“Why are those men after you?”
“It’s a little disagreement over property, you might say.”
“You stole from them.”
Jack opened his mouth. His brows widened. “Now why is that the first thing you think about me?” He thrust his fist into his hip. “I get into a little bit of trouble and you think I’ve gone and cut a purse.”
“Well? Did you?”
“Ain’t that beside the point?”
Beneath Crispin’s window, the men grumbled as they waited, and Crispin peered out again, observing them. Martin Kemp, Crispin’s landlord, opened his shop door a crack. The meek tinker made his polite inquiries. And then the men answered. Crispin couldn’t hear the words exactly, but their voices rose in volume as each side argued their case. The shrill voice that joined the others could only be Martin’s wife, Alice. Crispin winced at the sound filtering up through the timbers. Her appearance only made things worse and, against Martin’s protest, the men finally pushed past him. All of them rumbled up Crispin’s stairs, still arguing.
Jack sprinted toward the other window facing the back courtyard. “Sorry, Master. Must go. We’ll talk later.” He quickly pushed opened the shutter and looked back apologetically toward Crispin. Scrambling out the window, Jack leaped down to the next building and minced across the rooftops.
Crispin closed both windows and made a contrite smile to the girl who didn’t seem to understand or care what was happening.
His door suddenly shuddered under pounding fists. Steeling himself, he unbolted and yanked open the door, filling the threshold with indignation. “What is the meaning of this?”
The gathering pulled up short. Clearly they did not expect Crispin or his refined accent. Two strangers—one thin and golden-haired and the other short and robust with dark, bushy brows—stood on the landing beside the tinker Martin Kemp and his wife. “We beg your pardon, good sir,” said the blond-haired man, making a curt bow, “but we were chasing a thief and have good reason to believe he came this way.”
Crispin kicked the door wider so they could see into the sparse room. “Does it look like he’s here?”
They stared at the girl—eyes wide, mouth gaping—and then at Crispin. “No sir,” said the man with the bushy brows. He scanned the room again, and gave a resigned nod.
The tinker’s wife, Alice, pushed forward. “He’s here. Mark me.”
The bushy-browed man frowned at Alice and then at Crispin. “Sir,” he said, “if that boy is here we demand you surrender him to us. He’s a thief and we’re here to see he gets his just punishment.”
“Nonsense. This is my entire lodgings. Do you suggest he is hiding in the walls?”
As one, they all leaned down to look under the pallet bed—the only likely place left.
A solitary chamber pot sat in the shadows.
The bushy-browed man huffed with disappointment and they all straightened again.
Alice postured. “He’ll hang from the highest gibbet, if I have my way.”
“Hush, dear,” said the tinker out of the side of his mouth. His leather cap, snug against his head, trembled with agitation.
The men muttered together until the bushy-browed man finally said, “We’ll trouble you no more, sir. Our apologies. God keep you.” They bowed to him and the girl, gave Alice a scathing look, and slowly retreated down the stairs.
Martin and Alice remained on the landing.
Crispin glanced back at the girl. Clients were few and far between and the rent—as always—was late. If this girl could name the killer like she said, it could mean a reward from the sheriff. He studied her simpleton’s face and clenched his teeth.
If there was a body.
He tried to close the door, but Alice Kemp put out a large hand and stopped it. “That is the third time this week that boy has been in trouble,” she said, voice rising like a banshee. “I should call the sheriff on him.”
“Now my dear,” said Martin. His slim frame did not seem a match for Alice’s plumpness. Crispin knew the tinker could swing a hammer with all grace and skill, but could not seem to manage his wife. “There’s no need for that. Crispin can take care of any difficulty, can’t you, Crispin?”
The last was a plea and Crispin nodded. “Yes, Mistress Kemp. I will do my best.”
“Your best! Ha! Your best is piss poor.” She eyed the girl. “And this had better be a client, Crispin Guest, for I’ll have none of your whoring under my roof.”
“Madam!” He sputtered and drew up, glaring down his sharp nose at her. “This young woman is a client,” he said, teeth clenched, “but not for long if you persist. If you want your rent on time—” He jabbed his open hand toward the door, urging her out.
Martin paled and yanked his wife back out of the threshold. Crispin slammed the door and threw the bolt. He breathed through his nostrils at the wood, and listened as their steps disappeared downward. He counted to ten, turned back to the room, and tried to grin, but the throbbing in his head would not allow it. “I apologize,” he said tightly. “That was my landlord . . . and his wife.” He said the last with bared teeth. He gestured uselessly toward the closed window. “And the boy was Jack Tucker. He insists on calling himself my servant but I’m afraid he is more suited to the vocation of a cutpurse.”
The girl did not change expression. She merely lifted her upswept nose. Her eyes were gray like Crispin’s but more watery than his slate, and for all her steady gaze, there seemed little sense behind those eyes.
He gave up.
“We were speaking of a dead man,” he said quietly. “And his killer. You say you know who it is.”
“Livith wasn’t there,” she repeated.
“No, she wasn’t there. You said that.” He groaned and slowly blinked. This was going to take all day. “Does anyone else know this man is in your room?”
She shook her head. “I wanted your help.”
“You have it. Who killed him?”
“I shouldn’t say—”
“Are you protecting someone?”
“It ain’t like that.” She sucked on her dirty index finger.
“If you know who did it then you must tell me.”
Her face crumpled and tears spilled down her apple cheeks. She pulled her finger from her mouth and dropped her hand to her lap. In a small voice she said, “I did.”
2
CRISPIN DID HIS BEST to settle his expression into something bland and unthreatening. He looked her slight frame up and down. She was a hand span shorter than Jack Tucker, who was another hand span shorter than Crispin. “You killed him?”
“Aye. I must have, mustn’t I? I was the only one there.” She wiped her moist nose with her fingers.
He sat on the chair and pulled it up to her, looking her in the eye. “It doesn’t necessarily follow that you killed him.”
“But I did!” Her wide eyes darted, lighting here and there in the room, never finding a resting place. “I must have.”
“Did he attack you?”
“No.”
He watched her lip tremble, and a tear rolled with ferocity down her cheek, dragging a dirty trail with it. “I think it best we go to your lodgings and discover what we can. Maybe your sister has returned.”
“Aye!” She jumped to her feet and pushed him out of the way to get to the door. “Maybe she’s back.”
She unbolted the door and scurried over the threshold. Crispin watched her descend the stairs. He settled his cloak over his shoulders, locked the door, and tromped down the steps after her.
The midmorning shadows hatched the lane, leaving some puddles to catch the blue-tinted sky while others reflected a dull gray. A man with a pushcart of bundled sticks heaved his charge over the muddy ruts, swearing colorfully to the saints as he did so. A dog sniffed at his heel at first and then trotted onward to lift his leg at the first rung of Crispin’s stair.