AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I told you so is a phrase that delights the speaker much more than the listener, so Lucinda was glad they had arrived at their destination. They stood outside a row of red brick buildings, a common enough sight in any of the fancier parts of the city. Number fifteen was on the ground level in the middle of the row. The number was painted in gold in the center of the door. The upper floor lodgings had their own entrances to the right and were evenly numbered while the doors to the lower floors were odd numbers. Hopefully a good omen for her own odds of success.
“Here we are,” Moll said. “I think I should search his room, and you stay lookout.”
“No. It must be me who searches his room,” Lucinda insisted. “If you were caught that would be a disaster.”
“How do you propose to get inside?”
“The usual way. I’ll pick the lock.”
“You?”
“Don’t look so surprised. Grandma taught me.”
“I am still uneasy about this plan. What if Corvacho should come home?” Moll’s fingers took to stroking her pipe as if the future could be conjured from tobacco.
“He did say he would be gone all day.”
Moll looked at her sternly. “Plans can change.”
“True. So if you spot him coming, you must call his name out loud enough so I can hear you and then tell him you have some good news. That should give me enough time to slip out.”
The trouble was, Corvacho’s room could be approached from either end of the street. If she chose the wrong end to position herself, Moll might not get to him before he reached the door. It was a risk they would simply have to take. Moll chose to guard the end that led to the main part of the Palace complex on the assumption that would be the route Corvacho was most likely to walk home. While Moll found the best vantage point and lit up her pipe, Lucinda got to work on the door lock. Her hands were not as steady as she would have liked them to be, so it took longer than it should. Eventually she heard the click, and the door swung open.
Her heart hammered in her chest as she shut the door behind her, leaning her back to it and slowly surveying the room. It was very much like Robbie McCrae’s room in layout with a small fireplace straight ahead, a bed in one corner, and a chair at a desk with a small bookshelf above it. There were only a few books on the shelves, which considering he would have brought them from Spain was not surprising, but the clothes chest in the room was quite large and elaborate. A casual visitor to the room would not go through the clothes chest so it would be a safe place to hide something away. Perhaps she should start her search in there. The pressure of time weighed heavily upon her. She could race around the room and search everything in a frenzy. Or she could stop a moment and think her way into Corvacho’s head. Moll called the hair his trophies. Trophies were kept to admire and display. If they were hidden in a chest it would not be as satisfying. Or would it? Perhaps it would be more appealing if the items were hidden but the hiding place could be seen. She imagined Corvacho would lie in his bed or sit in his chair and look at his hair collection, gloating, and feeding on the sense of power. She sat in the chair at the desk and closed her eyes.
When her eyes sprang open, the first thing she saw was the small collection of books. Instead of being stacked vertically on the shelf. They were set down on their sides, one stacked on top of the other, which struck her as unusual. Though perhaps not when there were only a few. Her eyes ran along the titles. Spanish. Spanish. Spanish. The bindings were a thick expensive leather embossed with gold. Then something out of the ordinary caught her eye. Something was sticking out from underneath the top two books. A folio cheaply bound in the English manner for wide distribution. A flash of insight prompted her to reach for the folio and pull it out from between the stack of books.
The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kydd.
With a growing sense of dread she leafed through the pages of the folio. She stopped when she hit the middle and drew her breath in sharply. A long thick strand of Rosalind’s hair was coiled between the pages, blonde and crinkled exactly the way it was the day that she was raped. The folio in her hand began to tremble with anger, disgust, and an all-consuming revulsion. She dropped it on the desk, her gaze drifting up to the stack of books.
The books.
Books were the perfect place to store something fine and delicate. Grandma Jones pressed samples of flowers and leaves from the herbs she collected between pages of her remedy books to help in identifying them. She pulled the first Spanish volume down from the shelf and slowly leafed through it. Every few pages she encountered a sample of hair, all different, but all placed between the pages in exactly the same way, coiled like a sailor’s rope in a clockwise direction with a smaller lock nestled in the center. She pulled the next book down and then the next. Every single one was filled with samples of hair. How long had he been filling them? How many women did these pages represent? She did not dare try and count. She did not have time, and even if she did, the knowledge of exactly how many women were his victims would be too hard to bear. As if on cue the sound of the music struck up again. The court musicians were playing a loud and rousing tune that bounced along so merrily it made her want to scream. How could anyone play such a happy tune if they knew what horrors resided in here? Her head was momentarily spinning so she sat with her head between her skirts, and from this vantage point she spotted another piece in the puzzle lurking beneath Corvacho’s bed.
The rope.
She got up swiftly then dropped to her hands and knees pulling out the coil of rope. As well as the large coil there were also several pieces of rope pre-cut into two-foot and three-foot lengths. A wave of nausea welled up into the back of her throat. He had everything prepared for the next one. She had seen enough. She must get out of here. She kicked the rope back under the bed and smoothed the feather quilt so there was no tell-tale depression where she had leaned with her hands. She had almost finished putting the last of the books back on the stack when she heard Moll calling out, her voice only just audible above the din of the music in the background.
“Signor! Signor Corvacho.” Moll sounded out of breath. Lucinda ran to the door and opened it a crack.
Too late. Corvacho was only a few paces from the door. Dear God. Dear Moll. Please get him to turn around.
“Signor Corvacho!” Moll finally caught up with him.
The Spaniard spun on his heel. “What do you want? Why are you plaguing me?”
Lucinda took the chance to slip out of the door slowly side stepping with her back to the wall holding her breath as she edged away.
“My mistress has been looking for you. We have good news. Your purse was returned, and we were bringing it to you.” Moll looked over each shoulder. “She was here a moment ago. She will not be far away.”
Lucinda took that as her cue and started to walk toward Corvacho. “Signor Corvacho. I trust you will be pleased. I have brought your purse. We had another errand in the vicinity, so we stopped by hoping to catch you at home.” She dropped her head in a deferential nod, desperately fighting to maintain her composure. Corvacho looked at her suspiciously, obviously trying to work out whence she had materialized from. All she could think to do was swiftly hand over the purse and put as much distance as possible between them. She stuck her hand in her bodice and pulled it out. “Here it is. As we suspected another fencer had taken it home by mistake.”
Corvacho snatched the purse from her hand, his eyes lingering over her bodice. “I wish to check the contents are all here,” he snapped. Looking her over again he offered a conciliatory smile that had the opposite effect and sent a shiver down her spine. “Here I am being most impolite. Please come inside where we may check the contents out of this hot sun.”
He had her on the spot. She could hardly refuse, but she gave it a try. “I…we have our other errand to attend to.”
“It won’t take long,” he said, opening the door.
