Black Wreath Read Online Free PDF

was greatly distressed,’ he said. ‘It was said that you had drowned in the river in a most unfortunate accident.’ He said this in such a way that James felt he had inconvenienced the household by not having the grace to perish quietly.
    ‘I never believed it meself,’ Mrs Rudge said. ‘I always thought your going away was her doing, and since no body was ever produced I never believed you had gone to your reward.’
    ‘Was there a … funeral?’ James asked, hardly daring to utter the word.
    ‘Aye, there was,’ said Smeadie, enlivened by the memory. He described it in some detail and with unmistakable relish: the solemn procession, the onlookers, the grave voice of the archbishop in the cathedral, the tears of Miss Deakin and his father.
    ‘Oh be quiet man, can’t you!’ Mrs Rudge interrupted, irritated. ‘Young James doesn’t need to hear all that.’
    ‘How shall a dead man live?’ asked Harry, who had beensitting quietly, eating and listening. His question was met with silence. But James wasn’t defeated yet.
    ‘It’s a trick. They know I am alive. They know where I am.’ He stopped suddenly, as if he had just realised something.
    ‘The last thing they’ll want is you turning up now,’ Smeadie said.
    ‘He’s right,’ Harry said. ‘You’re in great danger now you’re … dead. It would suit them very well to have the reality match the lie.’
    ‘You must never come back here,’ Mrs Rudge said.
    ‘Can we trust you not to say anything?’ Harry suddenly asked Smeadie.
    ‘How dare you, you little get!’ Smeadie spat back.
    ‘He won’t say anything, don’t fret,’ Mrs Rudge said. ‘But you must take great care, Master James. Don’t go down any dark alleys at night. Keep your wits about you and be careful who you talk to, and don’t let anyone know who you are.’
    Everyone knows who I am already, James thought to himself. I can’t remove myself from their knowledge without destroying half the city.
    He could see that Smeadie and Mrs Rudge were growing more uncomfortable the longer the visit lasted, so he got up from the table, thanked them and took his leave, and he and Harry slipped back down the lane and down by quiet streets towards the river.

Six

The Faction Fighter
    I t’s hard to keep cheerful when you’re dead. From the night of the black wreath onwards, James’s life seemed to spiral downwards as if, being thought dead, the city had decided to wash its hands of him and no longer offer him any protection. But he wasn’t dead, James told himself, even if there were those who wished it. For the first time in his life James realised what it meant to have enemies, deadly enemies who wished him harm. After they left the house, Harry and he kept clear of the main streets and avoided the bridge, crossing the river by ferry instead and making their way circuitously westwards.
    ‘You can’t go back to the dancing master’s,’ Harry insisted. ‘He’d sell you for a quart of gin.’
    ‘But where can I go?’ James asked.
    Harry indicated with his thumb a window at the top of a ramshackle house. James followed Harry upstairs to a garret notunlike the dancing master’s but a good deal smaller. Harry’s mother, a frail woman with a heavily lined face, and his two younger sisters were seated on the floor. There was no furniture that James could see.
    ‘Who’s this?’ Harry’s mother asked gruffly. ‘And what’s he doing here?’
    ‘It’s James, Lord Dunmain’s boy,’ Harry began explaining.
    ‘Oh la deh da,’ one of the girls piped up, suddenly interested.
    ‘Spare some change, m’lud,’ the other added.
    ‘Don’t mind them,’ said Harry. ‘He’s in trouble, that’s why he’s here. They buried him in Christchurch last week.’
    ‘That’s what I call trouble,’ the first sister grinned.
    ‘Doesn’t look too bad for a corpse, does he?’ said the other.
    ‘Dead or alive, he can’t stay here,’ Harry’s mother was adamant. ‘We don’t keep a hotel