The Crimson Ribbon (27 page)

Chapter 44

Towards dawn I pull myself up from the bed. A thin light filters through the panes and I can hear the sounds of people stirring below.

I open the casement and breathe deep of the cold air, clean and still, not yet polluted by the smoke and stench of the day. A dank, marshy smell rolls in off the river and for a moment I shut my eyes and think of home. I will never see those flat, flooded lands again. I will never catch the salted scent of the sea on the autumn breeze, never lie on my back and gaze at summer skies of purest blue, watching swallows dart, never climb those worn stone steps to the top of the cathedral and stretch my hands up to the never-ending heavens. I have made up my mind. Later, I will leave London for ever and travel south, to the coast.

I watch the glow of first light rise over the rooftops and think of what I am leaving behind. Then I go in search of the innkeeper’s daughter.

I find her in the kitchens, sweating over the bellows and setting a cauldron of water on the fire to boil. I ask for paper and ink and she nods, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand. She runs to find her father.

Soon after, she comes to my room, carrying the writing things I need and a plate of oatcakes.

‘Your pardon, mistress,’ she says, dipping into an awkward curtsy, ‘but you look awful pale. Are you sickening?’

I shake my head.

‘Shall I light the fire?’ She glances at the open window as though she longs to shut out the cold air.

‘No. No fire today. Please tell your father I’ll be leaving this morning.’

‘Please, eat something.’ She pushes the plate towards me. ‘They are yesterday’s but they’re still good.’

‘Thank you. Now, please, if you will leave me . . .’

I sit down to write.

I have never been one for fancy words and, until now, have saved my romantic notions for Lizzie. A simple question will have to be enough.

I seal the letter with wax from my candle and write Joseph’s name on the front. I know where to find him. There is only one place he will be this morning and it is the same as half of London, the same as me. Today is a hanging day, and I am going to Tyburn Tree.

Despite the bitter winter morning, the crowds along Tyburn Road are merry. I keep the hood of my cloak down low and wear a veil. I carry a small bundle containing my mother’s book and one warm blanket, bought from the inn. With my money stowed in my skirts and my letter to Joseph tucked into my stays, I travel light.

As I check my reflection in the hand glass before leaving, I barely recognise myself. Still, if I want to live the life I have been granted, it will pay to be wary and I keep my eyes to the ground as I head west through the gatehouse. If I am caught, I have no plan, no means of escape a second time. But I cannot help myself. I must see Lizzie. I must see, with my own eyes, how it ends.

Will London never tire of blood? Even after these years of chaos and death, hanging days are still a holiday. Men, women and children revel in the prospect of a day out. Groups of young apprentices sup ale outside the taverns. There is already a crowd gathered when I reach the crossroads and see the gallows, marked out against the sky.

Tyburn is a mean sort of place, with tumbledown houses built next to the road and wooden scaffolds put up all around for the crowds. People hand over pennies to buy a seat, hoping for a better view. Hawkers and street merchants sell beer and bread. People spill from the nearest inn.

I’m put in mind of the King’s execution, just a month before. But today is quite different. Then the mob was quiet, deferent, hardly believing their eyes. Today there is no King upon the block to deserve their prayers. The unthinkable has been done and these people have witnessed it. Now London cannot be shocked.

I find myself a place in the crowd where I can see the gallows. People jostle for space and, more than once, I nearly lose my footing. I search for Joseph’s dark curls but find none like him. I watch pamphleteers handing out their wares to an eager public, hoping he is among them, but I cannot see him. Instead, there is another I recognise.

She is brightly dressed in her favourite red and green, fair curls bubbling over her shoulders. She hands out pamphlets to any who will take them and asks for no coin in return. I push through the crowd towards her. At first she doesn’t know me. She presses a pamphlet into my hand and says, ‘Read this, madam, and see that justice is undone today.’

‘Sal . . .’

She falters, peering through my veil. ‘Ruth?’

I shoot a look over her shoulder at the soldiers stationed before the gallows and put a finger to my lips.

She grabs my arm. ‘Oh, my Lord! My good Lord! We thought you were surely dead!’

I pull her close to me and together we move away from the crush.

‘How are you come here?’ she asks.

‘Joseph . . .’

‘He said he could save you. That boy knows more than—’

‘Where is he? Is he here?’

‘He’s looking for you. Gone to Whitehall as soon as we found out you had clean disappeared from Newgate. He seems to think the general had something to do with it.’

‘I thought he would be here.’

Sal shrugs. ‘This is the last place we thought you’d be. Lord, it’s good to see you safe. Let me fetch the boys. They are somewhere hereabouts.’

‘No.’ I pull her back. ‘Sal, I have to leave. Today. I’m not coming back. The less you all know the better. I just had to see . . .’

‘I know. I’m so sorry, Ruth. We all are.’ She puts her hand on my shoulder, and it is as if, by this show of kindness, she breaks a barrier in me and my pain comes flooding out. I collapse into her arms and let her hold me. She strokes my back.

A few people around us jeer, and a woman says I should not be taking up the space if I cannot stomach the spectacle, but Sal soon silences them with her wicked tongue.

‘Are you sure you want to stay?’ she whispers.

I unhook my veil and wipe my eyes. ‘I must.’

‘Then I’m not leaving your side.’

‘Please, don’t put yourself in danger.’

She gives me a withering look. ‘And what do you think I’m doing with these?’

She passes me a pamphlet from the bundle she carries. It is Lizzie’s work, the very words that Master Oliver could not swallow, the words that convicted her, the words that will kill her.

It is what Lizzie wants.

Sal grins. ‘You should be proud.’

‘Can I keep it?’

‘Keep as many as you like,’ she says, and hands out more to eager hands around us.

I slip the pamphlet inside my mother’s book. It is a tiny, precious piece of Lizzie.

Then I remember my own heartfelt scribblings.

‘Sal, will you do something for me, something important?’

‘Of course.’

I take out the letter. ‘Will you make sure Joseph gets this, today if you can?’

She hesitates. ‘He’s suffered enough heartbreak. If you’re leaving, perhaps best let it be. I can tell him you’re safe.’

‘Please, you do not need to protect him from me. I’ve done all the hurt I can do already. I think he will want to read this. Please do this one last thing for me.’

She takes the letter and nods. ‘I’ll find him.’ She puts her arm around my waist and holds me close.

Just then I hear noise coming from Tyburn Road: the cheers and catcalls of the mob as the convicts are brought to the gallows. Straining to see over the heads of the crowd, I can make out the cart and the figures inside, tethered together like cattle. At first I cannot see Lizzie and I think that perhaps Master Oliver has reconsidered, but then I catch a glimpse of green satin, shining bright in the sun.

She is like a jewel. She has washed and her skin is pale again, stripped of Newgate grime. Her hair gleams with the lustre of burnished copper. I thank God she is still sensible enough to have used the money I left to buy a few last comforts. As they draw near I see her face. Her eyes are large and glittery and, to my surprise, the corners of her mouth are upturned, not quite a smile, but an expression of defiance. Even though her hands are tied, she holds up her head and tosses her hair. She looks for all the world as if she has come to watch the day’s justice, not be a part of it. I marvel at her. She has more strength than I knew.

My own heart feels as though it is being pushed up into my throat and I can hardly breathe. I pant and quiver, like a frightened dog.

The crowd heckle and spit at the cart.

Soldiers on horseback clear a path to the gallows and the cart draws up beneath. The hangman wastes no time. Ropes are made ready and the prisoners are lined up without a moment’s reprieve.

I cannot feel my body. I am numb. Sal keeps her arm tight around me and I am glad of it.

The people nearest the cart are shouting and arguing, some of them waving Lizzie’s pamphlets in the air. A woman falls to her knees, crying out, ‘She is innocent! She is innocent!’ But those around her laugh, and someone pushes her onto all fours in the dirt.

An officer reads out the charges. When it is Lizzie’s turn a man behind me yells, ‘Witch! Traitorous whore!’ He takes the pamphlet Sal gave him not moments before and tears it into pieces. Then he throws it into the air and points a finger at Lizzie. ‘See the witch!’ he cries. ‘See how she does not repent! She is the Devil’s plaything!’

‘Pay no heed,’ Sal whispers to me.

But the call is catching.

‘Witch!’

‘Devil!’

‘Holy whore!’

As more people join in, they take Lizzie’s words and tear them into little pieces until the air is filled with floating print. Sal looks as though she does not know whether to run or to fight. ‘Where are the boys?’ she mutters.

But the mocking crowd cannot halt what is happening, and nothing can tear my eyes from Lizzie’s face.

She stands, glazed and detached, watching the crowd before her. I see her shiver, betraying a little of her doubt. In that moment, I would gladly give my life for hers. I long to call out that it is me they want, that I am the witch, I am the whore, and I will take her place, if they will only let her go. The thought grips me and I free myself from Sal’s grasp and stumble towards the gallows.

But then Lizzie’s eyes, scanning the crowd, find mine. I am transfixed. Her mouth opens slightly and a small crease appears between her brows. I swear she mouths my name. She smiles, sweetly, joyfully, and I see her lips move, forming the words ‘Thank you’.

Whether she thanks me or she thanks her God I will never know, but as the hangman puts the noose around her neck, she keeps her eyes on mine.

A preacher reads from the Bible, his voice drowned by the roar of the crowd. More and more people rip up the pamphlets and throw the pieces to catch the wind until the air flutters with them, like black and white butterflies.

I remember my promise: ‘Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die – there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you.’

It is a promise I will not keep after all.

Lizzie tips her face towards the sky, towards her God. And then the hangman whips the horse, the cart is pulled from beneath her feet, and it is done.

Chapter 45

My story started with a hanging and so it ends with one.

In the moments after Lizzie’s death I am robbed of my reason. I am faintly aware of the crush of bodies and feel as though I will suffocate in the rage and violence of the mob. I see Lizzie’s lifeless body, cut down by the hangman, her head lolling like that of a rag doll, her beautiful neck raw and bloody. I see hands grabbing for the fine green satin and her copper spun hair as she is carried away to a sinner’s grave. I see Sal’s lips moving, but I cannot hear what she says.

And then, before I know it, I am away from Tyburn and sitting on a grassy bank by the roadside, while Sal fans my face. ‘There, you’ve some colour now,’ she says. ‘Drink this.’

She hands me a flask of liquor.

I thank her and she shrugs. ‘It’s nothing. Best get this veil on before we go back to the city.’ She reaches up and clips the black gauze into place.

‘I’m glad you were here with me,’ I say.

She still has a few copies of Lizzie’s pamphlet. She picks them up now, folds them and puts them inside her satchel. ‘We’ll print more, you know. We’ll keep going. They haven’t silenced her, not while I’m still here.’

‘Thank you, Sal. She could not ask for more. But, please, be careful. I fear for you, and the others. There are still hard times ahead.’

Sal sighs. ‘Perhaps you are right,’ she says. ‘But we are used to such times, and what would life be without a cause to fight for?’

She takes my hand and squeezes it.

‘Have you seen Margaret?’ I ask. ‘And Charlotte? Do you know what’s become of them?’

‘Mistress Small is taken ill, I’m told. Brought low by the shock of it all.’

‘Is it bad?’

‘I don’t know. The Cutlers have taken her in.’

‘She is a good woman. She never meant for aught of this. I’m sorry for her.’

‘Indeed, but with such care she has as good a chance as any. And there is no one left now to bring charges against her.’

‘If you ever see her again, will you tell her . . . I’m sorry?’

Sal nods. ‘But no one has seen Charlotte.’

We sit in silence for a few moments.

‘What will you do now?’ Sal asks.

‘I make for the coast today.’

‘So soon?’

‘The sooner the better.’

‘Where will you go?’

It will be better for her if she does not know.

‘Abroad.’

She raises her eyebrows. ‘So far away.’

‘It has to be.’

‘I see. So, you’ll leave us all behind to carry on the fight. What about Joseph? What’s in this letter of yours?’

‘Give him the letter, Sal, and then it is up to him.’

She smiles. ‘I understand.’

She reaches down to a patch of small green shoots that nose their way through the earth. She picks one and gives it to me. I stare at the tiny white flower, so delicate, so pure and yet so hardy among the last frosts of winter. It is the first snowdrop I have seen this year. Sal does not need to say a word.

We part at the river. Sal leaves me to make her way to Whitehall, while I take a wherry to London Bridge where I will meet the carrier to Southampton.

I hug Sal tight and she kisses me hard on both cheeks. Then she watches me go, standing on the riverbank with her hand held to her heart, where she has tucked my letter to Joseph beneath her stays.