The Opening Night Murder by Anne Rutherford Page A

tart.”
    “While you were pregnant?”
    “There’s a market for everything, Daniel. Surely you understand that. I had my clientele.” He said nothing in reply, and she continued. “After Piers was born, I worked for Maddie near the tannery and he stayed with me.” She nodded in the direction of where Maddie’s house had stood on the Bank Side before it was torn down. Daniel nodded, and she realized he’d probably known Maddie and her girls as well as any other man did with money to pay for whores. And many without money as well.
    “Did she treat you well?”
    She took a sip of her ale and considered her reply. It had been years since she’d let herself remember her time in the brothel, and she’d never thought much about Maddie herself, even back then. It had always been the clientele she’d hated, and the knowledge the men she’d serviced thought her no better than an animal. Again, she didn’t want to whine about her fate to Daniel, so she told him, “As well as could be expected. We didn’t starve. Piers grew up with a dozen aunties who all cared for him, and there were other children for company. But we had to find a way out of that place so he wouldn’t grow up to be a cutpurse. Or worse.”
    “I’m sorry. I wish I could have helped.”
    She shrugged, irritated to hear lip service, and so long after the fact. “Well, if wishes were horses, then beggars would ride, wouldn’t they?”
    “Seriously—”
    “A letter now and again would have been help enough.” The anger blossomed in her breast, and though she struggled to swallow it she only choked on it as if it were a too-large bit of bread she’d bitten off by mistake. She coughed to clear it, and continued. “It would have helped for Piers to believe his father had some regard for him.” It would have helped her own peace of mind to believe he loved her and she hadn’t been a complete fool when she’d thrown her life away on him. Her cheeks warmed, and she sat back in her chair with her arms crossed over her chest to calm down.
    Daniel lowered his head just enough to appear chastised. He knew he was wrong, and she knew this was as close to an apology as she would ever get. He said, “You let him hate me.”
    “He has the same regard for you as you did for him. I had no reason to change his mind, particularly when the truth was so very undeniable. You deserve that he hates you.”
    Daniel picked at a chip in his cup and there was silence. Finally Suzanne’s anger abated and she sat forward again, picked up her drink, and said, “In reply to your question, I joined a theatre troupe for a while, just for the sake of getting Piers away from the criminal element at Maddie’s.”
    Daniel’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “Out of the frying pan, I’d say.”
    “The actors weren’t so very bad. We’d set up a performance in a street or alley, run the play for a penny a head, then tear down and move on the instant it was done. Another alleyway, another performance, and we rarely had to go far from London. Unlike with Maddie’s patrons, there were few fights among the actors and almost never any blood. They stole from the audience, but nobody boasted about it much. The fellow who ran things became something of a father to Piers, or uncle, as he was to allof us. He called me ‘niece,’ and I rather liked him. He taught Piers some things about business. Kept us all safe. The troupe became like a home, and more hospitable toward us women now that we’re sometimes accepted on the stage without a terrible amount of fuss.”
    Daniel sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “I wasn’t aware Cromwell allowed actors at all, never mind female ones.”
    Suzanne made a face and waved away the thought as if it were a bad smell. “Of course he didn’t. We were ever on the run, just like any criminal, and that made for some very exciting times.”
    S UZANNE ’ S son was nine years old when she joined the troupe that moved in and