Death in St James's Park (29 page)

Chaloner disliked the secretary trying to entrap him. ‘Leave Thurloe alone. Do you hear?’

‘I never did him any harm – and I could have done, given the secrets I knew. But he is nothing now, although I did do him a favour today. William Prynne, his fellow bencher, was bitten by a horse, and its owner has threatened to sue. It will make Lincoln’s Inn a laughing stock, so I advised Thurloe to intervene. The affair will take him hours to settle, but better that than the alternative.’

So Morland had ensured that Thurloe would be tied up half the night, thought Chaloner irritably – nothing involving the tiresomely loquacious Prynne was ever sorted out in a hurry. When the secretary bobbed his head and moved away, his triumphant grin made Chaloner suspect he had guessed that plans had been scuppered.

Chaloner aimed for the Angel as soon as he was sure Morland had gone, supposing he would have to tackle Fry alone, and was just passing the stump of the medieval monument that gave Charing Cross its name when he heard a flageolet. He stopped abruptly. The player was wearing a faded red cloak and a blue hat.

On a milder day, the musician’s merry
jigs might have attracted listeners, but dusk had brought a bitter wind, and people were eager to be home. Thus he was standing in splendid isolation, with passers-by giving him a wide berth lest he should ask for money, and Chaloner was spotted long before he could come close. The fellow stopped playing and took to his heels.

Chaloner would have caught him had he been fresh, but his lame leg still ached from his earlier run, and it slowed him down. The musician ducked through a stream of carriages, and was lost to sight. Chaloner spent a few moments hunting for him, but soon realised he was wasting his time. Disgusted, he began to retrace his steps, but then he saw another familiar face. It was the feral Senior Clerk Harper, who was striding purposefully towards the Strand.

Chaloner tugged his hat down, hoping it and the gathering darkness of night would be enough to prevent Harper from recognising him as the man who had waylaid him in the Cheapside tavern the day before.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, adopting a Buckinghamshire twang to disguise his voice. ‘Where can I catch the coach to Dover?’

It was an innocuous question, designed to allow him to strike up a conversation. Thus he was wholly unprepared for the reaction it provoked. Harper whipped around with startling speed, and grabbed him by the front of his coat.

‘I do not answer questions,’ he snarled in his low, sinister voice. ‘Not ever.’

Chaloner tried to push him away, but Harper’s fingers were like steel. ‘I only want to know about the coach to Dover,’ he objected, still playing the bumpkin. ‘Is it a secret, then?’

‘If you want to live, you will not ask it again,’ hissed Harper.

‘My mother was right about London,’ said Chaloner, finally wrenching himself free. ‘It is full of villains and traitors. No wonder the place declared for Cromwell during the wars.’

Harper gave what might have been a
laugh, although it was difficult to tell: the square was noisy. ‘Then go back to whichever desolate county from which you hail.’

‘Buckinghamshire,’ supplied Chaloner artlessly. ‘Have you ever been?’

Harper scowled. ‘That is another question, and you are lucky I do not cut out your tongue.’

Chaloner moved fast, and then it was Harper grabbed by the coat. ‘What is the Post—’

He got no further, because Harper was stabbing at his eyes with a knife. He ducked away, and the clerk used the opportunity to land a vicious kick that caught his lame leg. It hurt, and although he tried to limp after Harper, he simply could not move fast enough. Like the musician, Harper disappeared among the traffic.

Disgusted, Chaloner hobbled to the Angel, but his run of bad luck persisted: the landlord informed him that John Fry had indeed been in residence, but he had left that morning for Oxford.

‘To return to his mathematics,’ he confided. ‘I am glad to see him gone, personally. He was a dreadful bore, and drove my other guests to distraction with his angles and cosines.’

‘I meant a different John Fry,’ said Chaloner. ‘The political agitator.’

The landlord scowled. ‘That
was a nasty lie started by the pot-boys at the Imp next door. Fry the trouble-maker has never set foot in here and never will. This is a Royalist tavern, and his sort is not welcome.’

Chaloner went to the Imp, where the culprits gleefully confessed to what they had done, claiming it was in revenge for the Angel’s lads smearing manure on their windows. Chaloner was disheartened. Would Knight’s other letters be dead ends, too, and any ‘evidence’ just more unsubstantiated gossip? He was tempted to rip them open and find out, but then decided against it. Impatience would serve no purpose, and it would be better to wait for Thurloe and his hot knife.

Meanwhile, he supposed he might as well go to St James’s Park. Perhaps the bird-killers would appear, and he would have something to please the Earl in the morning.

Chaloner arrived at the park gate in a sour mood, angry to have lost the leads represented by the musician, Harper and John Fry in such a short space of time. His temper did not improve when he saw Storey and Eliot waiting for him.

‘You told Eliot that there might be another attack on my charges tonight,’ explained Storey. ‘So we are here to stop it.’ He grinned wolfishly. ‘Those despicable rogues will be in for a shock when they come to do their filthy work.’

‘No,’ said Chaloner shortly, not liking the idea of amateur assistance. ‘Thank you.’

‘But there were three of them last time, and you will be outnumbered unless we stay,’ argued Eliot. ‘Besides, I shall enjoy punching their teeth out.’

‘I shall do more than punch,’ declared Storey, eyes flashing. ‘I shall chop them into pieces and feed them to the foxes. And His Majesty will make me a knight for it.’

‘Very possibly,’ said Chaloner.
‘But I am more efficient when working alone.’

‘Then you will just have to adjust,’ said Storey, opening the gate with a key, and indicating that Chaloner and Eliot should precede him inside. ‘We shall leave this door ajar, to make it easy for them to get in. And then we will pounce.’

‘No,’ groaned Chaloner. ‘It will warn them that something is amiss.
Please
go home and leave them to me.’

‘Never,’ stated Storey with finality. ‘We are coming with you, and that is that.’

‘Yes,’ said Eliot with equal fervour. ‘My bananas are near that Canal, and I would never forgive myself if one was damaged in a skirmish.’

Chaloner tried again. ‘The poison they use is unusually strong, and even the merest touch can kill. You will be in great danger if you—’

‘You cannot manage poison
and
deranged killers by yourself,’ interrupted Storey. ‘And our minds are made up, so there is no point arguing.’

‘Consider us foot-soldiers,’ added Eliot. ‘Where would you like us deployed?’

They agreed on positions eventually, farther from the Canal than Eliot and Storey wanted, but too close as far as Chaloner was concerned. He put them together, in the hope that it would be safer, with strict instructions not to talk, even when they became bored.

‘We shall remain mum until dawn if necessary,’ promised Storey. ‘You can rely on us.’

Chaloner suspected they would do nothing
of the kind, and that their chattering presence would alert the culprits and drive them off. But there was nothing he could do about it, so he found a thick bush near the water and eased inside, hoping it would not be too long before something happened, because the night was bitterly cold.

Within an hour, the first sounds of fun began to emanate from White Hall, carried on a wind that blew from the north-east. It started gently enough, with flutes trilling what was meant to pass for Roman music, although it was not long before it was shattered by a braying trumpet. The fanfare ended in shrieks of laughter, followed by drums and a series of oddly metallic clashes.

The racket rose in volume and discordance as the night grew steadily colder. Chaloner began to shiver, and his feet and hands were soon so numb that he wondered whether he would be able to do anything if the culprits did arrive. Then he saw three shadows moving towards the Canal.

There was no moon, but starlight allowed him to see that all were swathed in thick coats and large hats, and that one was unsteady on his feet. Chaloner supposed he was drunk. He tensed when they passed the trees where Storey and Eliot were hiding, ready to race to the rescue should curator and gardener be discovered, but the trio did not falter and continued to make for the water.

The birds sensed the presence of hostile
intruders, and began to shift and fuss. One of the men cooed softly, and dropped something on the ground, his target the crane with the wooden leg. Hoping the poison would not be eaten before he could destroy it, Chaloner burst from his hiding place, sword in his hand, aiming to have all three in White Hall’s prison as quickly as possible.

Storey and Eliot were also racing forward, brandishing hoes and howling like banshees. Chaloner’s stomach lurched when the trio did not scatter as most petty criminals would have done, but drew weapons and took up a fighting formation. Clearly, they had done battle together before. He swore under his breath. He had assumed that anyone low enough to hurt birds would be cowardly weaklings, and it had not occurred to him that they might be warriors. It was a foolish mistake, and he sincerely hoped his lapse of judgement would not cost Storey and Eliot their lives.

The tallest stepped forward to meet Chaloner’s charge, and they exchanged a series of vicious blows that told him he was dealing with a man of considerable skill. Meanwhile, the drunk jabbed at him from behind, keeping his attention divided, while the third fended off Storey and Eliot with indolent ease. Chaloner saw the fellow was playing with them, biding his time until he grew bored, at which point they would die.

Chaloner intensified his efforts, but so did his opponent, and their swords flashed with such speed and ferocity that any blow finding its mark would have been instantly fatal. Meanwhile, the drunk was an annoying distraction. Chaloner lunged at the tall man, using an unorthodox manoeuvre that had him in retreat for a moment, then jabbed at the drunk with the dagger he held in his other hand. He missed, but the drunk dropped to his knees anyway.

The tall man came at Chaloner again, forcing him to give ground. It drove him beneath a canopy of trees, where it was more difficult to see, and he was hard-pressed to defend himself. His breath came in gasps, and he was sweating, hot for the first time in days. Then his opponent employed a peculiar twisting motion designed to wrench the sword from his hand. It did not succeed, but it jerked his wrist in a way that was unpleasant.

Aware that he was fighting for Eliot
and Storey’s lives as well as his own, Chaloner used every trick he had ever learned, eventually managing to turn his retreat into an offensive. The tall man met him blow for blow, but Chaloner was winning and was on the verge of delivering a swipe that would decide the outcome permanently when the drunk rallied.

Screaming incoherently, he raced towards Chaloner, barrelling into him with enough force to send him cart-wheeling through the air. Chaloner was vaguely aware of Knight’s letters flying from his coat before he landed with a crash that drove the breath from his body. Then there was a lot of yelling, and someone hollered that the palace guards were coming. His senses darkened, and the sounds of panicky confusion faded away.

Chaloner was not sure how long he lay in the frozen grass, but the first thing he did when he was able to move again was scrabble for his sword, feeling naked and vulnerable without it. Once it was in his hand, he struggled to his knees and looked around quickly. The drunk was lying on the ground next to him, being inspected by Eliot and Storey.

‘They escaped.’ Eliot sounded disgusted. ‘Well, two of them escaped. This one will not be going anywhere. Unfortunately, he will not be answering questions either – he is dead.’

‘But my birds are safe,’ said Storey with grim satisfaction. ‘We shall gather up the tainted bread, and when you catch the others, we shall make
them
eat it.’

Chaloner clambered unsteadily to his feet. ‘Which way did they go?’

Eliot pointed. ‘But you will not catch them. They have too great a start.’

‘Where are the palace guards?’

‘Oh, I
made that up,’ said Eliot airily. ‘The tall man was preparing to stab you as you lay helpless, so I shouted to our “rescuers” that we were by the Canal. Fortunately, it coincided with a particularly loud bit of the King’s soirée, so it did sound like an army was coming.’

‘A Roman army,’ said Storey drily. ‘But it worked. The bastards fled.’

‘Did you recognise them?’

‘No, it was too dark,’ replied Storey. ‘These courtiers knew when they decided to fight rather than run that we would never be able to identify them in the gloom.’

‘What makes you think they were courtiers?’ asked Chaloner, suspecting that the trio had not expected their ambushers to survive, so the darkness had been immaterial. But Storey and Eliot did not need to hear that.

‘Because they fought like courtiers,’ explained Eliot, as if the answer were obvious. ‘All that mincing around with rapiers. You included. And the men I saw feeding poison to the swan last Saturday were courtiers – they had to be, as only courtiers were in the park at the time.’

‘How do you know the ones who killed the swan were the men we fought tonight?’

‘Because they are,’ said Storey impatiently. ‘Eliot saw three rogues giving my swan toxic crumbs, and three rogues tried to kill a crane this evening. The first incident happened when there was a courtly rumpus, and so did the second. They are the same people.’

The ‘courtly rumpus’ was still ongoing, and Chaloner found himself thinking that if His Majesty showed the same dedication to affairs of state as he did to his pleasures, then the country might not be on the verge of war with the Dutch and London would not be in such a turmoil of discontent. Or was that just the old Parliamentarian in him?