‘Let’s smash it open,’ Barak said.
I hesitated. ‘No. This should be opened in the presence of Maleverer.’ I stared at the box.
‘That apprentice must have known it was here, whether by spying through his master’s keyhole or some other means.’
‘He can’t have told them at St Mary’s or they’d have been after it. I can understand the searchers missing it yesterday, it is well hidden.’
‘But why hasn’t the apprentice told them? You saw him, he was terrified.’
‘Maleverer left before he could question him. Come, the sooner this goes back to St Mary’s the better.’
Barak frowned. ‘What’s that noise?’ He stood and went to the window. A loud murmuring was audible from outside. I joined him. Goodwife Byland was standing there, weeping on the shoulder of another woman. Three or four other women stood around, with half a dozen men, shopkeepers by the look of them. I saw three blue-coated apprentices join the group.
‘Damn it,’ I breathed. ‘The housekeeper’s roused the neighbours.’
‘Let’s get out the back way.’
I tucked the box under Master Wrenne’s coat, glad now of its voluminous folds, and followed Barak down the stairs. But there was no escape. The housekeeper had left the door open and as soon as we reached the bottom of the staircase we were visible to the crowd. An apprentice pointed at us. ‘Look, that’s them.’
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Put on a bold face.’ I stepped out, remembering with sinking heart that I did not have my commission with me. ‘What is this commotion?’ I asked, adopting a stern tone.
A shopkeeper in a leather apron stepped forward. He had the scarred hands of a glazier and carried a wooden stave in his hand. ‘Who art tha? What business hast tha in that house?’ he asked angrily. ‘My friend Peter Oldroyd is dead and the King’s men take licence to knock his house and servants about. Poor Goodwife Byland is scared out of her wits.’
‘I am a lawyer sent from St Mary’s. We merely wished to check the house was in order.’ It sounded lame even to me.
‘Crawling hunchback,’ an apprentice called out, to murmurs of approval. Barak laid a hand on his sword, but I shook my head. If this crowd turned violent we could be in trouble. I looked up and down the street, hoping to see one of the guards or constables, but there was none in sight.
I raised a hand. ‘Listen, please. I am sorry for the damage that has been done here. I have had no part of it. I am sorry if we frightened the good woman there. But there are enquiries into Master Oldroyd’s affairs –’
‘What enquiries?’ the glazier said. ‘Peter was a good man, he did none wrong.’
‘I cannot say more. And now, please let us pass.’
The glazier tightened his hold on his club. ‘Where’s thy papers? Come on, tha awd scrat! King’s men all have papers!’
‘Mebbe they’re thieves!’ someone called out.
I glanced over the hostile crowd, looking for Master Dike, the glazier I had met yesterday. He could at least vouch I had made enquiries on behalf of the King. But he was not there.
I took a deep breath. ‘Let us pass,’ I said curtly, taking a step forward. Neither the glazier nor the rest of the crowd budged an inch. That meant we were in real trouble. Then a stone, thrown by someone at the back of the crowd, struck me painfully on the arm that held the box under my coat. My arm jerked and the box dropped to the pavement with a clatter.
‘Thieves!’ someone called out. ‘They are thieves!’ Another stone struck Barak on the shoulder, and the crowd surged forward, pressing us against the wall of the house. The glazier raised his stave, and I braced myself for the blow.
Chapter Eleven
‘STOP!’
A fierce shout, in a deep voice I recognized. The glazier lowered his stave. Looking past him I saw Giles Wrenne’s tall head as he shouldered his way though the crowd.
‘Sir!’ I called out. ‘I have never been so glad to see anybody!’
The old man stepped in front of us, placing himself between us and the crowd. He looked impressive in a robe with a fur trim, his best no doubt, and a black cap with a red feather. ‘What is happening here?’ he asked the glazier sharply. ‘Master Pickering, what are you doing?’
‘These men were in Peter Oldroyd’s house, maister! The hunchback says he’s a lawyer, but I say they’re thieves.’ He pointed to the painted box lying at my feet. ‘He had that hidden under his robe.’
Wrenne looked at the box with a puzzled frown, then sharply at me.
‘We were on King’s business, sir,’ I said. I felt myself reddening.
Wrenne then raised himself to his full impressive height and addressed the crowd. ‘You all know me here in Stonegate! I can vouch for this man. He is a lawyer sent to work with me on the petitions to the King. I will deal with this!’
The crowd muttered, but the heat had gone out of them. Faces began to look worried as it sank in that they had been about to assault an officer of the crown. The apprentices who had thrown the stones sidled away. Barak glared at them, rubbing his shoulder. ‘Arseholes,’ he muttered.
Wrenne put his hand on Pickering’s shoulder. ‘Come now, sir. Leave this to me. Return to thy shop, you will be losing business.’
‘What business that is left for us with all the religious houses gone,’ the glazier answered, casting me a bitter look. ‘Peter Oldroyd is well out of it, God rest him.’
‘Ay, ay.’
‘The people here are angry, Maister Wrenne. Half their trade gone, then Peter dead while working for the King and all they can do is send soldiers to wreck his house and scarify his servants.’ He glanced at where Goodwife Byland was looking on with a haggard, tear-stained face. ‘And young Green that’s nowt but a good-natured lump of a lad, hauled off and locked up at St Mary’s.’
‘I heard. I came this way to find out what was happening. But none of this is Master Shardlake’s fault. Come now, let us pass. Pick up that box, young Barak.’
Much to my relief, the crowd parted to let us through. Wrenne went over to where a young lad stood staring wide-eyed at the scene. He held the reins of a donkey weighed down with heavy panniers; the petitions, no doubt.
‘Come, Adam,’ Wrenne said. The boy patted the donkey on the rump to set it going. As we walked away he gave Wrenne a questioning look. ‘You did well to stay calm, lad,’ Wrenne said to him. He turned to us. ‘My kitchen-boy. He’s been pestering me to let him see the preparations at King’s Manor.’
I nodded. I felt a score of eyes on our backs and breathed more easily as we passed the church and the Guildhall came into view across the square at the top of Stonegate. ‘I thank you with all my heart, sir,’ I said. ‘If you had not come by I fear what might have happened to us.’
‘Ay,’ Barak agreed. ‘They had started throwing stones. I have seen what can happen when a London crowd start doing that to some foreigner.’
Wrenne looked at him seriously. ‘Which is much how they see you, I fear. Feeling in Stonegate has been much stirred by what happened yesterday. It has become the talk of the town. That is why I took this way round to St Mary’s this morning, to see what was going on.’
‘The blame was Maleverer’s,’ I observed. ‘And he is a Yorkshireman.’
‘He is on the Council of the North, and so far as the Yorkers are concerned that means he is a King’s man.’ He shook his head. ‘He is too rough in his ways.’
I sighed. ‘I have to see him later.’
‘In connection with that?’ He nodded at the box, which Barak held clasped to his chest. ‘You found that at Oldroyd’s house?’
‘Yes. Yes, we did.’
‘What is it, if I might ask?’
‘We do not know. We are taking it back to Sir William.’
He looked at me sharply. ‘Something the poor apprentice told them about, at St Mary’s?’
‘I may not say, sir. And we do not know what is inside, it is locked.’
Wrenne looked at the box again, but said no more. We walked on to St Mary’s. Master Wrenne walked slowly, remarkable though he otherwise seemed for his age. Young Sergeant Leacon was still at his post at the gate, and I asked him whether Sir William had returned, noticing as I did so that Wrenne gave him a curious look.