London - Edward Rutherfurd [205]
Another boy might have been crushed. But Martin with his secret pride told himself he despised them. What were they anyway? Only women. Fickle, weaker vessels – wasn’t that what the preachers in church called them? As for their smiles, their kisses, and their bodies – he shrugged. It was all the work of the Devil. As the poor young fellow brooded, his sad defences grew stronger. By the time he was a young man, still unkissed, he had come to believe, with a secret righteousness: “Women are unclean. I want none of them.”
Joan’s father was a decent, solemn craftsman. He painted the huge, elaborate wooden saddles of the rich and the nobility. His two sons worked with him; he had reasonably assumed his daughter would marry a craftsman of the same kind. So what the devil had she seen in the young Fleming, who had so few prospects? As would any reasonable father in his position, he had discouraged her. But the girl was quietly insistent, for a very simple reason: she was loved. In fact, she was worshipped.
Martin had been working for the Italian for six months when he noticed her. He had been on an errand to the Vintry wharves and was walking up towards West Cheap when he saw her sitting outside her father’s workshop at the bottom of Bread Street. Yet what had made him stop and talk to the girl? He could hardly say. Some silent voice within must have prompted him. Whatever it was, he had walked that way again the next day. And the next.
Little Joan was different. She was so quiet, so modest. She did not seem to find him ridiculous. When her calm, serious eyes looked up to his, it made him feel manly. And above all, he soon discovered there was nobody else. If he wanted her, she was his, and his alone. “She is pure,” he said to himself. Which, indeed, she was. She had never even been kissed.
And so he courted her. The absence of rivals gave him the confidence he needed and as that confidence increased, he became protective of her. He had never felt strong before, and it was thrilling. The first flush of courtship makes some young men conceited. It even makes them cast about, to see if they can be as successful elsewhere. But Martin knew that women were unchaste and not to be trusted, except for Joan. And the more of her goodness he saw, the more determined he was never to let her go. Not a week passed without some little present; if she was happy, he would match her mood; if sad, he would comfort her. No one had ever paid her so much attention before. So it was not surprising that six months later they both wanted to marry.
But how? The saddle-painter had only a little to give his daughter, young Martin’s father less. The two men met and sadly shook their heads. “He says there’s no one else for him,” the horner explained apologetically. “Joan’s just as bad,” the other replied. “What are we to do?” At last an agreement was reached, by which the young people were to wait two years in the hope that Martin might improve his position. After that: “Who knows,” Joan’s father said hopefully, “maybe they’ll change their minds.”
And then the disaster had occurred.
In a way, it had been Martin’s fault. The rules were simple enough. All common folk should be indoors after dark. If a servant went out, he must have his master’s permission. Even the taverns were supposed to be closed. This was the curfew, typical of medieval cities. Not that anyone took much notice; and apart from two sergeants at the city gates, and the beadle of each ward, there was no one to enforce it anyway.
One October evening, when his master was away, Martin had slipped out to a tavern. Two hours passed before he returned to the darkened house in Lombard Street and surprised the thieves. There had been two of them. He heard them as soon as he entered. Thinking of nothing, except that he must