by Peter Tonkin
'I see what has been done,' said Tom. 'I do not yet see what the cypher says.'
'I will translate: "b patient m i goe about to seek the srchr but i fear one man and go where he is punished armaddia man".'
Chapter Seventeen - The Searcher of Jewry
Robert Poley lived in outside the northern wall in Hog Lane, where he lodged with Master Yeomans, an elderly cutler with a trade in the city, and slept with his buxom wife Mistress Joan, as inclination and occasion arose. Tom found him alone next morning when he arrived unfashionably early, showing precious little evidence of having gone to bed at all and threatening to return to his old untrusting ways. But Tom had gone back to Blackfriars after the business in Wormwood House had come to a close, for he had managed at least to change out of his damp and offensively odorous clothes and was willing to put up with Poley's thin lips and dark looks. Also, he brought with him a gallon of ale, a loaf of new bread and a cheese for breakfast. 'I got these from a stall outside Bedlam Gate on the way here,' he infomed his tired host cheerfully. 'I came along Old Jewry and up through Bishops Gate. I was hard put to push past the crush outside Wormwood House. The Watch discovered the old chamberlain dead within just before the City Gates opened this morning, apparently. No one has any idea what's afoot there, so I am told. What sense have you made of the messages, many and various - starting with that from Mistress Kate?'
As he talked, Tom had been tearing up the bread and breaking the crumbly cheese. Poley made no verbal answer, but accepted a pile of food in exchange for a page of close writing and looked for a couple of tankards as Tom read Kate's message fully transcribed.
Be patient, Morton. I go nearby to find the Searcher at first. But I am frightened of one man and I will go to where he is held. (That will be to Bridewell for) he is an Armada man.
Tom looked up. 'All this in so few words?' 'I add a little commentary, here and there, knowing the lady and the situation.'
'So she still thinks Morton is alive,' mused Tom. 'Were they close?'
Poley shrugged. 'I think not. They worked together because I put them together like horses in harness. But they came from different worlds and Morton was never like to climb up into My Lady Kate's for all his pretty smile and winning ways.'
Tom decided to follow that line of enquiry later. After he had met My Lady, perhaps. In the meantime there were more important aspects to the lady's message. 'Are there any prisoners from the Armada still being held in Bridewell? I had thought them all dead long since.'
'A few. Desperate and hardy men, too full of the Devil to die. Dangerous and friendless. Too risky to release, too little thought of in Cadiz to warrant diplomacy or ransom.'
'Such men as our Spaniards might wish to contact. With information or wisdom to share?'
'Perhaps. The elder of our Spaniards is well enough known here and there and at Court come to that. It is Don Antonio Perez. You know his story, I am sure.'
'Yes,' said Tom shortly. 'But such a man as Perez who has been Secretary of State to Philip of Spain and an acknowledged poisoner and spy, would be just such a man as to consort with the ambidextrous assassin, S.D., and with desperate, secret survivors of the Armada, since all are Spanish.'
'Perhaps. But he is an acknowledged traitor to Spain, has sold Philip's secrets to Henry of France and will tell anyone that listens any secrets that they list. He sits high in Essex's eye at present. He is shortly to publish a book of his relations, I under stand, and will dedicate it to Essex, Southampton, Outram and the rest. But I still have no knowledge of your ambidextrous other than his initials. His lover, like as not.'
'It is not their inclinations that disturb me. It is their intentions. And their abilities. Perez is a poisoner, or a man that consorts with poisoners. Morton mentioned poisoners in his letter to you. It was a reference to the play at the Rose. The Man in Mantua is an apothecary who sells poisons to the lover Romeo.'
'That play's a thing that disturbs me. Rapiers and poisons and public disorder. It would be bad enough if it was all simply on stage; but it is spreading out too readily into the world at large. And more than two thousand saw it yesterday alone I am told. It is all the rage. If I had my way I'd close it forthwith and let Master Shakespeare pass the time of day with Master Topcliffe.'
'You distract yourself, Master Poley. We need to find the Searcher before we close the Rose. And we need to look for Mistress Kate and her sinister Don in Bridewell. How in God's name does she propose to get into Bridewell?'
'I sometimes wonder how in God's name she keeps out of Bridewell. But you are right. We must follow her footsteps if we are to track her down safely. To the Searcher of Jewry, then.'
'At the very least, we should be able to learn what it was she wanted to know, even if she never got to learn it for herself.'
The Vicar of St Margaret Lothby, through whose parish Old Jewry ran, was an arrogant, opinionated and unpleasant man. He was very much of the new Protestant stamp, with no sense of the structure of Society and his responsibilities to his betters therein. He had direct communication with God's truth and that put him far beyond any responsibility to man - except to lecture and bully him towards his very doubtful salvation. With women he had no truck at all, being vessels of lust and pools of filth, causes of men's downfall. Angels to the girdle, perhaps; but very devils beneath. And on the rock of this little man's petty obduracy, clearly, the vessel of Kate's investigation had foundered.
'Aye,' said the Reverend Word-of-the-Lord Parris, 'there was a woman here. A very trull from her dress and manner, demanding I tell her where our Searcher is to be found. I sent her on her way to church in her own parish, wherever that may be, and recommended her to her knees weeping and praying for marriage and motherhood according to the Word of the Lord.'
'A tall woman, well-set, with red hair and brown eyes. Fashionably dressed, like as not and softly spoken?' asked Poley quietly, while Tom shifted from foot to foot, thinking that a sound thrashing might bring this young jackanapes swiftly to the better.
'As to her person, it was as you describe. As to her attire, it would have shamed the veriest bawd. As soon as she left I called the Watch and set them after her. An arrant, jetting bawd with all her wares on display like a trull with her oranges on a tray. A compound of lust and whoredom, all frills and furbelows with the breast uncovered, a veritable valley of the shadow...'
'The very dress Her Majesty wore but last week,' whispered Poley, his voice like sand on silk. 'Uncovered, as befits a maiden lady. And as we have Her Majesty in mind, you should be aware that My Lady Kate Shelton, of whom you speak, on whom you set the Watch in God's name, is second cousin to the Queen. Her family has been wardens of Hunsdon Hall for generations and she could have your Brownist cant lashed or racked out of you tomorrow, did she so choose.'
'I fear neither she nor you. I serve a greater-'
'Call not your God down on my head, man, or I will have you at Paul's Churchyard - and for whipping, not for preaching.'
'You mistake me, Master Poley. I meant that I serve the new Lord of Wormwood himself. Baron Cotehel has been here to talk to me now that his title to the lands and possessions of the late Lord Outremer has been agreed. I have his ear at Court, sir, and he has that of Lord Essex. And my Lord Essex has the Queen's ear I am told. So I fear neither you nor Lady Shelton, if she is indeed a lady. But I will help you out of charity. The woman you seek is Hagar Kinch. If you would find her, ask first at the Poultry Counter, for she lives hard by.'
Poley turned to go at that, having had his belly-full of Master Parris. But Tom lingered. 'Was it recently you talked to Baron Cotehel?' he asked.
Parris enjoyed boasting of his influential contacts, clearly. He was much more forthcoming with Tom. 'Indeed. But two days since. He came in the evening, for evensong, and afterwards we talked, almost until the Bellman stirred. Such an earnest and well conditioned young man, mindful of what is due to the Ministry of the Lord. He promises well in himself, and promises much for this parish when he c
omes into his own.'
'And he mentioned the Searcher?'
'In passing only. It was she of course who took away the body of my predecessor here as well as the corpses of the family at Wormwood during the Great Visitation a year since. He wished to ensure, he said, that she too received her just desserts.'
'It is as well, perhaps, he told Kate nothing,' said Tom as they pushed their way through the lingering press outside Wormwood House just as the Watch carried an illwrapped corpse out across the road, heading for the church they had just left and the tender mercies of Word-of-the-Lord Parris. 'Or she might well have been inextricably involved with the way the Searcher gets her just desserts from Baron Cotehel. We'll be lucky to find her alive.'
'Aye,' said Poley. 'From the sound of it we will.'
'And did you notice the timing of My Lord's visitation? He must have been sitting passing the time with this foolish young cockscomb while his Spanish cohort was nailing that old man to the table and carrying off the girl in the attic. But here is Poultry. Now where is the counter?'
They were lucky. The Searcher of Jewry was alive and easy to find. She was old, more than sixty years by her own calculation, for she claimed to have been born before the Queen, in the heyday of Good King Harry. Her body was twisted with age but her hands were big, square and capable. Her face was wizened, worldly-wise and toothless, but there was no doubting the wisdom and strength shining from her clear eyes. She took to Tom, for he was young and good looking and not too grand to flirt with her a little. And that was lucky, too. Poley began the conversation the instant they entered the broken-down shack behind the counter that she called home, having once been married to a long-dead bailiff.
Even before they began to speak, Poley produced a golden angel. The old woman looked at the coin calculatingly. 'It's information, then,' she said. 'The time's long past I could earn an angel any other way.' Poley opened his mouth, but Tom spoke first, lightly. 'Mayhap, mistress, but I'll wager there was a time you could have called down more angels than sing in Heaven, had you a mind to it.'
The Searcher grinned and winked. 'For such a lad as yourself, I'd have opened Heaven's gates with no mention of an angel at all.'
'Still and all,' persisted Tom, 'angels of any kind must be few and far between with Word-of-the-Lord Parris at St Margaret's.'
'Nary an angel in sight up there,' she said. 'He's a hellfire man. And like to get to spend eternity in one of his own sermons, if I have any say in the matter. Which of course I won't. But ask away, gentlemen, and we'll see whether this old head has anything in it worth your precious gold.'
'It's there,' said Poley. 'But you may be hesitant to let it out. So remember, Mistress Kinch, that after the angel comes the stool at St Mary's Steps.'
'You'd never cry witch against me,' whispered the old woman.
'If I had to. With no more second thought than the Reverend Parris.'
'But there will be no need,' said Tom swiftly. 'My friend simply warns that we deal in the darkest matters here. There have been throats cut and rack-wheels a' creak over the matter so far. We need what you can tell us to cast a little light into some dark, dark rooms. You have heard what was done at Wormwood House a day since?'
'I heard old Master Seyton's been taken dead,' she said shifting uneasily. 'Found by the Watch, they said. I'd a mind to go there later myself-'
'No need,' said Tom, his mind leaping like a greyhound at the gate. 'Master Seyton was murdered last night and the house all but wrecked.' He paused a moment to let the information sink in. The woman's eyes widened as the implications hit the Searcher's mind. 'And those that did it ravished Mistress Margaret away with them.'
The broad hand rose shakily to the lined lips. The wise eyes bulged in horror. 'The information that you can give us will help us find her,' said Tom, quietly. 'Help us get her back before they hurt her.'
'Ask, then.'
Poley took over at once, switching from days to years past. 'It was you who took out the bodies of Lord Outremer and his family?'
'Aye. I've been Searcher here since Nell Field died the summer before Armada Year.'
'You registered their deaths and the cause of their deaths.'
'I registered their deaths with Master Scrope the Parish Clerk, God rest him. I
said nothing of the cause.'
'It was not the plague, then?' asked Tom, latching on to the momentary equivocation.
'It may have been, for they were swollen up and black. Even the little boys. But that could have been because they had lain dead a week and more before Master Seyton came to find them. Midsummer it was, and all hot and wet, like this year. But I found no marks or special swellings upon them. No sores or buboes, such as cry out the plague. Master Seyton it was who found them, like I said. He'd been a week away and it seems they all died the day after he left. All in the house, except poor Mistress Margaret in the tower. He'd found them and laid them ready, tidied them up and such, before he called me and the parish. I checked, though, for it is my duty, before I reported to the clerk. But all I could tell him was what Master Seyton told me. They were dead and they had run mad before they died. I could see that of course because of the state of their fingers and their clothes. Mad the lot of them, mad as poor Mistress Margaret; and only she alive. Mad before them, Heaven send her grace, and mad long after.'
'Seyton away when they all died, you say?' said Poley, narrow-eyed. 'That was a monstrous piece of luck.'
'Ill luck for him, poor man. Coming back to that horror near addled his wits. Them all stark dead - his beloved master and mistress; his own wife and sons as was among the servants. The lord's four children, on whom he doted as though they were his own. And poor Mistress Margaret up in the tower a week with only the scraps he had left her and the pitcher of water to sustain her, near famished to death. And she must have heard it all going on, for it can't have been that they died in silence nor anything like it. He never left the house again.'
'He left it an hour since,' said Poley. 'Carried over to the church. They'll be calling for you soon, no doubt, to lay yet another body out.'
'This one won't be pretty either,' warned Tom gently. 'He died hard. And if he was a friend ...'
'Aye, it makes it harder. When it's a friend.'
'Run mad, you said,' continued Tom after an instant's pause. 'He told you they had all run mad.'
'So he said. They had all run wild, convulsing, tearing themselves and each other, ripping away at clothes, walls and doors but none of them strong enough to go into the street and call for aid. Last summer, mind, they'd have never found any for the place was a forest of crosses. With Seyton back, they were planning to go to the country, he told me once. They were only waiting for him before they left the accursed place. More crosses than doors, it seemed sometimes, and the dead cart out every night. We took them up to the Pardon Yard from here, hard by Barbican. And that's where My Lord Outremer and all his household went. Death's no respecter of titles or power.'
'But you've helped Seyton look after Mistress Margaret, haven't you? During the last year?' persisted Tom.
'Lord love you, sir, how could I not? He was only a man after all. He knew nothing of women and their ways. Married a score of years and a father twice over, but the first time she had her monthly bleeding he was round to my door crying death and destruction. For I'm known as a wise woman locally. Wise woman, Master Poley, not witch.
'And I had been midwife to her in any case, all those years back when the little boy came. I'd brought in the new and laid out the old. Of course he came to me.'
Revelation sang in Tom's head like the Heavenly Choir itself. Poley pounced while the Master reasoned. 'A child you say? The mad girl had a child? A boy?'
'Yes. Early in Armada Year. She was run mad already and they had her locked up in the tower even then. A little boy it was. She doted on it and they let her keep it. Her mother and father would never look on her nor on the child, for there was never any father named for it - nor banns read nor
vows exchanged. So it was Seyton and me as looked to it, poor little bastard mite. She was her own wet-nurse, though a lady born and should have been far above such things. And she doted on the babe. I'd watched her with it, or one of the serving girls would, for we never let her have hold of it alone. But then last summer my lord decided the child should go away and that's where Seyton was. Away with the child. Though it was a lovely lisping boy when last I saw him, five years old and sharp as a pin. None of his mother's madness there. He'll be turned six this summer. I don't know where he is, God love him. And never am like to now.'
Ten minutes later, Tom and Poley walked slowly past the great water cans outside the Mercer's Hall where Poultry ran into Cheapside. They were deep in conversation. 'We had best take this to Lord Hunsdon,' said Poley. 'And he'll need to take it to the Secretary. I dare not move and must not stay.'
'Nor even hesitate,' said Tom. 'They sought a will. I supposed it was a will that named a poor mad girl. A daughter to the dead lord, yes, but nothing of import. A botch in the plan; a roughness to be smoothed away. But now it is all changed. The mad woman has a sane son and the dead lord has a living heir and Baron Cotehel is suddenly second in line for the title, so his dogs are out again.
'They knew about Morton and his fears for the family. They know about you and me; they know about Kate and the Searcher back there. They must know about the boy or Seyton would still be sitting in Hell. If we do not act, we die...'
And even as he spoke, a white-faced apprentice came past at a run, crashing almost blindly into them. 'Where away so fast, lad?' asked Tom.
The wild-eyed boy swung round. 'I'm to run for the Watch. There's murder done.'