‘What of my cousin?’
‘No longer here, sir. According to this, he left Bridewell days ago.’
‘Then why is there no sign of him? He’d surely have come first to me.’
‘Would he?’ said the man, suspiciously ‘If you are so concerned for his welfare, you could have saved him from being arrested in the first place. What sort of man are you to let a cousin of yours beg for a living on the streets?’
‘A repentant one,’ replied Elias, conjuring up a look of contrition. ‘You are right to chide me, my friend. When he came to me for money, I turned Hywel away and I’ve been overcome with remorse ever since. It’s such a shameful thing that a member of my family should end up in Bridewell.’ He glanced at the ledger. ‘Why was he discharged?’
The book was slammed shut. ‘Never mind, sir. He has gone.’
Dorothea Tate was so unaccustomed to generosity that she could not believe that it was happening. Since she had turned up at the Queen’s Head, she had been fed, comforted and treated with a respect she had never known before. Two men with whom she had only a fleeting acquaintance had immediately come to her aid, and the landlord had shown her indulgence as well. Suddenly, she glimpsed a different world. Dorothea feared that her good fortune could not last and, when Nicholas Bracewell invited her to return to his lodging, she resisted the idea strongly. In the past, most men had only sought her company for one vile purpose. What had made Hywel Rees so different was his kindness and consideration. Where others tried to molest her, he offered her protection.
It took Nicholas some time to persuade her and she set out with misgivings. She felt excited at being rowed across the Thames for the first time, though the foul language of the waterman made her cheeks burn. It was when they plunged into Bankside that her apprehension grew. It was a haunt of desperate men and the kind of shameless women she had met in Bridewell, standing brazenly in tavern doorways to beckon custom. Nicholas hustled her on until they turned into a quiet street. The houses were much bigger here and thatch had been replaced by tile. They stopped outside a door.
Dorothea drew back. ‘I’ll not go in alone with you,’ she said.
‘I do not expect you to,’ he replied. ‘Wait here a minute. I’ll not be long.’
Nicholas let himself into the house and closed the door behind him. Left alone in the street, she mastered the impulse to run, telling herself that he had shown her nothing but kindness. Though he had exposed Hywel’s deception at their first encounter, Nicholas had also saved them from a beating in the street. She had to trust him. If he had designs upon her, they would have been made clear by now yet he had treated her throughout with paternal concern. There was something else that influenced her. Everyone who spoke to Nicholas Bracewell at the Queen’s Head did so with fondness and respect. That was the clearest indication of his upright character.
When the front door opened, she expected him to come out again but it was an attractive woman who appeared. She took the girl gently by the shoulders.
‘Come in, Dorothea,’ she said with a welcoming smile. ‘My name is Anne. Nick has told me all about you. There’s shelter for you here until we find your friend.’
‘Something has happened to Hywel. I fear for him.’
‘He may yet be safe. Do not torment yourself with anxious thoughts,’ said Anne, leading her into the house. ‘God willing, your friend is still alive and well.’
It was the hand that gave him away. Looped around a piece of driftwood, the arm seemed to be clinging on desperately. As the piece of timber bobbed in the dark water of the Thames, the white hand broke the surface time and again to wave farewell to life.
Chapter Seven
The next day being the Sabbath, it began as usual with a visit to church. Nicholas Bracewell accompanied Anne Hendrik and Dorothea Tate through the streets of Bankside to the sound of a medley of bells. Washed, well fed and restored by a good night’s sleep, Dorothea was wearing one of the servants’ dresses and a borrowed hat that had been designed by Anne. When the girl knelt in prayer at the church, Nicholas had no doubt who was in her thoughts. Racked with anguish, she was pleading for the safe return of her friend and protector. After the service, Nicholas escorted the women back to the house, then left them alone in the hope that, if Anne could spend some time alone with Dorothea, she would win her confidence and draw out details that the girl had been too embarrassed to divulge to a man.
Nicholas, meanwhile, had to meet a friend on the other side of the river.
‘What did you learn, Owen?’ he asked.
‘Precious little from the gatekeeper at Bridewell,’ grumbled Elias. ‘He’d have told me nothing at all had I not wheedled the facts out of him.’
‘How did you do that?’
‘By posing as Hywel’s cousin.’
‘You have the looks and accent to carry it off.’
‘It was like getting blood from a grain of sand.’
He told Nicholas what had transpired. The two of them were in the Welshman’s lodging, a long, low room that was filled with amiable clutter. On the bed in the corner, the sheets were still rumpled from a night of passion, and from the sudden departure to church of the woman with whom Elias had been sleeping. There was a faint aroma of tobacco from the pipe that had been smoked earlier. Nicholas was disappointed that such scanty information had been gained at Bridewell. Elias added a telling detail.
‘I peeped into his ledger as he checked it,’ he explained. ‘Beside the name of Dorothea Tate was a scribble that I took to be a record of her discharge. But there was nothing beside Hywel’s name. Instead, it was scratched through with a line of ink.’
‘Scratched through?’
‘It was almost as if they were pretending that Hywel Rees did not even exist.’
‘That’s worrying news.’
‘I did not give up there, Nick. Since I got such short shrift at Bridewell, I decided to look elsewhere for help. I reasoned that, if anyone could tell me how that workhouse was run, it had to be a lawyer.’
‘Which one did you choose?’
‘The only one that I could trust. That friend of Frank Quilter’s. The jovial man who gave us so much assistance when Frank’s father was unjustly accused.’
‘I remember him well,’ said Nicholas. ‘Henry Cleaton.’
‘He told me things that bear out what Dorothea was saying.’
‘You surely did not doubt her word?’
‘No, no,’ replied Elias, ‘but she’s a young girl, wounded by her experience at Bridewell and still confused about what really happened there. Master Cleaton was able to throw more light on how the institution is administered.’
‘What did he say?’
Elias took a deep breath. ‘Bridewell has been dogged by corruption for years,’ he said. ‘One treasurer was dismissed for letting it flourish under his nose, another convicted for taking money that should have gone to the poor souls inside the place. A third, I discovered, was so incompetent that he paid several bills twice by mistake thus losing any profit that might have been made. Like the prisons,’ he continued, ‘the management and victualling of Bridewell is leased out to the highest bidder.’
‘Is that how this Master Beechcroft became involved?’
‘Joseph Beechcroft has a partner in the enterprise,’ said Elias. ‘A man named Ralph Olgrave. They somehow persuaded the good aldermen of this city to pay them no less than?300 a year to take over Bridewell.’
Nicholas was astonished. ‘As much as that?’
‘Master Beechcroft is a weaver, as I hear, and Master Olgrave a tailor. They wove a clever deal and tailored it to fit their needs. You can see why the two of them took an interest in the workhouse.’
‘Yes,’ said Nicholas. ‘They can watch their trades practised there. According to Dorothea, wool is carded, cloth woven, suits made up. Dorothea said that hides are tanned there as well — and not only those belonging to the inmates. Joseph Beechcroft and his partner have found a means of using cheap labour.’