Dad Hears My Thoughts novel · Chapter 7 of 32

Chapter 7: The Lord Behind the Counter

"My father died in his own bed," I said. "With his name clean."

"And his purse empty," the guildmaster said. "Clean names are expensive, Mistress Hawtrey."

He put the yellow paste in his waistcoat pocket and patted it.

"Run along. You've won your little trial."

I walked out of that hall with my knees shaking and my chin up.

Tristram fell in beside me at the door.

"He made the copy," I said. "And he knows I saw."

Tristram's jaw went hard. "Then Ralph will know it by supper."

"She says he's grey," he said. "Grey like a wet hen."

"That's not even a color."

"She's ten months old. She does her best."

By noon my shop was full.

Not with work. With people who wanted to see the Duke's thief behind my counter.

I put him there on purpose.

"If they're going to stare," I said, "they can buy something while they do it."

I sat at my wheel recutting a chipped amethyst for the chandler's wife.

Tristram stood behind the counter in his black doublet with the baby in a sling made of my old apron.

He looked like a prince who'd been sold to a pawnshop.

A lady's maid came in first, in a duchess's livery, with a brooch whose pin was bent.

"How much to mend it?" she said, staring at him.

Tristram looked at the brooch. He had no idea.

"Two crowns," he said.

I nearly dropped my amethyst. It was a ha'penny job.

The maid paid two crowns without blinking and asked if she could come back tomorrow.

When she'd gone, I said, "Two crowns."

"Too little?"

"You've just paid my rent with one bent pin."

He looked very pleased with himself.

The baby, in the sling, looked very pleased too.

Next came a thin man in a good coat who wanted to sell a pearl ring.

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