The shopman said he had them from a Barbary merchant, and they were very finely made. And of a particular red with a pattern on it. Ricky had been trying to din some Euclid into me at the time and the pattern seemed to illustrate one of the propositions about congruent triangles. Whichcote made quite a joke of it and the shopman said he had not taken us for mathematical gentlemen.’
‘Are you sure of the identification?’
‘Of course I’m sure. I have them here.’
Frank went into the study. He came out with a pair of slippers in his hand and placed them on the table.
Holdsworth stared at them. ‘Where did Tom get them – and when? Have you talked to him?’
Frank nodded. ‘The boy fetched him out of an alehouse. He was a trifle boozy, but we got some sense out of him in the end. He said he’d picked them up at the back of the Master’s Lodge. It was a day or two after Mrs Whichcote died, he wasn’t sure when. You recall that there is a paved walk from the garden door? One of them was half concealed beneath the hedge that borders it, and the other was nearby beside an urn.’
The slippers were sturdy enough in their way but designed to be worn in the house or when strolling in a garden on a fine day. Holdsworth turned the nearer one over. The original sole was still there but it had been covered with a much heavier one, clumsily stitched to the upper. Both uppers were scuffed and stained.
‘She must have run through the streets in them,’ Frank said. ‘Just before she died. Tom had a cobbler repair them.’
‘Why slippers? Why not something stouter, and a pair of overshoes as well?’
‘I think she was so desperate to leave that brute of a husband that she took what lay to hand – the gown, the cloak, those slippers. After that beating she’d have run stark-naked through the streets to get away from him.’
‘But still, is it possible there is another explanation for the slippers?’ Holdsworth said, half to himself. ‘Why did no one else see them? Could she have left them at the Lodge after a previous visit, perhaps because they were damaged?’
‘I know she was wearing them. Do you hear? I know it.’
Holdsworth looked up. The boy’s eyes shone unnaturally bright, as if with tears.
‘When she came to me that night, at Mr Whichcote’s, I was sitting on the bed in my chamber.’ His voice was hoarse and scarcely louder than a whisper. ‘She heard the sounds of my distress, sir, and she came to me like the angel she was. I was weeping because of that poor girl, because of everything. And Sylvia drew my head against her bosom. She called me her poor love and mingled her tears with mine.’
Holdsworth suppressed an unkind desire to laugh at this affecting narrative. Trust youth to turn an episode of drunken adultery into a three-volume novel and present it to you before breakfast.
‘Then the button dropped off,’ Frank went on.
‘What button?’ said Holdsworth, taken by surprise.
‘The one from my coat – the club livery. I was still wearing the coat. She and I bent to pick up the button at the same time. Which was when I saw those slippers on her feet. And that was when her dressing gown fell open, and, oh God – and I -’
Frank slumped forward, covered his face with his hands and wept.
Holdsworth no longer wanted to laugh. For where in God’s name was the humour in a weeping boy and a drowned woman? Or, for that matter, in a pair of Barbary slippers and a gilt button bearing the motto
After breakfast, Harry Archdale paid his usual visit to the Jericho. He joined the knot of men waiting their turn at the door. Tom Turdman was wheeling his handcart on the path beside the Long Pond. Afterwards, as Harry walked back to his rooms, he met the night-soil man outside New Building. Tom stood to one side with his eyes respectfully on the ground.
He took off his hat as Harry drew level with him. ‘If it please your honour,’ he muttered in his low, thick voice.
Harry stopped.
Tom held out a grubby square of paper. ‘Begging your pardon, sir, you let this fall.’
Harry had never seen the paper before and he had no desire to touch anything that the night-soil man had touched. Nevertheless he took it. He walked on with the note, holding it a few inches away from his body. He did not look at it until he was back in his keeping room.
He dropped the scrap of paper on the hearth and washed his hands. Afterwards, he crouched in front of the fireplace and picked up the tongs and a pipe spill. Using these implements, he unfolded the note. He was not usually so squeamish but there was something about Tom Turdman’s dirty hands that would make a man break the habit of a lifetime.
There was neither salutation nor signature on the paper but he recognized Soresby’s neat and clerkly hand.
Harry was suddenly irritated. Who did that man Soresby think he was? It was one thing for a gentleman to feel pity for an unfortunate wretch, but it was quite another for him to be summoned by a filthy billet to a squalid rendezvous with the wretch’s disgusting uncle. Why, anyone might see them together. It was quite intolerable.
Elinor heard a knock at the door, footsteps in the hall and the murmur of low voices. She laid down her pen and listened. Then Ben came up with the news that Mr Holdsworth was downstairs and sent up his name, but he did not wish to intrude, merely to ask how the Master did.
‘Ask him to step up,’ Elinor said.
The servant left the room. She pushed her letter to Lady Anne under the blotter, darted across the room and examined herself in the mirror over the mantel. Her own dark-browed face stared back at her, stern and dreary. The gown she wore was a sober grey, fit for the wife of a man in the anteroom of death. She straightened her cap and pushed a lock of hair underneath it. It made no improvement. She still looked a fright.
Ben announced Mr Holdsworth. The notion of him she had in her head did not quite correspond with reality, which was unsettling.
‘How is Dr Carbury?’ he asked immediately. His time at the mill had left a healthy glow on his face.
‘A little better, thank you, sir. You will forgive me if I do not disturb him. He is sleeping now. But I know he would take it as a favour if you would call on him when he is awake. I have told him that you and Mr Frank are back in college.’
‘Would he be well enough to receive me?’
‘That I cannot say. If you were to call at about two o’clock, perhaps, you should find him awake.’
‘I am glad to report that Mr Frank continues to improve. I have every hope that familiar scenes and old friends will complete his cure.’
‘I shall be sure to mention that to Dr Carbury – and to Lady Anne.’ She gestured towards her desk. ‘I am writing to her now.’
Suddenly they ran out of things to say. The silence between them lengthened beyond the point where it was comfortable or even polite. She wished he would not look at her with such close attention, particularly when she was not at her best.
‘There is one other thing, madam,’ Holdsworth said at last. ‘A matter I wished to raise with the Master himself, but I wonder whether in the circumstances I should confide in you instead. If you would permit it?’
She inclined her head, indicating her willingness to be confided in, but said nothing. The hairs on the back of her neck rose.
‘The matter is very delicate.’
She drew back in her chair, preparing a suitable snub in case Mr Holdsworth intended an impertinence. Her caution seemed confirmed when he drew his own chair closer to hers and leaned towards her.
‘It has to do with Mr Whichcote,’ he said in a low voice. ‘He is staying in college to avoid the bailiffs and he has certain papers in his possession. There are many people, in Cambridge and elsewhere, who would prefer it if these papers were suppressed. One of them is Mr Frank. And I am persuaded that the destruction of the papers would also be to the benefit of the college.’
‘What are they about?’
‘The Holy Ghost Club, madam. Whichcote hopes to use them to retrieve his fortunes.’
