Murder on High Holborn

Book 9: Adventures of Thomas Chaloner

by Susanna Gregory

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

1665, and the capital is awash with rumours of conspiracy. Thomas Chaloner knows that there are few grains of truth in the rumour-mill, but the loss of an important warship and the murder of Paul Ferine, a Groom of the Robes, makes him scent a whiff of genuine treason. As well as investigating the murder, Chaloner is charged with tracking down the leaders of a fanatical sect known as the Fifth Monarchists. Then, as he comes to know more about the Fifth Monarchists and their meetings on High Holborn, he discovers a number of connections – both to Ferine’s murder and those involved with the defence of the realm. Connections that he must disentangle before it is too late to save the country…

Release date: January 2, 2014

Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

Print pages: 448

Sample

His Majesty’s Ship London was a magnificent sight as she sailed down the Medway from the Royal Dockyard at Chatham. Carrying some eighty guns, she was one of the largest ships in the navy, and the Admiralty expected her to play a crucial role in fighting the Dutch – war had been declared two weeks before. She was the flagship of Admiral Sir John Lawson, and would sail up the Thames to collect him from Queenhithe, after which she would join the rest of his fleet in the Channel.

HMS London had always enjoyed a special relationship with the city after which she was named, so the crew was looking forward to taking her there, relishing the opportunity to show off her exquisitely painted woodwork, bright new sails and gleaming brass cannon. There were three hundred seamen aboard, and those not on watch had contrived to be out on deck, proud and trim in their best embroidered jackets and snowy white trousers.

There was also a smattering of passengers – a few of the Admiral’s relations making the journey between Chatham and Queenhithe as a treat. They would disembark in the city, after which the ship would revert to a fighting machine. The festive ribbons that fluttered from her masts would be taken down, her crew would exchange their smart, shore-going rigs for working clothes, and all would be battened down ready for combat.

Captain Jeffrey Dare, in command until the Admiral boarded, ordered the mainsails set and London heeled over as the wind caught her, a sharp bow-wave hissing down her sides. He was glad to be away at last, although he was concerned about the failing light. He had intended to get under way at dawn, but there had been some wrangling over paperwork with the dockyard’s commissioner, and it was noon before the matter had been resolved.

Wind sang in the rigging as London picked up speed, a joyful sound that drove the petty frustrations of the refit from Dare’s mind. He smiled. It was good to feel the deck alive under his feet again, and although he thought the King and his Privy Council were insane to declare war on a powerful maritime nation like the Dutch, he was eager to do his duty. And at least they had had the sense to put the Channel Fleet under Lawson, not some clueless aristocrat who had never been to sea. The Admiral might be a rough-mannered, salty-tongued braggart, but at least he knew his way around a ship.

Thoughts of Lawson reminded Dare of the two large chests that had been brought aboard earlier that day. Did they really contain the Admiral’s bass viols, as Commissioner Pett had claimed? Dare had been astonished to learn that Lawson was interested in music: no matter how hard he tried, he could not imagine that gruff old seadog engaging in anything so cultured.

He had challenged Pett about the weight, too. The boxes were extremely heavy, and he was unconvinced by the explanation that Lawson had purchased a new kind of instrument made of metal, so they would not lose their tone in the damp sea-air. But the Admiral’s luggage was none of Dare’s business, especially now, when the ship was under way and he had duties to attend.

He bellowed a complex stream of orders that changed London’s course as she flew out of the mouth of the Medway and into the Thames Estuary. She responded immediately, like the good ship she was, and he was pleased with both her and her crew – the Dutch would not know what had hit them when HMS London met them in battle!

Her motion was different once she was in less sheltered waters, and she began to pitch and roll; Dare grinned when several passengers made a dash for the rail. Normally, he would have tacked immediately, but the wind was capricious that day, and to the east lay the Nore, the hidden, shifting sandbanks that had brought many an unwary ship to an ignominious end. Wisely, he deferred until he was certain the danger was past.

He happened to glance landwards as they passed the little village of Prittlewell, a low huddle of cottages strewn along a bleak, muddy shore. Fishermen and their families had gathered on the beach, tiny figures who brandished their hats and waved joyously. Some of the crew waved back, as did those passengers who were not retching. Dare felt a surge of pride, knowing what a noble sight London must be, with her great press of canvas billowing white against the dark pebble-grey of the sky.

The delay in leaving meant they had missed the tide, so Dare climbed up to the crosstrees – the beams that attached the rigging to the mast – wanting the better view that height would provide. From that elevated perch he could really read the water – interpret the ripples and changing colours that warned of currents, shoals and contrary breezes. It was an undignified thing for a captain to do, but Lawson did it, and what was good enough for that staunch old mariner was good enough for Dare.

He fixed his eyes on the course ahead, and shouted directions that would alter their bearing a fraction. It was not really necessary, but there was no harm in working the crew after so many weeks in dock. The wind made his eyes water; it was much colder aloft than it was below, with a brisk south-westerly blowing.

Suddenly, there was a tremendous crack, followed by an explosion, and the ship heeled violently to one side. The lurch was so great that it almost dislodged him from his precarious perch, and for a moment he could do nothing but flail about in a desperate attempt to regain his balance. He glanced down as soon as he was able, and was horrified to see clouds of billowing smoke and bodies in the sea, bobbing and lifeless.

With a tearing groan the mainmast behind him began to topple, taking with it a mass of sail and several shrieking sailors. Dare did not understand what was happening! They could not have run aground, because they were in the middle of a wide, deep channel. Had the powder magazine exploded then? But how? No one should have been down there, and it was locked anyway. With a shriek of protesting timbers, London listed farther to starboard. Dare swung in the air for a moment, then lost his grip to cartwheel sickeningly towards the churning brown water below.

On shore, the villagers of Prittlewell watched in stunned disbelief. One moment, London was ploughing with silent grace up the river, her sails full and fat, and the next she was tilting heavily to one side, belching smoke. Corpses littered the water around her, while tiny splashes of white showed where the occasional survivor was frantically struggling to stay afloat.

‘Launch the boats!’ bellowed Jeremiah Westcliff, Prittlewell’s oldest and most experienced fisherman, the first to recover his wits. ‘Hurry!’

He had to shove some of his shocked neighbours to bring them to their senses, but then all was action and urgency as brawny arms heaved the little crafts into the waves. Once away, the villagers rowed for all they were worth, sinews cracking and breath coming in agonised gasps. Terrified screams and a gushing fountain of water told them that London was going down fast. They intensified their efforts, summoning every last ounce of strength to send their boats skimming across the grey-brown water.

But their labours were in vain: by the time they arrived, the ship had gone. The fishermen leaned on their oars, panting hard as they gazed helplessly at the bodies that floated everywhere they looked. The dead would not stay long, of course: the tide was never still, and Father Thames was already tugging some of his gruesome cargo away from the scene of the disaster.

Yet there were survivors. Several clung to a mat of cordage and spars, while a few more flailed in the water. The villagers began to pull them out, but their number was pitifully small.

‘Twenty-four,’ Westcliff eventually reported to the only officer they had found, identifiable by his fine blue coat. ‘How many were aboard?’

‘More than three hundred.’ Dare’s face was grey with shock. He had no idea how he had survived his fall, although the lower half of his body was numb and he wondered whether death might claim him yet. When his eyes were drawn back to the horrible swirling wreckage and the bodies of his sailors, he hoped it would. ‘What happened?’

Westcliff shook his head uncomprehendingly. ‘One moment the ship was going along as proud as Lucifer, and the next she was blown to pieces. Were you carrying much powder?’

‘One magazine was full,’ Dale replied hoarsely. ‘But we were going to load the others in Queenhithe.’

‘Then it was an accident,’ surmised Westcliff. ‘A tragic, dreadful accident.’

‘No,’ whispered Dale. ‘It was not.’

‘Of course it was,’ said Westcliff, briskly but kindly. ‘What else could it have been?’

It was an undignified way to die. The corpse was lying on its back with its mouth open, wearing nothing but a pair of bucket-topped riding boots and a Cavalier hat. The quality of the apparel indicated that its owner had been a man of wealth, and so did the fact that he had been enjoying the ‘gentleman’s club’ at Hercules’ Pillars Alley in the first place. It was an establishment that catered only to the extremely rich, and he would not have been allowed inside had he not belonged to the very highest echelons of society.

‘You can see why I asked you to come,’ said Temperance North, the club’s owner, in an unsteady voice. ‘This is Paul Ferine from High Holborn, and he has been murdered.’

Thomas Chaloner, intelligencer to the Lord Chancellor, regarded her in surprise. ‘What makes you think that?’

There was nothing he could see to suggest foul play, and it appeared to him that Ferine had simply expired on being entertained by one of the club’s vivacious and extremely energetic ladies. It would not be the first time it had happened, and Temperance was usually adept at handling such situations – her discretion was one of the reasons why the place was so popular. Thus he was bemused as to why he had been dragged from his bed in the small hours of the morning to ‘help’.

‘Because he was full of the joys of life an hour ago,’ she replied. ‘And now look at him. We cannot afford to be stained with the taint of murder, Tom. Business might never recover.’

‘It sounds healthy enough to me,’ said Chaloner.

The ornate clock on the bedside table showed it was well past one o’clock, but the parlour downstairs was full of customers enjoying the atmosphere of debauched jollity, while every bedroom on the upper floor was in use. Maude, the formidable matron who kept order among the guests – no easy matter with men who were more used to issuing orders than obeying them – had been too busy to do more than nod at Chaloner as he had walked past.

‘Yes, but it is very easy to lose favour. And as I said, this is Paul Ferine from High Holborn.’

The way she spoke told Chaloner that he should know Ferine, yet there was nothing remotely familiar about the fleshy, middle-aged face with its sagging jowls. However, he was the first to admit that his knowledge of London and its luminaries was lacking. After the civil wars, he had been recruited by Cromwell’s intelligence services, and had spent the next twelve years overseas. He had returned home when the Commonwealth had collapsed, and had been fortunate that the Earl of Clarendon, currently Lord Chancellor, had been willing to employ him, because opportunities for ex-Parliamentarian spies were few and far between in Restoration Britain.

‘I never met him,’ he hedged, loath for anyone, even Temperance, a friend, to know that Ferine’s name meant nothing to him. ‘Did he spend much time at White Hall?’

Temperance regarded him askance, and he could see there was a tart remark on the tip of her tongue. Then she seemed to recollect that she had summoned him to help her, and that disparaging remarks about his ignorance were not in her best interests.

‘Yes, he was Groom of the Robes.’ She shot him a sidelong glance. ‘Which means he performed the odd ceremonial duty at Court in return for a handsome salary. Obviously, the King is fond of him – His Majesty does not confer that sort of favour on just anyone.’

Chaloner gave her an irritable look. His knowledge of individuals might be lacking, but he was familiar with the Court’s workings, because he was part of it – his official title was Gentleman Usher to the Lord Chancellor. Unfortunately, his Earl kept sending him on errands overseas, never giving him the opportunity to settle down and become better acquainted with his fellow courtiers. The most recent jaunt had been to Russia, and he had only been back three days.

‘What shall I do?’ whispered Temperance tearfully, and he caught a glimpse of the vulnerable, innocent girl he had once befriended, a wholly different creature from the worldly woman she had become since an inheritance had allowed her to purchase a house and set herself up in the brothel business.

‘The first step is to find out whether you are right,’ he replied practically. ‘Neither you nor I are qualified to determine causes of death, so send for Wiseman.’

Richard Wiseman was Surgeon to the King, and was also Temperance’s lover. If there had been foul play, then Wiseman would know how to spot it. But Temperance shook her head.

‘No, Tom. He has just been elected Master of the Company of Barber-Surgeons, and cannot afford to be associated with scandal.’

‘And I can?’

‘You are a spy; it is different. Besides, you have dealt with far nastier matters in the past. Why do you think I sent for you now?’

‘He will be hurt if you exclude him.’ Chaloner spoke a little stiffly. He knew her affection for him had cooled since she had turned from Puritan maid to brothel-keeper, but did she have to make her disregard quite so obvious? ‘And we cannot make any decisions until we understand exactly what has happened. Or do you know another discreet medicus?’

Temperance was silent for a moment, then left the bedchamber without another word. He heard her ordering one of the servants in the corridor outside to fetch Wiseman, and when she returned, her face was grey with worry.

‘So what happens when Richard tells you that Ferine has been murdered?’

‘You tell Spymaster Williamson.’ Chaloner referred to the man who currently ran the country’s intelligence network and dealt with untoward happenings involving members of government and the Court. ‘And he will investigate.’

Temperance was horrified. ‘Then I am ruined for certain! My patrons will never visit me again if they think he might be here.’

‘I am afraid you have no choice. But Williamson will be discreet – the King and his cronies have never been as unpopular with the people as they are now, and he will not want to advertise the fact that courtiers haunt brothels.’

Temperance eyed him beadily. ‘This is not a brothel, Thomas. It is a gentleman’s club.’

Chaloner inclined his head in apology. ‘But my point remains: Ferine is an important man, and his death will need to be investigated by the proper authorities.’

‘Damn!’ Temperance rubbed a hand across her face. ‘Why did his killer have to choose here to ply his nasty skills?’

Chaloner regarded her curiously. ‘You seem very sure that something untoward has happened, yet there is no evidence to say that you are right.’

‘Yes there is. You see, poor Ferine had been saying for weeks that something bad would happen to him two days before the Ides of March. Well, it has.’

Chaloner frowned at the archaic way of referring to the date, and glanced at the clock. ‘I suppose it did become the thirteenth at midnight…’

‘Yes, and I saw him alive shortly before twelve, which means he died today – exactly when he predicted a calamity for himself.’

‘Predicted how?’ asked Chaloner, bemused.

‘He had calculated his own horoscope,’ explained Temperance. ‘And he was quite clear about what he read in the stars. They foretold a “grave misfortune” for him – and you do not get a graver misfortune than death.’

Solicitously, Chaloner took Temperance’s arm and led her downstairs to wait for Wiseman. She pulled away as they passed the parlour, and went to check that all was well. The parlour was a large chamber with judiciously dimmed lamps and dark red decor. Pipe smoke swirled thickly, mixing with the sweet, sickly perfume he always associated with bordellos. A game was under way between the clients and some of the girls, and it took a far less vivid imagination than his to guess that the manly cheers meant someone was divesting herself of her clothes.

Several patrons scampered towards Temperance when they saw her at the door, clamouring for her attention like fractious children. She listened to the ribald poem they had composed with every semblance of enjoyment, making Chaloner marvel at her patience. He folded his arms and leaned against the wall to wait for them to finish, and a glance towards the riotous fun at the far end of the room allowed him to recognise five Members of Parliament, three churchmen, four barons, two influential businessmen and an admiral.

The most boisterous participant was the Duke of Buckingham, the King’s oldest friend and the implacable enemy of Chaloner’s employer. He was a tall, athletic man in his thirties, whose licentious ways had rendered his once-handsome face lined and puffy. He possessed a brilliant intelligence, and might have been an asset to his country if he had given as much care to affairs of state as he did to his pleasures.

Next to him was Prince Rupert, who had fought valiantly, if somewhat mercurially, in the civil wars. Now in his forties, he was a petulant dandy, displeased with everything and everyone around him. Chaloner was surprised to see him with Buckingham, as it was common knowledge that they detested each other. This was a problem: both were on the Privy Council – the body that advised the King – and as neither could bring himself to agree with the other, meetings tended to be long, bad-tempered and alarmingly lacking in sound counsel.

‘Enough!’ Rupert was snapping irritably. ‘It is late, and we should all be in bed.’

‘Yes, we should,’ leered Buckingham. ‘Which whore do you—’

‘I am going home,’ interrupted Rupert, stalking towards the door and shoving past anyone who stood in his way. Being sober, Chaloner was able to step aside, but others found themselves shunted very roughly.

‘Ignore him, Lawson,’ said Buckingham to the stout, barrel-chested fellow whose wine had been knocked from his hand. ‘He has been in a foul mood all day.’

Lawson was in his fifties, and spurned the current fashion for wigs, allowing his own yellow-grey hair to flow freely over his shoulders. He spoke with the distinctive inflection of the Yorkshireman, and replied to Buckingham’s words with a string of obscenities that had even the jaded Duke’s eyebrows shooting up in astonishment.

‘Language, Admiral,’ said another patron mildly. ‘There are ladies present, and you are not at sea now, sir.’

The speaker was tall and lean, with a face like a wax mask that had been grabbed by the nose while still molten and pulled. He wore a long black coat sewn with silver stars – an exotic garment, even by London standards – and his voice had been soft yet commanding. His hands and neck were adorned with symbols, a permanent marking with ink that Chaloner had never seen in England – and certainly not among the kind of men who frequented the club.

‘That blackguard spilled my wine,’ shouted Lawson angrily. ‘Wine should be poured down the throat, not on to the floor.’

‘Then let me refill your cup,’ said the stranger, taking the enraged mariner’s arm and thus preventing him from storming after Rupert and demanding satisfaction at dawn.

The poets finished regaling Temperance with their verses and rushed away to rejoin the undressing game – the club’s patrons tended to be easily bored, and rarely stuck with one activity for very long. She went to stand next to Chaloner, and when she saw who he was watching, she began whispering in his ear.

‘Poor Admiral Lawson suffered a terrible tragedy last week. His ship London blew up in the Thames Estuary.’

‘Did it?’ Chaloner was doubtful. While warships were certainly packed to the gills with guns, powder and ammunition, they did not usually explode unless under attack.

‘It was the talk of the city. Did you not hear?’ Temperance raised her hand. ‘I forgot – you have only just come home. Well, it was a dreadful business, and more than three hundred men were killed. I imagine he came here to put it out of his mind for a few hours.’

Lawson did not look particularly grief-stricken, and began to regale the gathering with a raunchy song favoured by sailors. It had jaws dropping all over the parlour, and these were men used to a bit of bawdiness.

‘Who is the fellow with him?’ asked Chaloner. ‘The one wearing the peculiar coat?’

‘Dr Lambe,’ replied Temperance disapprovingly. ‘He is a sorcerer and a physician, and is the newest member of Buckingham’s household.’

‘Buckingham’s father had a sorcerer-physician named Dr Lambe,’ recalled Chaloner. ‘He was accused of making his enemies impotent and summoning whirlwinds, although I suspect he had no such skills and was just a trickster. He was murdered forty years ago by an angry mob.’

‘This is his son, apparently. He can divine the future, and it is rumoured that his unusually accurate predictions come courtesy of the devil, who helps him with them.’

‘He did not predict Ferine’s “grave misfortune”, did he?’ asked Chaloner, thinking that if so, Lambe would probably be arrested if the courtier did transpire to be murdered. It would not be the first time a seer had manipulated events to ensure that a ‘prophecy’ came true.

‘Ferine was quite capable of calculating his own horoscope. Indeed, he was better at it than Lambe – he told me only tonight that three black cats had walked in front of him on his way to the club, while a jackdaw had cawed thirteen times from a chimney. He said there were no surer warnings that something dire was going to happen.’

‘Then why did he not go home – keep himself safe until the thirteenth was over?’

Temperance sighed unhappily. ‘I do not know, Tom. And we can hardly ask him now.’

Chaloner followed her out of the parlour and along a hallway to the private quarters at the back of the house. Near the kitchens was a cosy sitting room where she usually sat to count her nightly takings. It was a testament to her unhappiness that she barely glanced at the heaps of coins on the table. He poured her a cup of wine to steady her nerves but she waved it away and reached for her pipe instead. He studied her as she tamped it with tobacco.

She was still in her early twenties, but the decadent lifestyle she enjoyed with her clients was taking its toll. She had always been large, but access to extravagant foods had doubled her size, and her complexion had suffered from never seeing the sun. She had once owned luxuriant chestnut hair, but she had shaved it off to wear a wig. Her teeth were tobacco-stained, and too much time listening to the opinions of men like Buckingham and Rupert had turned her acerbic and petty-minded.

‘How was Russia?’ she asked as she puffed. ‘I cannot imagine you enjoyed it. It is said to be very desolate – bitterly cold, with filthy streets and superstitious citizens.’

Wryly, Chaloner thought her description applied equally well to London: the weather had been foul since he had returned; every road was a quagmire; and she had just finished telling him about one man who was a sorcerer and another who put faith in black cats and jackdaws. He saw she was waiting for a reply, but good spies did not talk about themselves and he was a master of his trade. He made an innocuous remark about the amount of snow he had seen, then changed the subject by asking whether anything interesting had happened while he had been away, knowing that she, like most people, preferred to talk than to listen anyway.

‘Well, we are now officially at war with the Dutch,’ she replied. ‘Hostilities were declared three weeks ago, and both navies are already at sea. We shall win, of course. The butter-eaters cannot defeat our brave seamen.’

Chaloner disagreed, and thought that fighting the United Provinces was a very bad idea. He had tried very hard, within his limited sphere of influence, to prevent it, but the hawks on the Privy Council had itched to flex their muscles, and so that was that.

‘We shall soon have all the best trading routes,’ Temperance went on. ‘Routes that Buckingham says should be ours anyway, because we deserve them.’

And there was the nub of the matter, thought Chaloner sadly: there was not enough room on the high seas for two powerful maritime nations. It was a war of commerce, not politics.

‘Yet I cannot imagine how it will be funded,’ she sighed. ‘Not with taxes – there is already a ridiculously high duty on coal, which means the poor cannot heat their homes or cook. The government would not dare introduce another levy – not unless they want more civil wars.’ But her expression was distant, and before he could comment, she burst out with, ‘Who would want Ferine dead? He had his detractors, but who does not?’

‘What detractors?’

Her expression was unhappy. ‘Those who hated the fact that he had stopped being a Christian and put his faith in superstition instead. He took his horoscopes and omens very seriously.’

Chaloner was about to ask more but the door opened and Richard Wiseman walked in. The surgeon was a large man in many senses of the word. He was tall, broad and added to his bulk by lifting heavy stones each morning. He wore no colour except red, which served to make him even more imposing, and his character was arrogant, haughty and proud. He was not someone Chaloner would normally have chosen as a friend, but circumstances had thrown them together, and the spy was slowly beginning to appreciate Wiseman’s few but significant virtues – loyalty to those he liked, an ability to keep a secret and a strong sense of justice.

‘I understand you have a corpse for me,’ he boomed cheerfully. ‘Good! Lead me to it.’

Upstairs again, Chaloner sat on a chair that would have cost him a month’s pay, and watched Wiseman examine Ferine. The sounds of dissipated rumpus still emanated from the parlour below, while girlish shrieks and manly guffaws from the bedrooms indicated that business was continuing as usual upstairs as well – so far, at least.

‘Well?’ he asked, when Wiseman had finished. ‘I assume his heart gave out?’

‘Then you would assume wrong. He has been smothered.’

Chaloner blinked. ‘I saw no evidence of—’

‘Of course not – you are not a surgeon. However, he inhaled two feathers from the pillow that was pressed over his face, there is a cut on the inside of his lip, and his eyes are bloodshot. Ferine was definitely murdered.’

Chaloner’s duty was clear: he had to send word to Spymaster Williamson, then distance himself from the entire affair. Ferine’s death was not his concern, and the Earl would be aghast if he ever learned that his spy had visited a brothel, regardless of the fact that he had done so to help a friend and not to avail himself of its delights. But years in espionage had imbued Chaloner with a keen sense of curiosity, and his interest was piqued.

‘I know the wine flows very freely here, but surely the lady who was with Ferine would have noticed someone shoving a cushion over his face?’

‘Snowflake,’ said Wiseman, naming one of Temperance’s more popular employees, a small, vivacious blonde with a sensuous body and world-weary eyes. ‘Shall I fetch her?’

He returned a few moments later with both the lady in question and Temperance. The two women entered the bedchamber reluctantly, and Snowflake would only explain what had happened after Chaloner had covered Ferine’s body with a sheet.

‘He always liked to frolic in nothing but his hat and boots.’ She shrugged at Chaloner’s raised eyebrows. ‘Such antics are not unusual, and we aim to please. Afterwards, I slipped out for a moment, and when I returned, he was lying on the bed … I thought he was asleep.’

‘They do nod off on occasion,’ put in Temperance. Her voice was hoarse – she took no pleasure in hearing her suspicions confirmed. ‘Running the nation, managing dioceses or directing large commercial ventures is very tiring, and our guests are often weary.’

Chaloner thought it best not to comment. ‘Did you see anyone in the hall outside when you left?’ he asked of Snowflake.

She considered the question carefully, pulling a silken shift more tightly around her slender shoulders. ‘No, it was empty.’ She turned apologetically to Temperance. ‘I was only gone for a minute – just long enough to run down to the kitchens for a jug of wine.’

Temperance frowned. ‘Wine? But that is why we hire Ann – to fill the decanters between clients. You should not have had to fetch it yourself.’

‘Bring Ann up here,’ suggested Wiseman. ‘Then we can ask why she forgot.’

‘She is usually very reliable,’ said Snowflake when Temperance had gone. She shuddered. ‘I cannot believe this is happening! Men do die here, of course – we make them feel like youths, and their hearts sometimes cannot take it – but no one has never been murdered before.’

‘How did Ferine behave this evening?’ asked Chaloner. ‘Was he nervous? Fearful?’

‘Drunk,’ replied Snowflak