‘You don’t look in want,’ she said, still smiling. ‘Though a good meal never hurt no one. Please, eat.’
Acre picked up a piece of the bread she had set before him and essayed taking a nibble. He despised the formidably pious. Each one he had ever known or watched had been a hypocrite of some kind. From observing the old woman for a few days, it was not clear what she was – too old for whoring and too generous for hoarding. Perhaps her having turned her back on one faith and accepting the one that infected her native land sufficiently warranted what was about to befall her. The important thing was, as his friend and brother had pointed out, there were none in York who called her an enemy.
‘You don’t believe in confession, in the here- in the reformed faith, do you?’ he asked. If she was surprised by the suddenness of the question, she did not show it.
‘No. No, we need no priests to ask God for our salvation.’
‘Nor any charity. But I’ve saw you give it.’
‘I share what I have from humanity. Not faith.’ She looked around the one-room house from her position on a stool and smiled. The place was mostly empty, though a good fire was going in the grate with a pot bubbling over it. ‘Not that I’ve much to give, eh?’ She laughed, showing that she still had most of her teeth. ‘Are you seeking to turn to the new faith? Sometimes it happens. Fellows go to the services or not, don’t understand them, but are too afeard to speak even to the deacons. In case they’re accused of being papists, or having been them, or … well, you know how it is, sonny. It’s a sad time, people afraid. Is that why you’ve come? You wish to accept the queen’s faith? I can help you. I have books.’
‘Books?’
‘Aye. In English. Books of faith. Would you like to see them?’
‘Yes,’ he said, smiling. The foolish old goat thought she had captured one like herself – a convert. He could almost sense the fire kindling in her at the prospect. She had already pulled herself up from the stool and crossed to a corner of the room, where an old wooden coffer sat. She opened it and leant in, sorting through papers, chattering as she did so. ‘Pages from the Book of Martyrs. Some of the people mentioned, I was alive when they were murdered.’
Acre slid from his seat. ‘Murdered?’
‘Aye. Many’ve fallen on the path to salvation. When the queen’s sister reigned …’
‘She burnt, didn’t she? When I was a child.’
‘It would be around then, to be sure. Not so very long ago. Cast a right long shadow.’
‘Then we’ve something in common.’
‘What’s that?’ She was still bent over the coffer, digging away.
‘I burnt my parents. Burnt their house to the ground, the false creatures.’ He had crept up behind her, and he stood with his legs apart.
He was not prepared for what happened next.
The old woman, astonishingly spry, wheeled around. Rather than retrieving books from her little chest, gripped in her hand instead was a small, sharp dagger. She swung it at his face and sent him stumbling backwards. His legs hit the stool and he went over it. His heart, which had not sped up as he advanced towards her, started to race. ‘You old bitch!’
‘Who are you? You killer! Who sent you into my house? Papist assassin!’ She held her arm in the air, the dagger pointing downwards. She lunged. He rolled. He heard her blade splitting the floorboard where his head had been less than a second before. The attack seemed to have winded her, and he sprang up, twisted around, and fell on her back. She let out a low moan.
‘You’ll die for that!’ he hissed. He lay for a moment, crushing her, and then felt her weak movements as her arms stirred. She was trying again for the knife. ‘Traitor! Foul old carcass!’ He grasped her arms and twisted them behind her back. An internal snap told him that one of them had broken under the sudden pressure. The fight departed her. For a moment he panicked, expecting her to scream, to draw attention from someone on the street outside, despite the hour and cold. Instead, she moaned again.
Acre grappled her to her feet. She weighed very little. Her head lolled forward as he pushed her ahead of him. ‘Mhmm,’ she said. Then, with more strength in her voice, ‘who are you?’
‘I’m of the true faith, heretic. You know what we do in the true faith?’ Her back stiffened, but she lacked the strength to fight.
‘Oh God,’ he heard her whisper. ‘Oh God.’
‘God hates you,’ he spat. ‘He hates you. He hates me. He hates the false new faiths and the corruption of the old.’
‘Mmph,’ she mumbled. And then, with surprising strength in her voice, she said, ‘boy … you must be an unhappy boy to do what you do to me. God forgive you.’
Still gripping her arms, he pushed her towards the fire and thrust her, head-first, into it. Her screams were brief. She tried at first to rear back, but he knelt down on the back of her legs, leaning back himself to avoid the flames. The pot of stew which had been bubbling away fell in with her.
It took the blessed and much-beloved Mrs Oldroyd longer to die than he would have imagined. As the flames consumed her upper body, still her legs remained stiff. When he judged her to be gone, he got up and pulled her out, using the skirts of her dress to put her out completely. From the waist up, she had become thoroughly blackened. Heavy smoke had wafted back into the room, and the stench of burning meat clawed at the inside of his throat. He left her body lying in the centre of the room and then went to her coffer. The books were there – the dagger must have been hidden beneath them, as an old woman’s last line of defence. He removed them and began shredding them, casting the pages about her corpse.
Before he left, he scrawled on the wall, ‘SO BURN ALL HERETICS’. He doubted Mary Tudor could have done better herself. Mrs Oldroyd had, so he was told, been a fixture of York life, respected both by the heretical and pious Protestants, whom she worshipped with, and the so-called Catholics who pretended their faith and would have the rule of Rome restored, with all its fornicating priests and greedy, grasping bishops. Both camps would be outraged at the discovery. This would be a scene that would stir the blood. Death was always fanned into tragedy when those who suffered it were very old, or very young, or very beautiful. The Catholic north, famed throughout Europe as having tried to resist the heretical English queen, would now draw hatred and scrutiny to the Jesuits. Whatever the knave said, a day of reckoning would come which would see Catholicism washed clean of its venality and corruption, and fit therefore to wipe away the foolish and false sects which had been set up in vain to replace it.
Acre straightened himself up. His little diamond pin had worked its way loose during his labours. He pulled it out and held it to his lips before forcing it back through the loose thread in his doublet and concealing it under his coat.
4
Jack nibbled on a pie crust, careful lest the gravy spill out. It was a communal pie and he did not wish to appear greedy. ‘You tuck in, duck,’ said Doll, watching him as he ate. ‘You eat like a duck, too – there’s nowt to you, like a half-starved whippet.’ The truth was the pie was vile. Jack had heard from other customers in the main taproom that their hostess had once had a success with a homemade stew, and it had gone to her head; now she boasted her taproom as the only one in York that prepared and served its own meals. Grinning his way through another couple of bites, he thanked her, passed the pie on, and retreated to the back room. It was early, but the night was dark. January always seemed to have the dreariest and most miserable of days, and he had grown used to contemplating things in isolated silence; his fellow sleepers had departed for warmer houses with finer fare. He strode into the chamber and threw the door closed without turning.
‘You shouldn’t enter a room without looking around it first.’ Jack jumped. Beside the door stood Polmear, a grin on his face. His beard had grown thicker. ‘Another lesson for you, and for free.’
‘What do you seek?’ It came out more abrupt than Jack had hoped – it betrayed his surprise too much.
‘I’ve come to s
ee what you have for me,’ Polmear said easily, bounding across the room and hopping up on a low table. He drew his legs up and sat, child-like, on top of it. ‘Well? Have you ferreted out the papist scum?’
Jack swallowed before speaking. ‘How did you get in here? Doll – the tavern mistress warned me of no guests.’
‘I’d no traffic with her.’ He tapped the side of his nose. ‘You’ve got to learn how to enter places unobserved, unremarked. You’ve already been schooled in how to change subjects. Not well, though. What’ve you found here? Or who?’
‘You’re just like Walsingham. Just as bad. Just without the same power.’
‘Pfft. I’ve the same authority as our master. The same authority as the queen too. It’s just I don’t have as many folk who believe it.’ He winked. ‘Now, come on. What have you found? I’ll be put off no more.’
Jack swallowed before speaking. ‘I’ve met some men. Might be papists. Hard to know until I win their trust. Where have you been, anyroad?’
‘You’ve missed me, my friend?’ Jack rolled his eyes. ‘Lancashire, if you must know. Lot of trouble in Lancashire these past months. I swear before God, no sooner have these Jesuits been rounded up, or buggered each other to death, than more sneak in through the ports. Devil of a business. How many?’
‘How many what?’
‘How many are “some” men?’
‘Oh,’ said Jack, making a sham of getting comfortable on his pile of blankets. His old false smile twitched at his cheeks and he resisted it. ‘Three, I think.’
‘You think?’
‘Three.’
Polmear swung his legs off the table. When he spoke, his voice had lost some of its cheerfulness. ‘Jack, you can’t be playing at this. Our people want papists found, their plots discovered.’
‘Speaking of plots,’ said Jack, eager to change the subject, ‘I’ve cast around for news of this diamond plot. Have you heard anything?’
‘Nothing. Nothing that suggests that men of our faith are doing anything. There … well, there was some business in a village not too far from here, mind.’
‘The vicar? I heard tell of that.’
‘Lansing. Rotten fellow by all accounts. Looks like he was done in by papists, only … well …’
‘What?’
‘Not really their style, is it? Unless they’ve been given orders from the Pope to start butchering Protestants in their homes. Hard to see how that would win them the love of a country turned away already. More likely to do the opposite, to my mind. Keep us turned away. Disgust us.’
‘The diamond league are meant to be all Protestants,’ yawned Jack. ‘Leastways, the countess and Lord Seton heard in Scotland that they were trying to win the Scotch lot over to them. Protestants wouldn’t be killing their own.’
‘Our own,’ said Polmear, folding his arms. ‘Don’t forget who you work for, Jack. Or who you work with’ His voice turned sunny again. His hand went to his belt. Jack’s eyes narrowed.
‘What’s in that coin purse?’
‘Remarkably,’ said Polmear, ‘some coins. Come, let’s go and have a mug of ale somewhere.’
‘I’m tired.’
‘Wine then. If we can find any. That wakens the blood. Don’t like it myself. Rotten stuff. For women and rich bastards. But I’ve a lesson for you.’ Jack groaned in response. ‘No, a good one this. Listen up.’ He tugged on his own earlobe. ‘A man should drink.’
‘I don’t like it.’
‘Life’s full of things we don’t like. A man should drink, and he should drink every kind of drink that men can brew. Ah, there’s curiosity writ on your face now. A fellow ought to learn exactly what his humours can stand. How much of any drink can sit on his gut before his lips loosen and he starts telling strangers things that might get him killed. Or make him piss himself. Whichever of these things comes first. Come on, let’s have a cupful.’
‘You go, if you like.’
‘It wasn’t a request.’ He skipped over and yanked Jack up from his bed. ‘I’ve a thirst on me. And I’m in a talking sort of mood. Here, you know who’s an arsehole?’
‘What?’
‘Do you know … who is … an arsehole?’ Polmear repeated, slowly. ‘No jest.’
‘Who?’
‘The old dame who runs this place – what did you say her name was there – Dolly?’
‘Doll.’
‘Doll, then. Arsehole.’
Jack laughed, surprised at the randomness. ‘Why?’
‘Too easy to get by. I can read folk.’
‘Well,’ said Jack. He closed his mouth and grinned, diffidence stifling speech.
‘Well what?’
‘Well … I reckon her food comes out of one, anyway.’
‘Ha!’ Polmear slung an arm around him and ruffled his hair. ‘So you can play Sir Jester when you wish. Good lad. Come on, let’s have that drink and a talk and be merry.’
One reluctantly, the other eagerly, they left the lodging house. Out in the street, a crowd was moving. Excited chatter bubbled from it, growing with each step as people were drawn from doorways to join. ‘What’s this?’ asked Jack. Polmear shrugged.
‘What news,’ he shouted, grabbing at a man who was pulling on a coat and stepping out onto the road. ‘What’s happening?’
‘A murder,’ said the man, pulling away. ‘So they’re sayin’.’ Jack and Polmear looked at one another as the fellow launched himself into the crowd. They followed, winding their way along the streets until everyone reached an old, single-room house. The crowd fanned out before it. City officials were holding back those at the front.
‘What’s happened,’ asked Jack, his voice barely above a whisper. Polmear repeated the question more loudly to a woman at the back of the group of onlookers. Jack turned to see that it was Doll.
‘Old Mrs Oldroyd,’ she said. ‘Been murdered.’ She saw then that Jack was standing with Polmear. ‘Oh, it’s you, duckie. No night for a good lad like you to be out. You’ll catch your death.’
‘He’s a big, strong boy,’ said Polmear, giving him a slap on the back that sent him stumbling forward. ‘A mountain one day, not a maypole. You say a woman’s been murdered?’
Doll looked between the two men, curiosity on her face. She seemed to be weighing whether to ask her young friend who his companion was, and evidently thought better of it. Instead she nodded. ‘Set aflame. Sayin’ it’s Jesuit priests what’ve done it.’ She shook her head. ‘Old Mrs Oldroyd. She was a good soul. A poor old woman. Be hell to pay for this. Bloody Jesuits. Haven’t they caused enough trouble in’t north?’
‘Did you know her?’ asked Jack. Polmear shook his head. He had turned his attention to Doll, who had in any case dissolved into tears, and was surveying the crowd. ‘Should we say to the justices who we are? Find out the truth here?’
‘No. No speaking to the men of the city. They have their work and we have ours.’
‘What are you looking for?’
‘Strangers. Strangeness. Sometimes the men who do their crimes lurk amongst the crowd.’
‘Why? Don’t they run?’
‘I don’t know – madmen do mad things. Just the usual looky-loos here. News-seekers. Nothing. The devil among us is too clever for foolish mistakes, by my truth.’ He took Jack by the shoulder and steered him away from the crowd, looking around as he did so. ‘Another good Protestant killed. Could your new friends have done this?’
‘No,’ said Jack.
‘You sound right sure, for a lad who says he don’t yet have their trust.’
‘They wouldn’t harm an old woman.’ He shook his head to emphasise the point. ‘This, and the others … this diamond league. It can’t all be chance. Something strange is happening, Polmear. I don’t reckon it’s Protestants or Catholics. I … something strange is going on.’
‘I think you’re right, laddie.’ Polmear looked again at the crowd, and then back at the direction from which they had come. ‘We’ll have to have that ale some other time.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘To get word out. Never mind. I’ll be seeing you.’ Light on his feet again, he disappeared into the thick of the crowd and then into the darkness of the night. Jack stood awhile, looking towards the house. A gasp and then a chorus of cries went up as a covered stretcher was taken out. The news then rippled through that the woman’s books had been destroyed and a message from the Jesuits left on the wall. When it became clear that there would be no more from anyone official, the people began to disperse. Jack noticed that they were arguing furiously amongst themselves. He turned his back and began to make his way home.
Something stopped him.
Father Thomas, the eldest of the trio of priests he had befriended, and with whom he had recently shared the names of places known for Catholic sympathies, was standing by the porch of a building. He seemed oblivious to the thinning crowd, and simply stood, whistling. Jack paused, watching him. The priest cast a look to his left and right and then tossed an apple in the air, catching it, the model of nonchalance. Too casual, thought Jack. Thankfully, Thomas did not appear to have seen him. He stowed his apple inside his coat and began strolling, his hands behind his back. At a distance, Jack followed.
The priest was up to something, of that Jack had no doubt. His manner, his gait, were odd. He would take a few steps, look from side to side – causing Jack to bob down behind some goodwives – and then continue on his way. About halfway along the street, he disappeared altogether. Jack frowned and moved to where the man had been only moments before – just beyond an alley which ran between two houses. Nothing but the women, still pressing forwards.
Somewhere down the alley, the snap of a twig.
Jack turned and slipped between the houses. Their heavy thatched roofs shrouded the place in darkness, and he could barely see the ground. Yet Thomas could only have gone this way. He crept his way along the right-hand house, his hand to its wall.
On the other side of the alley, from a servants’ doorway cut into the side of the other house, came another sharp crack. He half-turned, expecting to see a dog or a cat, when a black figure loomed out of the darkness and grasped his arms.
Divided Loyalties: An Elizabethan Spy Thriller Page 11