Forged in the Fire (23 page)

“It cannot! Will not! I am twenty-one and—”

“I know that. Hear me out. I came here today, and met Susanna. Will” – he turned to me in a gesture of contrition – “Will, I saw at once that I was wrong, that I'd been wrong all along, that she loved you and had only your good at heart. She was not bold and scheming, as I remembered her. The poor girl was distraught – feared you were lost to her in this calamity…” He paused, and shook his head. “What will you
do
, Will? How will you live? She is carrying your child.”

“We will find a way,” I said. “When we wait upon God in the silence—”

“Oh, don't talk to me of that!” he exclaimed. “God is all very well but it's money you need, boy. Food in your bellies; a roof over your heads. Your lodgings are gone, I suppose?”

“I believe so. And the shop may burn too. But the stock of books is safe. We worked all day to store everything in the crypt of Paul's. No fire could get in there. We will rebuild the business.”

I told him about Nicholas Barron and saw that he was shocked.

“I thought to see your future there,” he said. “Well, you would have gone to another master. But I'm sorry for the man. To lose so much is a great blow.”

The three of us ate together in my father's room. There was a good spread of food: beef, a mutton pie, woodcock, bread and herbs. We paused a moment to give thanks before falling to.

Susanna was somewhat subdued, I think because she felt herself to be an outsider in this reunion; but my father likes reticence in a woman, and I saw that he approved of her quietness. She was pretty, too, in her brown dress that matched her eyes, a few curls of hair damp on her neck. I saw that he was warming to her. He asked after her parents, and whether they missed her, and what trade her brother was in. He was at his most charming – but he could afford to be, I thought; he was away from his home town and his status as an alderman. Would he welcome her into the heart of his family in Hemsbury? He had said once that he never could.

I asked after Anne, who was now seventeen. She was, he said, a dutiful child, pretty and accomplished, who should marry well in due course. He talked also of his business, which flourished; of his new apprentice; and he told stories that made us laugh about the foibles of some of his customers and suppliers. It all seemed familiar, and yet remote from my life now, and I wondered if I could ever truly regain my place in the family – or even whether I wished to.

Later, as night fell, we went downstairs and out into the yard, where several dozen others were gathered, and from there gazed at the terrible sight of all London on fire. Flames seemed to be bursting through Aldersgate, and someone came running with news that Goldsmiths' Hall was destroyed, and all of Foster Lane, and the fire was advancing on Paul's.

“Nothing can halt it,” the man said. “Christ Church and Newgate will be next. They'll have moved the prisoners by now.”

Newgate! I thought of that hated place, and rejoiced at the vision of fire consuming it. The straw would blaze, the lice pop and crackle; the iron shackles would melt. Flames would race up the stairways and into every cell, feeding on the grime-encrusted walls, the smoke-blackened ceilings, the plague rooms where my friends had suffered, the stocks and whipping posts. The whole structure would blaze from cellar to roof, and be cleansed.

Perhaps, after all, the fire
was
from God.

But those around us were talking of plots.

“It's the papists. A papist plot. They're in league with the Dutch and French. No fire could spread so fast by accident. They planned it: strike out the water tower, the wharves; start fires here, there, all about. Confusion and chaos. Then invasion. We'll hear of invasion next, I tell you.”

The talk washed over us. We were tired. Susanna went to bed, and I followed soon after. The landlord had somehow managed to find my father a small room on an upper floor, even though the inn was full; no doubt a servant or family member had been displaced.

Susanna and I lay and talked.

“Thy father has been kind,” she said. “I met him once in Hemsbury; I think I told you. I sensed the light in him then, and felt pity for him.”

“He has taken to
thee
.” I would not tell her all his remarks about her letter, but I added, teasing, pulling her closer, “Though he thinks I should demand more obedience from thee.”

We laughed and kissed.

“Thou'rt not angry that I wrote to him?”

“No. It has brought us together. But for him to arrive, now, with the city in flames! It is extraordinary that he found us.”

“It is God's work, I think.”

Next morning, when we went outside, I felt a change.

“The wind has dropped.”

We looked at the city. The smoke pouring from it now rose straight up and formed a dense black cloud above.

This will help, I thought: the wind no longer fanning the fire. It seemed to me more than ever that I saw God's hand in these events. The fierce east wind had arisen on the night the fire started, and now that the entire city had burnt it had dropped.

The explosions continued. News came that Paul's had blazed all night. I thought of the books, sealed in the crypt of Faith's. The fire would not reach them there, no matter how hot it became.

We stayed several nights with my father at the Angel. The fire at last ceased to spread, and we saw the leaping flames die to a red glow and then to a view of blackened walls and ruined buildings. Few dared go back at first. Those who did reported stones too hot to walk on, fires still burning in crypts and cellars.

One night an alarm went up: the French and Dutch were invading. We heard men yelling, “Arm! Arm!” and saw a great surge of people towards the city. But it was all false, and the trained bands were sent in to restore order. Next day the King was seen at Moorfields speaking to the people and assuring them that the fire was an accident and not the work of agitators or traitors. Soldiers came with tents and shelters for those in need, and set up places where people could go for the food and drink which had been requisitioned from the countryside around. We were glad to be at the Angel, but I went most days to meet our Friends at Sylvester Wharton's. On fifth-day Nat was not there; I heard he had gone to Houndsditch to ask after Rachel and her family. When I reported this to Susanna she smiled and said, “Nat has a fondness for Rachel.”

“Thou think so?”

“I'm sure of it. Oh, I doubt she knows yet; her heart is full of Vincent. But she likes Nat, and he will wait…”

It was seventh-day, almost a week after the fire began, when Susanna and I went with my father to see the ruined city.

The sight was worse than anything I had imagined. From the ruins of Cheapside we could see the river; scarcely a wall now stood in our view. Edmund's house in Throgmorton Street was burnt to the ground, only part of the garden remaining, full of ash and scorched timbers. Smoke still rose from the rubble and the ground was hot underfoot. We tried to walk to Bow Lane, but it was difficult to find familiar streets – all was one mass of destruction, with here and there a ruined wall, a broken tower. Around us people picked their way over the smouldering embers.

We came at last upon the ruins of Mary Aldermary. Several walls were still standing but the tower that had shaded our window was burnt to its base. The house we lived in had been built of wood. Nothing remained, and the attic space where we had been so happy was now empty sky.

Paul's was still a landmark, and we made our way towards it, walking over solidified streams of lead from the roof which had melted and poured down the streets.

Our shop was gone. I had believed that Faith's would still be secure, but my trust in that stronghold was misplaced. When the great tower collapsed, it seemed the walls and ceilings had fallen in, breaking open stone tombs and sending them crashing through the roof of the crypt.

Several booksellers and stationers were gathered there, searching among the debris. One of them saw me approaching and said, “You'll find no books here. Nothing but ashes.” Another told me that St Faith's had burned all night and everything within had been destroyed. “My entire stock,” he said. “My business. I don't know what I'll do.”

“There is scarcely a book left in London,” a scholarly old man said. His clothes were grey with dust and his eyes full of sadness. “Shops, libraries, schools, churches – all are gone.”

And my work with it, I realized. Edmund was not yet here, but his efforts, I knew, would now be directed towards rebuilding his home and his spice business. Once again I was without work – along with thousands of others.

My father understood this. That evening at the inn, while Susanna rested upstairs, he said to me, “You must both come back with me to Hemsbury for a while – at least till the child is born. You can't live without home or income.”

Instinctively I rejected this suggestion. I did not want to go home, to be in his power again.

“You won't want Quakers – fanatics – in your house.”

“I want my son, and my grandchild. And if others speak ill of you, they will not dare do so to my face.”

It was a generous gesture from him – for I knew how much he valued his status in Hemsbury and how fragile such status could be. But we could not go.

“Friends will help us,” I said. “Friends in Mile End and Southwark and other places outside the city walls.” I mustered a more powerful argument. “And I would not let Susanna travel in her condition. She cannot ride, and to travel by carrier is slow and hard. It might endanger the child.”

He nodded. “Perhaps you are right. Then I'll give you money. I have some with me, and will send more—”

“No, Father. There is no need. I have savings.” I patted my hip, where I kept a purse well hidden.

“Then keep them! They won't last long.”

“No.”

I could not explain to him why I was so unwilling to accept his help when I would take it gladly from Friends. It seemed to me like weakness, like defeat. And I would never admit defeat to him.

“Will,” he said, “you can't afford to be proud. You have no work, no home. You have lost everything.”

“I have my wife and child,” I said, “and the love of God.”

He sighed in exasperation. “But how will you
live
, boy?”

On first-day morning Susanna and I went to the farm again, and Friends gathered in a field and waited on God in silence. A light rain had begun to fall – the first in months. All around us, in the fields, others were at prayer, or walking to churches in Islington. It was only a week since the fire began, and all our lives were utterly changed. I knew I had to answer my father's question, and soon. How
would
we live?

That night I talked to Susanna.

“My father wants to give us money.”

“He told me. I thanked him for his kindness.”

“Thou thanked him? But I've told him I cannot accept it.”

“Why not?”

“I – I don't want to be beholden to him! He will take us over, Su – tell us what we may or may not do with our lives. I want to be free of him. I love him, of course, but I want us to be equals.”

“But you are not equals. He is wealthy and we are poor.”

“We have money saved!”

“But there is little enough. And thou hast no work. And this child – his grandchild – will soon be born.”

She was practical, like him. She did not see the loss to my pride.

“I have told him no. I rejected his help once, and said I'd make my own way. I will not turn to him now.”

“Oh, Will!” Her voice rose, and I felt her impatience with me. “Thou'rt so stiff and proud – it is ungodly! He wants to help thee. Let him give thee money; it is how he shows his love for thee. Thou hurt him by rejecting it. Be gracious and accept.”

She trembled as I stared at her, but her expression was resolute.

“I am right,” she said. “I have never been more sure of it.”

Her words found their mark. “Yes,” I said at last. “Thou'rt right. I
did
hurt him. I will tell him I have changed my mind.”

She came and embraced me. “Tell him too that next summer we will travel to Shropshire and show him his grandchild. It is what he wants, more than anything.”

My father left next day. He would meet with other merchants in Oxford and be home within a week. Susanna and I went down together into the yard to wish him Godspeed. He looked at the two of us, smiled and shook his head.

“You are such children!” he said. “So young for all this. And you think you can create a new world.”

Then he kissed us both, and said, “Come soon to Hemsbury. We will expect you.”