Murder by Misrule

CHAPTER 10

  On the topmost floor of a narrow house in the parish of Saint Martin's Le Grand in the City of London, Clara Goossens sat before her window burning ivory to make black paint. A chill breeze lifted the acrid smoke harmlessly above the rooftops. A small brazier supplied enough heat to keep her hands from growing stiff.

  The room was small, just large enough for her sparse possessions. A bed with a straw mattress, two plain chests, the table under the window where she sat. The stool she sat upon. The brazier. Two woolen blankets, a set of linens, and a few household items were all she'd salvaged from her mother's meager estate. She had earned her fine court clothes with her brush. The tools of her trade were her father's legacy: an easel that folded so she could carry it through the streets and the many-drawered writing desk that held her pigments, oils, and brushes.

  That was all she owned and all she needed. She was free: that was the main thing.

  Except for the nightmares.

  She lifted the piece of burnt ivory with a pair of tongs and set it in the mortar to cool. While she waited, she turned again to study the sketch she had made on Queen's Day. Her critical eye approved the vitality of its fluid lines even as she flinched from the horrible event depicted: a murderer in an open robe with velvet welts on the sleeves knelt over his victim, grinning with exultation. The sketch was charcoal, but she could see the colors in her mind's eye: black robe against sandy earth, blood made redder by the pinkish wall behind.

  She had dreamt that scene over and over again in the past two weeks. The nightmare churned up old fears she had thought long laid to rest. Even her new patron had commented on the dark circles beneath her eyes. That was bad; the merest breath of scandal could damage her reputation and destroy her livelihood. Ladies at court wanted nothing unlovely to sully their lives.

  Clara feared the nightmare would continue until she did something to banish it. She should do something to relieve her conscience.

  But what could she do?

  She'd returned to work in that same chamber the next morning, hoping and fearing for news about the murder. She'd had no need for subterfuge; the court was abuzz with speculation. No one had any idea who the killer was. They didn't even know he was another barrister.

  Clara said nothing that day since Lady Rich had been impatient for her portrait and she feared to lose her fee. Those three pounds would keep her for months. The next day, again she said nothing, fearing they would wonder why she hadn't spoken earlier. She finished the portrait that day and had no excuse to go back on Monday.

  Now it was far too late to come forward, but the guilt of her silence consumed her. If she kept silent, the man with the evil grin might escape without punishment. He could kill again and again, having discovered that he liked it and there was no penalty. Each of those lives would weigh upon her soul.

  She shuddered and tossed the sketch aside. She took her pestle and began to grind the ivory, carefully, so as not to spill any of the expensive powder. Black was in fashion; she would need lots of black paint and she daren't raise her fees. Not yet, anyway. With a good report from Lady Rich, perhaps one day soon.

  Her mind was still caught on the brambles of her predicament. What was a sketch? Not proof of anything. She was an artist; she might have imagined the whole scene. Or so a judge would say. Perhaps she hated lawyers, they would say, perhaps she held a grudge. She didn't, but many people did. She was a foreigner; they would never believe her. And then they might wonder what sort of game she was playing and poke their long English noses into her past.

  Here in England, strangers were tolerated only to the extent that they kept themselves out of trouble. Murder was trouble of the very worst kind. People would say she should have screamed at the man, she should have stopped him. She should have run fast for the watchman or anyone who could help instead of sketching merrily away while a man was stabbed to death before her eyes.

  She had thought to bear witness by sketching. She was skilled at her trade. She could draw faster than she could run. But they would accuse her of complicity. They would question her about herself. Who was she? Why had she come to London?

  She'd be exposed. And worse, she'd be expelled from England and sent back to Antwerp, where Caspar would find her.

  She couldn't show her sketch to a judge or the Captain of the Guard or to anyone in authority. But if she never told anyone she would go mad with the pounding of that horrible image in her mind. She might never sleep another night through. And she would be damned for all eternity if the murderer killed again.

  She had to tell.

  She couldn't tell.

  She was trapped.

  She heaved a sigh laden with fear and worry. Then she rose and found a clean bottle with a sound cork and a funnel. She returned to her stool and began to transfer the fine black powder carefully from the mortar to the bottle.

  Concentrating on the task calmed her. Perhaps she could tell someone not exactly in authority but close to it. A sympathetic person who might help her climb out of this thorny thicket. Another image arose in her mind: the face of the young man who had gazed up at her and spoken the words, "O angela luminosa!"

  She laughed softly and felt the tension slip from her shoulders. Tom, his friend had called him. He reminded her of her father. Although their features were not at all alike, Tom's face held the same open expression, bespeaking a generosity of spirit and frankness of feeling that she admired but could never allow herself to share.

  She corked the bottle firmly and placed it in a drawer of her writing desk.

  Tom. A plain name. A friendly name. She wondered what his surname was, who his family were. He'd worn the sleeveless black robe of a law student over his elegant holiday clothes. He and his friends had been helping the lords to examine the body. Perhaps they had known the murdered man.

  Clara shuddered and forced her mind back to the fair youth who had stood beneath her window. He had fallen in love with her right before her eyes. He had been ready to fall in love, he saw a woman he liked, and whoop, hey! In he fell.

  That was like her father too. Johannes Vanderporne had always been ready to meet the world, wrap his arm around its shoulders, and invite it home for supper. He had been a student of Pieter Brueghel the Elder in his youth and had gone on to become a sought-after painter of portraits. Their home had been a comfortable disorder of paint and canvasses, apprentices and clients, with artists visiting from all across Europe.

  Clara had been the only child to follow in her father's craft. She learned to make pencils and paints, how to stretch a canvas, how to draw, how to arrange a sitting client. Sharing a talent and a love of art, Clara and Johannes had been closer than most fathers and daughters. His world had been her world. Then he died, killed by his own recklessness. Stumbling home from a party late at night instead of sleeping in the stable with the other benighted guests, he fell into a ditch swollen with rain and drowned. A carter fished him out the next morning.

  Her world collapsed in the space of a week. Johannes left his family a pile of debts secured by uncollected fees. Few of his clients had the decency to pay their bills, and the family had no money to hire lawyers to sue them. They sold everything except the paint box and easel that Clara refused to part with. Clara's mother had gone to work in a brewery, taking in mending to occupy her evenings. She'd worked herself into an early grave.

  Now Clara never looked too far ahead. She knew how quickly disaster could lay waste to a life. She was safe and mostly content, and that was enough. She didn't need handsome young gentlemen singing under her window.

  She wouldn't mind a friend, though. Perhaps Tom could give her sketch to the authorities without risking her direct involvement.

  Clara cleaned her hands on a scrap of linen. She pulled her easel over to the window and clipped a fresh sheet of paper onto it. If she drew Tom's face, the act of making lines, of rubbing in shadows, might help her decide whether he could be trusted. She closed her eyes for a moment to summon his image then opened them
and began to sketch. His face was almost rectangular, with a strongly rounded chin. His brows and mouth formed straight lines, framing his well-formed nose and his wide-set eyes. She thought in some moods he might look severe, but she doubted such moods came upon him often. He was a man of choleric humor: made for sunshine, laughter, and good fellowship. After he spoke his words of love, he had smiled at her, showing a dimple in his cheek that melted her heart.

  She would like to see that dimple again and bask in the warmth of his open smile. She rose from her stool to walk around the easel, studying her drawing from various angles. It was a good face. A trustworthy face.

  Clara decided that if she ever saw Tom again, she would show him the sketch she'd made of the murderer. Then she sighed and smiled sadly to herself as she rolled up his portrait. She wasn't likely to see the golden-haired youth again.