Chaloner seriously doubted it — he had not met a box yet that could keep him out. ‘Are you not afraid of burglars?’ he asked politely, seeing the merchant expected some sort of response to his statements. ‘Especially when you are out at night?’
‘I am rarely out at night,’ replied Tryan. ‘Today is an exception — and I have been invited to join the dean of St Paul’s later, too. But I am usually at home, and I have a gun. I am fully prepared to use it, too, should any vagabond dare tread uninvited in my property.’
‘We had better not rob him, then,’ remarked Turner to Chaloner, amusement tugging at the corners of his mouth. ‘We do not want to be shot.’
The evening wore on. Symons came to confide to Hannah that he would rather be anywhere than at such a happy gathering, given his recent loss, but Margaret had written a list of tasks that she wanted him to fulfil, and attending Gold’s soirée was one of them. Another was dining with his old friend Samuel Pepys the following week.
‘You have my sympathy,’ said Hannah. In a motherly way, she reached out to smooth down some of the wilder ends of his orange hair. The gesture brought tears to his eyes, and Chaloner wondered whether it was something his wife had done, too. ‘Pepys is such a smug little fellow.’
Symons nodded miserably. ‘He is sure to gloat over his fine house, his success at the Admiralty, his new upholstery and his pretty wife. It will be difficult not to punch the man.’
‘Then perhaps you should indulge yourself,’ suggested Hannah wickedly. ‘It might do him good.’
Symons gave a wan smile, then handed Chaloner a sheet of paper. ‘Our maid wanted me to give you this. She said you were asking about it, and thought it might answer your questions — and we owe you something for persuading the surgeon to waive his fee when he came to tend Margaret.’
It was the letter offering the Bernini bust for a very reasonable sum. The handwriting was neat and familiar, and Chaloner knew immediately who had penned it. He put it in his pocket. It was certainly a clue, but unfortunately, it pointed him in a direction he would rather not look. He decided to put it from his mind and deal with it in the morning.
When Symons left, Haddon took up station at Hannah’s side. The steward chatted amiably, mostly about dogs and the Queen, which he seemed to hold in equal regard. Chaloner half-listened, most of his attention on George Vine, who was talking to Hargrave. The spy was reasonably adept at reading lips, and knew George was regaling the merchant with a drunken monologue about old Dreary Bones’ reaction when he had discovered his son’s plan to assassinate Cromwell with an exploding leek.
‘Did you know Gold is dying?’ Haddon was saying to Hannah. Chaloner turned around in surprise. ‘He will be in his grave in a matter of weeks. It is a sharpness of the blood, apparently.’
‘The poor man,’ said Hannah with quiet compassion. ‘He should be in bed, not giving parties. But I think I can guess the reason why he organised this one: he is hoping to find a good match for that silly Bess — someone who will not marry her for the money she will inherit.’
‘You are right,’ said Haddon. ‘He told me as much himself. He will leave her a fortune, and every wolf in the country will circle around, hoping for a bite of the prize. But he loves her, despite her faults, and wants her properly cared for.’
‘Do you know what I think?’ asked Hannah. ‘That Neale has poisoned him. See how he looks at Bess — all avarice and lust? And she is too stupid to know him for what he is.’
‘I suspect she has more wits than you think,’ said Chaloner. He shrugged when Hannah started to tell him he was wrong. ‘I am not saying she should be elected to the Royal Society, but she owns a certain innate cunning that will ensure she is no one’s victim.’
‘The Earl thinks the same,’ confided Haddon. ‘And he said so when Gold visited him the other day. Gold has asked him to guard Bess when he dies, you see, but the Earl maintains she is more than capable of looking after herself.’
Chaloner recalled seeing the old man in the Earl’s chamber a few days before — and the Earl lying about being alone. Gold must have requested secrecy, so the Earl’s fib must have been to oblige him. ‘His frailty is not an act after all, then?’ he asked. ‘He really is ailing?’
‘Yes, but he is a long way from being harmless,’ replied Haddon. ‘I have seen him draw his sword and wield it in a way that would put many of these youngsters to shame.’
‘Whom did he threaten?’ asked Hannah curiously. ‘Neale?’
‘Vine,’ replied Haddon. ‘Not George, but his father. I happened to be in John’s Coffee House, at the time and I witnessed the incident myself. Gold said their gatherings had gone from the honourable business of praising God, to the superstitious nonsense of praying for their own good fortunes. He wanted to end them, but Vine was afraid that if that happened, he would start to experience bad luck. Vine was being stubborn, so Gold hauled out his weapon to make his point.’
‘You have not mentioned this before,’ said Chaloner, rather accusingly.
‘Because I knew it would lead you to assume Gold was Vine’s killer,’ replied Haddon evenly. ‘And I am sure he is not. I had five pounds riding on you solving the case, so I did not want you wasting your time on false leads. Of course, my ploy was all for nothing, because Turner won anyway.’
‘These prayer meetings caused a lot of trouble,’ said Hannah, speaking before Chaloner could inform the steward that he was quite capable of making up his own mind about what constituted a false lead. ‘Scobel instituted something that should have been worthy, but that transpired to be distasteful.’
‘So it would seem,’ said Haddon. He grinned with sudden mischief. ‘I told Turner about Gold’s fight with Vine, though. He spent two days learning that Gold has alibis for all three murders.’
‘Do you know what they are?’ asked Chaloner, not sure they could be trusted.
‘He was with the Queen when Chetwynd and Langston died-’ began Haddon.
‘He was,’ agreed Hannah. ‘I was not there myself, because Her Majesty had sent me home for the night. But the other ladies mentioned it the following day.’
‘And he was with the Earl when Vine was killed,’ finished Haddon. ‘At Worcester House.’
Chaloner supposed the alibis were as solid as any he had heard, although that still left the possibility that Gold had hired someone else to do the killing. He rubbed his head wearily, and it occurred to him that he was wasting time at the soirée — and there was not even any music, as Hannah had promised. Perhaps he should be out hunting Greene, or re-interviewing the guards who had been on duty when the statue had gone missing. He looked at Hannah’s sweet, happy face, and realised he did not want to leave London because the Earl no longer had a post for him. He wanted to stay.
His gloomy thoughts were broken by a sudden commotion. People began to gather around Gold, who sat in a great fireside chair. Bess was on his lap and his face was oddly serene. But Bess was screaming, because her dress was caught on some item of his jewellery, and she could not escape. It took a moment for Chaloner to understand why she was so determined to be away from him.
Gold was dead.
The party broke up once its host was no longer in the world of the living. Outside, Brodrick bemoaned the fact that it was so early, then launched into a sulky diatribe against Temperance for electing to close her club on an evening when not much else was on offer. And how dare she organise a private get-together and not invite him, her most faithful customer? He turned towards his carriage with the defiant declaration that he would find something better to do. After a moment of indecision — to go with Brodrick or stay to see if any inroads could be made on Bess — Neale followed. Hannah watched him through narrowed eyes.
‘If he really cared for her, he would not be thinking about his own pleasures tonight. Sir Nicholas was right to elicit the help of a powerful baron to keep the vultures away. Unfortunately, it will be like trying to stop this snow from falling — you may catch a few flakes, but hundreds will get past.’