London (126 page)

“England will stay Protestant,” he assured Penny. “Even with dragoons, he can’t impose Catholicism by force. You’re safe. I promise.”

Penny, however, seemed unconvinced.

O Be Joyful liked working in St James’s Palace. The main carvings that Grinling Gibbons had undertaken were completed, but there were numerous small commissions which he had been given to do. The guards were used to seeing him go in and out and since he was always careful to choose a spot to work where he would not disturb anybody, he was allowed to move about pretty much as he pleased. He had chosen a panel over a doorway that afternoon where he carved some fruit and flowers, not as fine as Gibbons’s work, but good, and he was proud of them. The carving was actually complete, but he wanted to apply some beeswax to the wood and polish it. In order to work more comfortably, he erected a little scaffolding over his side of the doorway and here he had contentedly ensconced himself. This corner of the palace seemed to be empty this afternoon; the door was just ajar, but half an hour passed before he heard anyone coming, and then it was a pair of murmuring voices he heard, and a faint rustle as two men approached the doorway. As they did so, their voices stopped. He saw the door open, a head quickly look round it to make sure the room was empty, and then, standing just the other side of the entrance, the two men continued their conversation. The head which had looked in, he had just been able to see, belonged to a Jesuit priest; and, somewhat embarrassed, he was about to make a noise to alert them to his presence when the other man spoke.

“My only fear is that the king is moving too fast.”

O Be Joyful froze. Presumably these two men were papists. What would happen if they discovered him? Yet, suspicious as ever of any Catholics, he could not resist the desire to listen. A second later, as the first voice continued, he received a shock.

“The king is determined to bring all England back to Rome, but you must urge him to be cautious. It can’t be done overnight. Not even by force.”

O Be Joyful went cold.

“My dear Father John.” The Jesuit spoke in English but the accent was French. “We all regret, of course, that this toleration must be granted to Protestant sects for the moment. But Holy Church has time on her side. That is well understood. And you need not accuse us of impatience, for we have already been working with this royal family for some time.”

“With James, of course. But he has only been king a short time,” the English priest countered. His words were followed by a short pause, and O Be Joyful wondered if the conversation was over. But then he heard the Frenchman again, in a lower voice this time.

“Not quite. There is perhaps something you do not know. His brother died in the true faith.”

“King Charles? A Catholic?”

“Oh yes, my friend. He kept it from his people. But when he died . . .”

“The Archbishop of Canterbury attended him.”

“True, but as the archbishop went down the front stairs, our good Father Huddlestone came secretly up the back. He heard Charles’s confession, gave him extreme unction.”

“I did not know.”

“You must not say it. But I will tell you something more. Long before that King Charles II entered into a secret treaty with King Louis of France. In it, he promised to declare his true faith and return England to Rome; and King Louis promised him whatever forces he needed to do it. Nobody but a handful at the French court know this. Charles even deceived his own closest ministers. But the conversion of England has already been in preparation for fifteen years. I only tell you so that you shall better understand the work you are asked to do.”

King Charles a secret Catholic all along? O Be Joyful was trembling. Although he had always believed in a Catholic plot, to hear it confirmed so blandly by another person was terrifying. And the real conspiracy was even deeper than the one Titus Oates had invented. The French king ready to use force? The toleration edict only temporary? Penny was right then. It was all a trap. He was so frightened he could hardly breathe and he thanked the Lord when, a few moments later, he heard the two men walk away.

His first impulse was simple. He must tell people. But who would believe him? They would say he was another Titus Oates, a scandal-monger; and there was no way that he could prove he wasn’t a fraud. The alternative was to say nothing, to keep his terrible secret to himself, live his life in peace and quiet. No one would ever know. And if England was delivered up to Rome? It was fate. He was bound for eternal damnation anyway. Even the vision of Martha, rising up to admonish him for his cowardice, was not enough to dispel his apathy. He was helpless, he was damned, and, in all probability, all England with him. For fully five minutes he lay there meditating his course of action, and feeling more ashamed than ever.

Suddenly, he sat up. To his own surprise O Be Joyful was overcome by a huge indignation, a rage unlike anything he had known before. It was as if all his disgust with himself over the years and all the resentment he felt at the way these royal papists had so contemptuously duped him, had focused in a single point of fury. It was, though he did not realize it, the same sullen anger that his father Gideon had felt. No, he decided. This time, whatever the cost, he would stand up to them.

He came down from his place of concealment and made his way out of the palace. He would go to the Protestant Lord Mayor of London himself. And all the guilds too, if he must. His terror and even his rage were replaced now by a kind of wild excitement.

He was still in this state of furious elation when, about a hundred yards down Pall Mall, a carriage drew up a little in front of him, and an old man stepped out and moved slowly towards the entrance of one of the fashionable mansions. Just before reaching the steps to the door, he turned to glance at O Be Joyful, and the two men recognized each other.

It was nine years since old Julius had been made Earl of St James, and he had not expected to live so long. Yet, at the age of eighty-five, he had remarkably little to complain of. He was stooped; his eye was a little rheumy; an arthritic leg meant that he had to walk, rather painfully, with a stick but in his eighties he had acquired the same stiff dignity that had been the hallmark of his father, Alderman Ducket, back in the days when Shakespeare was still living. As he glanced at Carpenter now, in the manner of the very old who know they are soon to depart, he gave a smile of vague, uninterested curiosity.

But that was not what O Be Joyful saw. He saw the persecutor of his family, the hated Royalist, the thief who had taken an earldom to vote for a Catholic king. He was sure to be part of this papist plot. Worst of all, protected by wealth, titles, even his age, the evil old devil was grinning at him now because he thought he had got away with it.

Scarcely considering what he was doing, the craftsman rushed forward and in a voice of rage and blistering contempt he yelled: “You old devil! You think you’ve hoodwinked us all. Well, you haven’t.” Emboldened further by Julius’s look of surprise he continued shouting. “I
know
, do you understand? I’ve heard your priests in the palace. I know all about your Royalist papist plot. And in an hour the mayor and all London will know too. Then, my lord, we’ll string you and the king and all the priests up together.” And with a cry, he ran off.

It took Lord St James several seconds to recover from this verbal assault; but as soon as he had he clambered back into his carriage and barked out a sharp order: “Drive like the wind!”

Twenty minutes later O Be Joyful, hurrying along Fleet Street near St Bride’s, saw Meredith coming towards him. As the clergyman hailed him in his usual friendly manner, he halted.

“Why, what’s the matter, Master Carpenter? You look as if you’ve seen the Devil himself.”

O Be Joyful was glad to see the clergyman. Despite his rage and determination, the prospect of facing the Lord Mayor was rather daunting. By saying what he had to Lord St James, he had burned his boats; but he still had no idea of how to get the mayor to believe him. Seeing Meredith now, however, he suddenly realized that if he would accompany him to the mayor, it would be a different matter entirely. Meredith, at least, he could trust.

“There is something terrible . . .” he began.

“Come into the church,” Meredith suggested. “It’s quieter there.”

So inside the handsome new church of St Bride’s O Be Joyful told an astounded Meredith what he had heard.

When he had finished, Meredith, with a thoughtful nod, beckoned him. “Follow me,” he said. “There is something I must show you.” He led him down a passageway to where a heavy door guarded the stairs that led down into the crypt. Lighting a lamp, he gave it to Carpenter and asked him to lead the way. Only when the craftsman was more than halfway down, did Meredith close the heavy door and turn the key in the lock, as Lord St James had told him to do.

Then he went back through the church, leaving O Be Joyful a prisoner.

“Do you believe him?” Lord St James asked Meredith. They were sitting in the parlour of the clergyman’s house.

“I’m sure he believes that what he says is true.”

The earl said nothing for a moment, then asked: “Can you keep him there?”

“The poor fellow could shout his head off down in the crypt and no one would hear him. But do you really think it’s necessary?”

“Just for today. I need to think.” The old man rose to leave.

As the hours passed, Julius discovered it was not easy to work out what to do. Like most old people, it was not the recent past that was vivid in his memory, but the days of his youth. And despite all that had passed between them in the Civil War, he still felt, as keenly as if it were yesterday, the guilt over Gideon himself, Carpenter and the Spanish Ambassador. Unlike O Be Joyful he was sure that if the craftsman took his story of a new popish plot around London he would be believed. Quite apart from the trouble that might stir up, he was in little doubt about what King James would do. With Judge Jeffreys in charge the fellow would be lucky if he escaped with his life. I sent the father Gideon to a whipping, he thought. I can’t stand by and watch the son go to something worse. It was this that had prompted his dash that afternoon to St Bride’s in the hope that Meredith could help him prevent the woodcarver doing something foolish. But how could they stop Carpenter placing himself in peril?

This dilemma, however, was better than the other he faced. The popish plot: had Carpenter misunderstood what he had heard? Could this French Jesuit, for whatever reason, have been lying? James’s Catholicism was one thing, but had Charles really deceived his faithful supporters all those years? Had he really promised to deliver England to Rome, and bring in French troops to do it? The idea was unthinkable, a treachery not to be borne.

Lord St James supped alone. He took a little brandy. Unable to sleep, he found himself keeping a vigil through the night, just as he had once before, long ago, on the eve of the execution of the martyred king. Except that this time it was not the sad, chaste face of the first Charles who came before his mind’s eye, but the swarthy, lecherous, cynical face of the second.

Could his king, to whom he was bound by his sacred oath, really have done such a thing? Could his own faith be shaken by some foolish tale from one of the cursed Carpenters? How could it be, he wondered, as midnight silently passed, that in his heart he now believed O Be Joyful rather than his king? The answer, though it came to him like a tiny voice, also came from a lifetime of experience. The loyalties of the Stuarts had usually lain outside England. And the Stuart men – yes, even the martyred king if truth be told – were nearly always liars.

The crypt of St Bride’s was a musty place. It was dark. No sound could escape and the door was utterly solid.

It was the betrayal that hurt O Be Joyful most. Even Meredith, it seemed, was in the popish plot. Was there anyone in London he could trust now, apart from Eugene Penny? As the hours passed, he wondered what lay in store for him. If they were coming to arrest him, why were they taking so long?

At last he went to sleep, awoke, dozed again, then lost track of all time. His family must be wondering where he was. Penny, very probably, would be out looking for him. But there was not the slightest reason why anyone should look for him in the crypt of St Bride’s. Some time around what he supposed to be dawn, it occurred to him that perhaps Meredith meant to leave him there to die.

On Sunday morning Lord St James ate a light breakfast. He still did not know what to do about Carpenter.

At mid-morning he went to church and heard the service. He had hoped it would give him inspiration, but it did not. When he returned to his house he found a polite note from Meredith reminding him that they could not keep O Be Joyful locked up in a dungeon for ever. “At least,” it ended, “I ought to give the poor fellow some water – and some explanation.”

Finally, somewhat past the middle of the day, they finally brought Lord St James news that quite unexpectedly changed everything.

“You are sure?” Meredith asked when Julius told him.

“That is the official news. The question is,” the earl continued, “is it possible? As a physician, what would you say?”

“It’s more than a month early. You say it’s healthy?”

“‘Bonnie’ was the word that was used to me.”

“It sounds,” Meredith weighed his words carefully, “unlikely.” He paused. The two men looked at each other. “She has always miscarried before,” he said slowly, “and the king is now . . . unhealthy. That he should have a ‘bonnie’ son just now seems to me” – he made a face – “convenient.”

O Be Joyful had no idea at all what time of day it was when the door above him opened. As he clambered weakly up into the light he saw not soldiers, but Meredith and Lord St James standing there, smiling.

“I’m sorry we had to keep you here,” the clergyman said. “It was for your own safety. We believe every word you’ve said. And now I want you to go with Lord St James here. We can’t force you, but I think it would be best. You’ll be back in a week.”

“Go with him? A week?” He blinked at them in the light, confused. “Go where?”