The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins - [19]

– the horror that he has fought off for so long. It knocks him reeling, harder than any stone hurled from the crowd.

He is about to die.

No. No! They promised. He will live.

He is a coin, spinning on its edge. Heads or tails. Life or death.

Chapter Six

It was almost a week before I was ready to step into the world again. My jaw was so black and swollen for the first few days that I could only eat light broths and syllabubs. The gouges in my neck worried Kitty so much she insisted on washing them in hot wine twice a day.

‘I’ll stink like a tavern floor,’ I complained, flinching as the wine invaded the cuts.

‘Clean wounds mend faster,’ she said, dabbing a home-made salve over my throat. Kitty’s father Nathaniel had been a renowned physician – and a close friend of Samuel Fleet. When she first moved in to the Cocked Pistol, Kitty had found a cache of his books and journals locked in a chest in the cellar. She would read them avidly when the shop was quiet, or late at night, squinting by the light of the fire.

One morning, a few days after the attack, I was lying in bed when there was a soft tap on the door. I had just propped myself on my pillow when Jenny slipped into the room. She stayed close to the door, fingers on the handle. Her eyes trailed to my bare chest, then darted away. ‘May I speak with you, sir?’

‘Of course.’

‘I’m afraid… I’m afraid I must leave your service, sir.’

I hid my dismay. ‘Because of Sam? I’ll arrange a bolt for your room, Jenny, I promise – it’s just that I’ve been distracted these past days…’ I gestured to my wounds. ‘I will speak with him too, if you wish-’

‘It’s not that, sir. At least – only in part.’ She shielded herself behind the door, half in, half out. ‘I’ve found a position in a house on Leicester Fields. I met the family at church.’

‘Ah, I see. Well, Kitty will miss you.’ She’ll be furious. ‘D’you need a reference?’

She shook her head, alarmed by the offer. ‘It’s kind of you, sir, but I’d be grateful if you didn’t mention to no one that I worked here. They… they say such dreadful things about you in church.’

I chuckled. ‘Oh, I can imagine.’

‘No, sir.’

Her words stilled the room. No, sir. An interruption and a contradiction. This was not how Jenny spoke to me. A chill crept over me; a premonition that whatever she said next would destroy everything. I wanted to jump from the bed and cup a hand to her mouth. Instead, I waited, and a silence stole up between us.

Jenny twisted her fingers together in an anxious fashion. Her hands were red and chafed from her work and there was a small burn at the base of her thumb, where it had brushed against a hot pan. She too seemed reluctant to continue. Her lips were pressed together and she was breathing hard through her nose. She’s scared.Scared of me.

Don’t ask. Don’t ask her.

‘What do they say of me, Jenny?’ The fear made my voice turn cold. The question had sounded almost like a threat, even to my ears.

She swallowed. ‘They say you killed a man, sir. In the Marshalsea.’

There was a long pause. She began to shake.

‘You must know that is a lie,’ I said.

She nodded, without conviction.

‘Who is it, who tells such foul lies about me?’ But I knew the answer even as I asked. ‘Mr Burden?’

Another nod. She took half a step on to the landing. ‘He said Mr Gonson will prove it.’

‘And people believe him?’ Jenny attended St Paul’s church at the west end of the piazza. Half the neighbourhood worshipped there of a Sunday.

‘No… at least… not so much, sir. But then you was seen coming home all beaten and covered in blood and people began to wonder. Sir – I must think of my own reputation, you see? This new position, it’s most respectable…’

‘I understand,’ I said, and relief washed over her face. ‘I would be grateful, Jenny, if you did not speak of this to Miss Sparks.’

‘No, sir. I won’t say nothing. I promise.’

‘You do not believe I am a killer, Jenny?’

‘No, sir!’ she said. But oh – the pause before she answered. It near broke my heart.

‘Very good.’ I dismissed her with a nod.

She dipped a curtsey and closed the door. Packed her few belongings and left within the hour.

Damn Joseph Burden, spewing his poison. Rumours spread like the pox in this town – before long half of London would know me as a murderous villain. Heaven knows, I looked the part with my black eye and swollen jaw. I dared not venture out or even downstairs into the shop in such a dreadful state – that would only complete the portrait and set our neighbours gossiping afresh. And so I brooded alone in my room, prowling up and down as if I were back in prison.

I didn’t tell Kitty about Jenny’s confession. Kitty’s love was fierce and volatile as wildfire and it would only bring more trouble. At best she would worry. At worst she would confront Burden. So I kept quiet and prayed for the rumours to die away.

But Kitty was no fool, and she soon grew suspicious of my behaviour. I have always preferred to be out and in company. It was not in my nature to hide away in my room, not even for the sake of vanity.

One night I dreamed that I was trapped once more in the Marshalsea. The guards came for me in my cell and dragged me through the yard towards the wall. They were taking me to the Common Side, to the Strong Room. I began to scream, but I had no voice. They laughed and pushed me inside, locking the door behind me. I was alone. Breathing in the stench of death. The rats, writhing and squealing about my feet. I took a step forward and cold, dank fingers wrapped about my ankles. More hands, fleshless skeleton hands pulling me down. A pile of rotting corpses. I staggered and fell among them. They were holding me down, wrapping me in a tight embrace as the rats swarmed over us, claws scrabbling at my face. The more I struggled, the deeper I sank into the pile, until I couldn’t breathe and there was earth in my mouth and I would never be free, I was trapped in here for ever…