Forged in the Fire (4 page)

Several Friends spoke of the horrors visited upon London, and attributed it to God's judgement on a court and people grown corrupt, greedy and licentious, and who persecuted the innocent. One (who did not have a loved one there) spoke so, and with such self-righteousness that I almost jumped to my feet and retorted, as Will had said to me in his letter, that London's soul was not lost: there were many good people there. But I missed my moment, and sat silent, my heart hammering with the unspoken words.

Then Dan stood up. As usual, he spoke in pictures.

“Friends, you know I am a blacksmith, and work with iron and fire. The iron softens in the fire, and changes its nature; it can be moulded to any shape the smith desires. But first it must be heated till it glows red-hot; it must go through the fire. I see us, Friends, like that iron. We have suffered; we have been in the red-hot heart of the fire. And through our suffering we have changed and grown strong in spirit. We have been forged in the fire, and will endure, come what may…”

He went on to speak of how he felt called to reach out to the New World. “In our meetings here I have been filled with the presence of the living God. And the Word of God has called on me to proclaim to others what I have experienced. I must go across land and sea to the far places of the earth and labour in the service of the gospel.”

The next day they left: Dan, Judith and the baby. Dan had hired a cart, and they took an oak chest containing all their belongings, a basket of food for the journey, and letters and bundles for Friends in Bristol – in particular Judith's brother Tom and my brother, Isaac, who were both apprentices there.

As the cart was being loaded everyone wished them well and sent blessings with them. But Judith and I threw our arms around each other and cried. We knew this would probably be the last time we ever met.

“Oh, Su, I wish I could have left thee happier! I'll give thy letter to Isaac – I have it here. And write to me when thou hear from Will. Promise? Write straight away!”

“I will,” I said, though we both knew any news sent to America would arrive months later.

Dan embraced me too, and I kissed the babe. Then Dan sprang up and reached down his hand for Judith, and Elinor handed up Benjamin to them.

They looked a fine couple: Judith tall, fair and gentle, with her child in her arms; Dan broad and strong. They were going into the unknown, perhaps into danger and persecution; and yet I wished, at that moment, that I was Judith, setting off with my husband for a new life.

“
T
hat cat has pissed behind the door again,” I said.

Nat had just come in from work, grimy with ink, his shirt showing sweat stains on the back and under the arms, his hair stuck to his forehead.

“It can't smell worse than I do.”

He pulled the shirt off and flung it into a corner, then washed himself in the water I'd left in the bowl after coming in equally hot and sweaty.

The room was stifling. It was on the ground floor, with one small window that opened onto a shared backyard and passageway. I pushed it further open, but there was no fresh air, only the stench from the communal privy.

Nat and I had had words about the cat before. It was one of our landlord's, but Nat had taken charge of it when the order went out that all cats and dogs were to be killed. It was big with kittens, and he'd shut it in our room for safety. Meg Corder must have known it was there, for it miaowed relentlessly and scratched to be let out.

“It craps on the floor,” I said. “It eats our food. And it always sleeps on
my
bed.”

The cat was on my bed now, one leg in the air, cleaning its arse. I clapped my hands at it, and it sprang off and made its way to Nat's abandoned shirt, where it turned around a few times and then curled up, purring.

Nat pulled a mock-apologetic face. I tried to remain angry, but broke out in a laugh.

“I'll get a type tray from work,” Nat said, “and put some earth in it. And empty it – I promise!”

“I'm sorry,” I said. “It's the heat.”

From midsummer onwards the heat had been intense. We were all trapped in the city as in a cauldron of fire, with scarce enough air to breathe. The gutters and cesspits stank, the Fleet River was foul with sewage, the marketplaces reeked of rotting fruit and vegetables; and underlying every other smell was the sickly-sweet odour of decaying corpses. The authorities were struggling to cope with the increasing numbers of dead, but even lime could not dispose of them fast enough, and the graveyards were piled high.

The Bills of Mortality showed seven hundred and fifty deaths from plague in one week. Our Friends the Ansons, who had voluntarily enclosed themselves, were the first in our meeting to suffer. Their maid, Ellin Crowe, died first; then Mary Anson; her husband; and their young apprentice, Roger Millard, newly come from Canterbury. Matthias Anson's house and shop, which had been a carpenter's, was shut up. It would be cleansed and fumigated when all danger of plague had passed. The two Friends who had cared for them, Jane Catlin and Ann Hale, were sisters, both widows who lived alone. Ann took sick a week later and died within five days; but Jane was spared, though she kept herself apart for the allotted time.

These deaths caused much sadness in our meeting and caused us all to think about our own mortality. I thanked God that I had not, after all, brought Susanna into this afflicted city. And yet, despite everything, I wanted her with me. I longed to be living with her in rooms of our own instead of here with Nat. I knew that part of my irritation with him came from that sense of having been thwarted in my desires.

Like most people, my employer found that his business was affected. The shop was not as busy as before, with most of his wealthy customers gone, but that gave us leisure to sort and catalogue the stock, and for James to attend to some of the business of our meeting. He wrote to several families about their loss: the parents of Roger Millard and Ellin Crowe, and the widowed father of Mary Anson; and corresponded with Friends in other London meetings. We heard news: that our Friend George Fox remained in prison in Lancaster; and that the authorities at Newgate prison were still seeking a captain willing to undertake the transportation of those Friends sentenced to banishment to Jamaica for seven years. It cheered us to know that most captains would have nothing to do with the transportation of Friends, their natural inclinations turning them against such unjust work.

The Martell children, Agnes and Stephen, were too young to understand these matters – though Agnes listened, with a troubled face, to her parents' talk, and often asked questions. Most days they ran about the shop, playing hide-and-seek between the stacks of books, and watching us go about our work.

“What's that big book?” Agnes asked me once, pointing out one bound in dark green leather with gold lettering and a design of flowers and trellis-work embossed in gold on the spine.

“That is Plutarch,” I said. “A Roman. He wrote biographies of famous men.”

Agnes traced the gold with her finger. “Will thou read it to us?”

“I fear you would find it very dull.” But I could see that the beauty of the book fascinated her.

“I shall learn to read it,” she said.

Stephen reached out too, but Agnes pushed his hand away. “No, Stephen. Thou'rt sticky.”

Stephen wailed in protest. I put the book away and the tears subsided. He stuck his thumb in his mouth and lolled against me. “Tib's gone,” he said. “Bad men took him.”

“Tib?” I had seen carts laden with the corpses of cats and dogs rattling through the streets on their way to a dump outside the city wall.

“They are not bad men,” I said. “They hope to keep us all safe from the plague. But we have a cat at home who will soon have kittens. When the contagion is over I will ask our landlord if you may have one, if your mother agrees.”

“Will it have white paws?” asked Stephen.

“Silly!” said Agnes. “Only God knows that.”

But I said to Stephen, “It might.”

Agnes was uncertain whether she wanted another cat. “I loved Tib,” she said.

The following week there was scarcely a cat or dog to be seen in the streets, and rats were everywhere. The gentry had fled the city for their country homes. The Royal Exchange used to be a place where the wealthy came to be seen, and to buy trinkets, perfumes, gloves and lace. Now the great space was almost bare of people, half the shops closed. Only the markets and most of the everyday shops in Poultry, Pudding Lane and Cheapside continued as before.

And yet nothing was as before. People had changed towards each other. We had all begun to keep to the middle of the streets – even walking in the filth of the central gutter to keep clear of whatever airs or foul breath might waft from buildings. And I believe we all looked each other over, every time we met, for the first signs of plague: sweat, pallor and chill. The sight of houses with the red cross on the door had become commonplace – as had the sound of people within screaming in agony. Cecily, returning from market one day, burst into the shop, overcome with guilt. “I saw a man leap from an upper window in a plague house!” she said. “Stark naked and raving with pain. He charged like a mad animal and beat his head against the wall and fell dying. Everyone scattered. God forgive me, but I left him; I ran; I was so afraid…”

It was on fifth-day of that week, when I was serving at the front of the shop, that John Turner came to the counter. I knew him from the Bull and Mouth meeting: a strong, well-set man of about thirty years who worked as a porter at Paul's Wharf – though he was often out of work now because of the plague.

“Will!” he exclaimed. He was breathless, and I realized he'd been running. “They've brought about fifty Friends – prisoners – out of Newgate! They're marching them down to the wharf at Blackfriars. We reckon they're to be transported at last.”

“They've found a ship?” I turned to Agnes, who was near by. “Fetch thy father.” She sped away.

“Seems so,” said John. “Friends are gathering at Blackfriars. Come if you can. I'm spreading the word.”

He hurried away. James appeared, with Agnes trotting alongside, full of the importance of her mission.

“I must go there,” James said. “And you too, Will? Agnes will help mind the shop, won't thou, my good girl?”

He left Cecily in charge, and the two of us made our way to Blackfriars Wharf, where we found many Friends gathered, and a barge waiting.

Nat and his employer, Amos Bligh, were among the crowd.

“Nat!” I called. And when we reached each other I asked, “Is it true? They've found a captain?”

“They have. Fudge, his name is – master of the
Black Spread-Eagle
. Says he'd transport anyone, even his own family. The ship lies at Bugby's Hole. They will take the prisoners out to it on the barge.”

A murmur ran through the crowd of waiting Friends. The prisoners were coming: a line of them, guarded by turnkeys and officers. As they passed, people came to their windows and out of shops to stare and jeer – more often at the prison officers than the prisoners. Most of the prisoners were men, but there were perhaps a score of women among them.

I recognized several people from our meeting – in particular a young man Nat and I had become friends with: Vincent Chaney, a silversmith, who had been in prison several months. I was shocked by his appearance. He'd always been a slight man, but now he was gaunt, with a straggling beard; dirty and defeated-looking. His wife, Rachel, broke suddenly from the crowd and flung herself towards him, crying out his name in such grief that the people in the shop doorway behind me tutted in sympathy, and a woman called out, “Let her say farewell to her man! Poor girl!”

Vincent turned, his eyes seeking Rachel.

But the officers seized her and pushed her roughly aside. She collided with Nat, who stood beside me, and he caught her and gave her into the care of her women friends, where she collapsed in uncontrollable weeping.

By now the prisoners were beginning to board the barge. Though they did nothing to resist, they held back and had to be forced and prodded aboard with a good deal of foul language, while the people around shouted at the officers. We Friends were mostly silent, although a few spoke out. Elizabeth Wright began to preach that the city was cursed for its wickedness. “Repent! Repent!” she cried. And Joseph Law fell to his knees in prayer on the cobbled road, and was kicked and beaten until he got up.

But at last all were aboard, and the barge was cast off and proceeded downriver. We stood and watched its progress until we could see no more – the ship's mooring at Bugby's Hole being far away, beyond Deptford Reach.

We all began to disperse, shocked and distressed, talking together.

James told Rachel Chaney he was hopeful. “They have yet to get them aboard ship,” he said. “They may have found a master, but few seamen have much stomach for this work.”

It turned out he was right, for next morning we heard that only four of the prisoners had been got aboard, and those with much difficulty, since they would not move themselves and must be dragged or carried. The master had been absent, and the seamen, despite threats and curses, had refused to help in any way. At last the officers had admitted defeat and brought the remaining prisoners back to Newgate. But we knew they would try again.

Two weeks later – on the first fourth-day in August – another day of prayer was ordered to be held throughout the city. My employer closed our shop, and we all went to the Bull and Mouth meeting, where we found Friends assembled in large numbers. We half feared an assault by the authorities, but there was none; perhaps even they were at prayer.

Nat was there; and Rachel Chaney with her child, a little girl of perhaps a year and a half; and some other younger Friends of our acquaintance: Mark Ashton, a carpenter; and Francis Palmer, who was servant to a notary.