The Gallows Murders

thrusting my hands between my cloak so my master would not see my fists curled in fury. 'And you, Roger?' I stepped back and his hand fell away.
    'She was comely enough,' I muttered. 'Master, should we not return to the Tower?'
    Benjamin, the innocent, unaware of the black storm raging in my heart, gazed back in the direction of Pelleter's house.
    'Do you realise. Roger,' he whispered, 'if this Sakker is involved, if he's hunting our under-sheriff, perhaps at this very moment, he is not far away'
    I didn't care. I had to hide my envy and resentment and said we should leave. It was a fine day so we decided to walk down Lombard Street and into Eastcheap, the most direct path back to the Tower. Benjamin chattered like a magpie, unaware of my seething passion. (I once told Will Shakespeare about this in a tavern on Bank Side. He'd asked me what was the most powerful emotion a man could feel? Lust? Anger? The desire for riches? I told him jealousy! I sat back against the tavern wall, the tears streaming down my face, and told him about Benjamin and Miranda, that golden couple who lived so long ago. Will heard me out in that quiet attentive way of his, his olive-skinned features betraying nothing. Then he nodded and murmured that he would remember what I had said. Go and see his play Othello, about the Moor of Venice, the wicked Iago and the lovely Desdemona. I never asked him who Iago was! Last Yuletide, I hired a troupe of actors and made them recite the lines whilst I sat and quietly cried about the lovely Miranda.)
    Anyway, on that day we returned, hot and dusty, to the Tower. We were almost through the Lion Gateway when a woman stepped out of the shadows and caught me by the arm.
    ‘Mistress Undershaft,' I exclaimed, though in truth I felt no pleasure: after seeing the marvellous Miranda it was like comparing candlelight to the sun.
    ‘Master Shallot,' she whispered, 'Master Daunbey. I have something to show you.' She gazed fearfully around. 'I have heard about Horehound's death.' She continued hurriedly. ‘I need to speak to you, repay you for your kindness.'
    She took us back out, across the drawbridge, and down near the river. I gazed around but, apart from fishermen sitting on the quayside mending their nets, and an old beggar man pushing a barrow laden with half-ripe apples, I could see no one to be wary of.
    ‘Let's stroll,' Benjamin suggested, 'as if we were taking the air and enjoying the afternoon sunlight.'
    Mistress Undershaft agreed, though she first pushed a square of parchment into Benjamin's hand. ‘I went amongst my husband's belongings, looking for something which might help you.'
    Benjamin opened the parchment. He studied it, then passed it to me. It was nothing much, a square about nine inches by nine, yellow and greasy, the ink marks poor and faded. A rough drawing of the Tower: underneath, a shape like the letter ‘I, with a cross where the two lines met. Next to this was a large question mark. ·What does it mean?' she asked Benjamin. ‘I don't know, Mistress.'
    'Neither do I.' I pushed the parchment into my pouch. ‘What makes you think it's so important?'
    ‘Oh, at first I didn't,' Mistress Undershaft replied. She kept gazing fearfully around, as if someone might be watching her. ‘I was going to throw it into the fire. After all, Andrew often made drawings of one of his carvings or some piece of furniture. However, I remembered the day after the King's party, Andrew was in the garden. He liked to sit there admiring the flowers. On that particular morning, he was poring over that piece of parchment, as if it held some great secret. When I asked him what it meant, he shook his head and mumbled it was best not to know. For the rest of that day he was withdrawn.' She stopped. 'Masters, that's all I can tell you.'
    And, before we could stop her, she slipped away along the quayside. Benjamin and I went and sat on a small, grassy bank overlooking the river. I pulled out the scrap of parchment and stared at it.
    There's a rough drawing of the Tower,' I declared, ‘but that holds no secret.' I pushed it closer so my master could see it. 'And there's the letter ‘T’, done in square fashion, the lines scored time and time again.'
    'And what do these mean?' Benjamin pointed to the stem of the "T, where small dashes marked the right-hand side.
    ‘I don't know,' I said. rYet it disturbed Undershaft and set him wondering. Perhaps he was the executioner who saw something untoward that