A Murder at Rosamund's Gate

14

“Lucas?” Lucy called, knocking softly on the vestry door. Still unsettled by her conversation with Adam the day before, she thought to seek out Lucas. Walking in, she felt the air change, growing cooler. The slight chill of the church always surprised her, so pleasant in the summer, so frigid in the winter. She stepped quietly through the nave, where several candles were already lit. Finding a penny in her pocket, Lucy put it in the offering box, lighting a candle for Bessie and for her own father, dead near five years now.

Lucy remembered when she first starting attending St. Peter’s with the Hargraves. The small stained glass window above the altar—hidden for the years Cromwell had controlled England—had just been replaced. The smooth wooden pews and the choir loft had retained their peaceful quality, a striking vestige of the church’s Catholic past. The rood screen served as a dim reminder of long-ago religious controversies.

Not seeing Lucas, she sat down in a pew, looking reverently at the newly restored images of Jesus. If she looked hard enough, she could still make out an image of the Virgin Mary smiling over a nursing baby. Unlike the other images on the altar, it was not surrounded by lit candles. Pictures of Mary and St. Peter recalled the beliefs of the bloody papists, and most people knew not to speak of them much. It was rather remarkable that such an image had survived, and yet Lucy was rather glad that it had.

Lucy didn’t know how long she’d been praying when she noticed an odd thumping sound from beyond the central part of the church, toward one of the apses at the south side. Wondering if it might be Lucas, Lucy moved toward the sound, noticing in passing that someone had just lit a small taper by the portrait she had been admiring earlier. An object on the floor, near the bench, caught her attention. She picked it up. It looked like a necklace made of smooth wooden beads on a sturdy cord. It was then that the thumping sound started again, and what sounded like someone groaning.

From the other direction, where she stood with the odd necklace, she heard footsteps. Lucy stepped back into the shadows. Lucas appeared and stopped abruptly when he saw the candle. Frowning, he snuffed it out with a quick pinch of his fingers and then passed into a curtain on the other side of the apse. There was a muffled shout—was it Lucas?—and she heard someone respond in low angry tones. The odd thumping stopped. She began to creep away.

“Lucy?” Lucas called, suddenly back in view. “What are you doing here?”

Lucy held out the necklace. “I found this.” She jerked her head. “Over yonder. I thought someone must have lost it. Um, is everything all right? I thought I heard a noise.”

He gave her a sharp look but took the cord of beads from her. “Do you know what this is?”

Lucy shook her head. “No, but it looks so worn and smooth, I would suppose that its owner must be missing it. She will want it back. It’s pretty.”

Lucas laughed. “If that be true, I can assure you I will not be approached by its owner.”

At Lucy’s puzzled look, he laughed again, adding, “It’s a rosary. Used by the Catholics to pray.”

Lucy stared at him. “That would mean that a Catholic was here, praying in this Anglican church?”

Lucas took her arm and began to steer her back toward the vestry. He had pocketed the rosary. “There are papists everywhere, I’m afraid. They come here, I think, because we are an old church. You probably don’t know this, but the catacombs below are full of marble saints, albeit without their heads. Knocked off last century when Henry the Eighth stopped being Defender of the Faith.” Lucas chuckled. “But I do not think you came here to talk about the bloody Catholics, or our ongoing war against them.”

“No,” she said. “Not right now.”

“This way,” he said, leading her through a small door at the north end of St. Peter’s. Lucy had never ventured through this part before, the offices and living quarters of the men who ran the church. As soon as she was sure no one was about, she turned to him, finding his eyes fixed eagerly on her.

“Please, Lucas!” Lucy said. “I need you to help William.”

“Help him?” Lucas asked, turning slightly away. “How?”

“I thought perhaps we could go talk to the constable! Adam said there was no use trying to talk to the presiding justice. I thought, though, if we could talk to Constable Duncan and—why are you shaking your head? You know Will did not murder Bessie.”

“Alas, I do not know that, dear Lucy.”

The starkness of his words made Lucy’s mouth fall open. “But you, you could not think that?”

“Heartsick I am to say it,” Lucas said, taking Lucy’s hand. “Sad as I’ve been over Bessie’s death, it pains me deeply that your brother has been accused of this terrible crime.”

“But—” Lucy interrupted, tears threatening to spill.

“By God’s grace, Lucy! I do not know that he did not do it, and I could not swear to it in court as a man who will be taking the cloth soon! At best, I could say that I believe his heart is not that of a murderer, yet I know that he was very angry at her that day.”

Seeing her stricken face, Lucas tried to explain. “Well, you see, dear Lucy, when Adam and I saw him, he was quite bothered by Bessie.”

“Surely not angry enough to kill her!”

“I should think not! As God is my witness, he was angry with her. She had all but cuckolded William, he who wanted to marry her!”

“Marry? Truly, he said that?” Will had been genuinely distraught by Bessie’s death, but with all his lady loves, it was hard to believe that he would have actually wed her.

“Yes, indeed. He told me so. In a few years’ time, of course. He wanted to be his own man, with his own trade. Indeed, Richard, that boorish cur from the Embrys’, was egging us on, saying that he had seen—” He stopped short, deferring to her sensibilities.

“Del Gado’s sketches of Bessie,” she supplied. “Yes, I know.”

“Well, nothing inflames a man so much as to know that his lady love is stepping out on him.”

“That was before she knew William! I know it to be true!”

“That may be so. I just know that he was angry. That, and the babe, of course.” He tapped his pen on the paper, as if willing a sermon to appear on the blank white pages. “I believe poor Will felt trapped. He may have wanted to marry her, but not just yet. And who’s to say the babe was his? I can tell you, Lucy, with my hand on this Bible, that he was enraged enough to murder her.”

Lucas’s words were not making sense. “Babe? Trapped?” Lucy asked, confused. “What babe?”

Lucas looked sorrowfully at Lucy. “I just assumed you knew. I won’t drag this out, then. Bessie was with child when she died. The child, of course, being Will’s. Or so Bessie told him. As I said, he wasn’t sure.”

Lucy stumbled out of the room, tears blurring her vision, dimly hearing Lucas calling her name. With child? Oh, no! Poor Bessie! She clutched grimly at the stone walls. Waves of nausea threatened to overcome her as she trembled weakly. She remembered Bessie’s illness, her tiredness, her bouts of moodiness. She remembered seeing Bessie letting out the seams of her work dresses. Too many sweet cakes, Bessie had laughed it away, and Lucy had believed her.

“Oh, Bessie.” She sighed. “Why couldn’t you have told me? I, who loved you like a sister!” Shaking, she began to weep.

A hand on her shoulder made her look up, expecting to see Lucas. Instead, Reverend Marcus was staring down at her. Lucas hovered in the doorway, his anguished face reflecting the torture and pain she felt.

“Grieving young Bessie, are you?” the reverend asked her.

For a moment, Lucy was surprised that the reverend knew who she was, but she realized, of course, that he’d seen her all these many Sundays past, standing by the Hargraves in their pew. She nodded, a little afraid. Even though he did not sound as fierce as he did when he took the pulpit, Lucy still felt afraid of him. Those eyes! They were too probing, too knowing. Lucas seemed to stiffen, and to Lucy, he looked afraid of what the reverend was going to say.

“I came back here to check on Lucas’s sermon. He is to take the pulpit in my stead this Sunday morning, and I am afraid he is ill prepared, having not committed his sermon to paper and to practice.”

Lucas, looking like a chastened schoolboy, shuffled his feet.

The reverend continued, his tone mocking. “Something about subduing the lust of the flesh, I should think. Avoiding the temptations of young she-devils. Young Bessie’s tale will serve as a suitable parable, I should think.”

A red-hot anger coursed through Lucy at the reverend’s words. Seeing Lucas’s misery was the only thing that kept her from screaming at the man. She wanted to rip and shred and tear at the reverend—just as his words had shredded her—no matter that he was a man of the cloth. Using Bessie as a parable, indeed! She clenched her fists tightly, her fingernails cutting into her skin.

“You’d best be getting back to your chores now,” the reverend said, his eyes boring deep into her. It was clear he wanted her to leave. “Idle hands are the devil’s tools.”

Lucy began to feel her way blindly out of the church. Just as she reached the door, the reverend called to her. “Lucy!”

Reluctantly, she turned around. The reverend stood at the altar, much as she had seen him every Sunday, dark, captivating, and forbidding, the weight of the Almighty behind him. Even without his clerical garb, he was frightening in his godly authority. “I shall ask Lucas to add one more thing to his sermon. It comes from the Book of Exodus.”

“Yes?” Lucy asked, desperate to leave the church.

“’He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall surely be put to death!’” He began to laugh.

With that, Lucy fled St. Peter’s, feeling his eyes boring into her every step of the way.

* * *

At dawn, Lucy awoke, a fantastic thought bouncing about in her head. Perhaps if she could find out more about the other girls, Effie and Jane, she could discover something new about Bessie’s death. Although she could almost hear Adam questioning her logic, Lucy believed in her heart that they were connected.

“Adam thinks so, too,” she whispered. The contents of his tobacco bag suggested this to be true. The murders had to be connected. Unless there truly were three monsters running about, as Dr. Larimer would believe. Lucy laughed uncomfortably to herself.

Still in her shift, she rummaged through her trunk and found the crumpled penny piece that related the sad but true tale of Effie’s murder. She smoothed it out and found what she was looking for. Queen’s Row in Southwark.

It seemed less risky to go to a stranger’s house in a distant part of London rather than to Jane Hardewick’s old employers, the Eltons, who might recognize her from church. “Since I’m planning to be a servant for hire, I can’t have them carrying tales back to the magistrate,” she said to herself. “I just need to find out how to find Queen’s Row.”

Before she could lose her nerve, Lucy tiptoed to the master’s private study. To her surprise, she saw a light from under the door. The magistrate must still be awake. Trying to avoid a pang of conscience, she filled a tray with some rolls, a bit of Cook’s jam, and a draft to keep the chill away. “Here you are, sir,” she said, placing the tray on his desk. As she suspected, he had not lit his hearth, and she bent quickly to take care of it.

“Oh, Lucy, I was just thinking how I’d like a bite to eat. These briefs can be quite dry and cumbersome. You must have read my mind.”

Madame Maraid’s knowing face, poised over her crystal, passed into Lucy’s thoughts. If he had been almost anyone else, she would have done the same silly impression of the fortune-teller. Instead, she suppressed a smile and concentrated on getting the information she needed from the magistrate. “Indeed, sir, ’twas no trouble. I’m sorry you’ve been up all night, sir.” Lucy fidgeted a moment, looking at the map on the wall behind him. The details were hard to make out from across the room.

“Yes, Lucy?” the master inquired politely, shifting the papers on his desk. He followed her gaze. “Ah, you are looking at the map of London.”

“Oh, well, sir, the map, sir,” she stumbled. “Well, I’ve never really looked at a map up close, sir. I’ve never put it all together.”

The magistrate put down the quill he had been rolling in his fingers and shook his head. “We must rectify this situation immediately. Come here, Lucy, let me show you how it all fits together.” He beckoned to her, and she shyly stood beside him.

“I don’t want to be a bother, sir. I can see you have work to do.”

“Pah!” he exclaimed. “I should rather talk about this map anytime.” He pointed to the middle of the map. “First, let me show you the Thames, one of the most important rivers in Europe. And here, you see”—he moved his hand toward the middle left—“is the original Old London, Londontown as the Romans called it.” As he talked, he grew more excited. “Have you ever seen the Roman wall? No? You must stop by, the next time you are at market. I would show you myself, had I the time. But I shall show you how to find the original fortresses.”

Quickly he pointed to the different parts of London, showing her the Tower of London, Whitehall, Buckingham Palace, St. Giles, and the main thoroughfares, Fleet Street, Newmarket, and Burrough High Street. “Here on the other side of the Thames, to the south”—he pointed at the bottom of the map—“is Winchester Palace, St. Mary Overy, Shakespeare’s Globe, and the Rose.”

“Where,” Lucy broke in, “would one find Lambeth Palace?” After he showed her, she ventured, “And how would one get there? Take London Bridge, I suppose?”

“Aye,” he agreed. Then he looked at her, his face grave. “How is your brother William holding up?”

Tears blurred her eyes. “He didn’t do it, sir! I know he didn’t.”

He nodded. His eyes were kind, but Lucy could tell he didn’t believe her.

* * *

As she walked to Southwark, Lucy worked out her story, munching on a bit of bread and cheese from a sack, thinking through her plan. Although a godly respectable household would be unlikely to take in a stranger with no references—indeed, even in the city, people looked askance at strangers outside the local community—she had thought of a way to get around that natural distrust.

Lucy had decided she would tell them her mum had died. Even thinking this terrible thought made her cross her heart and look for forgiveness toward the heavens. The fog that swirled about her was an ever-present witness to her feckless acts.

Before long she had crossed the Thames into south London. After pausing a moment to admire Lambeth Palace, she finally found her way to Walworth. She was terribly thirsty but had not seen any public wells along the way. She fingered the coins in her pocket. She hated to use them so frivolously, but she thought she might find a place to stop in for a pint and cool off.

There were a few shops and taverns, and she soon found the Elephant and Castle. A little nervous about being in a public house by herself, she scooted into a table in a dimly lit corner.

A tavern girl, little older than herself but far more worn in spirit, approached her with a friendly smile. “What will it be, miss?”

Lucy ordered a pint of ale and pulled out her bite of bread and cheese. Looking around the dimly lit pub, she saw there were only a handful of people in the room. There were a few women, Lucy was grateful to see, for she did not think her mother would approve if she could see her right now. A snatch of conversation from a group of young men in the corner caught her attention. Although they were not in scholars’ robes, she guessed they were students from Cambridge or Oxford.

“This was most certainly a stop in Canterbury Tales,” one man said, gesturing to the room. “Chaucer’s pilgrims were definitely here.”

Lucy looked around the room, noting the careworn timbers and uneven stone floor. She’d heard of Canterbury Tales, from listening to Sarah’s tutor. Indeed, these young men reminded her of him—young, passionate, conversant in literature and philosophy. Now they seemed to be debating whether Chaucer had been influenced by Aquinas, another scholar she had learned about from her brief time in Sarah’s classroom.

Lucy envied them. She’d seen a picture of Oxford once, and the image of its graceful spires had filled her with a great longing. Not just to see the university, though of course the notion drew her, but to be a part of it. To live and dream, to study and share her thoughts, to ponder the words of great men. Lucy scarcely dared to think of it. To be a man, to be a scholar—she could only imagine the freedom and the headiness of reading and writing without being encumbered by scullery duties.

The clamoring of nearby church bells brought Lucy up with a start. “Make haste, Lucy!” she scolded herself. “You’ve got work to do!”

Finding Effie’s house required a little ingenuity and even more luck. Lucy did not want to make it obvious that she was seeking Effie’s house specifically, so she found herself making conversation with different shopkeepers and sweeps to find their house. She didn’t want to raise anyone’s suspicions by her questions, or worse, become an object of gossip. She varied what she asked, taking different approaches that she thought would give her more information. To some, she pretended to be Effie’s cousin (“Oh, you poor thing!” the older women would cluck). To younger men sweeping stoops or working leather, she batted her lashes a bit, saying she was really hoping to find work in the neighborhood.

As she slowly gathered information, she finally stood before the house on Queen’s Row that the young tanner had pointed out to her. “They doubtless need help in that house,” he had said. Though the white house he indicated was one of the biggest on the street, the magistrate’s home was far more fine. “I know they’ve had a hard time keeping a serving lass since their one girl got herself killed.”

“Killed!” Lucy feigned surprise. “In the house?”

“Oh, no! Not in the house! In some park, she was!” Suitably impressed with himself, the boy added, “But don’t you worry, miss. I’ll be glad to keep watch, neighborly like, you understand. You won’t likely be running into the same fate poor Effie ran into, not when Roger is around!”

“Who killed her?” Lucy asked, as casually as she could. “The girl, I mean. Effie, did you say?”

Roger looked mysterious. “No one knows for sure. My money’s on the master. He’s a mean sort, he is.”

Lucy’s face blanched, but she kept walking, resolute. Roger, taking a moment to catch up, said, “Wait a minute. Maybe you’d best work somewhere else.”

“I’ll be fine,” Lucy said curtly, wanting to shake him off.

Roger even wanted to come to the house with her. That she could not let him do, of course. “Don’t you worry, Roger dear,” Lucy said, repeating firmly. “I’ll be fine.”

At his dismayed look, she added, “If I get the job at the house, maybe we can go walking where no one’s like to kill me.” Giving what she hoped was a sufficiently flirtatious giggle, Lucy walked away without looking back.

Going around back to the kitchen, she knocked firmly on the stout oak door. Just as she’d hoped, an elderly servant opened it. She looked cross and sweaty. “What do you want? We’ve no deliveries expected today.”

Bobbing a quick curtsy, Lucy took a deep breath. “If you please, ma’am. I am looking for work.”

The woman, who looked to be in her sixties, stared at her, mistrust evident in her wrinkled face. She sniffed. “Who was so bold as to send you to us in this manner? I was not aware the master had gotten around to hiring a new lass.”

Something flashed over the woman’s face. Something Lucy caught but could not quite grasp. Fear? No, it looked more like guilt, and it was gone in an instant.

Lucy gave her brightest smile. This was not going as she had hoped at all. “I know, Missus—?”

She waited for the servant to supply her name. When she didn’t, Lucy went on, her words more hurried. “Well, it’s like this. My mum did die, just a few weeks back, and my dad did run off when I was just a babe. She used to do some odd jobs, laundry, sewing, and the like, but now I’m out on my own. I just thought I could work here a few days, not for pay but for a bit of food. Then I could get a reference and maybe set myself up proper. I’m a hard worker, I am.”

Toward the end of her little speech, Lucy let her voice shake. The servant crossed her arms, filling the whole doorway. “The master, he ain’t running no charity here. You’d best be off to the poorhouse, then, or I’ll be calling for the constable. This ain’t the place for you. You’d best run off.”

“Missus Jones?” a man called from within the kitchen.

The servant stiffened, glaring at Lucy. “Now you’ve done it,” she whispered.

A heavyset man in his thirties appeared behind Missus Jones. “What have we here?” he asked.

“A girl, sir. Looking to work here. Without no friends or family to vouch for her, either.”

“Is that right?” he asked. His eyes were small and greedy, and his face was fleshy and round. The overall effect was that he looked like a pig her family had once owned.

Lucy nodded. “Just for a little while, in exchange for food and a good reference, so I can get set up proper. I had heard you might be needing a maid.”

The man laughed in a way that made Lucy nervous. “Yes, that’s true. I think you’ll do just fine. Come on in. I’m Anders, Samuel Anders.”

“And does the young lady,” the servant nearly spit out, “have a name?”

This Lucy had already prepared. “Sarah Johnson,” she said quickly. “My mum and me, we used to live by Walworth. I’ve lots of neighbors who can vouch for me there.”

The man laughed. She was starting to wonder what she had gotten herself into. “Jones here, she can show you around. Do some scullery tasks for her; the good Lord knows we haven’t had the grates and pots cleaned in some time. Then, in about two hours’ time, come see me, and we’ll decide about your reference.”

Lucy spent the next two hours scrubbing and cursing herself. Jones seemed to take a great pleasure in bringing her the most disgusting things to clean. What maid in her right mind would go do another full day’s work for free?

After a while, Jones left Lucy to her efforts. By comparison, the pots at the magistrate’s house were a pleasure to clean and polish. This house, too, was somber and chilly, and compared ill to the magistrate’s warm and cheerful household.

Finally, Jones came back in with a pot of tea and some hard rolls. “I reckon you’ve worked hard enough,” she said gruffly. “Come sit with me.”

Lucy sat down, holding her cup of tea gratefully in her cold fingers, well aware of Jones’s scrutiny.

“I’m wondering why you came to this house. Surely, other homes are closer?”

Taking a bite of the roll, Lucy just shrugged. “I did hear tell that a maid who had worked here left sudden-like. So I thought—”

“Left sudden-like!” Jones exclaimed. “You cannot tell me that is what they”—she gestured angrily at the other homes on the street visible through the window—“are saying.”

“Yes, all right. I did hear that your maid—Effie, was it?—had been killed. In a field some miles off…?”

Unexpectedly, Jones seemed to choke up. “The girl was dirt stupid, that’s true enough. To run off with a lover? I do not believe it to be true. More like run off from him!” she hissed.

“Him?” Lucy asked. “Who? I don’t understand.”

“The master, of course. I knew it was only a matter of time before she fled. Taking up with all sorts, she was. I thought for a time she’d even become one of those dratted Quakers, but she was hardly the godly sort, if you catch my drift. Still, she did not deserve what happened here, or in that there field. The master, he did on more than one occasion—”

She broke off, hearing a door shutting in the hallway. Lucy looked at her in sudden fear. “He’ll be waiting for you. If you want a good reference, best do what he asks. Better yet, take yourself out of here, fast as you can. Make your bed, as it were.”

Afraid, all Lucy wanted to do was to bolt out of the kitchen and run all the way back to the magistrate’s household. Yet if she wanted answers, this was the best chance. “I think I’d like the reference,” she said.

Jones’s face was set back in her hard mask. “Suit yourself. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

She went into Anders’s drawing room, noting with distaste how dirty it all was. The dust was thick, the grate had not been cleaned, and the chairs looked in sad array. Clearly, little effort had been made to keep the house tidy.

Anders cleared his throat, sounding a bit like a bullfrog Lucy would hear at the lake. “Jones tells me you’ve been cleaning pots all morning and have met Jones’s particular standards. I can assure you, she is most discerning.”

Lucy somehow doubted that, but who would turn down free labor?

“However, I must see you clean before I can lend my good name to a recommendation. I see you still have your apron on, and a clean rag. Let me see you clean that grate. On your hands and knees, my lass.” He laughed jovially.

She looked at the grate and back at Anders. He was perspiring. Lucy remembered the stable, and what had nearly happened there. Shakily, she knew no one would heed her screams. Missus Jones was not like to help. It was bad enough for a young woman without a friend in the world, but for an old woman that could be the end. Jones probably overlooked her master’s transgressions. Perhaps that was why she looked guilty when she mentioned Effie. Poor Effie! Had she been trying to escape the master’s household when death caught up with her anyway?

Anxious to get away herself, Lucy began to cast about for an excuse to leave the room. “Let me get a bin,” she suggested, trying to stall. “This grate looks like it has not been cleaned in some time.”

“Never mind the bin,” Anders said, his voice growing gruff and his body flushed. “Lift your skirts.” He lunged toward her, his movements bovine and lumbering. Lucy nimbly jumped aside, but he still stood between her and the door.

“Help!” she screamed. “Oh, help!”

“There’s no one to help you, my dear. Do let me take this moment”—he grabbed her with great meaty hands—“to thank you for first servicing my house and then servicing me. It’s been so long since my Effie left. I’ve been craving female company.”

Hoping to divert him, she screamed, “Was it you? You who killed Effie? That’s what they all think, you know!”

Momentarily startled, he stopped. “What?” he roared. “I did not kill Effie! ’Twas those damn Quakers, I have no doubt! Why would I kill the best lay I’m likely to get—”

His face, already a mottled purple, started to twitch. Dropping her arms, he began to claw at his throat, gasping for air, flopping about on the floor. “Did—not—kill—Effie.” He groaned softly, spittle dropping from his lips.

Hesitantly, Lucy looked at him. “Uh, Missus Jones?” she called.

The door opened. The servant must have been listening at the door. She came in and calmly regarded Anders, who was still twitching, but less violently than before. They both watched him in silence. Then he stopped.

“Is he dead?” Lucy whispered.

“Let us hope so.” Jones bent over the body. “He’s not breathing, and I can’t hear his heart. Good thing, bloody bastard.” She straightened up and glared at Lucy. “Look, girl. He was a bad one, he was. I heard you asking him about Effie, and I don’t know why. I will tell you, though, that there’s no way that he, bullying coward that he was, told you a lie on his deathbed. He didn’t kill her.”

Lucy gulped. “Do you know who did it, then?”

“One of those blasted Quakers. She was mad about one of them, stupid git. Didn’t know, did she, they’re all touched in the head. Found out too late, didn’t she.” Jones shook her finger at Lucy. “Best you count yourself lucky and hightail it back to where you came, and pretend you never set foot in this misbegotten house. I’ve some things to take care of here.”

Lucy got her meaning full and clear. Jones wanted Lucy to go so she could pick through Anders’s belongings for anything of worth, a common enough practice, to be sure. Indeed, Jones had already pulled out a sack and started to fill it with things she could easily peddle. Likely as not, she’d tell no one of Anders’s death until she had near robbed him blind. She could clear out, a richer woman than she’d ever been, with none the wiser about her criminal misdeed.

Lucy fled, saying a small prayer for Effie, who had not been protected as she should have been. As she passed the Thames, she longed to jump in and wash away the vile aura that enclosed her.