An Instance of the Fingerpost (37 page)

‘I did not say that,’ he continued. ‘I know little, but perhaps can find out much, if I wish. What papers do you have of your father’s from that period?’

‘None,’ I said. ‘And I do not think my mother has any either. Why do you want them?’

‘No box? No books? No letters? You must find out where he was at all times. For if it was said he was in London, communicating with Thurloe, and in fact you can prove he was elsewhere, then your cause is advanced greatly. Did you not think of such a thing?’

I hung my head like a recalcitrant schoolboy, and confessed I had not. Wallis continued to press me, asking me the most absurd questions about particular books, although I do not recall the details now. My way was the more direct one of confrontation, not nit-picking through documents and books. Perhaps, I thought, Mr Wood’s skills would turn out to be useful after all.

Dr Wallis nodded in satisfaction. ‘Write to your people, and find out what they have. Bring it all to me, and I will examine it. Then perhaps I will be able to connect it with things I know.’

‘That is kind of you.’

He shook his head. ‘It is not. If there is a traitor at court it is best to know of it. But rest assured, Mr Prestcott, I will not help you unless you can provide proof that you are correct.’

It was now well into winter; in my mind time was pressing, and my task daily bore in on me, the memory of my father urging me to action. So I began to prepare my travels, and from then on voyaged almost without a break for the next few months, until all was resolved. I was on the move through one of the worst winters I can recall and
out again into spring, driven by my duty and my desire for the truth. I travelled on my own, with little more than my cloak and a pack, walking for the most part, trudging up road and tracks, skirting the huge puddles that swamp all byways at that time of year, finding rest where I could in villages and towns or under trees and hedges when there was no alternative. It was a time of the greatest anxiety and fear; until the last I often doubted I could be successful and was concerned that my many enemies would prove impossible to defeat. And yet, I also remember that time fondly, although that is perhaps merely the rosy glow that age always puts on the memory of youth.

Before I set out, I had to honour my promise to help Thomas. Coming across Sarah Blundy was easy, although engaging her in conversation was more difficult. She would leave her lodging at six in the morning to go to the Woods’ in Merton Street, where she worked as a servant every day except Monday, which was devoted to Dr Grove. Here she stayed until seven in the evening. She was given four hours off every Sunday, and one day every six weeks to herself. Most particularly, on Wednesdays she went to do the marketing for the family at Gloucester Green, a wasteland on the outskirts of town where farmers were allowed to sell their produce. She would buy whatever the family needed and (as Mrs Wood was a notorious miser) had to carry it back herself as she was not given the money for a hired hand.

This, I decided, would be my best opportunity. I followed her at a discreet distance to the market, waited while she made her purchases, then made sure I encountered her at the very moment she was struggling past with two enormously heavy baskets of goods.

‘Miss Blundy, is it not?’ I said with a look of pleasure on my face. ‘You don’t remember me, no doubt. I had the good fortune to consult your mother some months ago.’

She tossed the hair out of her face and looked at me quizzically, then nodded slowly. ‘That’s right,’ she said eventually. ‘You did. I trust you found the money well spent.’

‘It was very helpful, thank you. Most helpful. I’m afraid I did not behave as well as I should have done. I was very concerned and upset at the time, and this no doubt came through in my lapse of manners.’

‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘It did.’

‘Please,’ I said, ‘let me make some small amends. Allow me to carry your baskets. They are far too heavy for you.’

Without any pretence of protest, she instantly handed over both of them. ‘That is kind,’ she said with a sigh of relief. ‘It is the part of the week I like the least. As long as I am not taking you out of your way.’

‘Not at all.’

‘How do you know where we are going?’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said hastily to cover my mistake. ‘I have nothing at all to do, and I would willingly carry these all the way up Heddington Hill for the pleasure of your company.’

She tossed her head back and laughed. ‘Then you certainly don’t have much to do. Fortunately I will not impose on your good offices so much. I am heading only for Merton Street.’

They were formidably heavy, and I half-resented the girl for being so willing to hand them both over. One would have been more than sufficient. What was worse, she looked at me with scarcely concealed amusement as I struggled with what she carried as a matter of course.

‘Are you treated well there?’ I asked as we walked – I panting along, and she walking with a light and easy step.

‘Mrs Wood is a good mistress,’ she replied. ‘I have nothing to complain about. Why? Were you about to offer me a position?’

‘Oh, no. I cannot afford a servant.’

‘You are a student, is that right?’

I nodded. Considering that my gown was flapping in the sharp wind, and my cap in constant danger of being blown into the gutter, it was not a greatly perceptive remark.

‘You aim at the Church?’

I laughed. ‘Dear me, no.’

‘Do you disapprove of the Church? Am I talking to a secret Catholic, perhaps?’

I flushed with anger at the remark, but remembered in time that I was not passing the morning for my own amusement.

‘Far from it,’ I said. ‘Sinner I may be, but not to that extent. My non-conformity comes from a different direction entirely. Although in action I am blameless.’

‘I congratulate you.’

I heaved a sigh. ‘I do not congratulate myself. There is a group of God-fearing people I would like to associate with, but they wouldn’t even consider accepting me. And I cannot say that I blame them.’

‘And who is that?’

‘I had best not say,’ I said.

‘At least you could risk telling me why you are so unwelcome.’

‘Someone like me?’ I said. ‘Who would have such a person, so steeped in every monstrosity. I know it, I sincerely repent it, but I cannot erase what I have been.’

‘I always thought that many groups of people welcomed sinners. There hardly seems much point in only welcoming the pure. They are already saved.’

‘That’s the idea they put about, of course,’ I said with a great show of bitterness. ‘In truth they turn from the people who really need them.’

‘They told you this?’

‘They didn’t need to. I certainly would not accept someone like myself. And if they did I have no doubt they would constantly fear I would disrupt them.’

‘Has your life been so wicked? It is difficult to imagine, as you can be no older than myself.’

‘You were no doubt brought up in a righteous and pious family, though,’ I pointed out. ‘I, unfortunately, did not have such good fortune.’

‘It is true I was blessed in my parents,’ she said. ‘But you can be certain that any group which would turn you away would not be worth belonging to. Come, sir. Tell me whom you have in mind. I might be able to find out something for you. Ask whether you would be welcome, if you are too timid to approach them yourself.’

I looked at her with gratitude and delight. Would you? I hardly dare ask. It is a man called Tidmarsh. I have heard he is a saintly preacher, and that he has gathered around him the few people left in Oxford who are not corrupted.’

She stopped and stared at me. ‘But he is a
Quaker
,’ she said quietly. ‘Are you aware of what you are doing?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘God’s people they may be, but He is giving them sore trials. If you become associated with them, you will lose whatever protection your birth gives you. You will be jailed, and beaten, and spat on in the street. You may even have to give your life. Even if you are spared, your friends and family will shun you and you will be held in contempt by the world.’

‘You will not help me.’

‘You must be certain you know what you are doing.’

‘Are you one?’

A momentary suspicion passed across her face, then she shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I am not. I was not brought up to invite troubles. I think that as prideful as gaudy dress.’

I shook my head at the remark. ‘I do not pretend to understand you. But I am sorely in need of help.’

‘Find it elsewhere,’ she said. ‘If God commands it, you must obey. But make sure you know what He wants first. You are a young gentleman, with all the advantages that brings. Don’t throw them away on a whim. Think and pray hard first. Theirs is not the only route to salvation.’

We had been walking awhile down St Aldate’s, then along Merton Street and had paused outside the door of her mistress’s house while she delivered this last injunction. I imagine she was merely trying to shield herself, but even so, her advice struck me as wise. If I had been some impetuous youth on the brink of making a grave mistake, she would have given me pause for thought.

I walked away slightly discomfited, which now I understand. I was deceiving her, and she gave kindness in return. It made me very confused, until I later learned how much greater her trickery was than mine.

IT WAS NOT
difficult to contrive several chance meetings with her in the few weeks that followed, and I slowly won her friendship. I told her that I had decided to take her advice but my soul was still tormented. All the sermons in the world could not reconcile me to the Established Church. I had learnt that her father had been an extremist of the worst sort, so busy advocating the murder of property owners and the establishment of a republic that he had no time for Christ. Accordingly, I had to modify my approach.

‘When I think of the hopes that existed in the world only a few years ago,’ I said, ‘it makes me grieve. What were common aspirations are now cast out and despised, and the world is given over to greed and selfishness.’

She stared at me solemnly as though I had uttered a profound truth and nodded. We were walking down St Giles, I having managed to meet her as she was coming back from a cookshop with the Woods’ dinner that evening. It smelt delicious, hot and tasty, and the odours made the juices turn in my stomach. I could see that she also was hungry.

‘What do you do after you have delivered this?’

‘Then I am finished for the day,’ she said. It was already dark, and cold in the air.

‘Come with me. Let us eat together. I can see you are as hungry as I am, and you would do me a favour to keep me company.’

She shook her head. ‘That is kind, Jack. But you should not be seen with me. Neither of our reputations will be improved by it.’

‘What is your reputation? I know nothing of it. I see only a pretty woman with an empty stomach. But if it concerns you, we can go to a place I know where the clientèle make both of us seem like saints.’

‘And how do you know such places?’

‘I told you I was a sinner.’

She smiled. ‘I cannot afford it.’

I waved my hand. ‘We can discuss that at a later stage, once your stomach is filled.’

Still she hesitated. I leant over the bowl of food she was carrying and sniffed deeply. ‘Ah, the smell of that gravy, running over the lumps of meat,’ I said longingly. ‘Can’t you just imagine a plate of it before you, with a fresh, crusty loaf and a tankard? A plate piled high, the steam rising into the air, the juices . . .’

‘Stop!’ she cried, laughing out loud. ‘All right. I’ll come, if only you’ll stop talking about food.’

‘Good,’ I said. ‘So deliver your meal, and come with me.’

We went to a small place on the very outskirts of the town, past Magdalen College and over the river. No one from the university, not even students, ever ate there, it being too far away in distance, and too low in reputation. The food was execrable as well; Mother Roberts was as bad a cook as she was disgusting a person, and the food was like the woman: larded with fat and giving off a foul smell. Sarah looked uneasy in the little room where she served up the gruel, but ate with the appetite of one who rarely gets enough. The main virtue of Mother Roberts was that the ale she served was strong and cheap, and I regret the passing of those days. Now that men of business make beer and are trying to stop women selling the ale they brew, I believe the great days of this country are over.

The best quality of the brew was that by the time Sarah had drunk a quart of it, she’d become talkative, and susceptible to my questions. As much as I remember it, I set the conversation down here. On my prompting, she told me that she not only worked for the Wood family, but had also found work with Dr Grove. She did little for him, except clean his room, prepare his fire and a bath once every quarter – for he was fastidiously clean about his person – and he paid generously. The only trouble, she said, was his desire to bring her within the Established Church.

I said that this Grove must be something of a hypocrite to speak so, as he had something of a reputation for being a hidden papist. If I thought this would draw her out, I was wrong, for she frowned and shook her head fervently. If he was such, she said, she had
never seen the slightest sign of it, neither in his room nor in his manner.