Stolen Lives (The Alice Chronicles #3)

23

H er chamber at the inn faces south-west and the sun glares in. Sullen air sits heavy as a hot sponge, her skin is damp, and every now and then a drop of sweat trickles across her forehead. Even the sheet under her feels hot, and her chemise, though it is all she wears, traps the heat from breast to thigh. Lifting and flapping the fabric is an effort and brings no lasting relief. It is worst under her arms, between her legs. There is no cool part of the bed, and the stifling pillow wraps itself round her neck, intensifying the nausea. She pushes it away and lies flat on the sheet, heart thumping from the slight exertion.

The relief, when Robin suggested they cease their efforts for the day, mingled itself with remorse that there was still daylight. But both Robin and Jay were tired from the hours of riding, Robin told her, followed by their enquiries round the city, and if it was all right, mistress, he thought a better way was to retire for now and start again in the morning. It would be cooler then as well.

She recalls looking at them properly for the first time since their arrival in Bristol, and realising that she hardly considered their comfort in the frenzy of her single-minded search. Why are you driving them so hard? Is it to clear Wat’s name, or is it really to prevent Sir Thomas from getting his hands on your farm? Sometimes, she chides herself, you are unbelievably selfish.

She feels a painful squeeze to her chest and the trickle of tears. The whole journey is a waste of time, an interfering conceit. All we have done is to confirm what is written in that hateful broadsheet. Tomorrow, or the day after at the latest, we have to start back for Hillbury, or we will cut it too fine. How many dozens of inns and alehouses are there in Bristol? What is the likelihood of finding a landlord who even knows a pointmaker called Turner, let alone the direction where he lives? Our efforts are doomed to failure, better by far to have avoided this journey and taken Sir Thomas’s offer at the time he made it. Hill House Farm in exchange for the court rolls, and close your mind to the criminality.

All you have achieved, she tells herself, is the risk to your friendship with Ursula when she finds out you lied to her and took her people to Bristol without her sanction. This is gross meddling, the reason they so resent you at High Stoke, the very thing you resolved not to do, and this is the result.

Alice turns on her side, grasps the pillow and buries her face in it.

‘You did right to call a halt,’ Jay says. She’s tired, that’s all. You could see that when she went upstairs.’

‘Maybe.’ Robin takes a pull at his ale. The brothers sit in the shade of the inn, drinks to hand, jerkins discarded, shirts open at the neck and pulled free of their breeches.

‘Things’ll look better in the morning,’ Jay says, and mops his forehead with his bunched sleeve.

‘Maybe,’ Robin says again. ‘But meantime we’re getting nowhere fast.’ He puts down his mug and counts off his fingers. ‘One, Kemp employed him, sent him out with money and papers. He knew where to go but he never called on Norrys. Two, Norrys was definitely at home all day. Three, he’s got a manservant employed to answer the door, so no excuse of not hearing a knock. Four, Kemp and Norrys weren’t in league with Cazanove, because surely neither knew the name.’

‘And Norrys doesn’t know any pointmakers called Turner,’ Jay finishes.

‘And on that score,’ Robin says, draining his mug, ‘drink up and let’s get going. There’s still an hour or two of daylight.’

‘Why, what are we doing?’

‘We’re going to find a pointmaker called Turner.’

‘Rob, there could be dozens of pointmakers in the city for all we know. How do we find them? It’d take a month of Sundays to root each one out.’

‘When did you last have dealings with a pointmaker, Jay?’

‘I never did. Pointmakers are usually women, like Master Norrys said, and maybe this Turner is husband of one of them. You can’t go rooting out every woman in Bristol and putting her to the question.’

‘I don’t intend to. Women or men, what does it matter? Think what they do.’

‘They make cord.’

‘Exactly. And?’

‘How does that help? They don’t hang up signs. Leastways, I’ve never seen one.’

‘They make the cord and then what do they do with it?’

‘Cut it into lengths, I suppose.’

‘Yes? And then?’

‘Fix those end things on?’

‘Come on, Jay, think. What do they do when they’ve made the points?’

‘Of course!’ Jay exclaims. ‘Sell them to the tailors.’

‘And tailors do hang up signs, so let’s go and find them.’