The Fire Court: A gripping historical thriller from the bestselling author of The Ashes of London

Chelling paused to take more wine. His face was very red and running with moisture.

I said, ‘You know something that will do him—’

Chelling slammed the glass down on the table so forcefully that its shaft snapped.

‘A lapdog!’ he cried in his booming voice, so loudly that the taproom fell silent for a moment. ‘You must be sure to tell His Majesty when you see him. Gromwell is a damned, mewling, puking, whining, shitting lapdog!’ His face changed, and he looked at me with wide, panic-stricken eyes. ‘Oh God, I am so weary of it all.’

His body crumpled. He folded his arms on the table and rested his head on them. He closed his eyes.

For a small man, Mr Chelling was surprisingly heavy.

Once I had paid our bill, a waiter helped me manhandle Chelling down the stairs to the street door, a perilous descent because he twice made an attempt to escape, insisting that he had always stood on his own two feet and had no intention of changing his policy in that regard.

I had to bribe the servant a second time to help us across Fleet Street. With the lawyer dangling between us, sometimes kicking at our shins, we carried him safely past St Dunstan’s to the gate of Clifford’s Inn. At this point a porter came to our assistance.

‘Been at it again, has he?’ he said. ‘He’s got no head for it, sir. On account of his size, I reckon. Stands to reason: if you put a quart in a pint pot, it’s bound to overflow.’

‘I have the heart of a lion,’ Chelling mumbled. ‘That is what matters.’

‘Yes, sir.’ The porter winked at me. ‘I just hope the Principal don’t hear you roar.’

‘Take him to his chamber,’ I said.

The porter patted Chelling’s pockets until he found a bunch of keys. ‘Sooner he’s out of sight, the better.’

He left a boy to mind the gate. He and another of the Inn’s servants half-carried, half-dragged Chelling across the court, watched by a small but appreciative crowd of spectators outside the hall, where the Fire Court was still in session. I paid off the waiter and followed them.

Chelling lived in chambers on Staircase V, part of a range on the eastern side of the court that butted up against the north of St Dunstan’s churchyard. The building was one of the oldest parts of the Inn, dating back to its days as a private house, and the staircase was cramped and ill-lit. At each landing there were two doors, one on either side, just as there were in New Building, but there were few other resemblances. The air smelled of damp and decay, and the stone steps were uneven, worn by generations of feet.

As luck would have it, Chelling’s chambers were on the attic floor, which had been added to the building as an afterthought. The porter unlocked the door. They dragged him into a study with sloping ceilings and a sloping floor. It was sparsely furnished with a table, a chest, an elbow chair and a single stool. A dormer window looked east towards the ruins of the City. There was a broken pipe in the hearth and the study smelled of stale tobacco.

The porter dropped the keys on the table and glanced at me for guidance. ‘On the bed, master?’

I nodded.

The servant unlatched the inner door, and the pair of them manhandled Chelling into a chamber little larger than a cupboard. They dropped him on the unmade bed. His legs dangled over the side. One shoe fell with a clatter on to the floor. His round face was turned up to the ceiling, and his hair made a grey and ragged halo on the dirty pillow. His mouth was open. The lips were as pink and as delicate as a rosebud on a compost heap.

‘Friend of his, sir?’ the porter asked. ‘Ain’t seen you before, I think.’

‘Yes.’ I paused, and then, as the man was looking expectantly at me, added: ‘Mr Gromwell will vouch for me. My name’s Marwood.’

The porter nodded, giving the impression that he had done everything and more that duty required him to do. ‘Will that be all, then?’

I felt for my purse. ‘Thank you, yes.’

I gave the men sixpence apiece. I went back into the study and listened to their footsteps on the stairs. Snoring came from the bedroom, gradually building in volume. I glanced around the cramped chamber. It was very warm up here, directly under the roof. The windows were closed and the air was fetid. There were few books in sight. An unwashed mug and platter of pewter stood on the table.

Chelling had fallen on hard times. Perhaps Gromwell was not the only man at Clifford’s Inn who survived on the kindness of friends. Everywhere I looked, there seemed to be unanswered questions, large and small. After the efforts I had made, the time I had spent, the money I had paid, all I had to show was a cloud of uncertainties.

Suddenly I was angry, and anger drove me to act. I could at least make the most of my opportunities while I was here. There was a cupboard set into an alcove by the chimney breast. It was locked, but one of Chelling’s keys soon dealt with that. When I opened its door, the hinges squealed for want of grease.

The smell of old leather and musty paper greeted me. The cupboard was shelved. In the bottom section were rows of books in a variety of bindings. The upper section held clothing, much of it frayed and well-worn. On the very top shelf, a leather flask rested on a pile of loose papers an inch thick, with writing materials beside them.

I uncorked the flask and sniffed its contents. The tang of spirituous liquor rose up from it, with a hint of something else, perhaps juniper. So Chelling had a taste for Dutch gin as well as for wine. As for the papers, they were notes, by the look of them, and written in a surprisingly fine hand, the letters well formed and delicately inscribed. I glanced at the top sheets. They were written in Latin. Every other word seemed to be an abbreviation.

I leafed further down the pile and found a page that was written in English. It was an unfinished letter, though its contents made no more sense than the others.