Do We Not Bleed

by Patricia Finney

  Fleetwood grunted. "I'm surprised she even had any, the way she bleached her hair with lye and combed it every day."

  Fleet Street itself was worryingly full of apprentices and young men, hanging around the corners and talking loudly. A knot of respectable women were still at the conduit as usual, also talking, including a number of redoubtable matrons. The whores were nowhere to be seen. Where were they?

  Catlin spotted that player Shakespeare standing by the door of the Cock tavern with a very odd expression on his face. On the one hand he was nervous, as any sane man would be with a riot brewing. On the other hand, Catlin got the distinct impression from the bright curious look and his half grin that he was thoroughly enjoying the excitement. He was also wearing a very new poinard dagger at his belt, 19 inches long and highly lethal-looking. Catlin wondered if he knew how to use it. Every so often the player's hand bumped up against the hilt and then caressed it, which argued that he was no more a fighting man than he looked.

  Shakespeare saw Fleetwood and his men riding up and raised his arm, came over to where they were dismounting.

  "Go and hold the Christ's head room," Fleetwood ordered his men, "Nobody goes in or comes out."

  "Sir, Eliza's in here," Shakespeare said, gesturing at the tavern door, "but..."

  Fleetwood nodded his thanks and went in, Catlin following. When he saw who else was there, he wished he hadn't. The common room of the Cock was full of angry frightened and highly painted women in striped petticoats, all arguing at the tops of their voices. In a corner, the centre of attention, sat Eliza, her face-paint running down her cheeks with her tears, spent aqua vitae cups in front of her, sitting next to the only respectable woman in the place who was holding her hand. That woman was wearing a black velvet mask under a good beaver hat and linen cap.Catlin was shocked: he recognised her at once from her clothing: it was James Enys's widowed sister, Mrs Morgan. Next to her on the floor by the bench, like a bony little toad, squatted young Peter the Hedgehog who was gripping a paring knife in his fist and muttering to himself.

  Shakespeare led Fleetwood over to Eliza who stood and curtseyed unsteadily to him, drawing the attention of any of the women who had been too busy arguing to notice the Recorder coming into the common room. Mrs Morgan also stood and curtseyed. She was wearing the same tidy cramoisie wool doublet-fronted bodice and kirtle and an unfashionable bell-shaped farthingale that she had worn when Catlin had seen her during Topcliffe's abortive raid. Shakespeare presented her to Mr Fleetwood as Mrs Morgan.

  Catlin's mouth had dropped open. What on earth was a respectable widow doing in a tavern surrounded by women of... by whores? It was outrageous! Did her brother know where she was?

  Fleetwood was clearly as shocked as Catlin.

  "Ma'am, I would urge you to go home at once," he rumbled disapprovingly at Mrs Morgan, "I'm astonished to find you..."

  "Mr Fleetwood," interrupted the player hastily, "It's my fault she's here at all – I asked her in Christian charity to comfort Eliza, which she did with only young Peter to be her escort and while she was talking to Eliza, the other women came in and so she was caught here. I dared not let her go to her chambers without proper company and I could not escort her until you arrived for fear of Eliza running off."

  "Ah," said Fleetwood, "Can you not send for her brother?"

  "I have no idea where he is, sir," said Mrs Morgan in a low slightly muffled voice, "I'm sure as soon as he hears of my situation, he will come to find me. Believe me, sir, I had far rather be safely in my chambers. But first will you hear what Eliza has to say – she wanted me to be with her when she says it?"

  Fleetwood looked around at the packed room and the painted faces all watching him. He sat down opposite Eliza on the bench.

  "Eliza," he said, "Did you see who killed Isabel?" he asked quite gently. She shook her head.

  "She had a message to wait for a gentleman who would be along soon," said Eliza, shooting a dagger glance at Catlin under her blue eyelids which made him feel very uncomfortable.

  "Did she say who it was?"

  "Yes," said Eliza slowly and clearly, "She said it was Mr Catlin, sir, 'im over there.""

  Catlin's stomach froze. What? It was true he often did visit Eliza at noon and indeed he had been on his way to her but...

  "She was puzzled cos she knew that so she asked Goody Mallow who it was again. I went away then cos I had a business husband of my own to see to and that was the last I ever seen of her... I dunno what I'll do wivvout her, I'll never talk to her again, I'll never share a bed wiv her again and what if the Devil comes back..." Eliza started wailing and rocking herself on the bench while Mrs Morgan patted her shoulder.

  "So Mr Catlin was the man Eliza expected."

  Catlin was fervently wishing he hadn't come with Fleetwood and had simply gone home to bed. He was surrounded by angry faces and hostile eyes.

  "Yes sir, and he's a pursuivant and he works for Mr Heneage and that devil Topcliffe. And he found Kettle Annie's body too..."

  Catlin realised that Mr Jenkins was quietly moving away from him and that two stout women were barring the doors with their arms folded and their hips hitched. His heart started to thud.

  "But I..."

  "Mr Catlin, a moment. Eliza, are you accusing Mr Catlin here of being the Devil who killed all three women of the town..?" A calm and distant part of Catlin thought it was wise of Fleetwood to use a more delicate term than "whores" on account of being outnumbered by them.

  "And poor Goody Harbridge, what's more."

  "That's ridiculous," shouted Catlin, unable to bear this, "I loved Isabel, I would never kill her, never harm her... I...."

  "And he's a Puritan and they're all whoremongers who preach against whores so nobody guesses wot they get up to!" shouted another woman.

  "I... I was at the Tower all this morning, I was concerned on State business..."

  Fleetwood was standing up, his hand on his sword hilt. Even Bald Will had a hand on his shiny new poinard, whilst young Peter was on his feet, teeth bared, waving the little knife in his fist.

  "If 'e done my sister, I'll slit 'im!" shrieked the boy, "Lying bastard!"

  The noise of shouting was getting louder and louder. Catlin looked desperately for the door to the yard but that was blocked too, by more women who were all crowding in on him, shaking their fists. Fleetwood shouted something but could not be heard. Catlin glimpsed Mrs Morgan sitting back in her booth, her fingers bone-white as they gripped the table, so she was frightened too.

  Suddenly she surged to her feet. She looked very strange as she stood there, her kirtle vibrating, in her modest widow's cap and hat and the face a mere black shape. Although her face was muffled by the mask still, she looked quite frightening.

  "Sirs... and ladies!" she said in a voice which was not raised to a shout but did carry through the noise, "If Mr Catlin did these crimes then he deserves to be burned for witchcraft."

  That made them pause. A hanging was quite exciting, but a burning... Now that they would pay to watch.

  "But I didn't..."

  "However this is not Spain nor France full of papist foreigners, this is England," said Mrs Morgan, her voice strengthening, "And in this land we live under Her Majesty the Queen's rule of law! In this land a man must be tried for his crime. In this land we are honourable. We'll have no Papist inquisition here."

  A few shouts of No, some muttering and scowling but at least they were listening. Would burning be worse than simply being ripped apart by enraged women?

  "Mr Catlin must be given a proper fair trial as to whether he is guilty or not guilty of witchcraft and murder, by a jury of his equals."

  Someone shouted that Catlin's peers should go to Hell with him, and the shouting started once more. Mrs Morgan held up her hand for quiet and to Catlin's amazement, she got it.

  "There's something I don't quite understand," she said, her voice higher now and clear, "If, which is not admitted, Mr Catlin did the killing, why would he call you, Eli
za, to help him get into the room where Isabel lay?"

  There was silence.

  "Surely, anybody who had done such a foul dishonourable thing would slink away quietly and let the body be found by someone else when he was not nearby? Surely only a man who was woodwild would actually call on Isabel's best friend to open up the door for him to see the thing he himself had done? And Mr Catlin may be a Puritan but that does not necessarily mean he is a lunatic."

  There was a little scattering of laughter then. Fleetwood was leaning back, watching Mrs Morgan narrowly.

  "Besides," came another woman's voice from the door to Fleet Street, where the two large women had moved away. "He could 'ardly have killed poor Goody Harbridge when he was busy tupping my whores at the Falcon the day she died and the night before that as well."

  Framed in the door was Mrs Nunn of the Falcon, fists on her hips above her very latest Spanish farthingale and her stomacher embroidered with a picture of naked Grecian gods and goddesses hawking. It was detailed and Catlin remembered it well.

  There was another laugh and the other women parted for her; most of them didn't work for her since they were Whitefriars whores and proudly independent, but she was nonetheless a power in their land. Behind her at the door stood Gabriel Nunn her brother, that had been the most dangerous young upright man in the City and now worked directly for the King of London.

  Fleetwood looked highly amused and relieved. Catlin was hanging his head, quite purple with shame.

  "Is that true, Mr Catlin?" the Recorder asked, "The night Goody Harbridge was killed, you were at the Falcon?"

  Catlin nodded dumbly. Oh God. Why did it have to come out like this? Mrs Morgan knows I am not only a whorekeeper but also that I go to the bawdy houses on the South Bank. Oh God.

  Mind, at least the whores who had looked ready to string him up a moment ago were now giggling and elbowing each other. Bright red and miserable, Catlin concentrated on the ale and spit-clotted sawdust between his boots. At least Mrs Morgan had sat down again. She put her hand on Peter's shoulder and whispered to him firmly.

  "Then maybe not him, but the Devil did it!" shouted Eliza, "I knew it was that Devil, I knew it and it's that lawyer Craddock wot called him up in the night and then argued with him on Fleet Street. You saw the Devil too, din't you Peter?"

  Peter the Hedgehog looked up. "Yers I did," he shouted, "I saw 'im afore he killed my sister Mary!"

  "It's that lawyer!"

  "It's Craddock wot called him up..."

  "Even a lawyer should have a trial..." Mrs Morgan started to say but Shakespeare leaned down to her and muttered something. Catlin couldn't read her face because of the mask but she shrugged and said no more.

  "It was the lawyer, he called up the Devil!"

  "First we'll kill the lawyer!"

  Peter was on his feet waving the knife in his hand. "It was 'im!" he shrieked, "First he wapped 'er and then 'e cut her up, he did!"

  One of the younger whores hushed the shouting and caught his ripped sleeve.

  "Is that what happened to poor little Mary?" she asked.

  There were tears purling down Peter's face. "Yes, 'e did, that bastard, 'e done it wiv 'er and then the missus turned us out and then Mary was gonna go and get money from 'im and 'e killt her, 'e did. He's the Devil of Fleet Street!"

  There was the ugliest roar Catlin had ever heard, made more frightening by being high-pitched. The women were shouting at each other again.

  Fleetwood's man Smith pulled him closer to the Recorder, where Mrs Morgan had her face tilted up to look at the women shouting at each other. She was shaking her head and arguing with Shakespeare in a low voice, so Catlin couldn't hear what she said.

  Mrs Nunn had a jewelled dagger in her hand. She shouted for quiet and got it. And then she led the women out the door and onto Fleet Street, with Peter at her side, jumping up and down, his face purple, screaming about Mary.

  "I thank you for that, ma'am, but now would be a good time for you to go to your chambers," said Fleetwood urgently to Mrs Morgan, "Mr Shakespeare, will you bear her company? Mr Catlin come with me. We still have the body to deal with."

  "What about the Craddocks?" Mrs Morgan asked.

  Fleetwood's face was grave. "There is very little I can do for them until the trained bands arrive and they will only just be mustering now. We must hope that their house is securely shuttered as I'm sure it is. And I must view the body myself."

  "Mr Fleetwood, I think I know how..."

  "Please ma'am, go to your chambers and make yourself safe. If your brother arrives, send him to me. I shall need every well-affected able-bodied man I can get."

  "My brother is a lawyer, sir, not a soldier."

  Fleetwood smiled at her. "So am I, ma'am. But at the root of the fair tree of law is enforcement, the keeping of the law by deadly force. Therefore when riot breaks out, we must put it down at once for riot is the utter denying of law by the people. And so at a time like this, all lawyers are also men of war."

  Mrs Morgan swallowed and nodded. "I shall tell him so, sir," she said.

  "But you are no such thing, ma'am, and so I must command you, go to safety."

  There was a pause, and then she stood up, bobbed a curtsey to him, took her market basket and went to the door with Shakespeare. She didn't look back.

  Catlin watched her, sick and furious with himself. Unless he could somehow bribe her brother, or pressure him, there went his chances of a respectable marriage – not just with Mrs Morgan but with any woman of reputation in the city. It was not to be doubted that Mrs Morgan would not only tell her brother of his whoring but also all her gossips. And her brother might be insulted if Catlin pressed his suit. No doubt the pastor of his church would hear of it. In fact he might have to do penance for fornication... Oh God, what was he thinking?

  And the pity of it was that he rather liked Mrs Morgan. It was true she was too thin and tall for a woman and certainly a great deal too bold and forward and had learned to ape the legal speech of her brother in a manner completely unsuitable for a woman. But at least she had talked the whores out of thinking that he was the Devil who killed their friends. And she had been kind to Eliza, Isabel's friend.

  He sighed and stood next to Fleetwood. "I'd put you in protective custody, Mr Catlin, if I had anywhere to do it," said the Recorder, "But I don't, nor the men to do it with. You will have to come with me."

  They went down the alleyway cursed with the Papist idolatrous abomination in its window. At the first opportunity Catlin found, he had decided to break it with a brick. But not today. Out on Fleet Street there was a lot of shouting. It seemed Mrs Nunn was making a speech.

  At the door were the two men Fleetwood had sent to guard the place, looking nervous and visibly relieved to see their captain arrive. He shouldered past them into the room where Isabel still lay, unseamed and naked. It hadn't been visibly robbed by anyone else which argued a good deal of fear of the Devil. The place smelled of death. Catlin sniffed carefully: apart from that universal smell there was no stink of brimstone but there was still the strongly bitter smell he had noticed before.

  Fleetwood stood by the corpse and took his hat off, stood reverently for a moment. He lifted Isabel's head which was turned to the side, her head was greasy with oil, put it back down on the pillow, looked carefully about the room.

  Then he called his men and they brought in the litter they had for such occasions and put her on it – Catlin helped them, squeamish that they might hurt her when they moved her, although nothing could ever hurt her again.

  "Cut through Hanging Sword Court and Salisbury Court to St Bride's," Fleetwood said wearily, "I'll be on Fleet Street."

  Somebody had brought the horses down from where they had been left outside the Cock. Fleetwood mounted up and raised his brows at Catlin. Catlin shook his head. He would follow Isabel's body to the church where he would pray forgiveness for his sins. There was no point praying for Isabel – only Papists did that. She had already met God's ri
ghteous judgement and wrath for her life and was utterly lost to him. But St Bride's church was respected and he might be safer there than on Fleet Street where the whores and their upright men were gathering.

  Sorrow caught him shrewdly by the throat and he gasped from it. He would never again cup Isabel's beautiful soft breasts, so horribly split by the red chasm done to her by the Devil, he would never again laugh as he lay on top of her, never again...

  He yanked his mind away from his sin and sucked in his breath as hard as he could, held it tight. He was weeping for a murdered whore. What was wrong with him? He walked behind the litter which the young men carried quickly – it wasn't so very heavy. Hanging Sword Court was empty, no longer a carpenter's yard, it was built over with new houses now. Salisbury Court was full of the French Ambassador's men, keeping a wary eye on the entrances. Watching himself from a distance, he somehow spoke to their Captain, a young man with lovely black ringlets and lace on his falling band, showed the Frenchman his warrant. They passed through without any trouble to St Bride's churchyard. He looked sidelong at the men carrying the litter carefully down the steps to the cool church crypt. He helped them when they caught on the corners and they thanked him politely, calling him "sir." One of them casually gripped his shoulder. Catlin could say nothing. There was no deserved condemnation on the man's broad rough face, Catlin thought with surprise, only an unexpected kindness.

  "Did you want to say a prayer, sir?" asked the man, "before we lock 'er up?"

  "I... er... thank you," said Catlin convulsively, grateful for the chance to pull himself together.

  That was right, in fact. He needed quite literally to pull himself together, for he felt as if the parts of himself were breaking apart, as if he were a thing made of clay and an arm was crumbling here and a leg there, leaving only a naked frightened worm behind. So he stood trembling in the little dark crypt with the old knights lying on their monuments, some with legs awkwardly crossed, some with their feet on dogs or lions, with Isabel's body in front of him. He tried to get his thoughts to parade in a line as accustomed, instead of swirling round and round in circles.