Havoc, in Its Third Year: A Novel Read online

  When the horror in his guts took him from his tears, he got once more to his feet and turned back for the window, climbing and sliding over the coals as he went. The bars he took hold of were now hot to the touch. Smoke came into his nose and mouth so he choked as he called at the window to anyone outside who might be there.

  Brigge’s scorched hands lost their grip on the bars. Rising on his fours he spluttered and retched. The room was now full of smoke.

  In this blindness and suffocation Brigge struggled to fight down his terror. The thought of death was not new to him. What did it matter that he was called a few hours sooner? He would be hanged in any case. All he could do now was pray for the strength to die well, as the priest had died. He resolved to use the last minutes he had in this life to prepare himself for the next. He said a Pater Noster and heard in the murmur of the prayer the consolations he sought, the promise of life to come.

  Brigge’s time of pain had come; he would find the courage to embrace it. He fixed his mind on Elizabeth and saw her as she was in their garden with Samuel in her arms during the short time they had in paradise together. How beautiful she was and how happy. How he loved her then. He begged forgiveness for being the occasion of pain to her, then, bringing his hand to his mouth, kissed it as though it were her brow.

  Brigge’s head was giddy; the strength in his arms gave out. He fell into the coals and lay still.

  HE FOUND HER not in the garden but on the mountain overlooking the bleak beauty of the Winters. She was smiling as she came to embrace him. Her hair was dark, her eyes clear and bright, her skin fresh. Stretching out a hand, she showed him how his estate prospered. Looking down, he saw Starman with his flock, so many ewes and wethers he had never seen; and in the field that stretched from the house to the beck was a lush swaying crop of oats.

  He became suddenly alarmed and, looking about, asked where Samuel was.

  “He is not yet come to join us, John,” Elizabeth said gently. “He has life left to live and will live it well.”

  She drew him to her, saying, “Do not be frightened, my love. Here you are safe at last.”

  WHEN HIS EYES came open, they discerned a man’s heavy dark jowls. Brigge sucked in some air and at once vomited. Wiping his hand across his mouth, his lips and tongue became grimed with coal dust, and he spat and hawked to rid his mouth of it.

  The keeper stepped back and looked to a man Brigge could not quite devise.

  “Can I go now?” the keeper pleaded.

  He dropped the key into Adam’s hand and ran off as swiftly as his great bulk allowed. Brigge stumbled to his feet and saw they were in the street before the House of Correction. He retched violently.

  When he had breath again, he looked about in wonderment and horror at the advance of the flames. “Thank you, Adam,” he said. He thought he heard the squealing of pigs; but, listening with more care, he realized it could be nothing other than the cries of the roasting inmates.

  “The town has been attacked,” Adam said in wonderment and horror. “Our enemies have struck.”

  A strong wind was up and it whipped the flames toward them. People ran for their lives. The whole town, it seemed, would be consumed. Behind them the roof of a house collapsed in on itself and flames jumped from the windows.

  Adam gazed at Brigge. “Get away from this place,” he said; his voice was low and bewildered. “Men will be dazed by what has happened here, but they will soon find their anger again and will seek revenge.”

  “Why would they revenge themselves on me?” Brigge said. “I have nothing to do with this.”

  “We live in bitter times and the world is divided in two: those who live inside the godly nation, and those outside. Inside is righteousness and strength. Outside is barbarism and terror. You chose to live outside.”

  “I chose rather not to live inside,” Brigge said.

  “It is the same,” Adam said. “There is nothing in between.”

  The front of the house whose roof was gone now toppled to the ground in a motion like the felling of a great tree. It crashed to the street, causing hot dust to come up in clouds, sending sparks and embers everywhere. Brigge and Adam hunched their bodies and closed their eyes to protect themselves. Brigge felt his skin pricked with small burns.

  When Brigge opened his eyes, he saw Adam was already walking away.

  “Adam, wait!” Brigge shouted. “Where do you go?” Brigge hurried after him and took hold of his arm. “You must open the jail.”

  “I have freed you,” Adam said harshly. “Make good your escape while you may.”

  Some men ran past, one of them his hair alight and screaming. Adam went after them.

  “Adam!”

  When Adam was gone a dozen paces, Brigge saw him drop something from his hand. Running up to where he had been, he looked down in the dirt and soot and saw the key the keeper had left with him.

  HE DID NOT know that he would ever find the door, so thick and dangerous was the smoke. And when he came to it, he was almost overcome by the noxious air; he became faint and dropped the key and thought he had lost it until, scratching and raking the ground in a frenzy, he came upon it again. From inside there was silence and he feared the inmates might already be dead. He fought to make his trembling weak fingers do their work and unfasten the lock.

  They poured out, retching as Brigge had retched, staggering and falling and some dragging others as they made their way to the stairs. He called for Katherine Shay, but there was no answering call. He questioned those who stumbled to their escape where was Shay, where was she held, but no man paused to tell him.

  Fighting his way to the stone staircase, he went up through the choking smoke to the floor above where there were small rooms and private quarters. The heat here was still greater, for the roof was on fire and timbers and slate crashed around him. Taking the key, he attempted to open the first door, struggling with the lock. Then he heard pitiful cries from the far end of the passage. With his arm up to shield his eyes and face, he hurried to where he thought the cries were.

  “Katherine?” he shouted, and called her name again and again. Every time he opened his mouth, he felt it catch as the noxious smoke came into his throat and choked him. Hearing a weak call from behind a door, he set to it with the key. The lock was scorching to the touch and Brigge burned his hand as he wrestled to open it.

  Inside was Shay, loaded with chains, black with ash and smoke, so overcome she could not walk. Brigge pulled her up, a light burden in despite of her reckons, and carried her to the stairs.

  Coming out of the jail after them, he found the prisoners in the street. He saw Lacy and his wife. He saw Fourness and Lister and others he had seen when Katherine Shay had her followers among the prisoners. He saw Robert Hewison and Quirke, the keeper of the Painted Hand, and Susana Horton. Some were hardly able to walk and were helped by their fellows, others with stouter hearts and stronger legs ran away at speed to save themselves. He heard the name of Germanus invoked, and some said that Katherine Shay had promised one day a saint would come to liberate them. They stood about, trepid and in awe of him who had freed them. “Which way do we go?” one asked.

  “Why do you ask me?” Brigge answered sharply. “Go your own way.”

  Thirty

  BRIGGE ’ S COAT FLAPPED ABOUT HIM IN THE WIND AS HE HURRIED down Cheapside to reach the Lion and Samuel ahead of the flames. He went into Petticoat Lane where, at the woolshops, those coming from the north end of the town joined with those coming from the west. A horse cart loaded with goods came at them and Brigge had to jump so as not to be run down. He ran through the market, where the conflagration had not yet taken hold.

  Beyond the cornmarket the smoke began to thicken again. Brigge closed his burning eyes, and when he opened them, he saw he was not where he thought he should be and realized he must have turned off the way into an alley or courtyard. He knew the town well, but everything was so utterly changed that he was confused and, turning about, looked for a sign by which he
could discover where he was. That he should be lost in a place he knew so well added greatly to his terror. It was like walking into his own house and not knowing it; if that could happen, then the whole world had to be falling in on itself.

  A woman ran past him with chickens swinging in her hands as she went. Flames exploded from the small house at the foot of the alley, and Brigge felt a blast of heat sear the skin of cheek and neck on the left side. He wheeled about and hurried into what he thought must be Bull Green, but he was sure when he saw it that it was not.

  What street was this? He did not know. Was it possible he was in some other town? Had he fallen insensible in the jail of one town only to wake up in another and witness it consumed like Sodom? Brigge had to put his arm across his face. His skin was blasted and he felt his eyeballs horribly shriveled, so that even to open them for a moment seemed to risk them being burned in their sockets. The houses on both sides of the street were alight, and the flames billowed along the thatched roofs, whipped by the wind; he was in a tunnel of fire. Horses and pigs screamed; the air was full of firedrops. He saw smoke rise from his coat and became afraid his clothes would catch light.

  Out of nowhere someone passed him a bucket, and he threw the water at the wall of flame, hardly conscious of what he was doing. He might as well have thrown the water into the sea for the difference it made, and he could only stare at the flames and the flakes of fire swirling up into the air.

  He felt the bucket snatched from his hand and this brought him out of his daze. Looking back along the street, he saw men with ropes pull down a house in the fire’s path. Men and women hurried from doorways carrying infants and pots and chairs and chests. A brick chimney crashed to the ground only yards from where he stood. Smoke and dust came out in a great cloud and left him and those around him blinded and choking violently and covered in ashes. He could only put out a hand to find his way.

  He did not now know in what direction he was headed. Toward the fire? Away from it? He was jostled and pulled and he pulled and jostled as desperation overtook him. He was aware of a horrible sensation, something underfoot, yielding yet hard in places, unmistakably flesh and bone, a body, a human body. Someone had fallen, and to make good his escape Brigge was prepared to crush the unfortunate wretch, to squeeze his guts, smash his skull.

  Brigge stumbled blindly on, falling more than once. He tripped over an empty bucket and, when he realized what it was, went back to pick it up and take it with him, thinking he had a duty to preserve whatever might be of use in fighting the fire, and so made his way half a mile or more carrying an empty bucket until he reached the open spaces of Little Green and Bull Green, where men and women lay on the grass to recover their breath amid the screams of the burned and mutilated.

  He gathered himself for the strength to go on to make his way to the Lion and Samuel when he heard his name called. They were ghosts who approached him—Starman and women and the little boy James Jagger covered with white-gray ash, and Deborah shielding Samuel as best she could. There were oaths and curses and rumors and cries. There were cries that the woolshops were in flame, that the fire had now spread west of the market, that the whole town would soon be engulfed and no man and no woman would escape. The detested name of Exley the vagrant was on every man’s lips, and some said they had heard with their own ears Exley threaten to set the town on fire for revenge.

  Brigge shepherded his family together and said they must go while they could, for in the morning there would be wild justice. As they went, they found fat Lacy and his wife who, terrified out of their wits and fearful of being pointed out and killed, begged to come with them. They came to the end of the green, meaning to strike out for the moors and mountains north of the town. Brigge took Samuel in his hands and kissed him. The child felt hotter than he had ever done in his fevers and Brigge became seized with the need for expedition.

  He turned to Starman and the women. “Go up by Back Street and Snidal Lane and leave the town by that road. Do not let any man prevent your going. Wait for me beyond North Gate and I will come to you.”

  Lacy was very quick to be off with his wife, but the kitchen maids were loath to go from him.

  “Why do you not come with us?” Isabel cried.

  “I must stay to give what assistance I can,” he said.

  They would not go until Starman persuaded them for Samuel’s sake and promised them they would all be reunited but that they must go quick before the flames arrived at this part of the town.

  The first spots of rain came on when it was still dark.

  BY FIRST LIGHT it was raining as heavily as during the worst of the winter. The fires began to die down from the great dampness and having run their courses; by midmorning they were entirely extinguished. Brigge walked among the people. All men were the same, specters of ash and amazement, powdered over with dust, walking spirits and visible ghosts, and he went unrecognized.

  From the cornmarket to South Gate, from King Street in the west as far as the Causey in the east, the town had been destroyed, turned into a heap of blackened timber and ashes. The stench was there, the smell of roasted flesh and decaying, distended guts. Some were so badly disfigured their bloated limbs had the ruptured, crannied texture of charred wood, and the flesh of their heads was scorched back to the teeth and skull; others seemed hardly touched by fire at all. Brigge had seen men to their graves by apoplexies and blastings, by sudden blows, by water and fire, by every kind of instrument and agency, man’s and God’s. Nothing on earth is as feeble and frightened as man, and nothing more deserving of compassion, of charity.

  The air smelt densely of woodsmoke and on the wind charred scraps still floated. He passed people with the broken, vacant looks of soldiers of a defeated army going in search of shelter and food. At the market men were already laboring to clear away the waste and wreckage, and the gravediggers skulked with their handcarts and spades. Men’s talk was swiftly becoming terrible and wrathful. The town would be revenged, the City on the Hill rebuilt, its light restored. All swore they would not rest until those who had set the fires were called to account to receive such punishment as would terrify evildoers everywhere. There would be no mercy, only bitter revenge. When Brigge asked who it was they would revenge themselves on, the people rounded on him and threatened him with blows for the impertinence of his question and asked who he was. There was no need to ask who was guilty. The guilty were those who were their enemies: the papist gentlemen who armed their servants and went by night conspiring to murder them; the Irish who came in hordes from over sea, landing at ports and beaches, then setting out to claim the land for their own; the vagrants and rogues and counterfeit Gypsies who wandered the roads stealing and plundering men’s goods, striking fear into the hearts of honest men; the armies of emperor and pope that ravaged the poor people of Germany; traitors who lived in their midst and succored those outside who would destroy them. These and others were the guilty ones and would pay for the wickedest deed that was ever done by man. Reason and skepticism were the mark of the faintheart and the traitor. Brigge heard extravagance and absurdity. He heard the panting of tyranny. He saw that in the town at last all were now united where for so long they were warring and at each other’s throats: the great merchants and wealthy clothiers and drapers and yeomen with poor laborers and spinners and tallow-makers. Some lived well and some did not and some would eat tonight and some would not, but differences of rank, wealth and degree had melted in the fire. All were now united and would be revenged. War is coming, Father Edward had prophesied. It is on the horizon. Brigge stole away from men and made for the wilderness.

  BRIGGE FOUND HIS family among the hordes of those refugeed by the fire on the moor beyond North Gate. James Jagger had the nag with him, which he had led from the stable at the Lion at the first soundings of alarm. The kitchen maids Isabel and Sara were there too. And Lacy and his wife, and others of the jail. They were, all of them, waiting for Brigge, and when he came up to them, they asked him where he would lead them
.

  “I will not lead you to any place,” he said.

  He took Samuel in his arms and whispered loving words to him, then returned him to Deborah and put them upon the nag. He took the rein and led the horse, setting out for the mountains beyond.

  Thirty-one

  THE RAIN CAME ON AGAIN, A VERY HEAV Y DOWNPOUR OF water. Now will my sheep drink and my crop be watered, Brigge thought, though he would never see his fields or sheep again. He spoke to Elizabeth as he went, relating to her all that had passed and saying he was sorry he had not stayed longer with her when they were reunited on the mountain. And sorry too that he had looked for Samuel before his time. Brigge grinned with happiness thinking of Elizabeth saying that Samuel had life to live and would live it well. He would soon leave this life, and he would be content enough to go knowing his son would live and prosper. He glanced up at Deborah, who kept Samuel under her cloak, his narrow eyes watchful and bright and showing no sign of fear or complaint at the strange course his father was leading him. If Brigge was aware of those who followed in his wake, he did not show it.

  They came to East Wood in the evening. Mother Moore sat where Brigge had last seen her beneath the gibbet, so still he imagined she had not moved in the months that had passed since then. She rose on Brigge’s coming, clutching her son’s bones in her hands.

  “Where do you go, Mr. Brigge?” she called.

  They found shelter in a barn and begged food and milk from the farmer, which he, having tidings of the terrible fire, was content to give them, though casting his eye over the company could not but think that the town had disgorged to him its most disreputable inhabitants. He offered to take the child inside and Brigge and Deborah too, but Brigge would not have it.