Revelation

Cottages began to appear beside the path, surrounded by little market gardens; Gib's was the fifth along, a mud-and-daub cottage like the rest, smoke curling through a hole in the thatched roof. Gib was working in his patch, loosening the heavy soil with a spade. A woman and several small children were also at work digging and sowing. Barak called out Gib's name and he came across, his wife and children following. They gathered round as we dismounted, the children staring at me wide-eyed.

'My barrister,' Gib introduced me proudly. 'He seeks my help on a certain matter.'

His wife, a thin, tired-looking woman, curtsied then smiled at me warmly. 'We are so grateful, sir, for what you did. We won't ever forget.'

'Thank you.' Like all lawyers, I was delighted by gratitude. It happened so rarely.

Gib clapped his hands. 'Come on. Maisie, children, back to work! Master Shardlake and I have confidential matters to discuss.' Barak winked at me. The family returned to their labours, the children casting glances over their shoulders at us.

'I don't want them to hear about this bad business,' Gib said, suddenly serious. 'Tie your horses to this post, sir, and come inside.'

We followed him into the cottage, which smelt of damp and smoke. A few poor sticks of furniture stood about, and a fire burning in the hearth in the middle of the floor provided some warmth. The single window was unglazed, the crude shutters open. I looked out at the view of his market garden, the marshes stretching out beyond.

'Ay, it's a doleful spot,' Gib said.

'It must have been lonely this past winter, with all the snow.'

'It was. Bitterly cold too. At least now we can get busy with the sowing. Sit down on that settle.'

He brought some weak beer and sat on a stool opposite us. 'Now then,' he said, looking at us seriously. 'You've questions about poor Wilf Tupholme?'

'He was the man who was murdered?'

'Yes.' He paused, remembering. 'He was found in January. They are after Welsh Elizabeth, that he lived with. A Bankside whore.' He spat in the fire. Barak and I looked at each other. This sounded as though we were on the wrong track.

'Are they sure she did it?' I asked.

'Sure enough to issue a warrant against her. She and Wilf had been living together a few months, but they were always fighting. Both liked the drink too much. He turfed her out in December, then he was found dead a month later. The coroner's trying to trace her but the other whores say she's gone back to Wales. She'll go to earth there, they won't find her.'

'But there was no direct evidence?'

'Well, whoever did that to him must have hated him.' He looked at us curiously. 'Are you saying it was someone else?'

'We don't know. At Westminster you said his landlord probably killed him.'

Gib grinned. 'That was just to annoy Sir Geoffrey.' He looked at us with great curiosity, but saw that we were not going to tell him anything more.

'So what happened?' Barak asked. 'You said he was killed most horribly.'

'So he was. I'll tell you on the way to his house. His neighbour has the key, I thought you might like to look.' He inclined his head to the window and I saw that one of the children, a girl of ten or so, had edged close to the window as she walked up and down the vegetable patch, sowing. 'Little pigs have big ears,' he said quietly.

I glanced at Barak, who shrugged slightly. It did not sound as though this killing had anything to do with our investigation, but we might as well hear the full tale. 'Very well,' I said, 'let us go.'

GIB LED US eastward along the path. The cottages became fewer as the ground became marshier, water squelching under our feet and large pools standing among the reeds. An early pair of swallows, the first I had seen that year, dived and glided above them.

'What happened to Tupholme, then?' Barak asked.

'Wilf was a strange man,' Gib said. 'He was always bad-tempered and surly, seemed to prefer living alone in his isolated cottage. We'd only see him at market. A couple of years ago he became a hot-gospeller, telling everyone that the end-time was nigh. Plagues and earthquakes and Jesus coming to judge us all. He'd talk about the joys of being saved, in a smug way as though secretly enjoying that the rest of us poor cottars weren't saved. He went across the river to some hot-gospelling church in the city. But you know how it is with these folk, often it doesn't last long. Last autumn he took up with Welsh Elizabeth and she moved in. They'd get drunk and argue, like I said. You could hear them way out over the marshes. Then Wilf booted Elizabeth out. He was surly after that, you'd find him stumbling drunk around the lanes. Then he disappeared, his neighbour saw his cottage was locked up. After a while his neighbour thought, if he's gone, I'll take the land over before it goes back to marsh. So he broke open a shutter to take a look inside. Said the smell nearly felled him.'