Death and the Chapman Read Free

or soap or some other cargo destined for foreign shores. In front of one of the warehouses which lined the busy wharves was a carrier, loading his cart with bales of cloth which I learned later was woven by the weavers who lived and worked in the suburb of Redcliffe, on the opposite side of the Avon.
    The carrier raised his head and, when he saw us approaching, lifted his hand in greeting.
    ‘You’re late, Marjorie,’ he said accusingly. ‘I’m almost ready to leave. What are my orders this time?’
    ‘The same as usual. When you get to London, you’re to go straight to the Steelyard. Deliver to the Hanse merchants and to nobody else.’ She turned to me, adding by way of explanation: ‘ The Easterlings pay cash, which the Alderman insists on. Londoners want credit, he says, and then try to settle bad debts with all kinds of nonsense, such as tennis balls or packs of cards or bales of tassels.’ She chuckled again, drily. ‘They may get away with that in other parts of the country, but not in their dealings with Bristol.‘ She put her hand into the pocket of her skirt and produced a piece of paper sealed with red wax, which she handed to the carrier. ‘And if you’d deliver this for me, I’d be obliged.’ A coin passed between them.
    The man nodded cheerfully and tucked the letter inside his greasy, food-stained jacket. ‘Your cousin, is it? Never fear! I’ll see it gets there. What about His High and Mightiness? Payment as usual, I suppose, after the job is done.’
    Marjorie smiled. ‘What else did you expect? You know the way the Alderman works as well as I do.’
    ‘It was worth asking, just in case, one day, a miracle happens. I’ll be off, then. Tell Alderman Weaver I’ll see him in a week’s time, when I get back.’ He nodded briefly at me and disappeared once more inside the warehouse. Further along the wharf, some sailors were acting the fool, lurching perilously close to the edge and singing a drunken shanty. ‘Hail and howe, let the wind blow! The Prior of Prickingham has a big--’
    My companion gave an unconvincing shriek and clapped both hands over her ears.
    ‘It’s all right,’ I assured her gravely. ‘Has a big toe is what they’re singing.’
    ‘I dare say. It’s what they mean that matters.‘ She added with mock severity: ‘The fools will be in the water in a moment and then they’ll find themselves up before the Watch. However, that’s their lookout, not ours. So, if you’ll give me your arm again, we’ll be off to Broad Street and that meal I promised you. By the way, what’s your name?’
    ‘Roger.’
    ‘And mine is Marjorie Dyer. That was my father’s trade. He’s dead now, God rest him!’ She squeezed my arm and shuffled along beside me. ‘I’m sorry to be so slow, but this warm weather affects my legs. Cheer up! Not much farther to go now.’
    ‘Good,’ I said. ‘It’s been hours since my last meal. I’m starving.’
     
     

Chapter 2
     
    I realize that, as yet, I’ve offered no explanation for the political events which were unfolding in Bristol on that warm May morning. Well... politics are boring. As are dates and facts. But in so far as those happenings and their sequel of some months later impinged, however slightly, upon my own story and the unravelling of my first mystery, I feel obliged to paint in the larger background. Briefly. I promise. And I can hardly expect the young tyros of the present generation, in their feverish preoccupation with New Worlds and New Learning, to try to unravel the tangled skein of events which was England in the last century. I knew precious little about it, myself, at their age. What I know now is the result of age, of reading, of piecing together fragments of conversation and knowledge gleaned over many years.
    In the year 1399, King Richard the Second was deposed, and eventually murdered, by his cousin Henry of Bolingbroke, who usurped the crown as King Henry the Fourth.
    The childless Richard’s acknowledged