Much Ado About Murder by Simon Hawke

Author:Simon Hawke [Hawke, Simon]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Traditional British, Mystery & Detective, Fiction
ISBN: 9781429975285
Google: 6xilI-D42SIC
Amazon: B000HWYIE0
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2002-01-02T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

TUCK FOUND OUT WHAT HAD happened over breakfast downstairs in the tavern. Or at least, once he got past all the speculation, he found out as much as anybody knew, which was not a very great deal. When he came down in the morning, after sleeping fitfully through most of an entire day, everyone solicitously asked him how he felt. He replied with gratitude that he still hurt in at least a dozen places, yet in the main, he was very much improved. But despite their genuine concern about his welfare, it was nevertheless obvious that what had happened to him was no longer the primary topic of interest. Everyone seemed anxious to move on quickly past the question of how he felt in order to discuss the news of Master Leonardo's murder.

It did not take Smythe very long to piece together the details. From the general conversation in the tavern, he learned that sometime during the previous afternoon or evening, Master Leonardo, the wealthy Genoan merchant whom they had all met briefly only a day earlier, had been viciously murdered at his residence. His young and beautiful daughter, Hera, had not been at home, fortunately, but was away visiting her new friend, Elizabeth Darcie, who had taken the shy foreign girl under her wing and was helping her become acclimated to her new life in London. Regrettably, it had been Hera who had discovered her own father's body when she arrived back home that night.

"Dear God! The poor girl!" Smythe said. "How terrible for her!"

"Terrible is not the word," George Bryan replied. "Horrible would be more like. They say the man was sliced to ribbons. Slashed more deeply than a fop's silk shirt."

"Aye, there was blood everywhere," added Tom Pope, one of the newest members of their company, as he busily ladled porridge into his mouth.

"There is going to be porridge everywhere if you persist in trying to speak and gorge at the same time, you odiferous hog," said Kemp with contempt. "S'trewth, watching you eat is enough to put a starving beggar off his food. I know it puts me off mine."

"Well then, since I have put you off your food, 'tis only meet that I should put some food on you," retorted Pope, and with that, he flipped a generous ladleful of hot porridge right into Will Kemp's face.

"Aaarghh! You misbegotten Philistine!" roared Kemp, leaping to his feet as he wiped the porridge from his eyes. "How dare you!"

"Never say I gave you naught, Kemp," Pope replied with a grin, "for I daresay you have just had breakfast on me."

"Well then, allow me to return the kindness!" Kemp said through gritted teeth, and with that, he picked up his own bowl of steaming porridge and upended it over Pope's head.

"Gentlemen! Gentlemen! We were speaking of murder, for God's sake!" said Smythe.

"Aye, and that is just what I am going to do to that miserable, mincing old goat!" snarled Pope, wiping the dripping gobs of porridge from his face and shaking his hands off.

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