London in Chains (26 page)

The warder snorted again, took the money and wrote down Thomas's name as a permitted visitor.

After that they were searched, but not very rigorously. The warder asked Thomas to take off his coat and inspected the basket of food which Lucy had brought as a gift for the prisoner; he asked Lucy to hitch up her skirts and turn about, but he didn't notice the pockets inside the petticoat and demand that she strip it off.

Lilburne had a chamber on the first floor of Coldharbour, above the gate itself; the warder escorted them up to it. On the stairs they heard voices raised in excited discussion, and when they came into the room they found two men sitting at a table looking at a book.

‘. . . wrote it yourself!' the tall fair man was saying.

‘Nay!' cried the other, a rangy, dark-haired fellow with spectacles. ‘It is by Andrew Horn, a citizen of London in King Edward's day! See here, it says as much by the title!' He had a northern accent.

‘Then why do his words sound as though they came from your pen?'

‘Because we have both studied under the same masters!' replied the northerner. ‘History has taught us to cherish the same freedoms!'

The fair man inspected the title of the book, then grinned. ‘I yield: I see that this was translated only last year. No one now can set out to speak of liberty without sounding like John Lilburne.'

‘Visitors for you, John!' said the warder.

The bespectacled man turned towards them, an eager smile on his lips. He had only one eye: the socket of the missing one was misshapen, and a scar showed white above and below the black line of his spectacles. ‘Why, it's Thomas Stevens!' he cried, and set down the spectacles to come over and clasp Uncle Thomas's hand. ‘You that were a master-mercer when I was but an apprentice! And who's this? Your daughter?'

‘My niece, Lucy Wentnor,' said Thomas, beaming, snatching his hat off in token of respect.

‘I've heard your name before, Mistress Wentnor,' John Lilburne said, taking her hand with a smile. ‘Friends have told me of Thomas Stevens' niece, a girl as brave as she is pretty. You're well met!'

Lucy ducked a curtsey, tongue-tied. This man had changed her life – yet she hadn't even known he had lost an eye or that he was so
young
, surely not much above thirty! She'd assumed that he and Thomas had been apprentices together. Unsure what to do, she presented him with the basket of food.

The other man at once came over to inspect it like a greedy child, and Lucy noticed that he – like Lilburne – was thin and ill-nourished.

‘Apples!' he cried eagerly. ‘Give us an apple, John!'

Lilburne plucked an apple from the basket and tossed it to him. ‘Now get you gone, Lewis!' he ordered. ‘We'll feast later; now I'll speak with my old friend.'

Lewis grinned and made for the door; the warder, after a distrustful look at Lilburne, hurried after him.

‘Quickly!' Lilburne said, as soon as they were gone. ‘Lewis is a Royalist prisoner and must be escorted back to his cell. You brought paper?'

Lucy was already hauling up the side of her gown and turning her petticoat inside-out. Thomas, with a nervous glance at Lilburne, came and held the skirts out of her way. She drew the paper quickly out of the octavo pockets; by the time she'd pulled out the third small sheaf, Lilburne was offering her some folded papers to put in its place. ‘Two letters to Henry Marten,' he whispered. ‘Copy them over before you deliver them, and print the copies: they tell the truth about the double-dealing of that false hypocrite Oliver Cromwell!'

Lucy shoved the letters into her pocket and pulled out the rest of the writing paper. Lilburne took it and glanced around his room.

‘They searched the basket already,' suggested Lucy.

Lilburne shook his head. ‘The keeper will help himself from it, the rogue.' He thrust the paper under the open book on his table, just as the keeper returned.

The warder, as predicted, went over to the basket. He removed an apple and a round cheese and sat down at Lilburne's table. He took a bite of apple.

‘Thieving scoundrel!' Lilburne said irritably. ‘There are no thieves like jailers, Mr Stevens: they pilfer all that comes in, they steal anything lying about, they tax all that goes out, and if a prisoner complains, they clap him in irons. Sir, if you had
asked
me if you might have that apple, I would have given it you!'

The warder glared, swallowed his bite of apple and cut himself a slice of cheese.

‘So tell me the news!' Lilburne said, flinging himself into a chair. ‘What goes on under the wide sky, while I am buried here?'

‘Mr Stevens is come to appeal to you to use your influence for peace,' said the warder maliciously, around the mouthful of cheese.

‘Why, so I do already!' replied Lilburne. ‘I am as eager for peace as any man in England.' He leaned forward and slapped the table. ‘We might
have
peace, swiftly and easily, if our rulers did not set their own greedy interests above the common good!'

The warder rolled his eyes in contempt.

‘
Cromwell
spoke of peace!' continued Lilburne, warming to his subject. ‘By which he meant, having his own way. He said that I could not be released, for fear of my making new hurly-burlys in the Army, but that if I would be quiet, I might have an honourable employment in that same Army. I told him I will never be quiet until I have justice, and that I would not engage myself for either Parliament or
his
Army for all the gold in the world! And yet, to my shame, I did promise that if I were released, I would go abroad. He professed himself satisfied with this and said he would see to it that I was set free. We drew up a paper together – the warders of the Tower all witnessed it! And now my case has been
referred back to committee
, and God He knows if ever it will be heard at all!'

‘If you bore yourself humbly . . .' began the warder, then stopped as the prisoner straightened and glared at him.

‘If Lieutenant Colonel Lilburne had borne himself humbly,' said Thomas with quiet sincerity, ‘he would now be a poor mercer, like myself, and we would all be living – most humbly! – under tyranny, for no one would believe it right to resist injustice, however great.'

‘I see I have been misled!' declared the warder resentfully. ‘You are of his faction. Well, then, your visit is at an end!' He got to his feet. ‘Get you gone!'

He chivvied Thomas and Lucy out. Lucy paused on the threshold to glance back at John Lilburne, sitting alone in his cell. He saw her looking and gave her a tired smile, and she touched her hand to her heart.

When they left the inner ward again, she began to cry. It was a monstrous world: that brave, generous man was locked up in prison, subject to the petty malice and greed of his keepers, while scavengers grew fat and Parliament and the Army Grandees tussled with the king for power. She told herself, sniffing, that it was hardly
news
that the world was evil – yet why should those who were trying to make it better be
punished
?

‘Hush, sweet!' exclaimed Thomas. They stopped in the shadow of the Traitors' Gate, and he put his arms round her. ‘Don't weep! We
succeeded
.'

‘Aye,' agreed Lucy, still sniffing. ‘When the Army came to London, I thought it was all over and all would be well, but things are no better than they were!'

Thomas shook his head uncertainly. ‘Child, if human efforts come to naught, it is but to be expected: we are sinful and weak. God's ways are as high above ours as the heavens about the earth, and we can but hope that in His great mercy He will strengthen our feeble hands.'

Dissatisfied, she said nothing. If men could only do good through divine help, then why didn't God help them? Did He
want
them to do evil? It was a blasphemous thought, and she tried to put it out of her mind.

‘Come!' said Thomas with a desperate effort to be cheerful. ‘We'll visit the menagerie! That will lift our spirits.'

Lucy eyed him doubtfully: she'd seen enough prisoners for one day, she was expected back at work – and Agnes would certainly view the cost of the menagerie, added to what Thomas had already spent on bribes, as insult on top of injury.

Thomas, however, was smiling. ‘I took Mark and Hannah when they were babes,' he told her, ‘and Bella, and my little Tommikin. Bella cried that she wanted a lion to be her pet, and she and Tommikin fitted out a place for it beside their bed!'

For a moment she was puzzled; then she understood. She'd never before heard Thomas name any of the children he'd lost in their infancy; that ‘my little Tommikin' suddenly showed her a grief she'd never guessed at. ‘I should like to see the menagerie,' she said, suddenly wanting only to make her uncle happy. He smiled at her, as pleased as though he were a child himself.

The menagerie was in the western part of the Tower's outer ward; the cost of entry was three farthings – or a cat or dog to feed to the lions; Lucy was glad to see no miserable strays in the queue. Thomas paid for them both, and they walked about the tiny enclosures with the rest of the gaping crowd. There were lions, sprawled as though heartbroken on bare earth; there was a tiger, pacing back and forth before the bars of its tiny cage, gazing at the citizens outside with a blind, manic stare. Lucy found the sight painful and disturbing, but Thomas was delighted with the beast and marvelled at its bold stripes and terrible teeth.

They came to some apes. One of the crowd tossed an apple into the cage: an ape caught and ate it avidly, baring its teeth at its companions when they tried to take a share. ‘These are more warders of the Tower!' Thomas told Lucy, and she laughed.

Next was a great pale deer-like creature with dark, suffering eyes; Lucy thought at first that it must be a unicorn, but it had two horns, not one. She gazed at the beautiful, exotic animal in wonder and pity. ‘That's Lieutenant Colonel Lilburne,' she whispered.

Thomas stared at the creature then shook his head. ‘Nay. He's the tiger. He would not be in prison else.' He smiled. ‘Why his father ever apprenticed him to be a mercer I know not, for he never had the temper for it. He was ever a bold man, headstrong and ready to quarrel – though withal as generous and warm-hearted as any man that breathes.'

Lucy knew Lilburne's story now: how the young man, charged with illegal printing under the king, had refused to testify under oath before the High Commission; how he'd been whipped at the cart-tail and pilloried and imprisoned for his defiance; how he'd been released from imprisonment when Parliament began its struggle with the king; how he'd fought bravely for Parliament's cause, only to be dismissed from the Army for refusing to take the Covenant. She hadn't, until now, heard Uncle Thomas speak of the John Lilburne he'd known before the story began.

‘I'd thought you were apprentices together,' she said hesitantly. ‘But you're his elder.'

‘Aye,' agreed Thomas. ‘He was apprenticed to Thomas Hewson, with whom I did a deal of business before the war. In those days, all Puritans were friends and dealt candidly with one another. Everything was so much simpler then! We could call for liberty of conscience and the true reformed Protestant religion all in one breath, and no one imagined any contradiction between the two. And now many who used to call for liberty call for persecution, and conscience and religion are seen to be quite at odds. It grieves me to the heart when I remember what high hopes we had! Howsomever, John was Tom Hewson's apprentice, and I saw him whenever I came to do business with his master. I thought him a godly young man and a kind one, but something lacking in respect for his elders, and over-ready to take offence.' He shook his head. ‘I mistook his honest fervour for bluster. Had I ever been dragged before the High Commission, I would have cowered in terror and done all I could to appease them. John's courage and fidelity shamed me.' He gave her an earnest look. ‘As do yours.'

Lucy stared at him a moment in surprise, then caught his arm. ‘Never say so! Am I to
shame
you? I am
proud
of my uncle!'

‘Oh, dear child!' He patted her hand. ‘When Hannah married and left, my house was so empty of joy I could scarce endure it; I am so
glad
you came to stay with us in London! God keep you, sweet!'

It was later in that same week that Gilbert Mabbot took the plunge and launched his newsbook, in the profitable disguise of John Dillingham's
Moderate Intelligencer.
Lucy was at last required to leave the Bournes and assist in the smoke-filled workshop of Robert White.

It wasn't as bad as she'd feared: White wasn't around much, and when he was around, she was able to fend him off simply by taking a hairpin from her coif and pointing it towards him every time he approached. It turned out that he had recently bought a second printworks, and his quarrel with Dillingham had been because Dillingham expected him to oversee printing the
Intelligencer
personally. White would have split with Dillingham over the matter before, except that none of his downtrodden assistants was willing to manage the printshop in his absence. Mabbot had promised to pay for an experienced manager: Lucy was his economical fulfillment of that promise. When Lucy first understood this, she worried about how the assistants would view her; she discovered that the mere fact that she wasn't Robert White told strongly in her favour. The two men considered it beneath their dignity to be subject to a woman, of course, but they were happy to consider themselves subject to White while actually dealing with Lucy. The woman worker was simply pleased to answer to someone who would not molest her. No one, to Lucy's relief, seemed to believe she'd acquired her place by sleeping with Gilbert Mabbot. The Bournes must have scotched that rumour.