Chapter Sixteen

Philip and I were rowed across to the Southwark side of the river early the following morning.

I was no wiser as to what was troubling me than I had been the previous evening. No great revelation had burst upon me when I awoke. My bed companion from the fen country was still snoring loudly, so I had dressed, paid my shot for the night’s board, resisting the landlady’s pressing invitation to stay to breakfast, and made my way back to Cornhill. There, Jeanne Lamprey, as neat and bright-eyed as ever, having offered me hot water to wash and shave in, regaled me with a meal of bread and salt bacon, washed down with ale. Philip, for a small man, had eaten and drunk with exceptional heartiness, and had then sat picking his teeth while Jeanne bustled about, getting the booth ready for opening. I had offered a helping hand, hoping to shame him, but he had only grinned. He knew his wife better than I did.

‘No, no!’ she had said, almost angrily, waving me to one side. ‘You and Philip get on about your business and let me get on about mine. And, Roger, you’d best leave that leather jerkin behind. Both of you would do well to do as I suggested last night and borrow something from the stall.’

Now, as the oarsman rowed us across the river, skilfully riding the incoming tide, I thought to take notice of what Philip had on, and saw it to be an extremely old and disreputable camlet tunic, with tattered remnants of fur at neck and wrists. It might have been a garment of quality once, but I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to buy it in its present condition, and said as much.

Philip laughed. ‘It isn’t off the stall, you great lummox! Can you see my Jeanne selling anything as tattered and torn as this?’ He leaned towards me from his seat in the stern. ‘Don’t you recognize it?’ I shook my head, bewildered. ‘Look closer,’ he urged. He pointed to just below the collar; or rather to where the collar had once been, for it was now more than half ripped away. ‘At one time, there were two initials there, worked in gold thread, but nothing’s left of ’em now except the stitchmarks.’

Enlightenment dawned. ‘CW,’ I breathed. ‘That’s the tunic you bought all those years ago from Bertha Mendip, after she’d stripped it from a corpse she found in the river. It’s Clement Weaver’s tunic. Fancy you keeping it all this while!’ I wrinkled my nose. ‘Particularly as it still stinks of fish.’

Philip gave another of his raucous laughs. ‘That’s what my Jeanne says, but she knows better than to throw it away because it’s always brought me good luck. Mind you, we never knew for certain that it belonged to Clement Weaver. We only thought it might have done because of the initials.’

‘That’s true enough,’ I admitted grudgingly. ‘And Alison Weaver, as she was then, confirmed that her brother had possessed such a garment and thought he might have been wearing it on the day that he disappeared. But come to think of it,’ I added, ‘a camlet tunic, trimmed with grey squirrel’s fur, was mentioned to me not so long ago by none other than “Clement” himself. But he claims it was stolen from him by the thief who stripped and robbed him after he had swum ashore.’

The oarsman gently beached his craft on a narrow strip of sand and Philip and I disembarked. We climbed the flight of steps to the quayside above, but had barely reached the top before we were surrounded by half a dozen whores, immediately identifiable by their striped hoods. (Most of the Southwark stews are owned by the See of Winchester, whose yearly income is greatly enhanced by these women’s earnings.) They seemed in no way deterred by our impoverished appearance, but turned violently abusive when Philip and I declined their services. For a moment, I was afraid for our safety, but my companion grabbed me by the arm and we took to our heels through a warren of narrow, filthy alleyways fringed by dark and desolate dwellings, whose inhabitants turned to stare suspiciously after us as we ran. I was thankful on more than one occasion for my good stout cudgel and the gleaming steel of Philip’s unsheathed knife.

But finally, without mishap, we reached Angel Wharf, long since abandoned for all commercial purposes, and still looking much as it had done six years earlier. The same collection of hovels and near-derelict houses provided shelter of a sort for the tribe of beggars, thieves and vagabonds who lived and found sanctuary from the law there. As Philip and I got closer, shrill whistles gave warning of our approach, just as they had done on our first visit; and as we emerged on to the quayside, I noted again the little fleet of boats moored alongside the shallow flight of well-worn steps leading up from the river. The denizens of Angel Wharf took no chances: they made sure that they could escape by both land and water.

I could sense that Philip was far less at ease in such a community than he had once been, but he put on a good show of bravado, turning with a flourish to a little knot of onlookers who had gathered outside the door of one of the hovels. ‘Can someone tell me where I can find Bertha Mendip?’ he asked.

They all shuffled their feet and stared vacantly at him, as though he were speaking in Turkish instead of good plain English, and when he repeated his question, they looked even more bewildered.

‘God’s breeches, we’re old friends of hers,’ Philip said impatiently. ‘Bertha knows us.’

A young man, so wizened and stunted in growth that he might have been any age from twelve to twenty, stepped forward. ‘And what names shall we give these friends of hers?’ he demanded.

Before either of us could reply, a voice from inside the nearest hut called out, ‘It’s all right, Matt! I know ’em. One of ’em, at least, and I think I remember the other.’ Bertha Mendip emerged into the daylight, smaller and more emaciated than when we had last met, and with a skin like well-tanned leather. The elf locks that straggled, unkempt, about her shoulders had once been chestnut-brown, but were now almost completely grey. ‘You’re a pedlar,’ she said, addressing me. ‘Leastways, you were, although you look as if you’ve come down in the world since then.’

‘We’re in disguise, Ma,’ Philip grinned, circling her waist with his arm and planting a smacking kiss on her unsavoury cheek. ‘We were afraid that if we came smartly dressed, we might be set on by cutpurses and murderers, although I can’t for the life of me think what should have given us that idea! Not when we’re surrounded by so many honest faces.’

Bertha made a strange gargling noise in her throat which seemed to indicate amusement, for she punched him in the chest and protested, ‘Get away with you, do! So why are you and the pedlar looking for me?’

‘We’re trying to trace a Morwenna Peto,’ I said, ‘and hoped that you might be able to tell us where to find her.’

‘Morwenna Peto, eh?’ The shrewd eyes, whose bright blue had clouded with the passing years, regarded me straitly. ‘Now what would you be wanting with Morwenna?’ But when I would have made shift to explain, Bertha held up her hand imperiously. ‘If it’s going to be a long story, you’d best come indoors. We don’t want all these knuckleheads gawping at us. Matt!’ she yelled to the young man who had first spoken to us, and jerked her head towards the door of the hovel immediately behind her. ‘You remember my son, I expect,’ she added as the three of us followed her inside, and I hadn’t the heart to admit that I had failed to recognize him.

Bertha earned her living from ‘corpsing’; fishing dead bodies out of the Thames, stripping them of their clothes and other belongings (which she then dried and sold) and tipping the denuded cadavers back into the river. The inside of the hut reeked with the stench of decaying flesh and salt water, as garments from her latest catch dried on poles hanging above a smoky, slow-burning fire. The smell was so unpleasant that I was forced, from a fear of being sick, to refuse her offer of ale, saying that I wasn’t thirsty, but Philip accepted with alacrity. Little seemed to upset his stomach.

‘Right,’ she said, when she had discharged her duty as hostess and directed us to sit on a couple of very rickety stools, ‘what’s this about then?’

She listened carefully to all I had to say, sucking thoughtfully on the couple of good teeth still left to her, and, every now and then, spitting with remarkable accuracy into the fire, several feet away. When I had finished, she drank up the rest of her ale and said belligerently, ‘Well, I never said the owner of that tunic Philip bought of me belonged to this Clement Weaver. I don’t deal in names.’

‘No, of course not,’ I agreed hastily. ‘But do you recollect anything about the body you took it from?’

‘After all this while?’ she asked scathingly. ‘I expect he was too nibbled away by the fishes to be recognizable, anyway.’

I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat and shook my head. ‘No, at the time you said he hadn’t been in the water long enough for the fish to get at him.’ I turned towards Philip, catching at his sleeve. ‘This sorry-looking garment is the actual one, still preserved. Look at it carefully. It might bring back a memory or two.’

Bertha rose from her seat and peered closely at the tunic, fingering the cloth and examining it around the neck and down the seams, her face growing ever more lined as she furrowed her brow in concentration. ‘I don’t know how you expect me to remember anything,’ she whined at last, ‘considering the amount of garments I deal with in a twelvemonth. And this happened six years ago, you say?’ She shook her head. ‘No, I can tell you no more than what I’ve told you already.’

‘You said, back then, that the man you took it from was young and had been stripped of all his valuables. He’d been caught in a fisherman’s net, and he was one of three corpses you’d recovered from around the same spot in the river. Is it possible,’ I went on, ‘that this particular man was not dead, but only drugged, both when you dragged him out of the river and when you tipped him back in?’

Bertha furiously dismissed the notion. ‘Do you think I don’t know a stiffer when I see one? I’ve been doing this job since long before you were born, you young jackanapes!’

I had no wish to provoke her further. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said placatingly. ‘Is there nothing more that you can recollect? Can you remember the two initials embroidered in gold thread on the tunic, here, just below the collar?’

But it was too much to hope for. There had been too many dead bodies between then and now for Bertha to distinguish one from the other. But we had at least established our bona fides as seekers after truth, and when she had recovered from the insult I had offered her, agreed with perfect readiness to direct us where to find Morwenna Peto. And without her goodwill, it could have been many weeks before we were able to track down the lady.

*   *   *

The thieves’ kitchen, run by the Cornishwoman, was tucked into a noisome little alleyway behind the White Hart, the inn favoured as his headquarters by Jack Cade, when he and his army of rebels had marched on London seventeen years previously. Some of the damage inflicted on the buildings by the Kentishmen was still visible, and added to the general sense of decay and decrepitude. There were, and still are, some very fine mansions in the area, and the Priory church of Saint Mary Overy is always a pleasure to look at; but as London jurisdiction does not extend across the river into Southwark, and as there are more bear-baiting pits, cock-fighting rings and brothels to be found there than in the capital itself, it has always attracted rogues and vagabonds and harlots in vast numbers.

Morwenna Peto was not at all as I had imagined her, being large and fair, with a clear, unwrinkled skin despite the fact that she must have been well into her forties. I had been expecting someone more like Bertha Mendip, who, I suspected, was much of an age, but on whom hardship and deprivation had left their mark in no uncertain fashion. The Cornishwoman, on the other hand, appeared to have weathered the storms of life with little outward show of suffering, whatever her inward turmoil might have been.

Bertha had insisted that her son should accompany Philip and myself to Gibbet Lane and introduce us to Morwenna. This turned out to have been a wise precaution, for no sooner had we crossed the threshold of her house, than two of the most evil-looking men I have ever seen emerged from a door on the left-hand side of the narrow passageway to bar our progress. The fact that they uttered no word, merely standing there in stony silence, only served to make their presence the more menacing. I could feel the hairs rising on the nape of my neck, and Philip shuffled a step closer to me for protection. Matt was the only one of the three of us unaffected.

‘It’s me, you great zanies!’ he apostrophized them crossly. ‘Matt Mendip! Bertha Mendip’s son! These men are her friends. They just want a word or two with Morwenna.’

I was aware that a second door, a little further along the passage, had opened slightly, and that someone was on the other side of it, listening intently. ‘It’s about her adopted son, Irwin,’ I said loudly.

The door was pushed wide and this buxom, smooth-skinned woman emerged to stand, arms akimbo, looking at me with interest.

‘I’m Morwenna Peto,’ she announced. ‘What do you mean, my adopted son? What do you know about Irwin?’

‘I can tell you where he is and what he’s doing,’ I said, ‘if, that is, you don’t know already.’

She glanced towards Matt. ‘Can you vouch for these two?’

‘My mother can. Knows ’em of old.’ He turned to go. ‘I must be off. I’ve done my duty. Got things of my own need seeing to.’

Morwenna nodded and waved away the two bravos standing guard behind us. ‘Off about your business, and make sure there’s no fighting in the ale-room this dinner-time. One dead and three wounded already this week,’ she went on, addressing Philip and myself, and indicating that we should follow her into what appeared to be her private lair at the back of the house. ‘Now then,’ she said, when the door was fast shut, ‘what’s this about Irwin? Ungrateful bastard that he is! After all I’ve done for him, he just ups and leaves one day without so much as a word.’

There was a bench beneath a horn-paned window, which looked out over a noisome courtyard, and Morwenna waved a hand in its direction. She herself sat regally on a backless stool with two rolled, carved arms and a padded velvet seat, now torn and faded, once the property, I guessed, of some noble household. When she was ready, she nodded at me to speak.

When I had finished my story, she pursed her lips. ‘So that’s what it was all about,’ she muttered, more to herself than to us.

I waited for several seconds in mounting impatience before urging her to explain further. ‘Irwin hadn’t confided in you, then, about the sudden recovery of his memory?’

Morwenna shook her head. ‘There wouldn’t be any point,’ she spat viciously. ‘You say he’s claiming to be my adopted son? The ungrateful whelp! After all I’ve done for him! How dare he repudiate his own mother! He’s my own flesh and blood, fathered on me when I was working in one of the local stews. Oh, he wasn’t the first I’d fallen pregnant with, nor he wouldn’t be the last, but there are ways of ridding a woman of bastard children. But for some reason or another, I decided I wanted this one. God knows why, the thieving little toad! Maybe I was lonely. Maybe I needed someone to call my own. How can I tell, after all these years, why I made such a feckless decision? I was young, far from home, unhappy…’ She lapsed into silence, looking back over the years to the green girl she had once been long ago.

I leaned forward eagerly. ‘So you never had a son who died on the gallows? And Irwin wasn’t washed up on the Southwark strand, unable to remember who he was or where he came from? And you didn’t take him in out of pity?’

‘No is the answer to all those questions,’ Morwenna replied grimly. ‘Although I suppose I might yet end up with a son who’s hanged for a felon. Indeed, it seems to be more than likely, from what you tell me.’ She sucked thoughtfully at the end of one of her little fingers. ‘That man must have put him up to this,’ she said, almost to herself. ‘Irwin couldn’t have dreamed up such a scheme on his own.’

‘What man?’ I asked, my voice trembling with excitement. ‘Do you mean that you saw your son talking to someone?’

Morwenna nodded abstractedly. ‘On several occasions.’

‘When? What did he look like?’ I demanded.

She stroked her chin. ‘As to when, it would have been sometime last autumn; before Christmas, certainly. But I couldn’t tell you what the man looked like. Irwin and he were never close enough for me to catch a proper glimpse of his face. When I questioned Irwin about him, he told me that the stranger was a potential client, and that he, Irwin, was pimping for some of the Winchester geese.’ This I knew to be a local nickname for the prostitutes of the area, and inclined my head to show that I understood. Morwenna continued, ‘So, naturally, I thought nothing of it. Irwin was often employed on such work. It was a job he did well.’ She added hastily, ‘Not that I mean to decry his pickpocketing skills. He was good at most things he turned his hand to.’ She spoke with a simple pride, and I could see that Philip, for all his new-found respectability, sympathized with her.

‘But this stranger,’ I persisted, ‘how old would you say he was?’

Morwenna Peto grimaced. ‘I don’t know. I didn’t take much notice of him, not after Irwin’s explanation. There are lots of men who return to the Southwark stews whenever they’re in London. Irwin’s father was such a one. He was from your part of the country, that I do remember.’

‘Surely,’ I pressed, ‘you must have formed some idea as to whether this man was young or old, rich or poor, tall or short. Can you recollect nothing about him?’

She darted me a look of irritation. ‘Neither young nor old, rich nor poor, tall nor short. And with that you’ll have to be satisfied,’ she finished waspishly, ‘for it’s the truth. I was at a distance on each occasion that I saw him and Irwin together, and there was nothing to distinguish him from anybody else.’

‘Can’t you recall any item of clothing that he was wearing?’ I was growing desperate. ‘A hat, a cloak, a tunic?’

Morwenna frowned. At length, she said, ‘I think he may have had a scarlet lining to his cloak. Now you force me to it, I think I can remember a flash of colour as he turned.’ Her face took on a grimmer expression. ‘Why didn’t Irwin tell me what he was up to?’ She answered her own question. ‘I suppose because he knew I’d advise him against it. He’ll be out of his depth.’

‘On the contrary,’ I said, ‘he managed to persuade Alderman Weaver that he is indeed his son, right from the start.’

An angry flush tinged Morwenna’s cheeks and she compressed her lips tightly.

I had been aware for several minutes that Philip was growing restive, but I had attributed it to boredom, now that our quest was at an end. But suddenly he jumped to his feet, handed me my cudgel, at the same time ostentatiously fingering the haft of the knife tucked into his belt. ‘Time we were going,’ he said. There was an edge to his voice and the eyes which met and held mine were bright with urgency, willing me to agree.

I got to my feet with the utmost reluctance, for I felt sure that if I were to press Morwenna Peto further, she might recall something about the stranger which she had temporarily forgotten. But Philip had already opened the door and was halfway through it, and by the time I had taken a hasty farewell of our hostess, he was out in the street. As I joined him, he grabbed my arm and hissed, ‘Walk normally to the corner, and then run as fast as you can back to the water stairs.’

‘What’s all this about?’ I asked indignantly as we made our way out of Gibbet Lane, Philip’s obvious desire to break into a trot showing plainly in the peculiar nature of his gait. ‘For goodness’ sake, why didn’t you let me question her further?’

‘I wonder about you sometimes,’ my companion said, his grip tightening on my arm, ‘I really do! Morwenna is this fellow’s mother! Not his adopted mother, but his own flesh and blood; and she’s got more cutthroats at her command than you and I have had hot dinners! And there are you, making it plain to her that you’re going to put a noose around her son’s neck, and you don’t expect any reprisals? I was trembling in my shoes. I thought that at any moment she was going to shout for assistance and have us both carved up there and then. I think it’s only because she’s so angry at her precious son’s betrayal, because she can’t accept that he didn’t confide in her, that what you’re up to hasn’t quite sunk in … Here’s the corner. Now, run as if old Scratch himself is after you!’

He dropped my arm as he spoke and was off, weaving his way through the network of narrow alleyways, every now and again doubling back on his tracks, never pausing for breath until we came out on to the quay close by the Southwark gate of London Bridge. The strip of sand was now covered with water, but a boat was, fortunately, moored alongside the water stairs, waiting for custom. We sank, panting, into its stern, with hardly enough breath left to issue our instructions.

‘You gentlemen seem to be in an almighty hurry,’ the boatman observed. He nodded in the direction of the receding Southwark shore. ‘Couple more there, by the looks of it, in as great a haste as you two, shouting and shaking their fists. Well,’ he added comfortably, ‘there’ll be another boat along in a minute. Ah … Seems they can’t wait. They’re setting off across the bridge.’