Inferno

by Jo Macauley

  Ralph and John helped Polly over the wall and into the street on the other side, and while she waited Beth allowed herself a final look back. Behind a curtain of flames, she saw Hewer through the window of the church, clearly still trapped. Their eyes met for an instant, then there was a crackling and a rumbling, rapidly increasing in intensity. The upper part of the wall on that side of the church fell in, bringing half the roof down with it in a cloud of smoke and dust, and Hewer could be seen no more.

  “Come on, Beth!” John shouted from the top of the wall, holding his hand out to her. We’ll be trapped if we don’t run now!”

  With his help, she clambered out of the churchyard. The fire had reached the end of Ireland Yard now, with long flames leaping out of a butcher’s shop on the corner, almost closing that route off. Ralph, who was in the lead, hesitated when he saw the red and orange tongues of flame licking hungrily across their path. But John ran straight past him, carrying Polly on his back now, and covering her face with his free hand. “Keep running as fast as you can – there’s no other way out!”

  Ralph put a spurt on and followed them through the flames, with Beth close behind. She felt the heat scorching her skin and smelled her hair singeing, but it took only a second to come out on the other side. Ralph’s coat sleeve was on fire, and Beth helped him quickly to pat it out.

  But the danger still wasn’t over.

  Fleet Street was ablaze beyond the bridge now, and every way they tried to take was blocked by the fire. It soon became clear that while they’d been in the church the fire had overtaken them, at least on the northern side of the city. But by following the fleeing inhabitants, they found themselves on the last open route down to the river. People were pouring through the legal district where the Inns of Court were situated. Beth was being almost carried along, half off her feet, by the densely packed throng down to the Thames, and then along its banks towards Temple Stairs. There, boats of all shapes and sizes were ferrying escapees further west or across to Southwark on the other side, where she could see crowds lining the river bank. They were looking on in awed silence like spectators at a ghastly play.

  Beth and the others could see that from here it would easy to move further west along the shore if the fire should pursue them. They decided to rest for a moment, and sat on a decaying, upturned rowing boat at the water’s edge, panting hard. Only now did Beth truly realize how absolutely shattered, grimy and hungry she was. Her remaining energy seemed to drain away all at once now that the danger had passed, and she slumped forwards. After other adventures she’d had to come up with an excuse for her scars and torn clothing, but for once everyone in London looked the same or worse. No one would ever guess what she and her companions had been through.

  Ralph had flopped onto his back, and John was next to him, gazing down at the exhausted Polly who had curled up in a ball with her doll. He looked amazed to finally have his sister back, and rubbed her shoulder soothingly.

  “We did it,” Beth murmured.

  John’s brown eyes, weary but shining with the light of relief and triumph out of a soot-smeared face, held hers for a moment. “Thank you, Beth. I’d never have got Polly back without you.”

  She took out her handkerchief and wiped away a black stain from the tip of his nose, and he caught her hand before she could take it away. They were interrupted by a loud cough.

  “Yes – thanks Beth,” said Ralph. “He would never have done it without you. If only you’d had more help. A third person, with a nautical background perhaps ... ?”

  “Oh, Ralph!” John exclaimed in dismay. “Of course I couldn’t have done it without you either! I didn’t mean...”

  Ralph burst out laughing and sat up, slapping John so hard on the back he almost fell off the upturned boat. “Just kiddin’, matey! We’re a team – but some might think Beth’s a bit prettier than me. I don’t want you gazing into my eyes and wiping my nose, so no hard feelings.”

  “But Beth just ... I mean, I...”

  Ralph laughed again and John stopped talking, blushing hard even through the dirt on his face.

  “Come on,” Beth said, suddenly feeling more energetic. “Enough sitting around. Anyone would think we’ve just saved the life of the King and young Polly here in one day!” She stood up. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Chapter Twenty - Aftermath

  Ralph knew London like the back of his hand – every wide thoroughfare, every little back alley and dingy yard. And yet, picking his way through the ruined, smouldering streets he knew so well, he finally admitted to himself that he was lost.

  It was disorienting, even frightening, like a dream from which he couldn’t wake himself. Here he was right in the centre of his home town, gazing about like the country bumpkins on their first visit to the capital who he used to snigger at, lost and bewildered. Supposedly he was not far from where the Mercer’s Hall used to stand. Huge lumps of grey, blackened metal lay among the charred timbers and bricks of ruined buildings. Was this the remains of the lead roof of the Hall, or was he in another district altogether?

  Nothing looked the same. Landmarks that had been there for ever had been destroyed in three days. He could only head towards the afternoon sun as it sank in the west, shimmering orange behind the heat haze and thin pall of smoke still issuing from the ruins of a great city. With every step he scrunched through cinders and smoking rubble, through pieces of bizarrely twisted glass from the many shattered windows. His feet were beginning to burn as the heat leached through the soles of his thin, cheap boots.

  He came across an old man, bent and careworn, sifting through the wreckage of what must once had been his home. A woman of a similar age sat on all that was left of the staircase: three splintered, charred steps leading to nowhere. Her head was bowed, and she was clutching a portrait in a blackened frame, quietly weeping to herself.

  Ralph had arranged to meet John at the Old Bailey, only to finally navigate through the devastation and find that the famous courthouse wasn’t there any more. Luckily, John was.

  “‘When will you pay me?’ say the bells of Old Bailey...” he muttered under his breath as they both surveyed what had once been the courthouse. “I still can’t believe it.”

  “At least it stopped short of wiping out the whole of London,” Ralph replied.

  “What about Culpeper?”

  “He’s fine. I found out he went to stay with his brother in Islington ’til it was safe to come back. Is Polly all right?”

  “Yes. She’s having nightmares and she’s still a bit nervous about going outside, but the children in the street will look after her when I’m not around. And she knows the ‘bad men’ have gone and won’t be coming back.”

  “Can we be sure about that, though? Vale and Groby seem like cats with nine lives,” Ralph said as they walked together through the rubble.

  “But they must have used up at least half of them by now. Besides, if they make another attempt on the King, I doubt they would use the same tactics again.”

  Rumours about an attempt on the King’s life had spread in the days following the crisis near the Navy Board, but the King had already emerged to prove to the public he was unharmed. He’d let it be known that some brave, loyal subjects had once again foiled a secret plot against him...

  As they headed further west, they began to encounter houses and churches unaffected by the inferno. Eventually they reached a district where, with their backs to the desolation, it was possible to believe there had never been a raging fire at all. And finally they arrived at their destination: the King’s Theatre, Drury Lane.

  “Look!” said John.

  They both grinned. Adorning the walls were posters proclaiming the very first performance of the Company’s latest play:

  The Most Excellent & Lamentable Tragedie

  of

  THE EMPIRE DIES

  Mr Samuel Jones..............Alaric

  Mr Benjamin Lovett..............Emperor Honorius

  Mistress Beth Johnson....
..........Flavia

  “But what sayest you, fair Flavia? Triumphant I may be, but I have slain so many of your fellow Romans. How can you still love such a monster as me?”

  Beth and Samuel Jones were sitting among the ruins of Rome – or at least the King’s Theatre version of it. Samuel had proved to be a marvellous actor and had helped her enormously, but Beth was just about to utter her last line in the play and she dreaded the reaction she might get. In comedies, the laughter told her how well things were going, and if necessary she could make changes during the performance. The only way to tell a tragedy hadn’t gone down well was when people began booing and throwing rotten fruit at the end rather than applauding. There had been total silence for this whole last scene – did it mean they were captivated or bored?

  “I prithee hear me, Alaric, when I say that empires may rise and fall but mine love for thee shall never die!”

  As Beth moved to the front of the stage, she curtseying and Samuel bowing, the audience rose like a rippling, inrushing wave; applause and cries of approval echoed around the auditorium. In one of the front rows, Beth caught a glimpse of a beaming John and Ralph leading the ovation. Ralph stuck his fingers into his mouth and let out a whistle so piercing it even cut through the thunderous acclaim.

  She turned to pick out Maisie among the extras at the back of the stage, her face aglow – her friend was resplendent in her Roman noblewoman’s costume, and she looked as if she had been on stage all her life. Half of London came to see these plays, and it crossed Beth’s mind that perhaps Maisie’s father could be here, little realizing he was enjoying his own daughter’s performance. Out of the corner of her eye she also spotted a grinning William Huntingdon in the wings, applauding with gusto. Beth felt a warm glow inside, and the hint of a tear in her eye. She was no longer just a comedienne. She’d been a success in her tasks both as a spy and now as an actress. Things could only get better from here.

  Epilogue

  A group of men sifted through the still-smoking wreckage of what once had been St Ann’s, Blackfriars. One pulled aside bits of fallen masonry and fished out a silver candlestick holder, twisted and bent by the intense heat ’til it resembled a bizarre, strangled, swan’s neck. The clergyman, in his black coat and broad white collar, plucked out a singed but surprisingly intact Bible from under the remains of the lectern. The early September sun shone down on them, but the mood was sombre. Buildings like this had stood for centuries, and even though they might be replaced, things would never be the same again. Faint echoes of countless generations of worshippers: silent prayers, joyful christenings, mournful funerals, lingered within the very stones of places like St Ann’s. Like the fragrance of a flower trampled underfoot, those memories were gone for ever.

  The silence was broken by a shout, and a man’s head emerged from below. It was as if a soul from one of the graves beneath the aisle had been disturbed by the destruction of his eternal resting place. But he was one of the searchers.

  “A body!” he cried. “In the crypt. Too bad to recognize...”

  But as he watched from inside a burnt-out, half-collapsed house in Ireland Yard, one man nearby knew who the perished man was without needing to see him. His own men had already checked through the ruins of the church. They’d managed to pull out one poor soul from the wreckage, barely breathing and badly burned, before the authorities arrived. Sir Henry Vale had considered neatening the situation by leaving the wretched man to expire amongst the smouldering beams, but thought better of it. Saving a man’s life buys a special kind of loyalty.

  Before the officials brought the remaining body out of the church, Vale turned his back on the scene and walked away.

  But he would never forget this day.

  Everyone, from that coxcomb of a King to those who worked in the shadows to keep him on his false throne, would pay for preventing Sir Henry Vale’s plans.

  He shook his head. “Time for a longer game, I think...” he muttered to himself as he walked away.

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Beth Johnson

  Actress extraordinaire at the King’s Theatre and – unbeknownst to her admiring audience – a much-valued spy. Tall and beautiful with chestnut brown hair and green eyes, Beth has risen from lowly depths as a foundling abandoned on the steps of Bow Church to become a celebrated thespian and talented espionage agent.

  Sir Alan Strange

  Tall, dark and mysterious, spymaster Alan Strange seeks out candidates from all walks of life, spotting the potential for high-quality agents in the most unlikely of places. Ruthless but fair, Strange is an inspiration for his recruits, and trains them well.

  Ralph Chandler

  Former street urchin Ralph has lead a rough-and-tumble existence, but his nefarious beginnings have their uses when employed in his role as one of Sir Alan Strange’s spies, working in the service of the King.

  John Turner

  Junior clerk at the Navy Board, handsome John imagines himself in more daring, adventurous circumstances – and he soon has the opportunity when he meets Beth Johnson and becomes part of her gang of spies.

  Sir Henry Vale

  Criminal mastermind and anti-King conspirator, Sir Henry Vale was supposedly executed by beheading in 1662 for his attempt to take the King’s life – but all may not be as it seems...

  Edmund Groby

  Squat, swarthy and with one ominous finger missing from his left hand, Groby is a relentless villain and loyal henchman. He hates the monarchy and all it represents, and will stop at nothing to prevent our gang from derailing the King-killer’s plans.

  Maisie White

  A young orange-seller at the theatre where Beth works, Maisie has been quickly taken under the older girls’ wing – but she knows nothing of her friend’s double life as a spy...

  A Letter from the Author

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you have enjoyed this book. While Beth Johnson and her friends are fictitious characters, the world that they inhabit is based on history.

  During Beth’s time, fires were a frequent occurrence amongst the crowded streets of London. Houses were built from wood, and were packed closely together. If one house was set alight, the flames could quickly carry across to neighbouring buildings.

  On 2nd September 1666, after a hot, dry summer, a fire started in a bakery on Pudding Lane. It quickly spread across a huge area of London, wreaking havoc. There was no fire brigade ready with fire engines and pressure hoses to douse the flames with water like there is today. People had to make do with bailing water by hand and tearing down buildings to stop the blaze from spreading further. More than 13,000 houses were destroyed in the fire, leaving around one sixth of London’s population homeless. Lasting five days, it was the worst fire in the history of London.

  Jo Macauley

  Read on...

  ...for a sneak peek of the next Secrets & Spies adventure.

  New World

  The ship’s name was Dreadnought, but that name no longer suited her. To look at the state she was in as she lay moored in Portsmouth Harbour, you would think the tattered hulk would have a good deal to dread. The ship’s carpenter had done the best he could to patch her up, but his repairs looked like make-up on a week-old corpse. If the wind blew too sudden and strong, the mainmast would topple like a rotten old oak. The boards were split below the waterline, and tarred rags could only keep the sea out for so long.

  Her captain, Hugh Tucker, didn’t look too healthy himself. In a dockside inn not far from where his ship was berthed, he sat across the table from a fat man in a wig. Candlelight lit Tucker’s face from below, turning it into a gaunt, bearded skull.

  “I don’t like this job, and I don’t like you,” Tucker said. He was on to his third cup of wine, and it had freed his tongue from politeness.

  “You aren’t being paid to like either,” the fat man said. “My employer is paying you to take his ship where he wants it to go, carrying the cargo he chooses to export.”

  “Cargo!”
Tucker shook his head in disgust.

  The fat man shrugged. “A commodity like any other.”

  “You call a hold full of prisoners a commodity?”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve developed a conscience.” Lucius Bebbington, the fat man, sounded bitter and bored. He took a large fingerful of snuff. “It doesn’t suit you, Captain Tucker. Not with your reputation.”

  “It’s not that!” Tucker grimaced. “And it’s not the money, either. The money’s good enough. But your employer wants me to pack ’em in like so much stovewood!”

  “The Dreadnought is a large ship,” Bebbington pointed out.

  “But three hundred? It’d be like piloting Newgate Prison across the blasted Atlantic.”

  “The more prisoners we can ship to America, the more the government will pay. It’s sound economic sense.”

  “And if we never reach America?” Tucker said, glowering over the candle. “What then? Look, you’ve seen the state of the Dreadnought. That storm off Penzance practically crippled her.”

  “She’s seaworthy enough.”

  “If your mysterious employer would just fork out for repairs...”

  “Oh, let’s not open this casket of worms again.” Bebbington rolled his eyes. “If you’d kept to the agreed course, you’d never have run into that storm in the first place.”

  “I told you, the Dutch would have been on us if I hadn’t!”

  “My dear Captain, calm down. Do you want everyone to know our business?”

  Tucker filled a pipe with shaking hands. Bebbington watched impassively while he lit it.

  “It ain’t like we’d be transporting cattle nor coal,” Tucker protested. “These are criminals. They outnumber the crew! What if there’s an escape, a mutiny?”

  “It’s your job to make sure there isn’t one.”

  “And you’re overloading a damaged ship! The weight of that many people ... if we run into another storm...”