London in Chains

by Gillian Bradshaw

  Geoffrey floundered: he did not wish to leave. The whole trip to London was proving much more expensive than he’d expected and he couldn’t afford to pay for his lodgings. He scowled and grumbled an apology.

  His words had, however, hit their target. Thomas climbed the ladder to the loft when Lucy was preparing for bed.

  She and Susan were both in their shifts with their hair loose: they’d been combing out one another’s tresses and checking for lice. They both gasped when Thomas’s head appeared in the stairwell.

  ‘Be easy!’ said Thomas. ‘I only want a word with Lucy.’ He climbed the rest of the way into the loft, regarded the two young women for a moment, then smiled. Lucy had had a moment of terror that his appearance preceded some lustful advance, but the smile was one of extraordinary sweetness. ‘Lord, how pretty you are! So much like your dear mother.’

  Lucy had a sudden vision of her mother as a girl, sitting before the fire of the big farmhouse now owned by Uncle John, combing out her hair while little Thomas sat beside her reading aloud: two children, long ago.

  Then she remembered her mother as that last skeletal shape, lying on dirty sheets, dull eyes staring at the wall. ‘Oh Lord God, have mercy, no more!’ had been her last words. ‘I’m not made of iron.’

  Lucy twisted a hand in her long dark hair and pulled it behind her head, then pulled her coif over it, as though she could stifle the memory. ‘What is it, Uncle?’

  He sat down on the boards of the loft, acknowledged Susan’s presence with a nod and a weak smile, then returned his attention to Lucy. ‘Child, I’m troubled by what your cousin said. I was entrusted with keeping you from harm, and this employment of yours is like to put you in danger.’

  ‘I like it very well,’ Lucy said. Her heart speeded up again.

  ‘My dear, that’s nothing to the purpose.’

  She searched for his eyes, held them. ‘Uncle, you know what manner of thing we print. It’s work you would see done, or so I thought. Why would you hinder it?’

  He winced. ‘I would not hinder it – but I’m sure Will Browne could find another girl to help him, if he set his mind to it.’

  ‘And that would be better?’ Lucy asked sharply. ‘What’s dangerous for me is just as dangerous for another, and the one to replace me might not have as much will to the work as I do.’

  ‘I would not be answerable to your father for somebody else,’ replied Thomas. ‘I fear that your cousin will carry him a report, and he will be angry with the both of us.’

  ‘My father never wants to see me again!’

  He stared, shocked.

  ‘He’s ashamed.’ She’d never said this aloud before and she was surprised that she could speak of it now without tears. When she’d first realized that her father was shunning her, she’d been so sick with rage and grief that she’d been unable to eat. ‘I was ravished in his own barn, and there’s nothing he can do to revenge it or mend it, so whenever he looks at me he feels less of a man. He hates the sight of me! I’ve no doubt that you’re right – that Cousin Geoffrey will tell him tales – but if you think he’ll reproach you, you’re much mistaken.’

  Thomas looked at her for a long time in silence. Then he sighed. ‘Oh, Lord God, man that is in honour and understands not, he is like the beasts that perish! When a man is cast down, he should turn the more urgently to God – not punish his family with his own idolatrous pride!’

  Thomas always had been a godly man. Lucy bowed her head humbly, though privately she wondered why her own suffering should be so purely incidental to her father’s casting down. ‘Amen,’ she said vaguely; then resumed, ‘Do you see, though, Uncle? You don’t have to answer to my father for me, let alone to Geoffrey. As to the work, I like it well, and I . . . I think it tends to the good of the Commonwealth. I know that you and your friends think the same. Since we are agreed on that, don’t, I beg you, put me from it.’

  Thomas sighed, then raised his hands in surrender. ‘How can I argue against my own heart? So be it! Oh, Lucy, you’re a brave girl! I wish your dear mother could see you: she would be so proud!’

  She felt her throat catch: it had been two years since anyone been proud of her. She went over to Thomas and kissed his cheek. He gave her another of those sweet smiles and said goodnight.

  Susan was looking at her curiously. ‘Do you really think that?’ she asked, when Thomas had descended from the loft. ‘That printing these pamphlets is for the good of the Commonwealth?’

  Lucy considered that a moment. ‘Aye,’ she said at last, ‘if the Commonwealth heeds them.’

  She reminded herself of that the following week when William Browne was arrested.

  It happened at Westminster. Browne had let his boldness carry him away: he’d been overheard saying, ‘We have waited many days for an answer; we should wait no more, but take another course.’ When he was asked his name, he’d replied, ‘The time may come when I will take your name!’

  This, however, Lucy learned later; the first she heard of the matter was when she arrived at The Whalebone and found Liza sitting huddled against the press.

  It was the first day of May, but still cold and rainy. They had finished printing The Resolved Man’s Resolution two days before; Mr Browne had carried off the first batch of freshly assembled copies, but the carriage house was still aflutter with printed sheets and Lucy had expected to spend the day stitching. Instead she was confronted with Liza, wrapped in a blanket. The girl looked up miserably when Lucy came in, and announced, ‘My da’s in prison.’

  ‘Oh, Liza!’ cried Lucy, shocked. ‘Don’t you . . . isn’t there somewhere you can go?’ If Liza didn’t have an aunt or cousin or neighbour to take her in, Lucy knew she was going to have to beg Uncle Thomas to give her houseroom. An illegal printworks in a disused carriage house was no refuge at all.

  Liza shrugged. ‘I’ll go to Auntie Moll this morning, but I came here last night with the books.’

  ‘The books?’

  ‘Aye. Da said if there was trouble, bring the books here, the ones he don’t want the wrong people to see,’ elaborated Liza.

  Lucy noticed the neat stack of pamphlets on top of the cases of type; on the floor beside the cases was the bundle of The Resolved Man’s Resolution which Browne had proudly carried off the day before. She stared at it, her stomach cold. She’d known that this might happen, so why was she so shocked?

  There’d be no wages for Lucy now and no sales for the Brownes. What would Liza do? What would Mr Browne do, locked up in prison? Jailers were notoriously greedy, charging their captives extortionate rates for food and bedding: how long could the Brownes afford to pay? ‘Have you told Mr Trebet?’ she asked, flailing for some solid ground.

  ‘Aye, of course!’ said Liza impatiently. ‘He helped move the books, and he gave me my supper, and this.’ She plucked at the blanket and eyed Lucy unhappily. ‘I didn’t want to go home last night, in case the men came to search.’

  The door to the carriage house opened and Ned Trebet came in. He looked pale and anxious, and he stared at Lucy in surprise. ‘Oh, I’d forgotten you! You should have stayed home!’

  ‘Why?’ she asked – and suddenly the chill in her stomach turned to iron. ‘Would Mr Browne have asked me not to come?’

  ‘He’s in prison! Didn’t Liza tell you?’

  ‘Aye. But by what I can see, the pamphlets still need stitching. If we need to hide them, they’re easier to hide folded and stitched than loose.’

  ‘Well, that’s true,’ admitted Trebet, frowning. ‘But I can’t pay your wages for doing it.’ He paused, then went on cautiously, ‘If you’re willing to work unwaged, of course . . .’

  ‘I can’t,’ Lucy said, without thinking. She was a little surprised by her own certainty, and slightly disgusted. If she believed in what she was doing, why was she so determined to get her tuppence a day?

  It paid her way, that was why. Aunt Agnes had now settled on an arrangement of taking tuppence one day and a penny the next: she’d grudgingly
agreed that it covered Lucy’s keep. Without that money Lucy would be nothing but a drain on the household, and while Thomas might agree to support the cause that far, Agnes certainly would not.

  Lucy turned to Liza. ‘Do you know who your father’s customers are?’

  ‘Some of ’em,’ said Liza cautiously.

  ‘I know ’em,’ said Trebet, blinking. ‘The leaders meet here every week.’ He stared at Lucy for a minute, his eyes beginning to brighten. ‘You’re right! We don’t need Will to sell Freeborn John’s Resolution. I’ll just offer it here – aye, and take up a collection for Mr Browne while I do!’

  Liza clapped her hands. ‘Thank you, Ned!’

  He grinned at her, then at Lucy. She grinned back. ‘So,’ she concluded, ‘we have the pamphlets and we know we can sell them. I’ll take my wages when we have a profit. Why should I go home?’

  When Lucy finally got back to the house that evening, tired from a full day’s work, Agnes rushed into the shop to meet her before she’d even closed the door. ‘Where’ve you been all the day?’ she demanded.

  ‘At work, Aunt. I—’

  Agnes slapped her. ‘Liar!’

  Lucy stood in the open door, the mark of her aunt’s hand burning on her face, so indignant that she couldn’t speak. She could feel her fingers curling into claws; Agnes’s face once again became unnaturally distinct – the wattled neck and hot eyes, the spots of colour on the cheeks, visible in the last daylight. ‘You greedy, preaching harridan!’ Lucy said at last. She turned about on her heel and walked out into the street.

  She walked down to the corner, to St Olave’s Street, which led to London Bridge. There she stopped. The light was fading and there were few people on the street; the air was heavy with coal-smoke from a thousand kitchen fires. She told herself that that was why her face was wet with tears – hot on one side, cool on the other, where Agnes had slapped her. She tucked her trembling hands into her sleeves and swallowed repeatedly.

  She remembered her mother dying – ‘Oh God, no more!’ – and then her mind fell into the well-rutted track of the soldiers in the barn; always, always when she was angry she remembered that. She supposed it was because she’d fought them so hard. They’d laughed at her at first; then, after she’d bashed her head into one man’s face and made his nose bleed, they’d beaten her and told her she was making it worse for herself. She probably had – but she’d felt such immense, overpowering outrage that it had been impossible not to fight.

  She wiped her face with an ink-stained oversleeve and tried to set the memory aside so that she could think. For a moment she remembered hitting Agnes; then realized that she’d only wanted to; that, in fact, all she’d done was call her aunt names. She could probably go back and apologize, and things would limp on . . . but she wasn’t going to apologize. Agnes had struck her. Lucy hadn’t even realized that that was a line she’d drawn; she recognized it now that it had been crossed. She would do the chores Agnes assigned while she was in the house; she would give her aunt most of her money – but she would not accept being beaten.

  So what now?

  She could walk back across the bridge, go to The Whalebone Tavern and ask Ned Trebet if she could stay in the carriage house. He’d agree, she had no doubt of it. He was a friend, or so she was beginning to believe. Tuppence a day wouldn’t pay rent, but perhaps she could help at the tavern as well as—

  ‘Lucy!’ came Thomas’s voice from behind her. She turned and saw her uncle running down the street, hatless and coatless. ‘Lucy! Where are you going?’ He stopped beside her, panting a little.

  Lucy touched her cheek. ‘Your wife struck me!’

  ‘But where are you going?’ Thomas asked anxiously.

  ‘I will not stay to be beaten!’

  ‘Child, child! We heard Will Browne was arrested and we had no idea what had become of you!’

  ‘And therefore I should be beaten?’

  ‘She feared for you,’ said Thomas. ‘We both did. If she struck you, it was because her spirits were overwrought. She says you came in as though nothing were amiss and said that you’d been working!’

  ‘But it was true!’ She eyed her uncle warily. ‘We mean to finish the pamphlets and sell them – Mr Browne will surely need the money! I was going to take my wages from the profit.’

  ‘Oh!’ said Thomas, as though this had never occurred to him. ‘You should have explained.’

  ‘Agnes called me a liar and struck me before ever I had the chance!’

  Her uncle shook his head. ‘It was a misunderstanding; clear, it was. Come back to the house, child; beg your aunt’s pardon—’

  ‘Why should I beg her pardon? She struck me and called me a liar!’

  Even as she said it, she felt her indignation ebb. Agnes was her aunt, and Lucy had called her a greedy harridan. It might be true but it was still a sin to say so.

  ‘Oh, come, you used a proud tongue, or so she told me! I will tell her that she was mistaken, but you must kneel and beg her pardon.’

  Running off to The Whalebone was all very well, Lucy realized, but all her things were in Thomas’s loft. She sighed and nodded.

  She followed Uncle Thomas back to the house in silence. Agnes was in the parlour. Supper was on the table but Agnes sat glowering at an untouched bowl of pottage. Cousin Geoffrey was out, which was a mercy.

  Agnes came to a stand, glaring, as Thomas entered with Lucy trailing behind him. ‘She had but gone down to the corner,’ said Thomas. ‘And she says she was at work all the day, finishing the pamphlets so they can be sold to supply money for the Brownes. She will get her wages from the profit.’

  Agnes opened her mouth, then closed it again.

  Lucy knelt and bowed her head; the bare possibility of running off somehow made it easier. ‘I beg your pardon, Aunt, for my proud words. I spoke out of sinful anger and I do much repent it.’

  ‘So you should,’ said Agnes shrewishly.

  Lucy took that as forgiveness and got to her feet. She looked down at her aunt’s bowl of cold pottage and felt suddenly sorry for the woman. Agnes had once been young and pretty, with a prosperous husband and a string of children; now the husband was old and struggling and all the children but one were dead. She was an ageing woman in poor health, trapped in a house and a marriage that were nothing but the ashes of her hopes.

  Lucy was lucky: she could still escape. She had a choice and she felt a sudden hot conviction that once she’d really mastered typesetting, she would have more choices. The threat of Bridewell Prison was a small thing compared to that freedom.

  Four

  The Resolved Man’s Resolution sold all of its five hundred copies within three days. When Lucy went with Ned and Liza to Newgate Prison to visit William Browne and give him the money, he suggested that they print another five hundred.

  ‘We can’t, sir,’ Lucy told him, blushing a little. ‘Our friends want us to print flysheets, urgently. I’ll bring you money from those, though. Can you tell me where to buy more paper and ink?’

  The conflict between Parliament and the Army had intensified and become a wellspring of flysheets. The commissioners sent by Parliament to Saffron Walden to convince the Army to disband had returned to London in failure: the Army wanted its pay and a settlement of its grievances before it gave up the sword, suspecting that once disbanded it would receive neither. It was vocal in its defence, issuing declarations and petitions as fervently as its well-affected friends in London.

  Ned Trebet came into the printworks the day after Lucy was given the first of the Army flysheets. ‘Have you heard this?’ he asked, joyfully waving a sheet of paper.

  She finished the line of type she’d been setting, then looked up at him and raised her eyebrows. ‘Heard what?’

  He grinned. ‘The Parliament-men’s report from Saffron Walden.’ He held up the paper and read out, ‘“The Army is become one Lilburne throughout, and more likely to give than to receive laws”! And this: “Lilburne’s books are quoted by them as statute
law.” That’s what our pamphlets have done!’

  Lucy thought of all the copies of A New-found Stratagem that had gone north to the Army – not the first of Lilburne’s pamphlets that had moved in that direction, she was quite sure. She looked down at the paper on the table, with the half-set forme she’d assembled beside it. The Petition and Vindication of the Officers had arrived at the printworks the previous afternoon, but it was not handwritten. It had been printed: the Army now had a press of its own. Print was flowing in both directions now: mutiny to the Army and sedition to London. She felt a moment of vertigo and clutched the edge of the table. What if Parliament didn’t compromise? What if this was the start of another war?

  She did not have the confidence in the Army that Ned or Thomas did. They had fought as soldiers; she had been raped.

  ‘What’s amiss?’ asked Ned, taken aback.

  ‘What’s that paper?’ she replied, gesturing at the sheet in his hand.

  ‘Oh, this! It’s nothing to fear – only a letter from one of our friends in Parliament. He must miss the meeting this evening, so he bids me show it to the others.’ The grin began to creep back. ‘Have you heard that the soldiers have elected spokesmen? The common soldiers, not the officers! They’ve chosen two out of each regiment, all the men voting for those they best trust, and these spokesmen – they call them Agitators – meet with the officers to determine what the Army should do!’

  What do the officers think of that? Lucy thought, then looked down at the sheet she was working on, which answered the question. The officers, like the men, were angry and indignant. They had fought for Parliament’s cause: now Parliament denied them their pay, scorned their sufferings and called them traitors for petitioning about it! The officers might be willing to let the men take the lead in this dangerous game but they weren’t going to stop it.

  ‘What does Parliament think of that?’ Lucy asked instead. ‘Does your friend say?’

  Ned made a face. ‘The Presbyterians aren’t pleased. But think of it, Lucy! An Army behaving as “one Lilburne throughout”, electing its own choice of men to speak for it!’