By water and then afoot, Rosamond traveled from Salisbury Court to Soper Lane. En route, she bought two meat pies from a street vendor, offering one to Melka. Muttering in Polish, the actual words inaudible, the maid sent her mistress a look that said she’d rather eat a live rat. Since the morning’s activities and the long walk had made her hungry, Rosamond ate both pies, popping the last morsel into her mouth just as they reached the Hackett mercery. A small crowd had gathered outside to eavesdrop on the loud argument already in progress within.
‘That Goodwife Hackett is most intemperate,’ one man said, shaking his head.
‘Always did have a sharp tongue,’ said a woman in a dove gray gown.
‘A virago,’ another man pronounced.
‘A shrew,’ agreed a third.
‘Who is she berating?’ Rosamond asked, pushing through Isolde’s nosy neighbors to reach the shop door.
Before anyone could answer her, Isolde’s voice rose to a shriek. ‘Only her death will satisfy me!’
Rosamond sucked in a startled breath.
‘She speaks of her sister,’ said the woman in gray.
Rosamond opened the door and stepped into the shop, closely followed by Melka. Neither combatant took any notice of them.
‘She must pay with her life for killing my husband!’
Isolde shouted the words into the face of a toothsome young man. Dark hair curled over his forehead. Dark, soulful eyes beseeched Isolde’s mercy as he seized one of her flailing hands in both of his and drew it toward his mouth as if he meant to kiss it.
‘Will nothing else satisfy you, madonna?’ His voice was deep and carried with it the sultry flavors of Italy.
Rosamond’s eyes narrowed. Tommaso Sassetti – he could be no one else.
Isolde used her free hand to slap the impudent fellow. Tommaso released her and stepped away. The look on his face put Rosamond in mind of a puppy kicked by its master, but it provoked neither sympathy nor remorse from Lina’s sister.
‘I will be satisfied when I have proof that Lina is dead. I want to see her burn.’
‘My turtledove would not kill. She is all that is gentle and sweet.’ Tommaso’s hands moved when he spoke, as if to emphasize his agitation, but his voice lacked conviction. He had no doubt begun to question the wisdom of wanting to marry a woman accused of murder.
Isolde leaned in, one finger jabbing the embroidery at the front of Tommaso’s dusky orange doublet. ‘If you know where she is hiding, sirrah, you are as guilty as she is and must pay the price.’ Then her lips twisted into a terrible mockery of a smile. ‘If you do know, tell her I will settle for seeing her bloated corpse pulled out of the Thames. If she regrets what she did, let her fling herself into the river out of remorse and so drown.’
Rosamond cleared her throat. ‘How do you know she killed him?’
Isolde turned on her, a wild light in her eyes. ‘How do I know? How do I know? I will tell you how I know. She was standing over Hugo’s body when I found him, the bloodstained knife still in her hand. And then she flung it away from her and ran. What further proof does anyone need of her guilt?’
Holding the knife? Lina had not mentioned that detail, but Rosamond thought she could explain away the omission. ‘What more natural, though foolish, than to attempt to save a man who has been stabbed by pulling out the blade?’
‘She will not listen to reason!’ Tommaso flung his arms wide to express his exasperation with Isolde. ‘It is no use talking to her.’
Rosamond gave him a wide berth as she moved closer to Isolde. Lina’s sister ignored her to snarl at the Italian. ‘Get out of my shop or I will send for the constable and have you thrown in gaol.’
Tommaso made a sound of disgust, accompanied by an emphatic hand gesture in Isolde’s direction.
‘Go!’ she shrieked.
He went.
Rosamond watched him stalk out of the mercery. Follow him? Or stay and question Isolde?
She wanted to ask Tommaso where he had been on the night of the murder and if he knew that Hugo Hackett had been determined to marry Lina to his uncle. Did he know of Alessandro’s visit to the house of a bawd named Black Luce? Yet all those questions could wait. She knew where to find the fellow.
Hugo Hackett’s widow struggled to rein in her temper. Her hands, curled into fists, rested on fashionably padded hips, and she stood with her feet braced, staring at the exit as if she expected Tommaso to return at any moment to assault her. She’d be no match for him if he did, Rosamond thought. Isolde Hackett was an exceeding scrawny woman. On the other hand, fury could lend strength to even the weakest child. She stayed out of the widow’s way, biding her time.
When Isolde finally turned and noticed Rosamond, she sent a baleful look in the other woman’s direction. ‘Who are you and what do you want?’
‘Shall I take my custom elsewhere?’ Rosamond inquired.
‘Alys will help you.’ Isolde snapped out the words. ‘Alys? Where are you, girl? Assist Mistress …?’
‘Jaffrey,’ Rosamond answered. She had convinced herself that Lady Appleton was correct in her assumption that Isolde would not recognize the surname.
The same pale-faced girl Rosamond had seen on her first visit to the shop scurried out from behind a tall stack of merchandise, where she had been doing her best to avoid Isolde’s notice. Her voice shook when she addressed Rosamond. ‘How may I serve you, madam?’
Best to ignore Isolde for the nonce, Rosamond decided, and give her time to settle. She smiled at the girl. ‘Silk. I have come for silk. Are you by chance an apprentice silkwoman?’
‘Oh, no, madam. I am only a shepster. I sew shirts and sheets and linen underwear and other small linen items.’
In other words, she earned her living by doing piecework. She had likely had a hand in making the shift Rosamond had purchased on her last visit, when she’d been pretending to be Lady Noone. Of a certainty, the girl was poorly paid and beholden to Isolde Hackett for her livelihood. A complexion that pasty was proof enough that young Alys rarely saw the sun.
‘Do you live here?’ Rosamond inquired.
‘Yes, madam. What may I show you?’ Alys was so nervous she squeaked. ‘We carry all manner of silk goods, all of them very fine.’
‘Let us begin with tassels.’
Following Alys to that display, Rosamond pondered the girl’s answer. Lina had not mentioned the shepster when she’d provided the list of servants and apprentices. Rosamond wondered if the oversight had been deliberate or if her old friend had simply forgotten about this quiet mouse of a girl.
Rosamond lowered her voice. ‘Who is this woman your mistress believes killed her husband?’
‘Her own sister!’ Alys blurted out the answer before she could stop herself. Then she shrank back as Isolde, overhearing, bore down on them.
Rosamond turned to face the silkwoman, trying her best to look solicitous. ‘What a tragedy! How brave you are to keep the shop open.’
Having regained control of her temper, Isolde sounded more bitter than angry. ‘I have little choice. My livelihood depends upon it.’ She grimaced. ‘Many new customers have come into the mercery these last few days. How can I object so long as they buy?’
She put only the slightest extra emphasis on the word ‘buy’ but Rosamond took her meaning. Hackett’s murder had been good for business. If a gawker wished to visit the scene of the crime, Isolde meant to make certain he left with a lighter purse. No doubt that was why she had been so amenable to answering questions when Rosamond had presented herself in the guise of Lady Noone.
‘You must forgive my curiosity,’ Rosamond apologized, ‘but I do not understand why your sister would have killed your husband.’
‘Because she is a wicked, ungrateful young woman!’ Isolde pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at eyes that showed no obvious sign of tears.
‘There must be more to the story than that.’ Rosamond selected two overpriced silk tassels, handed them to Melka to carry, and moved on to a display of embroidered ribbons. ‘Did he offend her in some way?’
‘He did naught but carry out my father’s wishes.’ Isolde had a mulish look on her face and sounded defensive.
‘What wishes were those, if I may be so bold as to ask?’ Rosamond chose the most expensive ribbons the shop had to offer. Silent, as always, Melka took charge of them.
‘My father asked my husband to arrange a good marriage for her, and he did so. He knew what was best for her.’
Rosamond nodded, as if she agreed that men always made the best decisions on behalf of their female relations. Inside she was writhing with indignation on Lina’s behalf. ‘Did he match Lina with a worthy man?’
‘He found her a wealthy one, Mistress Jaffrey.’
Rosamond forced herself to laugh. ‘Not that young man who just left, then?’
‘Indeed not.’
Rosamond was about to ask another question about Tommaso when she noticed the odd expression that had come over Isolde’s face. Had she said something to arouse the other woman’s suspicion? She could not think what it could have been. To distract the shopkeeper, she turned her attention to an array of silk buttons. ‘I must have some of these.’
‘Alys, help Mistress Jaffrey.’
Leaving her customer to the shepster, Isolde bolted toward the rear of the shop and disappeared behind the curtain hung across a doorway. Was she in need of more time to compose herself? Or was she ill? Rosamond wondered if Isolde might be with child. She’d heard that the early months of pregnancy made some women sick to their stomachs.
‘What is back there?’ she asked of Alys in a whisper.
‘That is the workshop. She’s likely gone to make sure the apprentices are not dallying with the girls she’s training to be silkwomen. She is harder on those two boys than her husband ever was.’
Rosamond would have pursued this point had Isolde not returned as abruptly as she’d departed. Her lips were set in a grim line and she had a determined look in her eyes. Following close at her heels was one of the apprentices.
‘I have remembered who you are, Mistress Jaffrey,’ Isolde said. ‘You are Rosamond Appleton, Lina’s friend, the one who was such a bad influence on her. I have sent the other lad for the constable.’
‘If you know who I am, then you also know I am a respectable married woman with a considerable fortune at my disposal. Your constable can have no interest in me.’
‘He will if I tell him you are hiding my sister.’
‘But I am not. I am merely curious as to why you think her capable of murder.’
Behind her, Rosamond heard the shop door open and close. She glanced over her shoulder to see who had come in and realized that Melka had left the mercery. She did not understand why her maidservant would abandon her but she had no time to ponder Melka’s uncharacteristic behavior.
Lina’s sister seized hold of Rosamond’s forearm. ‘You know where she is. You have talked to her. How else would you have learned of Hugo’s death?’
‘I heard of it the way everyone else did. Your husband’s death is a nine-day’s wonder here in London. You said yourself that your business has increased since he died. Has there been a ballad written yet about the crime? Mayhap you should commission one.’
Isolde’s fingers dug deeply into the fabric of Rosamond’s sleeve. ‘Where is she? Tell me what you know!’
‘I know that Lina is a sweet-tempered girl, just as that young man said. To kill someone, especially with a knife, would be most out of character for her. Why is it that you will not even consider the possibility that she came upon your husband after he was already dead?’
‘She ran away!’
‘Not at first. At first, she screamed, waking the entire household. Why would a murderer do that?’
Isolde tightened her already vise-like grip. For a scrawny woman, she was surprisingly strong. ‘How do you know she screamed? You have seen her. I knew it. You are hiding her.’
‘I am not!’
Now nearly as infuriated as the woman grasping her arm, Rosamond attempted to wrench free. Tenacious as a terrier with its teeth clamped tight on its prey, Isolde refused to let go.
Rosamond gave her a push. Isolde shrieked as if she’d been skewered with a hot poker and tried to claw Rosamond’s face with her free hand.
She is a madwoman, Rosamond thought, ducking her head to evade the attack. She caught Isolde’s wrist to prevent a second attempt, forcing the arm back.
In the tussle that followed, Isolde never released her bruising hold on Rosamond’s forearm. Rosamond’s struggle to defend herself knocked Isolde’s cap askew but did no other damage. The two women were locked in a stalemate when the door banged open and a big, rawboned, red-faced fellow charged into the shop.
‘Here, what’s all this?’ He stepped between them and pried them apart.
‘Arrest this woman, Clem,’ Isolde demanded. ‘Take her to the Compter and lock her in with the thieves and strumpets.’
Clem looked from Isolde to Rosamond and back again to Isolde. Then he stuck one finger beneath his cap and scratched his head.
The lad Isolde had sent for the constable slipped inside the mercery and went to stand beside his fellow apprentice. Both took care to stay well away from their mistress. Alys remained where she was, cowering behind the display of buttons.
‘Did you not hear me?’ Isolde shouted. ‘Arrest her, I say!’ A tiny line of spittle ran out of her open mouth and down her chin.
‘This woman has run mad from grief.’ Rosamond was relieved to hear that her own voice sounded calm and reasonable. ‘I do much pity her, but I do not intend to stay here and be insulted.’ Head high, she turned her back on Isolde and the constable and started for the door. Her hope of making a dignified exit was shattered an instant later.
‘Noooo!’ Isolde flung herself after Rosamond and would have attacked her again had the constable not caught hold of her as she flew past him.
‘Here now!’ With a lack of effort Rosamond envied, he hauled Isolde away before she could inflict any more harm on her intended victim. ‘Stand here,’ he ordered, setting her down beside the display of tassels.
Rosamond was trying to slip away when he hailed her. ‘You, mistress – what is your name?’
Haughtiness seemed called for. ‘I am Mistress Jaffrey,’ Rosamond said, head held high and jaw thrust slightly forward. ‘I will have you know that I am a respectable married woman who came here only to shop for silks.’
Keeping one eye on Isolde, as if she was a powder keg about to explode, the constable whipped off his cap. ‘Clement Dodge, madam, one of the constables of Cheapside Ward. If you are what you say, then what was all this to-do about?’
‘She helped Lina escape.’ Isolde glared at Rosamond. ‘No doubt she is hiding the wretched girl. You must go and search her lodgings!’
‘Where do you dwell, madam?’ the constable asked.
Rosamond hesitated. Although she’d given him her real name – what choice had she had when Isolde already knew it? – she saw no need to reveal the precise location of her house. ‘I reside in Surrey.’
At this, Clem Dodge’s shoulders slumped. He sent Isolde an apologetic look. ‘She does not live in London, Goodwife Hackett. That means there is little I can do.’
The scowl Isolde bestowed on him was formidable. ‘Do you mean to tell me that you cannot search outside the city for an outlaw?’
Dodge shifted his weight from foot to foot, looking everywhere but at the silkwoman. ‘In truth, I cannot even pursue a cutpurse into the lower end of Soper Lane, not once it crosses into Cordwainer Street Ward. Constables from one jurisdiction to the next guard their territory like jealous lovers.’
‘I will complain of this to the Lord Mayor. Surely London’s sheriffs have sufficient authority to bring wrongdoers to justice.’
The constable shook his head. ‘Even if they do, they will scarce bestir themselves if it means upsetting a member of the gentry.’
Rosamond could not suppress a small smile at this good news. If the constable was reluctant to venture beyond the parishes that made up his own ward and would not cross the Thames into Surrey, then he most assuredly would not go hunting for Lina in Kent. As long as she remained at Leigh Abbey, she was safe from arrest.
Dodge stopped shuffling his feet to address Isolde. ‘You might offer a reward.’
The widow’s eyes lit up. ‘Is it money you want? I will give you a gold sovereign if you take Mistress Jaffrey into custody and ten times that much if you capture my sister.’
Dodge looked sorely tempted.
‘I can afford to pay you far more to keep my freedom than she can to deny it,’ Rosamond countered. The constable had only to look at the way she was dressed to see that she was telling the truth.
‘I have no charge to bring against Mistress Jaffrey.’ Dodge’s voice was rife with disappointment. ‘But the promise of a reward could lead to someone finding your sister.’
‘Mistress Jaffrey is harboring a murderess! Is that not a crime?’
‘Indeed, I am not,’ Rosamond said, annoyed all over again. ‘I have broken no law, not even the most minor.’
Clem Dodge began to edge toward the door, but Isolde was not about to let him go until he did as she wanted. She scooped up a silken coif from a nearby table and waved it in his face. ‘She tried to steal this from me!’
‘It is not in her possession now.’
‘I made her put it back. Ask Alys. She will tell you this is true.’
Everyone turned to stare at the girl and Rosamond felt the first stirrings of fear. If Alys supported her mistress’s lie, the constable might well arrest her and lock her up in one of London’s notoriously unpleasant gaols. A charge of theft was nothing to be taken lightly. Conviction for stealing any item valued at more than a shilling was punishable by hanging.
‘I pay for what I desire. I am a wealthy woman, constable.’ She hoped he would interpret this reminder as the thinly veiled offer of a bribe.
Since Alys appeared to be too frightened to speak in support of Isolde’s claim, the widow threw a new accusation at Rosamond. ‘She has broken the sumptuary laws. My late father knew her history. He told me she is the bastard of a knight and she married a man with no claim at all to gentility. She has no right—’
‘What fabrics one is allowed to wear is determined by income, constable.’ Rosamond had to raise her voice to be heard above Isolde’s raving. ‘I assure you, my husband’s income is greater than the required hundred pounds per annum.’
She held her breath, knowing that she was in violation of the law. Only the wives of barons, knights of the order, councilors’ ladies and women who waited on the queen were permitted to wear petticoats of tufted taffeta. Fortunately, no one in the mercery could see what she had on beneath her kirtle.
Trapped between two strong-willed, angry women, Constable Dodge appealed to the third and addressed young Alys. ‘Speak up, girl. Did Mistress Jaffrey try to take merchandise without paying for it?’
Alys swallowed hard. She kept her eyes lowered and her head down. Her voice was so soft that Rosamond had to lean forward to catch her words. ‘She did not, sir.’
Isolde’s glare promised retribution.
‘Does that satisfy you?’ Rosamond asked the constable.
At his nod, she lost no time heading for the door. She had almost reached it when it occurred to her that her quarrel with Isolde Hackett had placed young Alys in an untenable position. She addressed the shepster over her shoulder. ‘Are you bound by apprenticeship or any other legal contract to Goodwife Hackett?’
The girl’s head jerked up. Her wide-eyed gaze skittered toward Isolde before fixing on Rosamond’s face. The look in her eyes was full of hope. ‘I am not, Mistress Jaffrey. I do piecework and mind the shop in return for my room and board.’
‘Well, then,’ said Rosamond, ‘you are free to come away with me now. What say you, Alys? Would you like to have a permanent place in my household?’
The desire to escape from Isolde Hackett outweighed any qualms Alys might have had about accepting such an offer from a total stranger. In so much haste that she stumbled twice before she reached her new mistress, Alys abandoned all that was familiar to her and seized the opportunity Rosamond offered.
Isolde’s howl of outrage followed them into the street.