The Parliament House (2 page)

    'Yes,' said Sir Julius. 'You are an artist whereas he is a mere labourer, skilled enough, in his own way, but lacking the ability to conceive the house in his mind's eye. We are fortunate to get this young man, Francis,' he continued, indicating Christopher. 'He is destined for great things. In a few years, he may be well beyond our price.'

    'I doubt that, Sir Julius,' said Christopher.

    'You have ambitions to prosper, surely?'

    'Of course.'

    'And a desire to work on a grander scale?'

    'In time, perhaps.'

    'Then you will soon be emulating Mr Wren.'

    'Emulating and surpassing him,' said Susan, loyally. 'There will soon be only one Christopher they speak of in London and it will not be Mr Wren. He will have been eclipsed.'

    'You are too kind,' said Christopher, touched by her comments. 'I like to think that I have artistic gifts but they will never compare with those of a genius. Who, in years to come, will feast his eyes on Mr Polegate's house when St Paul's cathedral has been rebuilt?'

    'Hester and I will do so,' attested Polegate.

    'Yes,' said his wife. 'It will always come first in our affections. Let us ask an outsider for his opinion. What do you think, Bernard?'

    Everett grinned. 'This house has something that a cathedral will never have,' he pointed out. 'A wonderful wine cellar. Mr Redmayne is to be congratulated on his design.'

    'Wait until you see our home,' said Sir Julius. 'It's an example of Christopher at his most inventive.'

    'I thought you were taking me to the Parliament House first.'

    'Ha!' Sir Julius was derisive. 'It’s a den of iniquity.'

    'Nevertheless, I have to take my seat there.'

    'You shall take it beside me, Bernard. We could do with some more commonsense in there. Most of the members are charlatans, sycophants or ranting lunatics. The Parliament House is a species of Bedlam.'

    'Yet it exercises so much power.'

    'And does so very irresponsibly. My view is this, you see…'

    'Why not discuss it later on?' suggested Susan, interrupting her father before he started on a diatribe. 'We are not here to talk politics.'

    'No,' agreed Hester Polegate. 'We're here to celebrate.'

    'Eat, drink and enjoy yourselves,' urged her husband, slipping an arm around her shoulders. 'The Polegates are at home to their friends. Have everything that you wish.'

    Everett drained his glass. 'I'll have a spare key to the wine cellar.'

    'Behave yourself,' chided his sister, good-naturedly.

    'If I'm to lodge here when I'm in London, I can help Francis by acting as his taster. I have a most discerning palate.'

    'You're not here to drink away our profits, Bernard.'

    'You'll be amply repaid,' Everett joked. 'When I take my seat in parliament, I'll introduce a bill for the abolition of all import duties on wine. Sir Julius will support me - won't you?'

    But the other man did not even hear him. He had drifted off into a reverie and there was a faraway smile on his lips. Christopher noticed it at once. His gaze shifted to Susan, plainly discomfited by her father's behaviour. The normally belligerent Sir Julius Cheever was acting very strangely. Christopher wondered why.

    It was hours before the jollity came to an end. While the party was being held in the hall, Polegate's assistant was serving the first customers in the shop below. Both the house and business had been duly launched. Christopher Redmayne took the opportunity to conduct Susan around the property and she marvelled at some of its finer points. In designing the place for work and occupation, the architect had not wasted a single inch of space. Susan was impressed. When they returned to the hall, her father was getting ready to leave. Bernard Everett was going to share his coach so that they could call at the Parliament House together.

    Christopher was sorry that the time had come to depart. He had been enjoying Susan's company so much. While she accompanied her father in the coach, the architect would have to ride home to his house in Fetter Lane. There was one consolation. The rain had eased off. Though it was still drizzling, the earlier downpour had spent its force. They would get wet but not thoroughly soaked. After a flurry of farewells, they descended to the ground floor in their coats and hats.

    The coach was waiting in the street outside. Christopher escorted Susan to it and opened the door for her so that he could steal a kiss as she got in. Her smile was all the gratitude he required. Their eyes locked affectionately. Behind them, Sir Julius and Bernard Everett came into the street side by side. A voice suddenly rang out.

    'Up here!'

    The two men instinctively looked upwards. There was a loud report and Bernard Everett was knocked backwards as a musket ball went under the brim of his hat and burrowed deep into his skull. He was out of luck this time. There was no hope of survival. With blood gushing down his face, he landed in a puddle and splashed water everywhere.

    One thing was immediately apparent.

    He would never sit in the Parliament House now.

Chapter Two

    Everything was suddenly thrown into confusion. Startled by the sound of the gunfire, the two horses bucked madly between the shafts and the coachman had difficulty controlling them. Christopher Redmayne, meanwhile, fearing that a second shot might be fired, dived into the lurching coach to protect Susan Cheever. Shocked by what she had just seen, Hester Polegate put her hands to her mouth to stifle a scream. Her husband rushed forward to bend over his fallen brother-in-law and Sir Julius Cheever, lacking a weapon, waved an angry fist up at a window opposite. People emerged from houses to see what had caused the commotion. A small crowd soon gathered around the dead body.

    Christopher was the first to recover. Realising that Susan was not in any danger, he released her from his arms and peered through the window. Then he leapt out of the coach and went over to Sir Julius.

    'What happened?' he asked.

    'Some villain shot Bernard,' replied the other, purple with rage.

    'From where?'

    'Up there.'

    Sir Julius pointed to the upstairs window of the tavern on the opposite side of the street. It was wide open but there was no sign of the killer. Christopher needed only a glance to see that Bernard Everett was dead. Curiosity was bringing more people out of their dwellings. They began to converge on the shop.

    'Take him inside,' advised Christopher. 'I'll fetch a constable.'

    Before doing so, however, he hoped that he might be able to apprehend the murderer. Dashing across the road, Christopher pushed through the knot of customers around the door and entered the tavern. He went into the taproom and saw the staircase against the far wall. He darted past bemused drinkers before going up the stairs to the first floor, running along a narrow passageway until he came to the last door on the right. Christopher flung it open, only to find that the room was now completely empty. Drizzle was blowing in through the open window. He went quickly across to it and gazed down at the scene below. The corpse was now being carried into the shop, away from the prying eyes of the neighbours. Hester Polegate was patently in great distress at the death of her brother. Susan Cheever had an arm around her as she helped the grieving woman inside.

    Christopher went back into the passageway and saw that there was another staircase nearby. It corkscrewed its way to the floor below. Pounding down it, he came into a kitchen where an old woman was stirring something in a pot over the fire. When he popped up in front of her without warning, she turned to him with open-mouthed wonder.

    'Did anyone else come through here?' he demanded.

    'Yes, sir,' she croaked. 'A gentleman rushed in.'

    'When?'

    'Not a minute ago.'

    'Which way did he leave?'

    She pointed a stubby finger. 'That way, sir.'

    Christopher opened a door and found himself looking at a row of stables on the other side of a cobbled yard. Nobody was there. One of the stable doors had been left ajar. He ran through a stone archway and into the street beyond, arriving just in time to hear the distant clatter of hooves as a horse galloped down Bennet's Hill towards Thames Street. Christopher caught the merest glimpse of the rider before he turned a corner and vanished from sight. Pursuit was out of the question. The killer had been calculating. He had planned his escape in advance.

    Jonathan Bale had just returned home after patrolling the streets of Baynard's Castle Ward and his wife helped him off with his sodden coat. When she hung it on the back of the door, it began to drip on to the kitchen flagstones. Sarah was sympathetic.

    'You must be soaked to the skin,' she said.

    'A spot of rain never hurt anybody.'

    'It was more than a spot, Jonathan. The storm lasted for hours.'

    'We hardly noticed it,' said Bale with a shrug. 'One good thing about weather like this - it keeps villains off the streets.'

    'It ought to keep
you
off the streets as well.'

    'Don't fret, Sarah.'

    He gave her an affectionate squeeze. Bale was a hefty man in his late thirties with a facial ugliness that his loving wife had somehow failed to notice. As one of the constables in the ward, he guarded his territory with paternal care as if its entire population belonged to his own family. His wife, Sarah, was shorter, stouter and had a bustling energy that never seemed to flag. She wished that her husband's devotion to duty were tempered with more caution. Sarah thought him too fearless for his own good. Bale lowered himself heavily on to a chair. Before he could give her an account of his day, however, there was a loud knock at the front door. He started to rise.

    'Stay there,' she said, touching his shoulder. 'I'll see who it is.' When she opened the door, Sarah was pleasantly surprised. 'Why, Mr Redmayne!' she cried. 'Whatever are you doing here?'

    'I'm hoping to find your husband at home,' said Christopher.

    'Yes, I'm here,' called Bale, getting to his feet and coming to the door. 'What can I do for you, Mr Redmayne?'

    'At least step in out of the rain,' urged Sarah.

    'This is not a social visit, I fear,' explained Christopher. 'I've come to report a serious crime.' He turned to Bale. 'A murder has just been committed in Knightrider Street. You must come at once, Jonathan. I'll give you the details on the way.'

    Bale did not hesitate. Going back into the kitchen, he grabbed his coat and put it on again. He thrust his hat on his head then promptly left the house. As he and Christopher walked briskly up Addle Hill, his companion told him what had happened. Bale was alarmed by the news. He and Christopher were old friends. Thrown together in an earlier murder investigation, they had solved more than one crime together and had the highest respect for each other. They were unlikely soul mates. While the architect was a man of Cavalier inclinations, the constable was a dour and implacable Puritan, who firmly believed that the restoration of the monarchy was a grotesque mistake. In the normal course of events, their paths would never even have crossed. Yet whenever they worked together, their essential differences somehow vanished.

    Bale listened with interest to all that he was told.

    'And you went into the tavern?' he asked.

    'Yes, Jonathan. I thought that the man might still be there. But the bird had flown. He obviously had a horse, saddled and waiting.'

    'Did you speak to Mrs McCoy?'

    'Who?'

    'Bridget McCoy. She owns the Saracen's Head.'

    'I didn't have time for conversation,' said Christopher. 'As soon as I saw that the killer had fled, I came running to you.'

    'I'm glad that I lived so close.'

    'So am I. It meant that I knew where to find you.'

    They turned into Knightrider Street and saw that a crowd was lingering outside the shop. Bale recognised a number of them. Calling him by name, he sent a boy to summon another constable. He and Christopher then went into the shop. Bernard Everett had been carried into the warehouse at the rear of the building and was laid out on a table. The women had gone upstairs but Sir Julius Cheever and Francis Polegate were standing beside the corpse, still shaken by the incident. An hour before, Everett had been a welcome guest in the house, a happy man on the brink of entering parliament. He was now a murder victim.

    There was no need to introduce Bale to Sir Julius. They had met before in similar circumstances when the constable had been involved in the search for another killer, the man responsible for the death of Gabriel Cheever, the estranged son of Sir Julius. They had soon discovered a bond between them. Like Sir Julius - or, for that matter, the deceased - Jonathan Bale had borne arms at the battle of Worcester. Unlike the unfortunate Bernard Everett, he had come through it all unscathed.