clean sheet of paper, he’d penned, ‘My sweet S is dead. There can be no more for me with her gone.’
The quill had been cleaned, the small knife for sharpening it lying next at the side, the inkwell carefully capped. A man’s final actions.
‘Rob,’ Sedgwick asked, ‘how well did you know Will?’
‘Not well at all, I told you,’ Lister answered distractedly. ‘Why?’
‘I think he might be connected to the murder we have.’
He left the lad to sort through the correspondence, trying to find anything he could — love letters, the names of relatives, more about Jackson’s work. That was something he could do easily enough without anyone gazing over his shoulder. Sedgwick hurried back to the jail, the note carefully folded in his pocket.
Nottingham was still labouring over his reports, the remains of a mutton pie on the desk.
‘I think you’d better have a look at this, boss.’
He waited as the Constable read and then the two men looked at each other.
‘Sarah Godlove?’
‘That’s what I was wondering.’
Nottingham reached into the desk and found the note he’d discovered in the dead girl’s dress. He placed it next to the brief lines Jackson had left. The writing matched.
‘That would explain her being away one day each week, meeting him, I suppose.’ He sat back, scraping a hand over his chin. ‘Good work, John. I think we’d better find out all we can about Mr Jackson. Men have murdered their lovers before.’
Sedgwick nodded. ‘Rob’s going through his things.’
‘What do you think of him?’ Nottingham asked.
‘He’s got plenty to learn,’ the deputy said cautiously.
‘I know. But we all did when we started. I remember what you were like.’
‘He’s quick, I’ll give him that. If he stays he might be all right. If.’
‘I think he’d make a good deputy when you become Constable.’
Sedgwick smiled. ‘If the Corporation lets it happen that way.’
‘They’ll listen to my recommendation,’ the Constable said firmly. ‘No promises, mind.’ He waited until Sedgwick nodded his acknowledgement.
‘Still, plenty of time before that happens, boss.’
‘I bloody well hope so.’
Sedgwick turned to leave.
‘John?’ Nottingham held up the paper. ‘Worth learning to read?’
Sedgwick grinned. ‘Aye, boss.’
When he walked back into Jackson’s rooms, the deputy saw that Lister had thrown his jacket over a chair and was poring over the papers from the desk, sorting them into four piles on the table.
‘What do we have?’ he asked.
‘Those are nothing,’ Rob answered, pointing at his handiwork. ‘Just bills. Those are work — he was with Elias Tunstall, by the way — and those are family. Three sisters, one of them’s in Leeds, married to a merchant.’
‘And what about those?’ Sedgwick gestured at a small collection.
‘Those are his love letters.’
‘All from the same girl?’
‘The handwriting’s the same in all of them and they’re all signed S. No dates on any of them.’
‘S is Sarah Godlove, the murdered girl. Jackson’s writing matches a note she had hidden on her.’
‘Well. .’ Lister began, then couldn’t think of anything more to say.
‘An interesting turn, isn’t it?’ the deputy said. ‘You finish looking through these and we’ll take them back to the jail.’
‘John?’ Lister asked soon after, looking up from one of the notes. ‘Where did Sarah live?’
‘Horsforth. Why?’
‘Listen to this:
‘Aye,’ Sedgwick agreed thoughtfully.
The Constable divided up the tasks. Lister would continue to search through the papers. Sedgwick would go to Tunstall’s to break the news and see what he could discover. He himself would take word of Jackson’s suicide to his sister.
The house on Vicar Lane was run down, as if the people inside had stopped caring about it some years before. The windows were dirty, the limewash old and worn, its colour faded from brilliant white almost to grey. Not the house of a successful merchant, he thought as he knocked on the door. But then not every merchant made his fortune; many lost everything.
‘I’m Richard Nottingham, Constable of Leeds. I need to see Mrs Bradley,’ he told the maid, a toothless old wraith who showed him through to the dusty withdrawing room, sketching a curtsey on her way out. He had to spend ten minutes waiting until Elizabeth Bradley entered, skirts rustling, her face freshly powdered and hair up. She looked to be in her middle thirties, careworn and harassed but putting on a good front.
‘Maggie said you’re the Constable?’ she enquired, confusion on her face. Had she dressed up to receive him, he wondered?
‘I am. I’m sorry, Mrs Bradley, but I have ill news for you.’ There was never a way to break a death easily. Murder was difficult enough, but suicide was something impossible to understand.
‘What do you mean?’ she asked sharply. ‘Has something happened to Henry?’
‘No.’ He looked at her. ‘You’d better sit down,’ he told her. ‘It’s your brother.’
‘Will?’
‘Yes.’
She looked up at him, uncomprehending. ‘What is it? Is he in trouble?’
Nottingham paused.
‘I’m afraid he’s dead,’ he said finally. ‘He killed himself.’
‘Will?’ She spoke the word again. ‘Will?’
‘Yes.’ He watched with concern as her eyes began to lose focus, and took her hand to steady her. ‘Do you want me to get the maid?’
She shook her head slowly, squeezing her eyes firmly shut to stop any tears leaking out. Her fingers squeezed hard around his, the grip tight. She needed to control herself, he knew that, to let the shock pass. She let go of him, pulling a linen handkerchief from her sleeve and crushing it into a ball in her small fist.
‘It’s Will?’ she asked. ‘You’re sure?’
‘It is,’ he told her in a gentle voice. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘But why. . why would he kill himself??’
‘I don’t know,’ the Constable answered. ‘We’re trying to find out. Can you think of any reason?’
‘No,’ she said after a while, her voice full of bafflement. ‘He said that the business was doing well. He was making money. He was going to invest in Henry’s — my husband’s — firm.’ She put her hand to her mouth. ‘Henry.’
‘Mrs Bradley.’
She looked at Nottingham, her thoughts jerking back hard to the here and now.
‘Were you and your brother close?’
‘He always came to church with us on Sunday. We go to the new church, we have a family pew there.’
‘What about your sisters?’
‘Alice lives in York and Susan is in Pontefract. I’m the oldest.’ Her eyes widened as another understanding reached her. ‘I’ll have to tell them, won’t I?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry.’
She dabbed quickly at a tear before it could run down her cheek.
‘Did your brother have a girl, by any chance?’
‘Will? A girl?’ she asked in astonishment. ‘You didn’t know my brother, did you?’
‘No.’
