‘God save us,’ Dowling muttered.
‘Aye, God save us,’ the old woman agreed. ‘When the thief saw the daughter, he must have panicked. Perhaps she recognised him.’ Her shiny, black eyes narrowed. ‘Hugh Elks arrived at church very late, exceedingly sweaty, said he had been working in the field. When William Braine arrived home, he found his daughter lain on the floor with her throat cut, and a dog eating the cheese.’
‘Elks’ dog?’
‘Aye, Elks’ dog. He said his dog escaped its leash, and that the presence of his dog didn’t signify that he killed Braine’s daughter, and none could prove otherwise.’
‘Though all suspected it?’
‘Not all.’ The old woman sighed deep. ‘For not everyone liked William Braine, and not everyone was agin’ Hugh Elks, for Elks had a large family. Half the village is related to an Elks in some way.’
‘Josselin proved Elks killed the girl, and Thomas Elks hates him for it,’ I deduced.
The old woman ignored me. ‘When Elks arrived at church, sweat poured from his head like he had stuck it in a bucket. His face was red, his skin hot, yet Josselin noticed his shirt was clean.’
The old lady gazed up into Dowling’s serious face. ‘There were three or four spots where the sweat soaked through in circles, growing fast. It was a new shirt, else it would have been wet all over, like his body.’
‘For someone who wasn’t there, you tell a good story,’ I said.
She grimaced and turned again to Dowling. ‘Josselin walked the path between Braine’s house and the church. Elks’ house lay between the two. Past Elks’ house stood a thicket. Josselin took the dog into the thicket and found a shirt, covered in blood, in thin streams where it sprayed when he cut the girl’s throat.’
‘God’s teeth,’ I muttered.
‘Elks said it wasn’t his shirt, but the dog picked it up and ran to him with it. Then others from the village swore they had seen him wearing it earlier that day. I don’t know if they spoke truth or told lies to condemn him, but it was enough to see him hanged at Ipswich.’ The old lady turned to face me. ‘Some thanked Josselin for it; others blamed him for Hugh Elks’ death, accusing him of bearing false witness. When Josselin found his own horse dead one day, here at Colchester, throat cut with a wire, he knew Thomas Elks did it.’
‘Thomas Elks may be dead,’ I pointed out. ‘Half Shyam is dead, so they say.’
‘More than half,’ the old lady replied, ‘and none of them is Thomas Elks. We see the list every Friday, and his name has not yet been on it. So you tell me why James Josselin would venture into Shyam, and tell me then why you venture into Shyam. Though having met you I am inclined to send you on your way.’ She stuck out her chin.
‘All good questions,’ I assured her. ‘We would talk more to you later, but now we must go.’
‘ I must go,’ she corrected me, ‘and I don’t know that I have the inclination to talk to you more.’ She spat one last time upon the floorboards before shuffling off.
‘How sweet are thy words unto my taste! Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!’ Dowling grasped my shoulder. ‘We should inspect the latest list afore we leave.’
I didn’t honour him with a reply, for we dawdled too long if we wanted to arrive before the churches filled.
Dowling reckoned there were nine churches in Colchester. We couldn’t cover them all. If Josselin had indeed come here to meet the Dutch then St Martin’s was the most likely, an old Norman church inside the Dutch Quarter, deformed and stunted, its tower destroyed by Fairfax’s cannons.
We arrived at the door in sufficient time, for the streets were still filling. The sun still shone, which made it difficult to stand inconspicuous. By now word would have spread that three strangers roamed the town in search of Josselin and his four Dutch spies. Josselin may have been warned of our presence. Damn Withypoll for declaring our intentions so bold. I fetched in my pocket for my pipe and Culpepper’s leaves.
I offered the packet to Dowling. ‘Will you share my remedy?’
He shook his head, scowling.
‘Why so quiet, Davy?’ I asked him, packing the bowl. ‘You’ve barely said a word all day.’
He snorted and shook his head. ‘Does it not pain ye, Harry,’ he said. ‘That outside the walls men lie dying? Yet in here they feed themselves, watch over themselves, then rush to church to pray for their own lives.’ He shook his head again. ‘The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and,
behold, I will destroy them with the earth.’
‘God is angry you reckon?’
‘Angry with us all,’ Dowling replied, voice thick with fear and disgust. ‘God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. Who says the plague has left London, Harry? Who says it will not return?’
‘Where is your belief, Davy?’ I asked, shaken to my soul, for I never suspected Dowling’s faith was pregnable.
‘None of us know God’s intent,’ he answered. ‘For without controversy great is the mystery of godliness.’
‘Amen to that,’ I said, thinking of Shyam and watching the last of the congregation file in through the doors. ‘Though I reckon God would have us persuade Scotschurch to search this town from door to door, despite what Withypoll says.’
‘Withypoll cares little about Josselin,’ said Dowling. ‘All this talk of treason and treachery is but part of the act behind which Withypoll masquerades to achieve his true intention. And his true intention is to see you die, Harry, and me too, I suppose.’
I thought of London, the noise, the throngs, the sound of life. ‘Is now the time to flee then?’ I stepped across the road to light my pipe from a brazier full of coals. I sucked hard, feeling the smoke deep in my lungs. The colours about me intensified, coals burning like little suns.
‘If Withypoll reports we failed upon our obligation, Lucy may be killed, and Jane besides,’ Dowling reminded me, terse.
‘I know.’ I stumbled on my words. ‘I thought we could ride faster than Withypoll, seize Lucy and Jane, and carry them away.’
Dowling sniffed the air and regarded me, suspiciously. ‘Arlington has spies all over the country, people like us who live in fear of failure.’
The church filled now, a low, buzzing noise sounding from behind the two, sturdy doors.
‘No sign of Josselin,’ I noted. ‘Unless he arrived early.’
‘I will go and see,’ Dowling declared, striding towards the open doorway. ‘You wait here.’
Brave of him, I thought, watching his great, broad shoulders disappear into the blurriness of the dark church. Every man would stare at him when he entered, stranger that he was. I waited in the fading sun for the service to end, watching the white clouds racing across the scarlet sky, dark and shimmering. I leant against the wall to steady myself.
At last the townspeople emerged, in twos and threes, sombre and cheerless, no doubt reminded again of the plague and the sinful excesses that were supposed to have incited it. That would have cheered Dowling up.
Three men lingered upon exiting, stood in a tight circle, backs to each other, watching out onto the street. Well for me, I stood in the alley from where I could observe unnoticed. Three more men came out soon after, plain brown jackets woven from fine cloth in foreign style. They must be the men Benjamin saw. They didn’t look like churchwardens, nor behave like churchwardens either, skulking about the streets like criminals. I wondered where Dowling had got to.
I shook my head in an attempt to return the world to normal, but still the colours burnt. The little group headed east, as yellow became burnt orange, and so I followed, braving the open streets. At the end of the road they turned north, towards a large wide house, timber-framed with candles in all the windows already. They disappeared inside and closed the door behind.
‘Six men and more,’ I said to myself. ‘And three of them are neither of these parts, nor are they churchwardens.’ I stepped across the street towards the brightest window and peered in.