The Wicked Trade (The Forensic Genealogist Book 7) by Nathan Goodwin (types of ebook readers TXT) 📕

been incorrect in her identification of Jonas Blackwood, the man whose gaze she had met from the upstairs window had not appeared by the time the last of the men from upstairs had left the inn.

Crossing the street, Ann entered the inn, desperate for a pint of rum. In a morbid parallel to the execution, the bar was several deep with an influx of dry-throated people, whom the two perspiring barmaids were struggling to serve. Standing back, she searched the room in vain for Jonas Blackwood. He had clearly scarpered moments after she had spotted him.

Ann turned around and caught a glimpse of the gallows through the window and suddenly the idea of drinking here became an uncomfortable one. Taking one final glance around the room, she walked out of the door and onto the street. She knew the town and its multitude of inns and public houses intimately, yet she began to wander aimlessly, her desire for rum having abated.

To her surprise, she found herself avoiding the familiar backstreets of Dover; evading the tiny filthy houses rife with poverty, larceny and prostitution, which had been a part of her life for as long as she could recall. Something had changed which meant that she was viewing life here with an odd sense of detachment, but she didn’t know what had changed exactly. Standing outside St James’s Church, she found herself staring up at the old castle perched high on the hill, as she pondered the thought.

‘Soberness,’ she said, her lips hanging onto the word unduly, as she mused its significance and implications.

‘Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler; whoever is led astray by them is not wise,’ someone said from behind her.

Ann twirled around to see a pretty young lady in a handsome yellow silk dress and matching bonnet, holding open a door to the building behind her. ‘What be that?’

‘Proverbs twenty, verse one,’ the lady answered, stepping aside as a young girl entered the building saying, ‘Good morning, Miss.’ The lady looked at Ann with a fixed stare. ‘You mentioned sobriety.’

Ann studied the building a little more carefully. It was a fine three-storey place, painted white; the type lived in by wealthy merchants.

Another well-turned-out young girl went inside with a gentle bob of her head and saying, ‘Good morning, Miss Bowler.’

‘Do this be some kind of a church?’ Ann asked with a sneer. ‘There bain’t no bible verse what I ever be hearing what ain’t condemning me to the fires of hell.’

The woman laughed heartily and pointed at the small plaque beside the door.

Ann took a fleeting glance at the sign, then rolled her eyes with indifference.

‘It says Miss Bowler’s Academy,’ the lady said.

Ann shrugged and began to walk away.

‘I teach girls to read and write,’ she called after her, before adding, ‘and women!’

Stopping in her tracks, Ann turned her head back towards the lady, eyeing her with a detached inquisitiveness. ‘And what good do that be doing someone like me?’

The lady smiled. ‘Perhaps if you could read the bible, you would see that forgiveness commonly follows condemnation.’

Uncertainty prevented Ann from wandering off indifferently. Something curious about the lady and her fancy words made her stay a little longer.

‘Four shillings per lesson,’ the lady said. ‘For girls and ladies who need to learn to read and write.’

‘Don’t know what I be needing,’ Ann commented. ‘A pub, a church or an academy.’

The lady laughed, as another proper girl who could have been no older than thirteen entered the building.

Ann joined in the laughter, seeing the absurdity of herself with a lurid flash of clarity: a drunk criminal sitting in a classroom among the young daughters of the town’s bankers, solicitors, officials and surgeons. Without another word, she continued down the road towards the quay, all the while laughing.

The Strond Street clock tower had just struck midday. Three hours until the carriage departed.

Ann stood at the edge of the quay, watching life humming around her. Finally, she surrendered to herself and entered the Gun Inn, the air filled with the smells of the sea, as it bristled with mariners, sailors and fishermen.

Approaching the bar, she ordered two pints of rum and water and found herself a dim corner, where she could sit alone and release the distressing morning into a stupor. The first glass she drank quickly, spilling some down Hester’s dress in her haste to speed up intoxication and soften the edges of her feelings.

Having finished the second drink and ordered a third, Ann’s thoughts began to detach from themselves and trail off into a void before she had fully explored and understood them. Then another idea or worry would present itself, before following the same course into obscurity. The last thought—barbed with the hooks of regret—which she managed to maintain, before insensibility took full hold of her, was walking away from Miss Bowler’s Academy and entering this God-forsaken place.

Chapter Fourteen

Morton carefully entered the dark bedroom. In one hand he held the baby monitor and in the other a fresh cup of coffee, which he placed down on Juliette’s bedside table. Planting a kiss on her forehead, he threw open the curtains, sending a stretched rectangle of warm spring light across the bed.

‘Oh, God…’ Juliette slurred, withdrawing herself under the duvet.

‘Morning,’ he said with a forced attempt at breeziness. His short sleep had been intruded upon by an obscure fusion of the many jobs which needed doing this morning before everybody arrived, and utterly bizarre dreams, which even Freud would have had trouble decrypting. The final dream, which had been so shocking as to actually wake him up at the end, had been about this afternoon’s dinner. Everyone seated at the table had been drinking copious amounts of champagne and, one after the other, had stood up and given a speech. Through alcohol-laden tears, Juliette had