Rebellion's Message

by Michael Jecks

  But that was the end of the race for me. My head was already pounding like a stone as the dresser chips away the rough edges, and after that slip, I suddenly found that my ankle was beginning to hurt. It started as a dull ache, but quickly it became a sharp, stabbing pain, and putting my weight on it grew harder and harder. Just as I saw Henry turn out of the alley and into a broader way that had to be West Cheap, I was forced to accept that my ankle wouldn’t let me continue. I leaned against the wall and lifted my foot from the ground, staring at it with anger and frustration. I had been so close to him!

  I hobbled onwards, but when I reached the road, he was nowhere to be seen. The sailors all stood with me, gazing about, but there was nothing we could do, and soon I left them to return to their portering duties. We had lost him.

  But that did not matter. Ann had told me where to find him. I bent my steps towards West Cheap and the house near the conduit.

  After my experience the day before at the bishop’s house, I was prepared to exercise caution, especially since I had seen this fellow was capable of murder. I strode to the door with my anger at Ann’s death being moderated by a sense of wariness. The house was quiet, and the noise of the street all about me was enough to persuade me that I was safe enough, for no man would want to commit murder here in the middle of the street, in full view of the whole of London. I was counting on that.

  I hopped up the steps on my poor ankle and rapped smartly on the door. The solid timbers were clearly thick, and my knuckles bruised before I had finished. As the door opened, I suddenly wondered what I could do if he was there now. He could grab me and haul me inside, there to slay me. I would take the route of dissimulation, rather than run that risk, I decided. All the same, I let my hand rest near my dagger’s hilt and fitted a stern expression to my face. I was feeling bolder than usual after seeing Ann die, but no matter how courageous I felt, this was a dangerous task. Still, I had been threatened with the rack the day before. There was little that the men in here could do to me that would be worse. That led me to feel a degree of bravado.

  It was unnecessary. A mild-mannered servant stood gazing at me.

  ‘Yes?’

  The bottler was short and cheery-looking, with apple-red cheeks and a nose that would do service on a vintner’s face after forty years at his trade. I peered behind him, looking for Henry, but he could, of course, have been hiding behind the door. ‘I was wondering if your master was at home,’ I said.

  ‘Sir Peter? I’m afraid he’s not in right now, but can I say who called for him?’

  ‘Eh? Sir Peter? I thought this house was owned by a man called Henry,’ I said.

  ‘Henry? No, sir. It’s the London home of Sir Peter Carew. But he isn’t in the house right now. So if you could allow me to take a message, I shall see that he receives it as soon as he gets in.’

  ‘No. No, that won’t be …’ I paused. There was a glint of anxiety in his eyes. ‘Is Sir Peter this high? Broad shoulders, yellowish eyes, a beard and—’

  ‘Oh, that would be Master Henry Roscard, sir. Henry is a friend of Sir Peter’s, but he is not here just now either. Can I take a message for either of them?’

  I left the house with a small feeling of satisfaction. Henry Roscard had killed Ann after she told me who he was. He must have thought she had outlived her usefulness, just as he had planned to kill me, no doubt. I had his name at last.

  But who was this Carew? If Roscard lived at his house, was Carew also involved? I was beginning to feel that every stone I overturned merely exposed more stones.

  Suddenly, a flock of pigeons scythed through the air just in front of my face, and I recoiled at the clatter of their wings. It was a near panic for me because it was so unexpected, and I felt my heart thundering in my breast as if it wanted to escape and follow the birds.

  There was no safety for me. The bishop had told me as much. Somehow I had thought that if I discovered more about these men, I would learn something that could lift the bishop’s threats, but that was ridiculous! The bishop was too powerful for me to be able to escape him. No, I would have to do as Bill had said: run away. Maybe do as Ann had attempted, and make my way abroad. There were others who had done it – taken a ship and crossed the Channel. It was not a pleasant thought. I grew seasick stepping over puddles, and the idea of spending hours on a rolling set of planks haphazardly nailed together was enough to make me want to spew right now. Still, it was less alarming than the thought of lying on my back with ropes attached to wrists and ankles while a friendly voice patiently asked me questions.

  Yes. I would flee the city, I decided.

  Yet another decision that was soon to be demonstrated to be pointless. I had as much control over my destiny as a bird quicklimed to a branch.

  TWENTY

  I set off to the house at Deneburgh Lane without any great enthusiasm, limping on my bad ankle. I was going to tell Bill that I was off, and then make my way to Southwark by boat before setting off to the coast to find a suitable vessel.

  ‘Master Jack, I hope I see you well?’

  I turned at the sound of a friendly voice, to see that the soldier from the night before was following me. He saw my puzzled expression and grinned widely.

  ‘Master Atwood,’ I said. ‘You surprised me.’

  ‘Call me Dick,’ he said. ‘Aye, well, I consider all the city is in a state of surprise now, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Why?’

  Captain Atwood gazed at me as though I had volunteered to dig the army’s latrines. ‘Because the rebels are nearly at the city walls. Had you not heard? They have already come to the outskirts of the south bank, and soon they must reach the city.’

  I felt my heart plummet. It seemed to join the contents of my bowels, ready to embarrass me. After the soul-searching and decision to flee that I had taken only so recently, to hear now that flight was impossible seemed a cruel twist of fate. Not that I was unused to such bitter surprises after the last few days.

  ‘Are you well, master?’ Atwood asked, seeing my expression.

  ‘I had hoped to leave London and go to see my father. He’s on the coast,’ I lied. I didn’t like to lie to this kindly fellow, but it came so naturally to me. ‘But that’s in Kent.’

  ‘Ah. Is he far? If it is a matter of a mile or a league, you could perhaps hurry there now and bring him back during the night?’

  ‘He lives in Whitstable.’

  Atwood pulled a face.

  ‘You don’t think …’

  He shook his head. ‘It will have been overrun already.’

  I wanted to curse him then – and his cowardice. Although I had invented the desire to see my father, it did seem rich, this soldier, who had gone to defend the realm, gaily telling me that my father was already lost, more or less.

  ‘If you want, you could join the city militia and help us ready the city for defence.’

  ‘I am not made for fighting,’ I said hurriedly. ‘I’ve a poor ankle.’

  ‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,’ he smiled. ‘The main thing is supporting those who will serve the walls and see to them in case of the rebels using artillery. If they cause a section of wall to collapse, we will need intelligent men to direct their repair. And men to help keep the arquebuses loaded and ready to fire, and men to loose arrows. There are many duties for the willing.’

  I didn’t like to point out that my only willingness would have been to ride a horse and remove one more mouth from a lengthy siege. ‘I see.’

  ‘I could ask that you remain with my force, if you wish. I could see to your safety,’ he continued.

  That made more sense. This man was experienced in fighting, as his speech last evening had shown. It was possible that he was a coward and poltroon, but even were that the case, he had demonstrated a propensity for survival that was, to me, inspiring. Perhaps I would be safer in his company than alone. I nodded. ‘It’s not my safety I’m thinking of, naturally,’ I said, ‘but how best I can serve the queen.’

  �
�Oh, yes, of course,’ he said. But there was a gleam in his eye that didn’t convince me.

  Saturday 3rd February

  I was at the bridge with Dick Atwood for the next day, mostly helping manufacture barricades. It was hard work, lifting long baulks of timber and fetching and carrying stone to build into walls, and I was exhausted in the evening when I was permitted to go to my cot. It was not until the Saturday when Dick, whom I had to learn to call ‘Captain’, pointed to the first eddies of Wyatt’s men appearing before us. It was a daunting sight.

  They didn’t come with all the folderol of military splendour I’d expected. There was none of the pageantry I’d seen with the marching Whitecoats when they left the city only six days before. There was only the slow, grumbling rumble at first, the clatter of approaching carts and wagons on the road, the creaking of leather, the rattle of cook pans and weaponry making a din that could be heard over the men on the bridge shouting, the hammering of pegs into the makeshift barricades.

  ‘Aye, that’s them,’ Atwood said.

  I heard a new note in his voice. It wasn’t anger or fear, the Lord knows. I was coming to appreciate that Atwood was no coward. Yet there was a different tone. A blend of resignation, acceptance and – did I imagine it? – respect all commingled, like the elements used to make blackpowder – and, like that, all ready to accept the slightest spark to flare into noise and fury.

  Then, about the corner of the road, far in the distance, a section of riders appeared. They were well mounted, and, from the gleams and sparkles, they were well covered at breast and arm, thigh and head. They trotted easily up the road, far out of reach of our grapeshot, and gradually I saw that behind them there moved a great mass of men and beasts. It was an incomprehensible sight. I had seen five hundred Whitecoats as they marched, and I had seen five hundred more men who had volunteered from the city itself, but five hundred is nothing when compared with thousands. The army of Wyatt moved at a steady pace, but it filled the road before the bridge.

  I suddenly realized that all the noise about me had ceased. There was a knot of Whitecoats working at a gun, and a party of volunteers was trying to push a wagon into the road to block it still further, but just for a moment all had paused in their labours and were now staring down the road as though they were watching Death approach. Which, of course, they were.

  ‘Load the guns,’ Atwood commanded. ‘Men, load your arquebuses.’

  I had not received training in using these shoulder-weapons or the cannons, so I was relieved to have the opportunity to divert myself from the sight. In the name of Holy Mother Mary, there were so many of them! My teeth began to chatter. I have never known that before. In all the scrapes that I have survived more or less miraculously over time, I have never found my legs wobbling while my jaw resembles a handful of bone dice as a man shakes them before throwing them down. They did now, and nothing I could do would stop them.

  More men poured into the road in front of me. It was like watching the slow, inexorable movement of a spider across the ceiling. Gradually, the men grew nearer, and their flags and banners became decipherable as crosses and urgings to join them against the tyranny of the queen, or so I thought. They were colourful, anyway, and as they approached, I became aware of troops of horses pulling heavier weapons. These were guns on wagons, and as I watched, there was a hold-up in their advance. Two men rode forward towards the bridge, but stopped when they saw that not only was the drawbridge up, but a span had been removed. They would not cross here unless they had access to wood and skilful carpenters to make good use of it.

  The two had a muffled discussion, and while they spoke, I heard a man giving orders. All in an instant, I was engulfed by smoke and flame, which blasted for twenty yards, and I was choking and coughing, wondering what new evil weapon this was that they were using against us, that could have thrown such foul, sulphurous fumes. When I looked about me, seeking the poor, twisted bodies hit by Wyatt’s cowardly weapon, I was shocked to see all the men moving about frantically, yet none seemed injured, while ahead of me there was a bloody gap in the marching men. Glancing to my left, I saw the men at the nearer gun swabbing and cleaning the barrel, then drying it with a sheepskin wrapped round a pole. They shovelled in powder, and I instinctively winced to see how they threw it in, ramming it home, and then pushed in a large bag with small balls, ramming that too, before quickly clearing the area and standing behind the gun as the gunner held his match up, his hand cupping the vent hole as he gazed about him to check all his own men were safely behind the firing line, and then stood back, setting his linstock to the touch hole.

  There was a flash, a hiss of gas. A cone rose from the vent, and then there was a thunderous bellow as a roiling tongue of fire licked from the barrel, and the thick, greasy smoke coiled and blasted in the direction of the men. More were shattered and flung aside, some torn to pieces as they took the full brunt of the missiles.

  It was a sight to thrill us, but it also appalled in equal measure. After all, I knew full well that they had their own artillery and would shortly be using it against us.

  Atwood looked as though he had the same thought. He held up his hand. ‘Stop firing now. We’ll have time to warm the barrels another day.’

  ‘They must see that they cannot attack us here,’ I said hopefully.

  ‘They may do, aye,’ he said. ‘But I’ve stood against Wyatt already. I wouldn’t put anything past the bastard.’

  The rest of the day there was spent in weary fetching and carrying. Rocks and timber had to be borne along the bridge and used to strengthen the defences, more cannon were shoved and hauled to the front, their massive barrels standing ready to bark defiance and deal death to the enemy. That was how the man next to me put it, anyway. Personally, I didn’t want to be anywhere near those things when they went off again. The noise they gave made my head whirl, and the bruises on my skull thundered in sympathy, while the foul, cloying smoke made me choke uncontrollably. And it was made worse by the fact that the air was still and cold. In warmer weather, with a bit of a breeze, it would have been taken away, but here on the river, the fumes settled; just as the smoke from a house fire rose in a squat pillar and then sank over a house, these fumes loitered too, making breathing difficult.

  I was pleased when I was told that I could take the afternoon off and rest. Atwood himself was to be relieved by another warrior, a happy-go-lucky fellow who went by the name of Sergeant Dearing, but he had not yet arrived, and so I left Atwood there and made my way into the city, taking the road towards the cathedral as though my legs were bound by magnets that dragged me.

  Of course, I did not want to pass near to the inn and get another lump on my pate. Instead, I turned from West Cheap and continued down towards the cathedral, past the grand houses of the canons, towards a little tavern called the Red Dragon down at the south-east corner.

  I was about to enter when a face caught my attention. Close-set eyes, a narrow face, flaxen hair, the black of mourning – it was the woman I had seen with the dead man that morning outside the tavern. I slowed and watched her.

  She clearly had no recollection of my face. As I stood, her eyes passed over me without recognition, and then she walked on past – not with the slow, heavy step of a woman struck with the grim melancholy of sudden widowhood, but with the urgent gait of a lady in a hurry. Perhaps she had been to the church to organize the funeral of her man, I wondered, but just then she turned into an alley between two canons’ houses. Without thinking, I followed her under a low arched way and along a narrow passage. It was not a lonely, quiet corridor like others I have known, but a busy thoroughfare that had tranters and urchins barging into me every few paces. At the farther end, the woman – what was her name? – took a turn from that and into another, much broader lane, and here I realized I knew where I was. It was a road some two hundred yards from where I had first met her husband, a parallel street with that of the tavern where David died.

  I left her a moment, waiting to see if any
one was likely to tap me on the skull again, and then nipped up the treads and knocked boldly on her door.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Standing outside the place, I was struck by the contrast with Roscard’s.

  This was one of those places that a peasant could stare at without feeling jealousy. It was not a house to which any man would aspire. Only a stone’s throw or two from the rich canons’ houses it may be, but it was as different as a pigsty from a palace.

  It was not huge, but everything about it looked dilapidated, scruffy and ill-kempt. It had glass in all the windows, but not a pane was clean; the timber frame had once all been limewashed, and the daub between, and there were rich carvings on all the uprights, but the lime was worn and chipped as though it hadn’t been decorated for three years or more. Just under the roof, where the gable faced the road, there had been painted a coat of arms, but that was so faint now that it was unrecognizable. This place was not owned by a man who worried about proclaiming his position in the world. It was strange. It did not seem to suit the fellow who had died in the tavern’s yard that day. Was this really the home of David Raleigh?

  I was soon confronted by a short, suspicious fellow, who looked me up and down with every sign of distaste. I could imagine him fondling the rosary at his belt in defence at any moment. ‘Yes?’

  ‘I would like to see the lady of the house.’

  ‘She’s not likely to want to see you. Piss off!’

  He began to shut the door, but my boot moved faster. I smiled at him winningly, bringing the full power of my good looks to his attention. ‘I’ve heard about her husband. I want to pay my respects and mention something to her that could be of interest. It will be worth her while.’

  This servant wasn’t in the service of the widow for no reason. I had a lot more persuading and cajoling to do before he finally agreed to speak with her, and then he closed the door and left me waiting on the doorstep while he went to consult the lady of the house. Meanwhile, I was subjected to a barrage of insults from the urchins who infested the lane. Wherever there is an inn, tavern or bawdy house, you get the little brutes. They stand about, hoping for a man on horseback to appear so that they can claim a fee for holding the reins while he goes to slake his thirst. As they wait, they are apt to amuse themselves by lobbing derogatory remarks to anyone who takes their fancy. This little band of degenerates was clearly out for amusement and would have taken any target. I happened to be convenient. Usually, I would have thrown myself into the fray with enthusiasm, but today I really craved peace. Nothing that attracted attention was welcome, so I resorted to ignoring them. That only gave them courage. One tow-haired brat was weighing a handful of horse dung and considering flinging it at me when the door was opened again, and I gratefully, and hurriedly, slid inside.