Free The Thief Taker by C.S. Quinn

series of dizzyingly expert turns and feints along the maze of backstreets.
    The chair pulled up at a bear-baiting pit and Charlie ducked gratefully out and into the jostling pack of men shouting their bets.
    Moments later the chair carrier slid in next to him.
    His working clothes could not disguise that he lacked the scabbed legs and wasted arms of other sedan hustlers.
    Marc-Anthony, known to his friends as Marcus, ran an ingenious trade smuggling goods through London in sedan-chairs, which unlike larger wagons were never searched. His shining brown curls, glowing skin and sturdy limbs attested to his earning many hundred times more than most chair carriers.
    ‘Trouble Charlie?’
    Charlie nodded, keeping his eyes on the ragged-looking bear chained to a wooden post. The keepers were bringing the dogs into the scruffy dirt arena and they began to snarl at the chained bear. A couple of shouts went up from the excited crowd.
    ‘Did the guards find you with the forgeries?’
    Charlie had forgotten he had been selling Marc-Anthony’s forged Health Certificates less than an hour ago.
    Ordinarily the smuggler brought in tobacco, wine, lace and silk to avoid paying duty at Tower Bridge. But ever the entrepreneur he had deftly shifted his business to black-market Health Certificates as demand soared.
    Charlie shook his head. ‘It is nothing to do with the certificates. I am wanted Marcus, for some murder I know nothing of.’
    Marc-Anthony’s amber eyes widened. ‘You are wanted for murder ?’
    Charlie nodded quickly, outlining the morning’s events.
    Marc-Anthony gave an obliging whistle.
    ‘You of all people,’ he said after a moment. ‘You do not even believe in witchcraft.’
    ‘The Newgate guards know my face,’ continued Charlie, acknowledging Marc-Anthony’s observation with a wry smile. ‘And the girl has money. She’s probably paid every grubbing vigilante in the City to chase me down.’
    ‘Any bets! Any bets! Any bets!’
    The pit-keeper held out his hand for their penny bet to stay and watch the action.
    Charlie raised his hand and gave over two pennies. ‘For the bear,’ he said.
    Marc-Anthony raised an eyebrow. ‘I do not want to draw attention to myself by winning,’ explained Charlie.
    The bookie palmed the money with practised ease and raised a hand, signifying to the keepers that the dogs could be released.
    ‘So what will you do now?’ asked Marc-Anthony, raising his voice against the shouts of the crowd. ‘You cannot go any further east. The plague is bad here, but deeper in is horror. The streets are deserted, and the only sounds are the shrieks and the moans of the dying. I mean to sail up the river as soon as I get a chance,’ he added. ‘I mean to wait out the plague on my tall-ship anchored on the Thames.’
    Marc-Anthony seemed so urban in nature that Charlie frequently forgot he had a cottage in the little hamlet of Greenwich. He commuted once a week into the City by rowboat through the marshlands at Deptford Creek.
    Charlie shook his head. ‘I have to clear my name Marcus. I have no wish to be jumping at my shadow for the rest of my days, fearing being gutted at Tyburn.’
    A low growling started up. Four dogs had been released from their chains and were circling the bear, teeth bared.
    ‘Is it possible, to prove your innocence?’
    Charlie nodded. ‘Yes. If I find the murderer. To do that I must find out the blacksmith. A brand marked the corpse. Only a skilled blacksmith might have made it. When I find that man I think I might readily find facts which will lead me to the killer.’
    Marc-Anthony was shaking his head. ‘You cannot get to the blacksmiths Charlie. Have you not heard? They have all left town.’
    Charlie’s heart sank. ‘Every one of the blacksmiths has left?’
    ‘All Thames Street has been sealed off,’ said Marc-Anthony. ‘Plague has made it a ghetto. None are allowed in or out, and the blacksmiths are long gone.’
    Charlie frowned, unwilling to give