A Murder too Soon Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Recent Titles from Michael Jecks

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Day One

  Day Two

  Day Three

  Day Four

  Epilogue

  Recent Titles from Michael Jecks

  The Jack Blackjack Mysteries

  REBELLION’S MESSAGE *

  A MURDER TOO SOON *

  The Medieval West Country Mysteries

  NO LAW IN THE LAND

  THE BISHOP MUST DIE

  THE OATH

  KING’S GOLD

  CITY OF FIENDS

  TEMPLAR’S ACRE

  Vintener Trilogy

  FIELDS OF GLORY

  BLOOD ON THE SAND

  BLOOD OF THE INNOCENTS

  * available from Severn House

  A MURDER TOO SOON

  Michael Jecks

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  First published in Great Britain and the USA 2017 by

  Crème de la Crime, an imprint of

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD of

  19 Cedar Road, Sutton, Surrey, England, SM2 5DA.

  This eBook edition first published in 2017 by Severn House Digital

  an imprint of Severn House Publishers Limited

  Trade paperback edition first published

  in Great Britain and the USA 2017 by

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD

  Copyright © 2017 by Michael Jecks.

  The right of Michael Jecks to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78029-098-0 (cased)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78029-581-7 (trade paper)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78010-898-8 (e-book)

  Except where actual historical events and characters are being described for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.

  This ebook produced by

  Palimpsest Book Production Limited,

  Falkirk, Stirlingshire, Scotland

  This is for Alison and Angus of Tiverton Castle, the owners of one of the most delightful castles – and homes – which has inspired many of my books, this one included.

  In loving memory of Roy George (Peter) Jecks

  A wonderful father. 1920-2017

  PROLOGUE

  It has been said, so I have heard, that a man’s good name is his most precious possession; it should be more highly prized than silver or gold, rubies or diamonds.

  That sounds fine, but I’ve always felt that my own most important and valuable assets are my good looks and my pelt, and I am very closely attached to both. I dislike the idea of spoiling or losing either of them.

  Which is why, when I was suddenly confronted by Thomas Falkes in a dim, dingy alleyway that smelled of hog shit and rotten entrails, out near the shambles beside Smithfield, my inclination was just to turn and run, especially when I saw his mouth open in a broad grin. There was a lot in that grin: malice, vindictiveness and a complete lack of feeling for his fellow man. Mostly, it showed he was looking forward to inflicting pain on me.

  And I would have bolted, too, were it not for the two men who had appeared behind me. Individually, they were large – as wide as the alley, almost, and tall as a house, or so it seemed. It felt as if I was confronted by a wall of muscle.

  ‘I want a word with you,’ Falkes said, while I cricked my neck looking up at their faces.

  I turned to face him. It’s better, I reckon, to see what is about to happen rather than guessing, and, besides, I would never break through those two. I was inclined to think that if I were to escape, it would be around Thomas.

  ‘Hello, Thomas,’ I said airily. Then I saw the size of the knife in his hand.

  He smiled. ‘I’m going to cut your ballocks off and feed them to you.’

  Not the most favourable beginning, but Thomas Falkes was not one of the world’s light-hearted conversationalists. One of the most famous thief-takers and crooked men in the whole of London, if you ignore the politicians and lawyers, Falkes was a swindler, blackmailer, procurer of whores and fence of stolen goods. There was no crime so small that he wouldn’t deign to corner it. I’d heard that he had once robbed his own mother of her pewter. Another man told me he killed his own father, but I think that was Falkes boasting. I doubt he ever knew his father.

  He had a problem with me, and it wasn’t necessarily my approach to business.

  When my life suddenly changed for the better, with a house in the fashionable area near the Moor Gate and a new suit of clothes (which included a rather lovely new jack in cream with a splendid reddish lining), many people grew jealous. Wherever gossips would meet, you would hear my name mentioned.

  I was sworn to secrecy. Not that it was needed. I could hardly walk abroad and announce my new post. Many were the rumours about me. I heard some of them in the street as I passed by, and it seemed a grand ruse to live up to them – apart from the one that said I had sold myself as a bardash to some rich duke or earl who had more interest in a he-whore than his own wife. I didn’t want that reputation.

  My master, John Blount, expressed himself plainly when he heard the stories about me, but there was little I could do to stem the flow. People saw me in my finery and in my new house, and came to their own conclusions. At first he sought to accuse me of boastfulness, but it was his own fault. After all, it was Master John himself who had made my name so prominent in recent weeks. A man can scarce keep his entire life hidden when his fortune changes, and John Blount was paying me well. Only weeks before, I had been a poor, destitute fellow, living with purse-snatchers and pilferers, and all those who knew me were surprised to learn that I was now living in a house not far from the Moor Gate. Those who saw me were convinced that I must have robbed the Queen herself to be able to live in such a grand style. Well might they guess.

  Still, my problem today lay in the fact that Thomas Falkes did not listen to those who suggested I was a sodomite. No: he had good reason to believe that I was not that way inclined.

  While he was a gross brute of a man, with the face and manner of a degenerate alehouse-keeper, his wife was formed from a very different mould. Jen was slender, pale, with red-gold hair that was so abundant its weight seemed to keep her chin tilted upwards. She had blue eyes, full lips that were always on the verge of smiling, and a pair of bosoms that a man could pillow on for a lifetime and die happy.

  I had grown to know young Jen, you see, and Thomas had come to believe that she was bestowing her favours on me. I don’t know; perhaps if Jen had charged me a fee, Thomas would have been happier (if she had shared it with him). Be that as it may, she did visit me a few times. She was impressed with the style in which I lived. Perhaps she considered that she could throw over one husband for a richer one. Whatever her reasons were, I was happy to share my time with her. She was a pretty thing, and the sight of her coming tripping through my door was always enough to make me raise a smile – and something else besides.

  Perhap
s the necklace was an error, though. I was feeling expansive and happy after an afternoon’s gambling at the Bear Pit, where I had made a good profit. I knew I was to be rogering Jen half the night, and on my way home I saw a necklace in a merchant’s and bought it for her on the spur of the moment. I know: silly behaviour. What if her husband saw it? Still, she seemed ridiculously touched, and a day or two later she gave me a little pewter flask in return. It was tiny – no good to anyone – but I promised I would hold it with me at all times. She swore it would bring me good luck. Some luck!

  To be honest, I had expected the little strumpet to sell the necklace almost immediately. She had the heart of a wanton, and money was money, while a necklace could lead to embarrassing questions from Thomas, but the silly bawd couldn’t help herself. She liked it. I heard later that she wore it when she was out with him, and he asked where it came from.

  So that was why I was now standing in a dark alleyway, with two of his heavier brutes behind and him before me, dangling a long, thin blade around the area of my ballocks.

  It was not a comforting experience.

  As soon as I heard Thomas had come to the cuckold’s conclusion, it was clear that I was in trouble. If he decided to assault me in the deep, dark dead of night, I would stand little chance against him, and that was intolerable. I refused to remain closeted in my new home – I was used to walking the streets – but I am no brawler. If there is to be a fight, I prefer to land a blow with a cudgel and run. Not for me the excitement of a long-drawn dagger tournament.

  I tried the bluff approach. ‘Why, Thomas, what have I done to upset you?’

  He grinned evilly. ‘She may be a little tart, but she’s my little tart. I won’t have other men dipping their wicks—’

  ‘Oi! What’s goin’ on in there? Hey, you!’

  I have never been so grateful to hear a constable’s voice. This was a large, roistering fellow with thick lips, cheeks like a cider-drinker’s, and the belly of a bishop. He bore a heavy-looking staff, and as he approached us from behind Falkes, he brought this down into the quarter-staff, as if it was a lance he was pointing at us.

  One of the men said something, and Falkes quickly shoved his dagger away and turned, with a smarmy friendliness in his tone. ‘How can we help you, Constable?’

  ‘What are you lot doing here?’

  ‘I am with Sir Thomas Parry’s household,’ I said, pushing past Falkes quickly. ‘I would be grateful if you could tell me the way to St Paul’s. I am new to London.’

  ‘You must be if you come walking down alleys in this area,’ he said, eyeing the other three. ‘These with you?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Falkes, just as I gave the opposite response.

  ‘We were walking together, but now our paths diverge,’ I said, looking at Falkes.

  The constable gave me rough directions, which I ignored in favour of sticking to busier thoroughfares, and in that way made my way to a wherry, where I caught a boat for the south side of the river, past the bear pits, and out to the Cardinal’s Hat, my favourite stew, brimful of little harlots who would do almost anything for a decent purse. However, today I had no need of feminine companionship; it was more Piers, the door-guard, and his blackthorn cudgel that I craved.

  Soon I was sitting inside Piers’s little chamber, sipping a strong, spiced wine and contemplating my future. It was a bleak prospect.

  If I could see no remedy – and other than paying a dubious fellow a large sum to slaughter Thomas, I could see none – I would have to take a lengthy holiday from London. It was not a thought to fill me with delight, but there seemed little alternative. I would have to think of an excuse to leave the city for a few weeks; I would have to escape.

  Which is why when John Blount told me he wanted me to go to that Godforsaken hovel, the palace of Woodstock, I leapt at the chance.

  Even though he told me he wanted me to murder some woman who had done me no harm.

  Yes, it came as a surprise to me, too. I’d never even heard of her.

  The interview with Master Blount was infuriating. Most of my discussions with Master Blount are, I find, but this was even worse than usual. It is not every day a man is told he must commit murder – although Blount would term it an ‘assassination’, and called it ‘expedient’, as if those words could remove the horror.

  I had no inkling of this when I knocked on Blount’s door. He lived in a small house not far south of St Paul’s Cathedral, one of those narrow, three-storey buildings with prominent beams and limewash over walls and timbers. His fair-haired servant opened the door, waving me through to his parlour. His rooms were all plain and sober enough, just like him. There was little to upset even Queen Mary’s prudish tastes.

  It was a smallish chamber, and bare, apart from a table, chair, stool and a number of candles. A simple wooden cross hung from a nail in the wall. There was only one window, and that gave a clear view of the Fleet river. Outside all was grey and dull. Low clouds had appeared and were threatening rain at any moment. I had felt sure it would piss on my head as soon as I set off homewards. Not that I was in any great rush. I was very aware of Thomas Falkes and his stated desire to see me gelded before taking more drastic action. Dark streets and overcast clouds made for dangerous walking when a man like Falkes wanted to hurt a fellow.

  When I entered, John Blount was already standing with his left hand on his sword hilt, his right on the chair’s back, keeping his distance from me. His second companion, Will – whom I still thought of as the Bear, because of his dark hair and enormous size – was behind my master as he spoke.

  ‘The Lady Elizabeth is at Woodstock,’ he said, as though I heard nothing of her position. ‘You will come with me and we shall see what we may of the area.’

  I was nothing loath. Any excuse to leave London just now was welcome. ‘Woodstock?’

  He gave me a cold look. ‘Yes. The Queen’s palace. It’s only two or three days’ journey, up the other side of Oxford,’ he said.

  ‘Why do you want me there?’

  ‘It is an old palace. Four hundred years it has stood there, they say. First as a hunting lodge, then as a royal palace, and now mostly as a prison.’

  I shrugged. I also noted that he had not answered my question. ‘The journey will do me good. When do we leave?’

  ‘You are eager,’ he said, and his face darkened into a frown as he spoke.

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘There will be a task for you when we arrive,’ he said.

  ‘Yes? So?’

  He took a deep breath and eyed me. ‘It is time you repaid your debt. Master Parry has invested a great deal in you. Now it is time you returned his favours.’

  God’s teeth, but that was a painful thought. Parry, so I had learned, was Blount’s master, a jovial, portly gentleman with a pleasant, smiling demeanour. But that did not hide the fact that he was as political as any bishop, and twice as dangerous.

  ‘Return them?’

  Blount bared his teeth in a smile. I hated that expression on his face. I suddenly understood what he meant. You see, as I have mentioned, I had been in trouble during the rebellion. Somehow I managed to upset all forms of rich and influential people, and the upshot of it was, I was induced by this same Parry to be his hireling: he was to pay my rent and board, and in return I was to do his bidding. Specifically, I was to be his own personal executioner: an assassin.

  At the time, it had seemed an easy choice. I had lost my home and friends during the rebellion, and to be offered a house and clothing, as well as full board and spending money, was too good an offer for me to reject. However, there was the other perspective. It occurred to me in a flash that my position was not one to make a thinking man jealous. Yes, I would have board and lodging, but equally, were I to refuse him, Blount may be instructed to find another man to take on my job, whose first task it would be to ensure that my mouth was stopped permanently. It was not a happy reflection.

  I won’t go into the reasons how or why Parry decided to sel
ect me from the weeping boil that is London. You can see my comments in the earlier chapter of my chronicles. Suffice it to say, he felt he had good reason to believe that I was capable and willing to do his will in this, and the more I thought about it, the more certain I was that I would be able to enjoy the good life for a while, and then disappear into London’s underworld. It wasn’t as if Parry or Blount would be able to announce to the populace why I owed them money, after all.

  But now I was to be presented with a victim, and I was sure of one thing: be it a cat, dog, cony or human, I would not be able to kill it. My hands were made for other things.

  Of course, the obvious and best course was to do as I had planned: I should swiftly leave home and find a new refuge in the city. However, Thomas Falkes was a hideously ever-present concern. At the thought of him, my hands went clammy and my brow beaded with sweat.

  Blount was still talking. I tried to calm my fluttering nerves and listened.

  ‘Lady Elizabeth has been held in appalling conditions since the rebellion. Just now she languishes in Woodstock, surrounded by her enemies. She has a gaoler, Sir Henry Bedingfield, who has restricted her movements, and everything she does is watched and noted in case it can be used against her. The Queen still believes her to have been associated with the rebellion, and I believe she will have Elizabeth’s head if she can do so with impunity.’

  I forgot: I haven’t mentioned Lady Elizabeth and her plight, have I?

  You must remember that these were the days after the attempted rebellion. That damned fool Wyatt and his merry men of Kent sought to persuade our Queen Mary that she may not marry her Spanish Prince; but the rebellion failed, miraculously, at the gates of London, and in a few hours the whole of Wyatt’s company was captured, with many of them soon to be dismembered and set out on every available spike, or left dangling in chains from gallows as a dissuasive example to the rest of the country.

  However, Queen Mary had a firm conviction that others were involved. Poor Lady Jane Grey and her husband were speedily executed, and then Mary began to cast about for other plotters. Her eye alighted on her own half-sister, Elizabeth, and there it fixed. It was unfair, of course, but life often is. The two had never been close, since as soon as Elizabeth was born, Mary was declared illegitimate, and I don’t think it was easy for Mary to accept her change in status while Elizabeth was feted as their daddy’s ‘little princess’.