When the door opened, it was already dusk, and the sudden noise startled me so much that I fell from the stool and knocked my head again. This time it was a knock on the same spot as that which I had earned in the tavern on the day David was murdered, and I rolled on the floor for a few moments, clutching my pate and pulling a grimace of anguish, while desperately holding back a number of the choicer curses that were vying for attention.
‘What’re you doing down there?’ Moll asked. There was a hint of concern in her voice. Not, I should hasten to add, the concern of a person for a friend’s clear agony, but the concern of a young woman who finds herself in the company of what appears to be an escapee from the keepers at the Bethlem madhouse. Even as I peered up at her, I saw her roll her eyes and thrust her knife back in its sheath where she kept it, under her blouse. ‘Jack, in Christ’s name, what are you doing back here?’
‘I came back to see you,’ I said, with as much dignity as I could muster. ‘I’ve discovered what happened in the tavern that day.’
She suddenly went quite still. ‘You had best leave before he gets back.’
‘Who?’
‘Bill! Who else?’
‘There’s no need for you to panic,’ I said. Her anxiety was natural enough, knowing Bill as I did. The man was insanely jealous, after all. ‘He’ll be interested in this as well.’
‘I’m worried for you, Jack. If he finds you here and thinks you and I have been sleeping together, you know what he’s like. He’ll beat me and kill you.’
‘He won’t do that. He’ll be happy to learn that I think the problems with the dead man at the tavern are all over.’
‘They are?’
I explained about the parchment and the new message that had been sent with Atwood. She didn’t seem very interested.
‘These men have been hunting me down for the last week,’ I said, irritated by her indifference.
‘So? We’ve all been chased at different times,’ she said.
I didn’t say anything about that. I don’t recall whether I mentioned it before, but she had been chased from her home by an over-friendly stepfather. Our company was the only security she knew. She reckoned that Bill had saved her, and she owed him much for that.
I didn’t want to remind her of what must have been an unpleasant period in her life.
She must have seen how dumbfounded I looked, because she smiled then. ‘You’re a poor fool, aren’t you? Did you come here to see him or me?’
I think my sudden flush must have been obvious, because she chuckled to herself and walked to me. I was nervous about touching her, but – to my astonishment – she placed her warm little hands on either side of my face and gave me a kiss that almost made my heart stop.
There were footsteps outside, and she moved away and busied herself making a fresh fire.
‘What are you doing here again?’ Bill demanded as he walked in, and his eyes flew to Moll, then back to my glowing face.
I don’t know whether you have noticed, but men who can be prey to jealousy can also be very calm on occasion. It is as if they are listening and processing everything before flying off the handle like a badly fitted axe-head.
Bill was all smiles and kindness at the sight of me. He barely glanced at Moll, who fetched and carried for him when he called for ale and some bread, and she set a blackjack and cups on the bench near us, adding a half loaf that had hardly been a day from the oven. Bill broke the bread and gave me a hunk, dipping his own in his cup of ale and chewing with pleasure.
‘A good day,’ he said. ‘I found a merchant who could hardly walk for the weight of gold he had in his purse. I think I saved him from great injury by liberating him from that.’ He had more, too, finding a foolish old sot fresh from a tavern and persuading him to join him in a game of dice. Since the other player was Wat, the fellow had not a chance. What with that and a pair of kidskin gloves, the day had been successful already.
‘My own day was less successful, although I am alive,’ I said.
‘Aye? Well, I didn’t think you’d last above a day when you left here,’ Bill said.
‘You threw me out when I needed your support the most.’
‘Yes. And I’ll do it again. I won’t have dangerous men in here. There are too many others here to put them at risk just to protect a wastrel, gangling fool like you,’ he said, casting an eye at Moll.
I could see his point. It would be wrong to put Moll at risk of her life just so that I could find some fleeting, temporary security. She deserved better. ‘I learned more about the note, though,’ I said, and told him what Mark had said. Or I tried to. Bill put his hands over his ears as soon as I mentioned the Lady Jane.
‘Stop! I won’t listen to this, Jack! Are you mad? You can keep that sort of secret to yourself, lad, and don’t share its like with me. If there’s money in a tale, yes, I’ll be keen to hear it, but if it’s about politics and the conniving, thieving, rascally felons who infest government, you can keep that to yourself. I want nothing to do with traitors and other dangers, so help me I don’t!’
‘There is one piece of news you should like,’ I said. ‘Gil died because of a man called Roscard. He was the man who was working with Ann on the day the messenger was killed.’
‘Why did Gil die?’
‘I think because Roscard wanted me. He followed Blount, perhaps, and was led to Gil, so afterwards Roscard struck Gil down, tied him to a post, and then started punching and kicking him until he told Roscard what he needed to know.’
‘Which was?’
‘I assume he wanted to know where I was at that time. But Gil had no idea and couldn’t answer, so he was killed. And then Roscard became determined to find me. Somehow he tracked me down to the hospital, and I think if he’d seen me asleep there, I wouldn’t have woken.’
‘You think he was there to kill you?’ Moll said in a hushed voice. She looked at Bill with a strange look in her eye.
‘I’m sure of it,’ I said airily. ‘But it takes more than an assassin to put paid to me.’
‘It takes one inch of steel,’ Bill said. There was something in his voice that chilled my blood.
‘There is another thing, too. The captain of the soldiers who came here? He was not all he seemed either. He was determined to kill me. I barely escaped from him with my life. He’s in with the rebels, apparently, and he has gone over to their side.’
‘Him?’ Bill said. ‘How can you tell?’
‘He was pretty unambiguous about it,’ I said. ‘He took the note from me to deliver to Wyatt himself, and then, when I went back to the barricades, he sent men after me to kill me. Can you believe that? A fellow who was fighting to protect the city, and he sent his henchmen to murder me! It was sheer good fortune that saved me. We were all knocked aside by a cannon. Look!’ I said, and brought out the splinter. ‘That’s my blood, that is!’
‘Where did it hit you?’ Moll asked in a low, impressed voice.
I touched my sore shoulder briefly. ‘That is why I was forced to go to the hospital. Any other man, they said, would have been killed by my experiences, but I am made of sterner stuff.’
‘Cut the boasting, Jack,’ Bill said. ‘What are we going to do with you?’
That was not a question I had anticipated. ‘Eh?’
‘Well, I’ve already kicked you out of the company. What you wanted to come back for, I don’t know, but I don’t see that anything’s changed. There’s still danger for us all while you’re here.’
His eyes went to Moll again, but she wasn’t paying attention. She had set a pot on the fire and was stirring a thick pease pottage.
‘Well, at least let me sleep here tonight,’ I said. ‘I don’t have anywhere else to go.’
‘No. You’ve stirred up so much trouble in such a short time that you’re likely to bring danger to us. If they find you sleeping here, we’ll be in trouble for harbouring a felon, so sod that. No. You can stay and have some pottage, but then you’ll have to go. And this time, don’
t come back. Next time, I may hurt you to persuade you to sod off.’
THIRTY
There is one thing that I cannot argue with about Bill, and that is that he is a man of his word. No sooner was my bowl emptied of pease pudding than I was gently walked to the door and ejected into the evening darkness. I had my clothes, my cloak, a blanket, and little else. All I could think of doing was going back to the bridge, where I was likely to run the risk of another cannonade, I thought, and that was not appealing. However, it occurred to me that the other gates usually had a brazier for the men standing guard. Perhaps there I could find a little peace and quiet – and warmth – over the night?
It was the best idea I had. I strode off quickly, making my way to Ludgate and then down to the city walls. And luckily I was right. There was a small number of men there, standing in melancholy sympathy, staring at the flames.
That was one of the coldest nights of the winter, I’ve heard tell. The wind was not harsh, nothing like a gale, but it was steady, and every little draught seemed to strip another layer of clothing away, until all that was left was a man’s body, shivering so violently that it was like suffering from the ague. I wrapped my cloak about me, and then pulled my blanket over my head and shoulders in an attempt to keep warm, but no matter how my face scorched, my back felt as chilled as ice. It was the most miserable night of my life.
You can tell how unhappy I was: I started chatting in a desultory fashion with the other men there.
One, a young, straw-headed boy, was an apprentice for a silversmith, and he was clearly disgruntled at being out there. When I asked, his evasive answers led me to believe that he had been found wanting in some fashion – his abilities didn’t match the smith’s expectations, or perhaps the smith had a pleasant daughter and the apprentice a wandering eye: such things happen – and he felt this was his punishment. If so, it was severe. There were five others about our brazier that evening, two of whom were grooms, one a servant from a large house, and a scruffy old thief I’d known before, called Rob of the Moor.
He was a shocking old man. To my knowledge, he had been accused of murder three times, and he had been convicted once, but had won a pardon from the old king, Henry VIII, before it could be put into force. I don’t know how he escaped that one, but I suspect he was performing some kind of service for the king. Perhaps procuring girls for parties, or some such duty.
‘What you doin’ ’ere, lad?’ he demanded.
He was a good-looking fellow. One eye was milky white, and a scar reached from his chin, down past his Adam’s apple and on to his collar bone. His face could be politely described as possessing a ‘lived-in’ look, while the pepper-and-salt beard that never seemed to grow more than an eighth of an inch, and was never shaved to less, gave him a disreputable, shabby scruffiness that would have looked endearing in a man who possessed a less shrewd, sharp, acquisitive eye. As it was, when I shook hands with him, I made a careful investigation of my hand.
‘Just counting my fingers, Rob,’ I said when he asked.
‘Garn!’ he rasped, and spat a gobbet of thick, yellowish phlegm. ‘You can go piss on yourself!’
‘Even with my anatomical advantages, that would be difficult.’
He peered at me suspiciously. ‘Eh?’
‘What are you doing down here, Rob?’
He drew the corners of his mouth down and shook his head. ‘Bastard beadle caught me trying to get a crumb or two. Found me with a small pie from Mrs Hoggins up on Smithfield’s lane, and had me taken to the Newgate gaol. I was going to be up and accused next week, but I didn’t reckon much to my chances if that happened, so when the turnkeys came round and started asking if anyone would volunteer to help defend the city, I thought that sounded a better idea. With luck, I’ll win a pardon.’
‘Good,’ I said, but I kept my eyes on his fingers. Not that I needed to worry. I had nothing of value that he could take.
‘Aye, that’s the truth. It was bad luck had me seen by the beadle, but now, well, looks like it was even worse luck to volunteer.’
‘Why?’
‘Christ’s bones, boy, haven’t you heard anything? This rebel, Tommy Wyatt, has gathered up all the peasants and yeomen of Kent. They say he has twenty or thirty thousand men under arms. What’ll happen when an army that size gets to us here, eh? I’ll tell you, boy, what’ll happen is, they’ll see my dust on that horizon over there,’ he said, pointing, ‘and they’ll never see me in London again. Sod that! Think I’m going to hang around here, when there are thirty thousand hairy heathens from the wilds of Kent running at me with halberds? Ballocks to that!’
I mused over his words for a long while. The men I had seen running at me on the bridge had not been enormous, but had looked like ordinary lads. I doubted whether the fellows in the rest of the army were any more terrifying. Mind you, they had been terrifying when they got too close to me. That was the truth. However, the fact remained, if Rob was right and there were some thirty thousand of them, that was a large enough number to give all the soldiers and volunteers in London a run for their money.
‘You know how many the city has recruited now?’ he said.
‘No.’
‘Twenty thousand, they say. Twenty thousand. Think of that, eh?’
I did. And frowned.
‘Yeah, twenty thousand? They wouldn’t find twenty hundred in the city, I reckon,’ he said. ‘Even if they did, what sort of men would they be? Half of them would shout, “A Wyatt, a Wyatt!” and run to join them. The people don’t like our queen, boy. They accepted her when her father died, but they won’t be ruled by the wife of a bleeding Spaniard, and that’s an end to it.’
‘You think they’d give up the city to Wyatt?’ I said. It wasn’t something that I’d seriously considered, and the idea was appalling. That was the worst form of treachery, surely, when an entire city rejected its queen.
‘What do you think?’ Rob sneered.
I left him at the first opportunity and took to the wall, staring out over the suburbs as though I could see a safe passage away from the city, while I considered all that Rob had said. He had been depressingly convincing, I admit, but there was a small spark of resentment in me that refused to believe that all that many London or Kentish men would turn their coats. And a larger, more cynical part of me that was convinced that he was right.
But the key thing was, if Wyatt succeeded in his ambitions, then I was in real trouble. Because I had given Atwood the message that would later, presumably, be proved to be false. It was a forgery. So I really had to hope that the city stayed loyal to the queen. But that presupposed that the city winning was in my interests, too. And I wasn’t sure of that. The bishop was an alarming character, after all, and he would be angry with me for not giving him the message, as he had demanded. He was the queen’s most senior minister, so if he was cross, my life would be worth little. Then there was Roscard, who was apparently the servant of the Spanish. Certainly, he was likely to want my nuts in a bag after I’d chased after him on the day he killed Ann. And John Blount had sent me out with the forgery to give to Atwood – damn his black, demonic soul. He must have known I would be putting my life in danger doing that. I hoped he would soon go and join the devil for all the grief he had given me!
But that was no help to me just now. There had been a new moon at the beginning of the month, and tonight there were few clouds. Standing there, I stared out over the road and the low roofs of houses that stretched away in the silvery light of the moon, and pondered my predicament.
There was only one solution, I decided. I had to escape the city. I had to get far away, as quickly as possible.
I gazed at the road westwards with such longing that it was almost like love.
THIRTY-ONE
Wednesday 7th February
I woke to a cold, grey morning with a damp crust of ice sparkling on every surface. That was painful. My shoulder hurt like a bad burn when I stood and took stock.
Like the others, when my time
on the walls was done, I had smothered myself in cloak and blanket as best I could, with my feet near the brazier, my back on a thick bale of cloth or something that had been left by the gate. It was almost comfortable. If I’d had another three or four hours’ sleep, I would have been happy, but even as I scratched and yawned myself awake, the captain of the guard was running to and fro, shouting and making a general nuisance of himself.
‘What’s the matter?’ the apprentice called blearily. ‘Have they attacked?’
That raised a general chorus of chuckles. It was clear enough that all of us were still well, and there was no commotion at the gate. The timbers of the doors themselves were massive, and their vast weight caused the hinges to graunch alarmingly when swung open. With them and the six-feet-thick walls on either side, it would have taken a determined army to break through.
‘No, you dull tarse-tugger, but they’re moving this way.’
‘Well, unless they’re crossing the bridge, they won’t get to us, will they, Captain!’ the youngster called, and rolled over.
The captain walked to him and kicked him very precisely on the buttocks.
‘You think there’s only one bridge over the bleeding river? What if they get to Kingston and cross there? Stop choking your chicken and get on your feet! The rebels may not scare you, but if you’re not up and ready by the time I get to you, you’ll have reason to be bloody scared of me!’
There were more chuckles, but this time they were more sporadic as his words sank in, and then, with many a muttered curse, we all climbed to our feet. Soon afterwards we were treated to a heavy downpour. The rain was set to continue all day long.
‘Was he joking?’ I asked Rob.
‘I bleedin’ doubt it. Didn’t you see his face? I’ve seen happier faces on bulls in the baiting pits. Nah, today we’re in for a fight, I’ll tell you.’
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