard to be sure in the half-light, but there were two people standing in the little room. One was John Leigh, the other the girl with long red curls. They were murmuring too low for Carey to hear. The girl shrugged and spoke sharply. John Leigh nodded and held out what looked like a heavy purse. The girl reached to take it and in that moment, John Leigh dropped the purse, grabbed her wrist and hit her hard on the jaw. She reeled back and slumped. Then John Leigh was on her with his hands round her neck, silently squeezing the life out of her.

Dodd’s mouth was open. Carey stepped back, lifted his boot and kicked the shutters hard, kicked again. Dodd remembered something, left him to it, and slid down the ladder to the next level.

It was a horrible shock to John Leigh when a boot suddenly started splintering the wood of his window shutters and then burst apart the lead flushings of the expensive little diamond window panes.

Foolishly he let go of Julia Coldale’s neck, and started back, staring wildly. The head and one shoulder of the Deputy Warden shoved through the tattered window, causing glass to fall and shine in the rushes.

‘Get away from that girl,’ ordered Carey.

He can’t get through the window, thought John Leigh; it’s too small for him. Without really thinking things through, he reached for Julia Coldale again. There was a loud hammering downstairs. She was making crowing noises and blindly trying to crawl away from him; he grabbed her shoulder, pushed her back, clipped her jaw again and started strangling her once more. Something hard hit his ear painfully, drawing blood. He looked up, saw Carey with two more diamond panes in his hand, taking aim to throw them at him, his dagger in his left hand. He did throw them, John Leigh ducked, but didn’t duck fast enough and was hit on the cheek. He let go of Julia to put his hand up to the cut and another piece of glass hit him on the forehead.

There were footsteps on the stairs, but John Leigh had picked up his wife’s sewing table and was using it as a shield against the rain of missiles from Carey. The door was booted open and there stood Sergeant Dodd, breathing hard, a drawn sword in each hand.

‘Now,’ said Dodd sadly between pants. ‘Ye’d best do as the Deputy tells ye, Mr Leigh.’

Leigh’s teeth showed like a cornered dog’s. He drew his own dagger, dropped the sewing table in a mess of pincushions and thread spools, and picked up Julia, turned her about so he could put his blade to her neck. Her legs weren’t supporting her and she didn’t look as if she was breathing.

‘Stay away, Dodd,’ he shouted wildly. ‘Or I’ll cut her throat.’

Dodd stopped, partly because Julia Coldale was between him and Leigh and it was always hard to put a sword through two bodies at once. The girl made a loud snoring noise and then another, started coughing and gagging.

‘Matilda,’ roared John Leigh. ‘Matilda, come and help me. Matildaaa!’

There was no answer. Dodd stood there, a sword in each hand and no way to use either of them while Leigh kept his knife to the girl’s neck.

‘Get back,’ whispered Leigh hoarsely. ‘Get back through the door.’

‘Now listen,’ said Dodd regretfully. ‘Ye canna make it work. We both saw ye trying to kill the girl an’ I dinna care why and nor does the Deputy. But ye willnae hang if ye dinna kill her, see, so why not let her go and save us all trouble and sweat?’

The girl was gagging and whooping pitifully, still not able to stand. She must be an awful weight on his arm, thought Dodd, taking one considered step back. Leigh followed, facing him, his hand with the knife trembling dangerously.

I wonder what the Deputy’s up to, Dodd thought to himself.

‘Where will ye go?’ he asked Leigh reasonably. ‘What will ye do? Ye’ll be at the horn for sure and could ye live in the Debateable Land?’

‘Other men have,’ said Leigh desperately. Julia slipped against him and he hefted her up again, sweat on his face.

Dodd shook his head. ‘Fighting men,’ he said. ‘Wi’ all the respect in the world, sir, ye’re not a fighting man. Have ye a sword? Harness? A helmet? D’ye have horses? Can ye use a lance? My brother-in-law Skinabake Armstrong has his pick o’ men to join his gang, sir, and he’ll no’ take a Carlisle draper.’

The knife was shaking hard now. ‘I can learn,’ croaked Leigh.

‘Ay, ye could,’ said Dodd, consideringly. Behind Leigh something white appeared at the little window. ‘But could ye learn fast enough? The prime raiding season starts in August, after Lammastide, and we’re well into July already, sir.’ He raised his voice. ‘Ye’d have a lot to learn, ye ken. Are ye in one of the Carlisle trained bands, or did ye pay another man to take your place? Ay, I see ye had a substitute—and why should ye no’, ye’re a busy man, a prosperous merchant, an’ there’s nae reason in the world why ye should waste yer time out on the race course playing about wi’ pikes and arquebuses and the like…’

Carey barked his shoulders painfully, easing them through the window, then snagged his shirt on a piece of glass and had to free it. He caught the beam above the windowseat with the tips of his fingers and hefted himself through as quietly as he could, with his knife in his teeth and his tongue and lips as far back from its edge as he could grimace. He sucked his stomach in as far as it would go and prayed devoutly as he hauled his hips through past the points of the broken window panes. And then his knees were in, he could drop to the ground quietly, while Dodd droned impassively on about civic duties and Leigh’s own children. Carey was a head taller than Leigh. So with the back of John Leigh’s neck and his expensively furred brocade gown only a pace in front of him, Carey took his dagger lefthanded from his mouth, reached over the man’s shoulder to clamp Leigh’s wrist in his right hand and brought the hilt of the poignard down as hard as he could twice on the back of Leigh’s head.

Leigh grunted and collapsed, dropping his knife as well. Julia Coldale fell too, then picked herself back up onto her hands and knees and was sick. She looked up at Carey, past his hairy calves and his bare knees and his now ragged white shirt to his face, made a soft croak and fainted.

Dodd looked at him impassively and handed his sword back.

‘I’ll go and fetch in yer suit, shall I, sir?’ he asked.

‘If you would, Sergeant,’ said Carey.

Thursday 6th July 1592, dawn

Mrs Leigh met them on the stairs, her swollen body entirely blocking them. Dodd had tied John Leigh’s hands behind his back after the man had come mumbling and sobbing back to consciousness, and was pushing him down the steps ahead of him, his sword pressed against the man’s backbone, and the bloodstained shirt they had found in the roof tucked into his belt. Carey was carrying Julia Coldale who was still coughing and cawing like a jackdaw.

‘Wh…what are you doing with my husband?’ Mrs Leigh demanded. She was in her smock and dressing gown and her hair in its nighttime plait.

‘We’re arresting him, Mrs Leigh,’ said Dodd. ‘Would ye kindly move away?’

‘Wh…what for?’

‘Trying to kill Julia Coldale,’ came Carey’s voice from above. ‘He nearly succeeded as well.’

‘That little whore,’ sniffed Mrs Leigh. ‘My husband has nothing to do with the bitch.’

That’s what you think, mistress, thought Dodd, who could think of one reason why a man would give a woman money. He didn’t say that, mainly because he didn’t want to bring on Mrs Leigh’s labour.

‘We only just stopped him throttling the life out of her,’ said Carey. ‘Please, Mrs Leigh, out of our way.’

She did move back into the doorway of the shop. Jock Burn was standing there as well, licking his lips. As he went past, John Leigh looked desperately at his wife.

‘Matilda,’ he whispered. ‘Do something.’

She looked away.

They had a full escort of small boys and dogs by the time they got back to Carlisle Castle and Carey was beginning to puff and blow a bit with Julia’s weight. She had managed to stop whooping by then, so he put her down and she leant very prettily on his arm, trying to give him the occasional trustful smile. Oddly enough he didn’t smile back.

They were running out of space for prisoners; there was only the Lickingstone cell left apart from the hole under the Gaoler’s floorboards which was reached with a ladder. In the end they decided the hole was the least bad of the two.

‘Chain him,’ said Carey.

‘But sir…’ Dodd protested. ‘He didnae actually kill her.’