It was time, Abby told Jacob, to part company. “Let’s meet back at The Bull, in an hour or two.”

  Jacob was about to point out that neither of them owned a pocket watch, when Alice Wilkins appeared, running towards them, shouting something unintelligible.

  When she reached them, the stablemaid glowered as she held out a poppet for them to see. It was similar in design to the others and smelled also of lavender, except this one had wispy long hair made from dried grass and had red thread tied around its throat. A female doll, hanged by the neck.

  “What is this?” she demanded, shaking it angrily.

  “’Tis a poppet,” said Abby, having recovered her composure. “One was…”

  “I know what it is!” Alice exclaimed. “Who would dare send me such a thing?”

  “Where did you find it?” Abby asked.

  “It was on my doorstep. I discovered it when I awoke. Foul thing.” Angrily, she tossed it into a nearby hedge and stormed off, leaving the inquisitors staring agog at one another.

  “The murderer has a fresh victim in his sights,” said Jacob, scratching his temple.

  “Indeed. But why the stablemaid?”

  When her question was met with puzzled silence, she added, “We must work quickly to resolve the matter. Off to the gardener’s cottage with you, Jacob. Be quick.”

  She watched him stride down the path and try the cottage door. When it opened and he disappeared inside, she nodded to herself and set off in the opposite direction.

  Chapter twenty-seven

  The Cottage

  Jacob had expected the interior of the gardener’s cottage to smell musty and for its furnishings to be covered in a layer of dust, given that the previous occupant had passed away some time ago. Immediately he entered, he noticed that was not the case.

  Opening the shutters to allow more light in, he surveyed the scene. A single wooden bed was in the middle of the room, opposite a stone-cold fireplace. The pillows at the head of the bed were silk, and the covering was a throw of plush red velvet. Hardly the bedding of an aged gardener, Jacob thought to himself.

  The kitchen area at the far end looked spotless and unused. The whitewashed plaster walls were unadorned, except to the right of the bed, where hung a fine floral tapestry. Beside it was a scroll-legged table with a looking glass. The area to the left of the bed was plain and sparse, with only a wooden chest against the wall.

  What was this scene telling him? Think, Jacob, think, he told himself. You’re an inquisitor now. This is your realm.

  And it dawned on him: one side was occupied by a man, the other side by a woman. Rebecca’s shadowy figures! She was right - they were indeed a couple.

  There was a small, shallow drawer on the underside of the lady’s table, which he opened. Inside was a bottle of perfume, which looked to be full. When he opened it and sniffed, the scent was distinctive: bergamot and mint.

  Jacob moved around the bed to investigate the chest. Although it felt disappointingly empty as he lifted the lid, when he peered inside, he found a single, folded white silk handkerchief. Opening out the handkerchief, feeling the softness against his outstretched palm, he saw in one corner an embroidered initial: B.

  Bulstrode Bennett! It had to be, since the initial connected the handkerchief to the perfume, which he knew was the magistrate’s favourite. So Bennett was engaged here in an illicit affair? He could imagine as much of the arrogant fellow.

  But, he wondered, with whom?

  Two women they knew of in the village wore the bergamot-and-mint perfume. One was Helen Bennett - who was married to Bulstrode, albeit unhappily - the other was… Alice Wilkins.

  Wilkins and Bennett? he thought. Could it be? It might explain her silver chain and silk handkerchief, which had to have been gifts, since a stablemaid could never afford such luxuries.

  There was only one way to find out: confront the woman. He hardly needed Abby Harcourt’s assistance for that! He would investigate the matter himself and solve the case single-handed, as he had secretly dreamed of doing. Of course, he would give ample plaudits to his fellow inquisitor, who had chipped in here or there.

  Sadly for Jacob, his idyllic daydream was shattered when he neared the Ravenscourt Manor stable block and spotted a female figure on horseback, ahead in the distance, riding at speed in the direction of Huntingdon. The rider, he could just make out, was Alice Wilkins.

  Chapter twenty-eight

  To Battle

  Jacob found Abby already seated in The Bull, and she leapt up when she saw him.

  “What did you discover?” she asked eagerly. “Pray, be seated. Tell me everything, Jacob, and be quick. We have urgent business elsewhere.”

  Barty Nettlewood poured a half-pint of beer for Jacob, and laid bread and cheese before them. When he went to replenish Abby’s tankard, she held a hand over it, shaking her head. To Jacob’s horror, she also sent the food back.

  “Sup quickly, Jacob,” she told him.

  There was still no sign of Rusty the dog.

  When Jacob laid out his findings and conclusion - Bulstrode Bennett and the stablemaid engaged in an illicit affair, citing her silver and silk - she was neither as enthused nor impressed as he had anticipated.

  “We should be wary of leaping to conclusions,” she told him.

  “But… The embroidered letter B?”

  “Could be the physician, Bramwell,” she told him, then motioned towards the innkeeper. “Or Barty Nettlewood. What if our couple is not Bulstrode and Alice, but Bramwell and Helen? Or Barty and Alice? Or Barty and…”

  Jacob held his hand up for her to stop, and bowed his head.

  Abby placed her hand on the back of his. “Nay, you are right, Jacob. The most likely suspect is indeed the magistrate, who was at such pains to thwart our investigation. If that’s the case then we must ask ourselves: how does this affair connect with the Brampton witch murders? Come!”

  She was up and out of the door before he could protest. Downing the remainder of his beer in one, he waved to Barty and followed.

  The innkeeper just managed to call out, “You haven’t paid for…,” as the door swung shut.

  For once, Jacob had trouble keeping up with Abby, who was running faster than he had ever seen, past the church towards the T-junction at the end of the road. “Where are we heading?” he called out, but received no reply.

  He caught up with her as she stopped at the path to the Bennetts’s front door, gathering breath.

  “Why… are we here?” Jacob asked, also gasping after the exertion.

  Abby banged on the door. “Simon Hopkins is here as a guest of the magistrate.”

  The servant, Benjamin, answered. Before he could utter a word, Bulstrode Bennett appeared and shooed him away. His attire was no less garish than before - the requisite ribbons and pearls hung there - however today the colour scheme was crimson with silver detailing.

  The gaunt man regarded the inquisitors with disgust. “When will you return to London?” he snapped. “You have had warning enough.”

  With Jacob hovered menacingly behind her, Abby refused to be intimidated. “We seek an audience with Mr Hopkins,” she told the magistrate firmly.

  “I fear you have been misinformed. Mr Hopkins is not here,” Bennett replied. “He is interrogating the witches in the village hall.”

  Jacob blurted out, “But today is the Sabbath!”

  Bennett smiled smugly. “The witch-finder has made peace with his God. I suggest you take issue with he, not I.”

  The door slammed shut.

  “He labours on a Sunday!” exclaimed Jacob.

  Abby bit her lip. “He’s outfoxed us, Jacob. We haven’t a moment to lose.”

  They had passed the village hall only minutes ago and could see it set among trees from where they stood, harboured in shadows.

  “How dare thee question my faith!” the witch-finder thundered, when Jacob questioned his work on the Sabbath. “My quest is the Lord’s quest: to root out evil wherever it doth fester. Thus do I honour him even on this sacred day.”

  Hopkins was becoming desperate, which only made him more dangerous.

  Paulina and Rebecca were seated exactly as they had been before, yet appeared still more forlorn, frightened and defeated. Pepys’s sister did not even look up when they entered the hall; Rebecca managed the briefest of pitiful glances. It was apparent that neither woman had slept.

  They had been joined by two other women, both strangers to the inquisitors. These women were not being interrogated, that was obvious; they were too fresh-faced, and their clothing looked relatively fresh. One was in her late-teens, the other in her mid-thirties. The younger woman stared at the ground. Both wore peasant garb of linen dress with apron, and white cotton cap.

  Hopkins spoke. “Are you acquainted with Dorothy and Eleanor Brooks?”

  When Abby and Jacob shook their heads, he continued, “Mother and daughter. They are…”

  The younger of the two shot Abby a guilty look.

  “They are your watchers, Mr Hopkins,” Abby interjected. “Your work here is tantamount to torture, sir.”

  The witch-finder laid a gloved hand on Paulina’s shoulder, and she winced.

  “My work here is the Lord’s work, Abigail,” he retorted calmly. “You shall find nought untoward. Magistrate Bennett will support me in this.”

  It was time for Abby to play her hand.

  Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a folded sheet of parchment and held it out for Hopkins to take. He stood still, suspicious, stroking his beard.

  “Take it, Mr Hopkins,” she said. “It’s a Declaration, signed by Lord Fairfax’s physician, Archibald Bramwell.”

  Eyeing her warily, the witch-finder took the parchment and unfolded it.

  “It states that John and Margaret Pepys were not the victims of a witch’s curse…,” Abby began.

  Rebecca managed to raise her head, her sleep-deprived eyes intent upon Abby.

  “…but that they were the unwitting victims of poisoning by lead.”

  Hopkins bellowed with mocking laughter. Abby simply talked over him, explaining the deductions of the letter aloud.

  The key, she said, was Jacob’s illness. His symptoms - cold hands, cough, shortness of breath, among others - were the same as John and Margaret Pepys’s. It had made Abby wonder: What do they and Jacob share in common? Did they eat the same food, or inhabit the same foul space?

  Then it had struck her: they wore the same yellow undergarments, made by the same clothier, using the same dye. “What if that dye contained a harmful substance?” Abby asked, “which might cause illness, unbeknown to the woman who concocted it: Rebecca Thacker?”

  Hopkins’s laughter ceased. Abby now had everybody’s full attention.

  “That yellow pigment, I purchase from an apothecary in Cambridge,” Rebecca told her. “Then mix it with others of my own devising. It is no poison.”

  “You can’t be certain of that,” Abby replied. “Neither could I, knowing nought of the composition of dyes. Then I remembered the book we had been given, on our journey here.”

  Jacob slapped his thigh. “The book on dyes by Humphrey Worthington!”

  Hopkins snorted dismissively.

  “The book on dyes by Humphrey Worthington,” Abby repeated, beginning to relish her role of inquisitor. “Of Dyes and Dyeing: A Detailed Compendium of the Art and Science of Colouring Fabrics, and so on, to relate but part of its title.”

  Worthington’s text gave credence to her theory, she explained. However, she knew she would need a physician - ideally one who experimented with poisons - to confirm it. Thus, with Jacob employed elsewhere, she had visited Archibald Bramwell.

  Abby explained that she had taken the specific yellow dye to him, having found a jar of it at Rebecca’s cottage the night before. Bramwell tested it and confirmed that it contained lead, which he explained could poison a man given sustained contact. Since the Pepys’s were known to wear their yellow undergarments as a matter of routine, and since Jacob had even slept in his shirt, while it clung tightly to his skin, the physician confirmed Abby’s theory.

  “Indeed,” she concluded, pointing at the letter in the witch-finder’s hand, “he signed his name to it.”

  Hopkins glared down at the physician’s Declaration, his brow tightly furrowed, quietly simmering. Rebecca keenly studied his expression; Paulina still had not moved.

  “What of the curse on Grimston’s crops?” Hopkins said at last. “Or the death of Grimston himself? Thou doth not disprove sorcery at work in these instances.”

  Jacob spoke up, aware that the situation called for his authority. “Abigail Harcourt has cast doubt upon your case against the clothier, Rebecca Thacker. Lord Fairfax’s physician himself states that John and Margaret Pepys were poisoned by lead, not laid low by witchcraft as you assert. It would not reflect well in any trial of the woman.”

  Hopkins smirked. “Doest thou forget Bulstrode Bennett, Mr Standish?”

  “Do you forget the Senior Magistrate, Sir Edward Mallory, Mr Hopkins?” he retorted.

  Bulstrode had warned Hopkins about Mallory. The Senior Magistrate preferred a quiet life free from controversy, he told him, and would leave them alone provided Hopkins’s investigation ran smoothly. Hopkins knew he dare not trigger Mallory’s involvement.

  The witch-finder slammed his staff into the floor in anger. “Very well!” he roared. “I shall free the clothier…”

  Rebecca gasped, buried her head in her hands, and began to weep uncontrollably. Even Paulina managed to twist her head towards her friend, though she did not have the energy to muster a smile.

  But Hopkins had not finished. “…However, the witch Pepys doth remain here. For tonight she shall summon her imps.”

  Chapter twenty-nine

  A Few Ales

  The inquisitors were back in The Bull. They found themselves increasingly embracing its gentle homeliness - so far removed from the ruckus and ribaldry of a London inn - and had become fond of the eccentric innkeeper and his wife. The food was good, too. They had both noticed how ready access to such fresh rural produce offered noticeable improvements in flavour.

  It being a Sunday, the inn’s door was customarily closed. Since they were guests, and the innkeeper was no slave to piety, they had been served ale with their supper. When Jacob called for more, Barty Nettlewood locked the front door and obliged him.

  It had been an encouraging day. One of the so-called Brampton witches was free. Heady and affirming as that was, neither Abby nor Jacob could avoid the sneaking suspicion that they had freed the wrong woman first. Samuel Pepys had engaged them to save his sister.

  If Simon Hopkins saw his prospects of a successful witch-hunt fading, he would become more reckless and so more ruthless in his pursuit - with solely Paulina in his sights. The unfortunate woman already looked beaten and spent.

  “We have the mark of Simon Hopkins,” Jacob assured Abby. He was in a celebratory mood.

  Abby remained circumspect. “We shouldn’t underestimate him, Jacob. Now that Rebecca has escaped his clutches, he’ll act like a baited bear. ’Tis a grave concern.”

  “Then we must clear Paulina’s name!” Jacob declared.

  “That’s what we have endeavoured to do since we arrived in Brampton,” she pointed out. “And I wonder, are we any closer to doing so?”

  Jacob pushed his grinning face towards hers. “Your performance today! You held Hopkins like a spider and crushed him!” he exclaimed, crushing an imaginary insect in his big fist.

  She backed away from his beery breath. “That is precisely my concern, Jacob. He will not take kindly to being beaten.”

  “But Abby, you are an inquisitor! Mr Samuel Pepys’s inquisitor! Soon we shall be esteemed throughout the land!”

  “No, Mr Standish. I’m a maidservant. Master Pepys’s maidservant. And that is all I shall ever be.”

  Confused, he changed tack. “Then how do we prove that Bennett is the murderer?”

  “You assume that he is.”

  “For certain, he is!”

  Jacob detailed the magistrate’s suspicious behaviour: having them jailed to stop their investigation; his likely affair with Alice Wilkins; his curious disinterest in what turned out to be Goody Grimston’s death throes…

  Abby found herself joining in. “That he was present on the night of Goody’s death makes him a primary suspect. Then there’s the deadly nightshade you saw growing beside his stable…”

  Lost in the heady haze of Barty’s ale, she was becoming convinced herself.

  Chapter thirty

  The Morning After

  Abby heard rain beating on the window shutters when she became conscious the next morning. Her head was pounding, too. Curse that wicked ale, she thought to herself, and was surprised to hear Jacob already up and about. (“Woken by an infernal cockerel!” he told her, to her mild amusement.)

  They skipped breakfast - although both craved sustenance - and headed immediately for the village hall, wordless in their urgency. The rain was heavy, the skies were ominous, and the livestock was huddled together in the fields.

  Disconcertingly, they noticed the hall door was wide open as they approached. Inside, they found the witch-finder conferring with his watchers, Dorothy and Eleanor Brooks. Both women had dark bags under their eyes and looked fit to collapse.

  A white cat - the Pepys’s cat, Sugar - lay curled up on a windowsill at the far end of the hall, scornfully regarding the proceedings through slitted eyes.

  Simon Hopkins threw his arms wide when he saw Jacob and Abby. “Mr Samuel Pepys’s esteemed inquisitors!” he hailed, his voice laden with sarcasm. “Thine master hath but lately departed.”