‘Very well,’ I said to my companion. ‘Now you can show me the house in the Strand where Mistress St Clair and her husband live; then we’ll retrace our footsteps back to the city, to Needlers Lane.’
At my request, we walked the whole length of the Strand as far as the Chère Reine Cross, because I wished to renew my acquaintance with this part of London-Without-the-Walls, where the tentacles of the city were creeping further and further into the countryside between the capital and Westminster. Then we walked back again.
On our right were some of the finest houses in and around London – magnificent four-storey affairs with well-tended gardens running down to their own water-steps and landing stages on the Thames. Mansions, I suppose, would not have been too strong a word for many of them. Here, the great palace of the Savoy had once stood before it was destroyed during the insurrection of the peasants almost a hundred years before.
At the Fleet Street end, however, were three smaller houses; still handsome, but modest by comparison with the rest: they lacked a storey and were narrower in width. Nevertheless, the gardens were just as pleasant, and the overall impression was of money, possibly hard-earned, but plenty of it and well spent.
‘I think Master Plummer said one of those three belongs to Mistress St Clair.’ Bertram rubbed his nose apprehensively. ‘But I’m not sure which. The middle one, I think.’
‘Don’t worry. We’ll soon find out.’ I smiled at him, not displeased that he seemed a little wary of my displeasure. (I judged him to be a youth who could easily get too cocky.) ‘But first we’re going to pick up my pack and cudgel at the Voyager and then we’ll pay a visit to Needlers Lane.’
Three
In the event, I paid the visit alone, leaving young Master Serifaber to kick his heels in the ale room of the Voyager until my return.
Upon reflection, I had decided that it might be as well not to advertise – at least, not immediately – the Duke of Gloucester’s interest in this affair, which my companion’s blue and murrey livery, together with the badge of the White Boar, most certainly would do.
‘Just to begin with, I’ll spy out the lie of the land on my own,’ I told him.
‘I’ve been instructed to help you,’ Bertram complained fretfully. ‘After all, I’m supposed to be the spy.’
‘You’re a novice at this game, my lad,’ I retorted, ‘and don’t you forget it. You’re here to do my bidding. And if I have any nonsense, you’ll find yourself back at Baynard’s Castle quicker than you can blink. I don’t think Master Plummer would be very pleased about that, do you?’
He grumbled mutinously under his breath, but was forced to cave in.
I patted his shoulder. ‘I can’t conceal Duke Richard’s involvement for long,’ I consoled him. ‘Then you shall live in my pocket.’
He grinned at that and took himself off to sample Reynold Makepeace’s best ale with the money I had given him as a bribe for his good behaviour. I crossed the road and turned into Needlers Lane. A quick enquiry of a passer-by elicited the fact that Broderer’s workshop was on the right-hand side, at the far end, where the street we were in joined Soper Lane.
It wasn’t difficult to find. Not only was it the largest workshop in the vicinity, but it had an imposing sign above the door, bearing the somewhat faded, but still readable legend ‘EDMUND BRODERER’ in red paint. I hitched up my pack and went inside.
I knew nothing about embroidery, but I didn’t need to in order to understand that this was a thriving business. A first, cursory glance suggested that there were at least ten or twelve people in the room, and all hard at work. Along one of the walls, great panels of silken mesh were stretched on wooden frames. Two men in white linen aprons were busily plying their needles in and out of the net in a kind of cross stitch, which gradually formed patterns of birds and beasts and flowers. Occasionally, one or the other of them would refer to a coloured pattern, drawn on a piece of parchment and nailed to the upright between the frames. But for the most part, they seemed to need no guidance, knowing instinctively what to do next.
Three women were working at a horizontal frame just in front of me, laying strands of gold and blue thread across a piece of crimson silk, then stitching the strands in place to form a solid block of colour. (This process I eventually learned is known as ‘couching’. There’s also another process called ‘undercouching’, but we won’t go into that.) Two young women were being instructed by a grey-haired matron in the art of appliqué work; while yet another, middle-aged woman was sewing tiny prismatic glass beads into the centre of embroidered velvet medallions which, in their turn, were being stitched to the sleeves of a dark-green silk dalmatic. And at a long trestle to my left, a bevy of much younger girls were busy embroidering the smaller items such as purses, orphreys, belts and ribbons. A veritable hive of industry.
As I stood staring about me, a second door at the other end of the workshop opened and a man entered carrying a small metal box, iron-bound and double-locked. This, I guessed, most likely contained pearls and other precious gems which, as I could see from several of the richer garments hanging up around the room, were used for decoration. The man put the strong-box down on the end of the trestle, said something to one of the girls, looked up and saw me.
He frowned. ‘Who are you?’
I could see by his expression that he wasn’t really annoyed, but his voice had a harsh timbre to it that made him sound as though he might be, and was probably good for discipline. He could have been any age from the late twenties to mid-thirties, and was indeed, as I discovered subsequently, not long past his thirtieth birthday. He was of middling height, the top of his head reaching just above my chin, sturdily built, but with surprisingly delicate, long-fingered hands – a great asset, I imagined, in his chosen calling. Apart from a slightly bulbous nose, his features were unremarkable: blue-grey eyes and hair of that indeterminate fairish brown so prevalent among my fellow countrymen.
Before I could reply to his query, he had noticed my pack. ‘A chapman, eh?’ he went on. ‘Looking for offcuts to fill your satchel, I daresay. You won’t find many here. The owner likes the last scrap of material, be it silk, velvet or linen, and the last inch of thread to be accounted for.’
I didn’t want to start by lying and playing the innocent, so I resisted the temptation to ask if the owner were Edmund Broderer and merely said, ‘It’s not your business, then.’ I didn’t even make it sound like a question, but the man naturally took it as one.
‘No.’ His tone was curt. ‘I’m Lionel Broderer, as anyone around here will tell you. My cousin-by-marriage is the owner. The business was left to her by her husband.’
‘That would be the man whose name is over the door of the workshop?’
‘That’s right. He died twelve years ago this summer and I’ve run the place for Judith ever since.’ He stopped and the frown reappeared. ‘Not that it’s your affair. But you’re welcome to take a look around. If you see anything that might do for your pack, point it out and I’ll say whether or not it’s for sale. If it is, we’ll fix a price.’
‘Fallen on hard times, has she, this cousin of yours?’ I enquired, as he led me towards the trestle where the smaller items were being worked.
Lionel Broderer made a noise which could have been interpreted as a snort, but which he turned into a cough.
‘Not at all,’ he answered. ‘Just careful.’
‘Wealthy, then,’ I suggested.
This time he made no attempt to hide his exasperation, but whether with me or with Judith St Clair, I wasn’t certain. But it got me a reply.