Heartstone (9 page)

Barak frowned. 'Is there nothing to protect children under wardship?' A child of the streets himself, the plight of children in distress always moved him.

'Very little. The wardmaster has an incentive to keep the ward alive because if he dies the wardship ends. And he is supposed to ensure the child is educated. But he can marry the ward off to more or less whom he pleases.'

'The children are trapped, then? Helpless in the briars?'

'The court has a supervisory power. It is possible to apply for protection against bad treatment for wards, which is what Michael Calfhill did. But the court doesn't like interference, wardships are profitable. I will go to Wards tomorrow. I'll probably have to grease some palm to see all the papers. And while I'm at it - ' I took a deep breath - 'I'll try and get a copy of the document certifying Ellen's insanity. From nineteen years ago.'

Barak looked at me seriously. 'That Ellen is closing a vice on you. Weakness can give some folk a strange sort of power, you know. And she's crafty, as mad folk often are.'

'Finding out about her family may be a way forward. Maybe I can find someone who will care for her. Ease my burden.'

'You said Ellen was raped. Maybe it was a member of her family who did it.'

'Or maybe not. If the Curteys application goes forward, I may have to go down to Portsmouth to take depositions. Perhaps I could make a detour to Sussex on the way.'

Barak raised his eyebrows. 'Portsmouth? I've heard a lot of soldiers are going there. It could be a likely place for the French to land.'

'I know. The Queen warned me the King's spies say that is what is planned. But the Hobbey establishment is some miles north.'

'I'd come with you, but I can't leave Tamasin. Not now.'

I smiled. 'I won't hear of it. But help me with Michael Calfhill's hearing.'

'Strange he should kill himself just after making this application. When he might have been able to do something for the Curteys lad.'

'You mean he might have been killed? I thought of that. But his mother said no one else knew of the application, and she recognized his writing on the suicide note.' I passed the scrap of paper over to Barak. He studied it.

'Still strange. It would do no harm to go to where Michael lodged, ask a few questions.'

'Could you do that tomorrow?'

Barak smiled and nodded. This was the sort of work he liked, and was good at. Ferreting things out on the street.

'And visit the Curteyses' old church, see if their vicar is still there?'

'First thing.'

'Here, I'll write down the addresses.'

When I turned to give the paper to him he was smiling at me sardonically.

'What?'

'This one has got your juices flowing, hasn't it? I could see you were getting bored.'

Barak sat up at the sound of his wife's voice. We went to the door. Tamasin stood outside smiling. Guy looked happier than for some time.

'Everything is as it should be with my daughter,' Tamasin said. 'My little Johanna.'

'My little John,' Barak countered.

'But you are right heavy with the child, Tamasin,' Guy said warningly. 'You must take things easily.'

'Yes, Dr Malton,' she answered humbly.

Barak took her hand. 'You'll listen to Dr Malton, but not to your husband and master, eh?'

Tamasin smiled. 'Perhaps my good master will see me home. If you can spare him, sir.'

As they left the house, bickering amiably, Guy smiled. 'Tamasin says Jack is over-anxious.'

'Well, I have some new work that will keep him occupied.' I put my hand on his shoulder. 'That is what you need too, Guy, to get back to work.'

'Not yet, Matthew. I am too - weary. And now I should wash my hands again. Unlike some of my colleagues I believe it is important, to get rid of any bad humours.'

He went back upstairs. I felt a sudden weight of sadness, for Guy, for Ellen, for the unknown lad Hugh Curteys, for poor Michael Calfhill. I decided to walk round my garden to order my thoughts a little.

As I came round the side of the house I saw Coldiron chopping a pile of wood with an axe. His red face was slick with sweat; it dripped down past his eyepatch, onto his nose. Josephine was beside him, twisting her hands anxiously. She seemed on the point of tears. 'Hunchbacks,' her father was saying. 'Swart-coloured men, pregnant hussies falling and displaying their great bellies on the stairs.' He jumped and looked round at the sound of my approach. Josephine's eyes widened and her mouth dropped open.

I stared at him. 'Think yourself lucky Barak was not with me,' I said coldly. 'If he heard you talking of his wife like that you might find yourself on the wrong end of that axe.' I walked round him and away. I would have dismissed him on the spot, but the look of utter fear in Josephine's eyes had stopped me.

Chapter Five

A
N HOUR LATER
Guy and I sat down to supper. Coldiron was at least a good cook, and we dined on fresh river eels with butter sauce. His manner was obsequiously respectful and he kept his eye downcast as he served us.

When he had left the room, I told Guy about my meeting with the Queen and the Curteys case. I also said that if I were to go to Hampshire, it would be a way of investigating Ellen's past.

He fixed me with his keen brown eyes, hesitated a moment, then said, 'You ought to tell her you know how she feels about you and that there is no hope.'

I shook my head vigorously. 'I fear the effect on her. And if I stopped going to see her, she would be alone.'

Guy did not reply, only went on looking at me. I threw down my knife and sat back.

'If only love could always be mutual,' I said quietly. 'I loved Dorothy Elliard, but she could not return my love. While for Ellen I feel only - liking, yes. Pity.'

'Guilt? Because of what you cannot feel for her?'

I hesitated. 'Yes.'

He said quietly, 'It would take courage for you to tell her. To face her reaction.'

I frowned angrily. 'I am not thinking of myself!'

'Not at all? Are you sure?'

'The best way to help her is to find out the truth about her past!' I snapped. 'Then--'

'Then the problem may be handed over to someone else?'

'It does not belong with me. And finding out the truth can only help her, surely.'

He did not reply.

A
FTERWARDS
I went upstairs to look at my commonplace books, notes on cases and aspects of the law going back to my student days. I needed to refresh my mind on the rules and procedures of the Court of Wards. First, though, I thought about Coldiron. I half-wished I had dismissed him in the garden, but it occurred to me that if I did and then had to go to Hampshire, there would be nobody left in charge of the house and the two boys except Guy, and it would be unfair to leave that responsibility with him. Better to set enquiries about possible stewards in motion round Lincoln's Inn tomorrow, and make sure I had someone to take his place before dismissing him. Yet Josephine worried me; I did not want to cast her out into the world with nobody but Coldiron. I cursed the day I had taken him on.

I spent the rest of the evening making notes, calling down to Coldiron to bring a candle as the light faded. I heard Josephine's footsteps pattering up the stairs: she brought in a candle, set it on my desk, and left with a quick curtsey. Her steps descended again, pitter, pitter, pitter.

At length I stopped writing and sat back to think. Master Hobbey had begun by purchasing a portion of this tract of woodland plus the monastic buildings, which he had converted into a house, then he had bought the children's wardship. The capital outlay for all these transactions would have been large, even for a prosperous merchant. It would be interesting to find out the sums involved. Emma, Bess Calfhill said, had not liked young David Hobbey; but my reading had made clear that only in the most exceptional circumstances would the court consider an appeal by a ward against a proposed marriage. The marriage partner would have to be far below her in social class, or a criminal, or diseased or deformed - I noted wryly that a hunchback counted - for the Court of Wards to disallow the marriage on the basis of 'disparagement'.

But Emma had died, and if that was Hobbey's plan it had come to naught. Her inheritance would have passed to Hugh and though by one of the law's oddities a girl, if unmarried, could apply to have her wardship ended at fourteen, a boy could not 'sue out his livery' until the age of twenty-one. According to Bess, seven years ago Hugh had been eleven; he would be eighteen now - three years till he could come into his lands.

I got up and paced the floor. Until Hugh was twenty-one Hobbey would be entitled only to the normal income his lands brought in, and if it was woodland there would be no income from rents. Yet, as I had told Barak, the owners of wardships were notorious for 'wasting' the lands of their wards, selling and profiting from assets like woodland and mining rights.

A book on my shelf caught my eye: Roderick Mors's
Lamentation of a Christian Against the City of London
, a diatribe against the city's social evils that had belonged to my friend Roger. I opened it, remembering there was a passage about wardship: 'God confound that wicked custom; for it is too abominable, and stinks from the earth to heaven, it is so vile.'

I closed the book and looked out over my garden. It was nearly dark; the window was open and the scent of lavender came up to me. I heard the bark of a fox, a flutter of wings somewhere. I thought, I could almost be in the countryside, back on the farm where I grew up. At that moment it was hard to believe the country was embroiled in crisis; armed men marching, armies forming, ships gathering in the Channel.

N
EXT MORNING
I walked down Chancery Lane to catch a boat to Westminster Stairs. Crossing Fleet Street, I saw someone had placed handwritten posters all over the Temple Bar, calling on the mayor to beware 'priests and strangers' that would set fire to London. The weather was even stickier this morning; the sky had taken on a yellow, sulphurous look. I turned into Middle Temple Lane and followed the narrow passageway downhill between the narrow buildings. Along a side lane the old Templar church was visible. Vincent Dyrick practised in the Temple. I thought, only four days now until the hearing. I walked on past Temple Gardens, where the recent storms had laid great wreaths of petals under the rose bushes, and down to Temple Stairs.

The river was still crowded with supply boats heading east. I saw one barge laden with arquebuses, five-foot iron barrels glinting in the sun. The boatman told me all the King's ships had sailed out from Deptford now, bound for Portsmouth. 'We'll sink those French bastards,' he said.

At Westminster Stairs two barges were tied up, each with a dozen men leaning on the oars. I climbed up into New Palace Yard, under the huge shadow of Westminster Hall. A company of a hundred soldiers was drawn up beside the great fountain, resplendent in the red and white of the London Trained Bands. They made a magnificent display, as they were meant to. Their weapons were a stark contrast to their bright uniforms: dark, heavy wooden maces with heads full of spikes and studs in elaborate, brutal designs.

Facing them was a stocky officer on a black horse, with a surcoat in the royal colours, green and white, a plumed helmet on his head. A crowd of onlookers lined the square, the hawkers, pedlars and prostitutes of Westminster and some clerks from the courts. One of the whores pulled down her bodice to display her breasts to the recruits, and people nearby laughed and cheered. The officer smiled faintly.

The soldiers had a tense, expectant air, watching as the officer produced an impressive-looking parchment, held it up with a flourish, and began declaiming: 'By the faith I bear to God and King, I will truly obey the martial laws or statutes.' He paused and the men repeated his words in a loud chant. I realized this was a swearing in, men taking the oath binding them to full-time service, and I pushed my way through the crowd, a careful hand on my purse. Then, suddenly, I was in the narrow, dark lane between Westminster Hall and the abbey, deserted save for a white-headed old clerk walking slowly towards me, bent under the weight of a pile of papers.