Fire (17 page)

‘Leave that,' he growled, slapping her hand away. ‘I'm a God-fearing and a married man.' He shoved her back. ‘But I'll take me cut.'

Jenny sucked at her teeth. ‘I've already got a mackerel,' she said. ‘Bully Davis, in charge at the 'ospital. Shall I tell 'im you was trying to squeeze us?'

The man whitened. ‘On your way,' he muttered, and turned back to the men's door.

Jenny led the way up the stair. ‘Mackerel?' asked Sarah, as they rounded the corner.

‘Pander,' Jenny replied. ‘I ain't got one in 'ere, but Bully Davis is mad so 'e believes 'e is mine if I give 'im the odd free fondle.
Kill a man if I asked.' She paused before a door. ‘So 'ere we are. You sure you're ready for this?'

‘Yes. Why?'

‘Because you've got a face like a smacked arse. Can you fake it?'

Sarah smiled. ‘My dear countess, it's what I've been doing all my life,' she said.

‘Good girl. Tits up. Tally ho.'

She pushed the door. The first thing Sarah thought was, lovely room? With mould blooming on bare plaster between strips of torn wallpaper; the floorboards that were splintered and cracked; the single, sagging bed; and the same overflowing slop bucket that reeked in the corner of the women's ward. But then she remembered: one man has all this space to himself. He had a table, two chairs. There was a moth-chewed rug on the floor, but a rug nonetheless. Above all there was the open window. Higher up, a breeze reached through it, slightly tempering the heat of the morning.

There were three men in the room. One upon the bed with his forearm across his eyes; two at the table, face down. There were bottles upon that, dice – and some silver coins. Sarah indicated them with her chin. Jenny mouthed a ‘no' and crossed to the bed. ‘Sir Knight,' she said softly, running her hand down his chest. ‘Coo-ee there, Dickie bird.'

She rested her hand on the man's crotch. He jerked awake. ‘What?' he screeched. ‘Egad, what means this, ha? Who the devil –'

Jenny had leaned out of range of the flailing. Now she caught the knight's hand. ‘ 'Tis I, Dickie. Your sweet Jenny.' She kissed his finger, lingeringly. ‘You sent for me.'

‘Did I?' He swung his feet onto the floor, sat up, clutching his head with a yelp of pain. Sarah could see that he was a man of middling years, his face florid with drink, his nose a small purple cauliflower. Hair ringed his bald head like a grey coronet.

‘ 'Ere, sweetheart,' Jenny said, rising and fetching a mug from the table, ‘ 'ere's fur of the same wolf what bit ya.'

As the baronet gulped greedily, Sarah looked at the two men at the table, both of whom had sat up. The younger one was already appraising her from under a thatch of black hair. The elder had an eye-patch, in which the missing eye was marked out in tiny glittering gems. Sarah had a vague recall, of someone William had talked of, a dice sharper whom he disliked. Then she shook herself. Do not think of Captain Coke, she thought. Do not.

‘Are these the buttocks we were promised, Father?' said the youth.

‘I do not know, my boy,' Eye-Patch replied. ‘Are they, de Lacey?'

The baronet squinted. ‘Don't know that one. Who's she, Jenny?'

‘A friend. You said you'd like somethin' new.'

‘Something new, indeed.' A gleam had displaced the torpor in his eyes. He stood, wobbled, then steadied. Took a step forward.

‘Oh, but Dickie!' Jenny cried. ‘Aren't you going to offer the ladies a drink? A bite? You are always so gentlemanly.'

‘Gentlemanly,' drawled the younger man, rising, ‘to a pair of painted punks? There's only one part of this gentleman they'll get.'

‘No!' the baronet roared. ‘You do not live here, sir, and I do. We'll have our fun, never you fear. But we'll do it in proper style.'
He bowed. ‘Ladies, help yourself to whatever's here, while I relieve my beastly bladder.'

He staggered to the corner, turned his back and fiddled with his breeches. After a while a trickle came, the sound enough to provoke the others. They lined up behind the knight, turning their back on the two women.

Sarah looked at the table. The remains of several partridges were upon it, not completely picked clean. She tore into them, glancing about, and saw, upon the sill, a basket of fruit. Still chewing, she moved over and recognised greengages. Throwing the partridge bones through the open window, she lifted one and bit into it. It was young, a little sour. She didn't think she'd tasted anything so delicious in her life. The only fruit they got inside the Compter was the kind that pigs rejected outside it.

She ate three standing there, pausing only to throw a greengage to Jenny who caught it in one hand, while she swigged from a bottle in the other.

‘And now, my dear.'

His voice made her turn back. The baronet crossed to her. ‘My, but you're a plump one, girl,' he said, running his hand over her breasts. He mistook her pained groan. ‘Like that, d'ya? Hmm!' He squeezed harder and then his hand journeyed down. ‘See if you like…Egad!' He jumped back as if he'd placed his hand on a hot hob. ‘By Christ! By Jesus! You are with child.'

Sarah remembered what Jenny had said. What she had decided herself. She was there to – act. Which she could do. ‘Never mind that, sir,' she said, letting her voice go deep as she stepped forward, reaching towards him. ‘There's plenty of things –'

‘No! God, no!' He stepped away. ‘Can't stand the stench of a
woman with a babe in the breech. Reminds me of her Ladyship.' He shuddered and turned. ‘Jenny, do ye seek to gull us here?'

‘Nay, indeed, sir –'

‘It does not matter to me.' Eye-Patch's voice was as smooth as the baronet's had been agitated. ‘I doubt it will to my son.' He smiled. ‘Do you take your old moll, de Lacey. Let us handle the brood mare.'

Jenny turned to the men. ‘Do you suggest one after the other or both at once? That'll cost ya more –'

‘Quiet, whore,' Eye-Patch snapped. Then his voice returned to silk. ‘She will be well rewarded, I assure you. For I stint nothing in my boy's education. Why, has he not just come down from Oxford?' He reached into his doublet, pulling out a leather purse and placing it on the window sill. ‘What's within will also pay for whatever de Lacey wishes.' He chuckled. ‘Even deeper in my debt, old friend, what?' He turned to his son. ‘And I think, both at once, don't you?'

‘Really, Father?' The youth laughed. ‘You are better than any tutor at Oxford.'

Sarah swallowed. She wanted to run – from the coolness in the single eye of the older man and the heat in the eyes of the younger. But the purse? There might be a month of food within it. For her, yes. But more importantly for her baby.

Act, she told herself again and put a smile on her face. ‘Whatever you desire, gentlemen.'

Eye-Patch picked up the wooden platters on the table and tipped the scraps out of the window. ‘What I desire is that you remove that hideous dress and lay yourself on the table.'

With a last nod at her, Jenny led de Lacey to the bed. With
some difficulty, Sarah pulled her gown over her head. Then, clad only in her shift, she hoisted herself onto the table. Survive, she heard her William say.

‘Knees up,' Eye-Patch said, reaching for the buttons of his breeches.

As the bell sounded the quarter in the tower of St Olave's, Pitman limped into the yard of the Poultry Compter. He leaned there on his great staff and looked about.

There but for the grace of God go I, he thought, eyeing the wretches around him. He wondered if the proverb was biblical, and decided not. It was true nonetheless. How far had he and his been from such degradation? Not very far, was the answer. But that was all changed now.

He did not find whom he sought. But there was a turnkey on the Knight's side whom he'd dealt with before approaching the gateway now. ‘Jenkins,' he said.

The man jumped. ‘Jesu mercy, but you frightened me, Mr Pitman. Why are you lurking there?'

‘That's Pitman to you. Pitman to all, king or commoner. And I lurk, as you put it, because I need to see a debtor.'

‘What's his name?'

‘Hers. Sarah…Coke.'

‘Sarah –?' The man rubbed his chin. ‘Old? White hair? Missing an ear?'

‘Nay. Young enough. The actress.'

‘Oh, the whore.'

Pitman stepped closer to grab him by the collar. ‘They are not always the same, Jenkins. And you would be advised to speak most carefully of a friend –'

‘No, no, no! I assure you.' The man wriggled, unable to break the grip. ‘The actress. She is ab-ab-about the other business now.'

Pitman frowned, loosening his hold slightly. ‘What mean you?'

‘Up-up there!' He pointed to the men's side. ‘She and the other moll, Jenny Johnson, they went up to visit the baronet not five minutes since.'

‘Which window? Which?' Pitman shook the man hard.

‘Th-there!' the man whimpered. ‘Above the centre stair.'

Pitman released him and moved faster than he had until now, feeling the strain in his newly knitted bone, pivoting off his great stick to relieve it. As he came under the window, something struck his shoulder and stuck there. Looking down, he saw that it was the gnawed leg of some bird and a fruit stone. He flicked them off and charged in.

The stair was harder, though he managed it, and in just moments he stood between three doors. Then, from behind one of them, he heard a laugh. There was something nasty in it, so he pivoted on his staff and used his good leg to kick in the door.

For a moment there was no movement in the room but the door flying in to crash against the wall – no sound but its smash. The five people just stared at him, united in shock. There was a flame-haired woman kneeling at a bed, a man seated before her. The woman was not Sarah. Another woman was lying on her side on a small table at either end of which stood a man – one older with an eye-patch, the other younger. Both had their fingers on the buttons of their breeches, and one apiece undone.

It took Pitman a longer moment to recognise Sarah, for he had not seen her in a while, laid up as he'd been; and Bettina had not told him of her changes. But he doubted that even his wife would
have recognised her instantly, what with her eyes so painted, her hair falling so about her.

She gave a cry, rolled off the table and stepped into a corner, her back to the room. The older man cried too, differently. ‘Who the devil? Dog, how dare you? Burst in upon gentlemen, will ye?'

The younger man, closer to Pitman and nearer his size, did not yell. He growled, a beast interrupted; he stooped, slipped a hand into his boot cuff and pulled out a knife.

A blade always focused Pitman's attention – especially thrust at him. Placing both hands on his stick, he slammed it sideways into the man's wrist then smacked the top of the stout ash pole between the younger man's eyes.

He screeched, dropped the knife and fell to the floor. His father shouted, ‘Do you know who it is you cross here, wretch? By God, I'll have you flogged –'

Pitman brought the stick over in a great arc and slammed it on the table. ‘You are the ones who will be flogged,' he roared. ‘For I am constable of this parish and I have caught you in the act of fornication!'

It wasn't his parish, and the rules against fornication were rarely enforced when the king was the acknowledged master fornicator of the realm. But Pitman's size, his fury and the loud moaning of the younger man, together with the blood oozing between his clutched hands, cowed Eye-Patch's fury. White of face, he went and helped his son rise, and then, pausing only to snatch up his purse, he hurried him from the room.

‘Wha-what do you mean by this, sir?' The man on the bed's anger was countered by his quavering voice. ‘These were my friends.'

‘Are you their mack? Their pander? Will you join them in the stocks?' Pitman found that his fury had no bottom. Not while he could see Sarah turned away still in the corner, her shoulders shaking. He took several deep breaths and steadied himself. When he was sure his voice was calm, he took a step towards her and said, ‘Mrs Chalker?' She didn't move. ‘Will you come with me?'

She turned suddenly. Snatching up her fallen dress, she passed him without looking up and exited the room.

He followed her down the stairs and outside. ‘Mrs Coke,' he called, cursing himself for always forgetting her change of names. Still she did not turn back, did not stop until she'd reached the corner of the small yard from whence there was nowhere else to go. There she froze, lifted the dress she carried and thrust her face into it.

He reached out, but stopped his hand its own breadth from her back. ‘Mrs Chalk— Coke…Sarah. I –'

He paused, uncertain what to say.

Her voice came low. ‘So, Pitman, you arrived in the nick. Like something in a play. You have preserved my honour.' She gave a humourless laugh. ‘And you may have doomed me – us.' She broke off, pushing her face back into the dress.

‘It was the first time you –'

He stopped. He so wished Bettina had been there. In situations like these, words were not his strength.

It took a moment for her to speak again. ‘The first time, aye. But it will not be the last.'

He looked up, searching for the right words. He saw faces there in the cloudless blue sky, as he sometimes did. ‘Necessity is a hard master, Sarah. It forces us to do things we know to be sins against
God. Against man. In the late wars it forced me to kill. To steal. To –'

He paused, and she spoke. ‘How do you live with that?'

He sighed. ‘I had to make my peace with what was necessary.'

She turned to him a little. ‘And did you succeed? Do you forget?'

He looked down, away from the faces of dead men in the heavens. ‘Not always. Nor do I want to, entirely. For then, what will goad me to make myself better? I try to forgive my enemies.'