‘I want to ask you about two days ago.’ I looked into the boy’s dirty face. He stank mightily. He was even younger than I had thought, no more than thirteen or so. ‘Just information, you are not accused of anything. It could be useful to me.’ I produced another sixpence from my purse.
‘What is this about?’ Barak asked, puzzled. ‘He tried to rob Tamasin.’
‘What is your name, lad?’ I asked, ignoring Barak.
‘Steven Hawkcliffe, maister.’ The boy’s accent was so thick it was hard to understand him. ‘It weren’t a real robbery,’ he said. ‘She asked us to pretend to steal her basket.’
‘The girl?’
‘Ay, ay. My friend John and I were begging in the streets, trying to get what we could before we were thrown out of t’city. The girl came up to us and asked us to pretend to rob her. Her bodyservant that was with her, he wasn’t happy but she made him go to a shop and pretend to buy something. It weren’t robbery, maister.’
Barak jerked the boy round to face him. ‘You’d better tell the truth, or I’ll chop you smaller than herbs for the pot. Why would the girl do that?’
‘She said she wanted to attract the attention of a man who would be passing soon. ’Tis true, maister,’ he added, suddenly tearful. ‘She bade us wait in the mouth of the ginnel till she called. She did, and I pretended to try and take her bag, but I didn’t pull it hard. Then you came rushing over with your sword. That scared us and we ran.’
Barak frowned mightily. He could see the boy was telling the truth.
‘Where are you from, lad?’ I asked.
‘Northallerton, maister. There’s no work there, my mate John and I came to York but ended by begging.’
‘Where are the beggarmasters taking you?’
‘We’re being put on the road. We’ve to be ten miles from York by Friday. The infirm are hidden away at Merchant Taylors Hall but all who can walk are to go out. And not even any houses of religion left where we can claim doles.’ He looked at me, dark blue eyes wide in his grimy face. I sighed, but replaced the sixpence and brought out a shilling, making sure my back was to the beggarmasters. ‘Here. Don’t let them see.’
‘Thanks, maister,’ the boy muttered. I waved the beggar-master across and handed the boy over.
‘What the fuck was Tamasin playing at?’ Barak asked after they had gone. His face was furious.
‘I don’t know. I felt something was not right, but held my tongue.’ I looked at him. ‘Now, though, I will have to ask her. In case this was a ploy to get to know me.’
Barak looked surprised. ‘You? But it is me she has been after.’
‘It is me who is responsible for the welfare of an important prisoner. I have to discover what this is all about, Barak.’
He nodded. ‘May I ask one thing? Don’t report her to that Marlin woman. Not yet. Question her yourself –’
‘I intend to. Mistress Marlin herself has connections to a suspected conspirator.’
‘Shit. You don’t think…’
‘I don’t know what to think. But I must find out. Now come, let us see what has happened at Oldroyd’s house before too many people are abroad.’ I fingered the key in my pocket, glad Maleverer had not asked for it back.
THE SHOPS WERE OPENING as we walked down Stonegate. The shopkeepers glanced at us coldly and I felt eyes following us down the street. I wondered if a guard might have been left at the house but there was no one outside. Shutters had been drawn across the windows. The door was locked; Maleverer must have found another key inside the property. I unlocked it.
With the shutters closed it was dim inside. Barak stepped across the room and threw them open wide. Then we both jumped convulsively at a loud yell of distress from behind us.
In the light we saw the room was in chaos. The buffet had been pulled away from the wall, chairs and settles and table lay overturned. In the midst of all, in a truckle bed before the hearth, a plump middle-aged woman in a white nightcap and nightgown sat up. She screamed again, fit to shake the rafters.
I made a soothing gesture. ‘Madam, please. We mean no harm! We did not know anyone was here.’ But she went on yelling, her eyes wide with fear, until Barak stepped forward and gave her a slap across the face. She stopped, put her hand to her cheek, then burst out crying.
‘God’s mercy,’ Barak said. ‘You’ll wake the dead. We told you, we mean no harm.’
The woman’s sobs subsided and she pulled the thin blanket up around her neck. I felt sorry for her. She looked utterly helpless sitting there, a red mark now on her cheek. I noticed her clothes were folded by the bed. ‘Are you Master Oldroyd’s housekeeper?’ I asked.
‘Ay, maister,’ she answered tremulously. ‘Kat Byland. Art tha King’s men?’
‘Yes. Please, compose yourself. Barak, let us step into the passage a moment, allow this good woman to dress.’
We went and stood in the hall. From within came a creak, then a muted sobbing as the housekeeper sought her clothes. ‘I’m sorry I had to slap her,’ Barak muttered. ‘It was the only way to silence her before she roused the neighbourhood.’
I nodded. After a minute the housekeeper opened the door. Her face was unutterably weary. ‘We wish to cause you no more trouble, madam,’ I said. ‘We need merely to look upstairs for something.’
She sat on the bed again. ‘I can’t tell you any more than I told Sir William yesterday. I knew nothing of poor Maister Oldroyd’s affairs, God rest his gentle soul.’ She made the sign of the cross, then looked miserably around the wreckage. ‘See what they did to his house, they turned the yard inside out too. And poor young Paul taken and locked up, that never hurt a fly. I don’t understand any of it.’
‘If you know nothing, you will come to no harm.’
She raised an arm, then let it fall in a helpless gesture. ‘I ought to set all this to rights. But for who?’ She gave a despairing laugh. ‘There’s no one left.’
We left her and mounted the stairs. The doors to both bedrooms were open and both, like the hall, had been turned upside down. We stepped into Oldroyd’s room. The bed had been overturned and the chests up-ended, Oldroyd’s clothes strewn around. The wall-hanging had been torn down and lay in a heap. The wall behind was of painted wooden panels.
‘No sign of anything there,’ Barak said. ‘What were you hoping for, an alcove?’
‘Something, at least.’ I stepped to the area the boy’s eyes had gone to yesterday and tried tapping the wall. It sounded solid enough, it was a supporting wall between Oldroyd’s house and the next one. Barak joined me, bending down and tapping the panels.
‘Aha, what’s this?’ he said.
I knelt beside him. He tapped again at a panel by the floor. It sounded different, hollow. I felt the edges with my fingers. There were a series of recesses cut into the wood of the joist, just big enough to slip fingernails into. I pulled gently, and the panel came out of little grooves that held it into the wood and fell on the floor, exposing a hollow space behind. It was skilfully done; but then, I reflected, poor Oldroyd had been a craftsman.
We looked inside. A space, perhaps eighteen inches square. And, almost filling it, a box. I pulled it out. It was a foot square, strongly made from some dark wood, the lid beautifully painted with a scene of Diana the huntress, her bow and arrow raised at a stag. It was the sort of box a wealthy woman might keep her jewels in. I noted the paint was faded; the huntress’s dress and indeed the whole design of the box were in the fashion of a hundred years ago, before the Wars between the Two Roses. Barak whistled.
‘You were right. We’ve got something.’
‘It’s very light,’ I said. ‘But I think there’s something inside.’ I grasped the lid, but it would not budge and I saw there was a strong lock. I shook the box, but heard no sound.