‘I’ve never seen you so smart,’ my wife had said admiringly as I stood in the middle of our bedchamber earlier that morning while she had made final adjustments to the set of the tunic across my broad shoulders. But my sympathies had been with Elizabeth and Nicholas, convulsed by silent laughter, and with Adam who, upon coming into the room, had asked where his father was.
The ground floor of the three-storey building was part shop, for the display of finished goods, and part workshop, where the apprentices worked the bellows and stoked the furnace and the master craftsman, with his two assistants, fashioned the molten silver into cups and crucifixes, bracelets and necklaces, rings and buttons and all the other products of the silversmith’s art. They glanced up briefly as I entered, but did not pause to acknowledge me, leaving that to the well-dressed gentleman seated just inside the door, who rose to greet me with a large, ham-like hand and an ingratiating smile.
‘My dear sir! And what may I interest you in on this fine Mayday morning? Something for your lady, perhaps? A trinket, a token of your affection? This ring, maybe, in the shape of two clasped hands?’
I had no difficulty in recognizing Adrian Jollifant from Adela’s description of him; solidly built without being fat, fair hair turning grey, blue eyes in a round face and exuding an air of wealth and self-consequence that would not have been out of place in some of the highest in the land.
He grew impatient. ‘Well sir, and what will it be?’ Then he changed his tune. ‘Of course, I understand. You are a stranger to London. You stand amazed at the quality and variety of my goods. Take your time! Take your time! I can wait.’
The man was a pompous idiot, that was plain, but one, I had no doubt, who could turn nasty if things did not go his way. I had met his sort before and always found them unpleasant characters. The trouble was that, in my usual careless fashion, I had failed to work out beforehand exactly how I should approach him. His desire to buy the Arbour was not, strictly speaking, my business, and I could hardly ask him outright if he had murderous inclinations towards the Godsloves. But if he did, I might only make matters worse for them by claiming to be acting on their behalf. I cursed myself, as I had so often done in the past, for my lack of forethought.
I decided to play the innocent. As he had already decided that I was not a Londoner — my clothes could not be quite as fashionable as I had thought them — my role would be the country bumpkin, overawed by everything about me. I let my jaw drop a little and exaggerated my West Country accent.
‘I. . I wanted to buy summat fer my wife, zir, and was told to come here as you had the best goods in Cheapside. But. . I dunno. I don’ think I could manage anything I can see here.’
Master Jollifant preened himself. ‘Oh, I don’t know. I’m sure if we try hard enough, we can find something within your means.’ The condescending bastard! ‘May I ask who recommended me?’ He smirked. ‘It could be almost anyone, I suppose.’
‘Oh yes. Quite a number of people mentioned your name,’ I said, taking my cue from him. ‘That little ring you showed me, ’tis pretty now. How much would you be askin’ fer it?’
He named a price, obviously expecting me to reject it out of hand, and looked disconcerted when I paid up without demur. (My family and I had lived free at the Arbour for the past sennight, and I had had a profitable few weeks before my return to Bristol, so I was well able to afford it.) While he packed the ring into a small wooden box for me, I continued to stare reverently about me, trying to appear suitably impressed.
‘I can see you’re a gen’leman of means, zir,’ I remarked in a hushed whisper. ‘You mun live in a gert big house, I reckon.’
Immediately, an expression of keen dissatisfaction distorted his features. ‘As a matter of fact I don’t,’ he snapped. For a moment I could see him struggling against the indiscretion of confiding in a stranger, but in the end indignation and anger won. ‘I ought to, but no!’ He smacked the little box down on the counter in front of me and continued, ‘My old family home has been filched from me by an unprincipled rogue of a lawyer.’
‘Indeed?’ I forced myself to appear goggle-eyed with interest. ‘How did he come to steal it from you, zir?’
‘We-ell!’ The silversmith had the grace to look momentarily embarrassed before venom and spite took over, plunging him into a story of double-dealing and deliberate obstruction which had only the smallest relation to the truth. I could see that he was obsessed by his grievance to a dangerous degree; that long nurturing had turned it from a mild irritation into what he deemed to be a major injustice. But would he do murder, and multiple murder at that, to get his own way? The fanatical gleam in his eyes and the vicious thinning of his lips suggested that he might.
Clutching the ring in its little box, I left the shop, promising to call again. I was just about to untether Old Diggory, at the same time watching the turmoil that is Cheapside on a busy spring morning without really taking any of it in, when someone spoke my name and a hand was laid on my arm.
‘Roger? Is it really you after all these years?’
I turned quickly to find myself confronting a fashionably dressed woman whose painted face was considerably more raddled than on either of the two previous occasions when our paths had crossed. For a moment I was nonplussed, then recognition dawned.
‘Mistress Napier,’ I said with a polite bow. ‘As lovely as ever.’
She flushed. ‘You always did have a cruel tongue, Roger. I’m fully aware that time has not dealt kindly with me. You, on the other hand, appear to be as handsome and certainly more prosperous than heretofore.’
‘Appearances can be deceptive,’ I told her. ‘And how is Master Napier faring nowadays?’
She gave a short bark of mirthless laughter. ‘Gregory? Oh, he’s been in his grave these three years past, praise be!’ The thin, carmined lips twisted into a smile. ‘The house in Paternoster Row is all mine now, as is the shop. With a coronation in the offing, I’m expecting to do extremely well in the next month or two.’ The sudden pealing of bells from St Paul’s and half a dozen other nearby churches drowned out her voice for several moments, but as soon as she was able to make herself heard again, she said, ‘It’s dinnertime. Why not come and share mine? There’s a stable around the corner where you can take your horse.’
I hesitated for perhaps a second or two, but then agreed. Paternoster Row was near at hand, whereas to ride back to the Arbour would take some time. She smiled, laying long-nailed fingers on my proffered arm.
I had first met Ginèvre Napier eight years earlier while investigating the mysterious disappearance of two children from their home in Totnes, in Devon, and had encountered her again three years later while enquiring into a case of apparent murder by a cousin of the late King Edward’s mistress, Jane Shore. I had not much liked her then, nor did I now, but it occurred to me that she might know something about Adrian Jollifant that could be useful.
The parlour of the house in Paternoster Row was much as I remembered it. (In fact I was surprised at just how much I could remember.) The ceiling beams, once aglow with red and gold paint, were faded now and the wall tapestries had lost their pristine freshness. But the armchairs and the table, fashioned from the finest oak, and the corner cupboard, with its opulent display of gold and silver, were still the same, as was the candelabra with its many tinkling filigree pendants. Ginèvre waved me to a chair and told one of the servants to bring dinner as quickly as possible.
‘I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,’ she murmured, seating herself opposite me. Her foot brushed against one of mine under the table. I conquered the urge to withdraw it and returned her smile, although half-heartedly. She then utterly discomposed me by laughing out loud and saying, ‘All right, Roger, let’s dispose of the pretence that you like me and you can tell me exactly why you accepted my invitation to dinner.’