“Indeed, you do,” said Shakespeare. “Oh, the comings and the goings at that house that night! The first to leave was Hera, off to visit her friend, Elizabeth Darcie. Then the servants left to have their supper and their celebration at the Devil Tavern. As they were leaving, Corwin had arrived, doubtless in a state of temper. Soon thereafter, Corwin left, after confronting Leonardo and breaking off his engagement. Leonardo was thus left at home alone, wondering what to do. Doubtless, he hoped that Ben would soon arrive. Perhaps Corwin had mentioned to him that he had left word for Ben at the theatre. Only sadly, Ben was not the next to arrive. The killers were.”
“Poor Leonardo!” Dickens said. “If only I had not tarried at the Theatre!”
“The Steady Boys must have followed Corwin from the moment he was told of Hera’s infidelity,” Shakespeare continued, “for surely ‘twas they who had arranged it all. They must have followed him to the Theatre and from there to Leonardo’s house. They saw the servants leave and Corwin go inside. Most likely, Corwin did not stay very long, merely long enough to vent his outrage and announce that he was breaking off the engagement for having been deceived. Perhaps the Steady Boys listened at the window, laughing at how easily Corwin had been duped. Then, when he left, they went off to the nearby tavern to have a drink and celebrate. And there they found Leonardo’s servants, having a celebration of their own. Now a devilish new idea dawned upon them.
“Darnley must have formed the plan right there in the tavern. Or perhaps they had already conceived of it and merely awaited the proper opportunity. Two of them stayed to keep watch on Leonardo’s servants in the tavern. The other three went back to Leonardo’s house. The plan was to rob and murder the wealthy Genoan merchant and have the blame fall upon Corwin, for he was the last one seen coming to the house, and the word had already been spread about how he had been deceived. Thus would two birds be killed neatly with one stone. Corwin, a rival to their master and themselves, would be eliminated, and Ben would suffer as his closest friend went to the gallows, the very same friend who had once persuaded him to quit the Steady Boys. And so the deed was done. They lolled Leonardo, ransacked the house, stole whatever they could find, and made good their escape before the servants could return. Then Ben arrived, found Leonardo dead, and assumed that Corwin must have flown into a rage and killed him. Frantic with despair and guilt, he fled the house.”
“And then the servants returned,” said Smythe.
“Aye,” said Shakespeare, “but they had been drinking, and so they failed to realize that their master had been slain. They never ventured upstairs, never saw the body, never realized the house had been ransacked. They knew that Hera would be coming home soon and most likely awaited her return in the kitchen. And when she came home, she doubtless went straight upstairs to say good night to her father and found him slain. Her cries brought the servants running, then in a madness of grief, she fled the house, running out into the night. Budge, fearing for her safety, gave chase as best he could, growing more sober by the moment, until he saw that Hera had reached the safety of the Darcie house, whereupon he reported to Henry Darcie what had happened. Or, more to the point, what he believed had happened. And the very next day, poor Corwin was arrested for the murder of Master Leonardo.”
“One moment, I could not believe that he had done it,” Dickens said, “but the next moment, it seemed certain that he had. What other explanation could there be?”
“And so you gave up on him and went looking for your money?” Molly asked, bitterly.
“I went looking for the money, aye, but I never gave up on Corwin,” Dickens said. “Without the money, I would be able to do nothing for him. With it, I could hire a lawyer to plead on his behalf, find witnesses to swear he had been elsewhere in their company that night.” He sighed. “But whatever money had been left was gone. Those miserable, murdering bastards took it all.”
“Which brings us to this sorry pass,” said Shakespeare. “We know what must have happened, and how it must have happened, for we have used reason to deduce it. The trouble is, we cannot prove any of it. And without proof, poor Corwin swings.”
“Surely, there must be something we can do!” said Molly.
“Methinks there is,” said Smythe, thoughtfully. “Ben is not the only one who knows something of the art of cony-catching. As it happens, I have been reading up on it myself, of late. And I believe a trap set for a cony may catch a rat, as well. I have in mind a new production, Will, one eminently suited to your craft. And yours, too, Ben, and yours, my friends,” he added, glancing round at all the players. “That is, if you are game for it?”
“We are!” said Burbage.
“Tell us, Tuck!” said Fleming.
“Aye, tell us!” Speed said. “What have you in mind?”
“If I, too, may help, I shall,” said Liam Bailey.
“You may, indeed, Liam,” Smythe replied. “But most of all, we shall have need of Molly.”
“Me?” she said. “What can I do?”
“Once before we met,” said Smythe. “Now you may reacquaint me with your sister.”
12
THE BROOM AND GARTER WAS the sort of tavern that attracted a rough and tumble crowd and notable among them were the Steady Boys, a congregation of apprentices from various crafts and trades who all had in common the aggressive unruliness of youth and a desire to cause mischief. Here, among the wherrymen and dockworkers and drovers, they held court like young lords of the streets and presiding over them were Jack Darnley and his chief factotum, Bruce McEnery.
On this occasion, the Steady Boys were spread out among several tables in one section of the tavern, shouting and drinking and carousing, playing cards or games of mumble-de-peg with their daggers or bouncing young wenches on their knees and pawing at them greedily. Most of them worked hard during the day, from before sunup to nearly sundown, and this was their time to play. When they played, they liked to play hard and often, and the games they played were at other people’s expense.
“Cheer up, Jacko,” Bruce McEnery said, punching his comrade in the shoulder. “You have been glum for nigh on several days now. What troubles you, mate?”
“The money,” Darnley said, with a scowl. “There should have been more bloody money.”
“Are you on that again? Let it go, for God’s sake. We got what we got. ‘Twasn’t all that bad a haul now, was it?”
“ ‘Twas pathetic,” Darnley said bitterly, clutching his tankard with both hands as it sat upon the well-strained wooden tab
le into which most of the Steady Boys had, at one time or another, carved their initials – those of them who knew how to write their initials, at any rate. “There should have been much more.”
“Well, we tossed the place right proper, we did. If ‘twas any more there, we would have found it, eh?”
“The man was bleedin’ rich, Bruce,” said Darnley, with a scowl. “Everybody said so. He was going into business. He was in the bloody Merchant Adventurers Guild, trade voyages to the colonies and the Far East and all that. He was going to invest in Burbage’s damned playhouse and who knows what else? He had bought a house and was going to build himself a mansion right outside o’ London. You don’t do none o’ that on your good name, Bruce. All that takes money. Lots o’ money. Gobs o’ money. So where in the bloody hell was it?” He slammed his fist down on the table so hard that all the pitchers and the tankards jumped and everyone looked toward him.
“Steady on, mate,” McEnery said, placatingly. “If there was more, well then, we never found it, eh? Like as not some merchant banker kept it for him.”