The woman was slow to reply. ‘Two,’ she said finally. ‘They came back a few days later.’ Another hesitation, then she seemed to make up her mind and plunged on. ‘They brought better goods that time. Some little baubles that were worth money. Hardly a fortune, mind, but I bought them. Sold them on easy enough.’

  ‘Both of them came?’

  Mrs Marsh shook her head. ‘Just him. The last time, it was the pair of them again. It was a Saturday night, I remember that. It’s always the busiest time of the week in this trade. They came about an hour before all the wives were set to turn up and take back what they’d had to pledge.’

  The Foxes had vanished from Leeds on a Saturday.

  ‘Do you remember when this was?’ Simon asked.

  ‘The middle of June,’ she replied. ‘I’m sure of that. Right around my daughter’s birthday.’

  The hairs rose on his arms. The Foxes had last been seen on a Saturday in the middle of June. She might have been the last person in town to have seen them.

  ‘What did they bring?’

  ‘More jewellery. Rings, bracelets, a brooch. Wait there …’ she bustled off into a back room and returned holding an elaborate silver brooch with a deep red stone, maybe a ruby, at its heart. ‘I liked that, I decided to keep it for myself,’ the woman told him with a blush. ‘All the rest was as good as this, too. Got good money for it all, too; I’d have been a fool to turn it down.’

  ‘Did they say why they were suddenly selling so much?’

  She turned a withering look on him. ‘No, they didn’t, and I’m not enough of a damned fool to ask a question like that, Simon Westow. This was the best stuff they’d brought. Enough of it that they came close to cleaning out the money I keep about me.’

  ‘A good sum?’

  She gave a sharp nod. ‘Enough,’ she repeated.

  From time to time the rumours circulated that Mrs Marsh was a wealthy woman; he’d heard them for years. There was nothing in her appearance or the shop to show any money, but Simon believed it. She was canny and cunning.

  ‘Did they say much?’

  ‘Hardly a word. When I was counting out the money, she was looking at it like it was a feast.’ She chuckled. ‘You should have seen her. Any hungrier and she’d have been trying to gulp it down.’

  As he walked back towards Briggate, he felt as if he could put together a tale of the Foxes’ last few hours in Leeds. They murdered Shackleton and decided to run. Sold all the jewellery they’d gathered to give themselves travelling money and vanished into the night.

  Not far enough, though. Jane had discovered Mrs Fox’s body in Kirkstall, just three miles from town.

  Found the day after Andrew Barton disappeared from his friends at Kirkstall Abbey. Since then he’d been drinking more heavily than before. Had he been involved in her death? Was it guilt that had made him drown himself?

  A tale, yes, but so ragged it was in pieces, and so many other ways to tell it.

  Rosie might still be with Mrs Barton, but he needed to go there and ask the woman to see if any of her jewellery was missing. If so … there was only one person who could have stolen it.

  A sound woke her. Small movements in the kitchen. Knife in hand, Jane crept through, only to see Mrs Shields, dressed and busy with ingredients for her ointments and medicines.

  ‘I can do that for you,’ she said, and the old woman turned with a start, suddenly turning pale as her hand moved to her chest.

  ‘Oh child, don’t do that. I almost jumped out of my skin.’

  But she said it with a quiet laugh and tender smile. Jane helped, learning, until Sally began to stir. The girl was hungry, wolfing down the porridge and bread, back to the appetite she’d had before the beating.

  Her eyes were alert, her face alive. Jane helped her from the bed and took her arm, feeling the girl clutch tight as she rose to her feet. The effort and strain showed on her face: squinting, mouth tight. Sally waved her off, kept still for a few seconds, gathering her strength before she managed two halting steps, eyes tightly closed as she took quick, shallow breaths.

  She stopped. Very carefully, she turned, moving stiffly back to the bed.

  ‘Enough.’ She exhaled the word and Jane steadied her as the girl sank back down, panting and nodding to herself. ‘Longer next time.’

  Jane had been the same when she was hurt. She’d pushed herself hard. Made herself do more. At times, she saw much of herself in the girl. The desire for revenge would be burning inside, waiting for the chance to flame bright.

  Before that, though, she had to heal.

  Onions, carrots, beans. Meat from the butcher on Timble Bridge. Back through the courts and yards to come out just below the junction of Boar Lane and Briggate.

  Kate was in her usual spot, shouting her wares, beaming as she spotted Jane.

  ‘Here you are. Two meat pies, still warm for you,’ she said, and took the three pennies. ‘How’s the lass?’

  ‘She’s starting to walk again.’ To stumble, at least, but it was a beginning that would grow better.

  The woman’s eyes flashed. ‘One of those children she looks after said it was very bad.’

  ‘It was. I found the men who hurt her.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘That’ll be up to her.’

  A few minutes with Dodson the beggar, handing him one of the pies after dropping coins in his tin cup. He’d heard nothing of interest, no stray words about anyone named Barton or Fox. But how much of an answer could they ever find for the troubles that plagued someone’s mind?

  On the way home she stopped by the Market Cross at the head of Briggate. Davy Cassidy was playing his fiddle. Jane closed her eyes and let the music carry her off for a few minutes. A small piece of calm in the day.

  ‘Mr Westow,’ Barton said, surprised to see him. ‘If you’re looking for your wife, she left no more than five minutes ago.’

  ‘No,’ Simon said, and saw the confusion in the man’s eyes. ‘I’d like to speak to you and your wife. Together.’

  ‘Why? Have you found something?’ His voice was hopeful, his expression crestfallen when Simon shook his head.

  ‘Not yet. But I need to ask another question.’

  Two minutes later the three of them were sitting in the parlour. James Barton seemed lost, disconnected from the world, but his wife had the face of a woman locked in torment. Red, ugly with grief, eyes rimmed. She glared at Simon, as if he’d been responsible for her son’s death. He’d have preferred to wait a few days, but the man had asked him to find some answers.

  ‘We know the Foxes left Leeds on a Saturday.’ He paused until he was certain he had their attention. ‘Before they went, they sold some jewellery to someone who deals in stolen property. She said that there were good items in there. Believe me, I know this is the worst time I could ask, but please, I’d like you to look and check if anything of yours is missing.’

  She stood, moving away with a slow tread.

  ‘We’re burying Andrew tomorrow,’ Barton said into the quiet room. ‘The vicar decided he must have had an accident and gone into the water, so he can be buried in consecrated ground.’

  What could he say? The sorrow hung heavy all around the house, a pall so strong it might never lift. They waited until the door opened again.

  ‘There are three pieces I can’t find.’ Her eyes moved to her husband. ‘Do you remember the brooch your brother gave me five years ago, the one with the ruby?’

  Very like the one Mrs Marsh had decided to keep for herself. No real surprise. The parts were beginning to slide together. A garnet gold ring had gone, too, and a simple, thin gold bracelet she hadn’t worn in years.

  ‘Why did you need to know, Mr Westow?’ Barton asked.

  ‘At least one of them sounds like an item they sold.’ He didn’t want to tell them what that meant; better if they thought it out for themselves. Simon gave a small bow. ‘Thank you.’

  Barton caught up to him outside the front door.

  ‘Do you think Andrew stole them? Is that what you were trying to say?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Simon replied. He’d choose his words cautiously. The man wouldn’t want to accept the truth. Not yet. His son’s death was an open wound.

  After the fog in his mind cleared, Barton would understand. The image of his son would crack and tarnish. Let that happen in its own time.

  ‘I tried to talk to her,’ Rosie said after Simon settled in the kitchen and rubbed the sweat off his face. The boys had gone down to the river with some of the others from school, enjoying the long days of summer.

  ‘Any joy?’

  She shook her head. ‘You were just there, you saw her for yourself. All I could do was listen while she talked about Andrew. I didn’t attempt to ask any questions; I don’t think she’d have understood them.’ She sighed. ‘Poor woman.’

  ‘We have to try. Barton wants us to find answers.’

  ‘If we can. Andrew’s dead. Some things you can’t explain with words, Simon. Whatever made him kill himself, it’s over now. Mr and Mrs Barton are the ones who’ll have to carry the weight and try to understand. They’re the ones who’ll keep suffering.’

  That was true, Simon thought. His own parents had died before he was old enough to fully understand they’d gone. He could barely recall them, couldn’t see their faces in his own. He’d been sent to the workhouse, spent twelve hours a day labouring in the mills as soon as he turned six. He’d had no place for grief as he grew up.

  ‘How are we going to find out what happened?’

  ‘I’m not sure we ever will.’ Everyone who could tell them was dead. Andrew, Mrs Fox … maybe Mr Fox was, too. He sighed. ‘But we’re being paid, and Barton needs it, so we’ll keep trying.’

  Where to look, though?

  TWENTY-ONE

  Sally stood again, gritting her teeth and swallowing hard as she pushed herself up from the bed. Jane watched as she paced slowly and stiffly across the room, reaching to touch the wall, then back again.

  Quarter of an hour later, she made herself do it again. Then every five minutes for the rest of the hour.

  ‘That’s enough for today,’ Mrs Shields told her finally. She rubbed ointment on Sally’s wounds and made her drink from a mug. ‘Sleep now. It will help.’

  Jane picked up her book and slipped outside to read in the July warmth, quickly losing herself again in the American woods with Natty Bumppo and The Pioneers. At first, she’d wondered if she’d been gone too long, but within three pages she was there once more, a part of it all.

  Later, as dusk fell, Jane took a handful of coins from behind the loose brick where she kept her money.

  She pulled the shawl up over her hair.

  ‘Going to see the children?’ Catherine Shields asked quietly. She was sitting by the bed, her own book open on her lap.

  ‘Someone has to help while Sally’s poorly.’

  It wasn’t a task she’d expected, not one she wanted, but someone needed to do it. Years had passed since she’d been a child out there, but the memories stayed sharp.

  The money she gave wouldn’t last longer than a day or two. But without it, some would probably die, even in this weather. She could afford it. Even more than the coins that could feed them, they’d be clamouring for news of Sally.

  Early morning brought thick clouds, the heat building until it seemed to press down on his chest. The threat of rain made Simon’s skin prickle as he stood by the coffee cart. He was sweating in his wool coat, palms slick as he gripped the metal knob of his walking stick.

  No real gossip. It was that season when little happened and time felt sluggish. The Bartons would never forget this day, though, when they lowered their son into the ground.

  He’d wondered about going and decided against it. Let them keep their dignity, and their anguish private.

  That left him … with nothing to help his search.

  There was one man he could go and see, the visit he’d put off the day before. The man with the damaged knee. But at eleven, just as the bell at St John’s Church began to toll for the dead, he walked past the door on the Head Row for the fourth time, still undecided whether to knock.

  For the love of God, Simon told himself, if he was that unsure, it was better to leave it. He marched away. Knowing all the while that he’d return and face the same indecision.

  Jane watched the girl move again. With each pace, Sally seemed to grow a little stronger.

  Mrs Shields beamed with pleasure at the way the patient was healing. Even faster than she’d hoped, Jane knew. The broken nose would be somewhere close to its original shape. But the scar on her cheek would remain; the men had left their mark on her.

  Wearing an old dress Jane bought for her at a clothes stall, with a hand to steady herself, she stepped outside, blinking in the light as she settled herself on the wooden bench with a deep sigh. The muted sounds from the Head Row seeped in, and the air was filled with the stink and smoke of the factories. She breathed it in like the freshest scent she’d ever known.

  ‘Do you remember the names of all the men who hurt me?’ she asked after five minutes.

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘I want to know all about them. Where they live, where they go.’ She looked thoughtful, making her plans. ‘When the children come again, I’ll ask them to do it.’

  Her little army. The ones nobody ever noticed or remembered.

  ‘What are you going to do to them?’ Jane asked.

  ‘I’m not going to kill them.’ Her voice was slow and considered; she’d given this some thought. ‘They’re all from money, aren’t they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘They’ve already done this to me.’ She gestured at her body. ‘I’m not going to risk hanging for them. If I killed them, their families would make sure I was found.’

  ‘Then what else?’

  ‘I’ll give them something they’ll see every time they look in the mirror. Make sure they remember me for the rest of their lives so they can regret it every single day.’

  ‘I already did that to one of them.’

  Sally gave a cold, satisfied smile. ‘That’s what gave me the idea.’ Her fingertips traced the wound on her cheek. ‘I’ll never have the chance to forget. Why should they?’ Her gaze moved to the book next to Jane’s hand. ‘Is it a good story?’

  ‘Very good.’

  ‘What’s it called?’

  ‘The Pioneers.’ She held it up, pronouncing the letters as she traced them.

  ‘What’s it about?’

  How could she describe it to someone who knew nothing about geography or history?

  ‘It’s a story set in another country. America, on the other side of the ocean. The main character is called Natty Bumppo and he knows a lot of Native Americans. They’re the people who lived there before the white men came.’

  Sally wrinkled her nose. ‘Natty Bumppo. That’s a strange name. What does it mean?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘Maybe they use it over there.’

  ‘Could you read some of it to me?’

  The request took her by surprise. The girl had never shown any interest in books or stories. Perhaps she’d enjoyed the soothing sound when Mrs Shields read to her. More likely she just needed something to fill all the empty time.

  ‘I’m halfway through. You won’t know what’s happening.’

  ‘I don’t mind. Please?’

  Before she could start, Wilfred and Hannah arrived through the gap in the wall at Green Dragon Yard, loud and overjoyed to see Sally out in the sun. Jane tucked the book under her arm and went back into the house.

  The rain never arrived on Tuesday. The oppressive feel lingered into Wednesday, the sense of a torrent growing more and more imminent, as if the heavens could open at any moment. The only talk at the coffee cart was Andrew Barton’s funeral. Simon already knew the truth; he didn’t need the rumours. He drained the tin cup and made his way home.

  He’d barely closed the door before the rain began. Hammering on the roof and windows, a deluge that bounced high off the flagstones and the cobbles. Loud, overwhelming. As he watched through the window, a stream formed along Swinegate, swirling and spreading over the cobbles until it claimed all the dirt and the rubbish and bore it away.

  A quarter of an hour and it stopped as suddenly as it began. Water still rushed along the street, but as he opened the door and stood outside, the air felt cleansed, all the grime washed away from Leeds. The air was cooler and the wet town appeared to shine.

  An illusion, of course. A few minutes and it would pass. But for this one short moment he could enjoy it.

  Simon had barely settled at the table and opened the Mercury when he heard the knocking on the door.

  Mr Barton had been caught in the weather. His cape dripped water on the kitchen floor, clutching his hat between his hands. He opened his mouth, then closed it again, as if he wasn’t sure where to begin.

  ‘Give me your coat,’ Rosie told him. ‘You’re drenched.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said as he shrugged it off. The man looked dazed, Simon thought. He blinked and looked about him. ‘I suppose I am.’

  ‘We’re both so very sorry about your son,’ she continued. ‘Your wife …’

  He gave a grave nod and a sigh that seemed to fill the room. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Has something happened?’ Simon asked. It must be something important for him to trudge here through the downpour with the pain of the funeral overflowing in his heart.

  ‘It has …’ he began, then hesitated again, confusion flickering across his face. ‘That is, I think it has.’ He plucked at something on the sleeve of his coat. ‘There were only a few of us for the burial yesterday. That was my wife’s request. She wanted it to be small, very private.’ He left a long pause while he summoned the words. ‘Once it was done, I happened to turn toward the gate, where it opens on to the road.’