Some of the upright men at the back were shouting and throwing stones at Fleetwood while he read steadily through the Norman French of the old proclamation read by the Lord Mayor of London at the height of the Peasant's Revolt. He was taking his time about it as the long yellow light faded.
"We don't need to hear all this," shouted Mrs Nunn, "We know about it. Give us the Man-witch, the lawyer that called up the Devil to kill us, and we'll all go home." The women behind her growled and shouted and shook their fists. Some of them were drunk but all of them were serious.
"When you have all gone peacefully home," shouted Fleetwood in measured tones, "I will make it my business to arrest Mr Craddock and bring him to trial for witchcraft and treason,"
"Hah!" sneered Mrs Nunn, "He's a lawyer, he'll bring all his friends as oath-swearers and he'll get off. You know he will."
"On a charge of treason, madam?" said Fleetwood, "I very much doubt it."
Mrs Nunn only narrowed her eyes and tapped her foot. "We want him and we don't go home until we get him," she said.
Fleetwood began reading the English translation of the proclamation, which was in the language of two hundred years ago and nearly as incomprehensible as the lawyer-French. He was reading slowly and pompously and Shakespeare had to hide a grin as he realised that the senior lawyer of London was doing his best to bore the mob into dispersing. It looked as if it might even work.
He stole a look sideways at Enys who was very pale and biting her lip. She walked straight out of the alleyway, still panting from the jog up the alleyway and across the street to where the Recorder of London still stood, now disputing with Mrs Nunn, her brother, the frightening thug Gabriel and the urchin with staring hair, Peter the Hedgehog who was bouncing up and down, waving a small knife and shrieking something incomprehensible. At the moment though he was being ignored while Fleetwood and the madam of the Falcon argued. They were watched narrow-eyed by all the whores, the prentices and the trained bands.
And then a rock came sailing over the heads of the London trained bands and struck Mr Fleetwood on his head, making a musical sound as it bounced off his morion. Fleetwood staggered and fell to his knees. The young men of the trained bands, shouted and raised their polearms, the ones who were old-fashioned enough to carry longbows nocked arrows and drew their bows, while the upright men started throwing more stones. The shouting women who had gone quiet by habit to listen to the proclamation, started shrieking and advancing on the front door behind the three ranks of men.
Shakespeare knew they couldn't have worked out where the rock came from, but he knew. He had seen it thrown. He started running for the nearest alley that went round behind the Craddocks' house. He heard Enys shouting but the sound of what he said was drowned out by the roar of the mob as the prentices also started forwards, pushed from behind by the upright men. Once he shouted what he had seen, to try to distract them.
Nobody was listening. Shakespeare put his head down and sprinted, down the alley, right, left and right again. He was sure it was the right alley, but he couldn't see anything useful except some urchins with cunning looks on their faces, clearly waiting for the rioters to break into the lawyers' houses where there would no doubt be rich pickings.
And then he saw a figure in a cloak, with a hood over its head, come out of the yard behind the Craddocks' house. He skidded to a halt, hid behind a corner. The cloaked figure paused when it saw the boys, then it threw some round orange things at them. They were orangeadoes which the boys caught, looked at and some of them began to eat. "Don't eat them, they're poisoned," he said to the boys as he ran past.
The figure hurried down through the alleys. Shakespeare went after it and wondered about trying to stop her, trying to arrest her... But she had managed to throttle the life out of Goody Harbridge and she had killed, by her own account, six other women and although he might have tried his chances with a man, he felt very alone and...
All right. He was frightened. The objective watcher at the back of his head sneered at him and he shrugged. She was a witch. Who knew what else she could do apart from poison people through their ears? He was berating himself for abject cowardice and at the same time he crept along behind her.
She seemed intent and was carrying something cradled in her arms. Was it more poison, perhaps? Or a knife?
She came to the Christ window, paused a moment and then hurried past, down the side of the wall to a door that led into the small yard belonging to the monastery hut. This she opened and bolted behind her, while Shakespeare hid round the corner. When she had gone into the house, Shakespeare boosted himself up onto the wall, down into the small space, and up again onto the wall of Goody Mallow's yard. He lay full-length along it and waited. What would she do? Where could she possibly go?
Maliverny Catlin felt his brain must be melting down through his nose in an unending stream of phlegm. He had woken up crying, slouched in a corner on one of the wall-benches of St Bride's church. He was still crying, as if his eyes had somehow been connected to a freerunning conduit with fresh water from Hampstead Heath,
His kerchief was sodden and slimy by now. Then, suddenly, a not too grubby but dry one was slipped into his hand and he looked up in fright, fearing more phantasms.
It was only an ordinary round-faced man, in a dull dark wool suit, his hat on the bench beside him.
"I cry you mercy..." Catlin stuttered, flushing with shame. The old woman had been embarrassing enough. This stranger with sympathy in his eyes was worse.
"I only came in to pray, " said the man, "for guidance and for mercy and thought you were ill when I saw you weeping in your sleep. If you like, I'll leave."
Catlin shook his head. Actually, he didn't care. Another wave was rising up from his belly, the desolation of knowing that he would never ever see Isabel again; the logic was unimpeachable. Either she was in Hell while he would be with the Elect in Heaven, or more likely they would both be in Hell and part of their torture would be never to meet.
After a moment, the man spoke again, looking down at the scraps of straw on the tiles. "Sir," he said, "is there anything I can do to help you in your sorrow? My name is... Edmund Goodfriend and I have been known to live up to my name."
Catlin shook his head again. Then he stopped. What did it matter what anyone thought of him? The fear of what people thought of him was why he had delayed so long over marrying Isabel when he realised now he could have done it easily. He was rich, had no need of a woman's dowry, could himself endow her with a generous jointure if necessary. Only the fear of what others would say had stopped him, really.
"I lost a woman I longed to marry," he said, his nose so packed with phlegm it came out distorted and bubbling. "Or... I could have married her and been happy but... but I delayed."
"Why?"
"For pride." The word came out without Catlin intending it, but in fact seemed surprisingly true. "I thought... I thought the woman not worthy of me." And that was true as well, although he had never actually thought it in so many words."
Young Mr Goodfriend said nothing and only nodded. He had his head propped on his hand, his face tilted a little so as not to look at him directly.
"I could have made her mine and she would have been safe, but... she wasn't... she wasn't a virgin. She... she wasn't chaste."
The young man's face changed a little.
"Are you sure it was her fault that she wasn't?" he asked, which was an odd thing to ask.
"Well, no, I suppose not," Catlin admitted, a little surprised. "She told me how it happened."
"She was forced?"
"She said an upright man broke her in when she was twelve and put her to work for him," Catlin said, "So I suppose it wasn't her fault. And she had no other trade."
"Was she a good woman in other ways?
Catlin thought about it. At least the waterfall in his eyes had gone to a trickle. He trumpeted into the hankerchief again.
"I don't know, I think so, she was kind. She never laughed at me. Sh
e talked to me and listened to me. She... she stroked my head." His voice wavered and broke and he had to hold his breath against the pain in his chest.
Goodfriend smiled a little. "She sounds as if she was a good woman."
"But... but you don't understand," Catlin almost wailed to him, "She must infallibly be damned!"
"Why?"
"Because she was a... unchaste."
"And are you of the Elect? Are you one of these Puritans that follow Calvin?"
"Yes, of course. So by Calvin's logic and St Augustine's logic we are separated for all eternity. Either by her sin or by both our sins bringing us to Hell."
"Your sin of fornication?"
Catlin nodded.
Goodfriend looked up at the plain altar table and the headless saints of the old screen. He seemed to be thinking.
"Sir, if you will, may I speak my mind?"
Catlin could only shrug.The young man spoke quietly, in measured words.
"I fear that your undoubted sin of fornication was by far the least of your sins. Your much greater sin was pride, in that you loved the woman but did not make her honestly your wife rather than fornicate – for pride's sake, not for any other reason. This is why Pride is named one of the seven deadly sins because it makes a gateway for other sins."
Maliverny stared at him, transfixed.
"But she wasn't the only one... " He protested. "There were others... "
And then in a long scalding flood of words it all came out, like the pus from a lanced abscess. And the details: how he had returned from Paris Garden, drunk and shocked at himself and utterly spent, heading for the sanctuary of Isabel's room and tripped on Kettle Annie's corpse after meeting Mr Enys. How he had been in fear of being found out as one of Kettle Annie's regular clients, back in the old days when he worked for Sir Francis and she was a prime source of information about the Papists in the Clink. How he had agreed to look for the murderer and worked only to hide the fact that he knew the women and how as a result of his delaying, Isabel herself had somehow been killed... And that was why he knew he was damned. He said it aloud, the thing the beating ugly voice kept saying over and over in his head. "So you see, Mr Goodfriend, I am damned. Infallibly. And logically. You cannot deny it. As Calvin teaches, God knew from the beginning of the world who among us would be saved and who damned and..."
"I must say, I've always thought that Calvin was a pathetic excuse for a theologian," said Goodfriend outrageously, "What a numbskull. I don't care how many Swiss Puritans think him greater than St Peter, the man could no more argue logic than a striped grey cat."
Catlin gasped with horror.
"Let me put it to you this way. Who made Logic itself?"
"Er... God?"
"Having made Logic, is God greater or smaller than it?"
"Greater?"
"Which came first? God or Logic?"
"God is precedent of all things?"
"And which of the two is omnipotent?"
"God."
"Ergo which is bound by which: is God ruled by Logic or is Logic ruled by God?"
Something fell back into place inside Catlin. Perhaps... perhaps there was a little hope? He blinked at the young man who had somehow smashed all he had always believed since he had read Calvin's writings as a young man. It felt very odd to have your foundations suddenly slipped out from under you and tossed casually away.
"Sir," said Goodfriend clasping his hands together tightly, "I would only ask you to consider this proposition: that the only worse sin than Pride itself is spiritual Pride which is the worst of all because it leads us to think that we are so right, we need no forgiveness from God or can get none. And very ingeniously we argue ourselves into believing that we know the Mind of God and that we know how God would act. And yet in Isaiah chapter 55 it says, "let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord that he may have mercy on him, and to our God for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord.""
Maliverny knew the verse but had never really listened to the words. "Do you really think that's true?" he asked.
Goodfriend actually laughed. "I hope so," he said, "I am as much or perhaps more in need of God's mercy as you, sir, as God knows. Only this can we know – we have, in fact, no knowledge of who is saved and who is damned. All we do know is that Our Lord Jesus Christ came to save all that will ask Him to save them."
Catlin said nothing. The way he was thinking now was too strange. Goodfriend grinned.
"So perhaps, if she repented, your intended is saved while you, if you do not repent, most certainly will be damned."
Catlin shuddered. He had always been afraid he was in fact damned, but it had never crossed his mind that Isabel might go to Heaven and he might not.
"But..."
"Did Our Lord not eat and drink with publicans, tax collecters and sinners?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Did He not tell the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the prodigal son?"
"Well yes, but..."
"So which do you believe? Calvin's tortured logic or Our Blessed Saviour's words in the Gospels of Holy Scripture?"
Catlin's lips parted. He was finding it hard to breathe. "Do you really think so?"
"I know so," said the young man, very seriously, "It's why I became... well, God sends His holy angels to help us and His Son to save all of us that desire it. Surely your betrothed desired it?"
Catlin frowned. Isabel had often said how she would not ply her trade if she had any other way of eating. And he himself desired salvation too. Only the idea that it was not a fixed certainty but might change made him feel queasy.
"But surely that's too easy?" he objected.
"Yes. Our Lord said that His way is easy and His yoke is light." Goodfriend had his hands out and open, palms up as if he was receiving something into them.
At last Maliverny nodded once. The waves of misery had faded down to a distant thunder for the moment. Perhaps. Perhaps this man had a point. Perhaps somehow he could meet Isabel again?
"Sir," he said with a painful smile, handing back the now sodden hankerchief, "My name is Maliverny Catlin. You have helped me greatly with your wise words, Mr Goodfriend. Is there anything I may do for you?"
"Well... ah... yes," said the man uncertainly. "I am in a quandary. I am urgently in need of a place as a serving man or clerk or perhaps a tutor as I have... I have had a falling out with my previous lord. I was about to go to the serving man's pillar in St Paul's. In fact, I had best go there now or there will be no gallants left near Duke Humphrey's tomb. If there are any at all, thanks to the prentices."
"Very few, because of the plague's continuance." Catlin looked at the man. He seemed clean and well-set-up, his hands bore no sword calluses, so he was not a soldier returned from the Netherlands. He had spoken eloquently and with knowledge of scripture. "Can you write a good hand, Mr Goodfriend?"
"Yes, Secretary or Italic, as you desire. I read Latin and a little Greek as well. Alas, I have no letters to recommend me thanks to my dispute with my former lord."
"Hm. What was it about?"
The man coughed. "It was on a matter of religion, sir, I had rather not speak of it."
Catlin only needed to consider for a minute. "Well Mr Goodfriend," he said, "I myself have urgent need of a clerk and a man to carry messages for me . Would you be able to do those things?"
"Yes sir, I would."
"I can't pay you much, but I can give you board and lodging and perhaps livery," Catlin warned, his habitual frugality reasserting itself.
"That would be a king's wage compared to my recent living," said Goodfriend.
Catlin clapped his right hand on the man's right shoulder. "Then you're hired, Mr Goodfriend, and I hope we may have more conversation on philosophy. I urgently need someone to deal with Mr Topcliffe for me."
Goodfriend stopped for a second as if shocked, and then he smiled
again. From the lines at the corners of his eyes, he often did that. "Sir," he said honestly, "I think my own prayers have been answered."
Peter the Hedgehog was breathless and sweaty from bouncing up and down in the middle of Fleet Street, but full of exhilaration and rage as he danced in front of the mob. "E killed my sister!" he shouted again though his throat was hoarse, "He's the witch, he brung the plague!"
The women of the town were now close to the ranks of the trained bands of London who were starting to look shifty and frightened, especially as some of the whores were calling out to men that they knew as customers. Mrs Nunn was talking to Recorder Fleetwood who was standing in front of his men with the scroll of the Riot Act now stuffed into the front of his buff coat.
"We want the lawyer," shouted Mrs Nunn, "When we've got him we'll go home."
Her brother Gabriel stood at her shoulder, his own buff coat buckled up and a veney stick in his hand, a woollen statute cap on his head, pulled down over his blond hair and looking as if he had a secret under it, an iron cap to do duty as a helmet. Peter somehow felt safer knowing that Gabriel Nunn was there.
"Will you give him a fair... no, any kind of trial?"
"We don't need to," shrugged Mrs Nunn, "We know it's him."
"What will you do with him?"
Peter suddenly knew that Fleetwood was playing for time. "We'll hang him," he shouted, "He killed my sister! After he wapped her," he added.
"How do you know Mr Craddock killed your sister?" asked Fleetwood directly of him, "Did you see him do it?"
“Nah," sneered Peter, "Or I'd of stopped him, wouldn't I? I know he wapped her."
There was a look of distaste on Fleetwood's face. "The sin of fornication with a whore is not a hanging offence..."
Peter's head filled with blood and fury. "She warn't no whore before he wapped 'er, she was a virgin!" he shrieked, "That's why he killt her."
Fleetwood was standing solidly, his thumbs braced in the front of his buffcoat, quite clearly prepared to stand there and dispute all day if necessary. Suddenly Peter wanted to kill him too. And as he thought that, as if thinking it made it happen, a rock came sailing from behind them and hit Mr Fleetwood right on his helmet. It made a loud doiing noise.
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