“We’ve brought you blankets and a pillow, as well as food and cash,” Martha said. “If we’d known you would be living so well we would have come here for our supper rather than eating at home.”
“There wouldn’t have been enough for all of us,” Will said with a smile. “These poor sots have to make do with so little they’d have eaten an entire goose if I’d provided it. It’s lucky for me, though. The birth went well then?”
“Well enough,” I replied. I considered telling him about our encounter with Rebecca Hooke, but rejected the idea. There was nothing he could do to help, and I did not want to worry him unnecessarily. “We came to make sure that you were safe and in good spirits, but I see we needn’t have troubled ourselves.”
“So long as I keep my hosts in beer and bread, they’ll treat me well,” Will said. “But we do have to find a way to get me out.”
I nodded. “We will work on that.”
“What is your plan?” Will asked. “My stay here is off to a fine start, but I don’t much like where it might end.”
“We’ll find out what we can about why you were taken,” I said. “If it was simply on Joseph’s orders, there might be nobody to testify against you. He might merely want you out of the way for a time.”
“Or he might have found someone to perjure himself,” Will noted. “In which case I’m cooked.” The thought—which, I had to admit, was entirely reasonable—cast a cloud over our little reunion .
Martha reached out and took his hand. “It will not come to that,” she said. “We will testify on your behalf, and none could doubt us.”
“A maidservant and my own aunt?” Will asked doubtfully. “I wish I had your confidence. No, if you don’t free me before the Assizes, Joseph will see me convicted. I have no doubt of that.”
“We will free you,” I replied. “We have no other option. We will continue our inquiry into George’s murder. There are others who had reason to kill him—Joseph, Mark Preston, Agnes Greenbury, or the Lord Mayor himself. It is simply a matter of finding out which one acted against him.” I watched Will’s face to see how he would react when I included Joseph among the suspects. He winced, but that was all.
“I hope it is so easy,” Will replied.
“As do I,” I said. “It is late, and we should go. I’ll wait outside for a moment.”
Will and Martha nodded their thanks for this gift of time alone, and I slipped into the Minster yard. It was now full dark, and the moon hung low and bright in the sky, bathing the cathedral in an eerie silver light, as if it were crafted of ice and glass rather than stone.
As I waited, I wondered what Will and Martha could be talking about. The future to be sure, but what kind of future could they expect or even dream of? Will had lost his father, then his godfather, and now he faced hanging for a murder he hadn’t committed. I would try to protect him, but my encounter with Rebecca had made clear just how vulnerable those around me had become.
Not long before, I had assured Martha that midwives were safe from witchcraft accusations, but what if I was wrong? If Rebecca Hooke could make Elizabeth into a witch, we all could be charged, Hannah included. In my first years after coming to York, Phineas and I had made a family, and then I watched in horror and helplessness as death took my husband and children one by one. In the years since, I’d rebuilt my life, and now it was threatened, not by fevers or coughs, but by men. I knew there was nothing I would not do to defend my family, but as I gazed at the cathedral’s majesty I realized that I had never been so powerless.
* * *
The next morning came, clear and calm. When I stepped outside, for a moment I entertained the hope that the cold had broken, but within moments the chill had worked its way beneath my cloak and begun to dig its fingers into my flesh. The only change was that the wind had died down. I thanked the Lord for this small blessing.
I left Martha, Hannah, and Elizabeth at home and retraced the route to Peter’s Prison. I wanted to visit Will, of course, but also to speak with his keepers. The previous night’s bacchanal showed that they could be more agreeable than many of the city’s jailors, and I wanted to impress upon them that Will was not merely their friend, but a friend who had a wealthy, powerful, and (most important) free-spending aunt.
When I entered the Minster yard I was pleased to see that Peter Newcome had set up his movable shop against the cathedral wall, for I knew that if there was any news about the witch-hunts, he would have heard it first. As I crossed toward him, he raised his hand in greeting.