The Body in the Thames Read Online Free PDF

here since February.’
    ‘I have,’ agreed Griffith. ‘And I am sure you havenoticed a great improvement in John’s deportment and speech in that time. He is very nearly a gentleman.’
    ‘He has never been anything else,’ said Chaloner, using a compliment to avoid saying that Bulteel had not changed at all.
    Bulteel blushed and hastily turned the conversation away from himself. ‘Griffith lived in The Hague once.’
    Griffith took the abrupt switch in his stride. ‘But I did not like it. It smelled of cheese.’
    Chaloner had never noticed a smell of cheese, and was beginning to suspect that a penchant for fabrication ran in the family.
    ‘Did you know that one of the Dutch diplomats vanished on Friday?’ Bulteel asked his cousin conversationally. ‘Ambassador
     van Goch told me today that he fears for the fellow’s safety.’
    So did Chaloner, and heartily wished his enquiries into Hanse’s disappearance had yielded clues. For all his efforts, he knew
     no more now than he had when it had first been reported.
    ‘Then let us hope he is found safe and well,’ said Griffith, not very interested. He brightened. ‘Come with me to the New
     Exchange, John. One of its merchants has some
lovely
taffeta for sale.’
    The Earl snatched the wig Chaloner handed him, and studied it minutely. ‘There is a hole in it!’ he cried in dismay. ‘It will
     cost a fortune to repair.’
    ‘It was shoved inside a false ceiling,’ explained Chaloner.
    ‘I never did like Kicke and Nisbett,’ said Clarendon, placing the hair on a special stand. ‘Unfortunately, Downing hired them
     when you were fooling aroundoverseas, or I would have ordered you to watch them from the start. Has there been any word on that Dutchman, by the way?’
    ‘No, sir. Not yet.’
    ‘He has been gone for almost two days now. And if he is as crucial to peace as Heer van Goch maintains, we must do all in
     our power to locate him. I thought I made that clear to you yesterday.’
    ‘You did, sir,’ said Chaloner, itching to remind the Earl that he had actually been more interested in catching the White
     Hall thieves. ‘But all I can tell you about Hanse is that he was last seen at half-past eight on Friday evening, climbing
     into a hackney carriage outside the Sun tavern in Westminster. The driver was instructed to take him directly to the Savoy,
     but no one saw him arrive.’
    ‘How do you know? Have you interviewed his fellow diplomats?’
    Chaloner nodded. ‘And their servants.’
    ‘Perhaps he decided London is too dangerous, so elected to leave. I would not blame him. Hollanders are unpopular here – they
     cannot leave their lodgings without threats being hurled.’
    ‘Never. He thinks war will be bad for both our countries, and is determined to avert one.’
    The Earl regarded him soberly, and Chaloner tensed, waiting for the obvious question: how did
he
know what a foreign diplomat believed? He had not concealed his kinship with Hanse from any desire to be secretive, but because
     he had been trained never to share personal information, and found it a difficult habit to break. He had not even confided
     in Hannah.
    ‘Do you think he is dead?’ asked the Earl instead.
    ‘I hope not,’ replied Chaloner, although the possibilityhad crossed his mind. ‘It would deal the peace process a terrible blow. And his wife travelled from the States-General with
     him …’
    Jacoba, he thought to himself, recalling the disconcerting experience of seeing Aletta’s eyes smiling at him when they had
     met the previous week. They had been sisters.
    ‘Then I shall pray for his safe return,’ said the Earl, rather insincerely. ‘But if he
is
dead – murdered – then who are your suspects?’
    Chaloner tried not to let his master’s callous attitude annoy him. ‘Anyone who wants a war, I suppose. Including some of his
     colleagues.’
    The Earl’s eyebrows went up. ‘But the Dutch came here specifically to argue for peace.’
    ‘Heer van