Perhaps, but then again the hard-headed man of business would keep reminding him that at the time of her father’s death, it was Udo who was threatening to destroy Henry’s business. He had said he might sue him, which could leave Henry’s widow and daughter with no means of personal support.
The two ideas: her love for him and his cynical suspicion that she only wanted to guarantee that she had a roof over her head, vied for his attention all the time that he completed his toilet, checked his reflection one last time, and walked along the roadway to her house.
Before knocking at the door, he took a diversion.
As he left his house he could smell the fresh bread from the bakers further up the road towards the Carfoix, where the four main roads met. The odour made him consider: he could scent beef from the pie-maker’s at Cook Row, and the odour of sweet almonds from the cakeshop where the still-warm cakes were being snatched up by all those who could reach them. Warm cakes were such a pleasure. Infinitely better than cold. They were a treat to be treasured, Udo thought, and suddenly he beamed. He’d buy some for the ladies. No woman could resist a warm tart filled with flavoured custard.
No sooner had he made his decision than he set off up the hill. Cook Row was at the top of Bolehille, and continued in a straight line towards the Carfoix. Here the shops were set up to display all their wares. Each morning the shutters were dropped from the great shop windows, some hinged down to rest on a trestle, or removed entirely and set out like a table just in front of the shop, in order that all their goods could be spread out to their best effect.
Udo bought a small pie and ate it as he eyed the merchandise in the road, but his mind was already made up. The shop he wanted was the small one halfway along the road with the door gaping; no window, just a wooden board with a rough painting of a cake on it hanging above, and a plain table made from two planks laid over a couple of barrels. A green sheet was spread somewhat lopsidedly over this, and on it were set out the finest cakes in Exeter. That was not Udo’s opinion alone. Already a small queue of people trailed from the doorway out into the street.
‘Small’ was hardly the word for this shop. In another street it would be called a stall, and that would be a compliment. Only five feet wide, it was always hard to get inside, because the customers filled it when Ham opened up. Luckily Ham knew Udo well, and winked when he caught sight of the German. He was a large, satisfied-looking, brown-haired fellow with arms like a labourer’s: massive, with short, square fingers. He had the sort of face that Udo associated with brewers — relaxed and comfortable. He knew his job inside out, and loved the work and the end result. Contentment radiated from him like warmth from the sun. Although he was busy, he bellowed to the back of the crowded shop for his apprentice, and soon Udo was collecting a selection of flavoured custard tarts and sweet dowcettes, flans filled with jellied fruits. With his purchases made, he nodded to Ham, who winked again and commanded a small boy to take the basket and carry it for Udo.
With the boy in tow, Udo set off down Cook Row and turned right, down the hill, towards Julia’s house.
It wasn’t far down that alley, he knew. The place was one of the larger shops, not like the cook’s, but at least twelve feet wide and a good fifteen deep. That was the difference between a cook and a saddler, he thought to himself. A saddler of Henry’s quality would always make good money, although it seemed as though Henry had not recently been quite so successful. Udo was adept at reading a man’s status in the city. It was a necessary skill for a foreigner, and to his eye, this place had been in need of maintenance for some little while.
The timbers had been limed, and the plaster covering the wattle and daub between the frames had been whitewashed, but that was plainly a long time ago. Now the building appeared to be in a state of disrepair. The whitewash hadn’t been renewed this year, and the timbers had darker patches where the damp had seeped beneath the lime. It was good oak, this wood, and would last many years, damp or no, but Udo knew that the appearance was all when it came to selling a property, and right now, this place was falling in value. It could hardly do anything else.
Udo felt certain, looking at the dilapidated building, that the women here must be delighted with his offer. He hardly need bother to honey his words. He was a man of wealth and status, and his desire to help them was untarnished with greed — it was based upon his desire for companionship, and the result would be a good education for his wife, and a home for her mother. Surely no impecunious women could turn down his generous offer — especially when she herself had asked him to come and visit her.
He glanced at the boy, who was eyeing the basket of cakes with more than mere professional interest, and then rapped sharply on the timbers with his stick before clipping the lad about the ear. ‘Keep your eyes and your fingers off those cakes, boy!’
Thomas had watched the men approach the Charnel Chapel. ‘Who’re they?’ he wondered.
Matthew was there with his roll and a reed. He glanced up from his calculations. ‘Hmm?’
Thomas pointed with his chin. ‘Them at the chapel. There’s the Dean and a couple of Chapter men, but who’s that knight?’
Matthew stared along the mess of the building site towards the little chapel. ‘Oh, him. He’s a friend of the Dean’s. When we had a murder here some little while ago, the Dean asked him to come and help discover the killer. I suppose he’s here for the same reason. That saddler’s still in the Charnel Chapel, you know. The Dean wouldn’t let us move the body until the Coroner had seen it.’ He sniffed distastefully. ‘I was surprised at that. Far better, I’d have thought, to bring the body out and store it somewhere else, and have the chapel reconsecrated. It is a great shame to have it polluted with shed blood in this way.’
‘Aye. Not pleasant for poor Henry Saddler, neither.’
‘You knew him?’ Matthew asked.
There was a sharpness in his tone which warned Thomas to be wary. ‘Who doesn’t get to know a man like him? He was famous for his workmanship, wasn’t he? It’s only a small city, when all’s said and done.’
‘I just wondered,’ Matthew said. ‘There was something about you …’
‘What?’ Thomas asked, feeling the ice settle at the pit of his stomach.
‘No, it’s nothing,’ Matthew said, but then he set his jaw. ‘It’s just that I had reason to hate him, you see. Henry was one of the men who attacked my master and killed him.’ He stared back at the chapel. ‘They nearly killed me too. So anyone would look on me as the murderer. I must be the clear candidate for guilt in their eyes.’
He faced Thomas once more, and the recognition which Thomas had feared for so long was in his eyes today. Yesterday there had been nothing, but now, Thomas knew, Matthew recalled him from all those years ago.
Thomas had fled this place, and when he returned, he knew that there was a risk that someone might have remembered him. He hadn’t thought that Matthew posed a risk, but poor wounded Nicholas had arrived here, and suddenly all Thomas’s careful attempts to disguise his voice and his features seemed pointless.
He had made it his task to ensure that he knew always when the friar was likely to be in the Cathedral Close, and then he avoided the place. He daren’t risk being seen by him, for Nick would be sure to denounce Thomas if he saw him. How could he not accuse him — the man who had so cruelly scarred him all those years ago and blighted his life?
Thomas found his eyes dragged back to the chapel. A man was hurrying away, and Thomas wondered where he was going in such a rush. That was the trouble with the body appearing there just as Nicholas returned to the city: it meant that men’s thoughts were once more on the evening nearly forty years ago, when the Chaunter was killed. It brought the events back to life, in some way. The fact of Henry’s body being discovered in the chapel had made Thomas’s life here dangerous. If he had a brain, he’d pack his tools tonight, and take to his heels. He’d always be able to find work, and he could maybe explain himself to the Master Mason. Robert de Cantebrigge was going to leave before long, to go and inspect another building site he was managing. Thomas could tell him that he was sick of this city and persuade his Master Mason to take him too, when he left. It would be the best answer.