Idonia: A Romance of Old London

All this I was to learn from a strange accident that befell me when at length I left loitering before Idonia's door, and skirted about the place in search of any index to the riddle she had read me. For I was persuaded that to reach the heart of the mystery, I must at all adventures gain access to the house itself; I being then quite ignorant of the dividing of it in the manner I have told. It was with an extraordinary delight, therefore, that I discovered the lane to the rearward of the house, and the low door. Somewhat to my surprise I found the door not made fast, and so at once entering by it, I began cautiously to ascend the rotten stair. But scarce had I gone half-way to the first stage, when I stumbled over the body of a man that lay stretched there in the dark, and was, I thought, dead. Howbeit, he was not, and when I had him down into the air, and had loosened his clothing, he opened his eyes. He stared upon me wildly.

"How? You are not of the brotherhood?" he stammered.

I said nothing in reply, but leaving him where he was, ran to a tavern hard by upon Tower Hill, called The Tiger, whence I returned presently with a flask of strong wine. The drinking of it revived him marvellously, so that he was soon able to support himself on his feet, although without strength to walk yet. I got him some meat, too, and bread, both of which he ate like a wolf rather than a man; so far had he gone in starvation. When he had done, he would have thanked me, but I interrupted him, asking in my turn who he was, and what trade he was of. He straightened his back at that, and looking me very proudly in the face replied: "My name is Andrew Plat, and by the grace of Heaven I am a lyrical poet."

Upon the sudden I recalled Mr. Jordan. "So," I thought, "'tis the worthy that stole my lord Pembroke's buttery-beer." However, all I said was: "I think I have not read any of your writing, Mr. Plat."

"'Tis very possible," said he, "for I write less than I think: and indeed publish less than I write."

"And how standeth it with your fasting, Master Poet?" quoth I.

"I feed my thoughts that way," he replied simply, "as 'twas in a fast I conceived my famous lines upon the Spring."

I bade him drink another draught of the wine, having no interest to scrape acquaintance with his Muse; but he was not so easily to be put off.

"It begins thus," said he, and tossing back his long and tawny hair from his eyes, lifted his right hand aloft and beat the air with his fingers as he proceeded—

"Fresh Spring, the lovely herald of great Love,On whose green tabard are the quarteringsOf many flowers below and trees aboveIn proper colours, as befits such things—Go to my love–"

"Hold, hold!" I cried, "methinks I have read something very similar to these lines of yours in another man's verses."

He held his hand still suspended, though his eyes flashed in disdain of my commentary.

"An' you were not young and my benefactor," he said, with an extreme bitterness, "I would be tempted to clap you into a filthy ballad."

"Do you use to write your ballads, full?" I inquired, "seeing 'tis apparently your custom to steal your lyricks, empty."

He brought down his raised hand clenched upon the other.

"I steal nothing from any man," he cried in a great voice; but even as he spoke his face went white, and his eyes rolled in his head. I thought he had fallen into some fit of poetics, and offered him the wine again, but he cautioned me to be silent, at the same time cringing backward into the shadows.

"Why, what ails you?" I asked encouragingly.

He laid his forefinger to his lips, and then, laying his hand upon my arm, drew me to him.

"Spake I overloud?" he muttered, shivering, too, when I answered that he certainly had done.

"'Twould be my death were I heard," said the miserable fellow, and then told me, by starts and elliptic phrases all that I have set down about this mysterious fellowship of Petty Wales, and the cruel rigour in which its secrecy was maintained.

"'Tis no place for an honest man," he said, "for all here, but I, be notable thieves and outlaw villains, bawds, and blasphemers every one. And were't not for the common table we keep, each man bringing to it that he may, but all equally partaking, and that we lie sheltered from foul weather and terror of the watch, I had long since avoided hence. For I am a lyrical poet, sir, and have no commerce with such as steal."

I could have returned upon him there, with his unconscionable plagiarism and his assault upon Baynards Castle too, but judged it Christian to hold my peace. Furthermore, I had entered this unwholesome den for another purpose than to argue a point of authorship, and therefore said quietly enough, but in such a manner as he should perceive I meant it—

"Now listen to me, Master Poet," quoth I, "and answer me fair, else will I raise my voice to such pitch as your Captain shall take note of it for a contingent fault of thine to have loud-speaking friends.

"This great mansion, now," I went on, when I thought he could bear a part in the argument; "do all the parts of it join, and the dwellers herein have exchange of intercourse each with the other?"

"No," he said, "they do not."

"But once they had," said I.

"Long since they may have done," replied the poet, "but since the place hath been converted to its present use, it hath been divided by strong walls of partition, so as each man is now master of his own."

"How!" I cried, raising my voice of set purpose to frighten him. "In this nest of thieves what man is so absolute a master as another may not possess himself of his goods?"

"I know not, I know nothing," he wailed piteously.

"Are there no cracks in the wainscote even?" I persisted, for something in his denial led me to suspect he put me off. He shook his head, whispering that their new Captain reposed but a dozen paces distant and would hear, and kill us both.

"Enough," I said pretty stern, "for I see there be privy ways opened that you have at the least heard tell of (though you may not have dared investigate them), and communication hence through every party-wall."

"There is none," he repeated, near mad with apprehension.

"It is necessary I discover these passages," I continued, "or rather one of them, as I think there is one leads to the great hall."

"What know you of such a place?" he almost screamed.

"Rest you easy, sweet singer," said I, laughing at the slip he made, "for we will not go headlong to this work, nor disturb your Captain's sleep where he lieth snug till nightfall; but you shall lead me by quiet ways thither, and when you shall have put me through, I will suffer you to depart in peace. But so much I most positively require of you."

He wept and wrung his hands, protesting I was grievously in error, and he the most miserable of men; indeed 'twas not until I pulled out my sword and showed him the blood on it, that he professed himself willing to serve me, though he still continued to pretend his inability therein.

"That we shall see," said I. "But first finish your bottle, and then advance, man, in Master Spenser's name!"

He drank it down, and then cramming the broken morsels of bread and meat into his wallet (where I saw he kept his verses also with a parcel of goose quills) he cautioned me to be silent, and stole ahead of me up the wide and broken stair.

Small light there was to see by, for the few windows which should have served us were all shuttered or roughly boarded up, and the wind piped through them shrilly. Upon the great open gallery he paused as in doubt which way to proceed, and, to speak justly, 'twould have puzzled a wiser man in that dimness to pursue any right course between the huge bales and chests of sea-merchandise that pestered our passage. Nay, even the very roof and ceilings were become warehouses, so that once I espied so great a thing as a ship's cockboat slung from the rafters above our heads, and once rasped my cheek against the dried slough of a monstrous water-snake that some adventurer had doubtless brought home from the Indies. But I knew well enough that we should have made twice our progress but for the infinite dread in which the poor poet went of crossing the lair where the officers of this unholy brotherhood awaited their hour to steal forth. At every rustle of wind he staggered so he could scarce stand, and had it not been for the invigorating coolness of my sword upon the nape of his neck, he would have fled thence an hundred times. Yet for all the dangers (to call them so) of our stolen march, the thought that stood in the front of my mind was: What lover, since the world began, hath gone in this fashion to his mistress? For insensibly my intention had narrowed down to the mere necessity of seeing Idonia again. Surely, never was a house of so many turnings and bewildered issues; so that we seemed to traverse half the ward in our quest, and for the most part in pitchy blackness, as I have said, until I almost could have believed the day had gone down into night while we shuffled tardily forward. But at last Mr. Andrew stopped. We had turned a coign of the wall, and come into an open space palely lighted from above; and looking up I saw we stood beneath the vent wherein the crane worked that I had note from without the night before.

"If it be not closed up, 'tis here," whispered the poet, and enjoining upon me to succeed him, he took the crane-rope in his hand and pulled himself up thereby until he had ascended some fifteen feet, when he swung himself a little to the right hand where was a sort of ledge in the masonry of the wall (I mean not the front wall of the building, but a wall that joined it on the square), and there he stood firm. I was not slow to join him aloft and there found, behind the ledge or sill, a low arch in the thick of the wall, and within it a little wicket door.

"You have guided me well," I said, clasping his hand hard, "and I shall not forget it. If there be any favour I can show you before we part, name it, Mr. Plat, and I will use my endeavour to please you."

He considered some while before he replied, and then looking at me very earnestly, said—

"Since you seem to have some acquaintance with the poets, and thought fit to remark upon a certain fancied resemblance (though indeed there is none) betwixt my lyrick of the Spring and another's treatment of that subject, I would beg you, should you be in any company where my works are spoken of, as I make no pretence they shall be everywhere as soon as they be published, I say, I would beg you to refrain yourself from bringing in that … from directing the attention of the company toward … but I see you take me, sir, and so enough said."

However he would not let me go before he had begged my acceptance of a copy of his works, which he intended should be decently bound in calf leather, with a device of Britannia sitting upon Helicon, and his name of Andrew Plat entwined in a wreath of flowerets at her feet.

"And wherefore not upon her brow?" I asked him.

"Oh, sir," said the poet, flinging an arm about my shoulder, "you honour me too much."

I got him down the rope soon after, and saw him return along the passage, his head high and his gait light as though he trod a measure.

"We be both in the same plight," I sighed, "and support ourselves upon favours not yet received."

Then I set open the door. A stout ladder reached down from thence to the hall where I had fought with Guido Malpas, or rather to a part of it that was full double the height of that part, and had entrance into it by means of a sort of wide arch betwixt pillars. The hall was empty, and I descended to it immediately.

"Well," thought I, pretty grave now I had accomplished this much of my business, "I would I knew in what case I shall depart hence."

At that moment I heard a footstep on the stair beyond the arches, and Mistress Avenon entered the hall.

At first she saw me not, but when she did she stood perfectly still, the colour fading from her face, and one hand upon her bosom. I bowed low, having no words to speak, and then expected with an infinite weight at my heart, until she should declare her will.

At length she came slowly toward me.

"What is this you have dared to do?" she murmured, so low I could scarce hear her.

"I could not help it," I said, and would have told her there and then that I loved her, had not my courage all gone to wreck before her visible anger. She drew herself to her full height, and keeping her eyes on mine said in a louder voice—

"Ay, you could not help intruding upon a defenceless girl, and yet you went nigh enough to slaying Mr. Malpas, poor man! for that same fault. Have I not given you thanks enough, that you are come hither for more? Are you greedy of so much praise? Else indeed wherefore have you come?"

Her words so stung me, and her coldness after all I had suffered to get speech with her, that I felt the tears very close behind my eyes, and, as a schoolboy that has been detected in some misdemeanour casts about for any excuse however vain, so did I; for all in a hurry I stammered out—

"I came hither to tell you I have twelve shillings."

Was ever any excuse so ill-considered?

"Twelve shillings!" cried Idonia; but my self-respect was all down by that time, and I could not stop; I spoke of my father's letter, mine own penury, and the detestation in which I held the necessity to enter into trade.

"I have but twelve shillings in the whole world," said I, but she not answering, I turned my head sharply to see how she had received it. To my utter astonishment Idonia was laughing at me through a blind of tears.

CHAPTER XIV

HOW IDONIA TAUGHT ME AND A CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD HOW TO KEEP BOOKS

"Now, cry you mercy, Mr. Denis!" said Idonia, "for indeed I guessed not that affairs of trade were to be in debate between us."

But so confused as I was by her laughter, I could neither deny nor confirm that saying, but stood before her very hot in the face and, I make no question, as sour to look upon as she was merry to see me so.

"I had thought you had forced your way hither," she continued, setting her head a little aside, "in order to rid me of such dangers as might beset me here, albeit I know of none."

"And knew you of any," said I, pretty desperate by this, "my sword should make it none, if you would."

Perhaps it was the bitter tone I used, or the knowledge that I spoke not in mere idle boastfulness; but upon the sudden her manner changed wholly and she was pleading with me in so tender and deep a voice as it thrilled me through to hear it.

"Ah, Mr. Denis," said she, coming close and laying her hand on my arm, "we be friends surely, or if we be not, I know not where I am to seek for a friend as true hearted, nor one that would venture as far to aid me. I meant no harm, indeed I did not, though my tongue played my meaning false, as it doth, alas! too often. If I laughed, 'twas to fend off weeping, for once I fall to that, I know not when I should be done."

"Yet you said you had no especial trouble," I returned.

"Nay, if I did, I lied," said Idonia, "for I am beset with troubles here."

"I thought no less," said I, "and 'twas for that very reason, and in despite of your refusal to admit me awhile since, that I sought out other ways to come to you."

She smiled when she heard this honest confession. "So much trade as that comes to, Mr. Denis, will hardly satisfy your father's debts, I think."

"I gave myself this one day more," I told her, "but to-morrow I must necessarily seek employment, though the doing of it I can scarce abide to think of."

"Having but an half-handful of shillings," said she, "poor lad! there seemeth nought else to do, unless indeed you steal."

"Steal!" cried I.

"And wherefore not?" said Idonia, with a little hard laugh, "seeing we all do worse than steal here, or if we do not all so, yet do we stand by permissively while others do. Oh, sir," she cried, "I warned you this very morning I was not worth your thought of me, and 'twas truth, or less than the truth, I told, who live amongst evil folk in this place and secret men that whisper as they come and go."

She hid her face in her hands so overcome was she by the horror she had waked, and how to comfort her I knew not.

"Of what quality be these men you speak of?" I demanded, thinking perhaps they were the thieves beyond the partition wall, who overran into this place too. "I will lay information against them, before the magistrate if you will."

Idonia looked at me with a sort of wonder.

"But you know them not," said she, "nor where they bide, when they leave us."

"Is it not yonder then?" I asked her, and pointed to the little door aloft in the wall.

"They—poor folk!" she cried. "A pitiful lean company; would they were no worse I ope the gate to! … If you had known, when you would have had me admit you, Mr. Denis.... But they be gone for this while … oh, I fear them!" said she, and fell again to weeping.

'Twas evident she dared not be open with me as touching the business nor estate of those she consorted with, nor, I found, dared give over this life she led amongst them, for all the fear and horror she had of it. So, notwithstanding I returned again and again to the question, she put me off with a manifest dismay.

"No, no," she would cry. "Even so much as I have already let fall is haply more than wise for me to speak and you to hear. But now," in conclusion she said, "let us return to your own affairs, in the which it may chance I may assist you."

She conceived from the first an infinite admiration of my father, bidding me tell over again the tale of his renouncing all his wealth in order to the ending his brother's supposed confinement, as well as to pay that added debt which I had so foolishly incurred. Idonia drew in her breath sharply when I had done, and then looking me full in the face, said—

"Whatever may befall you to do, Mr. Denis, 'twill be less than he hath the right to exact of you; although I believe that the least you will do he will give you thanks for it."

'Twas my father's nature just, and none could have bettered the character.

"What can you do?" she demanded briefly, and bade me sit (for we had both stood this while); she sitting too, on a bundle of folded sails that lay by the wall.

I hesitated to reply, for leaving the few scraps of Latin and logick that Master Jordan had been at such pains to drive into me and I had as easy let slip again, my studies had been woefully neglected, or rather I had profited by them so little, that there was nothing I knew anyways whole. I stammered out at last that what I could do, I doubted would scarce earn me a scavenger's wages, and looked (I suppose) so glum, that Idonia laughed outright.

"Come, there be books of account," said she, "can you not make shift to cast moneys in figure?"

I told her I thought I might compass that if I were given time enough; though for that matter I did not see how I was like greatly to profit the merchant that should employ me.

But without replying by so much as a word, Idonia went over to an oaken press by the stair, presently returning with a soiled leathern volume clasped with a deal of brass and so heavy as to be hardly portable. This she set open before me saying it was a record of trade done, and had belonged to one Mr. Enos Procter, whom she knew, and bade me read in it.

"Lord!" said I, very grave, for I had never seen so intricate and mysterious a labyrinth of words and cyphers as she then discovered. "If Dives the rich man got his wealth that way, I suppose his life to have been something less easy than our divines would have us believe."

"It is a ledger-book," said Idonia.

"Let it be what it will," said I, "it is more than I bargained for."

"Nay, but observe this superscription," she went on, eagerly, "where it commenceth as is customary: Laus Deo in London, and so following." She ran her finger along the line commenting with a facility that astonished me. "This is the accompt of one Mendoza, as you see, a wool-stapler of Antwerp, and as the Jews ever be, a punctual man of his money. Look you, now, how differently this other sets to work, Jacob Hornebolt of Amsterdam, and with what gross irregularity he transmitteth his bills of exchange … nay, here, I mean, upon the Creditor side," cried she, for my eyes ran hither and thither, up and down the page, like any Jack-apparitor, in quest of her accursed Dutch Jacob and his pestilent bills.

"Oh, a truce to this," quoth I, "or else turn o'er to a page where a man's doings be set down in fair Queen's English, and not in such crabbed and alchemist terms as one must have gone to school to the Black Witch that should understand 'em. You point me here and you point me there, and there's Creditor this and Debitor that, with an whole history between them, good lack! mistress, but it makes my head reel to hear tell of."

"I had thought you understood me," said she very simply.

"Then 'tis time you understood I did not," said I, roundly, "and what's more I think you should not neither. It is not maidenly reading;" and indeed I was staggered that so much of a man's actions should lie open to any girl's eye that had the trick of cyphers, to peruse them.

Idonia lifted her eyebrows pretty high, hearing me speak so, but presently shut up the book, and putting it by, said a little wearily—

"I had meant to help you, Denis, but you are over-dull, I find; or if you be apt 'tis not in learning. Some lads there be think to get a living other ways, though other ways I know not to be so honest, though haply as easy."

'Twas on my tongue to retort upon her with a speech in the same kind, but I had to confess I could not frame one half so wittily, and therefore said very tragical—

"I stay not where I am not welcome," and taking up my cap, bowed very low to Idonia, who for her part, paid no heed to me, and although I halted once or twice on my way to the door, stood averse from me, as being careless whether I stayed or went.

"I am not reckoned over-dull at sword play," I muttered, when I had got as far as I could, without departing altogether.

"Oh, if you think to fence for a living, sir," said Idonia, over her shoulder, "I pity your father."

"He needs none of your pity, mistress," cried I.

"I know not where better to bestow it," she replied, "unless it be upon a boy with twelve shillings and no wit to add to them."

Now, how one I had so handsomely benefited could yet run into this excess of obstinacy as she did, I stood astonished to consider, and in my heart called her a thankless wench, and myself a preposterous ass to remain there any longer. Notwithstanding had I had the sense to read the account between us whole, I doubt Mistress Avenon owed not a whit more to me than I to her; although in my resentment she seemed then a very Jacob Hornebolt, and as gross a defaulter upon the balance as that dilatory Hollander.

"Then I leave you to better companionship," said I, having run my length, "and to such as have at the least the wit to please you, which I have not, all done."

What she would have said to that I cannot guess, for before she could speak there came a thundering rattle at the door and a voice calling upon her to open in the Queen's name.

"Dear God!" whispered the girl. "'Tis the soldiers come," and stood facing me, distraught and quaking.

"Is it you they seek?" I asked, quick, but could not hear what she answered me, for the knocking drowned all.

"Up the ladder," I bade her. "Go, and draw it after. I will abide the event."

'Twas this advice steadied her, although she refused it. Instead, she shook off my hand that would have led her, and going to the ladder by which I had descended, drew it away from the trap in the wall and laid it along the floor.

"They would but use the same means to follow me," she said, and so without more ado went to the door and opened it. A score of halberdiers burst into the hall.

"What is your will, masters?" demanded Idonia; and her pride I had before denounced I found commendable enough, now she directed it against these intruders.

One that seemed to be their Captain stepped forth, and having slightly saluted her with a hand to his morion, turned leisurely to his following, and bade them shut the gate; which done, he posted them, some before the ways accessible to the hall, and the rest under a sergeant, in the rooms above it, that he commanded them strictly to scrutinize. The soldiers had no sooner obeyed him than he drew forth a paper largely sealed, which he told us, with a great air, was Her Grace's commission and gave warrant to search this messuage of Petty Wales for any such as might seem to be obnoxious to the Queen's peace, there harbouring.