Remember Me - Lesley Pearse [149]
Hawkins then went on to explain that as long as a prisoner had some money or goods to sell they could buy their way into somewhere cleaner and safer, and get the extras they’d already discovered for themselves. The merriment in the courtyard was proof of all this; the people they’d seen were either wealthy or had rich and influential friends. But once a prisoner had run out of money, it was back to the common side for him or her.
Hawkins had cited a highwayman who had his own feather bed brought in, hot water for a bath brought up to him each morning, his shirt laundered, meals with fine wine, and during the afternoons he was visited by his mistress. He was eventually hanged, but as Hawkins pointed out, bribes couldn’t get you out of everything.
‘Do any of you know anyone in London?’ Mary asked the men in bewilderment. None of them had any idea who their mysterious benefactor could be.
‘I used to know a few people,’ James replied. ‘But not the kind who’d even buy me a pint of ale, let alone a decent cell.’
‘Maybe it was someone who felt sorry for us after reading that in the Chronicle?’ Sam suggested.
‘That would be it,’ Bill said, stroking his beard thoughtfully. ‘There was a man murdered in Berkshire when I was a boy, he left a wife and five children, and when people heard the story they sent money for them.’
‘That’s fair enough. But who told the story about us in the first place?’ James asked, looking puzzled. ‘That paper was four or five days old. We were still on the ship in the English Channel. How could they have got the story?’
‘Someone must have talked when the ship docked at Portsmouth,’ Sam said, and his face broke into a wide grin. ‘Captain Edwards left then, and he would have informed the authorities about us. A big number of people left the ship there too, anyone of them could’ve talked to a newspaper.’
All at once Mary realized the story could only have come from Watkin Tench. Captain Edwards had no sympathy with them or the mutineers he’d caught, so any information from him would have cast them in a very bad light. As for any of the other officers who went ashore at Portsmouth, their accounts wouldn’t have been so accurate.
Tench would also know about corruption in prisons from his time on the Dunkirk, and how to go about fixing a cell for them in Newgate.
Instantly Mary decided to say nothing to the others. She was a little surprised they hadn’t considered Tench, but then none of them had been as closely involved with him as she had. To tell them what she thought now would only raise questions she didn’t want to answer. Besides, if Tench had done it in secret, he wanted it to stay that way – it might put his career at risk if it got out. Better that they continued to think it was a benevolent stranger.
‘Luck’s smiling on us again,’ James chortled gleefully, not even noticing Mary had made no comment about it all. ‘Maybe if the money keeps rolling in we’ll end up like that highwayman, sleeping in feather beds.’
‘Bless you, Watkin,’ Mary thought, and she had to turn away from the others so they didn’t see the tears of gratitude in her eyes.
In the days that followed they had many visitors to their cell. Some wanted to hear only of their escape, but more were facing transportation themselves and wanted to know what to expect.
Mary felt a little guilty that they were taking money from these people. It was bad enough for them to face parting from their loved ones, without compounding their misery by telling them of the dreaded flogging triangle, of hunger and unremitting heat. But as James said, it was better for them to spend some