A Plague of Sinners Read Online Free PDF Page B

In truth it was but a quarter of a palace, for three-quarters of it was demolished by the previous owner who planned to build something more splendid. The Restoration thwarted his grand ambitions however, and now he languished, a pauper, somewhere out east. The Earl, on the other hand, enjoyed elevation to loftier heights, through some mysterious services to the King. Not great services, I supposed, else he would have got a whole palace.
    Narrow, latticed windows speckled the front of the house, a ready vantage from which to spy unseen. We rode slowly to the coach house, across the front of the silent building. One man laboured easily to clean the stables, where stood just two horses.
    A tall figure emerged from a door at the base of a squat little tower attached to the house. He strode towards us, a strong young man, oddly energetic amidst such dormant surroundings. ‘May I help you?’ he asked in a Scots accent. To my ear he spoke similar to Dowling, yet Dowling tensed.
    ‘We work for the King. We would talk to Lady Wharton,’ Dowling said, eyes unmoving.
    The young man eyed the rough attire of the butcher, then looked to me. Though my clothes had crumpled and become sticky, I evidently presented a more comforting aspect. Theyoung man’s black hair lay cropped close to his scalp, his face swarthy, his eyes brown and inquisitive.
    ‘We have urgent news of the Earl.’ I showed him the thick wax seal. ‘News that cannot wait.’
    He ran a finger over the seal and scowled.
    We followed him into the tower, a dark musty passage, walls lined with oak panels, thick and warm. Black and white tiles covered the floor, worn and polished. Noiseless, save for the crashing echo of our own steps reverberating across unseen halls and spaces. Cracked paintings hung on the walls, long-forgotten faces peering out in awkward pose, the self-consciousness of moments gone, buried beneath thick layers of varnish and grime.
    We emerged from the gloom into a luminous space, where tall, foggy windows turned bright sunlight into ghostly white effervescence. Then back into the bowels of this sickly place, past a series of open doorways giving view only to faded tapestries, shrouded furniture and emptiness.
    We turned a corner into a fresh passage into which light flooded from far ahead, beneath a square stone archway. As we advanced, so the banqueting hall came into view, a magnificent structure towering above us like the inside of a cathedral. The roof was built of oak, an artful lattice of ornate carved beams. Tapestries climbed the walls from floor to the height of three men, patchworks of red and green flowers. Above the tapestries, a row of arched windows allowed the sun to burst through thick walls, bathing all in a bright, warm light. Yet none banqueted here in recent times. The several long tables that ran the width of the hall were bare and dusty. Chairs sprawled as if those that dined here last left suddenly, never to return.
    ‘My name is Conroy.’ The young fellow bowed. ‘Please wait here, gentlemen, and I will see if her ladyship is disposed to see you.’ He turned and left.
    ‘This place has about as much life about it as Wharton himself,’ I noted, sitting down.
    Dowling shook his head. ‘The Lord maketh poor, and maketh rich. He bringeth low, and lifteth up.’
    ‘The Earl was brungeth low, it seems.’
    ‘Aye,’ Dowling growled.
    I watched the sun creep from one window to another. I worried what was happening to the corpse in the afternoon heat.
    Finally she arrived, dressed in such formal elegance I understood why time dragged. Mercilessly boned, bedecked in deep-scarlet skirt and gold-braided, pale-green underskirt, she radiated a severe strain of beauty. These were not the clothes of a woman in mourning. She wore an intricately arranged wig, a heavy burden in this hot weather. Beads of sweat erupted in small globules about the edges of the paint upon her face.
    My eyes didn’t linger, for she had with her a child