Barnaby Gill relished his role as the official guide.
‘Merton College is to the left, next to Corpus Christi, which stands by that woodyard. Back on this side, you can see Lincoln, then Exeter with Jesus College facing them across Turl Street.’ He flapped a wrist. ‘I can never tell whether Oxford is a town in which a university has taken root, or a university around which a town has somehow grown up, for the two are so closely entwined that it is impossible to see where the one begins and the other ends.’
It was a problem that did not afflict those who dwelt in Oxford, where the distinction between town and gown was so marked that the two halves were set irreconcilably against each other. The simmering hostility occasionally spilt over into violence and even into full-scale riot, but there was no sign of either now. A depressing uniformity had settled on the town and made the shuffling scholars merge peacefully with their counterparts among the townspeople. Nicholas Bracewell noted the same look on every face they passed. Players had often visited Oxford but the appearance of a celebrated London troupe should have elicited more than the dull curiosity it was now provoking. Lawrence Firethorn rode at the head of the company as if leading an invading army, but even his martial presence did not arouse interest. Nicholas leant across to Edmund Hoode.
‘Something is amiss,’ he said.
‘Other players are here before us.’
‘The truth may be harsher yet than that, Edmund.’
‘Why do the people turn away from us?’
‘I fear there is only one explanation.’
Westfield’s Men swung right into the Cornmarket then rode on down to the Cross Inn before turning gratefully into its courtyard. The journey had been a lifetime of discomfort but it was happily forgotten now. Oxford hospitality would solve all their problems.
The landlord of the Cross Inn robbed them of that illusion. Short, stout and hobbling on aged legs, he came out to give them a half-hearted greeting.
‘You are welcome, gentlemen, but you may not play here.’
‘We will act in the Town Hall,’ announced Firethorn.
‘Neither there, nor here, nor at the King’s Head nor at any place within the Oxford, I fear.’
‘What are you telling us, landlord?’
‘Sad news, sir. The plague is amongst us once more.’
‘Plague!’
The word devastated the whole company. They had come all that way to be denied the pleasure of performance and its much-needed reward. It was utterly demoralising. Plague, which had so often driven them out of London, had now shifted its ground to Oxford out of sheer spite and made their presence redundant. Disease festered in summer months and spread most easily at public gatherings. Plays, games and other communal entertainments were banned. The lodging of strangers was limited, and pigs and refuse were cleared from the streets. The haunted faces they had seen on their progress to the inn belonged to survivors. Westfield’s Men had no purchase on the minds of such creatures. People who feared that they might be struck down with the plague on the morrow did not seek amusement on their way to the grave.
The landlord tried to offer some consolation.
‘Fear not, sirs!’ he called out. ‘Our mayor will not be ungenerous. You may be given money not to play.’
‘Not to play!’ Lawrence Firethorn shuddered at the insult and bayed his reply. ‘I am being paid not to play! And will you pay the river not to flow and the stars not to shine? Will you give money to the grass to stop it growing? How much have you offered the rain not to fall and the moon not to rise? Ha!’ He smote his chest with lordly arrogance. ‘I am a force of nature and will not be stopped by some maltworm of a mayor. Oxford does not have enough gold in its coffers to buy off Lawrence Firethorn.’
‘We have the plague, sir,’ repeated the landlord.
‘A plague on your plague! And a pox on your welcome.’ He swung round in the saddle. ‘Nicholas!’
‘Yes, master.’
‘Go to this meddling mayor. Inform him who I am.’
‘Yes, master.’
‘And if he dares to offer us money to withdraw,’ said Firethorn vehemently, ‘curse him for his villainy and throw it back in his scurvy face.’
Nicholas Bracewell accepted a commission he knew that he could not fulfil because it was pointless to try to reason with the actor-manager when his blood was up. Plague was too strong an opponent and it had wrestled them to the ground once more. Whenever the company was on tour, Nicholas was accustomed to meeting civic dignitaries in order to get the required licence for performance. Westfield’s Men were usually offered handsome terms to stage their plays but not this time. As Nicholas went off, he resigned himself to the inevitable, yet he was able to snatch one crumb of comfort. A plague town was far too dangerous a place to linger. Even an assassin would keep well clear of the contagion. Nicholas could afford to relax. Inside Oxford, he was safe.
Paternoster Row was famous for its literary associations, and many printers, stationers and booksellers had their premises there. Yet it was here that they found the apothecary’s shop that they sought. After hours of combing the back streets and lanes of Cordwainer Ward, they widened their search and eventually came to the busy thoroughfare that ran along the northern side of St Paul’s Cathedral. Merchants, silkmen and lacemen also lived in the area, which was justly celebrated as well for the number and quality of its taverns. For these and other reasons, Paternoster Row was never quiet or empty and Anne Hendrik was grateful for the reassuring presence of Leonard as she made her way through the crowd in his wake. They were an incongruous couple. His shambling bulk reduced her trim elegance to almost childlike stature. Unused to the company of a lady, Leonard fell back on a kind of heavy-handed gallantry that only made his awkwardness the more poignant.
When Anne called on him at the Queen’s Head, he had been more than helpful, telling her all he could remember about his meeting with the doomed traveller from Devon. She could see why Nicholas had chosen this friend to represent him at the funeral. Leonard might be slow witted, but he was a kind man and completely trustworthy. With touching candour, he told her how he had wept at the graveside and wished that he could do something to avenge the girl’s death. Anne gave him that opportunity. It was pleasant to be with a person who had such an uncritical affection for Nicholas Bracewell, and Leonard’s powerful frame was a guarantee of her safety in the bustling streets.
They visited several shops without success but Anne was systematic. None of the apothecaries was able to help her but each one gave her a degree of assistance, albeit with reluctance in some cases, talking to her about the constituent elements of poisons and sending her on to another possible source of enquiry. The process had taken them into Paternoster Row and they called at the address they had been given. It was a small but well-stocked shop, and the man behind the counter had a neatness of garb and politeness of manner that set him apart from the grubby appearance and surly attitude of some of his fellows. The apothecary had brown hair, a pointed beard and the remains of an almost startling handsomeness. His faint accent joined with his exaggerated courtesy towards Anne to betray his nationality.
‘What may I get for madame?’ he said. ‘Perfumes from Arabia? Spices from the East? My stock is at your disposal.’
‘Does it include poison?’ she asked.
‘Poison?’
‘Do you carry these items?’
Anne Hendrik gave him the list of possible ingredients, which she had first devised with the aid of the surgeon. At each shop, her list was amended or enlarged in line with the advice of respective apothecaries. From the general pool of expertise, she had fished up a final inventory. Philippe Lavalle studied it with interest and surprise. He was a French Huguenot who fled from his native country over twenty years ago to escape persecution. It had been a great struggle to establish himself at first but now, under the name of Philip Lovel, he was a respected member of his profession. Poverty was his chief customer. People who could not afford to send for a doct
or or a physician would come to him. He could diagnose diseases, prescribe cures for many of them and bleed a patient where necessary. Anne Hendrik was not typical of his customers at all and he had assumed she was there to purchase some of the perfumes and spices that he kept in the earthenware pots that were arranged so tidily on his shelves.
‘You want this poison, madame?’ he said cautiously.
‘I want to know if you have sold such ingredients.’
‘But, yes. Everything here is in my shop.’
‘And has anyone bought from you recently?’
‘Why do you wish to know?’
‘Please, sir,’ she said, ‘it is of great importance.’
‘I do not discuss my business with strangers.’
‘Help the lady,’ grunted Leonard in an absurd attempt to sound menacing. ‘She is with me.’
Philip Lovel threw him a scornful glance and ignored him for the rest of the conversation. Loathe to part easily with information about his customers, he yet sensed a hope of material reward. The man was plainly an oaf. Even in the aromatic atmosphere of his shop, Lovel could smell the beer on his visitor. Evidently, he was a drayman or tapster. The woman, on the other hand, was attractive, smartly dressed and well spoken. Money would not be the problem it was for the majority of his customers. Only a strong motive would bring her on such a strange errand, and he was intrigued to know what it was. He returned her list and gave an elaborate shrug.
‘I may have sold these items, I may have not.’
‘If you had, how much would they have cost?’ she said.
‘You wish to buy them yourself?’
‘I am ready to give you twice as much money if you can describe the customer.’
He was tempted. ‘Well …’
‘Three times as much,’ she decided, producing a purse to back up her offer. ‘That poison killed a young girl.’
‘He told me it was to get rid of some rats.’
‘Then you did sell these ingredients?’
‘Four days ago.’
‘On the eve of her arrival in London.’
‘It was an expensive purchase.’
‘How expensive?’
Lovel stated his price and Anne put the money onto the counter. Before the apothecary could scoop up the coins, they were covered by the giant hand of Leonard. The reward had to be earned before it was paid over.
‘I sold him the three powders on your list,’ he said, ‘and some white mercury. Then there was a quantity of opium in a double bladder. When I added a secret potion of my own invention – it is not known outside this shop – he had the means to kill fifty rats. That was his declared purpose and I took him for the gentleman he seemed.’
‘Gentleman!’ sneered Leonard. ‘He was a murderer.’
‘Tell us all you can remember,’ said Anne.
Philip Lovel could remember a great deal because the customer had been as unlikely a visitor to his shop as Anne Hendrik herself and he drew his portrait with care. They were shown his height, his bearing, his features, his apparel. The apothecary even made a stab at the timbre of his voice. Convinced that she was seeing the poisoner come to life before her eyes, Anne committed every detail to her retentive mind. When Lovel had finished, she lifted Leonard’s hand up to release the money then added the same amount again. The information she had just bought was invaluable.
Leonard was slower to react. It was only when they stepped out into Paternoster Row and began the long walk back that his brain assembled all the facts into one coherent picture. He stopped dead and slapped his thigh.
‘I know him!’
‘Who?’
‘I’ve met the man. Even as he was described.’
‘Where?’
‘At the Queen’s Head,’ he recalled. ‘He was there when the ballad was sung about the fire. It turned Nicholas into the hero. I know it by heart, mistress. I’ll sing you a verse or two, if you wish.’
‘The man, Leonard. You say you know him?’
‘Not by name but it must have been him.’
‘Why?’
‘He asked about Nicholas going off to Barnstaple.’ He took off his cap to scratch his head. ‘And I do believe the fellow was there at the Bel Savage Inn to watch the company leave. Yes, I saw him there, I swear it.’
It took Anne a long time to extract the full details from him and she grew increasingly fearful as she listened. The man had secured his poison at the shop in Paternoster Row and prepared it in a form that could easily be slipped into a drink. In killing the girl, he was trying to stop her reaching Nicholas Bracewell, but that part of his plan had miscarried. Since the book holder was now making for the town from which the girl was sent, he himself could become a potential target for the murderer. Why else did the man take such an interest in his departure from London?
Nicholas Bracewell was in danger. Anne had to warn him.
‘I must ask a favour of you, Leonard.’
‘It is granted.’
‘Take me to Shoreditch.’
Chapter Six
The mayor of Oxford gave Nicholas Bracewell the expected response. Local government was effectively suspended and plague ruled the town. There was no possibility of Westfield’s Men acting there, and since they were a body of strangers above a certain number, no inn would be able to give them hospitality for the night. Both as thespians and as travellers, they were being ejected. The mayor was full of apologies but – he used the phrase repeatedly – his hands were tied. Nevertheless, he was able to use them both to gesticulate helplessly and to offer some measure of compensation to the disappointed troupe. He bestowed two pounds on the book holder and assured him that the company would be accorded a very different welcome on their next visit. Nicholas thanked him for his generosity and promised him that they would depart as soon as they had had time to rest the horses and take some refreshment.
When he left the Town Hall, he slipped the money into his purse and decided to leave it there until they had put Oxford many miles behind them. Lawrence Firethorn might be disdainful, but his company needed all the money that it could get and from whatever source. Nicholas decided to give his employer more time to cool down before he returned with the bad tidings and he took a stroll in the direction of the castle. It gave him an opportunity to reflect on the vagaries of life with a dramatic company. Robbed at High Wycombe, they had now been ousted from Oxford. The actors would begin to believe that their tour was damned. Inasmuch as it cut a day off his journey home, Nicholas was an incidental beneficiary of the plague, but that gave him no pleasure. Westfield’s Men needed a performance at Oxford to steady their nerves. After riding into the town as one of the leading troupes in London, they would be slinking away like unlicensed strolling players. The loss of their venue at the Queen’s Head had cast them out into the wilderness.
Nicholas paused to gaze up at the five great towers of Oxford Castle, one of the first stone-built fortresses to be constructed in England by the Normans. Steeped in history and surrounded by a moat, it was a formidable garrison in a town whose geographical position gave it immense strategic importance. Oxford Castle had a proud solidity but it was not enough to withstand an assault by a deadly enemy. As Nicholas watched, a horse and cart came out through the arched gateway with an all too familiar cargo. At the sight and smell of the shrouded figures, he turned quickly away and headed back towards the inn. The plague was insidious.
There were plenty of people in the streets, going about their business, but they did so without any real purpose or alacrity. An air of listlessness hung over the town as neighbours conversed with one another to find out who the latest victims were and to speculate on who would be struck down next. Like inhabitants of a flooded valley, they were waiting helplessly for the plague to wash over them and hoping that they would not be among the drowned. Their fatalism was saddening but it aroused Nicholas’s pity. Westfield’s Men had only lost a performance. Some of the people lurching along the streets had lost family members and friends.
That thought brought Nicholas to an abrupt halt. The crisis that they found at Oxford had obscured the memory of what happened before they reached the town. Without quite knowing how, he had spoken to Edmund Hoode about his own family in Devon and talked at length about his father. It was a conversation that would have been inconceivable only a few days ago when he was still suppressing all mention of his life before his voyage with Drake. His accent placed him firmly in the West Country but he acknowledged no family ties there, until the recent summons from Barnstaple. Yet he discussed his childhood for the best part of an hour with Hoode and trespassed freely on forbidden territory. Nicholas could not believe that he had confided so much personal detail to his friend, and he was amazed that he had been able to confront the spectre of his father without the customary pain and revulsion.
Robert Bracewell was a name he kept locked away in the darkest corner of his mind. He had not even spoken it to Anne Hendrik. On the ride to Oxford, his father had been set free at last. What was more remarkable was that, in talking about someone he despised and disowned, Nicholas actually came to feel vague pangs of sympathy for him and even tried to excuse his faults. Robert Bracewell was a hostage to fortune. Ill luck had dogged him. Shortly after he became a Merchant of the Staple, the last English foothold in France was lost and British merchants were promptly expelled. Queen Mary died saying that the name ‘Calais’ was engraved on her heart, but it was tattooed on the soul of Robert Bracewell. More setbacks stemmed from that first dreadful shock, and Nicholas recalled the locust years when his father trembled on the verge of bankruptcy. It took enormous strength of will to rebuild his reputation and his company. Any man should surely be admired for that.
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