Tombland

Next morning, as usual, people rose at dawn. It promised to be yet another hot day. I had slept well last night, though it was stuffy and noisome in the little lean-to, with barely room for the three of us. We all stank to high heaven, but were becoming used to the musty, sweaty smell we shared with everyone in the camp. We all had straggly beards now – mine white, Barak’s brown, Nicholas’s coppery.

At breakfast bread and cheese were handed around by Goodwife Everneke. As I ate with my fingers, I thought that even a fortnight ago the idea of living in such conditions would have horrified me. The strange thing was that, despite the heat, with the bracken bed and regular movement, I was feeling better than for some time; my body more like a functioning organism than a disjointed collection of aching parts, though after my recent injury I still had to be careful.

There was much laughter among the villagers about Alderman Aldrich’s visit to the camp. Apparently, he lived at Swardeston, three miles away, and had been brought into Norwich by a party of rebels. ‘E’s ours now, bors,’ one villager said with pleasure.

Most men had been assigned work for the day, but some, and a number of the women, were going down to Norwich market. The previous evening the leaders of the Hundreds, accompanied by soldiers, had gone around the camp, distributing coins – a shilling for each man, representing wages for their work. New debased shillings, but money nonetheless.

Young Natty, wearing an armless leather jerkin and threadbare upper hose, looked at the coin in his big brown hand. ‘First I’ve had in weeks,’ he said.

‘Are you going back to tree-felling today?’ I asked him.

‘Better than that, one of the carpenters is teaching me to saw planks. Perhaps I may become an apprentice, after this is done.’

‘Will you go back to the Sandlings?’

‘I may stay in Norwich. I never really liked the sea.’ He looked at me, and I remembered Walter, washed up on the beach with his head stoved in, like Edith Boleyn’s. Evidently he remembered it too, for he leaned forward and said, ‘An old pal of mine has come to camp, with some people from the Sandlings. He comes from poor Wal Padbury’s village; I thought I might ask him if he remembered anything.’

‘If you could, I would be very grateful.’

Old Goodman Johnson rose to his feet. ‘I have to go to a meeting of them as fought in the wars. Thanks for the food, Goody Everneke. I’ll miss Conyers’s sermon, so pray for my soul.’

‘’Tis early for a gathering, bor.’

‘There’s much to organize.’

I looked at him. ‘So my friends and I may visit Norwich unaccompanied?’

‘Ay, those are the orders.’ He looked doubtfully at Nicholas, who returned the old man’s gaze, a flash of anger in his green eyes.

* * *

AFTER BREAKFAST hundreds gathered to hear the sermon by Thomas Conyers. Its tone was evangelical, calling on the assembly to remember they were in God’s view and to behave in a sober and peaceable manner, though he also referred to the need for reformation of the greed in the land, as well as giving a long disquisition on the extirpation of sinfulness. It was, I thought, carefully judged. I wondered how many of the camp people were radical Protestants. Some, no doubt, but many, I suspected, were bending with the wind in hope of support from the Protector. Traditionalists – and there must be some – were keeping their heads down.

Afterwards, people, mostly carrying baskets, headed for the road down to Norwich. We walked to the escarpment, past a group of men digging another large pit to bury the remains of some of the slaughtered sheep. The stink was terrible.

We watched people descend, cross Bishopsgate Bridge, which had been opened, and enter the city. The mood of those setting off was cheerful in the main, though the peddlers who had come to the camp looked disconsolate, for they could not compete with the city market. I said to Barak and Nicholas, ‘Well, let us go down.’

‘I wish they’d returned my sword,’ Nicholas grumbled. ‘Having to go to the city in a ragged shirt like a peasant – it’s humiliating.’

‘Be glad they released you,’ Barak said impatiently, strapping on his artificial hand. He turned to me. ‘It’s going to be a long day, if we’re going to make all the visits you want. Are you feeling up to it?’

‘I want to do as much as I can. Go to the Maid’s Head to see if there’s any new correspondence for me and send my own, give Isabella the money Flowerdew took if she is still at the inn, then go to the castle and see Boleyn. And I would like to visit Josephine and Edward. And perhaps Scambler’s aunt – we’ll look out for the lad in the city. You have your letter to Tamasin?’

‘Yes. It just says I’ve been delayed by the troubles, but am safe.’

‘I have written a like letter to Guy.’ I took a deep breath. ‘And one to Parry, again saying the same, but also that I will continue to investigate the Boleyn case where I can.’

Barak looked around at the crowds, the vista of huts. ‘That seems pretty small beer now.’