The Butcher Of Smithfield

Book 3: Adventures of Thomas Chaloner

by Susanna Gregory

Genres: General Fiction; Historical Mysteries

Synopsis

Susanna Gregory, author of the Matthew Bartholomew series of medieval mysteries, has created another compelling fictional detective set in Restoration London.

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The third adventure in the Thomas Chaloner series.

Having just returned from a clandestine excursion to Spain and Portugal on behalf of the Queen, Thomas Chaloner finds London dank and grey under leaden skies. He finds many things changed, including the Government slapping a tax on printed newspapers. Handwritten news reports escape the duty, and the rivalry between the producers of the two conduits of news is the talk of the coffee houses with the battle to be first with any sort of intelligence escalating into violent rivalry. And it seems that a number of citizens who have eaten cucumbers have come to untimely deaths.

It is such a death which Chaloner is despatched to investigate; that of a lawyer with links to 'the Butcher of Smithfield', a shady trader surrounded by a fearsome gang of thugs who terrorise the streets well beyond the confines of Smithfield market. Chaloner doesn't believe that either this death or the others are caused by a simple vegetable, but to prove his theory he has to untangle the devious means of how news is gathered and he has to put his personal safety aside as he tries to penetrate the rumour mill surrounding the Butcher of Smithfield and discover his real identity.

'Pungent with historical detail' (Irish Times)

'A richly imagined world of colourful medieval society and irresistible monkish sleuthing' (Good Book Guide)

'Corpses a-plenty, exciting action sequences and a satisfying ending' (Mystery People)

Release date: December 2, 2010

Publisher: Sphere

Print pages: 506

Sample

Smithfield Meat Market, October 1663

The solicitor Thomas Newburne knew he was not a popular man, but he did not care. Why should he, when he had everything he
wanted – a lovely mansion on Old Jewry, a pleasant cottage on Thames Street, cellars stuffed with fine wines, and more gold
than he could spend in a lifetime? He glanced at the man walking at his side. People liked Richard Hodgkinson, because he
was affable and good-hearted, but had his printing business made him wealthy, allowed him to buy whatever he fancied and not worry about the cost? No, they had not, and Newburne could not help but despise him for
it.


‘Let me buy you another pie, Hodgkinson,’ he said, making a show of rummaging in his loaded purse for coins. He was aware
of several rough types eyeing him speculatively, but he was not afraid of them. He was legal adviser to the infamous Ellis
Crisp, and only a fool would risk annoying the man everyone called the Butcher of Smithfield. Cutpurses and robbers could
look all they liked, but none would dare lift a finger against the Butcher’s right-hand man.


‘I have had enough to eat, thank you,’ replied Hodgkinson politely. ‘It was good of you to invite me to spend a few hours
with you.’


Newburne inclined his head in a bow. Of course Hodgkinson appreciated his hospitality. Newburne was the ascending star in
Smithfield, and Hodgkinson should be grateful that the solicitor had deigned to acknowledge him, and spoil him with little treats. Of course, Newburne would
have preferred to be with his one true friend, a shy, retiring fellow by the name of Finch, but Finch was off playing his
trumpet to some wealthy patron, and so was unavailable. Newburne had not wanted to be alone that afternoon – it was much more
fun spending money when someone else was watching – so he had asked Hodgkinson to join him instead. It was a good day for
a stroll – the first dry one they had had in weeks, and they were not the only ones taking advantage of it. The Smithfield
meat market was packed, a lively, noisy chaos of shops, taverns, stocks and brothels.


‘My stomach hurts,’ Newburne said, not for the first time during the outing. ‘You said gingerbread would soothe it, but I
feel worse.’


Hodgkinson looked sympathetic. ‘You drank a lot of wine earlier, and I thought the cake might soak up some of the sour humours.
Perhaps you should take a purge.’


Newburne waved the advice aside; the printer did not know what he was talking about. ‘I shall have a bit of this cucumber
instead. Cucumbers are said to be good for gripes in the belly, although I cannot abide the taste.’


‘They are unpleasant,’ agreed Hodgkinson. He pointed suddenly, and his voice dropped to a low, uneasy whisper. ‘There is the Butcher, out surveying his domain.’


Newburne glanced to where a man, hooded and cloaked as usual, prowled among the market stalls. Even Crisp’s walk was menacing,
light and soft, like a hunter after prey, and people gave him a wide berth as he passed. He was surrounded by the louts who
did his bidding, members of the powerful gang called the Hectors. They were another reason why no one tended to argue with
the Butcher of Smithfield, and even Newburne was a little uneasy in their company, although he would never have admitted it
to anyone else.


‘I am told he killed a man yesterday,’ he said conversationally to Hodgkinson. He smiled, despite the ache in his stomach.
The Butcher knew how to keep people in line, and Newburne fully approved of his tactics. It was refreshing to work for someone
who was not afraid to apply a firm hand when it was needed. ‘By that slaughterhouse over there.’


Hodgkinson swallowed uneasily. ‘I heard. Apparently, the fellow objected to the way he runs things. I suppose that explains
why Crisp’s shop is so full of pies and sausages this morning.’


Newburne nodded, glancing across to where the emporium in question was curiously devoid of customers, although everywhere
else was busy. He was never sure whether to believe the rumours that circulated regarding how Crisp disposed of his dead enemies.
Most of Smithfield thought them to be true, though, which served to make the Butcher more feared than ever, and that was not
a bad thing as far as Newburne was concerned. Frightened folk were easier to control than ones who were puffed up with a sense
of their own immortality.


Hodgkinson shuddered, and began to walk in another direction, away from the Butcher and his entourage. ‘Look! Dancing monkeys!
I have not seen those in years.’


Newburne took a bite of the cucumber as he stood in the little crowd that had gathered to watch the spectacle. He was beginning
to feel distinctly unwell, and thought he might be sick. He swallowed the mouthful with difficulty, and started to take another.
Suddenly, there was a searing pain in his innards, one that felt like claws tearing him apart from the inside. He groaned
and dropped to his knees, arms clutching his middle. He could hear Hodgkinson saying something, but could not make out the
words. Then he was on his back, in the filth of the street. People were looking away from the performing animals to stare
at him, although no one made any attempt to help. Hodgkinson was shouting for someone to bring water, but all Newburne cared
about was the terrible ache in his belly. He could not breathe, and his vision was darkening around the edges. And then everything
went black, and the printer’s clamouring voice faded into silence.


London, Late October 1663

A combination of chiming bells and hammering rain woke Thomas Chaloner that grey Sunday morning. At first, he did not know
where he was, and he sat up with a jolt, automatically reaching for the dagger at his side. The realisation that he did not
need it, that he was safe in his rooms at Fetter Lane, came just after the shock of discovering that his weapon was not where
it had been these last four months, and it took a few moments to bring his instinctive alarm under control. He lay back on
his bed, staring up at the cracks in the ceiling, and forced himself to relax. He was at home, not working in enemy territory
on the Spanish–Portuguese border, and the bells were calling the faithful to their weekly devotions, not warning of an imminent
attack.


He pushed back the blanket and walked to the window. In the street below, Fetter Lane was much as it had been when he had
left the city back in June. Carts still creaked across its manure-carpeted cobbles, impeded that morning by the rainwater
that formed a fast-moving stream down one side, and the Golden Lion tavern still stood opposite, its sign swinging gently in the wind and its sleepy-eyed
patrons just beginning to emerge from a night of dark talk and conspiracy. The recently installed Royalist government was
uneasy about the seditious discussions it believed took place in the many coffee houses that were springing up all over London,
but Chaloner thought half the country’s dissidents could be eradicated in one fell swoop if the Golden Lion was monitored
– and probably half its criminals, too. He did not think he had ever encountered a place that was such a flagrant haven for
felons and mischief-makers.


He almost jumped out of his skin when something brushed against his leg, and he reached for his knife a second time; but it
was only the stray cat that had attached itself to him on his journey home from Lisbon. He assumed its affection was hunger-driven,
until he spotted the remains of a rat near the hearth; the animal had evidently despaired of being fed and had procured its
own breakfast. It rubbed his leg again, then jumped on to the window sill and began to wash itself.


Dawn had broken, and people were walking, riding or being driven to church. Chaloner supposed he had better join them, not
because he had any burning desire for religion, but because he did not want to draw attention to himself with unorthodox behaviour.
After a decade of Puritan rule, the newly reinstated bishops were eager to assert the authority of the traditional Church,
and anyone not attending the Sunday services laid himself open to accusations of nonconformism. Like most spies, Chaloner
tried to keep a low profile, and aimed to do all that was expected of him in the interests of maintaining anonymity.


The travelling clothes he had been wearing for the last three weeks were tar-stained and stiff with sea-salt, so he knelt
by the chest at the end of the bed and rummaged about for something clean. He was horrified to discover that moths and mice
had been there before him, and that what had been a respectable wardrobe was now a mess of holes and shreds. It was not that
he particularly enjoyed donning splendid costumes, but his work as an intelligence officer meant that he was required to dress
to a certain standard in order to gain access to the places where he needed to be. If he went to the Palace of White Hall
– where the King lived and his ministers had their offices – clad in rags, the guards would refuse to let him in.


Eventually, he found a blue long-coat with silver buttons, knee-length breeches and a laced shirt that had somehow escaped
the creatures’ ravages. ‘Lacing’ was a recent – and to his mind foppish – fashion, and he disliked the sensation of extraneous
material flapping around his wrists and neck, but at least it provided convenient hiding places for the various weapons he
always carried. Over the coat went the sash that held his sword; no gentlemen ever left home without a sword. His hat was
black with a wide brim and a conical dome, and looked unremarkable. However, it had been given to him by a lady he had befriended
in Spain, and its crown had been cleverly reinforced with a skin of steel. In a profession where sly blows to the head were
not uncommon, he felt it was sure to prove useful.


He stumbled over a warped floorboard as he headed for the door, and a quick glance around the rented rooms he called home
– an attic chamber containing a bed, two chairs, a chest and a table, and an adjoining pantry-cum-storeroom – told him that
the subsidence he had first noticed at Christmas had grown a lot more marked during the four months he had been away. A fire in the house next door was
to blame, and he was surprised the city authorities had not ordered his building to be demolished, too. The roof leaked, his
windows no longer closed, and there was a distinct list to his floor. He only hoped that if – when – it did collapse, he would
not be in it.


He walked swiftly down the stairs to the ground floor, the cat at his heels. He did not tiptoe deliberately, but stealth was
second nature to a spy, and his sudden, soundless appearance startled his landlord, Daniel Ellis. Ellis was standing in front
of a tin mirror, trying to see whether his wig was on straight in the dim light of the hall.


‘Lord!’ Ellis exclaimed, hand to his heart. ‘I did not hear you coming. I must be growing deaf.’

Ellis had been genuinely pleased to see his tenant return the previous evening. The speed of Chaloner’s departure – which
had barely left him time to pack a bag; he had actually missed the ship he had been ordered to catch, and had been obliged
to pay a riverman to row after it – had left Ellis with the impression that Chaloner might not come back. And there had been
rent owing.


Chaloner gesticulated upwards. ‘Did you know the ceiling in my room—’

‘There is nothing wrong with my house,’ interrupted Ellis, in a way that told Chaloner he was probably not the first to complain.
‘Rats have a penchant for wood, as I have told you before, and they always gnaw beams when folk leave their rooms unoccupied
for long periods of time. Of course, now you have a cat, rodents will no longer be a problem.’


Chaloner could have argued, but the chambers suited him well for a number of reasons. First, the subsidence had allowed him to negotiate a low rent, which was important to a man whose employer sometimes forgot to pay him. Secondly,
Fetter Lane was a reasonably affluent street and its householders kept it lit at night – a spy always liked to be able to
see what was happening outside his home. And finally, it was convenient for White Hall, where his master, the Earl of Clarendon
worked.


‘Some letters came when you were gone,’ said Ellis, retrieving a bundle of missives from the chest under the mirror. ‘I was
going to give them to your next of kin.’


‘You thought I was dead?’

Ellis became a little defensive. ‘It was not an unreasonable assumption – you left very abruptly, and then there was no news
of you for months. I heard you playing your viol last night, by the way. At least the rats did not eat that.’


Chaloner would not have been pleased if they had. Playing the bass viol, or viola de gamba, was the thing he had missed above
all else during his time away. Music soothed him and cleared his mind when he needed to concentrate, and although Isabella
– the lady who had provided him with the hat and other comforts in Portugal – had arranged for him to borrow an instrument,
it was not the same as playing his own. He took the letters from Ellis as his landlord locked the front door behind them.


There were five messages, which included three from his family in Buckinghamshire. He opened these first and scanned them
quickly, afraid, as always, that a missive from home might carry bad news. All was well, though, and his brother was only
demanding to know why he had not written. The fourth note was from his friend, the surveyor–mathematician William Leybourn,
inviting him to dine with him and the woman he intended to marry. A date of the twentieth of July was scrawled at the bottom, and Chaloner wondered whether he might find Leybourn wed
when he went to visit. He hoped so: Leybourn was always whining about not having a wife.


The fifth and last had been written just two days before, and was from a musician called Thomas Maylord. Maylord had been
a close friend of Chaloner’s father, and had played for Oliver Cromwell’s court; when the Commonwealth had collapsed and King
Charles II had reclaimed his throne three years before, Maylord had somehow managed to persuade the Royalists to keep him
on. The letter was brief, and begged the spy for a meeting at his earliest convenience. The tone was curt, almost frightened,
and very unlike the amiable violist. It was unsettling, and Chaloner supposed he had better find out what was distressing
the old man as soon as he could.


St Dunstan-in-the-West was a large, stalwart church with a big square tower and a walled graveyard that jutted out into Fleet
Street – much to the annoyance of carters and hackney-drivers, who tended to collide with it in foggy weather. It was full
that morning, as people crowded inside to hear Rector Thompson preach a sermon about original sin. It was probably an erudite
and well-argued discourse, but Thompson mumbled and there were so many babies and small children screaming that very little
of his homily could be heard. Chaloner leaned against a pillar, folded his arms and thought that obligatory appearances at
Sunday services was one aspect of home he had not missed at all.


Also bored, Ellis began to tell Chaloner about the foul weather that had beset the city while the spy had been away. Chaloner glanced around and saw the landlord was not the only one to be talking while Thompson pontificated in his pulpit.
Behind them, two merchants discussed the imminent arrival of a consignment of French wine, while the man in front had his
arms around two women, and was enjoying a conversation that was bawdy and far from private.


‘You did not say where you have been,’ said Ellis, when Chaloner made no comment on his dreary monologue of storms, rain and
drizzle. ‘Was it far?’


‘I visited Dover,’ replied Chaloner ambiguously. He was fortunate in that Ellis seldom quizzed him about the odd hours he
kept, or the disguises he often donned. The landlord believed him to be a victualling clerk for the Admiralty, an occupation
so staid and dull that few people ever wanted to know about it. Unfortunately, though, even Ellis’s incurious nature was goaded
into asking about a sudden and abrupt departure that had lasted nigh on four months.


‘Dover?’ echoed Ellis, scratching his head. There were lice in his periwig. ‘In Kent?’

‘The navy has business there,’ hedged Chaloner. Careful phrasing meant he was not actually lying, because his ship had stopped in Dover before sailing for Lisbon. He supposed there was no reason why he should not tell people that he had been
on official business in Portugal and Spain, but he had been trained to keep confidences to a minimum and, after a decade in
espionage, it was a difficult habit to break.


‘There is a big castle in Dover,’ said Ellis, as if he imagined his tenant might not have noticed it. ‘It will be our first
line of defence when the Dutch invade. I was in the Turk’s Head Coffee House last night, and it was full of talk about the great flotilla of boats the Dutch is building, ready to fight us.’


‘They do not need to build anything,’ said Chaloner, who had spent several years undercover in Holland. ‘They already have
a great navy. And, unlike ours, it is manned by sailors who have been paid, and is equipped with ships that are actually seaworthy.’


Ellis shook his head. ‘The government should spend more money on defending us from foreigners, and less on chasing phantom
rebels in the north of England. Have you been reading the newsbooks? The new editor, Roger L’Estrange, wants us to believe
that Yorkshire is trying to start another civil war. He is obsessed with men he calls “phanatiques”.’


‘Right,’ said Chaloner vaguely, reluctant to admit that he had not seen a newsbook – an eight-page ‘news-paper’ produced by
the government for the general public – since June or that he had never heard of Roger L’Estrange. He did not want to startle Ellis into an interrogation by displaying a total
ignorance of current affairs.


‘L’Estrange is something of a phanatique himself, if you ask me,’ Ellis went on disapprovingly. ‘Someone should tell him the
newsbooks were not founded to provide him with an opportunity to rant, but to disseminate interesting information to readers. I want to know
who has died, been promoted or robbed in London, not L’Estrange’s perverted opinions about Yorkshire. And as for that piece about the Swiss ambassador – well, who cares what a foreign diplomat was given to eat in France?’


‘True,’ said Chaloner, supposing he had better spend a few hours reading, to catch up.

‘I am pleased to see you home again,’ said Ellis, searching for a subject that would elicit more than monosyllabic answers. ‘You said you might be gone a month, but it was four times
that, and I was beginning to think you had decided to lodge elsewhere.’


Chaloner thought back to the blossom-scented June morning when he had received the message that ordered him to go immediately
to White Hall. Such summons were not unusual from his employer, and he had not thought much about it. Like many politicians,
the Earl of Clarendon – currently Lord Chancellor – had accumulated plenty of enemies during his life, and relied on his spy
to provide him with information that would allow him to stay one step ahead of them. However, it had not been Clarendon who
had sent for him, then dispatched him on a long and dangerous mission to the Iberian Peninsula. It had been the Queen – and
no one refused the ‘request’ of a monarch, even though Chaloner had been reluctant to leave London. He smiled absently at
Ellis, then made a show of listening to the sermon. Ellis sighed at his tenant’s uncommunicative manner, but did not press
him further.


When the service was over, the congregation flooded into Fleet Street and Ellis went to join cronies from his coffee-house.
They immediately began a spirited debate about a newsbook editorial that described Quakers as ‘licentious and incorrigible’;
some thought the epithet accurate, while others claimed they would make up their own minds and did not need L’Estrange telling
them what to think. Chaloner began to walk to White Hall, aware that his Earl would want to know he was home at last. The
rain had stopped, although it had left Fleet Street a soft carpet of mud, and he was astonished by the lively bustle as traders
hawked their wares. There had been few secular activities allowed on the Sabbath in Catholic Spain, and the contrast was startling.


‘God will send a great pestilence,’ bawled a street-preacher, who evidently thought the same. He stood on a crate in the middle
of the road, and risked life and limb as traffic surged around him. ‘There is plague in Venice, and He will inflict one on
London unless you repent.’


‘He has already sent one,’ quipped a leatherworker’s apprentice, as he staggered by with a load of cured pelts balanced on
his head. ‘Half the Court has French pox, so I have heard.’


People laughed, and Chaloner was impressed when the lad managed a cheeky bow without dropping what he was carrying. The preacher
scowled at him, and muttered that God would be including cocky apprentices among His list of targets when the plague arrived
in the city.


Chaloner hurried on, warned by a rank, acrid smell that he was approaching the Rainbow Coffee House, an establishment infamous
for the ‘noisome stenches’ associated with its roasting beans. Suddenly, the door was flung open and a man stalked out. He
was tall, lean and elegantly dressed, and a pair of outrageously large gold rings dangled from his ears. His handsome, but
cruel, face was dark with fury, and he gripped the hilt of his sword as though he itched to run someone through with it. Chaloner
thought he looked like a pirate – dangerous and unpredictable.


Moments later, the Rainbow’s door opened a second time, and two more men emerged. Both were clad in the very latest Court
fashions, although the spotless white lace that frothed around their knees and their clean shoes told Chaloner that they had not sloshed through Fleet Street’s mud that morning, but had travelled in style – carried in a sedan-chair
or a hackney-coach. The shorter of the pair, who sported a long yellow wig, held a newsbook in his hand.


‘“Personal lozenges by Theophilus Buckworth for the cure of consumptions, coughs, catarrhs and strongness of breath”,’ he
read in a yell that drew a good deal of attention from passers-by. ‘You call that news, L’Estrange?’


The tall man whipped around to face him, while Chaloner noted wryly that, for all London’s vast size – it was by far the biggest
city in the civilised world – it was still a small place in many ways. Ellis had mentioned a newsbook editor called L’Estrange,
and suddenly, here he was. Not wanting to be caught in the middle of a spat that looked set to turn violent, Chaloner stepped
into an alley, joining a soot-faced lad who was disposing of a bucket of coffee-grounds there. The youth scattered his reeking,
gritty pile by kicking it, and the stench of decay told Chaloner that the lane had been used as a depository for the Rainbow’s
unwanted by-products for years. The coffee-boy pulled a pipe from his pocket and watched with interest as L’Estrange strode
towards his tormentor.


‘That particular notice had nothing to do with me,’ he snarled. ‘My assistant inserted it without my knowledge.’

‘I see,’ drawled the yellow-wigged man, exchanging a smirk with his dashing companion. ‘So, you admit you have no control
over what is published in your newsbooks, do you? That explains a good deal – such as why they contain all manner of dross
about the Swiss ambassador’s dinner in Paris, but nothing about the dealings of our own government.’


The coffee-boy grinned conspiratorially, and nudged Chaloner with his elbow. ‘They have been at it all morning,’ he whispered.


‘At what?’

‘Squabbling. L’Estrange edits the newsbooks – although they hold little to interest the educated man, except their lists of recently stolen horses; the rest is given over to L’Estrange’s
tirades against phanatiques. The fat fellow with the yellow wig is Henry Muddiman.’


‘Who is Muddiman?’ asked Chaloner, aware, even as he spoke, that this was a question which exposed him as an outsider. Unfortunately,
it was true. His postings to spy overseas, first for Cromwell and then for the King, meant the time he had spent in London
was limited to a few weeks. He was a stranger in his own land, which was sometimes a serious impediment to his work. He knew
he could rectify the situation – but only if his masters would stop sending him abroad.


‘Muddiman was L’Estrange’s predecessor at the newsbooks,’ explained the coffee-boy, looking at him askance. ‘Everyone knows
that.’


‘Oh, yes,’ said Chaloner, frowning as vague memories of the man’s name and the nature of his business began to surface. Muddiman
had produced newsbooks during the Commonwealth, and the King had kept him on after the Restoration. ‘I remember now.’


‘Muddiman was ousted for political reasons, and the pair now hate each other with a passion. These days, Muddiman produces
newsletters, which are different to newsbooks, as you will know.’ The lad shot Chaloner another odd glance, not sure if he was assuming too much.


‘Newsbooks are printed,’ supplied Chaloner, to show he was not totally clueless. ‘Newsletters are handwritten. Printed material is subject to government censorship; handwritten
material is not.’


‘Precisely – which means the newsletters are a lot more interesting to read. Of course, Muddiman’s epistles are expensive – more than five pounds a year! – but they
contain real information for the discerning gentleman.’


From the way he spoke, Chaloner surmised that the boy considered himself familiar with ‘real information’. He was probably
right: coffee houses were hubs of news and gossip, and working in one doubtless meant the youth was one of the best informed
people in the city. Chaloner edged deeper into the shadows when L’Estrange drew his sword.


‘L’Estrange should learn to control his temper,’ the boy went on, his tone disapproving. ‘One does not debate with weapons, not at the Rainbow. We deplore that sort of loutishness, which is why he has been asked to leave. And Muddiman should not
have followed him outside, either, because now L’Estrange will try to skewer him. You just watch and see if I am right.’


‘You speak as much rubbish as you print,’ said Muddiman, addressing his rival disdainfully. Chaloner was not sure he would
have adopted such an attitude towards a man with a drawn sword, especially one who was clearly longing to put it to use. ‘You
are nothing but wind.’


‘You insolent—’ L’Estrange’s wild lunge was blocked by Muddiman’s companion, and their two blades slid up each other in a
squeal of protesting metal. The Rainbow’s patrons had seen what was happening through the windows, and friends hurried out
to separate the combatants.


The coffee-boy tutted. ‘There is not enough room in London for two greedy, ambitious newsmongers. One of them will be dead before the year is out, you mark my words.’


Bells were ringing all over the city, from the great bass toll of St Paul’s Cathedral to the musical jangle of St Clement
Danes, as Chaloner resumed his walk to White Hall. He threaded his way through the inevitable congestion at Temple Bar – the
narrow gate that divided Fleet Street from The Strand – and headed for Charing Cross. Carriages with prancing horses ferried
courtiers and officials between state duties and their fine residences, although judging from the dissipated appe