Margaret Frazer, The Sempster's Tale

[ellarien]

Dame Frevisse is sent to London on a secret mission to retrieve a large sum in gold for her newly-widowed cousin the Countess of Suffolk -- not something with which she is very comfortable, but in the end the gold turns out to be the least of her problems. The gold has been smuggled in by a Jewish merchant who can't legally be in the country at all, and who is having an affair with sempster of the title, a widowed and independent businesswoman; that isn't too much of a problem until he runs afoul of a fanatical friar. In the meantime, the Cade rebellion puts the streets off-limits, trapping Frevisse for days in a household where a young stepson has recently been murdered, and where the merchant -- a friend of the family -- is being held by the friar in a downstairs room, while a heavily pregnant woman is stuck upstairs. Solving the mystery doesn't really solve the dilemmas she faces, and there are no happy endings.