London - Edward Rutherfurd [206]
It was a few minutes later that the beadle had emerged from the shadows to ask him if he had permission to be in the streets after curfew. And inspected the bag.
When the Italian returned the next day, nothing would persuade him that Martin had not tried to rob him. For the bag was found to contain several gold ornaments he had kept hidden. Poor Martin never had a chance. “I’ve caught this young man trying to rob me before,” he told the justices at the trial. It was enough for them to find him guilty of theft. The penalty for theft was death.
There were three main prisons that belonged to the city, all by the western wall: the Fleet, Ludgate, used mainly for debtors, and Newgate. None of them consisted of more than a few stone rooms, usually crowded. The regime was simple. Prisoners could pay the gaoler for food, or their family and friends, if any, might visit and pass food and clothing to them through a grille. Otherwise, unless passers-by took pity on them, or the gaoler gave them a little bread and water out of kindness, they would starve.
Martin Fleming had been in Newgate for a week now. His family had fed him, Joan had come to visit him each day, but he had no hope. Sometimes rich people could buy pardons from the king, but for a fellow like him, that was not even a possibility. Tomorrow he was going to die; and that was that.
So he hardly knew what to make of the strange message he had just received. It was Joan’s brother who had brought it, delivering it verbally, through the iron grille.
“She says to tell you that tomorrow everything will be all right.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Nor do I. But she said something else. However it looks, nothing will be what it seems. Just do as she says. She was very insistent about that. Told me to repeat it. It won’t be what it seems and you have to trust her.”
“Where is she now?”
“That’s just it. She’s gone. Told me to tell the family not to expect her until tomorrow. She’s vanished into thin air.”
“So you’ve no idea what this is all about?”
“Beats me,” her brother shrugged. Then he left.
And what, Martin wondered, would be all right? Death?
Some time earlier – about an hour before noon – a tall, fair-haired man in his late twenties had stood before a door on the first floor of the house of William Bull. A servant had sent him up there, but now, faced with the awful prospect, his courage failed him. He hesitated. From the other side of the door, he heard a grunt. Then, nervously, he tapped.
William Bull sat on his privy and ignored the tap at the door. He was thinking.
The privy, which had been built on to the upper floor of the house by the sign of the Bull, was a splendid affair. It was a small square room with a shuttered window; the walls and the door were covered with green baize; the floor with fresh, scented rushes. The orifice itself, which opened on to a chute with a ten foot drop, was fashioned out of polished marble, upon which, in the shape of a ring, was a thick, red cushion which had been embroidered with a design of fruit and flowers in red, green and gold. The last king, Henry III, had conceived a passion for sanitation which led him to build as well as his many churches, the most extraordinary number of garderobes, or privies. Nobles wishing to be fashionable had followed suit, and Bull’s father, a baron and alderman of London, had installed his own, upon which he sat as though upon a throne, a merchant monarch proud of all he did.
It was also a good place to think. And that morning, William Bull had much on his mind. In particular, there were two decisions to make – one small, the other large. So large, in fact, that it would entirely change his life. Yet strangely enough, after the unspeakable events of the day before, it was the big decision that was easier.
When he grunted, he had just made it.
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