by Sam Burnell
Chapter Six
†
Robert dropped easily from his horse in the street outside Clement’s house and flipped the reins at one of the men who rode with him.
“Wait here, I’ll not be long,” he commanded and strode with the confidence of the rich up the path to Clements moldering office door. Robert didn’t consider knocking and let himself straight in, calling for the lawyer.
“Master Fitzwarren,” Marcus attempted to intercept him as he stepped towards Clements office, “I’ll let Master Clement know straight away you are here.”
“Do that,” Robert commanded, pulling his riding gloves a finger at a time from his hands.
“Please sir, if you would like to wait in the…”
Robert didn’t allow him to finish. “Get to your Master, man, now. Tell him I’m here and I wish to see him” Robert was not for moving.
Marcus knocked and let himself into the lawyer’s office. Even from outside Robert heard the raised high-pitched voice of his legal advisor.
Marcus, his face reddened, returned a moment later. “Sir, he is with a client and asks that you wait please, and he will see you shortly.”
“Well go back and tell him I’m not one of his flea-bitten clients. And no, I will not damn well wait,” Robert spat. Marcus wrung his hands together, stuck as he was between an angry client and an even angrier master.
“I will try, sir…” Marcus ventured, backing towards the door.
“Oh God’s bones, out of the way.” Robert shoved the man aside and advanced towards the door he knew to be Clement’s, wrenching it open.
“Marcus, I told you I was not…Master Fitzwarren, it’s a pleasure as always,” Clement’s voice sounding not all in agreement with his words.
“Hurry up Clement, I’ve not got all day. I’ll not sit in your waiting room like a commoner,” Robert barked.
“I’ll come back,” the small man sitting in the client’s chair opposite Clement offered.
“You stay there Master Green,” Clement commanded. “We will finish our business, then I will attend to this gentleman.”
Robert banged a fist on the panelling releasing a torrent of dust from the niches.
“I can come back Friday, it’s not a problem for me,” Green was rising now from the chair.
“Sit down. We’ll finish our business. Master Fitzwarren will wait his turn,” Clement almost shouted across the desk.
It was too much for Green. He continued to rise, bobbed a half bow at Fitzwarren, and was out of the door in an instant.
Fitzwarren dropped into Green’s seat and smiled at the lawyer. “There then, it looks as if you have time to talk to me now.”
“Every time you come here you put the very fear of God into my clients: Mistress Murrow never came back you know? You, sir, are not good for business,” Clement complained.
“I, sir, am very good for your business and you know it. So how is the De Bernay case coming on?” Robert asked, hitching his feet up onto Clement’s desk.
“I told you last time this would not be quick. I’m waiting for letters back from his lawyers and I have lodged a case with Chancery Court, but all this will take time,” Clement supplied wearily.
“Time, time. Yes, so you keep telling me. And the other matter?” Robert asked; this was the real reason for his visit.
“The papers are in order and your friend is stuck in Marshalsea until someone can come up with the amount, and of course the interest. Prison isn’t cheap,” mused Clement. “He’ll not last long, they never do. It’s a big debt so they’ll have some interest in him at first, a goodly fee would attach to it’s recovery, but very soon they will realise that no-one is coming for him or going to redeem his debt, and then why give him food and water? He’s just a waste of resources.”
“Are you sure?” Robert regarded him closely. “I don’t want him back out of there again.”
“I’m sure. The only way for him to get out of Marshalsea is if someone pays them a hundred pounds, plus interest, and as you say he has no-one. He’ll die soon enough and rot in a common pit.”
“And none of this will be traced back to me?” Robert pressed.
“Not at all. The creditor is fictitious and, under client privilege, no-one can see the papers. As if they would care to even ask anyway,” Clement scoffed.
Robert seemed satisfied. “Good, send me a note when he’s dead then. How long does that usually take by the way?”
“Good God, man, I can’t be exact,” Clement was exasperated.
“Aye, but I bet this is something you’ve done before for your clients, isn’t it?” Robert replied slyly.
Clement reddened. “Two or three weeks, once they realise no-one will pay; then no one can last long without food or water. He’ll have to pay for whatever he wants, and he has no money, no means and no sponsors.”
“Good, two weeks then. I’ll expect your note.” Robert rose and left the lawyer.
Clement cursed his retreating back. Fitzwarren should be grateful for all the work he had put in. It wasn’t easy, there were risks, and he could at least show some gratitude. Clement resolved to put his fee up.
†
It was the following day before they came for Jack. He was dragged out of the cell and into another one opposite. Manacles were clamped round both his wrists, the chain linking them was no more than a foot long.
“There you go,” his gaoler rattled the chains between his two wrists, “you’re a properly dressed debtor now.”
Jack didn’t retaliate. He knew where he was and he was more than aware that survival was going to need every ounce of strength he had. He was wise enough to waste none of it on them. The only change they could make to his circumstances would be one for the worse. So he took their shoves and pushes, and their insults and kept his head bent, his eyes down, and his focus on a place deep inside himself.
“Right then, take him down to see the keeper. You’ll get assessed and we shall see how you fare. I hope for your sake you’ve a family that loves you well,” one of them laughed.
He walked between them and entered the keeper’s rooms. Jack was shivering and he could feel the heat from the fire in the room and was glad of it.
“For the Lord’s sake, Ross, you’ve done it again. How many times have I told you not to put them in there before you bring them to me? Why do you have to subject me to the smell of piss and filth first thing in the morning? Don’t bloody well do it again, do you hear, or you’ll be spending a night in there yourself.” Then addressing Jack, “You, yes you, shift yourself near the door and come no nearer,” the keeper of Marshalsea, one Mark Kettering, instructed.
Jack dutifully backed three steps towards the door.
“I’m sorry, Sir, but I wassna on duty last night when they brought him in. It was late like, and the lads just put him in there for safe keeping,” Ross apologised, giving Jack an accusing sideways glance as if it was his fault.
“Well see it doesn’t happen again. It fair turns my stomach. Right then, we have your papers here.” Kettering found the correct sheet. “So you owe one hundred pounds: quite a sum, quite a sum indeed,” he raised his eyes and looked at Jack over the spectacles. The man before him did not look like a gentleman. Many passed through here that were of a noble birth and Kettering could spot them from a mile away: this was, after all his trade. Gambling debts usually, and their families would be pressed to save the wretches from Marshalsea, either by paying in full and freeing them or by contributing weekly amounts to cover the debtor’s board and lodge and to reduce the balance of the debt. “Mmm, so who shall we apply to for cancellation of this debt, Master Kilpatrick?”
Kilpatrick was the name Jack had seen on the papers Bartholomew had shown him. He knew enough to know that arguing they had the wrong man would do him no good.
Jack met Kettering’s eye. “No one, Sir, there is nobody to press for this debt.”
“Nobody? Are you sure?” asked Kettering. “You do realise where you are don�
�t you?”
“Marshalsea,” Jack replied.
“And you do realise that if there is nobody to discharge this debt for you,” Kettering flapped the sheets of paper in front of him, “then you have no chance of setting foot outside of these walls again?”
“I do know that,” Jack accepted. “There is no-one to pay that debt. I have no family.”
“Oh well, that’s not good is it?” Kettering was looking quite disappointed, a hundred pound debtor did not come his way every day. This man should have proved quite lucrative. You didn’t get into this kind of debt if you were a nobody, and Kettering was quite sure that out there somewhere would be family, a friend, even an employer or a business partner he could press for Jack’s release. It happened often. They came to him full of bravado, but he had his methods, and a few days in the pit usually persuaded them to divulge the names of family and friends who might be able to help with their release.
“Well then, Ross, how much did he come to us with?” Kettering shifted his attention to the gaoler.
“Four shillings and an angel, Sir,” Ross replied.
“Four Shillings and an angel,” Kettering repeated. “That’s not a lot: that is going to buy you four meals and pay for a roof over your sorry head for a week. Are you sure there is no one can save you from this sorry state?”
“No-one, sir.” Jack’s voice was firm.
Kettering was finished with him, “Go then Ross, put him back where you found him,” he waved them from the room, “and leave the door open for a few moments and let some of that stench escape.”
They led Jack back to the room he had spent the night in and opened the door. “Last chance, matey. Is there anyone to help you?” Ross asked. Jack didn’t reply and Ross pushed him hard in the small of the back sending him sprawling on the filthy floor.
“Bloody idiot,” Ross turned the key locking the door.
There wasn’t any light in the room at all. The only variation came from a narrow slice of grey marking the bottom of the door where some light from the gloomy passageway outside leaked in. Jack crawled on his knees until he found the wall. There he sat, back to the wall, knees pulled up to his chest, head bent; alone in the silence and cold of Marshalsea.
†
Richard broke the seal on the letter. He’d written to Jamie at Burton, using Christian Carter as his name. There wasn’t any news of Dan and the other men; they had left and not returned. To be fair he had not expected them to. Burton was a dangerous place, but he had needed to start looking somewhere.
Sliding the letter away, he pulled the open book towards him. After half an hour he heard the bells ringing. Pulled back from his reverie he realised the same unread page still sat before him. Snapping the book shut, he accepted that his tired mind had reached the point where it would work no more. Reluctantly he went to his bed. His was always an uneasy sleep, and he knew tonight would be no kinder to him.
†
A sense of time had finally left him and Jack had no idea how many days he had been there. The dark was absolute, the cold complete, the isolation final. Sometimes he was unsure whether his eyes were open or closed. The fire in his wrists from the crushing manacles felt almost like warmth, pain no longer felt like pain.
Then the terror attacks started, and Jack’s misery was complete. He didn’t know where they came from, but he had begun to recognise the onset of the terrible, paralysing fear.
“No, no, please, please, no, please,” escaped his lips on an anguished sob. Nobody listened, no-one heard and even less cared. Fear, his only companion, crawled from within him and spread, clamping his heart in a hard fist so it hammered in his chest. It pressed his lungs flat so the air wouldn’t fill them and it caught painfully in his throat. Then his body shook; he had no control. The chains on the manacles clanked. Pulling his knees to his chest Jack clamped his arms around them, his head sagged and he begged for it to stop.
†
The door onto the living world opened. The air that flooded in smelt fresh and wholesome. Breathing it in was almost like food for his lungs, unlike the poisoned rank air that filled room to which they had abandoned him.
“Where are you?” called the voice at the door.
“Water,” Jack’s voice cracked.
“Master Kettering wants to know if you’ve got something to tell him. If you’ve had a change of heart?” Ross asked.
“Yes, I have, I need water,” Jack closed his eyes against the sudden light.
“Good lad. Why didn’t you do that before? I tell’d you there was no need to suffer in here, didn’t I. Right get over here and I’ll take you up to see Master Kettering,” Ross was pleased that he would have good news for his master.
Jack pulled himself up the wall and walked to the door, breathing deeply the pure, cleaner air.
“Lord, you do stink,” Ross had a hand over his nose. “You’d think I’d get used to it, but I don’t.” Ross rattled on, but Jack wasn’t listening anymore. He was out, out of the dark for the moment, and that was all he cared about.
“Right then, here we are. Now you just wait at the doorway: you right upset Master Kettering last time.” Ross knocked on the door and opened it when he heard Kettering’s voice on the other side.
“Master Kettering, I’ve brung him up, he’s had a change of heart,” Ross said triumphantly.
“Well that’s most fortunate,” Kettering sounded pleased. “Well then,” he looked back down at the record book in front of him, “Mr Kilpatrick, who can we contact to help relieve you from your sorry state?”
“Water, if I may, please, sir,” Jack begged.
“Let us sort this, then water and food you can have,” Kettering readied a pen.
“I can’t speak, sir, please,” croaked Jack.
“Oh very well. Ross, get him a drink,” Kettering waved his hand impatiently.
A cup was brought and Jack raised it with two shaking hands. “More,” he pleaded finishing it.
“Here, and that’s all you’re getting.” Ross slopped more water into the cup.
Jack drank the second cup slower, grateful for every mouthful.
“Now then, let’s get this sorted out,” Kettering tapped the pen on the desk. “Names please.”
Jack held the cup up and let the last drops run into his mouth.
“Come on, man, I haven’t got all day,” Kettering barked impatiently, and Ross gave him a shove in the arm, making Jack drop the cup to the floor.
“I can’t think properly. If I could have some food please, some…” Jack’s voice was quiet, his eyes downcast.
“I said after we sort this out, now come on…” Kettering insisted.
Jack shook his head, “I can’t remember.”
Kettering slammed down the pen. “Ross take him back. I’m a busy man, and if you are not going to help yourself, then how can I help you?” he finished angrily.
Jack just shrugged.
“Go on, Ross, you know where to put him,” Kettering turned angry eyes on the gaoler.
Ross shoved Jack down the passages of Marshalsea again, complaining bitterly that he, meaning Jack, had made a fool out of him, and he was in trouble with his master on Jack’s account for the second time.
“Right you, in there,” Ross opened a door and stepped back, the smell that rolled out was pure evil.
Jack then did fight back. He could already feel the fear starting to clamp a cold fist around his heart, the blood starting to stop in his veins. He stood little chance, being as he was half-frozen and chained, and the gaoler made short work of propelling him through the door.
The room had a high grilled window onto the world letting in a little light, enough light for Jack to be able to see his new companions. He was no longer alone, no longer by himself: now he shared his confinement with the lifeless debtors of Marshalsea. Their rotting corpses, awaiting final disposal were left to decay in the cold cellar until there were enough to warrant an efficient collection.
Jack screamed in t
he dark. He screamed until his throat hurt. Finally taking a long shuddering breath he realised, with relief, that the fear was passing. A second breath opened his tight lungs further and he let it out noisily.
“God, will there be no end to this?” he spoke to the darkness.
Jack had hated and despised the Church all his life. They had branded him a bastard, and that put him on the same societal rung as thieves, prostitutes and beggars. His birth meant that in a priests eye’s he should not exist. He couldn’t inherit, his final resting place would be a common pit outside the church ground and not interred beneath the hallowed sanctified soil. On the whole he’d not overly cared much. His death, he had decided, would be an occasion long distant and one he could do little about. Jack very much dealt with the here and now, the physicality of existence. His soul, if he had such an ethereal presence, he found it hard to consider.
Sitting in Marshalsea, alone, in the dark, his only companions pain and a hammering in his chest that felt like his very life was trying to escape, was something he couldn’t bear. He wasn’t a bastard, but who knew that? Who cared? If God had a face, Jack had never looked for him before. If he could have bought anything at all, he was forced to admit, what he wanted the most was faith.
He’d seen men go to their deaths well, murmuring the words of a prayer, offering their souls to God, before the axe fell or the rope, if it was merciful, snapped their necks. As a boy he’d watching the hangings and he’d laugh and jeer with the other boys when the rope delivered a choking death, the faces contorted, purple tongues distended, piss pouring down their legs as the bodies convulsed. “God doesn’t love you,” they’d shout at the dying faces, and they’d call it Lucifer’s end: for surely the Devil was taking them straight to Hell and starting their eternal torment on the rope.
Jack didn’t think he would live long. Once, when he was a child, there’d been a lamb rejected by the ewe and it had been brought to the stables and put into a byre. He could never remember why he forgot about it; probably he’d not listened to the instructions he’d been given. But after three days it was dead and he got his backside lashed for the waste of it. So just three days. It was not long he decided.