Plague

by C. C. Humphreys

  So the father, the son—and now for the son’s son. He lowered his eyes and gazed upon his monarch.

  The room was not enormous and he could see him clear, knew his face anyway from closer studies. On the walls of Worcester and the eve of battle, they’d shared a bottle of Rhenish wine and talked of Spanish women. Five years later, in Antwerp, Charles had come to borrow money from the Jew whom Coke warded with his sword. That second time of meeting, he had stood by, silent, head bowed. If young Charles had found out Coke was English, he would have tried to borrow money from him too, such was the impoverishment of his exile.

  He had seen him only once since his restoration, when Coke was among a crowd of returned cavaliers who petitioned the new king to restore to them their family lands, mortgaged for his cause. Charles had listened carefully, suffered obviously, and refused all but a very, very few—of whom Coke was not one. The captain knew why the king had done so. After the turmoil of twenty years, he wanted a settled land to rule over, a chance to refill the nation’s treasury. He would not do that by taking land from those who had acquired it in legal purchase, no matter that it was for him and his father that so much had been given up.

  No, thought Coke, taking a step nearer. I did not blame him. I do not now. I merely took the sole course left to a man with an education largely confined to blades and black powder.

  At his side, Dickon, who’d been much taken with the surroundings and vocally intrigued with all the ailments manifested, was now staring to the dais ahead in open-mouthed wonder. At either end of it, two priests intoned the words for this ritual from the Book of Common Prayer. One held a bowl of water, the other a towel. In the middle of the dais was the third man, the centre of it all—indeed, the very centre of the realm.

  If Coke had expected a weary reluctance, mere duty exercised, he was wrong. Charles did not just dismiss his supplicants with a brush of fingertips and averted eyes; he bent, whispered, laid on his hands like any healer in the slums. The scale of sickness did not deter him. Faces that disease had half rotted away, goitres with the circumference of wheels and the tautness of drums, the lame, the expectorant, the blind, all received the same royal care: both hands placed on the worst of wounds, a head lowered to an ear, a murmured phrase of comfort. It had an effect too: people left the dais weeping with joy, laughing, limps diminished and faces, however disfigured, held higher in hope. Yet the nearer Coke got, the more clearly he saw that the exchange was not one way. Charles’s eyes were as ecstatic. He was a torch, bearing flame, and for the first time Coke wondered whether the king’s touch might not indeed calm some of his ward’s worse excesses.

  The line proceeded slowly, until the captain and Dickon, his jerks already diminished by atmosphere and awe, mounted the last, small stair and paused at the top. Coke had no desire to be recognized, though he was sure Charles, with the thousands that he had met, would not remember him. Still, to distract all attention from himself, he bent swiftly and, while pretending to mouth calming words, dug his fingers into the boy’s armpit.

  Dickon exploded. “G-g-go!” he yelped, squirming sideways. Coke took a firm hold with one hand, removed his hat with the other; then, keeping his eyes and voice low, and returning to his accent of the West, beseeched, “This is my son, Majesty. Will y’elp him?”

  “I will.”

  The king’s attention was off him now, so Coke could watch as Charles reached hands to either side of Dickon’s head. At first the boy shied, like a horse when something comes sudden at it; but soft words gentled him. His tongue withdrew, his eyes centred, he looked up into the dark gaze growing closer. “By the power that comes from our saviour Jesus, and only through his love, I ask that you be healed.” The hands clasped, and Dickon, who usually hated to be held by any but his captain, stilled entirely. His eyes closed, his knees weakened and, for a few seconds, only a monarch’s grip held him up. When Coke stepped in and took the boy’s arm, he felt instant heat, like fire transferred through metal. He looked up. Monarch and highwayman regarded each other for a long moment. Then Coke saw those dark eyes narrow, as if the king sought a memory. So he pulled Dickon, meek as a calf now, gently clear of the royal grasp and down the side stairs to where a second line had formed, twisting around a roped-off area.

  When he’d entered the hall, Coke had noted another group of men on the deep dais. Priests and guards had obscured them from the front, but here at the side he could see them more clearly—and soon spotted his quarry. The Earl of Rochester had been pointed out to him at the Drury Lane playhouse a few months previously, as the new man in town, the latest favourite. And there the puppy was. Today John Wilmot wore peach petticoat breeches, held up God only knew how, as they seemed to dangle untied and well below the hip, pulled down farther by a mass of multi-hued ribbon. His scarlet doublet was short, with a yard of canary linen puffing out of the gap at the waist.

  The youth was just the sort of gaudy popinjay to catch a girl’s eye—and mo re. And he was within earshot, the end of the dais being half a dozen paces to the roped pen where supplicants awaited their second approach to the king and their gold token. Giving up his place in line to the person who’d limped after them, Coke drew Dickon across.

  “My Lord of Rochester,” he called, not soft, not loud.

  His was one voice among a multitude of intoning priests, chattering ill, gossiping courtiers. Rochester, amused in a conversation with Sir Charles Sedley—Coke knew him as another of the gadflies who hovered around the king—did not notice him. But one of the king’s guards farther along the rope did. “Oy,” he said, coming closer, his metal-shod pike tapping the floor, “don’t bother your betters.” Coke ignored him. “Lord Rochester,” he called louder, and this time the eyes, with lashes like heavy veils, flicked to him. “My lord, I bring you a letter—”

  “What did I just say?”

  The guard jabbed the butt end into Coke’s ribs. Pushing the weapon aside, Coke finished his sentence. “From Mrs. Absolute.” The name got attention, if not from Rochester. “A billet-doux, by God,” chortled Charles Sedley. “Isn’t Absolute the name of that actress with the sumptuous tits? The one you’ve been tupping, Johnnie?”

  “It is,” said another of the group, “so perhaps not so much a billet-doux as a bill.” He laughed. “Fellow looks like he could be her pimp.”

  The pike was now placed slantways across Coke’s chest. “Do you know this man, me lord?” the guard asked.

  At last, Rochester spoke. “I do not. Nor—” he hesitated for a moment “—nor this woman he names.” He turned away. “Now, as I was saying, Charlie, the wager.”

  “Sir!” Coke called, pressing against the rope.

  But the pike shaft, pushed hard against his chest, halted him. “You desist, my lad,” said the guard, “or I’ll throw you out. Then your idiot son won’t get his token.”

  Dickon heard the insult and his eyes narrowed. He’d been known to fly at people who abused either him or his guardian. He also had the courage of a lion. The captain felt his own ready anger come; but he held it in and stepped away from the rope, pulling the boy with him. Keeping a firm hold, he moved out of the guard’s sight. He waited, and as the pen filled with the ecstatic in a jostling line, he made sure he always shifted to the rear of it, with people ever ready to go before them.

  At last, the healing was over. The final phase of the ceremony began. Holding on to Dickon, Coke moved slowly nearer. Finally, the last to do so, they climbed the small stair and stood again before the king.

  He beamed at them, obviously relieved to be done. Behind him, the two priests waited with the bowl of water and the towel, while his courtiers jostled, eager to be away and about some other sport. “So, sir,” said Charles, holding up by its azure ribbon the gold coin with his image upon it, “have I helped your son?”

  Dickon was growling, glaring behind him at the guard who’d insulted him—and completely ignoring the king. “As you see,” replied Coke.

  The dark eyes narrowed at the terse r
eply. “Well, sir. I am better with physical ills. I never claimed the power of our Lord to cast out devils.”

  “That is obvious. Since you keep so many about you.”

  The words were not loudly spoken, yet all must have heard them, for even the gossips behind the king fell suddenly silent. The guard stepped upon the stair. Dickon’s growling grew still louder.

  “What do you mean, sir, hah?” Charles’s one eye with the cast in it remained glazed. The pupil in his other eye contracted. “Are you some disgruntled Parliament man come here to insult us?”

  “No, Sire. I fought for your cause and gave up much for it.”

  Charles leaned closer. “Do I know you?”

  “I do.” It was Charles Sedley who spoke. “This is the pander who just now tried to present our Johnnie with some buttock’s bill.”

  “I am no pander, sir. And you should consider when you speak ill of a lady you clearly do not know.”

  He accompanied this with the lightest touch of fingers at his left hip. No sword hung there—none was allowed into the royal presence—but the implication was clear, and the guard grabbed his arm. Coke felt Dickon about to leap, so wrapped an arm around him. The boy wriggled but was held. Other guards moved swiftly closer.

  “Stop! All of you!” the king commanded. Movement ceased. He pointed at the guard. “Unhand him.” The man did and he continued, “And you, sirrah, tell me what you mean by this. To which lady do you refer?”

  “He knows.” Coke nodded at the man at Sedley’s shoulder.

  With the king’s regard upon him, Rochester flushed the same colour as his scarlet doublet and muttered, “I think I do remember now. There is a lady. A woman. Ah, an actress.”

  “A whore,” interjected Sedley.

  “Sir Charles!” the king barked. “Since this woman, whatever her profession, is important to this gallant here, you insult her at your peril. And it is my wrath I am talking about, not his.” He turned back. “What is this lady to you, sir?”

  “Her brother was dear to me. Died in my arms, and in your father’s cause, on Lansdown field. I promised I would watch over her and I have.”

  “I see.” The king studied him a moment. “And what do you believe this earl is to her?”

  For a moment, Coke wanted to blurt out the truth. Shame Rochester before the court—though how much shame would it be when the monarch’s own bastards abounded, some also gotten on actresses? Yet he had his vow to Lucy. She must be the one to tell the man and see her fate in his eyes. So he swallowed, then brought her letter from his cloak. “I believe nothing, sir. I am simply a messenger.”

  He held out the letter. No one moved—until the king did. “Well, if you will not take it from him, you will from me.” Charles snatched the paper. “Come, sir!” The earl accepted it. “Now, read!”

  All watched as the earl broke the seal. His colour lightened as he read. “It is … it is only a summons.”

  “Is it?” The king tipped his head. “One you will answer. Yes?” At the earl’s slight nod, Charles turned back. “Will that satisfy you, Captain?” When Coke started, he smiled. “Yes. Can’t place where or when, but I remember you. And you have a captain’s bearing.” Coke nodded. “ ’Twas at Worcester, sire. On the eve of battle. I had a bottle of Rhenish you were gracious enough to share.”

  Charles laughed. “Greedy enough to cadge, more like. I had precious little liquor of my own that night so I had to steal it from my soldiers. And your name?”

  God’s eyelids, thought the captain. He considered making one up. But His Majesty would probably remember his real one before long. “William Coke, Sire,” he said, bowing. “Ever at your service.”

  “Cock!” yelled Charles Sedley, lurching forward again. “And a captain? Perhaps he’s the Monstrous Cock whose story so diverted us at breakfast. The bloody butcher of Tally Ho!”

  Coke closed his eyes. It was the king who spoke. “Don’t be more of a fucking idiot than God and inbreeding have made you, Sedley. A murderous highwayman would hardly come to stand before his monarch on this occasion.” He turned back. “I apologize for my drunken friend. Youth cannot hold it like us old soldiers, eh? As for my devil—” he gestured to John Wilmot, who was again reading the letter “—I will see he answers the summons. But now, sir, would you care to join us and let me repay the Rhenish I stole from you that night? I would like to hear your story.”

  That was the last thing Coke wanted. One could only hide in plain sight if one didn’t stay in it too long. “Majesty,” he began, without knowing what excuse he could give.

  And then he was spared the need.

  “The evil takes me! Cure me! Cure me!”

  The shouting sounded from the doors, followed by the smack of wood striking wood. A tall man was charging into the hall. Whipstaff in hand, he had used it to strike down one guardsman’s pike, ducked under a second’s swing and now rushed toward the dais.

  It was the driver from the coach crash. Still completely naked, though he appeared to have on apparel as scarlet as Rochester’s, so covered in blood was he. How he was alive, Coke could not guess, but he had seen men in the wars walking around for three days with their guts in their hands.

  He came on, shrieking. The guard who had held Coke descended the stair, pike at port. But the man didn’t even attempt to fight. He dropped straight onto the wooden floor, using the velocity of his run and a body slick with his own blood to slide under the guard and right up to the base of the stairs. Then he was up and before them.

  “Heal me!” he shouted, reaching up for the king, the buboes pregnant and all too vividly black under each armpit.

  But Coke was between them. Shoving Dickon to the side, bending at the knee, he drove the heel of his hand sharp up. He hit the man under his chin, knocking him back and down. The coach driver fell hard, a last cry exhaled on a rush of air.

  “Touch me,” he wheezed, and closed his eyes.

  Then guards were everywhere. Shod pike hafts driven down, kicks flying in to subdue. Coke suspected that they were unnecessary, that the man was already dead, though whether by plague, blows or blood loss he could not know and did not stay to verify. The dais was now a mass of soldiers, priests and courtiers, the king lost among them. Taking his chance, Coke seized Dickon’s hand and fled.

  11

  FINDERS AND KEEPERS

  May 22, 1665

  As the church bell tolled noon, he heard the cry.

  “Ass’s milch! Fresh from the teat! Sweet as honey!”

  Pitman rose. His son would arrive soon, and Josiah hated the small beer in this alehouse, which was sourer than most. Indeed, the whole place stank, the rushes on the floor unchanged in months, clogged with scraps of food thrown down and the street filth customers’ boots had brought in. The alehouse’s location was its only recommendation: almost opposite the goldsmith shop of Mr. ben Judah, with glass that could be seen through if eyes were not too far removed from it, thick enough so that the shape of the watcher would be but vague from across the pavement, let alone the whole street.

  He would buy both himself and his son ass’s milch. And he would take some back to Bettina. Emptying the remnants of the pint he’d been nursing to further sweeten the floor, then scooping up another tankard that had not been collected, he went outside. The landlord, a thin, scabby-faced fellow, grunted at him. Pitman may not have been a high-spending customer, but he was a steady one, having been there every day for five days now. And in the few hours when he was not, his son was.

  He waited till a larger group was passing, stooped into it, followed the ass and its owner to the corner. There, with one eye still on the Jew’s front door—the shop had not a back, he knew from exploration; its rear wall conjoined with another—he delayed the milch man and offered his tankards for filling. The man set up his stool, took the teats, squirted expertly into the vessels held between his knees. When one was full, Pitman drank it off, returned it for refilling. The milch ass let out a mournful bellow and flicked its tail, befo
re returning its patient gaze ahead.

  As the second vessel filled, Josiah came up. “Here, lad,” Pitman said, handing over a mug brimming white. The boy slurped, but after a few big gulps, his father pulled his hand away from his mouth. “Save it,” he said. “The new barrel of beer’s even fouler than the last. Buy a pint of it later, but nurse the milk.”

  He gave the boy some of the metal tokens that passed for coins—few of the local shopkeepers had much small change, so short was its supply—and watched Josiah till he disappeared inside the alehouse. Then Pitman went down Love Lane and cut across some alleys to avoid passing the storefront, yawning widely. Ever since the Jew had fired that gun over him he’d watched the shop, from an hour before the goldsmith opened at seven till five in the afternoon when he closed. Josiah stayed for a couple of hours more, in case Mr. ben Judah—and more importantly, their quarry—returned. It allowed Pitman to attend to his parish duties as constable, till nightfall.

  He frowned, thinking about those duties now. Only last night the first case of plague in the parish had been discovered in a house three streets over from his own on Cock Alley. With two other constables he had shut up the two families who lived there, hammering planks across windows, bolting the doors on the outside, daubing “Lord have mercy on us” in red upon one exterior wall. The wails of those within had been terrible, and indeed, to close up the sick with the well seemed a harsh thing. But the law was the law, and he saw the sense of it. Keep the plague in that one house and with God’s mercy it would not spread farther … to his own dwelling in Cock Alley.

  And if it did? Well, if his fortune held, he might soon have enough coin to move his family away from the City altogether. A few weeks with his wife’s brothers in Kent, while the whole thing passed over, might not be too bad.

  If his fortune held. Good fortune indeed, or rather God’s blessing, to have spotted O’Toole, the second of Coke’s accomplices in the Hounslow robbery, staggering from a tavern in Whitefriars, so drunk he could barely run and certainly incapable of fighting. He had not been able to tell much more of Coke than Maclean had, having not seen the captain since their joint endeavours. But the five guineas Pitman had collected for depositing O’Toole at Newgate, where he now awaited his short trial and even shorter rope dance, had enabled this watch to be tolerable and had bought his family some food and fuel for the nonce.