Hearts of Darkness (26 page)

‘That was close,’ I wheezed.

‘Aye, close.’ Dowling leant forwards, hands on knees. ‘And getting closer. The fire will drive us all up against the wall.’

The wind continued to billow and churn, carrying a sheet of embers above our heads. Some died, others drifted deep into the maze of close-packed houses, dry as dust. I heard the Withypoll shouting in the distance.

‘What are you two doing?’ a voice cried out from behind. ‘Make yourselves useful or clear the way!’

Two fellows pushed a large barrel down the street to which someone had fixed two sets of wheels. A third fellow led the way, parading afore it with great majesty, urging all to stand aside and let it pass, which was hardly necessary given the troubles the two men at the back were having in persuading it to roll against the cobbles.

‘Where are your buckets?’ the portly fellow bellowed into my face. ‘You may save your goods, but what about your property?’ His gaze fell to our hands, where still we wore our ropes. Then something caught his eye.

‘Stop that man!’ he yelled, pointing at a small thin fellow scuttling along Cheapside clasping something to his chest. The thin man cast a frightened gaze over his shoulder and tried to run faster, but whatever he had beneath his shirt slowed him down.

‘Stop that Frenchman!’ our protagonist shouted again, attracting the attention of all on Cheapside.

Two burly fellows pulling a wagon by hand dropped their load and spread their arms wide, attention fixed upon the poor unfortunate. His hair was straight, black and well oiled, and he wore it pulled back and tied behind his neck. He danced from foot to foot, no chance of escape. As the two big fellows jumped at him, he fell to the cobbles in a ball, knees tucked up to his chest.

The portly fellow rolled his sleeves further up his arms and marched up like a great waddling bulldog to where the little man lay cowering. ‘What does he hide in his shirt?’ He squinted.

The little fellow peered up. His face was thin and angular. A big black mole sat tucked beneath one nostril. ‘My dog,’ he exclaimed, pulling forth a small black creature with hair over its eyes. ‘It is just my dog.’ His accent indeed sounded foreign, but many foreigners lived inside London’s city walls. He clambered to his knees and sat crouched, holding up the dog with both hands like it was a sacred offering.

Dowling shoved his way to the front of the small gathering. ‘What did you think it was?’

The big ugly fellow stood feet astride, gazing down on the smaller man like he hated him with all his soul. ‘They found a Frenchman with a trunk full of fireballs out at Moorfields.’

‘You thought he carried fireballs in his shirt?’ Dowling snorted. ‘He is as frightened as the rest of us. Let him go.’

‘Frightened you say?’ The portly fellow turned to Dowling, thick black eyebrows halfway to the top of his balding head. ‘I am not frightened, nor should any of us be. We must put out this fire.’ He turned again to the little man and his dog. ‘The only ones that have
need to be frightened are those that fear being caught.’ He held up a hand high into the air, with great ceremony. One of his colleagues handed him a thick iron bar. ‘The French have started fires all over the City and are descending upon us now, an army of French and Papists, four thousand men.’

Before any could stop him he swung the bar through the air and hit the little man hard across the temple. The short fellow fell to the ground instantly, eyes closed and body limp. The little dog landed sideways upon the cobbles before righting itself. It began to bark: short, snapping yelps aimed at no one in particular. The gathering crowd stood in a silent circle watching blood pour from the small man’s head, trickling between the cobbles in a meandering stream.

‘This is revenge!’ the portly fellow snarled, clasping the iron bar tighter in his fist. ‘Holmes burnt Westerschelling and now the Dutch are trying to burn London.’

Dowling pushed him in the chest. ‘I thought you said it was the French?’ he said. ‘Dutch or French? Make up your mind.’

The portly fellow recovered his poise and took a step back towards Dowling. ‘Who are you, anyway, sir?’ he sneered. ‘Why do you wear rope?’ he nodded at Dowling’s wrists. ‘What prison have you escaped from?’

The crowd now turned to us, murmuring amongst themselves, faces unfriendly and unsmiling. All were terrified, desperate for assurance that someone might save their homes and possessions, and ready to tear to pieces whosoever it was started the blaze.

Why hadn’t we just slunk back into Gutter Lane, I asked myself? Why did we always find ourselves at the midst of every conflagration? Withypoll’s soldiers would be here soon, if they weren’t already watching at the fringes of the mob now surrounding us.

‘We were imprisoned by the Dutch,’ I called out, an unformed lie. ‘Which is why we know it was not the French.’ I waved a hand at the dead man upon the ground. ‘This man was guilty of no crime.’

Which speech did nothing to settle the atmosphere. I realised, too late, that to suggest a murder took place was to suggest all were party to it. I would have to work twice as hard.

‘We came back from Colchester yesterday.’ I held up the rope for all to see. ‘The Dutch attempted to land at Hythe but were thwarted. Their spies captured us in the Dutch Quarter, and Lord Arlington’s men rescued us. We are members of Lord Arlington’s secret service.’

The portly man didn’t know what to say. He stood with mouth open, eyes gleaming, still holding his iron bar. I did my best to look like a battle-hardened soldier, staring back, expressionless.

‘We don’t have time for this,’ said Dowling, breaking the silence. ‘Stand aside, all of you. The army will root out the perpetrators of this great fire, if perpetrators there be. Gather your possessions and leave, else stay and fight the fire.’

He shoved the portly man aside and strode with great confidence towards the Little Conduit.

‘Who speaks of Arlington?’ shouted a voice from behind. Withypoll’s voice again.

‘Fish teeth!’ I exclaimed, running fast afore any could think to stop us, diving into the crowd that thronged about the Little Conduit pumping water into buckets.

Opposite the Little Conduit stood a gate, a passageway into St Paul’s Churchyard, which swarmed busier than Cheapside. All of London carried their possessions here, it seemed, assuming like me it could never burn down.

‘God help the good people of Colchester,’ Dowling grumbled,
slowing to a walk, rope bundled in his fists in an attempt to hide it.

‘God help the good Dutch people of London,’ I retorted. ‘What should I have said? Or should I have stood there silent, like a big fish, with my mouth wide open? Like you.’

He muttered something beneath his breath and shook his big head, ruefully, eyes moist. I thought of the poor Frenchman, if Frenchman he was, lain dead upon the street. ‘I hope someone looks after his dog,’ I said.

‘The dumb ass speaking with man’s voice forbad the madness of the prophet,’ Dowling grumbled.

Did he call me a dumb ass?

No matter; we had to get to St Paul’s.

The old cathedral was in a sorry state. Already falling to pieces before the Civil War, Cromwell allowed his military to brick off the choir from the rest of the building, converting the nave into a stable for eight hundred horses. They dismantled the scaffold set up in the south transept and the vaulting collapsed. They destroyed the bishop’s throne and the choir stalls and demolished the Bishop’s Palace. The walls leant and the tower stood crooked, supported by a complicated trellis of timber.

We entered the nave through the Little North Door with a crowd of others. Huge columns towered high above our heads. Every voice sounded thin and shrill beneath the formidable, vaulted ceiling, blackened arches hanging above our heads like a terrible judgement. A steady stream of men, women and children scuttled about, carrying
their possessions into the nave from all directions, hunting for a bare patch of floor to claim for their own. A notice instructed all who passed to deposit a penny into a box for every burden fetched into the building, but the box was empty. The mercers, goldsmiths and booksellers hurried faster than everyone, bustling impatiently, fetching their stock down into St Faith’s where they might guard their wares against thieves. We stood, backs against the cold stone wall, searching for Josselin.

‘If he was mad before, he’ll be lunatic now,’ I said in low voice. ‘All this destruction because he lit a fire in Pudding Lane. What will that do to his conscience?’

I stepped out across the busy stone floor, picking my way carefully through the melee. So many bodies crammed together created an unnatural warmth, leading all to feel uneasy. A fight broke out away to the left, afront of Bishop Kempe’s chapel. Two men squabbling over a square foot of stone floor, anxiety and frustration turned to violence.

‘A long time since so many came to church,’ I said, crossing the transept into the choir, treading through the rubble beneath the shadow of the four enormous pillars that held up the lead-covered tower.

The Rose Window glowed red and orange, shimmering and flickering, casting a fiery pall upon the walls and ceiling, and upon the marble tomb of Thomas Ewer lain just afore us. Past the bust of Dean Nowell, we entered the Lady Chapel, past the skeletal brass figure of Bishop Braybrooke. Unsettling to walk amidst the fine carved figures of men long dead, across a rubble-covered stone floor glowing red like the pits of Hell.

We returned back the way we came, discouraged, for Josselin was
more cunning than us. I feared we might walk straight past him and not recognise him. Yet he knew where we were, I was certain.

The merchants, booksellers and goldsmiths queued at the two entrances to the crypt on either side of the transept. Stairs led down into the bowels of the cathedral, the parish church of St Faith’s. Yet these fellows didn’t push and shove in order to pray. Their boxes and chests were full of worldly goods. However unlikely it seemed that Josselin would expose himself to the attention of so many, I had no doubt that if the letter was down there, he would be down there too.

We joined the line and stood self-consciously with arms bare. A fog of stinking sweat hung about our heads. These men’s faces shone red and wet, despite their fine clothes. We dared not skirt the queue, for tempers simmered, so we descended the steps slow, one at a time, hemmed in the midst of the angry crowd.

At the base of the stairs stood a man with parchment and pen, surrounded by merchants, wearing a frayed dark coat, fingers stained black. A row of five great brutes, each with pike and sword, prevented further passage. The crypt spread the whole length of the church, like a giant warehouse. Crates of books and lines of chests and trunks stood in long, neat lines. The room was bare of furniture. The edges of the space hid in darkness.

The man with the ledger peered up at me through rheumy eyes. ‘What do you want?’

‘We have come to help,’ I replied. ‘We were told to come down here and move some books.’

‘Told by who?’ he asked, looking me up and down.

I remembered a name. ‘Edward Taylor.’

He stared. ‘Edward Taylor,’ he repeated. ‘Edward Taylor is here. Is it worth my while fetching him?’

I pursed my lips and shook my head. The man with the ledger shuffled over to whisper into the ear of one of the sentries, pointing at me and making hissing noises. Time to leave. Through more crowds of anxious squirrels, all desperate to hoard their nuts.

‘Josselin cannot be there,’ I said, once we reached the transept, looking anxiously back over my shoulder.

‘Josselin has more wit than you and I put together,’ replied Dowling. ‘If he wishes not to be found we will not find him.’

I gripped his sleeve. ‘We’ll try the Chapter House.’

I hurried across the transept and out into a tiny square, surrounded on three sides by a two-storeyed cloister. Here we were alone, for the sky hung heavy above our heads, a dull, dirty orange flecked with grey clouds of wafting smoke speckled with ash.

‘Why did Josselin leave his letter here in the first place?’ I grumbled, pushing open the door of the Chapter House. It was a strange, round building, ten paces wide, wall to wall.

‘He was in a hurry,’ said Dowling. ‘Accused of murder and treachery. He passed by on his way out east.’

‘Why enter the City at all?’ I replied. ‘Faster to go round the wall.’

‘Aye,’ Dowling replied. ‘Perhaps there is no letter after all.’ He wandered back out into the courtyard. ‘When a man says he possesses a box and refuses to tell ye what it holds, usually it’s because he has only just made up the lie and hasn’t had time to finish it.’

The cloisters were shallow, impossible to hide therein without being seen. We toured the square slowly, scrutinising every inch of stonework.

‘The roof?’ Dowling suggested.

‘Why should he hide on the roof?’ I spoke as if the idea was ridiculous, for I had no desire to climb such a decrepit structure.
‘The roof is covered in timber where they are repairing it. Even if he climbed all the way up where could he have hidden a letter?’

‘We’ve been everywhere else.’ Dowling stared upwards. ‘Who knows what hiding places there might be.’

I followed his gaze. My head spun, the ceiling was so high. Dowling headed to the door leading to the staircase

‘Attention!’ shouted a voice from around the corner. ‘Attention!’ it shouted again, more urgent. ‘The fire has spread nearly to the wall,’ a soldier pronounced. ‘Soon Ludgate will be ablaze. The prisoners have already been moved elsewhere. Everyone must leave now, through the west gate, before it is too late.’ The soldier stepped into view out of the choir, repeating his message, bellowing at the top of his lungs.

A low moan filled the air, rising to the top of the ceiling and reverberating about our ears in strange echo. A woman screamed and men began to shout. Soldiers streamed from the choir down into the nave, rousing the inert and forcing everyone to pick up what they could and hurry away to our left.

Dowling and I stayed where we were. Keen to leave, but not before we found Josselin. We allowed ourselves to be swept along by the crowd towards the choir. Soldiers lined the steps, armed and anxious, surveying the crowd that swarmed the nave, nervous and afraid.

‘No more time,’ shouted another soldier at the merchants that fought against the tide, arms full. ‘Take the rest of your goods with you and seal the doors. No more time.’

I ducked my head just in time to avoid being spotted by Arlington and Withypoll.

I tugged at Dowling’s sleeve. ‘Lower your big head,’ I hissed.

He bent his knees and tried his best, but his white head shone like a beacon, glowing in the gloom.

I pulled him sideways, towards a thick wooden door. Behind it a narrow staircase, twisting up into the gloom.

‘How did they know where to find us?’ I panted, dashing up the first few stairs in case we were followed.

‘One of his spies,’ said Dowling, close behind. ‘Unless it’s Josselin’s doing.’

‘Why should he do that?’ I snorted, though I feared he might speak the truth. ‘Save us from the flames, then unleash those two beasts upon us.’

‘Just climb,’ Dowling snapped. ‘You’ll need every breath you’ve got.’

I had to stop and rest twice before we finally reached the top of the stairs, five hundred feet above the ground. The wind gusted strong, rattling loose timbers strewn all about, the sky awash with black smoke. My legs felt weak, petrified by the fear of being blown off the top, yet I couldn’t help but follow Dowling to the edge to contemplate the horror that played itself out before our eyes.

The whole of London was ablaze. We sat as if upon the mast of a giant ship floating on a small lake, the cathedral protected on all sides by the expanse of the churchyard. It was the only empty space betwixt the City walls, and so the flames below us happily consumed every house and every building, not a single hole in the sheet of fire. All gone. The churches, the halls, Cole Harbour, the Exchange. My little house on Bread Street and Dowling’s house and shop. Nothing survived.

Looking west was like looking down a long tunnel, fire on each side all the way to the wall. Only ahead could we still see whole buildings through thick black smoke, and a dark silhouette.

‘What are you doing up here?’ I shouted, wind carrying my words
in his direction above the incessant roar of the blaze.

Josselin turned, face covered in a thin layer of soot. His lips moved but I couldn’t hear the words. We moved closer.

‘… lit the fire, but I didn’t send the winds,’ he said, a strange brightness in his eyes. ‘I will execute judgement: I am the Lord.’

Which seemed a tenuous conclusion to me. God sent the wind every winter; it didn’t mean he expected us to put flame to buildings.

‘Do you have the letter?’ I asked.

‘Downstairs,’ Josselin replied, transfixed upon the flames, a strange smile upon drawn lips. ‘God will not allow its destruction.’

When a man sought assurance from God, it was usually because he faced circumstances he couldn’t contemplate managing alone.

‘Arlington is downstairs,’ I said, at last.

‘Arlington?’ He raised a slow brow. ‘I cannot meet him here, not with the letter upon me. I must take the letter somewhere safe first, then you must talk to him.’

‘The soldiers are forcing everyone out through Ludgate,’ I said. ‘Arlington and Withypoll will be gone soon. We should go too.’

‘Look around.’ Josselin flung his arms in the air. ‘Do you not see we are safe? Ye shall reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord.’

Now he reckoned he was God. This was not going well. I leant over the balustrade, peering down through the black clouds that gathered about the spire. A steady procession of tiny people streamed out the west porch in a thin, straggled line towards Ludgate. Something told me Withypoll and Arlington would not be among them.

‘Look there!’ I yelled, pointing. Though the wind blew from east to west, the flames reached out from the City to touch the north-west corner of the building, seizing upon a stray board that covered a hole in the lead. Even as I watched, the fire seemed to skate along the
wooden roof, like oil rolling over a polished floor. ‘We have to go,’ I shouted. ‘If the fire takes hold of the nave, we will be trapped.’

Josselin’s eyes widened, a look of terror upon his long, dirty face. ‘The nave, you say?’ He spun to face the door and took off, crashing across planks of timber.

I ran behind him, clattering down the staircase as fast as my legs could manage. Josselin and Dowling might take these steps two at a time, but my legs were too short. My chest constricted, and I stepped aside for a moment to let Dowling pass, before resuming the chase.

Even as we ran I heard flames take hold of the scaffolding about the tower, heard the bricks groan and creak about us. I stepped out into the transept just behind Dowling, to see him chasing Josselin down the nave. Smoke filled the huge cavity above our heads as the roof’s giant timbers began to smoulder.

Arlington emerged from the gloom, and Josselin slowed to a halt, arms held up in the air.

‘At last!’ Arlington declared, clasping his hands together. ‘I almost gave up hope. I feared you might be burnt alive.’

Withypoll marched towards me, sword fully extended. I turned and ran towards the Lady Chapel, Dowling and Josselin fast behind. The walls sang out now, the stone screeching like it was being throttled. A great lump of burning metal dropped from the ceiling and hit the pavement in front of me with a great crack. I danced about the debris and kept running, all the way to the Rose Window, arriving just as it shattered into a thousand pieces, glass shards flying through the air, embedding themselves in my hair and on my clothes. I turned to see Withypoll slavering like some great hellhound, unsure who to devour first.

The vast, empty window sucked in fresh air, enraging the fire in
the rafters so it ignited in a great ball of flame, momentarily engulfing Withypoll. He fell to one knee, beating at his clothes with his beaver hat. Josselin saw his distraction and hurled himself forwards, grasping for Withypoll’s throat. Withypoll reached for his blade, lain discarded on the flagstone, but Josselin saw in time and rolled aside to grab it first. Josselin stood first, sword held aloft.

He jabbed the tip of it into Withypoll’s chest. ‘It was you killed Berkshire, wasn’t it?’

Withypoll clambered to his feet, letting his burning jacket fall to the floor.

‘Where are you, Arlington?’ Josselin shouted.

Arlington stood ten paces distant, sword still sheathed. He drew his weapon and approached.

Josselin bared his teeth. ‘Which one of you was it? Or must I slay you both?’

Arlington lowered his blade. ‘Why do you concern yourself with Berkshire? He would not have concerned himself with you.’

‘Don’t seek to confound me,’ Josselin replied, face contorted. ‘I am beyond confusion. Just tell me which of you killed Berkshire.’

Arlington pointed at Withypoll. ‘He did, because I told him to. I had no choice.’