Half the stairs were missing, making the ascent dangerous. The only light came through a single broken window on a landing, shards of glass on the wood covered with years of cobwebs and grime.
At the top a door had been forced off its hinges, hanging forlorn, awkward and broken. Nottingham gripped the knife in his pocket and eased his way through the gap.
Perhaps the room had been neat yesterday. Now, though, it was chaos. A chest had been broken open, the jaws of its lock gaping, the contents cast wide on the floor. The bedsheet had been cut, and the old straw of the mattress scattered.
Other than destruction and violence, there was little to see. A six-pointed star, beautifully carved from wood and polished, was nailed to the wall. The glass inside the tiny window was clean and clear.
So someone killed Isaac then came here looking for something, he thought. He walked the room, five paces by four, inspecting the floorboards to see if any were loose, looking for any hiding place. There was nothing.
No papers, no memories. Isaac was dead and there were no anchors of his life here. A few clothes, worn but carefully cleaned, a spare pair of shoes. But what did any poor man have to leave behind besides debt and despair?
He turned, ready to leave, and was shocked to see an old woman standing in the doorway. For a moment he thought the stories were true after all, that the ghost did walk. She was so frail as to be insubstantial, and he wondered if he blinked whether she’d be gone. Then he saw her eyes, blue, sightless, and knew she was very real.
Her back was as straight as a girl’s, her wrists as thin as wire, her clothes fashionable three decades earlier but cared for, the apron and cap starched crisp and white.
‘So you thought you’d rob him, too.’ Her voice was firm, unwavering. ‘I’m not afraid of you.’
No, he thought with admiration, you’re afraid of nothing.
‘Mistress, I’m the Constable of Leeds,’ Nottingham introduced himself.
‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’ she asked, and he saw her hand tremble before she clutched her dress. ‘I thought he must be when he didn’t come home. He always came home. And I knew it when the others came.’
‘The others?’
She answered his question with one of her own. ‘Did they kill him?’
‘I suspect they did,’ he told her.
‘There were two of them. I live under here. I heard their footsteps and their voices during the night. They woke me. By the time I could dress and get up here, they’d gone. Was he murdered?’
‘Yes,’ Nottingham told her. ‘I’m sorry.’ That was why he’d never heard her. She was intimate with this place and moved silently, knowing each inch.
‘They were looking for his gold. Not that there was any to find. Isaac was as poor as me. Look around, you can see that, can’t you?’
‘I can,’ he agreed.
‘But people think, he’s a Jew, he must have a fortune hidden away.’ He could hear her bitterness. ‘We ate together. He cooked for me, he gave me clothes.’
‘He was a good man,’ was all Nottingham could say. ‘Did you hear anything these men said?’
She stayed perfectly still. Only fury and sorrow were stopping her vanishing before his eyes, he thought.
‘Not the words.’
‘But?’ He could sense there was more.
‘The tone. They were young. There was money in their voices.’
‘I see.’ He walked across the room, careful to avoid what was left of the things here, the detritus of Isaac’s life. Gently he took her hand, her skin like aged vellum under his fingertips. The texture reminded him of Wyatt’s book and he let go quickly.
‘What was he like?’ Nottingham asked.
‘Like?’ She turned into his words, and he was disconcerted to see blind eyes looking up at him. ‘He was a good man, just as you said.’ She let out a long sigh. ‘He kept his faith when most would have given up. Do you know, ten years ago he walked to London and back because they have a synagogue there — that’s where the Jews pray. When he returned he seemed to sparkle for a while.’
‘How old was he?’ Nottingham asked her. She shrugged briefly.
‘He thought he might be seventy, but he didn’t really know. He always said he was a man who walked across the world. He was a boy when he saw his family killed. He never even knew why it had happened. After that he just began walking.’
‘And ended up here.’
‘Eventually.’ She smiled wanly. ‘It took him many years. He had plenty of stories to pass the evenings.’
‘How long did you know him?’
‘Longer than I’ve known anyone.’ Her hand clutched his, her fingers surprisingly strong. ‘It wasn’t long enough. He should have lived for a long time yet.’
‘Yes,’ Nottingham agreed soberly, ‘he should. What’s your name? In case I need to talk to you again.’
‘Hannah. Hannah MacIntosh. My family came down from Scotland when I was small.’ She allowed herself a small, quavering smile. ‘So I know about wandering, too. I was born blind, just in case you were wondering. But I’ve learned to see in other ways.’
‘Can I do anything to help you?’
She shook her head. ‘No need for that. I’ll manage. But thank you, Constable.’
He left her standing at the entrance to the room and made his way gingerly down the stairs, not daring to look back lest he’d imagined her.
Josh waited in the court, idling against the wall.
‘His room’s been ransacked. I saw the woman who lives in the room below. She heard two young men.’ He decided not to mention the idea of a wealthy family. ‘I couldn’t find his pack there or near the body, so someone has that. They’ll probably try to sell the clothes.’
Josh nodded his understanding.
‘Get out there, start looking, talk to people. They’ll help. Isaac was well-liked.’
The boy hesitated and Nottingham took him by the arm.
‘I know John told you to look after me, but we have work to do.’ His face softened. ‘Don’t worry, I can look after myself if Wyatt comes for me. Now go on, let’s find whoever killed Isaac.’
Josh took off at a run, with all the energy of youth. Nottingham pulled up his coat collar against the cold and made his way through the ice and snow.
At the jail, Sedgwick was sitting behind the desk, his face dark and sober. As the Constable entered, he stood, the chair scraping back loudly on the flagstones.
‘Boss-’
‘You saw Isaac’s body?’
‘Boss.’ There was foreboding, warning, in his voice.‘Rushworth,’ he said.
Nottingham closed his eyes and felt the world explode. He’d become distracted; for a few hours he’d forgotten about the clerk.
‘Is he here yet?’
‘In the cold cell with Isaac.’
He walked through slowly, knowing what he’d find but hoping to put off the moment, to make it wait forever. The deputy followed, a lit candle in his hand.
‘Where was he?’
‘Down by the river. Close to where I found Graves.’
So this was Ralph Rushworth, he thought. He made a small corpse, with a bare, concave chest. His white breeches were dusty and dirty, stained with piss at the crotch. Nottingham stared down into the face. The features were tight, compact, the mouth drawn back over yellowed teeth, the nose long and bulbous at the tip. He lifted the right hand, light, almost weightless in death. The fingers were deep-stained with ink, calloused from years of holding a quill, nails bitten down roughly and rimmed with dirt. Just another clerk, with nothing to distinguish him from hundreds of others besides a few words spoken years ago in court.
He pushed the corpse on to its side. The skin had been neatly taken off the back, removed in a single sheet. What remained was livid and bloody, the body within no longer contained. Like Samuel Graves. This is the way
