The Masque of a Murderer (33 page)

Authors: Susanna Calkins

BOOK: The Masque of a Murderer

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“I am glad of that,” he said. “Let me help you to the carriage.”

He pulled her up and put his arm around her waist. “Let us proceed slowly. Yes, that is it,” he said as they began to walk toward the waiting carriage. Wincing, she was able to take one careful step after another. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Duncan watching them before turning away.

After a few steps, Adam spoke. “Lucy,” he said, “I think I understand something now that I did not understand before.”

“What is it?” she panted. “What do you understand now?”

“I understand why you do not wear my bracelet.”

“What? Oh, Adam, it’s a beautiful bracelet and—”

“I have something different for you.” He opened the carriage door and helped her inside. He settled himself across from her. Reaching into his coat pocket, he pulled out what looked like a silver stick. “I have been carrying this around for a while. It is a pen—different from those quills you usually use. See how there is ink inside there?” He opened it up.

“Oh, Adam, how lovely!” she exclaimed. “But—”

“No buts,” he interrupted her with a short laugh. “Father told me how his friend Sam Pepys had such a tool. I thought,
I know a young woman who might like such a thing, too.
You can keep it hidden,” he said, for the first time sounding a bit anxious, “so you do not need to fear it being stolen or broken. I know that was what concerned you about the bracelet. I hope you will still wear it from time to time. I hope, too, great things come from that pen.”

“Thank you, Adam,” she said, laying her hand over his. “Truly, I will treasure it.”

He took her hand. “Lucy, there is so much about you that I admire, from these ink-stained fingers”—he smiled down at her—“to your great capacity for love,” he said. “I think, though, you have known something all along that I have not understood. Something that perhaps I have not allowed myself to see.”

“What is it? What do I understand that you do not?”

“I do not mean to speak in riddles. But I would not want to take you away from what you love.”

“I do not think you are trying to keep me from working for Master Aubrey,” Lucy replied. “Indeed, this pen could offer no greater proof.”

When he remained silent, she rushed on, trying to dispel his odd mood. “I just never wanted you to resent me,” she whispered. “People will always remember that I was a chambermaid in your father’s household, even if I am a printer’s apprentice now.”

“I would never resent you.” Adam swallowed. “But that is not what I am referring to now.”

“What, then?”

Now Adam’s smile no longer reached his eyes. “When you knocked into Esther and you both fell over the side of the cart, I saw Duncan’s face. Like he was fearful of losing the most precious thing in his life.”

Lucy could feel her heart starting to pound, and she began to tremble. She knew there was a truth to what he was saying, but she had no words.

Adam continued. “Then he ran to you
.
He saw the distress you were in even before I did. It was as if he simply had to be by your side.” He swallowed again. “It was not just the constable’s face I saw, Lucy. You looked at him, too, in a way that showed me you were not displeased by his attention.”

“Adam, I—” she began, but then stopped. “I do not know what to say.”

“You do not need to say anything right now.” He pressed her hand. “Lucy, I am not angry at you. How could I be? I have told you before that I am willing to wait, because you are worth waiting for. But if your heart beats for someone else—well, I would want to know that, too.”

Taking her hand, he turned it over and kissed it. Then he stepped out of the carriage and paused by the window. “I just ask, Lucy, that you think about this new world that has arisen since the Fire, and know that how it once was may not be how it will be tomorrow. Promise me that, at least.”

“I promise, Adam,” she said. “I will.”

“Then farewell, for now.”

As he began to walk toward his horse, which was grazing on the side of the road, she was suddenly afraid that he was walking out of her life. “Always have to have the last word, do you not?” Lucy called after him, her voice a bit shaky.

He looked back at her and grinned in his old way. “This time, yes.”

From the window, she saw Duncan approaching the carriage, a thick blanket under one arm. “Mr. Hargrave,” he said to Adam, “thank you for your assistance in apprehending these murderers.”

“No, Constable,” Adam said. “It is I who should thank you. You traveled all this way to save my sister, a fact I will never forget”—he paused, glancing back at the carriage—“no matter what the future may hold.” He held out his hand. “Thank you, Constable.”

The two men looked at each other, something unspoken passing between them. Then Duncan grasped Adam’s proffered hand, and the two men shook hands vigorously before going their separate directions.

Walking toward her, Duncan called, “I thought you might want to prop your leg on this blanket. I took it from the other cart.” He passed the wool blanket through the window, a shock passing between them when their fingers touched.

“Thank you,” she murmured, the memory of Adam’s words bringing a flush to her cheeks.

He looked at her curiously. “You will be all right?” he asked. “I will drive the other cart back, to keep watch over our felons until we can get them safely locked away.” He took a step and then touched the window near where her hand was still holding the frame. “Perhaps I will see you soon? Perhaps at a time when there is no murderer lurking about?” There was a question in his eyes.

“And when would that be?” Lucy asked lightly. “Sometimes I think there are murderers everywhere.” She drew back slightly, knowing she was not addressing the question he was asking. Truly, she needed to ponder what Adam had said to her, and her thoughts were so disquieted from all that had happened, she scarcely knew what to think.

She expected him to leave then, but instead he traced his fingers along the carriage door. “You know what I was wondering?” he asked. “Why did Esther Grace not simply kill Mrs. Burroughs? Would that not have been easier than hoping that her secrets would not come out? After all, Esther killed Julia Whitby for the knowledge the poor girl held. I do not think, given her record, she was too concerned about killing family members!”

Lucy had been thinking about this, too. “I think Esther knew that no one would take the searcher seriously. But more than that, I think she needed an audience,” she said slowly. “Like the magistrate said, Esther had created a masque around her. Gervase and Deborah would not do, for they were players, too. They were focused on their own roles. She needed someone who would appreciate how her character had changed between acts. Someone who would appreciate the intricate nature of the masque that she had authored.”

Duncan nodded. “You have a good sense for this,” he said.

She did not catch his next words, for an image of a printed ballad floated in her mind. Not
The Scold’s Last Scold,
as Master Aubrey had requested, but something altogether different.

“The Masque of a Murderer,”
she said, nodding her head. “Yes. That is what we will call it.” She pulled out her new pen and smiled brightly at the constable. “Now, Duncan. How about finding me a piece of paper so I can get this tale told?”

HISTORICAL NOTE

Readers sometimes ask me why I selected 1660s London to form the backdrop of my novels. Naturally I reply, “Plague and Fire! What’s not to love?”

But the reality is, I came to appreciate this time period when I was a graduate student in history, primarily because I was entranced with the notion of a society in intense flux and unprecedented social mobility. Following the plague of 1664–1665 and the Great Fire of London in 1666, social and communal ties were greatly disrupted after thousands died or fled London altogether. People were no longer around to affirm or deny the identity of their neighbors. Even more tangibly, many records—wills, marriage and death certificates, baptismal records, property deeds, titles, and the like—were destroyed in the Fire. So essentially, many people could—for a short time—forge their own identities. And even if they did not commit identity theft outright, many honest people like my Lucy also could—for a brief period—take advantage of the diminished labor force and explore new opportunities for employment.

This is why I thought it reasonable that Lucy could become a printer’s apprentice. While it may not have been common, examples abound of women becoming apprentices in a range of trades and professions, and even owning their own businesses. Indeed, there were a number of women working in the bookselling and printing trades (which for ease of understanding, I collapsed into a single trade in my novel).

Also, while some of the tracts described here, like those by Smith and Calvert, were real, most were made up by me.

While I did take some license with Constable Duncan’s duties, as well as Adam Hargrave’s legal responsibilities in the Fire Court, some of the stranger details in my novel were faithful to the historic record. For example, the medieval scold’s bridle was still being used to shame and punish women, although by the seventeenth century, the bridle was more an object of jest. Quaker women like Ahivah did speak out against the king and Parliament, in written tracts as well as in fervent public laments. While the real Ahivah did not have her tongue cut out, there were laws in New England that listed “tongue-boring” as the punishment for a third-time offender.

Last, the winter of 1666–1667 was quite harsh, with the Thames freezing over more than once. Even in March, the diarist Samuel Pepys had noted that “the weather, too, being become most bitter cold, the King saying to-day that ‘it was the coldest day he ever knew in England.’” Amazingly, despite the chill, the Fire did still smolder for months afterward, a surprising fact at which Pepys and other Londoners marveled.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Susanna Calkins
became fascinated with seventeenth-century England while pursuing her doctorate in British history, and she uses her fiction to explore this chaotic period. Originally from Philadelphia, Calkins now lives outside Chicago with her husband and two sons. This is her third novel. You can sign up for email updates
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