Forged in the Fire

by Ann Turnbull

  I began my search the next day.

  The city was full of vacant houses and rooms, many at very low rents, but there was good reason for this. The first place I saw looked a handsome house, and the whole upper storey was vacant, but at a suspiciously low rent.

  “You won’t find better value,” the agent assured me.

  “Is it a plague house?”

  He shrugged. “The plague was everywhere, last summer.”

  “But people died here?”

  “It has been aired and fumigated. Thoroughly smoked throughout, the hangings changed…”

  I did not even go in. Something in his manner made me distrustful. I knew I should not give in to fear. I should put my trust in God. But I had Susanna to care for now, and was fearful on her behalf. Coming fresh from the country, she might be more likely to fall victim to the plague. And the sickness was still about, though the death toll was falling. Fourth-day that week was another day of fasting and prayer in the churches, and Friends closed their businesses and went to meeting.

  We heard that the King, who had been in Oxford, had returned to London, and this made us feel confident that the greatest danger from plague must be over. But there was no more news yet of the Black Spread-Eagle.

  At the end of the week, Susanna and I went together after work to see a place in Bow Lane, which runs south from Cheapside. The house was next to the steeple-house called Mary Aldermary, built close up against it, so that on the north side it was shaded by the tower. The ground floor was a hosier’s, with living quarters and storage above, and an attic floor to let: two rooms, furnished, at a reasonable rent.

  We climbed the narrow back stairs and found ourselves in a low attic room. The window was small and the ceiling sloped towards it.

  “Oh! I like this view!” said Susanna.

  I stooped, and looked out over a spread of roof-tops, jetties, innumerable chimneys with smoke rising up and, far below, glimpses of people thronging the darkening streets. I saw a few lanterns already glowing, the moving lights of link boys, and the flicker of candles in windows. So many people live in this city, I thought; so many other lives. I could not see the river, but saw a slender crescent moon, which pleased me after the view of the privy at Creed Lane.

  The walls were limewashed and the floor made of clean boards, and there was a table and stools, and a small fireplace with a pot and trivet for cooking.

  The hosier’s wife stood at the top of the stairs, watching us. “It is all newly done,” she said. “And quite high, in the centre.”

  I removed my hat as it knocked against the ceiling.

  A doorway led to a second room that contained a bed, washstand and clothes chest. It too had a low window, but the light was stopped by the nearness of the steeple-house. The walls were painted reddish-brown. As we stood looking around, a great sound of bells burst from the steeple-house next door, seeming to rock the walls of the room. We both gasped and clutched each other in shock, then began to shake with laughter.

  “Bell-ringing practice,” the hosier’s wife said. “Every Friday night. You get used to it.”

  “We wouldn’t lie in on first-days here!” I murmured to Susanna, who was still trying to stifle her laughter.

  We came back into the parlour, where Susanna examined the cooking area and looked at me in approval.

  “It’s a long way to carry water,” I warned her, “up all those stairs.”

  She shrugged. “Oh, I’m strong!”

  “Thou like it here, then?”

  “I do. I like to be high above the city. And thee?”

  I agreed. There was a madness about the place that appealed to me: an eyrie, blasted by bells, where I would knock my head at every turn; and yet I could imagine us making a home here.

  “Let’s take it,” she said. And we exchanged a smile, secret and complicit. Now we could be wed.

  As we followed the woman downstairs I took Susanna’s hand and felt her fingers curl in to mine.

  “Quakers, aren’t you?” the woman said. I realized that mixed, perhaps, with her fear of Dissenters was a feeling that Quakers were unlikely to use the furniture for firewood or make off without paying the rent. I gave her a crown piece as deposit and agreed to move in next week. She produced an account book in which she asked me to write my name or make my mark; I signed it, and she wrote down the five shillings and made her own mark – a cross – beside my name.

  Susanna and I were married at the Bull and Mouth meeting nine days later, on Susanna’s nineteenth birthday. The meeting was full of our friends, for everyone likes a wedding, and there were many young children present. Edmund Ramsey came with all his family, dressed in subdued fashion and sitting unobtrusively near the back – which I liked him for, being concerned that the Ramsey presence might disconcert Susanna.

  But I soon saw that nothing could unsettle Susanna today. Her face, framed by the plain linen cap, was calm, her hands loose in her lap. I felt all around us the support and well-wishing of the meeting, and knew she must feel it too. The silence grew, broken only by some fidgeting and babble of small children. I meditated on marriage, my responsibilities as a husband, wondered what our future would hold, and thought about how we might serve God more fully together than separately. At first I slid a few glances at her, but she had closed her eyes, and after a while I ceased to think about my surroundings and withdrew into the inward light, and felt the meeting become gathered.

  The silence was long and deep, as befitted our serious undertaking. At last the atmosphere changed; I heard a rustle of movement, and Jane Catlin rose to her feet and said that we had all come here today to bear witness to the marriage of William and Susanna.

  “We are not here to join these two in marriage as the priests do,” she said. “We are but witnesses. The marriage is the work of the Lord.”

  Then I caught Susanna’s eye, and together we rose to our feet and took each other by both hands.

  I said, “I, William Heywood, take thee, my Friend Susanna Thorn, to be my wife. And I promise that with God’s help I will be to thee a loving and faithful husband until death shall separate us.”

  I spoke with much intensity, and felt tears spring to my eyes and saw an answering glitter in hers. But she spoke out light and clear, in much the same words, ending, as I had, “until death shall separate us”.

  Until death shall separate us. There was death all around us in the city, and danger at every turn, from sickness, accident or persecution. Only God knew how long we would have together. We must live every moment of our time fully and in the light.

  After we had spoken, there was another brief silence, and then the meeting broke up with smiles and good wishes. Rachel Chaney came and put her arms around me and wished us happiness, and as I returned her embrace and felt how small and thin she was, I became aware more than ever of the fragility of life and the need to use it well.

  “God keep thy husband in the light, Rachel,” I said, “and bring him safe home to thee.”

  Nat embraced us both, and so did Jane Catlin, and Hannah Palmer, and others – including Edmund Ramsey, who spoke warmly to us both and introduced Susanna to his wife and daughters. If Susanna felt any awkwardness with them, she did not show it.

  Afterwards we had a wedding breakfast with Friends at the inn, and then Susanna and I left together and walked to our new home.

  “Oh!” said Susanna. “Someone has been here!”

  The fire was lit, there was a white linen cloth on the table, bread, milk, and a bowl of fruit; and bunches of dried lavender lay on the bed and window sills.

  Susanna smiled. “Rachel, I reckon. And Hannah. They left the inn early.”

  I put my arms around her, held her close. “Sometimes I thought this day would never come.”

  “I feared that too.”

  “Thou don’t mind that it was not at Eaton Bellamy? Will thy mother mind?”

  “No. I think she expected it. She gave me my wedding gift: this shift.”

  “Shift
?”

  She looked at me and sighed, mock despairing. “Thou hast not even noticed! It is new. My parents made it for me.”

  I looked at the shift where it showed in the neckline of her dress and below the hem of her sleeves. “It’s very fine,” I said – though for the life of me I could not see it to be much different to any other shift. “But I shall like thee better without it.”

  “Thou promised thou’d take me to see London Bridge this afternoon.”

  “I did. And I shall.”

  It was a fine, cold day, the sun bringing some winter brightness. The filth of the streets had hardened under the ice and walking was cleaner than of late, though slippery. We held hands.

  “Londoners are dirty,” Susanna said. “And the people are rude. They don’t give you good morning.”

  “If they said good morning to everyone they met it would take all day.”

  “But they push past and are always in a hurry.”

  “Thou’ll get used to it.” I felt a moment’s anxiety. “Thou won’t want to go home?”

  She held my hand tightly. “No! I belong here now, with thee. I shall learn to love it.”

  So we walked to the bridge, and Susanna marvelled at the tall houses, several storeys high, built all along its length, narrowing and shading the roadway below; at the carved woodwork and gilding, the grand shopfronts, the domes and weathervanes of Nonsuch House. Her excitement inspired me, and I pointed out the sweep of the river, full of little craft upstream; and downstream, beyond the Tower, the tall masts of seagoing ships. We walked to the Southwark side, passing under a score of skulls impaled on poles and picked clean by birds.

  Susanna glanced up. “Traitors?”

  “Yes. Some of those who signed Charles the First’s death warrant are there.”

  I led her ashore. “Shall we take a boat to Whitehall?”

  We did, and saw the King’s palace and the park they call St James’s – a great space of trees and water – and from there walked east to Charing Cross. We stopped at a street vendor’s and bought spiced warm ale and pies, then made our way home along Fleet Street as dusk was falling, and through Ludgate into the city.

  The day had grown much colder, and Susanna shivered. We went around the north side of Paul’s because I did not like passing James Martell’s shuttered shop, and so to Bow Lane and up the narrow stairs to our home.

  “Oh, it’s cold!” Susanna held her hands to the fire.

  “Come to bed, then.”

  It still felt strange to undress in front of each other, but with the shutters closed it was almost dark in the room. I was quicker than her, and turned to see her laying aside her stays. She stood barefoot in her shift, her hair falling in loose curls over her shoulders. I took her in my arms, my hands under her shift. “Take this off. Spare thy mother’s needlework.”

  She laughed, and complied, but sprang quickly into bed and under the covers. As I got in beside her the bell of Mary Aldermary began to sound for evening prayers.

  Susanna

  I wrote to all my family and friends to tell of our marriage: my parents; my brother, Isaac; Mary Faulkner; and other Friends in Hemsbury. I bought paper and ink and a new quill from Amos Bligh and took pleasure in spreading my good news.

  Will was reading. He watched me, somewhat wistfully, I thought. He had no one to write to.

  I folded another letter, then melted wax in the candle flame and dropped it onto the letter and sealed it. “Won’t thou write to thy father?” I asked.

  At once his face took on a closed expression.

  “There is no reason to,” he said. “He has disowned me.”

  I knew, because he had told me during our three-year correspondence, that he had long since given up writing to his father; he had sent letters for the first few months, but his father had kept his word and had not replied, and his silence had hardened Will’s heart.

  I got up and went to Will, and kneeled beside his chair.

  “Thou might end that silence with this news,” I said.

  “Hardly. Thou know’st what he called thee – how he insulted thee and told me that a girl like thee could never be daughter to him. I’ve broken with him, Su. I chose thee.”

  “But it hurts thee,” I said. “I know it does. And it hurts him too. I told thee he came to see me in Hemsbury?”

  “Yes – and was churlish to thee, by the sound of it.”

  “I can forgive him that.”

  “I can’t. He has cast me off, and wants nothing more of me. He’ll care not whether I’ve married thee or no.”

  His body felt stiff. I knew he was wrong not to try to heal the rift. “Write to thy sister, then?”

  “Anne can scarcely read.”

  “Send her a token – a drawing, with our names. She’ll understand. She always took thy part.”

  He smiled, and I felt the tension leave him a little. “Maybe,” he said. “But I don’t want to involve her in secrets. If she fears to tell…”

  “Why should she fear? We are wed now; it is done. And thou’rt of age and free to marry without consent.”

  “Yes.” He hugged me close. “That’s all that matters. Hast thou sealed thy letter to Mary? Let me add a few words.”

  It was a time for letters. One morning came the longed-for letter from Judith, sent on to me from Hemsbury by Mary, and telling of the Kite family’s safe arrival in the New World – I calculated on my fingers that little Benjamin was now nearly a year old. Judith was not much practised at writing, and her letter was short, but her happiness and excitement were clear enough. Dan had found work as a blacksmith and they had a temporary home on the outskirts of Boston. There are some here that do not love the truth, but many will listen, she wrote. She spoke more of a mother’s concerns: the long voyage; Benjamin’s teething and how someone had given her a smooth peg for him to bite on and brewed a tisane for his fever; the friends they had made on arrival. We are happy to be here, and grateful for God’s goodness.

  I shared the letter with Will. Now we had an address and could tell Judith and Dan of our marriage.

  The other news that came threw us all into alarm. We heard that the Black Spread-Eagle had at last sailed from Plymouth on the twenty-seventh of February, only to be captured the next day by a Dutch privateer and taken to the port of Hoorn in Holland.

  Rachel, when we went to see her, was both relieved that Vincent was not yet transported to Jamaica and yet in dread that the Dutch, our enemies, would keep him prisoner. It was the first time the war with Holland had touched us directly.

  “The Dutch will not want to keep them,” Will said. “They’ll try and exchange them as prisoners of war.”

  “But England will never agree to that! Not for Dissenters! They’ll abandon them; leave them in a Dutch jail.” Rachel’s face showed the strain of months of waiting.

  “If they do, Friends will work to get them released,” Will assured her.

  We sat in silence together and waited on God. I knew Rachel must have been thinking, as I was, that there might be few prisoners left to release; and I closed my eyes and sought the light that is in all people, of whatever religion, and prayed for a good outcome.

  It was not long before we heard more news. I had returned from work one afternoon, and was alone, preparing supper, when I heard rapid footsteps followed by a loud knocking at our door. I opened it to Rachel.

  “Su!” She was distraught, white-faced. “The prisoners are back! The Dutch have no use for them – they’ve sent them home. They are at Newgate – those who have survived…”

  “Thy husband…?”

  “I don’t know. I must go there, Su. Will thou come with me? I’m so afraid…”

  “For sure,” I said – though I dreaded it. “Where’s Tabitha?”

  “At home. Sarah Chandler’s there.”

  I left the food, and a note for Will, and went out with her at once.

  She explained, “Sarah came to me. She’d been to visit her cousin in Newgate and heard tha
t the Dutch prisoners, as they called them, were back.”

  Her teeth were chattering. I took her hand as we walked, and prayed that she would find Vincent alive and that I would be strong enough to help her through this ordeal.

  I had never been inside Newgate jail before. Will had told me what it was like, but nothing he said could have prepared me for the stench and squalor and ungodliness of that place. The guards – one bloated and indifferent, another eyeing us both up in a lewd manner – mocked Rachel as she asked for information.

  “Vincent Chaney,” she said. “He is with the Quaker prisoners from Holland.”

  The fat one spat. “Quakers! Do you think we know the name of every Quaker in this place?”

  “He was on the Black Spread-Eagle. Friends told me those prisoners are here.”

  “They came yesterday,” I insisted.

  The other man said that he’d heard “a lot of praying and preaching going on down there”, and demanded money if we were to see them.

  Rachel had known she would have to pay. She gave what they asked, and the second man led us down passageways so thick with dirt and ordure that even the walls were encrusted. The smell made my stomach heave, and I pressed my hands to my mouth, to the guard’s amusement.

  Behind closed doors we heard screams, curses, raving, and a general drunken racket. Will had told me that most of those who could afford to do so drank themselves insensible.

  Our people were in a separate cell. The guard unlocked it, flung open the door, and held up his lantern. I heard a rattle of chains as the inmates turned towards us.

  “See one you fancy?” the guard asked Rachel.

  There were a dozen or more men in the cell: all of them thin, bearded, with long matted hair and staring eyes, all with running sores on their faces and bodies. Their clothes were dark with grease and sweat, and several were unable to stand upright, but moved as if they were still below decks.