Bartholomew Fair

by Ann Swinfen

  Arthur looked blank. ‘What can I buy?’

  ‘He has everything in that stall. Why not a rattle for the new baby when it’s born?’

  His face cleared. ‘A good plan. My wife will be pleased. She was not pleased that I was coming here with you and not with her.’

  ‘It is much too hot and crowded for a woman near her time!’

  ‘That is what I told her.’ He grinned. ‘That did not make her any less annoyed! By the way, did you see on their billboard, there is another performance at eight o’ the clock tonight?’

  ‘I saw,’ I said gloomily. ‘I hoped we need not stay. Well, I shall start looking for Poley. We might as well work the Fair separately. Shall we meet at the inn when St Bartholomew’s strikes six? That gives us plenty of time to look for Poley, and time enough to eat before the second performance.’

  He nodded his agreement and we separated.

  For the best part of two and a half hours I worked my way back and forth across the fair ground, finishing at the Master Chawtry’s inn just as the church clock sounded out six o’ the clock.

  But I saw no sign of Robert Poley.

  Chapter Ten

  Once again, we made a good meal at Master Chawtry’s inn, though both Arthur and I were downcast at having made so little progress in our hunt for Poley. The inn felt different as night drew in. Flaming torches had been set up in stands all round the periphery, and every table held a branched candlestick. Their light made the surrounding darkness seem all the darker. A small wind had arisen, casting fluttering shadows from the leafy boughs, so that from the corner of my eye I thought I saw furtive movement. The underlit faces of the diners, the occasional burst of raucous laughter, gave the whole place the air of another stage, another playhouse, in which I was not sure what role I was supposed to fill.

  ‘A fruitless search, eh, Kit?’ Arthur dipped his fingers in the bowl of water in which a few sprigs of lavender floated, then dried them on the napkin over his shoulder.

  ‘It seems so.’ I was very tired, for I had slept badly the night before, worrying about the motives of the puppeteers, and now I seemed to have been wandering around the Fair for days, to no purpose.

  ‘I could see nothing wrong with that toy man,’ he said. ‘He was courteous enough and seemed harmless. A gaggle of mothers with children came up behind me, so his attention was called away from me.’

  I nodded. ‘Probably he is telling the simple truth, that he was asked at the last minute to provide music. All the same.’ I paused, rolling bits of bread into pellets and eating them, one by one. ‘Just for that brief moment when I saw him with Poley, I got the impression they knew one another. Perhaps I was mistaken.’

  ‘I do not think you were mistaken about the puppet masters,’ he said, ‘whether or not Poley and Borecroft have anything to do with it. There is certainly something afoot there. And I think you are also right, that some of the soldiers are also involved.’

  It was reassuring that Arthur had gained the same impression as I, and I was glad he had accompanied me, for he could back up my report to Phelippes.

  ‘Quite what is afoot, though,’ I said, ‘is the problem. No constable or pursuivant could arrest the Italians merely on such weak evidence as our impression of what their performance seemed to signify.’

  ‘Oh, I think they might. The performance was scurrilous and the puppets themselves, especially the one of the Queen, must be near treasonable.’

  ‘But what would be the point of arresting them, if we do not know what they intend?’

  ‘No doubt some would say that Topcliffe would soon get it out of them, in the dungeons of the Tower.’ He shuddered.

  ‘No doubt. But how does it relate to the soldiers? Are they meaning to start an uprising, the two groups working together? If so, why did the soldiers stand quietly under discipline at the entrance to Smithfield and send four of their leaders to negotiate with the Lord Mayor and Common Council?’

  ‘You said it yourself to Phelippes. Most of the men are peaceable by nature. All they are pursuing is compensation for their suffering and lost incomes. But some, either in the army group or outside it, are pursuing other aims.’

  ‘I wish I could make sense of it,’ I said, thumping my fist against my forehead in annoyance at myself. ‘Come, it is nearly time for the next performance, and we have to walk almost the whole way across Smithfield.’

  ‘It will soon be over, Kit,’ he said, ‘then we can take a wherry home to our beds.’

  Or rather, back to Seething Lane, I thought, before ever we see our beds.

  As we came out of the circle of light which marked the inn, the darkness seemed to hit our faces like a bag over the head. We paused at the top of the first alley of stalls, waiting for our eyes to adjust. The whole Fair seemed to have changed in character. The families had all gone home and the forms looming out of the dark and disappearing again were mostly groups of rowdy young men. Many of the stalls were still doing business and had a candle or two burning in order to light up the goods for sale. These intermittent pools of light left great stretches of blackness between them, which could easily conceal an attacker. The increasing wind stirred the canvas sides of tents and the awnings over stalls, so that there was a constant sense of stealthy sound and movement – movement which might hide the sudden thrust of a sword or dagger coming out of the dark.

  Arthur and I hurried along, both conscious of this change in the atmosphere of the Fair. As we neared the puppet tent, I noticed that several of the nearby stalls were being closed up, though faint slivers of light showed around the doors and shutters, where the owners were preparing to spend the night watching over their goods. I shivered. I was glad I did not have to spend the night alone in a flimsy stall in Smithfield. The very air seemed filled with the remembrance of the dying cries of beasts slaughtered in the nearby Shambles, while the place itself, so gaudy and merry by day, was now haunted by the ghosts of those who had gone to the fire on this very soil for their faith, both Catholics and reformers.

  We reached the platform, which was empty, except for a drunkard snoring under the edge of it. At the nearest corner of the lane leading down to the Fair entrance at Pie Corner, the gingerbread stall was closed and dark. If someone was spending the night there, they were already abed, but it had an air of emptiness about it. The women would have little there which was worth stealing, just their gold leaf and their moulds, and those could easily be carried home for the night. Unsurprisingly, the toy stall was also closed and dark. Few of the present fairgoers, a looming mass of young men, would be buying toys. Besides, Nicholas Borecroft would probably be playing again for the puppets.

  A crowd of half a dozen roisterers, much the worse for drink, lurched toward us out of the lane of shops. My hand went to my sword hilt, but Arthur caught me by the arm and pulled me firmly back into the shadow of the platform.

  ‘Best just keep out of sight,’ he murmured in my ear, so softly I could barely hear the words.

  I nodded, though he could hardly hope to see me in the dark.

  Across the wrestling ground from the platform, a group was gathering outside the puppet tent, where candle lanterns had been mounted on tall posts on either side of the entrance. They lit up a crowd of different composition from the earlier ones. As I had expected, there were no families. There was a high proportion of rough-looking men, and – curiously – several finely dressed gentlemen, of a higher rank than anyone I had seen here before.

  The flap of canvas over the entrance was pulled aside and tied back, the flamboyantly dressed woman appeared again, with her handful of cheap playbills. She seemed to be looking all about and studying the crowd waiting outside. Then she gave a nod. If she said anything, we were just too far away to hear. Then the men began to file inside, without paying.

  Arthur and I looked at each other.

  ‘I think,’ he said carefully, ‘that we were better not to go in there again.’

  ‘I agree.’ I could not keep the relief out of m
y voice. ‘Though it is strange they should advertise a performance if it was meant only for their friends.’

  ‘Perhaps it was a signal to their friends, when to meet.’

  ‘Aye. And if anyone else turned up – like us – they would have been told that all the tickets were sold, or some other deceit. Listen, there is no music.’

  We both strained our ears. All we could hear was a murmur of voices, too faint to make out distinctly. I wondered whether Nicholas Borecroft was there, or asleep in his stall. And what of Poley? He seemed to have vanished.

  ‘Shall we catch a wherry back to the city?’ Arthur asked hopefully.

  I wanted very much to agree, but reluctantly shook my head.

  ‘I think we should wait and see whether anything further happens,’ I said. ‘I don’t suppose it will take as long as the performance would have done. If we stay here by the edge of the platform, we won’t be noticed.’

  We made ourselves as easy as we could, sitting on the lumpy ground beside the platform. It was dry but very stony, and did not make for comfortable sitting. The remaining shopmen at this end of the Fair soon closed up their stalls and no one was left roaming the lanes. Further over to the west, several of the pig roasts were still doing good business, serving roast pork and ale, and bursts of laughter and drunken shouting reached us over the dark and empty spaces between. There were lanterns on poles at the junctions of the lanes, and a dim glow from the area of the pig roasts, but otherwise it had grown very dark. I realised that clouds had built up, masking any light from the moon.

  Beside me, Arthur shifted uncomfortably.

  ‘My bum is as numb as a drunken sailor,’ he muttered.

  I grinned in the dark. I could not imagine Arthur saying such a thing in the formal atmosphere of Seething Lane.

  ‘Is that rain?’ I whispered.

  ‘Aye.’

  It was indeed. Just the beginnings of one of those fine mizzling rains that look like nothing but nevertheless relentlessly soak you to the very skin. We both huddled closer to the edge of the platform for shelter, and I heard the drunk on the far side groan and turn over, but he stayed where he was. I was on the very point of suggesting that we give up and catch that wherry home before we were truly sodden, when the tent flap opened opposite, and men began to slip out into the darkness. The very furtiveness of their movements was enough to reawaken my suspicions. We both sat up and leaned forward.

  The men did not all leave in a crowd, but in twos and small groups, dispersing in different directions and mostly in silence.

  One group of four men walked past us so close I could have put out my foot and tripped up the nearest one. They were whispering together and I heard only a few words, but one of them was ‘Dowgate’.

  At last it seemed that all those who had been in the tent had gone and the swarthy man I had noticed during the earlier performance came out to carry the two lanterns inside and lace up the tent door. Soon after, the lights in the tent went out. I stood up and jerked my head in the direction of the river, hoping Arthur could see me against the distance loom of light from the pig roasts. He got to his feet with a faint groan, dusted himself down, and we set off along the dark lane of stalls leading toward Pie Corner. The ground was uneven and once or twice we stumbled, but we reached the street at last. It was easier going here, and we hurried down to the river and Whitefriars Stairs, for the rain was getting heavier.

  Fortunately, a few wherrymen were lingering here, sheltered in their hut, hoping for a fare from some of the roisterers still eating and drinking at the Fair. We found a boat with a canvas shelter and bade the wherryman take us down to the Bridge. He seemed glad of the fare. It was a strange, dreamlike journey. I had never before been on the river at night. The clouds covered moon and stars, so that we moved within the small circle of light cast by the wherryman’s lantern, reflected back from the ripples made by his oars. All around us the waters of the Thames were black under the midnight sky. On the south shore of the river there were no lights to be seen, for it was long past the time when the bear pits closed. Even the brothels would have put up their shutters. On the City shore, a lighted window showed here and there amongst the wealthy houses along the Strand, but there was no movement on the river. It seemed as though we travelled alone through a deserted world.

  When we reached Old Swan Stairs on the upriver side of the Bridge and I had paid the man from Phelippes’s purse, with an extra twopence for his trouble so late at night, I urged Arthur to go home.

  ‘There is no need for us both to see Phelippes,’ I said. ‘Go home to your wife. Here, I almost forgot.’ I reached into my satchel. ‘The gilded baby. Mind, she is not to eat it until after the babe arrives.’

  He laughed. ‘I thank you, Kit, and I will tell her so.’

  ‘And I thank you for your company,’ I said. ‘I would not have liked to spend that last vigil alone.’

  I saw that he shivered in the light of the torch mounted on the landing place.

  ‘Nor would I.’

  We parted then. He assured me he lived not far away, and I hurried off to Seething Lane. This was a better part of the city than Queenhithe, with lanterns hung before many of the substantial houses, but it was not far from the Legal Quays near the Tower, and the sailors there were a rough lot.

  The watchman in the stableyard of Walsingham’s house gave me a nod – he must have been warned I was coming – and unlocked the door for me. I ran up the backstairs, glad to be out of the rain. Phelippes was sitting at his table, working as usual at his papers, looking no different from that morning. I was glad to see there was a fire on the hearth and took my stand in front of it, where I steamed gently like a goodwife’s cookpot.

  ‘Well?’ he said. ‘What news?’

  ‘A little news, but no Poley.’

  I recounted everything we had seen and done, of which the most important was the gathering of men at both performances in the puppet tent, but especially the latter, and our complete failure to find any sign of Robert Poley.

  ‘One last thing,’ I said. ‘When the men were leaving the puppeteers’ tent, one group passed near us. I heard only one word of any importance. Dowgate.’

  ‘Dowgate?’ He looked at me thoughtfully. ‘And what do we have in Dowgate?’

  I searched my mind. ‘London Stone?’ I said.

  ‘Aye.’

  I pictured the street, one of the main thoroughfares in the centre of the city.

  ‘Ah,’ I said, ‘the Herbar. The house Sir Francis Drake bought with the loot he seized in the midst of the naval battle against the Armada. When he was supposed to be leading our navy forward, but slipped away for a little freebooting of his own.’

  ‘Careful what you say, Kit.’

  Phelippes spoke automatically, but I felt he agreed with my view of the matter. I had not been present at that part of the naval battle, only later, off Gravelines, but I had heard what Drake had done after I came ashore. It had not made him popular with either commanders or sailors, deserting them like that. And now I thought about it, his actions then were all of a piece with the way he had behaved toward the rest of us on the recent expedition. The man was a greedy, self-serving pirate, though it did not do to say so publicly.

  ‘You think something might be intended against Drake?’ I moved a little away from the fire, for my legs were beginning to roast.

  He laid down his quill and clasped his hands behind his head, tilting his chair on to its back legs.

  ‘Let us think what we have. A crowd of angry soldiers and sailors, who feel they have been cheated out of their due reward for their services.’

  ‘As they have,’ I said.

  ‘Don’t interrupt. I know what you think, Kit.’

  I closed my mouth. He was right. I had said it often enough.

  ‘The moderate men among them will await the outcome of their leaders’ meeting with the Common Council. In the meanwhile, the wilder spirits among them may not be willing to wait, but may wish to take matters into
their own hands.’

  He let his chair fall forward again.

  ‘Add to this some travelling Italian performers, almost certainly papists, who have gone to a great deal of trouble to prepare a treasonous play, probably to incite covert Catholics and disaffected soldiers into action.’

  ‘Would they have known about the disaffected soldiers?’ I risked interrupting, for this seemed like an important point. ‘The making of those puppets, the painting of the backcloth – that must have taken a long time.’

  ‘You are right. But perhaps they did not learn about the march on London at the last moment. How long have you been back in England? Six weeks? Time enough for them to hear of this through their own spies and prepare accordingly.’ He smiled grimly. ‘We are not the only nation which employs spies.’

  ‘True enough.’

  ‘So if there has been a conspiracy from the start, if some amongst the soldiers are in league with these Italians, it begins to make sense. You said there were gentlemen present this evening. Did you recognise any of them?’

  I shook my head. I had wondered for a fleeting moment whether Sir Damian Fitzgerald might have been there. It was his household I had joined briefly at Walsingham’s orders three years before, but I had never believed him to be a papist conspirator of the more dangerous sort. He would hold secret Masses, hide priests, and pass letters, but I did not believe him capable of violent action. Moreover, he made great parade of his loyalty to the house of Tudor, even in the design of his new chimneys, with their Tudor roses. He had too much to lose.

  ‘Nay, there was no one I recognised, but I would probably not know papist sympathisers. Arthur did not recognise anyone either.’

  ‘Hmm. So what could be planned against Drake?’