Free Witch Finder by Unknown Page B

from beneath her cap. ‘Same as mine.’
    ‘Right.’ Luke turned to peer out of the narrow sooty window, across the smoke-stained chimney stacks of the stable mews.
    ‘What’s happened to your shoulder?’ Becky asked curiously from behind him. Luke glanced reflexively and then bit his lip. The dressing stood out clear beneath the wet material.
    ‘None of your business,’ he said curtly.
    ‘Well!’ Becky gave a little huff of annoyance. ‘Some’d say a civil question deserves a civil answer. Dinner’s in three-quarters of an hour. Don’t be late.’ And with that, she turned on her heel, her apron strings fluttering as she stalked down the stairs.
    Luke sighed and then sank on to the bed and put his head in his hands. He couldn’t afford to get off on the wrong foot with everyone. There was every chance he’d need the help of the other servants, albeit unknowingly, if he were going to do what needed to be done. And Becky would have been a good place to start. He wasn’t a fool; he’d seen the interest in her eyes as she took him in. And now he’d have to work twice as hard to bring her round.
    So this was Fred Welling’s domain. He looked around the little room, taking in the small windows, the low-beamed ceiling. He’d have to be careful not to bump his head going to bed. There was a stub of a candle on the saucer by the bed, so at least he was one candle in credit with Mrs Ramsbottom. A Bible on the washstand – it didn’t look like it had been read very much. A rag rug on the floor and a metal bedstead with a chipped chamberpot beneath. And that was it, except for a few pieces of rickety furniture that looked like cast-offs from the house. Not exactly the lap of luxury, but not bad. It was a room of his own, which was better than many servants had, and bigger than his room at home.
    Home. He thought of William and Minna and the sights and smells of Spitalfields and for a moment his heart ached and he wished he could put his head down on the flat limp pillow, close his eyes and rest . His whole body cried out for it.
    Then he clenched his jaw and stood, wiping the last of the rain off his face with his sleeve.
    He was here to do a job, and he’d do it, and get back home to where he belonged. That was all. And then – then – he’d tackle the Black Witch. Time enough for rest after that.
    He began to unpack his bag. It was heavier than it looked, certainly too heavy for the meagre clothes he took out first. It was the other stuff, what John Leadingham called the tools of the trade that had made the bag so heavy to carry across London, all shoved down beneath his clothes and covered in a piece of newspaper. The long knife. The iron gag. The garotte, the blindfold and the syringe. The bottle, wrapped tight in a dirty rag.
    ‘For God’s sakes, don’t breathe the fumes,’ Leadingham had said. ‘And don’t, whatever you do, break the bottle or the witch won’t be the only one in trouble.’
    Now Luke cast about for a hiding space. A loose board beneath the bed caught his eye, but when he prised it up the space was already occupied by a bottle and a stash of postcards. Luke pulled them out. The bottle was whisky, by the smell of it. And the postcards were photographs of women, everything from buxom matrons to slim young girls, all without a stitch on them. So . . . Fred Welling had had more than his Bible to pass the time up here of an evening. They’d be a good camouflage at least, if anyone did remove the board.
    He put his tools into the space beneath the floor, then fitted the bottle and the cards back into the opening, masking the bundle of newspaper behind them. Then he replaced the loose board and began to unbutton his wet shirt.
    The clock over the stable was striking quarter to as he hurried down into the yard, tucking his clean shirt in as he went. Fifteen minutes before dinner. He had just enough time to put his head round the stable door.
    He paused for a moment with his hand on the