‘What else? There must have been more than that.’
‘She said she’d been dismissed and she couldn’t go home. One look at her with the belly starting to bulge and you could see why.’
‘Was that all she said?’
Davidson scratched his head again, a fingernail digging into the scalp for lice.
‘Aye, there was summat odd, I suppose. She said he’d find her if she went home.’
‘Who?’
‘I didn’t ask. It didn’t seem to matter.’ He took another drink then poured himself more of the ale.
‘If you didn’t think anyone would want her, why did you take her on?’
‘I told you, we’d just come to Leeds ourselves. I thought she might bring in a little. Besides, our Sarah felt sorry for her.’
‘And are you always so kindhearted, Mr Davidson?’ the Constable asked.
The pimp stared at him. ‘Mebbe I was a bit when I came here. Not now. It’s a cruel place, is Leeds.’
‘What happened when she was hurt?’
‘The lasses brought her back here and cleaned her up. Whoever he was, he’d done a right job on her face, it were all bloody and swollen up. Sarah looked after her, sat up with her all night.’
‘What about the next day? Was she willing to go out again?’
Davidson shook his head. ‘She didn’t want to. She was scared. Offered to stop here and clean for us instead. Look at me, Mr Nottingham.’ He opened his arms appealingly and glanced around the room. ‘Do you think I’d know what to do with a servant girl? So she went back out with our Sarah and Fanny.’
‘But she didn’t come back.’
‘No. When they were done they went looking for her, but she’d gone. Not seen her since.’
‘You didn’t search for her?’ Nottingham wondered.
Davidson shrugged. ‘What for? I thought she’d decided I were right and she wasn’t made to be a whore. Best to let it be.’
The Constable stared at the man. His leg might stop him moving fast but he had a large pair of fists that could damage a girl. His tale seemed plausible enough but he still wanted to talk to the girls.
‘You’d better be telling me the truth,’ he said finally.
‘I am, Constable. I told you, ask me sisters.’
He found them down by the bridge, standing close to the old chantry chapel. He could hear the yells of the men from the barges out on the river, loading cloth from the warehouses that would end up in more countries than he could name.
The girls were easy to spot, with the same pinched, hungry faces as Davidson, looking as if youth had been drained from them too early. They were standing together and talking, warily eyeing the men who passed. A few weeks before they’d probably had an air of innocence but it had already been rubbed off them, leaving their mouths and eyes hard. He walked up to them and the taller one turned, appraising him quickly.
‘We’re only looking for gentlemen today, love,’ she told him.
‘I think you’ll talk to me,’ he said with a friendly smile.
‘Oh aye?’ she asked cockily. ‘Why’s that, then?’
‘Because I’m the Constable of the City.’
The girls looked at each other with the kind of quick, silent conversation only sisters could manage. He’d seen it in his own daughters when Rose was alive.
‘We heard you said this was all right unless we caused trouble,’ the girl said.
‘It is,’ he agreed, keeping his voice light. ‘But I need to ask you some questions. You’re Sarah?’
The taller one hesitated then gave a brief nod.
‘I need to know about a girl called Lucy.’
Sarah sighed. ‘What about her? She were hardly with us long enough to draw breath.’
He asked what he needed to. Everything they answered echoed Davidson’s words. Lucy had been a timid little thing, hadn’t talked much. With her face and the signs of a baby on the way they knew not many would want her, but she might have made enough to keep body and soul together. They’d looked after the girl when she was hurt, bathed her face and tried to ease her tears.
‘She said she didn’t want to go home?’
‘Aye, that’s right,’ Fanny said. ‘She said he’d find her there.’
‘Who would?’ Nottingham asked.
The girls shrugged together.
‘Her business,’ Sarah said. ‘If she’d wanted to tell us, she would have.’
‘Who beat her? Was it your brother?’
The girls glanced one to the other and started to laugh.
‘Mister,’ Sarah told him, ‘it weren’t our Joshua. He wouldn’t dare raise his hand to a lass. I’d kill him mesen if he tried. I know what he seems like, but he’s soft as summer butter.’
‘It was someone she was with,’ Fanny interrupted. ‘Hit her all round the face. Thought it should have been free wi’ her. Poor thing cried half the night.’ She paused. ‘She weren’t made for this. I’m not sure she were made for anything.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, she had the lip.’ She stared at him to be certain he understood her. ‘And mister, she were simple. Didn’t know what you meant half the time, you had to show her. And then there were the babby. No lass should have all that,’ she said seriously. ‘It were like God hated her.’ She blushed and looked down.
‘What about when she left?’ he asked gently.
‘She came out with us the second day,’ Sarah said. ‘She didn’t want to, not after what had happened, but it’s like Joshua told her, you have to make money to eat. We left her here and that was it. She never came back.’
‘You didn’t look for her?’
Her eyes widened, surprised by the question. ‘Why? She weren’t one of ours.’
Davidson’s tale hadn’t fully convinced him. It had slid too glibly off his tongue. This was different, though. He’d no doubt the sisters could lie with the best of them when it suited them, but what they’d told him had the stark, spare ring of honesty. And it left him little further along.
Rob had watched the dark blue of evening turn to thick black on the western horizon. He’d already made his first rounds with the men, seeing everything quiet in the inns and alehouses. It was still early in the week and people didn’t have enough money left to cause trouble. That would come after they were paid on Friday or Saturday.
He knew the smells of Leeds at night now. They weren’t as strong as in daylight, the shit of carters’ horses worked hard into the street and dried, the harsh steel tang of blood around the Shambles fading with nightfall, the rank stink of unwashed bodies now locked behind closed doors.
He made his way down to the river, hearing the water flowing and seeing a pair of fires glowing on the bank, looking for all the world like an entrance to hell. The sight made him think of tales of the gabble ratchets his governess had scared him with when he was young. Looking around, he half expected to see the eyes of the dogs made by the devil from the souls of children who’d died before they could be baptized. Instead he saw faces: people who had arrived a month or so before with the first warmth of spring. He’d met them on their first night, just men and women who had nothing, keeping each other safe in the darkness and looking for fitful work in the city or the country that surrounded it.
There were more of them now, maybe forty in all, a mix of the wounded and the weary, the hopeless and the defeated. The trust had vanished from their eyes, and the love from their hearts. They left with the dawn, only coming back when dusk fell.
They kept the fires burning all through the night, sleeping close to the flames for warmth and protection. The men kept cudgels close to hand to fight off the drunks who came for sport or rape.
One man stood as Rob approached. He was slight, his hair lank, but he stood out from the others, wearing clothes that had he kept carefully clean, his boots shiny from spit and effort. His right arm was withered, wasted and useless, life’s dark joke that would always be with him.