Beautiful Blood

Rosacher opted for the ale and cast an eye about the room. Basically unadorned, it had here and there a feminine touch: gillyflowers in a vase; a print showing Griaule against a mass of clouds; a framed needlepoint homily with letters so crooked that he was unable to read them. The woman returned with the ale, she hovered beside the table, and after he had paid her she continued to hover. He had a sip and said, “This will do,” thinking she wanted him to approve the ale, yet she remained standing by the table, beaming at him. Finally she said, “You don’t remember me, do you? Truly, there’s no reason you should. You didn’t take much notice of my face.” She winked broadly. “You were mainly interested in my backside.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Martita.” She tapped her ample bosom, dislodging a silver locket that had been half-concealed in her cleavage, the image of a dragon scratched on the casing as if by her own hand. “Martita Doans. I was a maid in your house. The night the assassin came, it were me what was sent to bandage you.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “We made love.”

The term “made love” befuddled him for a moment and, once he had sorted it out, feeling embarrassed, shamed, yet not wishing to admit to anything, he said weakly, “Of course. Uh, I…How’ve you been?”

“Lately I’ve been doing very well, thank you. But directly after I left your service, now that were a bit of rough road, what with me being in a family way and having no family to turn to.”

She took a seat opposite him and leaned forward, her milky breasts squashed against the tabletop, threatening to overflow their flimsy restraint. “I wanted to tell you, seeing how the babe was yours, but that Ludie hustled me out so fast I scarce had time to pack,” she said in a stage whisper. “And Mr. Honeyman said if I gave him any trouble, he’d let his men at me and sell tickets to whoever cared to watch. So there I were, out on the streets and big as a house. I couldn’t even sell meself.” She dropped back into a normal tone. “Griaule knows what would have happened had not Mister Doans—that’s my late husband, Nathan Doans—took me in.”

“I had no idea!” Rosacher said. “I mean I wouldn’t…”

“I didn’t figure you did. Mister Honeyman made it clear I wasn’t to pester you. He said that should I try to inform you of my situation, there’d be hell to pay. Still and all, I didn’t think kindly toward you those first months.”

The elderly card player called to her and Martita went to see what he wanted. Stunned by what he had learned, Rosacher drained his pint in two swallows. If what she told him was true, and he had no reason to doubt her, Ludie and Arthur had much to answer for. Not that he would have done much better than they for Martita. He likely would not have accepted paternity of the child, yet he would have at least seen to its care and feeding. It seemed he could feel a space inside himself that affection for a child would have occupied, and this sparked a deeper resentment. He would have to rein in Arthur and Ludie, rein them in sharply, perhaps even to the point of reconfiguring the business—they had been acting more-or-less independently in recent years, and probably not to his benefit. It might be time for a housecleaning. Neither of them were indispensable and it was evident he could no longer trust them.

Martita returned, bringing a second pint, and he asked, “The child? Is it a boy or a girl?”

Her face fell. “It were a boy. I couldn’t carry it to term.”

Speechless for a moment, he said, “I obviously can’t make things right, but you must let me help.”

“I don’t want for much. Mister Doans was a scalehunter, like most here. He did very well for himself. Found several loose scales of museum quality during his day.” She shook her head ruefully. “Two years back it were he died…and him still a young man. But that’s the way of it with scalehunters, ain’t it?” She nodded toward the card players. “Jarvis is the only one I know what’s lived past middle years. For all the good it does him. He’s a miserable sod. But like I was saying, Mister Doans left me the tavern and a tidy sum besides. I’ve a decent life now.”

“There must be something I can do.”

“You might stop in and have a pint now and again. Having you here tones up the place.” She blushed. “And it would please me.”

“Why would you want me around? First I force myself upon you and then…”

“Oh, don’t be thinking that! Maybe that was your view of things, but it weren’t mine. All the girls what worked in the house had an eye for you…and me most of all.”

“I see.”

“I could have done with a little romance, but you heard no complaints from me at the time and you’ll hear none now.”

Perplexed as much by his concern for her as by her forgiving attitude, he said, “If you want me to come around, I will…though I question whether either the moral or spiritual tenor of your establishment will be improved by my presence.”

She apparently didn’t understand his words and simpered to cover her confusion.