A Famine of Horses (16 page)

“Do you know where this man Swanders may be?”

Without question he was halfway back to Berwick by this time, no doubt laughing at Turnbull as he went.

“I dinna ken, your ladyship, I wish I did and that’s the truth.”

“Oh, ay,” muttered Janet.

“What did you pay for the horse?”

“Er…four pounds English,” lied Turnbull. “See, I didna expect to make much profit and it was all to go to the repair of the church roof, which lets in the weather something terrible.”

“Oh be quiet,” growled Janet Dodd. “You know you paid two pounds for the creature and so do we.”

How did they know, wondered Turnbull, when God had made them poor foolish women? How dare they show such disrespect to a man of the cloth.

“Well, it doesn’t matter now,” said Lady Scrope soothingly. “You can give what’s left of your three pounds profit back to Janet Dodd and then claim the money off Swanders the next time you see him.”

Turnbull’s mouth fell open with dismay.

“B-but it’s all spent,” he protested.

“Is it now?” said Lady Widdrington. “And what exactly did you spend it on?”

A happy night at Madam Hetherington’s bawdy house, among other things, but Turnbull couldn’t bring himself to say so. He muttered the first thing that came into his mind.

“Charity?” said Lady Widdrington. “Well, that’s very Godly of you. Mrs Dodd, when do you think your husband and some of his patrol would be ready to come and talk to Reverend Turnbull?”

“Oh, I can run and fetch him now,” said Mrs Dodd, turning to go, “I’m sure if the lads pick him up and shake him something will fall out.”

“Och Chri…well, I might have some of it about me.”

The ladies turned their backs obligingly as Turnbull unstrapped the pouch from his thigh and the bright silver rolled out in the crusting mud. Lady Widdrington scooped up most of it and gave the money to Janet Dodd.

“You can owe the rest, Mr Turnbull,” she said, “I wouldn’t want you to be travelling the Border completely empty-handed.”

“No. I thank you,” said Turnbull feebly.

“Good day, then. I expect you’ll want to be out of Carlisle before Sergeant Dodd tracks you down,” said Lady Widdrington and added formally, “God go with you.”

“Ay, well, good day, ladies.”

Turnbull trudged up the wynd feeling as if he had already walked ten miles and wondering how one started proceedings against witches. He thought he heard the sound of laughter behind him but decided he must have been mistaken.

“You know what I find so odd?” said Lady Scrope after a while. They were gathered in a private room of the Bear and Ragged Staff, near the drawbridge gate of the castle. The windows of their private room overlooked the moat so they could watch the pleasant sight of the fish who were a thrifty source of food to anyone that could catch them and were therefore as cunning as foxes.

“What?” asked Lady Widdrington as she cautiously drank the beverage sold to her as wine.

“Why didn’t this man Swanders go to Thomas the Merchant Hetherington? Or if he did, why didn’t Thomas the Merchant buy such a beautiful piece of horseflesh as this Courtier was supposed to be?”

“Ay,” said Janet slowly, “now that is odd.”

“He’ll have known we’d have paid good money for the animal.” Lady Scrope went on, “Seven or eight pounds, likely enough, if he was good; God knows we’ve been searching out decent horses ever since the old Lord got sick.”

Lady Widdrington put down her goblet. “Shall we ask him?”

Wednesday, 21st June, 12 noon

Thomas the Merchant Hetherington happened to be completing his accounts for some important clients when his servant came in to announce that the Ladies Scrope and Widdrington would like to see him. He was honoured and a little puzzled. He was a man who could see a way to make money at anything: the kind of man who bought up and forestalled barley when there was going to be a bad harvest, who paid cash down in advance for the entire shearing of the West March sheep and then joyfully twisted the cods of the Lancashire woolbuyers who came to do business with him and him alone because there was nobody else. However, stay laces and pots of red lead for improving ladies’ appearances he left strictly to the common cadgers and peddlers, since they were small, retail items and invariably low profit. He dabbled in horses but only because he loved them.

The ladies came in and he bowed low.

“How may I serve you, your ladyships?” he said in a voice as unctuous as he could make it.

“We are here on the same errand,” said Lady Scrope, “in search of good horses.”

You and me both, thought Thomas the Merchant.

“We heard that Mrs Dodd had bought a beautiful animal from the Reverend Turnbull and we were wondering if you knew where it came from?” said Lady Scrope blithely. Lady Widdrington frowned at her across the room.

“Surely,” said Thomas the Merchant with a warm smile, “this is really a matter I should discuss with your husband, my lady Scrope, since…”

“Of course,” said Lady Scrope, nodding vigorously, “I would never dream of buying a horse without his advice and permission.” Lady Widdrington made what sounded like a repressed snort.

“But I do so want to help him find the right horses for his father’s funeral and he’s so busy with other matters, I thought I could save him a little time.”

“But it’s just been postponed to Sunday.”

“We’ll still need horses.”

Suddenly Thomas the Merchant was alert. He was as sensitive and shy of trouble as a fallow deer and could sense it on the wind in much the same way. He looked from Lady Scrope to Lady Widdrington and back again. Damn me, if Janet Dodd isn’t outside, waiting on them, he thought suddenly.

Thomas the Merchant normally backed his hunches, to great effect, but that was only because he meticulously checked on them first. He turned from the high desk he used standing up, as if he were a mere clerk which was what he had been twenty years before.

“It’s a little close in here, mesdames,” he said, to cover the move. As he opened the little diamond paned window, he looked down in the street, and there, of course, was Sergeant Dodd’s wild-looking Armstrong wife.

“Alas,” he said smoothly, “I canna help ye ladies. I know nothing of Turnbull’s horse save that he bought him, perhaps unwisely, from Swanders the Peddler.”

“Do you know where Swanders got it.”

“Presumably,” said Thomas the Merchant, steepling his fingers and smiling kindly at their womanly obtuseness, “presumably he stole it from the Grahams, or so it seems.”

“He might have another source of horses.”

“He might,” allowed Thomas the Merchant, “but I doubt it.”

“Why?” asked Lady Widdrington suddenly.

“Er…”

“Why do you doubt it, you seem very sure.”

Thomas the Merchant was nettled. “Because, madam, I ken verra well where every single nag in this March was born, raised, and who it was sold to and stolen from, I make it my business to know.”

“Do you?” said Lady Widdrington kindly. “Then you knew when Swanders showed you the animal in question that he belonged to Sweetmilk Graham. Why didn’t you buy him to give back to the Grahams—surely they’d like that?”

Thomas the Merchant moved with dignity to the door and opened it.

“I verra much regret that some ill-affected fellow has been telling you ladies the old scandal about the Grahams and myself, but that was tried and I was cleared of the charge at the last but one Warden’s Day.”

“Oh,” said Lady Widdrington, not moving, “and what scandal was that? I live in Northumberland and I’m not familiar with the gossip in this town.”

Give ye two days and ye’ll know the lot, madam, Thomas the Merchant thought to himself, but didn’t say.

“He was accused of collecting blackmail money for the Grahams,” explained Lady Scrope.

Thomas the Merchant found himself being examined at leisure by Lady Widdrington’s steely grey eyes. He examined her in return. Her face was too long and her chin too pronounced for beauty but she was a striking-looking woman, with soft pale brown hair showing under her white cap and feathered hat. He disliked tall women, being a little on the short side himself.

“I fear I canna give you ladies the information you’re seeking,” he said humbly, “as I have not the faintest idea what you’re talking about. If ye will excuse me now, I have a great deal to do.”

Lady Scrope moved to the door, but Lady Widdrington stayed still for a moment. Then she smiled suddenly, not a particularly sweet smile.

“What an opportunity you’ve missed to be sure, Mr Hetherington,” she said and he bowed to her. Both ladies gave him the barest token of a curtsey and sailed out, the hems of their gowns whispering on his expensive rush-matting. When they had gone he sat down and stared into space for a while, thinking of the price of gunpowder and where firearms could be had. At last he made a decision and began writing a letter to a cousin of his in York.

Wednesday, 21st June, afternoon

Barnabus brought his master bread and cheese to eat immediately after he came out of the castle jail. Carey, to his surprise, gave him the afternoon off. While Carey and Richard Bell disappeared into the Queen Mary Tower to attack the tottering pile of papers and the arrangements for the postponed funeral, Barnabus hung around the castle twiddling his thumbs. He found a young lad with shining fair hair sitting in the stables, polishing some horse tack and borrowed him from the stablemaster to act as his guide. Then Young Hutchin and he wandered down to the market place.

At noon the town crier made the announcement at the Market Cross that his lordship, Henry Lord Scrope, quondam Warden of this March, would be buried on Sunday and not the next day which caused Young Hutchin to blink and raise his eyebrows.

“He’s lying in state at the cathedral,” explained Young Hutchin slowly and carefully so Barnabus could understand him, “so anybody that wants can be sure the old bugger’s dead as a doorpost and not as sweet.”

“Not much liked hereabouts, eh?” asked Barnabus, munching on a flat pennyloaf (referred to by Hutchin as a stottiecake) with salt herring in it, since it was a fishday. Young Hutchin grinned and shook his head, but didn’t add any information.

“Well,” Barnabus patted his belly as he finished, “Now what shall we do?”

“I could show you round about the town, Mr Cooke,” said Young Hutchin, “so ye can find your way.”

“Lead on.”

No one who knew his way around London town could be in the least confused by Carlisle which was barely a village by comparison. They wandered down Castle Street and looked at the cathedral, which was in a little better condition than St Paul’s and examined what was left of the abbey. English Street was where the best shops were and Barnabus had been there before to buy paper and ink for his master with Richard Bell and also to visit the goldsmith’s. Young Hutchin’s eyes shone as he peered through the thick bars of the goldsmith’s grill and counted the rather poor silver plate and gold jewellery displayed there. Barnabus wondered if the goldsmith also dealt in receiving stolen goods, as some of his London colleagues did, but Young Hutchin when asked, explained virtuously that he knew nothing of such sinfulness.

They examined the glowering two towers of the citadel, with their cannon, defending the road called Botchergate which led to Newcastle and ultimately to London. Then they retraced their steps and bore right up Scotch Street which was a poorer place altogether, though well-supplied with ale houses, horse dealers and smiths.

All about them flowed the townsfolk, greatly thinned in their numbers by the men who had gone out to work the fields round about. The women kept many of the shops, particularly the fish and butcher’s shops, and some of the fish they were selling actually looked and smelled quite fresh. Barnabus remembered they were only a few miles from Solway and no doubt there were fishermen who went out to harvest the Irish sea. Perhaps Wednesdays and Fridays would not be such a trial here as they were in London, where the trotting trains from Tilbury and East Anglia could not bring in the fish any quicker than two days old.

They were passing by a wynd with the strong smell of herring saltworks coming from it when Barnabus said to Young Hutchin, “Where would I go to…er…find a woman?”

Young Hutchin grinned cynically. “Depends on the woman, master,” he said. “What kind of woman was ye thinking of?”

Barnabus coughed. Well, Devil take it, he’d just been paid and what else was there to spend his money on? There was no bear or bull-baiting in this backwater and there certainly wasn’t a theatre. “I was thinking of a…helpful sort of woman,” he said. “The kind that might take pity on a poor southerner far from home.”

Young Hutchin nodded in perfect comprehension. “Ay, well there’s two bawdy houses, ye ken, but neither of them have lassies that are much in the way of beauty if ye’re used to London ways…”

“Are they poxed?” asked Barnabus.

Young Hutchin raised his eyebrows and for a second he looked astonishingly like Carey, who could be no relation.

“Now, master, how would I know such a thing, being only a poor lad meself.”

“You might have heard where the nearest of them is, so I can go and inspect them myself,” said Barnabus, gravely.