“Sir!” someone shouted. “We’ve found a trapdoor!”
“Ha!” ejaculated Skelton. “Now we shall see.”
“See all you like,” Silas told Skelton’s back as he strode away. “I’ve naught to hide.”
“Naught to hide,” George echoed, voice quavering a little.
Frey hadn’t moved. He stood, staring at Silas, and Silas couldn’t but look back.
Frey looked bad. Those familiar lines of tension around his eyes that Silas had liked to see relax after— And there were dark rings under them. Silas was glad to see the sod hadn’t slept, bloody annoyed to think his own face would betray him as much. Frey was shaved clean, which was a lot more than Silas could say, his own chin with four days’ pepper-and-salt bristles. He’d always shaved for the Tory, every Wednesday morning. Well, no more. Frey would have to face him as he was.
Slamming. Creaking. Footsteps on the stairs.
Frey’s dark eyes were fixed on him. “You don’t seem worried about them finding anything, Mason.”
“I said I’ve naught to hide.” His voice was a rasp. “And when I said to piss off out of my shop, I meant you too.”
“Silas,” George whimpered. “Don’t.”
Don’t argue. Don’t speak up. Don’t provoke the important, rich man with your livelihood in his hands and your freedom at his whim. Bugger that.
“I’m no murderer.” He pitched it loud, to the men he could hear coming up again from the cellar. “I’m no murderer, Harry’s no radical, my cellar is no more than a hole in the ground, and you pox-addled whores’ get are wasting my time. You prove your case or get out.”
“Mason!” Skelton came back to the counter, his face tight with repressed feeling. Disappointment, Silas would wager, and anger too. “There are ink stains on the walls of your cellar! Paper dust in the air!”
“That a crime now?”
“Where is your press?” bellowed Skelton, right in his face, spittle flying. “Where do you print your seditious libels?”
“Where’s your mother, you whining hound? Piss off.”
Skelton raised a fist. Frey, behind him, caught it in his own hand, with an audible slap. Skelton looked around furiously; Frey gave a shake of his head. “When we have proof, Mr. Skelton. Until then, this is, in law, an innocent tradesman.”
“Until then,” Skelton echoed. He brought his hand down, not quite wrenching it from the Tory’s grip. “I tell you this, Mason: We will find proof. We know your past. You’re a felon. A habitual gaolbird. A revolutionary. I know you set the Vane fire. You will hang.” He lifted a finger. “Unless you turn king’s evidence. That’s your only chance, and it won’t last long. If you admit the truth, it will go easier on you.”
“King’s evidence, eh?” Silas said. “And there’s me thinking the king you serve is too mad to know what day of the week it is.”
“It’s Wednesday,” Frey said over Skelton’s splutter. Voice strong and clear, eyes on Silas. “It is Wednesday, and I for one have appointments. This is not a fruitful use of my time or yours, Mr. Skelton. I suggest we leave.”
Skelton’s mouth was drawn tight as a cat’s arse against that, but Frey was clearly the senior. He gave a tight nod. “We will be back, Mason. We know about you. Think on it.”
—
Dominic walked up the anonymous side street to Millay’s feeling as though he might be sick.
This was a mistake, a terrible, stupid one. At best, Silas would not be there. Why would he come, after all?
For revenge, perhaps. He’d have every reason. The soldiers had smashed though the shop, and even disregarding that it was the man’s livelihood, Dominic knew how the brute loved books, with a passion that left him silent and incapable of more than turning a precious volume in his hands with reverent care. He wouldn’t be any happier about that careless damage than about the prospect of being gaoled for seditious libel.
Dominic took the little alleyway, nodded to the gatekeeper. The discreet, anonymous door swung open as soon as he raised his fist to knock.
“Welcome, sir.” Mistress Zoë approached in a rustle of skirts as he entered. Millay’s had three madams, of whom he much preferred Zoë, a handsome black woman. She was never bawdy, never jested, never gave a hint of the purpose of the house or his visit. Her grave professional deportment reminded him irresistibly of Shakespeare, the majordomo at Quex’s.
Now he thought of it, the majordomo and Zoë had very similar skin, an unusually deep, near-ebony tone. “Do you know Shakespeare?” he found himself asking.