The Burgundian's tale

I had counted on the fact that the garden door would be unlocked, and I was not disappointed. It opened easily into the kitchen passage, and halfway along were the arch and the ‘secret’ stair. Luck was certainly with me this morning, for when I reached the top of the steps leading to Mistress St Clair’s bedchamber, that door, too was unbolted.

I eased myself inside, where my feet gratefully encountered the softness of the embroidered carpet. Today, the two chests standing against the opposite wall, with their carvings of grapes and vine leaves, were properly closed. No belts or sleeves or scarves spilled over the sides. The bed under its dazzling counterpane was neatly made, the Daphnis and Chloe curtains pulled back and carefully wound around the bedposts beneath the canopy. A fresh candle — wax, of course, not tallow — had already been inserted into the candlestick ready for the coming night. This was a household where efficiency was highly prized.

I noticed also, which I had not done on my previous visit, that the walls were hung with the same beautifully crafted embroidered tapestries that I had seen both at the Needlers Lane workshop and in Lydia Jolliffe’s parlour. They covered every inch of the grey stone walls except … except for one wooden panel near the bed head. My heart lurched excitedly. Was it possible that this house also boasted a ‘fly trap’? And was this it?

These three houses were very similar in many respects, both outside and in. And why shouldn’t they be? If they had indeed been a part of the Savoy Palace and built for the selfsame purpose, then it was more than likely that they contained many identical features. I already knew that this one and the late Martin Threadgold’s had a ‘secret’ stair. Why not, then, a ‘fly trap’? But this time I would not be caught. Forewarned was forearmed.

I walked round the bed and surveyed the wooden panel. Bertram had spoken of a hidden spring which I had accidentally triggered when I fell against it; so, now, I extended my arms to their full length and, with my hands, cautiously began pressing the surface.

Nothing happened for what seemed like an age, but was probably no more than ten or twelve seconds. Then I spotted a mark right in the centre of the wooden panel: a tiny circle with a thread-like circumference of silver, almost invisible until the light struck it at just the right angle. Hastily, I took off one of my boots and pressed the circle with the tip of my index finger. Immediately, the panel swung inwards, staying open just long enough, I judged, to allow someone to step inside. Then it began to close again. But this time it remained ajar, unable to move any further, jammed against the tough leather of my boot.

Fifteen

This left very little room for a man of my height and girth to get through, so I tried pushing the door further open, but it refused to budge. I then pressed the unlocking device again, but nothing happened. Obviously, this would only work if the door were closed. Exasperated and uneasily conscious that I was wasting time — time in which Mistress St Clair might return to the house — I removed my boot from the aperture, allowed the panel to swing shut, then took off both boots and, when I had once more unlocked the door, shoved them, side by side, into the vacant space. Now there was enough leeway for me to enter with ease.

This ‘fly trap’ was roughly the same size as the one in Martin Threadgold’s bedchamber, being, I judged, no more than two to two and a half feet square — about as big as a large cupboard. The main difference was that the walls were panelled and a shelf, some five or six inches wide, ran along the back wall. A carved wooden box stood at one end of it and proved to be unlocked when I lifted the lid, but the contents were disappointing. Two gold chains, a necklet and matching bracelet of quite small emeralds set in silver — and, as even I could see, poorly set, at that — a gold-and-agate thumb ring, half a dozen pearl buttons and a jade cross on a silken string. Judith St Clair might be a wealthy woman, but one thing was certain: she didn’t waste her money on the adornment of her person.

Beneath the shelf, on the floor, was a much larger box on which I had stubbed my stockinged toes as I stepped over my boots into the chamber. This, too, was unlocked — and indeed why shouldn’t it have been, stored as it was in the ‘fly trap’? — and held only a man’s rolled hose, tunics, cloaks and bedgowns, all laid up in lavender in the vain hope of discouraging the moths. (Several overweight and overfed little monsters flew at me angrily as I raised the lid.) These, I presumed, were the clothes of either the late Edmund Broderer or Justin Threadgold or perhaps both; the sad remains of Judith’s first two marriages.