St Paul’s Cathedral was the true heart of the city. It dominated, the skyline with its sheer hulk and Gothic magnificence. Within its walls could be found the teeming life of London in microcosm. Paul's Walk, the middle aisle with its soaring pillars and vaulted roof, was a major thoroughfare where gallants strutted in their Finery, soldiers escorted their ladies, friends met to exchange gossip, masters hired servants, jobless men searched the advertisements on display, lawyers gave advice, usurers loaned money, country people gaped, and where all the beggars and rogues of the neighbourhood congregated in the hope of rich pickings.
Crime flourished in a place of divine worship and yet the sacred glow was somehow preserved. St Paul's was not simply an imposing structure of stone and high moral purpose, it was a daily experience or everything that was best and worst in the nation's capital.
The cathedral stood at the western end of Cheapside. Its churchyard covered twelve and a hair acres with houses and shops crowding around the precinct walls. At the centre of the churchyard was Paul's Cross, a wooden, lead-covered pulpit from which political orations were made on occasion and from which sermons were regularly preached.
'There indeed a man may behold hideous devils run raging over the stage with squibs in their mouths, while the drummer makes thunder in the tiring house and the hirelings make lightning in the Heavens.'
The sermon which was being delivered there on that sun-dappled morning was fiery enough to draw a large audience and to capture the interest of those who were browsing in the bookshops or loitering by the tobacco stalls. Standing in the pulpit, high above contradiction, was a big, brawny man with a powerful voice and a powerful message. He waved a bunched fist to emphasise his point.
'Look but upon the common plays of London and see the multitude that flocks to them and follows them. View the sumptuous playhouses, a continual monument to the city's prodigality and folly. Do not these vile places maintain bawdry, insinuate knavery and renew the remembrance of heathen idolatry? They are dens of iniquity!'
There was a ground swell of agreement among the listening throng. Isaac Pollard developed his argument with righteous zeal.
'Nay!' he said. 'Are not these playhouses the devourers of maidenly virginity and chastity? For proof whereof, mark the running to The Theatre and The Curtain and other like houses of sin, to see plays and interludes, where such wanton gestures, such foul speeches, such laughing and leering, such winking and glancing of wanton eyes is used, as is shameful to behold. The playhouse is a threat to Virtue and a celebration of Vice!'
Pollard was really into his stride now, his single eyebrow rising and falling like a creature in torment. He pointed to the heavens, he pummelled the pulpit, he smashed one fist into the palm of his other hand. In launching his attack on the theatre, he was not averse to using a few theatrical tricks.
'But yesterday,' he continued, 'but yesterday, good sirs, I went to view this profanity for myself. Not up in Shoreditch, I say, not yet down in Bankside but within our own city boundaries, at the sign of the Queens Head in Gracechurch Street. There I beheld such idleness, such wickedness and such blasphemy that I might have been a visitor to Babylon. Men and women buy this depravity for the price of one penny and our city authorities do nought to stop them. Yet upon that stage-I call it a scaffold of Hell, rather-I saw the visible apparition of devils as they capered for amusement. That is no playhouse, sirs, it is the high road to perpetual damnation!'
The more vociferous elements gave him a rousing cheer.
'The theatres of London,' said Pollard with booming certainty, 'are the disgrace and downfall of the city. Among their many sinful acts, there be three chief abominations. First, plays are a special cause of corrupting our youth, containing nothing but unchaste matters, lascivious devices, shifts of cozenage and other ungodly practices.'
Support was even more audible now. A woman in the crowd clutched her two children to her bosom, as if fearing that they would go straight off to the nearest playhouse to lose their innocence.
'Second, theatres are the ordinary places for vagrant persons, thieves, beggars, horse-stealers, whoremongers, coney -catchers and other dangerous fellows to meet together and make their matches to the great displeasure of God Almighty.'
Pollard drew himself up to his full height and his shadow fell across those who listened down below. Both arms were outstretched for effect as he came to his final indictment.
'Third, plays draw apprentices and other servants from their work, they pluck all sorts of people from resort unto sermons and Christian practices, and they bind them to the worship of the Devil. Playhouses mock our religion. Destroy this canker in our midst, say I. Perish all plays and players!'
There was a deathly hush as his imprecations hung upon the wind, then a derisive laugh was heard from the rear of the congregation. Isaac Pollard turned eyes of hatred upon a personable figure in doublet, hose and feathered hat. The man had the look of a gallant but the air of a scholar.
It was Ralph Willoughby.
*
The house in Shoreditch was not large and yet it served Lawrence Firethorn and his wife, their children, their servants, the four young apprentices with Westfield's Men and sundry other members of the company who needed shelter from time to time. It fell to Margery Firethorn to make sure that people did not keep bumping into each other in the limited space and she presided over her duties with a ruthless vigilance. A handsome woman of ample proportions, she had an independent mind and an aggressive charm. Firethorn could be fearsome when roused but he had married his match in her. Pound for pound, Margery was redder meat and she was the only person alive who could rout him in argument. He might be the captain of the domestic ship but it was his wife's hot breath which filled the sails.
'The room is ready, Lawrence,' she said.
'Thank you, my dove.'
'Refreshment has been set out.'
'Good. We deal with weighty matters.'
'Nobody will dare to interrupt!'
Her raised voice was a threat which could be heard in every coiner of the house. She glided off to the kitchen and Firethorn was left to conduct his two visitors into the main room. Barnaby Gill puffed at his pipe and took a seat at the table while Edmund Hoode curled up on the settle in a corner. Firethorn remained on his feet so that he could the more easily assert his ascendancy.
It was a business meeting. All three of them were sharers with Westfield's Men, ranked players whose names were listed in the royal patent for the company. They took the leading parts in the plays and had a share in any profits that were made. There were four other sharers but most of the decisions were made by Firethorn, Gill and Hoode, a trio who combined wisdom with experience and who represented a balance of opinion. That, at least, was the theory. In practice, their discussions often degenerated into acrimonious bickering.
Barnaby Gill elected to strike the first blow this time.
'I oppose the notion with every sinew of my being!'
'No less was expected of you,' said Firethorn.
'The idea beggars belief.'
'Remember who suggested it, Barnaby.'
'Tell Lord Westfield that it is out of the question.'
'I have told him that we accede to his request.'
'You might, Lawrence,' said the other testily, but I will never do so, and I speak for the whole company.'
Barnaby Gill was a short, plump, round-faced man who tried to hold middle age at bay by the judicious use of cosmetics. Disaffected and irascible offstage, he became the soul of wit the moment he stepped upon it and his comic routines were legendary. Tobacco and boys were his only sources of private pleasure and he usually required both before he would shed his surliness.
Lawrence Firethorn grasped the nettle of resistance.
'What is the nature of your objection, Barnaby?'
'Fear, sir. Naked, unashamed fear.'
'Of another apparition?'
'Of what else! I am an actor, not a sorcerer. I'll not meddle with the supernatural again. It puts me quite out of countenance.'
'But we survived,' said Firethorn reasonably. 'The devil came and went but we live to boast of our ordeal.'
It might not be so again, Lawrence.'
'Indeed not. The creature might decline to visit us next time.'
'He'll get no invitation from me, that I vow!'
Firethorn reached for the flagon on the table and poured three cups of ale, handing one each to the two men. He quaffed his own drink ruminatively then turned to Edmund Hoode.
You have heard both sides, sir. Which do you choose?'
'Something of each, Lawrence, said the playwright.
'You talk in riddles.'
'I think that The Merry Devils should be seen again.'
'Excellent wretch!'
'An act of madness!' protested Gill.
'Hold still, Barnaby,' said Hoode. 'I agree with you that we must not run the risk of bringing back that real devil.'
Firethorn was perplexed. 'How can you satisfy us both?
'By amending the play. Here's the manner of it.'
Edmund Hoode had given it considerable thought. Instinct urged him to refuse to be involved again in a work that had taken them so close to catastrophe, but the words of Grace Napier echoed in his ears. His performance as Youngthrust had started to win her over. If he were allowed to give it again-replete with all the sighing and suffering that his beloved could wish for-then he would move nearer to the supreme moment of conquest. To make the play safe, he proposed a number of alterations, principally in the scene where Doctor Castrato summoned the merry devils.
'Ralph's magic was too potent,' he said. 'I will get him to cast some new spells that are too blunt to raise anything more than George Dart and Roper Blundell. It is a simple undertaking for Ralph.'
'Not so,' said Firethorn sternly. 'Do it yourself, Edmund.'
'But that scene came from his hand.'
'Which is exactly why it caused so much trouble. Ralph Willoughby has been the bane of this company for long enough.
Ever since be worked with us, we have been plagued by setback. Misfortune attends the fellow. I spoke with him yesterday and severed the connection. We paid him for his share of the play and he has gone. It is up to you now, Edmund.'
'But we were friends and co-authors,' said Hoode defensively.
'That time is past.'
'I never liked him,' admitted Gill sourly, tapping out his pipe on the edge of the table. 'Willoughby was the strangest soul. There was a darkness behind that bright smile of his that I could not abide.'
'Ralph is the finest dramatist in London,' insisted Hoode.
'That is open to dispute,' said Firethorn.
'He has worked with all the best companies, Lawrence.'
'Then why have they not retained his services?'
'Well…'
'Everyone seeks a resident poet, Edmund, which is why you are the envy of our rivals. But none of them has pressed Master Willoughby to stay. He writes well, I grant you, but he brings bad luck-and that is too heavy a burden to bear in the theatre.'
Hoode withdrew into his settle and brooded over his ale. Gill pondered. Firethorn let out a wheeze of satisfaction, feeling that he had carried the day with far less aggravation than he anticipated.
'Thus it stands, then,' he said. 'Lord Westfield will have his entertainment to order. Are we agreed?' He took their silence for consent. It is but a case of striking out one play and inserting The Merry Devils. Weil give it on Tuesday of next week at The Rose.'
'That we will not!' said Gill, exploding into life.
'I have made the decision, Barnaby.'
'Well, I resist it with all my might and main. Cupid's Folly was destined for The Rose. Strike out another play, if you must, but do not tamper with Cupid's Folly.'
'The Rose is most suited to our purposes, Barnaby.'
'You'll not find me there as Doctor Castrate'
'Put the needs of the company above selfish desire.'
'I mean this, Lawrence. I'll leave Westfield's Men before I'll submit to this. That is no idle threat, sir, be assured.'
Barnaby Gill's tantrums were a regular feature of any business meeting and his fellow-sharers learned to humour him. Once he had flared up, he soon burned himself out. This time it was different. He was in earnest. Cupid's Folly was his favourite comedy, the one play in their repertoire that offered him total domination of the stage. His performance in the leading role had been honed to such perfection that he could orchestrate the laughter from start to finish. He was not going to be robbed of his hour o: triumph. Folding his arms and pouting his lips, he turned an aggrieved face to the window.
Firethorn glanced over at Hoode and attempted a compromise.
'I have the answer,' he said guilefully. 'Edmund, did you not say that Doctor Castrato might have a dance or two more?'
'No, Lawrence.'
'Come, sir. You did.'
'I have no knowledge of the matter.'
'Then your memory is leaking. You urged it only yesterday.'
Unseen by Gill, he gestured wildly to Hoode for his support. The latter gave a resigned nod and went along with the lie, but his voice lacked any conviction.
'Now I bethink me, you are right. Another jig, f said.'
'Two, Edmund.'
'Oh, at least.'
'And a new song for the Doctor. His role must be extended.'
'At the expense of Justice Wildboare?'
'We need not go to that length,' said Firethorn hastily.
'Dances and a song, then. I will see to it.'
'Not on my account,' said Gill. 'I want Cupid's Folly.'
'But your new Castrato will dazzle the galleries at The Rose,' urged Firethorn. 'This is fair recompense for the change of play.'
'No, Lawrence. I am immoveable.'
And he turned his back on them in a spectacular sulk.
Firethorn exploded. He bullied, he badgered, he threatened, he aimed a torrent of abuse at his colleague. His voice was so loud and his language so florid that he made the whole room shake and dislodged four spiders from the beams above his head. It was the towering rage of a great actor in full flight and it would have brought a lesser man to his knees but Barnaby Gill was proof against the tirade. He simply refused to be a one-man audience to the extraordinary performance.
Impasse was reached. In the bruised silence that followed, Gill held his pose and Firethorn glared vengefully across at him. There seemed to be no way around the problem until Edmund Hoode intervened.
'We do not have to cancel Cupid's Folly' he said.
'Indeed, we do, sir!' snarled Firethorn. ' The Merry Devils must be our offering at The Rose.'
'And so it shall be.'
'Have you lost your wits, Edmund? We cannot stage both plays in the same afternoon. One must give way to the other.'
'That was not my meaning,' said Hoode quietly. 'The Merry Devils will be presented at The Rose and Cupid's Folly will take its turn on Friday at The Curtain.'
Firethorn was momentarily dumbfounded but Gill bubbled with joy.
'There you have it, Edmund!'
'The play we strike out is Vincentio's Revenge.'
'Have a care what you suggest, sir!' growled Firethorn.
'Vincentio's Revenge is a tedious piece,' said Gill airily. 'It will not be missed. Oh, we know that you touch the heights in the title role, Lawrence, and it is one of your most assured successes, but is it not time to ask-I put this to you in the spirit of friendship-if you are not a trifle long in the tooth to be a young Italian hero?'
Firethorn bared his teeth for Gill to assess their length.
'Is not this the best answer?' asked Hoode cheerily.
'Yes, sir!' said Gill.
'No, sir!' countered Firethorn.
'Edmund shows the wisdom of Solomon.'
'Then why does he talk like the village idiot?' The actor-manager stalked the room. 'I have fifteen special moments in Vincentio's Revenge and I'll not be denied one of them. It stays.'
'And so does Cupid's Folly,' said Gill petulantly.
It was stalemate again. While the two of them withdrew once more into a hurt silence, Edmund Hoode tried to sound impartial as he proffered his advice. But the removal of Vincentio's Revenge suited his purposes very well. Losing the part of a decrepit old lecher, he instead became a lovelorn shepherd in the pastoral comedy of Cupid's Folly. It would give him the chance to impress Grace Napier with his readiness to bear the cross of unrequited passion. Hoode worked hard to soothe Firethorn, telling him how incomparable his performance as Vincentio was, yet reminding him of his dazzling role as a prince in the other play. Siding imperceptibly with Gill, he slowly brought Firethorn to the realisation that there was no alternative. Without Cupid's Folly, they would have no Doctor Castrato. Vincentio would have to forgo his revenge.
'Put the company before yourself for once,' said Gill spitefully. Lawrence always does that,' said Hoode. 'And I am sure that he will make this supreme sacrifice for the sake of Westfield's Men and our esteemed patron.'
Firethorn showed one last flash of surging arrogance.
'But for me, there would be no company. I am Westfield's Men.'
'Right, sir,' sniped Gill. 'Play Doctor Castrato yourself, then.'
'Gentlemen, gentlemen…' calmed Hoode.
'Play Droopwell. Play Youngthrust. Play the merry devils themselves.' Gill's tone was cruelly sarcastic. 'Since you have such an appetite for solo performance, carry a fan to hide your beard and play Lucy Hembrow into the bargain.' Enough, sir!'
Firethorn's exclamation was like the roar of a cannon. Circling the room in a frenzy, he kicked a chair, pounded the table, spat into the empty fireplace and sent a warming pan clattering from its nail on the wall. He came to rest before a window and stared out unseeing at the small but well-tended garden.
Hoode waited a full minute before he dared to speak.
'Is it agreed, Lawrence?'
There was an even longer pause before the hissed reply came. Castrato is to have no new songs or dances!'
'It's agreed!' shouted Gill in exultation, then lie expressed his gratitude to Hoode by kissing him on the lips. 'God bless all poets!'
Yet another meeting thus reached its amicable conclusion.
*
Anne Hendrik was not a typical resident of Bankside. In an area that was notorious for its brothels, bear gardens and bull rings, for its cockpits, carousing and cutpurses, she was a symbol of respectability. She was the widow of Jacob Hendrik, who had fled from his native Holland and settled in Southwark because the City Guilds did not welcome immigrants into their exclusive fraternities. Overcoming initial problems, Jacob slowly prospered. By the time he married a buxom English girl of nineteen, he could offer her the comfort of a neat house in one of the twisting lanes. Though childless, it was a happy marriage and it left Anne Hendrik with many fond memories. It also gave her a liking for male company.
'Ralph Willoughby has gone?', 'Banished from the company.'… 'What does Master Firethorn have against him?' ' 'Everything, Anne.'
'It seems so unfair.'
'Unfair, unwarranted and unnecessary.'
'Can Edmund Hoode revise the play on his own?'
'I have my doubts.'
They were sitting over the remains of supper at the Bankside house. The mood was relaxed and informal. Nicholas Bracewell had lodged there for some time now and had come to appreciate all of his landlady's finer qualities. Anne Hendrik was a tall, graceful woman in her thirties with attractive features of the kind that improved with the passage of time. She was a widow who never settled back into widowhood, and there was nothing homely or complacent about her. Intelligent and perceptive, she had a fund of compassion for people in distress and a practical streak that urged her to help them. Her apparel was always immaculate, her manner pleasant and her interest genuine.
'What will Master Willoughby do?' she asked.
'I have no idea.'
'Poor man! To be hounded out like that.'
'Master Firethorn can be brutal at times.'
'Yet he wants the play staged again?'
'Lord Westfield's command.'
Anne had liked him from the start. He was solid, reliable and undemanding in a way that reminded her of her husband. Nicholas was also a very private man with an air of mystery about him and she loved that most of all because it was something that Jacob Hendrik did not possess. In place of a dear but predictable partner, she had taken on a deep and thoughtful individual who could always surprise her. Their friendship soon matured and they now enjoyed a closeness that was untrammelled by any need for a formal commitment on either side. They could trust and confide in each other.
'Give me your true opinion, Nicholas,' she said.
'Of what?'
'The apparition.'
'I hardly saw it, Anne.'
'But those on stage who did took it for a devil.'
'Each one of them. As did Ralph Willoughby.'
'Yet you are not convinced.'
'I am trying to be.'
'What holds you back?'
A vague feeling, no more.'
'Do you not believe in devils?'
He looked at her shrewdly for a moment then chuckled softly, reaching across to pat her arm with an affectionate hand. The concern on her face changed to puzzlement.
'Answer my question,' she pressed.
'It was answered the day I was baptised,' he said evasively. 'A man who bears the Devil's name must perforce believe in Hell. I am Old Nick. The Prince of Darkness. His Satanic Majesty. Lucifer.'
'You have still not given me a Pit reply.
'Very well. He sat back and became serious. 'I will tell you the truth, Anne. I do not know. I do not know if devils exist and if I believe in them. I've lived long enough and travelled far enough to see some strange sights, but none of them came straight from Hell. Ralph Willoughby and the others saw a real devil but I did not. If I had done so, I would have believed in it. That is my honest reply.'
And what of God?' she said.
'No doubts there, Anne,' he affirmed. 'I have seen God's hand at work many times. You cannot go to sea without entrusting yourself to His special providence. When I sailed around the world, I witnessed more than enough miracles to strengthen my faith. I know that there is a God in Heaven.' He smiled pensively. 'What I cannot yet accept is that there was a devil in Gracechurch Street.'
There was a tap on the door and the maid came in to clear the table. Anne studied her lodger. After all their time together, there were still many things she did not know about him. The son of a West Country merchant, Nicholas voyaged with Drake on the Golden Hind and survived the onerous circumnavigation of the globe. Those three years spent beneath the billowing canvas of an English ship had made a lasting impression on him yet he never talked about them. Nor would he ever explain how and why he chose to move into the choppy waters of the London theatre. Nicholas Bracewell felt the need to be secretive in such matters and she had come to respect that.
When the maid left the room, he looked across at Anne once more
'I have a favour to ask.'
'Do but ask it and it will be granted.'
'Your hospitality is without fault.' They traded a short laugh. 'I would like you to visit The Rose next week.'
'The Merry Devils?
'Yes, Anne. I need a pair of eyes in the gallery.'
'Do you expect this devil to appear again?'
'We should be prepared for that eventuality,' he said. 'I will tell you exactly what to look out for and when it may happen. In the meantime, I hope you will also enjoy the play.'
'That I shall, Nicholas.'
They got up from the table and crossed to the door. Something made her stop suddenly and turn back to him with a furrowed brow.
'When they saw that devil on the stage…'
'When they thought they saw it,' he corrected.
'Were they not alarmed?'
'Demented with fear. All except Master Firethorn, who carried on as if nothing untoward had happened.'
'He must have nerves of steel.'
'Only one thing can frighten him.'
'What's that?'
'His wife, Margery, when she is on the rampage. Hell may open its gates to send up its merriest devils but they will have to take second place to that good lady.'
'And what of Master Willoughby?'
'Oh, he was afraid,' recalled Nicholas. 'Deep down, I think that he was more shaken by the experience than any of them. He took the full blame upon himself. For a reason that I cannot comprehend, Ralph Willoughby is quite terrified.'
*
He slept for no more than ten minutes but lost all awareness of his surroundings. When his eyelids flickered, he could feel the darkness pressing in upon them and he had to make a conscious effort to shrug off his drowsiness. He was unwell. His head was pounding, his mouth nauseous, his stomach churning and his whole body lathered with perspiration. He groaned involuntarily. Then something moved beneath him and he realised with horror that he was lying naked in the arms of a young woman. By the uncertain light of the candle, he could see the powdered face that was now split by a jagged smile of ingratiation.
'Did I please you, sir?' she said hopefully.
Revulsion set in at once and he rolled over on to the bare floor, groping around in the gloom for his clothing. The girl sat up on the mattress to watch him, her long, matted hair hanging down around her bony shoulders. She was painfully thin and her breasts were scarcely fully formed. Sixteen was the oldest she could be. In the lustful warmth of the taproom downstairs, she seemed quite entrancing and he had brought her drunkenly up to her squalid chamber. Deprived of her flame-coloured taffeta, she looked plain, angular and distinctly unwholesome. Yet it was into this frail body that he had plunged so earnestly in search of refuge.
'Must you leave, sir?' she whispered.
His embarrassment grew. Grabbing his purse, he fumbled inside it then tossed some coins at her. She scooped them greedily up and held them tight in her little fist. Half-dressed and still only half-awake, he grunted a farewell then lurched out into the passageway.
Ralph Willoughby was overcome by the familiar sense of shame.
As he rested against her door and hooked up his doublet, he tried to work out exactly where he was. Somewhere in Eastcheap, but which tavern? Could it be the Red Lion? No, that was the previous night. The Lamb and Flag? No, that was the previous week. Was it the Jolly Miller? Unlikely. That particular haunt of his had a musty smell that he could not detect here. In that case, it had to be the Brazen Serpent, an appropriate venue for his latest disgrace. Fornication with some nameless girl in her wretched lodging at the Brazen Serpent in Eastcheap. Guilt burned inside him and the pain in his head became almost unbearable.
Willoughby put his hands together in prayer and recited quickly in Latin. Perspiration still ran from every pore. Consumed by an inner grief, he began to sway gently to and fro. Approaching footsteps jerked him out of his confession. Three people were coming noisily up the stairs, laughing and joking as they banged against the walls. Willoughby stood motionless and waited in the dark. The newcomers soon staggered along the passageway towards him.
The man had an arm around each of the two women so that he could both fondle and lean on them. His voice suggested that he was young, educated, flushed with wine and very accustomed to the situation in which he found himself. There was also a lordly note that showed he was used to giving orders and being obeyed. The moon shone in through the window to guide their footsteps along the undulating oak floorboards over which so many men had walked to perdition.
Willoughby shrank back but they were far too absorbed in their own drama to notice his presence. When they were still a couple of yards away from him, they went into a room and closed the door behind them. He waited no longer. Scurrying along the passageway, he hurled himself down the stairs as if the tavern were on fire. Seconds later, he was outside in the road but his headlong flight was delayed. As his stomach turned afresh, he felt a rising tide of vomit and bent double in humiliation.
Up in the chamber, the other man was ready to savour his pleasures. Flopping on to the bed, he stretched both arms wide and invited his two companions to practise their witchcraft.
'Come, ladies. Unbutton me now.'
Francis Jordan was clearly there for the whole night.
*
Isaac Pollard was formidable enough when delivering a sermon from a pulpit. He had a way of subduing his congregation with a glare and of browbeating them with his rectitude. But it was his voice that was his chief weapon, a strong, insistent, deafening sound that could reach a thousand pairs of ears without the least sign of strain. When it was heard at Paul's Cross, it was a powerful instrument of earthly salvation. Encountered in a domestic setting, however, it was frankly overwhelming.
'It outrages every tenet of public decency!'
'Do not shout so, Isaac'
'The very fabric of our daily lives is at risk!'
'I hear you, sir. I hear you.'
'We demand stern action from our elected guardians!'
'Leave off, man. My head is a very belfry.'
Henry Drewry was a short, rotund, red-faced man in his fifties with an ineradicable whiff of salt about him. He was the pompous Alderman for Bishopsgate, one of the twenty-six wards of the City which chose a civic-minded worthy to represent them. A freeman of London, Drewry was also of necessity a member of one of the great Livery Companies. The Salters were vital contributors to the diet of the capital since their ware was used as a condiment at table and as a preservative for meat and fish. First licensed in 1467, the Salters ' Company received its royal charter in 1559. In his portly frame and proud manner, Henry Drewry was a living monument to a flourishing trade which helped to control the taste of the citizenry.
Isaac Pollard returned to the attack with unabated volume.
'We seek support and satisfaction from you, Henry!'
'Seek it more mildly,' implored the other.
'The authorities must act to stop this corruption now!'
'What do you advocate, Isaac?'
'First, that the Queen's Head be closed forthwith!'
'Ah!' said Drewry gratefully. 'That lies not within my ward. If a tavern in Gracechurch Street exercises your displeasure, you must speak with Rowland Ashway. He is Alderman for Bridge Ward Within.'
'Master Ashway will not hear me.'
'Then he must be deaf indeed, sir.'
'When I talk of morality,' said Pollard solemnly, 'he thinks only of profit. Master Ashway, as you well know, is a member of the Brewers' Company. He sells his devilish ale to the Queen's Head and to the other taverns in Gracechurch Street. Sordid gain is all to him. The Alderman would not see the premises of a customer closed down, however sinful its workings.' The eyebrow crawled vigorously. 'I tell you, Henry, if it lay within my jurisdiction, I would shut down every brewery and tavern in the city!'
'Oh, I would not go to that extreme,' said Drewry, thinking of the dozen barrels of Ashway Beer that he kept in his own cellars. 'The people of London must be allowed some pleasure.'
'Pleasure!’
The word sent Pollard back up into the pulpit at Paul's Cross and he delivered a virulent homily against the sins of the flesh. Henry Drewry could do nothing to stem the flow. They were in the salter's house in Bishopsgate and the host was wishing that he had not agreed to meet the Fiery Puritan. Isaac Pollard was a friend of his because he found it politic to gain the acquaintance of any person of influence in the community. That friendship was now being put under intense strain.
Pollard moved back to the issue which had brought him there, ranting about plays in general and The Merry Devils in particular. I Ie described the lewd behaviour of the audience and then the appalling spectacle on the stage. Drewry was so buffeted that he could not take it all in but he did hear the questions that were hurled straight at him.
'Do you frequent the playhouse?'
'My duties and my trade forbid it,' said Drewry virtuously.
'Will you not condemn this filth?'
'With all my heart.'
'Unless it be checked, this corruption will spread until nothing is safe,' warned Pollard. 'How would you like your daughter to view such profanity?'
'I would not, sir. I hope I am a sensible parent.'
But even as he spoke, Henry Drewry felt an odd twinge of alarm. Something which his wife had told him now flitted across his mind. Their daughter, Isobel, returned from some outing in a state of excitement. For the first time in years, Drewry wished that he had listened to his wife properly. Isobel was a headstrong girl at the best of times and it was not impossible that she had attended a play.
The anxious father now sought more details.
'When was this offending performance?
'But two days since.'
'At the Queen's Head, you say?
'A stage was set up in the yard by Westfield's Men. All manner of people flocked to the place. Women, too, which shocked me most.'
The time was correct. Isobel Drewry could indeed have been one of the females whose presence had so disturbed Pollard. But why was the girl there and what in fact had she seen?
'And a devil appeared upon the stage?'
'Three, sir. There was no end to their blasphemy.'
'What followed?'
'Bedlam. The whole inn yard became Bedlam.'
*
The hospital of St Mary of Bethlehem was housed in the buildings of an old priory outside Bishopsgate. Founded over three centuries earlier, it had now acquired notoriety as an asylum for the insane. The unfortunate souls who were confined there were not shown the compassion that they deserved. Bethlehem Hospital-or Bedlam, as it was known-was famed for its brutal regime. Instead of caring for its inmates within the privacy of its walls, it punished them unmercifully and put them on display. Watching the lunatics was a regular pastime, as much a normal part of recreation as bear-baiting or playgoing. The weird antics of the mentally disturbed were a form of entertainment.
'We have all kinds here, said Rooksley. 'Those that bay at the moon like wild dogs and those that speak not a word from one year's end to the next. Those that fight each other and those that do harm only to themselves. Those that laugh the whole day and those that weep without ceasing. Those that are tame and those that need a whip to teach them tameness. Bedlam contains a whole world of lunacy.'
‘How came they here?' asked Kirk.
'Some twenty or so are supported by their parishes. The others are all private patients maintained at regular charges. Families pay between sixteen and sixty pence a week to keep their imbecile members locked away here.'
'That is a high price, Master Rooksley.'
'We earn it, sir. We earn it.'
It was Kirk's first day there. A muscular young man of medium height, he had a faintly ascetic air about him. Rooksley, the head keeper, was older, bigger and much more cynical. A livid scar down one cheek suggested that the job was not without its physical dangers. Rooksley was conducting his new colleague around the dank corridors and explaining his duties to him.
'We rule by force at Bedlam,' he said. 'It is the only way.'
'Beating will not cure the mind.'
'It will subdue the body, sir.'
'Is that the sole treatment for these poor wretches?'
'Most of them.'
As they turned a corner, a maniacal laugh came from a room ahead of them. It set off a series of other inmates and the whole corridor echoed with the strange cachinnation. Kirk was rather startled but the head keeper was unperturbed. The sound of whips confirmed that the staff were busy. Laughter changed to howls of pain.
Rooksley stopped outside a door with a small grille in it. He invited Kirk to peer into the gloom within. A young man in white shirr and dark breeches was sitting on the floor and gazing up at a fixed spot on the ceiling. He seemed to be deep in meditation.
'This one's a true gentleman,' said the head keeper. "The chamber is bare, as you see, with no pictures on the walls or painted cloths about the bed, nor any light except what creeps in through that tiny casement. We give him warm meat three times a day and Iced him cassia fistula for the good of his bowels.'
Does he never leave this chamber?'
'Never, sir. We have orders for it. He is restrained here.'
Hearing their voices, the man turned his dull gaze upon them and smiled with childlike innocence. Then, without warning, he suddenly fell to the floor and threshed about in a convulsive fit that was frightening in its violence. When it finally subsided, Kirk turned to his companion.
'What ails the man?'
'The Devil,' said Rooksley. 'He is possessed by the Devil.'