The Gilded Lily (7 page)

She turned her back on the bolted door and saw anew the small square box they lived in. It was smaller than the stall they kept their cows in at home. The pang of homesickness took her by
surprise. A longing that seemed to spring straight up from her heart. She pulled her shawl more closely round her shoulders and tied the ends. It was one she had knitted herself with Herdwick wool.
She brought it up to her face and inhaled. It was shabby and worn, with a tatty fringe, but it smelt of Westmorland. She liked it better than the cloak Ella had bought her.

The smell took her straight home. She pictured her father’s back straining against his yoked shirt, bent over the fire to see what was cooking. She missed her da. Fifteen years she had
spent hating him, dreading him coming home, fearing his drunken footsteps outside the door. At night she used to lie awake and dream about the day Ella would come back in her fine lace and satin
and take her away from him. Ever since she was small she had been his scapegoat, someone he could hit when he was angry, someone who would cringe and beg, make him feel powerful, like a man, when
in truth he wasn’t a man at all – just bones held together by beer. Yet now she missed him and it shamed her. But at least he was predictable, not like Ella who blew hither and thither
like chaff in the wind.

She went to the window and opened the shutters to look out on the street. She wondered what Da thought when she had disappeared. Since coming to London she played out imaginary scenes in her
head, where he wept and told her he loved her, begged her to come home, said he’d never forgive himself. Maybe he was out searching for her right that minute. But deep down she knew he would
not, that he had just drowned it as usual.

She turned away from the window and hoicked the bowls out of the sand where Ella had left them, then dried them on her apron. She rubbed the cloth around the inside, staring into space. Da. The
memories flooded back. She realized she had not thought of him since Christmas Day. She knew it was Christmas Day because she and Ella hunkered up in front of a big fire with a meal of roasted
pigeon and boiled taters, courtesy of selling another pair of candlesticks, and Ella had even bought a sprig of holly for the windowsill. At the first mouthful of pigeon she had felt a sudden
grief, wondering how he was managing with nobody to fetch their share of the goose from their neighbours. That day Sadie saw Ella’s faraway look and knew that, like her, she was remembering
other feast days and holidays, the May Day carousings and the warm fires of the Candlemas supper. But there was no snow in London, no village fiddler coming door to door, no mummers play, and the
grey damp was unabated.

She had reached across the table then and given Ella her last boiled tater, even though she’d been saving it till the end because it was the biggest.

Sadie looked down at the two bowls. What was she doing standing about like a lummock? She stacked the bowls on the shelf and pushed her memories away. The pain of them scalded her too much. She
ached for the beauty of the hills – the open skies with their scudding clouds, the hawthorn’s scarlet berries, the sweet tang of cow dung. She sat back on the hard wooden chair, winding
her hair in her fingers, the stench of horse urine, bird droppings and soot in her nostrils, the incessant noise of iron-shod hooves drowning out the vermin scratching in the rafters.

She waited for Ella to return and wondered if she had ever really known her sister. There was something in Ella’s tale that made her spine prickle, for she knew that Ella never told anyone
the truth when a lie suited her better. With Ella there was always the feeling that the truth moved about, like tussocks on shifting sand, and that sometimes when you thought you were on solid
ground, it would tilt and sink beneath you. And that fact alone made her shiver, and not just from cold.

Jay Whitgift hurried down the narrow alleyway towards the Pelican Coffee House. The icy rain was like pitchforks so he was anxious to get away from the midden of the narrow
unswept streets with their seeping piles of horse excrement and into the dry darkness of the Pelican, where he was to meet Allsop, a client. As he rounded the corner into Cooper’s Yard, he
almost tripped over a chapman whose tray of pamphlets was jutting out into the main thoroughfare. About to curse the man, he turned to face him but was arrested by a pair of familiar eyes.

‘Josiah Whitgift.’ The man moved out from under the upper storey and pushed his tray under Jay’s nose. ‘Well, I never.’

Jay did not reply and stepped away. He had no wish to linger and speak with him for he recalled him well.

‘Don’t go running away from old friends now. There is an almanac here would suit you very well.’ He fished amongst the damp pile of thin booklets in his tray.

Jay shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. ‘Sorry, Tindall, I’m meeting someone, maybe another time, eh?’

Tindall fixed Jay with his eyes. ‘Take my advice, you ignore the stars at your peril. A wise man takes them into account or he cannot move with the tides.’

Jay looked over his shoulder, seeking an excuse to leave.

‘There is a message here could be made for you,’ Tindall went on, ‘and you would do well to heed it. There is a conjunction of Saturn and Mars coming, the reaper and the
firebrand. It will mean great upheaval, not least for those born under the twins, such as yourself.’

Curse the man. He would walk past, but it was evident that Tindall was not going to let him by unless he made a purchase. It was embarrassing to see him standing out on the street in such a
condition. The last time he had seen him was in his father’s warm parlour, where in his fancy velvet coat it seemed as if he was doing them a favour by calling at all. Now astrologers had
fallen from the king’s favour, and like all the others Tindall must be finding it hard to earn a living.

‘Very well, I’ll take this.’ Anxious to move on, Jay picked out the first chapbook that came to hand, giving it a cursory glance to see the price. He turned it over. It showed
what appeared to be a depiction of Hell – burning skeletons flailing behind a wall of forked-tongued flames. In the background, a building that looked like St Paul’s Church was toppling
into the fiery sea.

He stuffed it into the top of his breeches and held out a penny.

‘No. It is not that one you need,’ said Tindall, his eyes dark and shifting behind his dribble of greasy hair, and he took out a thinner handwritten paper from under his coat.

Jay sighed and reached for another coin. Tindall took it. His cuffs were thick with dirt, the edges frayed.

‘This is the one,’ said Tindall, holding out the paper, which was peppered with diagrams and symbols and tiny writing. ‘But you will not make much sense of it without my
interpretation – you would do better with a full consultation.’

Jay snatched the paper impatiently. ‘No, I don’t think so.’ He looked at Tindall almost apologetically. ‘You must know, nobody bothers with astrology these days. My
father doesn’t need your help. We are men of reason now – I even have my own telescope. We don’t need old-fashioned notions of predatory comets and portents of doom. We’ve
moved forward with the king, into a new age.’

Tindall shook his head and said nothing, just stared at him intently, a look of pity in his eyes. Jay shifted his gaze, feeling uncomfortable, and having said his piece thrust his way past and
continued up the road, screwing up the paper in his fist and throwing it down onto the road in disgust.

Tindall watched him go. He dodged a passing handcart to retrieve the paper, unfolded it and smoothed it out. Through narrowed eyes he glanced at the sign of the Pelican, carefully shielded the
paper from the rain, refolded it and put it back inside his waistcoat.

‘That’s as may be,’ Tindall said, drawing the oilskin cover over his wares. He shrugged and moved off. In a moment he was swallowed up by the crowd of itinerant hawkers,
pedlars and barrow boys.

Meanwhile Jay swung in through the door of the coffee shop and looked for a place to sit in the fug of steam and tobacco smoke. The stalls were full, but the occupant of one of the round tables
near the bow window sprang to his feet and beckoned him over.

‘Over here, Whitgift.’ Allsop removed a glove and held out his hand, and Jay took it, noticing that it was immaculately manicured as always, the nails white curves above smooth pink
flesh. Jay’s sharp eyes also saw that Allsop wore a mourning ring, presumably for his late mother. It was a particularly fine example, an ebony mount with engraved doves. He mentally assessed
its worth as he gave Allsop’s hand the briefest of shakes. He recoiled a little for the hand was slightly damp. Sweat also stood out like dew on Allsop’s forehead.

They sat, Allsop having some difficulty in forcing his large frame into such a tight corner, for he was a giant of a man, barrel-chested, like a mastiff, but with the jowls of a bloodhound. He
was impeccably attired, in a tight-fitting plum-coloured damask coat. He snapped his fingers at the molly behind the counter and ordered more coffee, before leaning in to speak.

‘Look here, Whitgift, I’m going to need another loan. The burglary cleared me out. I’d hoped selling my late mother’s collections would clear my debts, but until the
stolen goods are recovered I find myself in a bit of a tight spot.’

‘You realize the other loan is still outstanding?’

‘It’s a short-term difficulty. I am in poor health. I need to pay the apothecary and the physician, and they do not come cheap. It’s nigh on ten shilling these days just to get
bled. Twenty pounds should cover it.’

Jay whistled through his teeth. ‘That’s a fair amount on top of what’s owed.’

‘If the silver that was stolen is recovered – and I know you will let me know if it shows up at Whitgift’s – then obviously I will pay off both loans together.’

‘You know there’s no guarantee—’

‘Come on, Whitgift, I’ve always paid my dues on time, have I not?’

‘I can let you have ten. It’s all I have brought with me.’ Jay had been prepared for this. He brought out his satchel from under the table and counted out the amount, before
pushing the book across for Allsop to make his mark.

Allsop made a great fuss of uncorking the ink and wiping the quill afterwards with unsteady hands. He pushed the book back. ‘I don’t know, I seem to be bedevilled – what with
the burglary, and now I am unwell. And there’s more.’

Jay raised his eyebrows in question.

‘We are in a bit of difficulty. The matter is somewhat awkward . . .’ He paused to wipe his forehead with his sleeve. His eyes shifted sideways, not meeting Jay’s gaze.

Jay did not like the sound of the ‘we’. He put his elbows on the table and pushed his hat back on his head to get closer. ‘What is it?’ He sensed trouble coming.

‘There has been an oversight . . .’

‘Tell me straight. What’s the flutter? Is it horses again?’

‘No, not that. The list of my late mother’s jewellery, the one I sent over to Whitgift’s last week, from the burglary . . . well, there was something I missed, something I
didn’t know was gone . . .’

‘Another jewel? It can easily be added to the inventory, you know, just give my father—’

‘No, no, it’s not that. This is a little delicate . . . if it was to fall into the wrong hands, it would ruin me. And bring you down with it.’

‘Go on.’ The hairs had risen on Jay’s neck.

‘I got the idea from my friend Pepys, it is a kind of notebook – a private diary.’

Jay’s stomach sank. He grasped immediately the implications of that confession. ‘What’s in it?’ Allsop shifted in his chair. The man was red in the face and sweating even
more profusely under his full-bottomed wig. A drip ran down his forehead. ‘Is my name in it?’

‘I think not. But you see, I cannot exactly recall. But I’m afraid it—’

‘You know what this means. We’ve got to get it back before it reaches someone who can read. What does it look like?’

‘Well, it’s a small leather-bound book—’

‘I know that, how the deuce am I supposed to—?’

‘– about a handspan tall and four digits wide. Buff calfskin, gold-tooled binding . . .’

‘For God’s sake.’ It had just started to sink in. ‘And you say it gives details of our transactions?’

‘Not just yours. I write them all down, see, afterwards. The doxies. So I can read it over again another time for my own pleasure, and you know my tastes are not straightforward. But
it’s not just that – if anyone read it, I would be finished.’ Allsop clutched Jay’s arm and looked up at him through panicky eyes.

‘Now look here, you’d best level with me, if my name’s in it and my neck’s at stake. What else?’ Jay lowered his voice. ‘Is it . . . gentlemen?’

‘Of course not. What do you take me for?’

Jay looked at him coldly and stood up. ‘I will need ten pounds to pay my men to track it down. And you do not need me to tell you how urgent that is.’

‘Ten pounds? No. That is outrageous. You know I cannot pay that.’

‘’Tis cheap enough in this circumstance. Why did you not have the damn thing under lock and key?’