The Ashes of London (4 page)

As if to lend emphasis to his words, a distant explosion shook the window in its frame.

‘Go back to work,’ he said.

C
AT DREW THE
grey cloak over her head. The fine wool smelled of the fire, but also something unpleasantly musky and masculine. The face of the thin young man whose cloak she had stolen was vivid in her mind, his skin almost orange in the light of the flames.

She was still breathing hard from running through the streets, from pushing her way through the crowds. She had looked back often as she fled, and sometimes she was sure she glimpsed his face. But, thanks be to God, he wasn’t there any more.

She crouched and tapped on the window shutter.

Three taps. Then a pause. Three more taps.

Light flickered in the crack behind the shutter. The window was no more than eighteen inches wide, and not much taller. The sill was barely six inches above the cobbles. The ground level had crept higher and higher over the centuries.

Something flickered in the crack of light. Three answering taps. Then a pause. Three more taps.

She moved deeper into the alley. It wasn’t dark – even here, beyond the walls. The Doomsday glow filled the narrow space with a murky orange fog that caught at the back of her throat and made her want to retch.

No one had taken refuge here yet. No one human. The mouth of the alley was concealed by an encroaching extension from the shop on the other side of it. Unless you knew it was there, you wouldn’t see it.

But the rats had known where the alley was. They were fleeing the burning city in their hundreds of thousands. She felt movement around her feet and heard a distant squealing.

The ground was paved with uneven flags, which were covered with cinders, scraps of paper and charred fragments of wood and cloth that crunched like black gravel beneath her shoes.

At the end of the alley was a pointed archway recessed in the wall, the stone frame for an oak door studded with nails. She had seen it by daylight: the wood had blackened with age and was as hard as a stone wall.

In the distance came the sound of three explosions. They were blowing up more of the houses in the path of the fire.

There came a faint scraping sound from the other side of the door. Then silence. Then another scrape. No lock, thank God. Only two iron bars, as thick as a man’s arm.

The door swung inwards. A crack of light appeared on the other side, widening with the opening door. She slipped through the gap. Immediately she turned, closed the door and dropped the latch in place.

‘Mistress …’ The whisper was a hiss of air, barely audible.

‘The bars, Jem.’ Cat’s eyes hadn’t adjusted to the gloom yet. ‘Quickly.’

The flame wavered behind the grille of the closed lantern as he placed it on the floor. Shadows fragmented and glided over the wall. The air was foul, for the cesspit of the house on the other side of the alley had leached through the foundations of the wall.

Jem scuttled to the door. Iron grated on stone. He had rubbed grease on the bars to make them move easily and as quietly as possible. She watched, clutching the grey cloak about her throat.

When the door was doubly barred, he turned to face her. She heard his breath, wheezier than usual perhaps because of the smoke. Sometimes his wheezing grew so bad that they thought he would die of it. ‘Scratch me, I wish he would,’ Cousin Edward had said last winter. ‘It’s like listening to a death rattle.’

‘Mistress, what happened?’

She brushed aside the question with one of her own: ‘Where are they?’

‘Madam’s retired. Master’s in the study. Master Edward’s not back yet. The dogs are loose.’

If the dogs were in the house, then the servants had gone to bed too, all but the watchman and the porter.

Jem bent down for the lantern. As he picked it up, the shadows merged and swooped to the vaulted ceiling, sliding over stone ribs and bosses.

Now she was safe, or as safe as she could be for the time being, Cat was aware that she too was breathing raggedly, and that she was drenched with sweat. It was hot even in here.

He lowered his voice still further. The flame flickered as he mouthed the words, ‘Did you find him, mistress?’

Tears filled her eyes. She bit her lower lip, drawing blood. ‘No. And St Paul’s is lost. I saw part of the portico fall and crumble into dust.’

‘If Master Lovett was there, he will have escaped.’

‘We must pray he did.’ Her words were pious, but her feelings were more complicated. Was it possible to love her father and fear him at the same time? She owed him her devotion and her duty. But did he not owe her something as well? She wondered why Jem cared for him, the man who had once beaten him so hard that it caused the lameness in his leg.

‘Remember, I cannot be sure it was him I saw this morning.’ Jem brought the light closer to her. ‘Your clothes, mistress. What happened?’

‘It doesn’t matter. Light me upstairs.’

The house was built mainly of stone and brick – a blessing in these times, Master Alderley had said at dinner, though he also urged his family to mark that God tempered the wind to those who took thought for the morrow – and it lay at a safe distance beyond the City wall near Hatton Garden. The place had belonged to the monks in the old days and it had been much altered since then. It was old and rambling, with stairs that spiralled to chambers that were long gone and to great vaulted cellars half-full of rubble.

Jem led the way, holding the lantern high. They mounted a flight of steps and passed through another door.

Claws clattered on stone. The mastiffs met them in the passage. One by one, they pushed their moist muzzles at Cat. They pressed against her, sniffing and licking her outstretched hand, eager for her familiar touch. By day the dogs lived in a special enclosure in the yard, and by night they patrolled the house, yard and the garden.

‘Thunder,’ she whispered into the darkness, ‘Lion, Greedy and Bare-Arse.’

The dogs whined softly with pleasure. Cat drew a deep breath. Now the worst was over, she began to tremble. It was unlikely she would be discovered now. For most of the time, the nightwatchman stayed at the other end of the house, away from the kitchens and close to the study and the cellar that Master Alderley had adapted to be his strong room. The dogs would warn them if he was about, and his lantern and his footsteps came before him when he patrolled the other parts of the building. As for the porter, he slept in the hall, on a mattress laid across the threshold of the front door. He would not move from there until Edward returned.

The passage led to the kitchen wing. They crossed a narrow hall with a row of small, shuttered windows, descended a few steps and turned sharply to their right. Then came a spiral staircase that climbed through the thickness of the wall, lit only by the occasional unglazed openings that gave glimpses of the sullen glow above the burning city. These stairs smelled strongly of the stink of the Fire, unlike the lower regions of the house. They taxed Jem’s strength, for he was short of breath as well as lame.

Cat’s chamber was a small room facing north towards the hills of Highgate. The heavy curtains were drawn across the window, blocking the glare of the Fire, which was visible even on this side of the house.

Jem lit her candle from the flame in the lantern.

‘Why has my father come back?’ she said.

‘He does not confide in me, mistress.’

‘They will kill him if they find them. He must know that.’

He bobbed his head in acknowledgement. She wondered if he knew more than he was saying.

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Good night.’

Jem lingered, his face unreadable in the gloom. ‘They say in the kitchen that Sir Denzil will dine here tomorrow.’

She bit hard on her lip. This on top of everything. ‘Is it certain?’

‘Yes. Unless the Fire prevents it.’

‘Go,’ she said. ‘Leave me.’

He turned and hobbled from the room.

Once the door was closed, and she was quite alone at last, she could allow herself to cry.

I
T WAS A
mark of Sir Denzil’s importance that Aunt Olivia sent Ann to help Cat dress for dinner. Cat did not have her own maid to attend her, a fact that underlined her anomalous status in the household.

Ann, Aunt Olivia’s own maid, spent what seemed like hours working on Cat’s appearance. Most importantly, she wound a bandage beneath Cat’s breasts with padding set in it in order to create the impression that Cat had far more of a bosom than God had at present seen fit to provide. Cat was already a woman – she would be eighteen next birthday – but sometimes it seemed to her that she and Aunt Olivia were different creatures from one another.

The maid worked in silence, frowning constantly, and tugging at laces and bandages as if Cat were an inanimate object incapable of feeling pain and discomfort. Afterwards, she showed Cat her reflection in Aunt Olivia’s Venetian mirror. Cat saw a richly dressed doll with slanting eyes and elaborately curled hair.

Ann brought her down to the best parlour. She left Cat stuffed and trussed like a goose for the oven, to wait on the pleasure of Uncle Alderley and Sir Denzil Croughton.

The parlour smelled of fresh herbs with a hint of damp. The dark wood of the floor and the furniture had been waxed to a dull sheen. A Turkey carpet glowed on the table underneath the windows. There was a small fire of logs, despite the unnatural warmth of the season, for the room was chilly even in summer.

She stood by the table and idly turned the pages of a book of airs that lay there, though she could not have sung a note to save her life.

Her mind was elsewhere, wondering whether she could slip outside again tonight, with Jem’s help, and how it might be contrived.

She heard steps on the flags outside the door and shivered with distaste. Her hand froze in the act of turning a page. She knew who was there even before she turned: she would have recognized that slow, heavy step in the middle of a crowd.

‘Catherine, my love,’ said Cousin Edward. The Alderleys never called her Cat.

She turned reluctantly and gave him the curtsy that good manners required.

He bowed in return, but with an element of mockery. ‘Well! You are quite the court beauty today.’ He sucked in his breath to show his appreciation and walked slowly towards her, watching her face. ‘How you have grown!’ He moved his hands, sketching an exaggerated version of her shape. ‘A miracle! Scratch me, my dear, I think this must be the effect of Sir Denzil. The power of his charms is acting on you from afar.’

She closed the book. She said nothing because that was usually wisest with Edward.

‘And what are you reading?’ He stretched out his hand to the book. ‘Ah – studying your music. How delightful. Shall I beg you to sing to the company after dinner? I’m sure Sir Denzil would be enchanted.’

She was tone-deaf, and Edward knew it.

He lowered his head and she smelled the wine on his breath. ‘Of course I myself am already enchanted without the need of song.’

Cat edged away from him. He followed her, penning her close to the table and blocking her retreat. She turned away and affected to stare through the window at the green geometry of the garden and the hot, heavy sky. He was a big man, nearly six foot, and growing fat, for all he was barely five-and-twenty. He looked like a pig, she thought, and had the same voracious appetites. Most of the time he ignored her, which was infinitely better than the times when he baited her instead. Lately, she had been aware of his eyes on her, watching, measuring.

‘This miracle.’ He moistened his lips. ‘This sudden change to your appearance. Why, you are all of a sudden grown so womanly. It is quite remarkable.’

He laid his hand on her shoulder. His touch was warm and slightly moist. He tightened his fingers.

‘Skin and bone, sweet cousin,’ he said. ‘Like a child still. And yet … and yet …’

She pulled away from him.

He brought his head closer to hers, and again she smelled the wine on his breath. ‘I saw you last night.’

Startled, she looked up at his flushed, familiar face.

‘Creeping back to the house,’ he said. ‘You’d been out by yourself, hadn’t you, walking the streets like any tuppenny whore. You little Puritans are all the same, primness and virtue on the outside and the filthiest wickedness within. I saw you from the window of the tavern by the gate. Slipping like a thief into the alley. Who let you in? That crippled knave of yours?’

Cat had hated Edward Alderley for some time now. She was a good hater. She hoarded the hatred as a miser hoards his gold.

The latch rattled on the door. Edward snatched away his hand and stepped back. Cat smoothed her dress and turned to the window. She was breathing rapidly and her skin prickled with sweat.

Olivia came into the room. ‘Let me look at you, child. Now turn to the side.’ She nodded. ‘Good. Your colour is much better than usual, too.’ She turned to Edward. ‘Don’t you agree? Ann has worked wonders.’

He bowed. ‘Indeed, madam. Why, my cousin is quite the little beauty today.’ He smiled at his stepmother. ‘No doubt the work was carried out under your guidance.’

Uncle Alderley came in with Sir Denzil.

The ladies curtsied, and Sir Denzil bowed elaborately, first to Olivia and then to Cat. He was a small man with a lofty periwig and unusually high heels to his shoes.

‘Ah!’ he said in a high, drawling voice, directing his remarks impartially at the space between the two women. ‘A feast of beauty!’ He turned to Master Alderley and touched his lip with his forefinger, an oddly childlike gesture. He wore a diamond ring on the finger. ‘Truly, sir, I am a veritable glutton for beauty.’ He looked directly at Cat for the first time and said without marked enthusiasm, ‘and soon I shall have the pleasure of eating my fill.’

The ungainly compliment fell like a stone in a pool. There was a moment’s silence.

‘Well, sir,’ Aunt Olivia said to her husband. ‘Shall we go in to dinner?’