Plague

by Jo Macauley

  “Whoever he is, he’ll be angry when he doesn’t get his three guineas,” John said morosely.

  At the mention of money, the men’s faces changed like the sun emerging from behind a cloud. “Uh, I’m Bob Farnshaw,” said the bigger one, “and this is Selwyn Tanner. Either of those ring a bell?”

  “Afraid not,” John said, and their faces fell again as he moved onto the next table. He seemed to be successful with his technique, customers eager to talk to him as he gave his ruse of an excuse.

  “He seems to be doing quite well!” Beth said with a grin.

  Ralph folded his arms. “I suppose,” he sulked. “Well, I’m hopeless at that talking lark. You and silver-tongue John over there can handle that. Me, I’m ’appy with a crowbar in me hand and a locked door to crack open.” He half smiled. “Or a cove’s head. That’s where I’m best served. Fighting, running or climbing in and out o’ things.”

  “That’s why we’re a team,” Beth reassured him. “Good spies work together. We’ve each got our own fields of...”

  Before she could finish the sentence, the plaque above the bar caught her eye:

  By the Authority of His Majesty the KING & the City of London, Mr SEBASTIAN PETERS is Licensed to Serve Beverages in this Place

  “Ralph, look!”

  He followed Beth’s gaze. “Sebastian Peters,” he whispered. “SP! We were so busy asking round the customers, we never thought to check the bloomin’ landlord!”

  Beth pencilled Sebastian Peters? next to the initials SP on the paper. “We need to tell John,” she said. “And find this Sebastian Peters as soon as possible...”

  Chapter Eight - A Close Call

  John was deep in conversation with a group of four men. It took Beth several meaningful glances in his direction before he got the message and came back to their table.

  “Have you found someone?” he whispered urgently.

  “I think we have!” Beth said. “Look at the sign above the bar.”

  John did, and gave a low whistle. “No wonder this place is so bound up with the conspiracy, if the landlord himself is embroiled in it! He could be running a safe haven for every King-killer that Vale recruits!”

  “Let’s not judge him guilty until we’ve found out more,” Beth cautioned, remembering what Strange had told her about making assumptions. “John, you seem to be the most welcome of the three of us here. Can you ask the serving woman where we can find Sebastian Peters?”

  “I’d better get our cover story straight just in case she takes me straight to him,” John said, draining what was left of his beer. “What business might a young scallywag like me have with an innkeeper?”

  “Say you’re looking for work,” Beth suggested. “The plague’s left lots of places short-handed. You look healthy, and there’s a good chance the serving woman wouldn’t be able to hire anyone without the landlord’s say-so.”

  “It’s worth a try,” John said, though his recent confidence seemed a little shakier now. “Wish me luck...”

  All Beth and Ralph could do was watch. They couldn’t hear the words that passed between John and the woman at the table, but it seemed to be taking too long for a simple conversation. Suddenly Beth felt deeply uneasy. Had all the questions John and Ralph had asked roused suspicions? If Sebastian Peters was here, why wasn’t the serving woman showing John right to him?

  A horrible thought occurred to her. What if everyone in the pub was a conspirator? There was only one door to this place. It would be fatally easy for one group of men to block it off, trapping them inside while the rest of the tavern went to work on them. Everyone here could swear blind they’d never seen three young people come into the tavern. Then, many weeks later, their bodies would be fished out of the Thames...

  Beth sat in a cold sweat, glancing at John from time to time, wishing he’d hurry up and come back.

  “You look like you’re sickenin’ for something,” Ralph whispered. “Are you all right? You’re not ... ill, are you?”

  Beth shook her head. “I’m quite well. Just trying not to lose sight of the kind of people we’re dealing with here.”

  “They’re killers,” Ralph agreed. “Don’t you worry, though, Beth. Nobody’s going to lay a finger on you. They’ll have to get through me first.”

  That’s what I’m afraid of, Beth thought. John and I might escape to fight another day, but you’re the kind of boy who’d stand and fight. That could get you killed.

  John finally turned and made his way back to their table, and Beth felt her body sagging in relief, like a puppet on suddenly slackened strings.

  “What took you so long?” she whispered.

  “It turns out Sebastian Peters isn’t on the premises today,” John said.

  Ralph swore under his breath, remembered Beth was there, and glanced at her guiltily.

  “But – I do have his home address,” John grinned. “It’s only a few streets away. Sorry it took a long time, but Bella the serving maid didn’t give it up easily. I had to pretend I’d lost half my family to the plague before she’d take pity on me.”

  “John, you’re a marvel,” Beth said, looking at him appreciatively. She felt bad for underestimating him. “Come on. Let’s go and take a look.”

  * * *

  “Why doesn’t Peters live above his tavern?” Beth asked as they hurried towards the suspected conspirator’s home. “Most landlords do, don’t they?”

  “It seems our Sebastian is something of a family man,” John said. “He has too many children to cram into one room and he needs the others for paying guests, so he had to move his wife and family out into the cheapest lodgings they could find. It’s Bella, that serving woman, who has the upstairs at the Four Swans.”

  “My mum raised six of us in one room,” Ralph said gruffly. “And it was a cellar too...”

  “You’re going to have to change your story, John,” said Beth, ignoring their friend. “Pretending to look for work might have got Sebastian Peters down to talk to us at the pub, but it won’t get us through his front door.”

  “You’re right,” John said. “Let me think...”

  “Or maybe Ralph could get us in through the back door, if we went after dark,” Beth suggested.

  “No, wait. I’ve got it!” Ralph said. “Listen to this. Down at the docks, the ships are always bringing cargoes of wine in. Red wines from France and Germany, sack and brandy from Spain. The vintners buy them up from the merchants, and sell them on to the tavern keepers.”

  “You’re going to pose as a wine merchant?” Beth said with a quizzical frown.

  “Not likely,” Ralph said with a wicked grin. “I’m going to pretend to be a drayman for the vintners! You see, once in a while, a barrel or two goes astray. Many’s the landlord who’ll happily pay for a stray barrel of wine, with no questions asked.”

  “You can’t sell stolen wine!” John exclaimed. “Especially if it doesn’t even exist!”

  “Don’t have to sell it,” smirked Ralph. “Just need to ask if he’s interested, hem and haw, haggle over the price. That should get our foot in the door.”

  “That could just work!” Beth said with genuine admiration. “If you can keep him talking, John and I can have a look around for clues.”

  Their path took them down a shadowy, narrow lane where the houses pressed in so close to each other that washing lines had been strung between the upper windows. Beth instantly felt she had to be on her guard. This was a London very far from all the bright boutiques and parlours – it was an area where the citizens had grimy faces and shoeless feet. Heads popped up at the windows to stare at them as they passed. Shutters were hastily banged to.

  “Are you sure this is the way?” she asked John uncertainly.

  “The street we want is at the end of this row, on the right,” John assured her, though he sounded a little nervous himself.

  Without warning, a group of five or six children – Beth couldn’t even tell how many – came charging out of one of the houses an
d running up the street towards them. Mostly boys, they wore ragged shirts and breeches tied with string. A babble of half-friendly, half-aggressive shouts rained down on the three of them:

  “Where you going, miss?”

  “What you doing down here?”

  “Spare a farthing for a poor orphan, do.”

  “Is he your sweetheart, miss? Is he?”

  Ralph cursed as the children danced around him, pawing at his shirt, pulling at his trouser leg.

  “Buy a bunch of violets, mister?”

  “Here comes a chopper to chop off your head!”

  Hands tugged at Beth’s skirt. “Play with us. Come on. Come play with us.”

  “No. Be on with you. Stop it, now,” Beth said through clenched teeth.

  “Leave her alone!” John tried to shoulder his way between them.

  Before Beth knew what was happening, her purse was snatched out of her hands, and the children all ran off in a group, tossing their prize from one to the other, laughing at the tops of their voices.

  “Stop them!” she yelled.

  The children were running away from the streets into the fields and brickworks to the east of Bishopsgate. Once they vanished into that barren place, they’d never be found. Beth’s money was gone – but what was worse, the cipher note was gone too.

  Beth ran a few paces, then stopped. She couldn’t hope to catch up with them. They’d lost the clue that Jeffrey Tynesdale had died to secure. Her heart sank. What would Strange say to her? Only fit for amateur work...

  But suddenly she saw a dark figure sprinting out across the field. Beth was amazed to see it was Ralph. His reactions smart as a cracked whip, he’d taken off running after the children the instant they’d grabbed Beth’s purse.

  “Thank goodness!” she cried. “Get them, Ralph!”

  The children fanned out across the field, each one running in a different direction. They were trying to throw him off the scent; they must be old hands at this, Beth realized. But Ralph already knew which one had the purse. Like a greyhound after a hare, he was gaining on the fleeing child. They had nearly reached the brickworks now. The boy made as if to throw the purse to his friend.

  “No you don’t!” Ralph roared, and flung himself at the thief. He caught him by the shirttail and both of them went down, flailing in the dust. The boy fought like a wildcat, raking at Ralph’s face, and Ralph had to kneel on his chest, grab his wrists and wrench his fingers off the purse before he’d give it up. All the while, the boy kept up a loud torrent of the filthiest language Beth had ever heard.

  With the purse safely back in his hands, Ralph let the boy go. He was off immediately, running like a greased piglet, screaming and yelling obscenities.

  “And your mum an’ all!” Ralph yelled after him furiously. “You can tell her I said that!”

  On his way back to Beth and John, Ralph traded many more shouted insults with the street children, who had retreated to the safety of the brickworks. He was limping badly when he finally pressed the purse into her hands.

  “Hail, the conquering hero!” Beth said with affection. The folded paper was safe at the purse’s bottom, marked with grubby fingerprints, though Beth’s few coins had disappeared. “Thank you, Ralph. I don’t know what I would have done if we’d lost this.”

  “You didn’t get hurt, did you?” John asked.

  Ralph shook his head, wiping away a little blood that trickled down his cheek from a scratch above the eyebrow. “Just kids mucking about,” he said. “Come on. We’ve got work to do.”

  As they headed further down the cramped little lane, Beth’s mind reeled at the overcrowding and sheer poverty of this district. Multiple families seemed to be living in the same house, without any fresh water or outhouses. The stink was unbelievable. Only Ralph’s quick reflexes saved John from being doused with the contents of a chamber pot, emptied out from an upstairs window. These streets were still as crowded as ever, despite the plague. London only seemed empty in the richer quarters because the people who could afford to pack up and leave had already gone, Beth realized. But nobody here had that kind of money. The families here were trapped – and the plague spread quickest where people are all pressed up together...

  “Just around the corner now!” John urged.

  They all started to walk a little faster, spurred on by the thought of what they might learn. Sebastian Peters, Beth thought. We have a chance at apprehending our first real conspirator. He must know something.

  They were all rushing along so quickly, they nearly ran straight into a funeral procession.

  Four young boys were carrying a coffin on their shoulders, and the tracks of their tears left white lines down through the dirt on their faces. Beth had never seen such a pitiful, boxy-looking coffin in her life. Bits of old wood were nailed crookedly together – from the look of it, it had been made of smashed-up furniture: the back of a wardrobe, the bottoms of drawers.

  “Excuse me?” John asked a grave-faced man who stood watching the coffin go by. “Which one on this row is Sebastian Peters’ house?”

  “That’s the only house Sebastian has now,” the man said, pointing. “Four walls and a roof to last him ’til Judgement Day.”

  Ralph looked with horror to where the man was gesturing – towards the pathetic box carried on the shoulders of four young children.

  We’re too late, Beth thought, her heart sinking. The plague has taken him.

  Chapter Nine - A Worrying Discovery

  “Those boys carrying the coffin – are they his sons?” John asked hollowly.

  The man watching the funeral procession gave a curt nod. “Four sons he had, and three girls. And a wife.”

  “Poor things,” Beth said, her heart heavy. Whether Sebastian Peters had been a conspirator or not, these boys were mourning their father. And maybe they’d be mourning their mother too, soon enough. In houses like these, with so many families crammed in together, the plague would spread like wildfire.

  “Do we talk to ’em?” said Ralph reluctantly. “They might know something.”

  Beth looked at the boys’ tearful faces. “I doubt it. And I think their fortunes have been bitter enough already.”

  “That settles that,” John said. “We may as well forget about being able to look around inside Peters’ house too.”

  “Too right. I’m not going inside a plague house, not for anything,” Ralph agreed. “If Strange wants to go poking around in a plague house, he can ruddy well do it himself.”

  “So we’re back to where we started,” John sighed. “Nothing but a piece of paper to go on.”

  “Let’s go back to the Four Swans,” Beth said. “Their landlord’s in a coffin, and they don’t even know it yet. Maybe there’s still some information to be had there.”

  They made their way quickly and solemnly back through the streets to the tavern, but outside the pub Ralph stopped in his tracks. The drayman’s trap door, which led to the tavern’s cellar from the pavement outside, was open. That usually only happened when the draymen needed to drop the barrels down, but there was no sign of a delivery cart. Maybe they were late, or maybe the serving woman had forgotten to close and bolt the trap door.

  Any which way, Beth could see it was an opportunity he couldn’t resist.

  “You’re going down there, aren’t you,” she said with a wry smile.

  Ralph grinned. “You two go on ahead. I’m going to have a nose around – Peters might have left some clues down there.”

  With a quick glance back up the street to check there was nobody watching him, Ralph ducked under the window level and began to climb down through the trap door. He gripped the edge and lowered himself down until he was hanging by his arms like a monkey.

  “Be careful,” Beth warned.

  “I’m always careful,” Ralph panted. “But if I’m not back up in an hour, send out the search party...”

  Beth looked at John. “Let’s go and deliver the ill tidings,” she said. “With any luck, they’ll all
be too busy mourning Peters to give any thought to what might be happening in the cellar.”

  They went inside and the doors swung shut behind them. John ordered more beer, and then quietly broke the news to Bella about her landlord. Word soon spread around the pub, and as the patrons began to eye the two of them curiously, Beth and John quickly moved to sit together in the darkened booth again. She crossed out the name Sebastian Peters, that she’d pencilled on the paper.

  “I’m not certain announcing the landlord’s death to the whole pub was a good way of avoiding attention,” she said ruefully. “Everyone knows our faces now.”

  “Perhaps we can make it work in our favour,” John insisted. “We’ve got something in common with everyone here now. We can talk to them about poor old Seb, and they won’t be so suspicious.”

  His instincts proved to be right. The regulars were much more willing to talk now that they had something in common to talk about. All Beth’s money had gone, but John still had some silver that Strange had given them for expenses, so it was easy to keep the drinks coming in Peters’ memory.

  When John offered to buy a drink for a man with straggly ginger hair and a notch-shaped scar in his upper lip, Beth’s ears pricked up at the name he gave: Robert Mott. Her eyes met John’s and he nodded, recognizing the same thing. RM – the fourth set of initials on the paper. His table was right near the booth, and Beth watched and listened closely as he began to talk.

  “They don’t make ’em like Sebastian Peters any more,” Mott declared drowsily, wiping the beer froth from his stubble with the back of his sleeve. “If you hadn’t the money to eat, Seb would see you right ’til you could pay him back. A saint, that man was!”

  Mott was blinking rapidly and his lips were trembling.

  “You’ll have another?” John was already sliding the money across.

  “Aye.” Mott seemed to come to his senses. “You’re all right, son. Good lad.” He drank deep and coughed. “Damn the plague. Rot its bloody bones. It’s took away my trade and now it’s took away the best man in London. A better man than that fool of a King...”