‘Sam Crookshank?’ Simon spooned up more of the soup with one eye on the boys, watching that they didn’t spill too much on the table. ‘So he was aware that White had come back,’ he said thoughtfully.

  ‘Do you know him?’ Jane asked.

  ‘He has that stain on his face. We’ve never talked, but I know he has dealings with the council.’

  ‘A mark?’ Rosie looked up sharply. ‘On his right cheek, the colour of a plum?’

  ‘That’s him,’ Simon said. ‘Why?’

  ‘He’s the one who pulled Richard away from that cart.’ She tousled her son’s hair.

  ‘Then I owe him some thanks.’ He pursed his lips. ‘I don’t remember him having anything to do with White before he was transported.’

  ‘He set someone to follow me,’ Jane said. ‘One of his clerks. I sent him back with a message that I’d be outside the office at eight.’

  ‘I’d like to be there.’

  She nodded. He kept looking at her face for any sign of resentment. He knew that Jane preferred to work alone. She rarely revealed who gave her information, and he’d learned never to ask. Three years of working together, two with Jane living under his roof, and so much of her was still locked behind doors. Sometimes he wondered if they’d ever open.

  The meal was over, Amos and Richard shifting restlessly on their chairs.

  ‘Right,’ Simon said, ‘I have time to get this pair to bed before we leave.’

  Julius White might want his blood revenge, but at home he was determined to live as if nothing was happening.

  With the sun gone, there was a bite in the air. Simon huddled into his coat, glad of the extra warmth. Jane never seemed to feel the cold; she still wore her thin old dress, the shawl gathered around her shoulders.

  A woman with a baby on her hip searched a pile of rubbish for anything useful. People walked home from work, heads down. Lights still burned in offices and shops. Couples strolled arm-in-arm, lost in each other.

  Finally, the door across the street opened and Crookshank came out on to Kirkgate. Blinking behind his spectacles, he glanced around before strolling away slowly.

  Simon started at a quick trot, Jane at his side. In just a few yards they caught up to the man, one on either side of him. He was tall, half a head above Simon, towering over most of the people around. He glanced down at Jane.

  ‘My clerk said Mrs Rigton told you to come and see me. What do you want?’

  He sounded terse, annoyed by her company.

  ‘Julius White,’ she said.

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘You knew he was back in Leeds.’

  ‘What if I did? He served his sentence. He was free to return.’

  ‘We want to find him,’ Simon said.

  Crookshank turned his head. ‘You’re the thief-taker.’

  ‘I am. And I believe I need to thank you for saving my son from a cart.’

  It caught the man off guard; he knew it would. The man blushed a little. It made the mark on his skin stand out even more.

  ‘I hope he’s fine.’

  ‘He is. And very well chastened. I’m curious, Mr Crookshank – how do you come to know White?’

  ‘We did some business before …’ He let silence fill the gap. ‘And he trusted me to look after his affairs while he was away.’

  As if it had been a trip for pleasure, a Grand Tour. But Simon smelled the wariness coming from Crookshank. He could use that.

  ‘When did he return?’

  ‘About three months ago, I believe. That was when I first saw him.’

  Three months, and a shadow all that time. ‘Where is he living? Who’s hiding him?’

  ‘I didn’t know anyone was,’ Crookshank replied calmly. ‘He served his sentence in full.’ A small hesitation. ‘I don’t know where he’s staying. He visits me at my home.’ It was a reluctant admission.

  ‘Where’s that?’

  Crookshank drew himself up. ‘Little Woodhouse. Beech Grove.’

  An impressive address. The man had done very well for himself.

  ‘But that’s in the other direction.’ Simon smiled at him.

  ‘I’m well aware of that, Mr Westow. I have to meet someone.’

  ‘White?’ Jane asked.

  ‘A gentleman,’ he replied after a moment. ‘His name is none of your concern. We have an appointment.’

  ‘I understand Mr White came into some money very recently,’ Simon continued.

  ‘Did he?’ Crookshank’s confusion sounded genuine. ‘I don’t see how.’

  ‘He did. Very definitely. A small fortune. You can take my word on that. When you see him, pass on a message from me. Tell him it won’t stay in his hands for very long.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘That’s fine. He will.’ He stopped, and Jane was still, too, leaving Crookshank to keep walking and glancing back over his shoulder.

  ‘Do you think that did any good?’ she asked.

  ‘Maybe. The question is what will White make of it?’ Simon shrugged his shoulders. ‘We still have work to do tonight.’

  THIRTEEN

  So Crookshank had been looking after White’s affairs. The way he’d said it, the man might have been any client or friend. But the words meant more than he realized, Simon decided. Julius White had always known he’d return. He’d left things worth saving. And it confirmed those looks he’d seen in court, from dock to judge. Everything had been worked out beforehand.

  Simon sat in the beershop, the drink untouched in front of him. Another evening that brought nothing. Nobody had seen White. Half of them had never heard of him. He was looking in the wrong places. The man wasn’t hiding among the criminals and the poor. That was why they hadn’t even had a sniff of him yet.

  And if he wasn’t with them, he had to be sheltered and out of sight among the rich. What had he entrusted to Crookshank? Money? Valuables? Property? And those influential friends … Simon had believed they’d abandon him with the trial and try to forget they’d ever known him. But maybe they hadn’t all blown away with the wind that took him to Australia.

  He needed to begin searching elsewhere.

  By midnight he was home. Rosie was asleep, tossing and thrashing in her dreams. The boys were in their beds. And Jane … not a sound from the attic. She might be there, or still out and around.

  He stood on the landing, listening to the small creaks and sighs of the house. In the morning they’d start fresh.

  Jane listened. Simon could see the doubts cloud across her face. She ate as he talked, the pobs she liked for breakfast, bread in warm milk.

  ‘You’d think people with money would have better sense than to hide someone like that,’ Rosie said.

  ‘He must have a hold over them,’ Simon said. ‘Something he knows.’

  ‘Then it would have to be something bad. Something important. It’s nine years since he left. Things change.’

  ‘Not as much as we think, it seems.’

  ‘Perhaps the rich have deeper secrets than the rest of us,’ Jane said quietly. She tore off a piece of bread and began to chew it.

  ‘Maybe that’s true,’ he said. He didn’t know, didn’t care. As long as he found White, they could all carry their secrets to the grave.

  ‘We know a few wealthy people, too,’ Rosie said. ‘There’s Emma Hart.’

  Four years earlier, they’d found some plate and lace handkerchiefs that burglars had taken from the woman’s house on Park Lane. She’d been grateful for their return. She must be in her late forties now, he thought, a widow with a brassy, vivacious voice and a teasing smile.

  She wasn’t the only one. He knew a small scattering of the well-to-do around Leeds. How many of them would help him, though? How many would even give him the time of day any more? A thief-taker was just another tradesman. Useful when you needed him and then forgotten.

  Rosie looked him up and down and shook her head. ‘If you’re going to call on the quality, you’d better wear your good suit and get a yourself a shave. One look at you like that and they’ll never let you through the door.’

  Jane had never known anyone rich. She never would. They inhabited a different world, somewhere that was always clean and bright. But she did know a few of their servants: a kitchen maid in a house out along North Street. A washerwoman in a grand place on Park Square. A groom for a man who liked to play at being a farmer.

  That was the place to begin, she decided. Josh always seemed willing to find a few minutes for her. He was a pleasant lad, shy, willing, happier with animals than with people; working in the stables was the perfect job for him.

  Half an hour’s walking, up past Richmond Hill, the climb along Spital Field and beyond Star and Garter house. The suggestion of spring warmth growing every day. Up on the peak, she turned around to see Leeds below.

  Down there, when she was moving along the streets, the town felt so large, every inch as big and choked as she imagined London would be. From here it looked small. Everything was pushed and crammed together, so tight it might burst. The chimneys poked up, throwing out a haze of smoke to shroud the place. If she reached out her hand she felt she could pick it all up, squeeze it in her fist and put it away in her pocket.

  You’re not a child, she thought. Stupid ideas don’t do any good. With a grim, serious face she turned back to the track.

  Josh was in the hayloft, tossing straw down to the stable floor with a pitchfork. He’d been ten and thin as a wretch when she first met him as they looked for food after the market one Saturday. Even then he’d loved horses, spending time at the ostler’s gate, face breaking into a smile when he was allowed in to groom one of the animals. Some nights they let him sleep in the stables and gave him a meal. Finally they took him on, and he couldn’t have been happier if he’d inherited a fortune.

  He’d done well. Horses scared her, so large and threatening, but he handled them as if he’d been born to it. He worked hard, he relished every hour of the job, and the beasts responded to him. Then last year, Mr Warner had offered him a position in charge of the stable out here. It wasn’t big, just three horses and a gig to keep running. But for him it was a dream that had become real.

  A long way from sorting through the rubbish and trying to fill their bellies. Josh had security now. He had a future.

  Jane stood at the entrance to the stable, watching him work. He’d grown into a young man. Still thin, but he’d filled out with all the labour. The muscles bulged on his arms as he shifted load after load. He finished, wiping the sweat off his face, and climbed down the ladder.

  ‘They work you hard here.’

  He turned in surprise, his mouth curving into a smile when he saw her. Half his teeth had fallen out, a memento of those years of hunger.

  ‘How long have you been there?’

  ‘Long enough.’

  He’d been a brother to her once. A little older, watching out for her when neither of them had anything. Now, in their different ways, they were both settled.

  ‘You haven’t been to visit in a while. The last time you were here there was snow on the ground.’ He poured a mug of beer and offered it to her. Jane shook her head.

  ‘You look happy,’ she said.

  ‘Me?’ He glanced around and she could see the joy in his eyes. ‘I suppose I am. Mr Warner’s pleased with the way I look after the animals. What about you?’

  She shrugged. ‘I’m fine. I’m looking for someone.’

  ‘You found me.’ Josh grinned.

  ‘Does Mr Warner have any guests staying here?’

  ‘Him? No. He hasn’t even been here much himself this year. Too busy, that’s what he said when he was out last time.’

  ‘What about the other places around?’ After the walk up here, she wanted to return with something.

  He drank as he wandered round the stable, patting a horse’s flank before picking off a piece of straw.

  ‘I thought I saw a stranger over at Hawley’s farm. Why?’

  ‘What did he look like?’

  He pushed his lips together. ‘This job of yours. A girl shouldn’t be doing things like that.’

  ‘It’s work.’ That was all anyone needed to know.

  ‘But …’

  He started this argument every time she came to see him. Sometimes teasing, occasionally with a sharper edge. Today she wouldn’t let him distract her.

  ‘The man. What did he look like?’ she repeated.

  ‘I only saw him from the back. But it wasn’t Hawley or anybody who works for him. He didn’t walk like any of them.’

  ‘How long ago was this?’ Jane asked.

  ‘Four or five days.’ He stared at her. ‘Why?’

  ‘Where is the farm?’

  He opened his mouth to speak, closed it again, then led her to the stable door and pointed.

  ‘You see those trees up on the ridge? It’s just down from there.’

  A dark, weathered box of a building on the hillside, exposed to the wind. A third of a mile away, she judged. At that distance it would be impossible to see how burned a man’s skin might be.

  ‘Is he still there?’

  ‘I don’t know. I only saw him once.’

  She could wait here all day and not catch a glimpse of the man. It might not even be White. And there was no way to approach the place without being seen.

  ‘I’d better go back,’ she said.

  ‘I know someone over there.’ A blush crept up from his neck. ‘I could go over later and ask, if you like.’

  ‘I’d be grateful. Be careful, though. Just say you happened to see someone.’

  ‘Come back tomorrow and I’ll tell you.’

  Jane started back down the track, holding the shawl tight as the wind began to blow. She could never live out here where the cold penetrated to the bones. Up on the hills life seemed too fragile, like nature could pick it up and end it in a second.

  The man at the farm was no more than a faint possibility. But even that was better than going home empty-handed.

  ‘You know people.’

  Barnaby Wade put down his coffee cup and dabbed his mouth with a handkerchief. Around them, the coffee house buzzed with conversation. Men with soft faces and intent voices discussed business, shook hands on a quick deal.

  ‘I knew people, Simon,’ he said slowly. ‘I was barred from the law a long time ago, remember? Now I gull fools and take their money.’

  ‘It’s legal.’

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed slowly. ‘I make money. A few of them do, too, sometimes. But it doesn’t make me welcome in the best houses. You already know that.’

  He did, but asking cost nothing. And it was still too early to call on Mrs Hart. Never before ten, that was the etiquette.

  ‘Is this to do with White?’ Wade asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ve heard he wrote a letter to the newspapers, but I haven’t seen it in the Intelligencer or the Mercury this morning.’

  ‘No one’s going to print it. He says he’s back to demand justice.’

  Wade took out a cheroot and lit it from a spill. ‘I can imagine the kind of justice he wants. You’d better watch out for yourself.’

  ‘I will, don’t worry.’ He gathered up his hat. ‘I am. Let me know if you do hear anything. I want to know where he’s staying.’

  In the distance he heard the toll of the bell as it rang ten o’clock. Simon took a breath, crossed Park Lane and knocked on a door. He was wearing his good black suit. Rosie had adjusted his stock until it was sat just right at his throat. The barber had given him a shave so close that his skin shone pink in the mirror. He looked quite respectable enough to call on a rich widow.

  The maid in the apron believed he was, at least. She escorted him through to the parlour, bobbing a curtsey as she announced him, then quietly closing the door as she left.

  Emma Hart look amused. She was dressed in muslin the colour of bilberries, a silk shawl around her neck, hair neatly dressed, just a few strands of grey to give away her age. A small dog nestled in her lap, and she stroked it as she spoke.

  ‘You’re in your finest get-out, Mr Westow. Are you on your way to a wedding or a funeral?’

  ‘I’m here on business.’ That was enough to pique her interest.

  ‘Business? I’ve had nothing stolen.’ She raised a carefully painted eyebrow. ‘Or do you know something I don’t?’

  ‘I’m looking for information.’

  She smiled. ‘I see. Well, I hear gossip from the ladies, but I don’t know if that’s information.’ She emphasized the word gently. ‘More like defamation, usually. What kind of things do you want to know?’

  ‘About a man who returned to Leeds a few months ago.’

  ‘Then perhaps you’d better sit down and tell me about him.’

  By the time he finished, he had her promise to listen carefully and pass on anything she heard.

  ‘But there’s a price, Mr Westow.’

  Wasn’t there always? In one way or another, life was filled with debts and obligations.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘When it’s over, you come back and tell me the whole story. There’s more to it than you said, I can tell.’

  ‘I will.’ If he was still alive then.

  ‘One last thing,’ Mrs Hart said as he was leaving. ‘When you do return, present yourself like this. You’re a handsome young man. Dressing well suits you.’

  He was planting seeds, he realized as he walked out over Quarry Hill. Now he had to hope they’d grow soon, without drought or flood. He wished the Vulture hadn’t died; he always had information to peddle. Still, Jane was right, someone would replace him soon. But now was when he needed to know things.

  The house on Black Flags Lane was quiet. But all the trade here came with the night. The doors leading off the corridor remained shut. He’d never seen any of the girls who worked here. That privilege was reserved for the paying customers to make their choice.

  Simon had to spend ten minutes waiting in Lizzie Henry’s parlour, gazing out of the windows at the ground coming into bloom.

  ‘Have you found him yet?’ she asked as she swept into the room. There was a brittle edge to her voice. Under the powder, her face looked drawn and haggard.

  ‘No.’