Christopher Uptake

by Susan Price

  From the tower above me came shouts. "Stop thief! Stop that thief!"

  People came out of the buildings in the court-yard, all looking about them for the thief. The voices from the tower cried directions. "There! There! Stop him!''

  I was caught, dragged from my feet and set on them again. Brentwood had come out - he must have heard me land on the roof above him - and I was jerked across the yard to him, my feet often leaving the ground altogether.

  "What's he stole, master?"

  "We got him; what's he stole?"

  "What shall we do with him?"

  Brentwood answered none of the questions, but stared at me, his face reddening. This crowd, these witnesses, were just what he had not wanted.

  "What's he took, Master?"

  Brentwood managed to bring an expression of dignity and sorrow to his face. "Something very valuable to me," he said. "I do not wish to discuss the matter. I - had thought him a friend."

  There were expressions of disgust, and I was struck, and spat upon too, and poked in the back and ribs with various tools and utensils which the people had happened to be carrying when they had run out to catch me; but I could survive all that.

  "Lock him up," someone said. "See that he don't get away."

  "Send for the magistrate; I should."

  "Lock him in the gatehouse - No, the cheeseroom; it's like a prison."

  The idea of locking me in the cheeseroom proved popular, and soon they were all chattering about it, chattering in my ears until my head swam. Brentwood looked pained, but said, "Lock him in there if you think it best."

  So I was pushed and pulled away, dragged into the dairy with its smell of cold stone, milk and butter; and on down stone steps into the cheeseroom; and there I was dropped on the floor and left. I watched the feet and legs of my jailers climb back up the steps, and the door shut; and I listened as it was locked and barred. Then I lay back at full length and pillowed my hands beneath my head. I sighed.

  My side was bruised and aching; my shoulder too, and my hands were scratched, and burning from nettle-stings; but it all proved that I was still alive. I had never thought that I would be glad to be in pain.

  After a while, uncomfortable and chilled from lying on the stone floor, I got to my feet and limped up and down the cheeseroom, aching from stiffening bruises. The room was long and thin, and partly underground; its only windows were small and near the ceiling. Above, its roof was of thatch, and might have been torn open if I could have reached it – but doubtless, I would have been seen.

  All along both sides of the room were shelves, on which sat round cheeses, wrapped in bandages. The room would have smelled strongly of cheese if it had been warmer, but it was damp and cold. I tried climbing the shelves to reach the thatch, but the shelves had been designed to hold cheese, not aid escapees, and at each attempt I was forced to jump back to the floor before I fell.

  I walked up and down until I was tired; then I sat down at the far end of the room with my back against the wall. My bruised right leg was stiffening. I was safe enough, I guessed, until that night. What could I do when they came for me? Hide behind the door and hit them over the head with a cheese? I got to my feet and tried again to climb the shelves.

  It was much later, when I had at last admitted that I would never reach the thatch by climbing, that there was a noise at the door. It partly opened, and I heard Mistress Cowling’s voice speaking to someone outside. She came in, balancing a tray on her hip as she closed the door, and then she came down the steps and stooped to place the tray on the ground before me. "I have to come in here to turn the cheeses every day," she said. "So I thought that I might as well bring you something to eat at the same time, although it is a little early."

  "Thank you," I said.

  She turned to the cheeses nearest the door and began to turn them. "It was only Christian," she said curtly, after a pause.

  Those few words inspired me. "Mistress Cowling,'' I said. "did you know that there is a priest-hole in this house where your cousin shelters Catholic priests who enter this country illegally to preach their filthy blasphemies of Purgatory and Confession, and their filthy lies about our Queen?"

  She turned broadside to me, one hand on her hip. “What?”

  “I am an agent of the government,” I said. “I – “

  "Oh, so is every thief when caught, I imagine."

  “Mistress – “

  “I am aware, Master Uptake, that my cousin is a Catholic, and has – and thinks – but – “

  “Mistress, I am no thief. I have never in my life stolen anything at all. Your cousin isn't going to send me to the magistrate. He is going to have me taken to Furze Hill and killed.''

  She stared at me.

  "It's true," I said. "All of it; you have to believe me. Your cousin is not only a Catholic, he's sympathetic to a Catholic invasion from Spain.''

  "No,” she said, and shook her head. “No.”

  "We - my department," I said, “have reason to believe that he is involved in a conspiracy to aid Spain; we have good reason to believe it."

  She came closer and stooped towards me. "What reason could you possibly have?"

  “The priest-hole,” I said.

  "How could anyone be hidden in a house full of people?"

  "I have seen it,” I said. “I have been in it. I am locked in here now because I discovered it. Go and see it for yourself, mistress; it's underneath the platform in the Rents Room." She made a mocking, disbelieving face, so I told her how to find the entrance in the back of the cupboard. "But perhaps you know about this?"

  "No," she said. She was listening very hard.

  "Behind the pivoting plank, there is a space and in the floor of that place there is a trap-door which leads under the platform, and down there is a mattress and candles.'' I hesitated. "There was also a man's body – “

  She straightened abruptly, drawing away from me.

  “The body of a man like me, mistress, who had been working for the Protestant cause." I put one hand to my eyes, in the pose of a hero who has lost a comrade-in-arms, and looked at her from under it.

  She was staring at me with an expression of thoughtful horror.

  "Go and look for yourself," I said. "You'll find every word of what I say to be true, although they may have moved the body by now . . . You'll see why you must help me. I know you are a Protestant. I pretended to be a Catholic, yes; but that was for my work. If I had not been such a thorough Protestant, I could have acted the part more convincingly, but my heart wasn't in it. Mistress Cowling, do you want to see the last rags of Popery torn from the English Church? If you do, you must help me. We must root out Catholicism in whatever form it is found. Not until all threat from the Pope, and Spain, and those Papists and Spanish Englishmen within our country has been quite removed will we see the City of God builded here. Help me to get my report to my superiors, Mistress Cowling, and you will have helped lay that City's foundations.''

  Fists clenched, I ended my appeal and waited for her eager reply of "yes, yes, at once, this way!'' There was a long, uncomfortable pause, as if someone had forgotten his lines, and then she turned, climbed up the steps to the door and went out, without a word. A second later the door was locked.

  I went to the far end of the room, leaned against the wall, and slid down until I was sitting. I thought over the past few minutes, and sighed because I had failed to gain Mistress Cowling's assistance; but despite everything I was pleased with myself. The speed and fluency with which I had lied! Such improvisation! I wished that I could write with such readiness.

  I thought of writing. Surely I could make a play out of the life I had lived for the past few months - but would it pass the censors if I did? It probably would if I set it in Spain or Italy - but they were Catholic countries - so the intrigue would have to centre on something else. Not the discovering and execution of Protestants; that would never pass. Money. Money is always a good substitute for religion; and it would be my own experience of
fear that I would use rather than anything in particular that had happened to me - And then I realized, with a jolt, that I would never write anything more unless I could escape.

  The dairy, above me, had become very quiet. I climbed the stairs to the door and listened. Silence. Was it eleven or twelve o'clock? When was I to be ''taken to the magistrate"? I ran back down the steps, and was once more attempting to climb the shelves when Mistress Cowling returned. She unlocked the door and slipped round the edge of it with a backward glance, then pushed it almost shut. She looked down at me. "It does open, just as you said," she whispered.

  I jumped down from the shelves where I had been clinging, looked up at her, and waited.

  ''If I help you," she said "what will happen?"

  I began to lie. "A Catholic plot will be foiled, another plague-spot of Popery lanced, another Spanish infection purged . . . er . . . and we will be one step nearer to a truly Christian church." I thought it best not to mention anything of what would happen to Brentwood.

  "No, no," she said, impatiently. "I meant - this is the only home I have. If I helped you, would you tell - the people you report to - tell them that I helped you? That I risked - ?''

  "That you risked everything you have and are," I finished for her. "Madam; in my report I shall tell of everything you have done for me; I will say everything I can for you - My employer is a man of influence - the Queen herself is likely to hear of your great courage . . . There will be a reward; I promise you."

  "If I helped you, where would you go? How would you get far enough away on foot?"

  ''Once outside the walls of this house, I have my contacts, madam," I said.

  She turned quickly then, and pushed the door open. ''Then hurry; come along while everyone is at dinner. Let us be done with this."

  I started towards the stairs, but stopped. "Now? Immediately? But how?"

  "I have the key to the garden gate," she said, and held it up.

  I asked no more, but ran up the steps, despite my aches and bruises. “Are there guards?”

  “Not if you’re quick. He’s gone to fetch his dinner from the kitchen.” She gave me the key to the garden gate. “Quick – be through it while I lock this door.”

  I was away before she’d even turned to the door of the dairy. I didn’t bother to sneak, or look around – I simply ran straight to the garden gate, unlocked it and – leaving the key in the lock for her to find – went through.

  I went down to the bank of the moat, and ran along it, through mud and rushes until I found one of the small fishing-boats, and rowed across to the other side. As I climbed out, I looked back at the house, afraid that I had been seen - but that wasn't the only cause of my nervousness. I prickled with the knowledge that I had lost something which I could never regain.

  Honour? What's honour? I can't afford it. But it wasn't that either - I hadn't time to sit down and think it out.

  The cart-track which led to the village of Alston was plain enough to ensure that I wouldn't become lost if I followed it, but if it was plain to me, it was also plainly visible from the house. I set off at a run away from the track, but at an angle which would take me in roughly the same direction. I was heading for Bagthorpe. My best chance, it seemed to me, was to run to where I was certain of being hidden, even if that meant Bagthorpe.

  I have no idea how far I ran and walked in turns, but it was much further than I cared for. I found the cart-track again, and walked along the edge of it, too weary to run any more, and, eventually, reached Alston village.

  I asked my way to the White Hart, was told, and trudged on to where it stood, a little outside the village, at a point where two dirt tracks crossed. It was a small place, but even so I did not think that I would be welcome at the front entrance, and went round to the yard and the kitchens.

  I asked for Bagthorpe there, saying that I had a message for him, and was told to wait. I waited for a long time, leaning on the wall and slowly sinking down to sit on the hardened earth. I had begun to think that Brentwood would arrive and have me arrested as a thief, when Bagthorpe suddenly stepped out of the kitchen door. I hadn't remembered his being so tall - as as tall as I am myself - and, in the sunlight, his skin seemed darker and his hair a brighter red. He seemed new-made. He said, "Good day, Kit; do you want to come up?'' The room to which he led me was much more cramped and shabby than the one he'd hired in town, and he'd managed to make it even more untidy.

  "Sit, Kit." he said. "Have a drink. You must need it; you're filthy with dust." He poured a cup of beer and passed it to me with a quick smile. It was all so calm and pleasant. I was suspicious, but I couldn't help relaxing a little; I couldn't help thinking: Perhaps he's not so bad. Never, to my knowledge, had he ordered anyone to be beaten to death.

  He crossed to a chair, sat, rested one ankle on his other knee, and tilted his chair back. "Well, Kit,'' he said. “What did you find out?"

  Then I realized that I was far from safe. I shook my head, refusing to answer, and drank my beer. Leaning on the table, I put my head into my hand and closed my eyes. I could feel Bagthorpe waiting. I was scheming to remain alive. I opened my eyes, and said, "I've found out everything you want to know." I didn't know whether this was a wise or a foolish admission. I watched him, and he smiled. It had been a mistake. "What will you do if I tell you what I've found out?" I asked.

  Bagthorpe laughed and poured himself more beer. "What do you expect me to do?"

  "You'll kill me," I said.

  "And what gives you that idea?"

  "You told me you would."

  "You're too nervous, Kit. You make things up and then believe they're true. Why would I bother? What makes you think I could kill someone in cold blood?"

  I considered that question, remembering the corpse in the priest-hole. Bagthorpe hadn't been responsible for that. I said, "You're going to kill Brentwood in cold blood."

  "He's a traitor."

  "A traitor? So are you."

  He looked at me sharply. "I'm law-abiding, Kit. I like the law. It sorts people out into sheep and goats, and saves me the trouble. You'd be a lot happier if you'd let it do the same for you. Now tell me what you've found out."

  He didn't look wicked; neither had Brentwood. Their faces were quite ordinary: Brentwood's rather fleshy, Bagthorpe's haggard and wrinkled. But Brentwood had already ordered the murder of one man, and had almost succeeded in having me killed.

  "Kit," Bagthorpe said. "Tell me.''

  "No," I said. I couldn't. I didn't know anything. I couldn't remember.

  "Kit . . . '' Bagthorpe said, wheedling. "Why protect him? He's tried to kill you, hasn't he? Well? Hasn't he?"

  I shook my head. I was no longer protecting anyone but myself. I knew that staying silent wouldn't save me, but neither would betraying Brentwood, or, I realized, I would have accused him of every crime I could think of. He had shown me how briskly a murder can be ordered; and I had an idea that Bagthorpe might order it more efficiently.

  Bagthorpe raised his brows and stared thoughtfully at me, like a man trying to decide how to deal with a difficult problem. I realized that I was the problem. He crossed to the door, opened it, and spoke to someone in the next room.

  "I'll tell you what I've sent for, Kit," he said. "Water, towels, tools, rope." He went over to the window with long strides and sat on the sill, grinning, his arms folded. The light fell through the glass and over his shoulders, bleaching again the white collar of his shirt, and making his red hair bright. He rocked backward and forward slightly, waiting for me to ask what he meant to do.

  I looked at the door and wondered what my chances were of getting through it and far away - but Bagthorpe's usual helpers would be somewhere about, and then there was Brentwood . . . I leaned my head on my hand, pretending to be calm and unafraid, even though my heart was jumping just under my collar-bone and making me feel ill.

  Ten minutes passed before there was a knock on the door. Two men, strangers, came in. One carried a jug of water; the other ha
d towels, and a length of rope, slung over his arm. All these things were put on to the table near me. "Shut the door," Bagthorpe said, "but stay; both of you."

  While one man shut the door, Bagthorpe came to the table and sorted through the things. He held up a pair of pincers, and two long spikes, like skewers. He turned them in the light, intently considering them - then he shifted his eyes to me suddenly, smiled, and said, "Right, Kit! We're going to have some of your teeth out." I stood abruptly.

  Both men came toward me, one picking up the coil of rope as he reached the table. I backed into the chair behind me, and collapsed on to it. A coil of rope was wrapped round me, so deftly that I hardly saw it happening. I tried to free myself from it, but I had so little strength, just when I needed it, that I felt like a gingerbread man.