The Sweet Smell of Decay (18 page)

Shoreditch was a little hamlet beyond the city walls to the east. The road that led there was long and winding through tenement after tenement over what had once been lush farmland. The countryside was being ravaged, now covered with house after house after house, a carpet of identical little timber buildings, each with tile roof, each one a small hovel of squalor, damp and pestilence.

I wasn’t a very good rider. My arse was sore and the insides of my thighs worn and raw. The rain began to fall, dripping down my back and soaking into my trousers. The rough road, soggy and wet already, churning up. The roads of little Shoreditch were narrow and uncobbled and the mud was inches thick, stirred and layered with refuse and sewage. Suspicious faces peered out at me from behind small, dark windows. Smoke curled upwards out of the roof holes and downwards into the houses. The government had a tax on
chimneys; so poor people blocked them up and choked to death instead of starving.

Heading towards the church I called to a man who walked with a basket of what looked like onions, looking for directions to Mottram’s house. He looked at me blankly – no surprise there – then shot me a furtive glance and hurried on without saying anything useful in reply. I cursed him impatiently, for the wet weather meant that there were few others around to ask. I rode around a while longer before dismounting clumsily and landing awkwardly on my ankle. I limped towards one of the low houses, one with smoke coming out of its roof, and banged my fist on the top half of the split wooden door.

‘What do you want?’ shouted a deep, gruff voice from within.

‘I’m looking for Mrs Mottram, recently widowed. She lives around here.’ I pushed at the door, but it was bolted.

‘Aye, well if you knows that, then you should know where she lives.’

‘If I knew where she lived I wouldn’t be asking, would I?’ It was like playing guessing games with a monkey.

There was a silence. I took off my hat and shook it. From every window about me eyes watched. Like flies, they disappeared as I turned towards them, only to resettle once my attention was fixed elsewhere. I could feel them like lice on my body.

‘What do you be wanting with Mrs Mottram?’ the voice from inside shouted from behind a window across which was stretched a layer of paper soaked in oil. I tapped my finger on the tight paper.

‘If you open the door we can talk. Otherwise I’m going to have to cut a hole in your window.’

The top half of the door swung slowly inwards. A long, narrow face poked out, topped with an unruly tangle of rough, wiry, brown-grey hair, bottomed with a thin, unkempt small beard designed to mask a fiercely receding chin. The face stared at me with squinty eyes, both looking inwards, wrinkled nose and raised upper lip. Although it was pouring with rain he looked as if he was struggling with the glare from a tropical sun.

‘Who are you?’

‘Harry Lytle, and I want to help Mrs Mottram.’ I stood back, not wanting to alarm him.

‘Be a bit late to try and help her like, Harry Lytle. Her husband’s dead and she ain’t got no one to look out for her. Unless you intend to provide for her, which I doubt, looking at those fine clothes you got.’ I had changed out of the butcher’s clothes as quick as I could, so ruining another expensive outfit.

‘I want to find out who killed her husband.’

‘Not sure how that’s going to help her, Harry Lytle. He’s dead now and she ain’t got no provider. Could help her find his head, though, that’d be helpful. Mighty put out she is, not having his head.’

‘How did she find the rest of his body?’

‘Weren’t hard. It were sitting outside her front door yesterday mornin’. Back up against the wall, legs out straight. Looked very comfortable, by all account.’ The man leant forward and wrinkled his nose, smelling the air. ‘So what you be wanting with Mrs Mottram, then?’

‘Like I told you before, I want to find out who killed her husband.’

‘Why you care who killed her husband? He was a fat, ugly
old dog. No one liked him, not even Mrs Mottram. Sure he wasn’t no friend of yours.’

‘Because the same man tried to kill me and is still likely trying to kill me.’

‘Ah,’ the cross-eyed man leered. ‘Self-preservation, isn’t it? That I can believe. Keen to find Mrs Mottram, then. Well, I’ll tell you. There’s no one round here who don’t know where she lives, but few will talk to you. So you give me six pennies and I’ll tell you now, save you time.’ He smiled disconcertingly.

I reached into my pockets without hesitation and gave the man his money. I had had enough of people like this. I waited expectantly, daring him to withhold the information.

‘Follow your nose down the road, Harry Lytle. Follow it left down the hill, pass four houses, you want the fifth. May God bless you and watch over you.’ The man leered again before closing the door in my face. I turned and looked in the direction that he had given me, into the grey wall of rain, at the pools of thick, stinking mud. Despite the short distance I decided to remount. Each one of the four houses I passed looked sodden and fragile, ready to sink into the soggy quagmire. I dismounted and sunk up to my ankles.

‘Mrs Mottram!’ I knocked on the door.

‘Good morning, sir.’ The door opened, and a small, thin shadow of a woman stood there, shoulders drooped, chin dropped and head bowed.

‘Good morning, Mrs Mottram.’ I took off my hat, baring my head to the heavens. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you at this time.’

‘Oh, I’m always up at this hour,’ she answered in a little voice, eyes glazed.

‘No, that’s not what I meant.’ I looked at her carefully. It had sounded like it might have been a joke. ‘I know your
husband was killed. It’s what I’ve come to talk to you about.’ I held my hat in both hands and edged forward into the dry.

‘Oh, I see. Come in.’ She turned and walked into the house and sat on a chair behind a wooden bucket. The bucket sat under a hole in the roof through which the rain fell straight without touching the sides. There were two other chairs, and I sat on the one closest to her. She sat with her hands clasped on her lap.

‘Mrs Mottram, I’m sorry about your husband. You must be upset.’

‘Aye, upset is the word alright,’ she said very quietly, head still bowed like a little mouse.

‘You must miss him.’

‘No, I don’t miss him. He was a useless lump of lard. He was always getting himself into trouble. Whatever money he made, he spent it. Then he came home and snored like a fat pig. God, I hated that man.’ She looked up, pale and expressionless. ‘Hated him with passion. Glad to be rid of him, delighted to be rid of him. Sometimes felt like cutting his head off me self.’

I didn’t know what to say.

‘But he was the one what put food on the table. Now I will have to see how I’m to feed myself.’ She smiled faintly.

‘Well that’s good, I suppose.’

‘Oh aye.’

I leant forward, playing with my hat. ‘Mrs Mottram, I would find out who killed your husband. Not because I especially care that he’s dead, but because the same man tried to kill me, and killed others besides.’

She didn’t reply, just sat still with her head cocked, waiting for me to say more.

‘Your husband and friend Wilson attacked me in my own
home. They took me to a butcher’s shop for the afternoon, and then when night fell they took me onto the river. Lucky for me I woke up and managed to escape.’

‘Aye, lucky for you. Not so lucky for old Mottram.’

‘No. Listen, Mrs Mottram, I know that your husband wasn’t a murderer, he was a cutpurse, a thief.’

‘How do you know that, then?’ she asked.

‘Because a man called Davy Dowling told me. He’s the man who came to see you before. You told him about Wilson, the weasel.’

‘Another silly, stupid man. Thought he was so clever.’

‘Who were they working for, Mrs Mottram? Who told them what to do, paid their wages?’ I leant forward a little too eagerly. She noticed, and her eyes narrowed. She licked her lips like a fox outside a henhouse.

‘I don’t know who they worked for. They didn’t tell me their business.’

‘He must have talked about the people he worked for, when he was drunk, perhaps. Names …’

‘Maybe.’ She nodded brightly. She looked at the hole in the roof. It was the size of a man’s fist.

‘Would sixpence help?’ I reached into my pocket.

‘Five pounds.’

I fell backwards against the seat of the chair and stared at this strange little woman.
Another
five pounds? I was already more than fifteen pounds out of pocket. Had word spread as far as Shoreditch that I was such an easy touch? Anyway, I didn’t have five pounds with me. I should refuse her.

‘I can write you a promissory note.’

‘I’ll wait. You go and come back.’

Godamercy. ‘Mrs Mottram, I don’t have time. The men
who cut off your husband’s head are still after me, and I don’t have time to be running to and fro from London this morning. I’ll give you the note but only if you give me names now.’

She wrinkled her nose and put her finger to her cheek. ‘Very well,’ she nodded. She put her hand out.

‘Names first.’ I closed my jacket decisively. I wasn’t paying five pounds without knowing what I was paying for.

‘Very well, mister. Old Mottram didn’t use to work for nobody, you see. He was well known amongst the weasels of this world. They used to ask him to come on their jobs. Just stand there like a big bear. He used to scare the customers. “Customers” is what he called them. He wasn’t very bright, old Mottram, not that you could tell him so, but the others didn’t pay him full share. They’d give him some money, take him for a drink, get him drunk, and by next day he’d forgotten. He wouldn’t be told. He’d just threaten to take his belt to me if I even mentioned it. So I left the stupid brute to the mercy of his friends and sat here while the rain poured in through the roof. You understand?’ She pulled her big skirts straight and pulled down her apron tidy.

‘Yes, I do understand. That’s more or less what Dowling told me,’ I replied impatiently.

‘Aye. Well, last week he came home all excited. Said the weasel had put them onto more money than we’d ever seen. Must have been taking
you
out onto the river.’ Rubbing her eyes, she stretched her arms and yawned. ‘Friday night he went off into London, went to meet Wilson. Old Mottram came back before nightfall, sober as a magistrate. Said he had been told to stay sober, not to drink. Never took no notice when I told him not to drink. Stupid sod.’

‘Told by who?’

‘Told by this gentleman they went to meet Friday afternoon. Met him at Cornhill.’

‘Where on Cornhill?’

‘I don’t know where. I just know it wasn’t a tavern or an inn, which is where they usually did their business. The gentleman didn’t want to be seen with them in public.’

It made sense given what it was he asked them to do. ‘What was the man’s name?’

‘Pargetter,’ Mrs Mottram smiled brightly. ‘Least that’s what old Mottram called him. Referred to him several times in fact. Called him Pargetter.’

‘Any other names, descriptions, address?’

‘No, mister. I don’t know what he looked like, and old Mottram never said. Took great delight in not telling me any of the details. His big secret, it was; excited, he was. But he called him by name. Pargetter.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Mottram.’ I could think of nothing else to ask, and I was only too aware of the time slipping away. I stood up, had a final look around at the bare wooden hovel, and the poor furniture that was in it. There was a small table by one wall covered in vegetable peelings. Mrs Mottram watched me from her chair in the middle of the room, her hands still on her knees, as I made a space to write out the promissory note. She took it from my outstretched hand and hid it somewhere inside her clothing. Then she smiled, slightly, and I left.

Now. Who the boggins was Pargetter?

Hill would know who Pargetter was – Hill knew everybody – but he wouldn’t tell me. Ne’ertheless, I determined to track him down before putting the great plan into effect. There were elements of the great plan that worried me now and I secretly hoped that Hill might have a better great plan. I sent message for him to meet me at the menagerie.

The menagerie is located close to the Bulwark Gate inside the grounds of the Tower. Hill arrived in the company of a short, squat and very determined beefeater, who was nagging him for money, trying to charge him for escorting him to our meeting place. I cuffed him about the head and bade him leave, ignoring his slurred obscenities. I knew him well – he hung about the Bulwark Gate everyday looking for marks.

‘Why did you invite me
here
?’ Hill demanded, irritated. He looked tired and uneasy.

I felt safe here, behind the guards that manned the Bulwark. ‘It’s a quiet place.’

I led him up the short winding staircase to the viewing gallery. It was made of wood and curled off to the left alongside the lions’ cages. Light shone from a thin grille set into the wall above, and from the wider grilles of the cages below.

‘The smell is foul, it stinks of cat piss,’ Hill moaned.

‘These are big cats – they piss bucketfuls.’

‘Why did you ask me here, Harry?’ he asked me again, leaning out over the den of a young lioness. A low growling rumbled forth. Turning, he rested his back against the top of the gallery wall. The lioness suddenly sprang up, roaring, the tips of her unsheathed claws scything past one of Hill’s elbows. Hill threw himself forward and fell onto his arse. The lioness stood on her hindquarters for a moment before dropping back to the ground and turning away in a sulk, shoulders stiff and back prickly. It was very funny, I thought, though I didn’t smile.

‘God’s mercy, Lytle!’ Hill gasped, climbing to his feet, ashen-faced and shaking. ‘That was your doing.’ He took off his camelotte coat, shook it hard, then picked at imaginary fragments of lion shit with his thumbnail.

Shouting loudly at the top of his voice the keeper of the menagerie strode in, carrying two buckets full of raw meat dripping blood along the floor. ‘Make way! I expect you would like to see them fed, gentlemen. Six lions, two leopards and an eagle. Also there is a dog that lives with one of the lions, but he is famous and you already know that. Now you may look and listen for five minutes while they roar at the smell of the blood. I will be back!’ He leered and winked at me before disappearing, leaving the meat standing on the gallery.
Oftentimes I brought ladies here. The lions began to growl and whine. Though the meat was old, it was covered with fat black flies.

‘You are a fool.’ Hill gave up on his coat and held his fingernails to his nose. He pulled a face and shook his head in disgust. ‘I
saw
you at the Exchange.’

I said nothing in reply.

He spoke to me as if I were a snotty urchin. ‘It was an idiot thing to do, Harry, stand there watching Hewitt like he was some low criminal. I told you to leave him alone!’

‘Was it he who sent Mottram and Wilson to kill me?’

I watched his face closely. Casting a quick glance over his left shoulder like he did when he lied, he shook his head. ‘I don’t know. God have mercy, Lytle, you are lucky to be alive! Wilson is an evil little man.’

‘You know who sent them.’

Hill snorted. ‘You wander into the Exchange like a Court fool, you rush round London making loose accusation, and you march into Matthew Hewitt’s house and accuse him of murder!’ He leant forward and stabbed a finger at my chest, angry now. ‘Yes, I know you went to see Hewitt, Harry, and I still cannot believe how you could have been such a witless Whoball!’ His face was red, his voice thick and angry.

I didn’t answer. He was posturing. I considered whether or not to ask him about Pargetter. Not yet. ‘Tell me,’ I said, ‘who
did
kill Anne Giles?’

His eyes dropped again, shrouded with sly cunning. ‘Keeling killed Anne Giles, as you have already discovered for yourself. How else would you hear it?’

Lying, stinking rat. ‘I think Hewitt killed Anne Giles, to intimidate John Giles. Then he killed John Giles. He sent
Mottram and Wilson to kill me, since I was the only one in London that did not believe Richard Joyce did it.’

Hill shook his head and sighed.

Nodding his head and whistling cheerfully, the menagerie keeper approached. He picked up the first bucket and walked to Old Crowley’s cage, a mangy old lion with broken teeth and blackened gums. The keeper threw a slab of the meat at Crowley’s splayed feet.

‘What
is
your relationship with Shrewsbury?’ I demanded, once the menagerie keeper was out of earshot. Hill stood stooped; hands plunged in pockets, looking very miserable.

‘I have no relationship with him.’

‘You know things, though.’

‘Aye, I know things. I know lots of things, but I have no privileged relationship with Shrewsbury. He loves me not and never will. I know him well enough to know that behind that wide, friendly smile is the soul of a wolf. I’ve told you that before.’

‘I don’t recall you saying that,’ I answered slowly. ‘I remember you telling me how lucky I was to have a friend like him. What an excellent patron he was.’

He pulled a face. ‘Aye, well he’s close to the King, which means he is a good person to know. There’s many would say you were very lucky to have a patron of such lofty standing.’

‘You said his position at Court was precarious.’

‘I never said his position at Court was precarious, Harry. I am not stupid. I know him only by reputation and have some insight as to the comings and goings at Whitehall. This is how our King would have it. He plants seeds, gets others to cultivate them, then finds insects that like to eat these plants, and others who like to eat insects. Keeps everyone on their toes.’

‘Tell me what you would do if you were I.’

He looked up into my eyes and spoke passionately. ‘Go talk to Shrewsbury. Tell him what you found at Epsom.’

‘And Pargetter?’

‘Forget him, Harry! He has nothing to do with this! How many times must I tell you!’

‘So Pargetter is Hewitt?’

Hill stepped back and regarded me curiously. The veil slid slowly back over his face, eyes wondering what had just happened.

‘I have to leave now, Hill. I’ll find you later.’ I could barely contain my excitement and didn’t want him to see it. Pargetter was Hewitt, which left no doubt that it was him that plotted to kill me. Time for the great plan.