Read Online Dark Fire by C. J. Sansom - Free Book Online

through the departing crowd. Left alone in the hall, I sat down on a bench. Then I heard a rapid patter of footsteps from the court. The door was flung open and
Forbizer’s clerk, a round little man, ran up to me, his face red, robes billowing around him. ‘Brother Shardlake,’ he puffed. ‘Thank goodness. I thought you had
gone.’
    ‘What is it?’
    He handed me a paper. ‘Judge Forbizer has reconsidered, sir. He asked me to give you this.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘He has reconsidered. You are to have another two weeks to persuade Mistress Wentworth to plead.’
    I stared at him uncomprehendingly. No one could have looked less like reconsidering than Forbizer. There was something shifty, uneasy, in the clerk’s face. ‘A copy of this has gone
to Newgate already.’ He thrust the paper at me and vanished back into the courtroom.
    I looked at it. A brief order above Forbizer’s spiky signature, stating Elizabeth Wentworth was to be detained in the Newgate Hole for another twelve days, until the tenth of June, to
reconsider her plea. I sat staring around the hall, trying to work it out. It was an extraordinary thing for any judge to do, let alone Forbizer.
    There was a touch on my arm. I looked up to find the sharp-faced young man at my elbow. I frowned and he smiled again, a cynical smile that turned up one corner of his mouth, showing white even
teeth.
    ‘Master Shardlake,’ he said, ‘I see you have the order.’ His voice was as sharp as his face, with the burr of a London commoner.
    ‘What do you mean? Who are you?’
    He gave a small bow. ‘Jack Barak, sir, at your service. It was I persuaded Judge Forbizer to grant the order just now. You did not see me slip behind the bench?’
    ‘No. But – what is this?’
    His smile vanished and again I saw the hardness in his face. ‘I serve Lord Cromwell. It was in his name I persuaded the judge to give you more time. He didn’t want to, stiff-necked
old arsehole, but my master is not refused. You know that.’
    ‘Cromwell? Why?’
    ‘He would see you, sir. He is nearby, at the Rolls House. He asks me to take you there.’
    My heart began pounding with apprehension. ‘Why? What does he want? I haven’t seen him in close on three years.’
    ‘He has a commission for you, sir.’ Barak raised his eyebrows and stared at me insolently with those large brown eyes. ‘Two weeks’ more life for the girl is your fee,
paid in advance.’

Chapter Six
    B ARAK LED ME at a brisk pace to the courthouse stables. My heart still banged against my ribs and the skin on my face had a
tight, drawn feeling. I knew Lord Cromwell was not above bullying judges, but he always liked to observe the legal niceties and would not have done this lightly. And Barak was a strange person to
use to confront a judge. But though he had risen to be chief minister, Cromwell was the son of a Putney alehouse keeper and was happy to work with men of low birth so long as they were intelligent
and ruthless enough. But what in Christ’s name did Cromwell want from me? His last mission had plunged me into a hell of murder and violence I still shuddered to recall.
    Barak’s horse was a beautiful black mare, its coat shining with health. He cantered out while I was still saddling Chancery, pausing in the stable doorway to look back impatiently.
‘Ready?’ he asked. ‘His lordship wants to see you this morning, you know.’
    I studied him again as I climbed on the vaulting block and eased myself onto Chancery’s back. A hard eye and a fighter’s build, as I had observed before. A heavy sword at his hip and
a dagger too at his belt. But there was intelligence in his eyes and in the wide, sensual mouth, whose upturned corners seemed made for mockery.
    ‘Wait a moment,’ I said, seeing Joseph running across the yard to us, his plump face bright, clutching his cap in his hand. When he had returned from the jakes I told him Forbizer
had changed his mind: I said I did not know why. ‘Your