Bartholomew Fair (30 page)

‘Berden and his men searched their lodging house very thoroughly,’ Phelippes said. ‘That seems to have been all of it.’

‘It would have caused a terrible explosion,’ Sir Francis said seriously, ‘had you not prevented it. Many lives lost. Homes destroyed.’

‘I wonder,’ I said. ‘Borecroft had placed it in a far corner of a stone built cellar. It would certainly have caused damage, but not nearly as much as it would have if he had left it in the middle of the house. I suspect he was trying to minimise the harm done. He was probably told to cause the maximum damage. Putting the puppet in the cellar was the only way he could do what he was forced to do, while hoping for the least hurt.’

‘You may be right,’ Sir Francis said.

‘I hope that will be remembered when he is punished.’

Of course he would be punished. It was an act of terror and violence, even if it had been carried out unwillingly. I could not get out of my mind the contrast between the cheerful impish toy man of the Fair and the gibbering wreck in Dowgate. The thought that he might receive the savage sentence of being hanged, drawn and quartered sickened me.

‘I have sent a message to the inn at Westminster where Drake’s party have been spending the night,’ Sir Francis said. ‘I wanted him to have an accurate account of what happened before he reached home and heard some garbled version from the servants.’

Phelippes nodded his agreement. ‘They only witnessed the aftermath,’ he said.

I was too tired to care.

Not long after this, the sun rose and Phelippes extinguished the candles. Though I had refused dry clothes, I was anxious to go back to Wood Street and change.

‘Am I needed any longer?’ I asked.

‘Nay,’ Sir Francis said. ‘Go home and rest, and look after that hand of yours. I do not want to see you here again until it is recovered.’

‘You’d best take this,’ Phelippes said, holding something out.

It was the porcelain bowl with the rest of the salve in it.

‘That is Sir Francis Drake’s property,’ I said. ‘It is the sort of valuable piece the spice traders sometimes bring back. Ruy Lopez has one that he treasures. They come from China. I cannot take that.’

‘Take it, Kit,’ Sir Francis said. ‘You have saved Drake a great deal more than one little bowl. And I shall tell him so.’

Thus it was that I arrived back at the Lopez house on stumbling feet, wet through, barely able to keep my satchel from sliding off my shoulder, and carrying in my good hand a bowl that was probably worth more than my entire year’s salary would be from St Thomas’s.

Sara took one look at me and sent me to bed. She arrived in my room shortly after I was under the covers, carrying a hot stone wrapped in a piece of old blanket for my feet and a cup of brandy posset like the one I had seen Sir Francis eating at Barn Elms. She was followed into the room by the insinuating shape of Rikki. As soon as the door closed behind Sara, Rikki jumped up on the bed, licked my nose and settled himself comfortably at my side.

When I had finished the posset I slid down into the bed and put an arm over Rikki’s warm, shaggy side. To my shame, tears started up in my eyes, for my mind kept playing over and over that moment in the cellar when I had stared at the lit fuse and the grotesque puppet staring back up at me. Besides, my hand was very painful.

By the time I next woke, it was dark. I must have slept for the entire day. Rikki was asleep, but I realised that I had heard a light tap on the door.

‘Aye?’ I called.

Anne put her head round the edge of the door.

‘Good, you are awake. Mama is going to send you some supper to have in bed.’

She came across and rubbed Rikki behind the ears.

‘How bad is your hand?’

I held out my left hand, palm up, for her to see, and she gave a gasp.

‘Oh, Kit, that looks terrible!’

‘It was treated quickly,’ I said, ‘and I have healthy skin. I think it will heal. Would you pass me that bowl? I’ll salve it again.’

She picked up the bowl and sniffed it. ‘It smells very odd. Almost like something you might eat, though I’m not sure I would like it.’

I laughed, and tried not to wince as I spread a fresh layer on my hand. ‘Egg white, honey and bacon grease.’

‘Ugh!’ she said.

Rikki must have smelled the bacon grease, for he woke and became very interested first in the bowl, then in my hand, so that I had to push him gently away.

‘I’ll see that your supper is sent up,’ Anne said. ‘Will you be able to manage?’

‘As long as I do not need to cut anything up,’ I said.

‘I will tell them.’

For the next three days the family treated me as an invalid, though I was out of bed the next morning. It was time for Anthony to return to school, so Ruy rode with him down to Winchester, and we were a house full of women, though we might not appear so. Then a summons came from Sir Francis. I was to present myself at Seething Lane at two o’ the clock the next day.

‘Wear your physician’s gown,’ the note said cryptically. ‘I hope your hand is healing.’

When I presented myself at Sir Francis’s office at the appointed time, I found with him not only Phelippes but a familiar figure I had not seen since our arrival in Plymouth all those months ago.

‘My lord,’ I said, bowing deeply to Sir Francis Drake. Had he come to ask for the return of his valuable bowl? It was sitting on a joint stool beside my bed now, washed clean.

‘Dr Alvarez.’ He inclined his head slightly. ‘I remember how you and Dr Nuñez laboured to save Norreys’s brother at Coruña.’

‘Do you know how he fares, sir?’

‘Quite recovered now, I understand.’

I lifted my eyes and looked Drake fully in the face for the first time.

How to regard such a man? Undoubtedly a gifted seaman, probably one of the best then living. A man who had risen entirely through his own efforts from very humble beginnings to become perhaps the richest man in England. An intrepid adventurer and implacable enemy of the Spanish. A favourite of the Queen, whose exploits filled her coffers with treasure and humiliated her foes. In the eyes of many, England’s greatest hero.

Yet he could act with tremendous cruelty, not only to his enemies but to his own men and his officers. He would brook no criticism, listen to no advice. He was also a lying, treacherous brute.

I kept my eyes steady on his, but it took some effort.

‘I see you are a bold fellow, Dr Alvarez,’ he said, with a sharp laugh, quickly cut off. ‘As Walsingham here tells me you are. Let me see your hand.’

I held out my left hand. It was bandaged now.

‘Take off the bandages.’

I glanced to one side at Sir Francis, who gave the merest of nods, so with some difficulty I unwound the bandage. I would need help to replace it. My palm was still an unpleasant sight. The blisters from the burn had burst and some were oozing a yellow pus, which clung to the bandage. Removing it was painful, but I would not cry out before this man who would not tolerate weakness.

Drake seized my wrist and examined my hand. Only then did he smile and relax.

‘Well, Dr Alvarez, it seems I am greatly in your debt. I understand that it was you who first discovered this conspiracy and later it was you who carried the gunpowder out of my house before it could explode. It was a brave action. Braver than I would have expected from a civilian, and a young one at that.’ There was a note of contempt in his voice, in spite of his praise.

I bowed, unable to think of anything to say.

‘I believe in rewarding bravery. Hold out your other hand. I hope you are right handed?’

‘I am, sir,’ I said, somewhat baffled by this.

He reached into the breast of his doublet and drew out something which he dropped into my hand. I barely caught it before it slipped to the ground. It was a heavy purse of coin. I took an involuntary step backward and opened my mouth to refuse, but I caught Sir Francis’s eye. He gave me a warning look and shook his head, fortunately out of the line of Drake’s sight.

‘I, I thank you, sir,’ I stumbled out the words, ‘but there is no need . . .’

He made a dismissive gesture with his hand. ‘The matter is finished. And the details, I am sure you understand, are not to be made public.’

I flushed. Was I being bribed to keep my mouth shut? I wanted to shout out to this arrogant, untrustworthy man, than he had no right to speak to me in that tone, but who was I, a humble Marrano physician, to answer back to one of Her Majesty’s courtiers?

‘Come, Kit,’ Phelippes said, springing to my rescue and speaking for the first time. He had probably read the expression on my face correctly. ‘I have a new cipher I want you to look at.’

We both bowed ourselves out and walked along the corridor without speaking. Once inside Phelippes office, I let out my breath like a minor explosion in itself.

‘That man!’ I said. ‘That man, who betrayed us! When I remember all the men who died on the voyage back from Portugal . . .’

‘Sit down, Kit,’ Phelippes said, ‘and let me help you put that bandage back.’

‘You are become quite the physician,’ I said, doing as I was told. ‘He thought I was a fraud, even though Sir Francis,
our
Sir Francis, told him otherwise.’

‘He is not worth you anger, Kit.’

He made quite a neat job of fixing my bandage back in place.

‘Where is this cipher you want me to look at?’

‘There is no cipher. I thought I should get you away before you exploded and we were all in trouble.’

I laughed weakly. ‘Ever the diplomat. But I cannot accept his money, like some grubby fawning servant. He was trying to bribe me, as if I would babble!’

‘You cannot refuse it. Do you not see that? What would be the consequences? Take it and rest content. Did you not say that you needed money to buy your own physician’s cap and gown, so you need not wear those borrowed from Ruy Lopez? Spend it on that.’

‘Aye,’ I agreed reluctantly. ‘I do need them before I start at St Thomas’s.’

I looked at him suddenly in alarm. ‘Jesu, I’ve forgotten the date, with spending time in bed and mooning about the house! What is the date?’

‘The ninth of September.’

I took off my cap and ran my hand through my hair, breathing a sigh of relief.

‘I thought I had missed it. I am to report at St Thomas’s on the twelfth of September. Three days still from now.’

I looked down at my bandaged hand.

‘If they will have me.’

Chapter Sixteen

I
took Phelippes’s advice. There was a great deal of money in the purse, though perhaps not quite as much as the value of the porcelain bowl. Sir Francis was sure no questions would be asked about that, and if there should be, he assured me that he would deal with it. I took the purse to one of the best robe-makers with premises near the Royal College of Physicians and demanded that he have both gown and cap ready for me by the eleventh of September. I handed over the buttons I had bought at the Fair. I must have impressed him, for he scrambled to finished the work in time.

Ever since facing up to Drake, despite not following my inclination to refuse the money, I had a new sense of confidence. My suspicions, first aroused at the Fair, had been proved right. I had been taken seriously by Sir Francis, Phelippes and Berden, all of them men I greatly respected. By acting on those suspicions, however confused and baffled we had been, we had prevented a disaster. I was beginning to feel that I had earned my place within that inner group. My only worry now was that the deputy superintendent at St Thomas’s would take one look at my injured hand and refuse me my position there. My hand was getting slowly better, but it would not be fully healed before I had to report for duty.

While I waited for my gown to be finished, I decided to pay a call on William Baker and his wife, to discover how Adam Batecorte was faring. I had already sent a message to ask whether his injuries were healing and had received a reassuring answer, but I would be happier if I could see him for myself.

I had now learned more details of what had happened in the action against the soldiers who had marched against the Fair all the way from Plymouth on their blistered and bleeding feet, the men who had waited quietly for justice, encamped in Finsbury Fields. I felt that Adam should be told all that I now knew.

The Bakers welcomed me into their shop in Eastcheap, for once quiet and empty of customers. Liza was sitting close to the window, stitching the upper of a lady’s elegant dance shoe to the sole, while Adam was carefully drawing round a pattern on to calf skin with a piece of chalk, watched by William..

‘Excellent! We will have Adam a shoemaker before we are done,’ William said cheerfully. ‘He’s very neat fingered. He’s a born craftsman.’

Adam grinned and shook his head.

‘I’ve never worked at any craft but smithing and soldiering,’ he said. ‘I was born on my grandfather’s farm, but there were too many of us to make a living there. My eldest brother has it now. Then I worked with my father at the smithy. I can trace out a pattern, but I could never stitch as neatly as that.’ He gave a nod toward Liza.

‘It comes with practice,’ she said, biting off her thread. ‘You did not learn to handle a sword or a blacksmith’s hammer overnight, nor did Dr Alvarez learn his physic without much study. Every trade demands time and patience.’

‘Wisely said.’ I smiled at her. I was more than ever glad that William had found this haven after the horror of losing his leg.

‘Now,’ I said, ‘may I borrow your apprentice for a short while, and examine his injuries?’

‘Certainly,’ William said. ‘Go through into the back. You can be private there, in case a customer should come in.’

Once we were in the back room, Adam removed his shirt and I saw that the sword slashes were healing well, though they would leave scars.

‘And what of this nasty gash in your head, Adam?’ I said, tilting his head to the light. ‘I can see that it looks clean, but have you been troubled by any recurring pain or dizziness?’

‘Not at all, doctor. It was very sore at first, then it began to itch as it healed and I had to remind myself not to scratch it. But now it is only a little tender if I touch it.’

‘It is time to take the stitches out.’ I removed the small scissors from my satchel and snipped through the threads.

He slipped his shirt on again and tied the strings.

‘It looks as though you have been in the wars yourself.’ He gestured toward my bandaged hand.

‘A burn, quite a severe one,’ I said, ‘but it is getting better. I hope it will not bar me from work, for I have a new position.’ I told him about starting at St Thomas’s on the twelfth.

‘Well, if they need any recommendations from patients, William and I will speak for you,’ he said.

I laughed. ‘I will remember that! And what of you, Adam? When you are fully recovered, will you return to the West Country? Or do you think you might like to take up the shoe-making craft, as William suggests?’

He sat down across the kitchen table from me.

‘They have been more than kind to me, William and Liza, but they have no room for another pair of hands in the business. With William and his wife, and Bess and her husband, and even young Will coming along, they have more than enough people for the business to support. Even if they should decide to take on an apprentice, I am far too old. They would want a young lad to train up.’

He began to trace circles on the table with his finger.

‘I feel no desire to go back to the West Country. Too many sad memories. I will try to find work of some kind here in London.’ He looked up at me, somewhat desolately. ‘I am strong. There must be employment for a strong labouring man, working on the docks, perhaps, or for a builder. I have not been outside much, for fear they were still looking for us soldiers, but from what little I have seen, there is a lot of building work going on in London.’

‘Aye, there is,’ I said. ‘I will ask around for you. I think you are safe to go outside now, for I do not believe they are still looking for soldiers. I will tell you what I know for myself and what I have heard from others about the outcome of your march on Bartholomew Fair.’

I hesitated, for what I had to tell was not a pretty story, but Adam deserved the truth.

‘The Lord Mayor was so terrified by the march you made on the Fair,’ I said,  ‘that, after he reported the situation to the Common Council and the Privy Council, he himself called out two thousand of the London Trained Bands. Those were the men who attacked the camp and injured you.’

‘Aye,’ he said, ‘I thought they were the London militia.’

‘It seems they rounded up most of the men after some vicious scuffles, but without too many casualties on the part of the militia. They probably inflicted far more injuries than they received.’

‘Our veterans were still weak from our time in Portugal and the starvation journey home,’ he said.

I nodded my agreement. ‘Most of them have now been driven out of London,’ I said, ‘with a warning that if they return they will be imprisoned. If any remain, they have gone into hiding. I believe the City authorities feel they have won that particular skirmish.’

His face grew sad. I do not suppose he still had any hope that the soldiers’ demands might be met, even in part. Instead his fellows had been defeated and disgraced, after those soothing promises of discussions by the Lord Mayor.

‘What has happened to the soldiers who had the gunpowder?’ he asked. ‘Have they been taken, or are they still at loose in London?’

‘They have been taken, the men and the gunpowder,’ I said grimly, and could not forebear glancing at my burned hand.

Adam caught my glance and his eyes widened.

‘How did you burn your hand, doctor?’

‘I will tell you the whole story some day,’ I promised, ‘but for the moment it is not to be spoken about. Those men will certainly suffer punishment.’

He looked thoughtful at that, but did not press me further. He had a quick wit, Adam, as I had realised on more than one occasion.

‘What has become of our leaders?’ he asked. ‘Our leaders who went unarmed to consult with the Lord Mayor and Common Council? We heard they had been thrown in prison.’

This was news I was reluctant to deliver, but it must be done.

‘To set an example, they say, your leaders who were invited so courteously to consult with the Lord Mayor–’ I found it difficult to go on.

‘Tell me,’ he said grimly. ‘I know it must be bad news.’

‘They have been hanged at Tyburn without trial,’ I said. ‘They went to the hanging with great courage, holding their heads high. I was told that as the noose was put round his neck, one of them cried out to the watching crowd, “This is the pay you give soldiers for going to the wars!” And then they hanged him.’

Adam covered his face with his hands and we sat in silence.

I believed, as I had said to Sir Francis, that this treatment of the men would have serious consequences the next time the State wanted the citizens of England to rally to the defence of country and Queen. More immediately, however, now that his fellows had fled from London, what was Adam to do, once he was well enough to leave the Bakers’ home?

After a time, I said, ‘They were brave men, Adam, and they were treated abominably. The Lord Mayor broke his word.’

He looked up at me, with a stricken face.

‘Why do great men always feel they can betray the lesser? Drake betrayed us thrice over – by abandoning us at Lisbon, by stealing the food from half the army, and by refusing to pay us, keeping the booty for himself. Now the Lord Mayor and Council betray us.’

‘I suppose that is how they become powerful,’ I said slowly, ‘by climbing over the bodies of other men. You cannot expect compassion from them. As they say, a rich man does not become rich by giving alms to the poor. If you want help, go to a poor man.’

He sighed deeply.

‘But Adam, we must look to the future. I start at St Thomas’s shortly. I will see whether there might be work there. When I visited, I found the whole place teeming with people. There are workshops there, all kinds of businesses, left over from the days when it was a monastery. I will enquire whether there is anyone needing a strong reliable man.’ I grinned at him. ‘One who is also neat fingered.’

After I left the Bakers’ shop, I decided to go for a longer walk. Sir Francis had said that he did not want me back at Seething Lane until my hand was healed, and after I began work at St Thomas’s I would have little time to myself. It was a beautiful September day. Under a sky of that bright pale blue one sees at this time of the year, the occasional trees which managed to survive in London were beginning to take on their autumn tints. There was a little sharpness in the air, a reminder that colder weather would come soon, but it also managed to allay the stink that usually arose from the London streets.

I found my steps automatically turning to the places I had known so well and where I had lived since coming to England. Just inside Newgate I saw that the chestnut seller had set up his little portable brazier again and was roasting his nuts. He had a full sack on the ground by his feet and was slitting each nut swiftly before laying it on the grid iron. I stopped to greet him.

‘Why do you do that?’ I asked.

‘If you don’t slit ’em, master, they can explode. Don’t know why. Tricky things, chestnuts. So I allus slits ’em.’

He reached forward with a kind of iron paddle, shuffled the roasting chestnuts on to it, then flipped them neatly over.

‘And how well did you do at the Fair?’ I said.

He beamed. ‘That gentleman’s sixpence made my fortune. I sold my comfits so fast my wife had to stay up all night, every night of the Fair, making more. I made a tidy sum, which will help see us through the winter.’

‘I am glad to hear it.’

‘It was a good thing those ragamuffin soldiers wasn’t allowed to break up the Fair, or honest men would have lost everything.’

‘They were badly treated,’ I said. ‘They were honest men too, and should have been paid for their service and their suffering.’

‘But why make other poor men suffer?’ He shook his head. ‘Don’t seem right to me.’

‘I wonder whether they would have carried out that threat,’ I said. ‘I think they only wanted to force the authorities to pay them what they were owed.’

‘Well,’ he said, shovelling the cooked chestnuts on to the side plate of his brazier and laying out a fresh batch, ‘I don’t suppose we’ll ever know, master.’

‘I don’t suppose we will. I’ll have two pokes of chestnuts, please.’

As usual, I handed one of the paper twists of nuts through the grid of Newgate prison, where the destitute prisoners with no one to bring them food stretched out their hands to the passersby. I wondered whether any of those grubby hands belonged to the soldiers who had planned the attack on Drake’s house.

Through Newgate itself, then up Pie Corner. The fair ground was empty of all the stalls and tents and booths, the acrobats and pig women, the fortune tellers and gingerbread bakers. Litter blew about the wide space, but soon there would be no sign that the magical town had ever been here. Like the fairy palace in some ancient tale it had vanished away for another year. Already the men who worked at Smithfield were putting up the pens for the beast market next day.

I crossed toward the hospital and stood looking at it with fondness, but sadly. It was there that I had learned my profession, and there that I had worked for so many hours with my father. It had been hard work, and sometimes distressing, but I had been happy there. A familiar figure emerged from the gatehouse and came toward me.

‘Kit!’ It was Peter Lambert, grinning from ear to ear. ‘Have you come to see us?’