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“The man who showed up afterward?”
“Bayard said he just appeared whilst he was talking to the tailor,” supplied the soldier.
“Just ‘appeared’?”
The soldier nodded. “Said they did not appear to know each other.”
“And yet there he was,” Sherwood murmured.
“Aye. And he was there later, too, with a whore. Taking her up against the side of a building. Bayard said it looked…well, like the tailor.”
The idiotic mayor burst into laughter again.
Sherwood turned to the window, deep in thought as yet another messenger hurried into the room, this time the mayor’s clerk, his face distressed. “My lord,” the clerk huffed. “There’s been another disturbance.”
Mayor Albert tossed Sherwood a wary look. “Go on.”
“Down at the quay. One man’s arm slashed, another dumped in the sea, and a captain gone a’missing.”
Sherwood turned slowly as the mayor said, “Who?”
“Pepin, sir.”
“Oh, well, Pepin.” The mayor laughed. “He is of no account, my lord. He marks himself among the seediest class of captains, found in all the seediest ports of the realm.”
“Such as yours?” Sherwood asked coldly.
The mayor opened his mouth, then shut it. “Such men are always getting in fights, my lord. I do not think it need concern us.”
“Do you not?” Sherwood broke away and strode to the lower end of the hall, saying over his shoulder, “Brawls on your quay, merchants accosting your reeves; one would think your town is turning entirely to villainy, Albert.”
As the mayor sputtered in indignation, Sherwood drew up beside the table where his men sat, shoveling food into their mouths. He bent beside them.
“Visit a tailor on Thread Lane,” he ordered quietly. “Female, widowed, comely. Search her place, see what, if anything, she knows. Or what she has in her possession. Be circumspect if you can. If not…” He dipped his head. The meaning was clear: circumspection came a distant second to success. “First man to come back with my dagger gets a new mount and all the whores he can suckle for a month.”
They shot to their feet and left in a clatter of boot heels. Sherwood turned to the mayor.
“Let us go see about your missing sea captain.”
Chapter Five
MAGDALENA WAS IN her narrow shop, set deep amid the warren of close-set, leaning-in buildings that netted Sal
eté de Mer in an endless catch of noise and stench. Despite having gained a reputation for her work, there were still some who did not wish to engage in trade with a woman. Others saw payment as a flexible matter, since she did not have much recourse to insist.
As a result, her prospects had never matched her skills since her husband had died. Neither had her income.
And so, her shop sat at the farthest, darkest end of Tailor’s Lane, close enough to smell the animal refuse tossed out by Butchers Row each day, and the human refuse tossed out of the ale-houses and wine shops at night.
She was looking through inventory, but in her heart, she was still pressed up against a wall, hard against the chest of the dark-eyed stranger. The flushes and leaps of excitement this occasioned were not conducive to inventory-taking: she’d just restarted her count of the long needles for a third time when the sound of boots drew her attention to the door.
Three men stood there. They wore thick padded leather gambesons and tunics bearing an unfamiliar crest. All bore swords. They did not look interested in commissioning a new pair of hosen.
A cold chill slid down her back as they crowded into her shop.
She got up off her stool. “May I assist you?”
“Best hope you can,” one of them muttered.
