The Ladder Dancer (15 page)

The George lies just up from St Nicholas’s Church, and I was only a street or two away. It wouldn’t take long to get there and ask a few questions; I turned down an alley, across a street and into the inn yard.

The inn is a rickety old place, whose haphazard beams and homely whitewash disguise excellent service and a hearty welcome. A maid directed me to the stable lad who was, she said, breakfasting; I found him sitting on a bench outside the kitchen, in a patch of sunshine, enjoying a very large tankard of ale and a wedge of freshly baked bread. He was two or three years older than Kate, maybe fifteen, and stank of the stables. Dried horse-shit lined one boot and a streak of mud his right cheek; he had a nervous habit of scratching at his leg.

I described the grey horse to him. He screwed up his eyes in thought. ‘Oh, aye. Fine horse that was. Left it here two or three hours.’

‘That’s not long. Did he say why he wanted to leave it?’

The lad stared. ‘He wanted it looked after.’

I rephrased the question. ‘Did he say where he was going?’

He thought, shook his head, drank ale, scratched his leg. ‘Didn’t ask.’ He grinned. ‘Didn’t like him. Rude.’

‘Insulted you, did he?’

‘Had a filthy temper on him. Said he’d been told the George was good and it better had be. Like I’d not look after the horse right!’

He expiated on the horse’s good points at length, growing more and more enthusiastic. It had obviously been a well-bred, expensive animal.

‘What did he look like?’ I intervened. ‘The man, I mean, not the horse.’

He shrugged and immediately lost all inclination to talk. ‘Dunno.’ Another scratch.

‘You must have been close to him, if you took the horse out of his hands.’

‘Had a hat,’ he said, at last. ‘And a big coat.’ He shrugged. ‘It were foggy. He were just some fellow.’ Light seemed to dawn. ‘I remember the bag. Chinked as he took it down. Money, lots of it.’

That puzzled me. Ridley had had money? Why then did he need to steal from his mother? Unless he’d lost the money, gambling perhaps. Was that why he’d come to Newcastle in the first place? But somehow I couldn’t imagine Ridley getting annoyed over losing money. He’d regard it as just another amusing incident.

‘Was it a bag with letters on it?’

‘Dunno.’ Another one who couldn’t read. ‘Had gold on it. All swirls.’

I scratched the monogram on the stone bench, using the sharp end of a pebble. He looked at it dubiously. ‘Mebbe.’

I sighed. ‘Was he still in a bad temper when he came back for the horse?’

The lad grinned. ‘And how!’

‘But he didn’t say why?’

‘Just took the horse and went off. No,’ he corrected himself, ‘I forgot. He asked which way for the bridge.’

‘He was riding south then?’

‘I told him, and then he goes off in the wrong direction!’ The lad grinned. ‘Well, I weren’t running after him to say. Not after him being so rude.’

He scratched at the leg, stared reflectively into the bottom of the empty tankard. I fished a sixpence out of my pocket. He stared at it with growing appreciation.

‘I can tell you more,’ he said, adding, just as I was getting hopeful again, ‘Dunno any more but I could easy make something up.’

I gave him the sixpence and retreated.

I thought of going to the Old Man Inn to question the girls there, and see if Ridley had been telling me the truth about what he’d been doing on the night the child had died. But it would be well-nigh impossible to find two girls whose names I didn’t know and who might not be connected with the inn at all, so I went back home to give Kate her promised violin lesson. Having sold not a single concert ticket.

She was in the estate room with Esther, wearing a neat, rather drab dress I fancied Esther must have borrowed from a servant, and her brown hair was down (and washed) as befitted her age. Apparently, she was demonstrating she could write her name; this, I saw over her shoulder, consisted of writing a large ungainly K.

I took her into the library. She scampered after me with a child’s eagerness and hung over the painted images of nymphs and shepherds on the harpsichord lid. ‘What are they doing? Are they dancing? Why are they doing it in the middle of a field?’

I took my violin out of its case. It’s not a valuable instrument but one with sentimental value for me; I’d seen enough to know Kate would handle it carefully. She ran her fingers over the age-smoothed wood, clearly appreciating the feel. I gave her the bow and was just telling her to play me something she liked, when a sparkle of light caught my attention and the spirit George shot along the raised edge of the harpsichord lid. ‘Master! You can’t teach her. You know you can’t!’

Kate stared. ‘Who’s he?’

‘My former apprentice,’ I said, sighing.

‘I’m
still
your apprentice, master,’ George said indignantly. ‘You can’t teach her. Girls can’t play the violin.’

‘Who says?’ Kate demanded.

‘It isn’t proper!’

‘George—’

‘Besides, girls aren’t any good at music.’

Kate spluttered in indignation. ‘Don’t suppose you ever talked to a girl in your life!’

‘Girls are silly!’

‘I bet you never got a look in,’ Kate said. ‘Bet you had spots.’

That was an unluckily accurate guess; George’s skin had been horribly scabbed. The gleam of light throbbed. ‘I bet
you
got the pox!’

Kate shrieked. ‘I do not!’

‘Kate—’

‘Well,’ she said, ignoring me, ‘at least I ain’t dead!’

‘Master!’ George protested. But the rest of what he had to say was lost as Kate launched into a very fast, very loud jig.

Kate played; the spirit skittered about the harpsichord lid, yelling. Its high-pitched indignation cut into my head like a saw; I had a raging headache in seconds. I tried to stop Kate but she pretended not to hear me, said, ‘Eh? What?’ a couple of times. George yelled, ‘Stop her, master, stop her!’

I took a deep breath and bellowed. ‘Be quiet!’

Kate stopped in mid-phrase, with such a look of dread on her face I was startled. She took a step backwards, said, ‘I didn’t mean— I wasn’t going to— honest, I wasn’t . . .’

‘She shouldn’t be playing, master!’ George said with an edge of triumph.

‘George.’ Esther’s quiet voice came from the doorway. ‘Come with me.’

The gleam of the spirit jittered about uneasily. ‘But mistress . . .’

‘Now, George.’ And Esther turned on her heels.

‘Master!’ George wailed. I said nothing. The gleam hesitated, then shot off across the floor after Esther.

There was silence for a moment after they’d left. Kate stood hugging the violin, looking fearful. She could fight off a drunken man with no hesitation but someone shouting at her made her tremble. I realized I hadn’t the slightest idea what her life must have been like in that slum.

‘I apologize for shouting at you,’ I said formally. ‘But if you and the spirit are going to yell each other down all the time, living in this house is going to be intolerable.’ Inwardly, I was groaning; first George took a dislike to Tom, now to Kate. Perhaps Esther could talk him round; I was beginning to think I could not. ‘Now,’ I said to Kate. ‘You’re not standing properly.’

Criticism, as ever, worked its magic. The tension melted out of her. ‘I am!’ she said indignantly. ‘I’m on my two feet. How else do you stand?’

‘Straighten up,’ I said. ‘Rest the violin on your shoulder and keep your palm away from the neck.’

She held the violin out. ‘Show me.’

I took the instrument and stood in the correct position. Kate walked round me, peering under my raised bow arm, ducking under the violin, standing on tiptoe to see over my shoulder. Then, with a look of complete smugness, she took the violin from my grasp and held it perfectly.

The lesson was a new experience for me. Kate did not respond well to being told what to do, but
show
her and she copied it, well-nigh perfectly. And if it wasn’t perfect, she was willing to do it again and again, and if need be, again, until it was. I was impressed; most pupils want to play just well enough to bumble through the piece and then move on to the next. Not Kate. She even submitted to playing her favourite tunes as slowly as possible, to make sure the bowing was even and the notes perfectly in tune.

The only thing she couldn’t do was read the notes on the page. She couldn’t even see the sense of being able to do it.

‘Look,’ she said, pointing at the score on the music stand. ‘That little dot there.’

‘That represents the note C.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it does.’

‘Why can’t it be K?’ For Kate presumably.

‘Because it isn’t.’

‘And why not apple?’

‘Apple!’

‘And why are there five lines on that little ladder thing they sit on and not four?’

She didn’t know her letters but she could count.

‘Kate,’ I said, ‘you’re doing excellently. But if you play that violin in public . . .’

‘I’m going to,’ she said, firing up at once. ‘This afternoon. In the old fellow’s concert.’

‘You’ll be branded as no better than your mother,’ I warned.

‘That’s unfair!’

‘That’s the way it is. Women who appear in public are not respectable.’

‘Your wife plays the harpsichord.’

‘Only in private. And even then, only the harpsichord and harp are suitable instruments for women.’

‘Anyhow,’ she said, changing tack skilfully. ‘Don’t matter. I ain’t respectable.’

‘You’ll be made the butt of all sorts of offers, which you’ll not like in the least.’

‘I’ll say no,’ she said. ‘If you won’t let me play, how can I ever earn any money without selling myself?’

She had a point. ‘You could take up a position as a servant, in a respectable household—’

She shrieked with derisive laughter. ‘How do you think my ma ended up where she is? I ain’t doing that.’

‘An apprentice is a servant of sorts,’ I pointed out.

‘Right,’ she said, thrusting the violin back into my hands. ‘You don’t want me, I’ll go to the old fellow.’

‘Nightingale simply wants to make money out of you.’

‘Well, that’s all right,’ she said, ‘because that’s what I want too. Lots and lots and
lots
of money!’

I nearly said she could have mine.

Twenty

No gentleman ever raises his voice.

[
A Gentleman’s Companion
, July 1732]

The first person Esther and I set eyes on when we entered the crowded Assembly Rooms that afternoon was Claudius Heron, standing by one of the tall windows. If by keeping to the shadows, he was hoping not to draw attention to the large bruise disfiguring his left cheek, he was mistaken. It gave him a raffish air totally at odds with his character.

‘Ridley was not quite as pacified as I anticipated,’ he said dryly. ‘He was perfectly well-behaved until we drew up outside his parents’ home, at which point he apparently realized where he was and started flailing about. It took three footmen to subdue him.’

I grimaced. ‘His behaviour to Nightingale last night was unforgivable. In a private house – in front of ladies!’

‘I am beginning to think him insane.’

Esther said tartly, ‘He needs a firm hand, and work to keep him occupied.’

‘I agree entirely,’ Heron said, ‘but only so much can be done by force. If he will not discipline himself, there seems little others can do.’

‘He’s not seen Armstrong yet?’ I asked.

‘He has been given until the end of the day to do so.’

Jenison was talking to Nightingale on the other side of the room; he signalled to me and I excused myself to Esther and Heron. A surprisingly large number of people had already arrived for the concert and as I made my way through the company, I received some hard stares; I heard someone murmur, ‘. . . rich woman. All the same, these fellows . . .’ I gritted my teeth, prevented myself – just – from turning to give them a hard stare. That’s what Heron would have done; I don’t have the confidence to carry it off.

Nightingale was in pink, with the usual silver ladders climbing all over his ample stomach. All that embroidery must have cost a fortune. Jenison was saying, ‘Just a little demonstration, not a full concert. A few airs to entertain us.’

‘Of course,’ Nightingale said. I smelt a faint aroma of beer; he’d plainly been indulging but not, I hoped,
over-
indulging.

It was almost impossible to get him to the harpsichord; every lady wanted to greet him and he wasn’t in the least averse to returning the greetings fivefold; old or young, he treated them all with the same flattering flirtation. When he arrived at the harpsichord at last, he was breathless and glowing.

‘The Vivaldi,’ he said. ‘Slow movement, just to warm us both up, eh? Then the Handel. The overture to
Giulio Cesare
.’

‘All of it?’

He had a pile of music on the harpsichord stool and handed it to me as I was trying to unlock the instrument. I put it back on the stool again.

‘Then the last movement of the Vivaldi. Do you know
The Lass of Patie’s Mill
?’

‘Of course.’

‘We’ll do that then. All five verses. I’ll do verse one as a violin, verse two as a trumpet, verse three—’

‘Alpenhorn?’ I suggested.

‘And I’ll sing the rest of them. Then the trumpet march by Purcell . . .’

‘Jenison asked for a
few
airs,’ I reminded him.

‘And the witches’ song from
Macbeth
.’

I gave up trying to persuade him to exercise restraint and concentrated instead on tuning the harpsichord. There was a flurry of satin and a breathless voice said, ‘
Dear
Mr Nightingale.’ I glanced up to see Mrs Annabella, in the most amazingly elaborate white dress with an exceedingly low neckline, simpering at Nightingale. He bowed deeply, took her hand and bestowed the breath of a kiss on it. Then he drew himself up to his full height, standing just a fraction too close in a protective manner. ‘My dear lady, it is
so
crowded in here. Allow me to find you a seat.’