Foxe and the Path into Darkness Read online

  FOXE AND THE PATH INTO DARKNESS

  WILLIAM SAVAGE

  Ridge & Bourne

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events, other than those clearly in the public domain, are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is unintended and entirely co-incidental. Where actual place names are used, I have changed the geography on several occasions to suit the needs of my story.

  Copyright © 2021 by William Savage

  All rights reserved.

  CONTENTS

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Facilis descensus Averno. Noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis.

  Virgil, The Aeneid

  “The path to eternal darkness is easy to travel.

  Night and day the black gates of Death stand open.”

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Eighteenth-century Norwich was a proud city. Proud of its position as the second or third city in the kingdom after London. Proud of its history, wealth and prosperity. Proud of its many trees, gardens and green spaces, which had earned the place its description as ‘a city in a garden or a garden in a city’. Proud of its unchallenged position as the capital of a large swathe of eastern England and of its many trading links to the continent.

  The past had, however, left its mark on more than just the architecture and layout of the city. Its governance was a tangle of overlapping jurisdictions. Norwich city itself was governed independently of the county of Norfolk, in which it stood. Norwich cathedral and its surrounding area, the close, constituted yet another independent entity within the other two. Since, in this book, we deal only with the city itself, we can ignore the others, but it is as well to know they were there.

  The city government consisted of two ‘chambers’. Firstly, the common councillors, elected by all men in the city who met the substantial property qualification. They served for a set term between elections. The senior chamber consisted of the aldermen, who were chosen from amongst the councillors of long-standing. They served for life. The mayor, chief magistrate and leader of the city, was supposedly elected from amongst the aldermen, but long-established custom decreed that each alderman should hold the office in turn. It was an position carrying extraordinary prestige and its holder was expected to maintain or enhance the standing of the city in whatever ways he could.

  This is a work of fiction. Although the background, location and most of the details are as authentic to place and period as I can make them, the story itself and all the characters are entirely imaginary. Don’t be surprised, therefore, to find that I have sometimes taken liberties with strict historical accuracy, if I felt the story required it.

  1

  April 23rd, St George’s Day, had been a festival in Norwich since the Middle Ages. At that time, it was the Guild Festival for the important Guild of St George. Now it had lost its religious element and had become the day on which the new mayor was welcomed by the city and formally took up office. The city declared a holiday so that ordinary people might have the chance to experience some of the ceremonial pomp which had disappeared from their lives with the ending of the guilds, so many years before. Not that any of the day’s long history passed through the mind of Alderman Robert Belton, the latest mayor of the city of Norwich. He had no interest in the past or in anything much beyond a feeble concern for his business and, latterly, a much stronger sense of anticipation and anxiety about his unexpected progress to this, the topmost post in the city government.

  Even this obsession, for that was what it had become, was recent. It had arisen from his conviction that the other aldermen viewed him as a lightweight, if not a complete nonentity. The position of mayor was, by tradition, awarded by seniority in the office of alderman. That should have left Belton with several years to go to wait for his chance. The unexpected deaths of several more senior aldermen had suddenly left him as the most senior amongst those who had not yet held the office of mayor, hence today’s procession and his central part in it. Soon the procession would leave the guildhall to make its way through cheering crowds to the cathedral and back.

  Mayor Belton looked across the vast space of the marketplace towards the grey bulk of St Peter Mancroft church on the far side. Most of the market stalls were empty or closed up for the festivities. It gave the place a curiously dead look, matching his mood. He should be experiencing a day of triumph and unalloyed pleasure, not this sense that some disaster was bearing down upon him. He straightened his shoulders, weighed down by the unfamiliar weight of the mayor’s chain of office, and attempted to pull himself together. It was probably the weather which was responsible for his sense of impending doom, he told himself. Not only was it dull and cool but the sky was heavy with dark clouds to the west, promising abundant and sudden showers. A typical April day in England most would say. Yet it shouldn’t be like this. There should be sun and warmth and crowds of onlookers, not this thin line of people foolish enough to risk getting soaked to watch him pass by.

  ‘Pull yourself together,’ he told himself. ‘Stop imagining doom and disaster. You should be looking forward with optimism to the chance, at last, to remove the slurs that have haunted most of your life.’

  As long ago as he could remember, he had been dogged by failure and its aftermath. His own father had told him time and time again that he was, “lazy”, “useless”, “pathetic” and “a sad disappointment”. Maybe he was lazy but the rest hurt him deeply. Not that his father would have cared. Nothing was ever right for him and he delighted in pointing out every flaw and failing. In time, young Robert had come to believe that everything his father had said about him must be true and he would never amount to anything. His wife would certainly agree with that, but he knew she disliked everything about him.

  That was now his greatest fear, that serving as mayor, like everything else in his life, must inevitably turn into the familiar mixture of disappointment and failure. This time though things would be different. This time he would show the world just how much they had underestimated him. This time he would be famous.

  Unfortunately, things had not started well. He had talked with several of his fellow aldermen about his wish to make real change during his period in office. These ideas had not been welcomed, garnering responses ranging from active discouragement to bland disinterest.

  He also knew that the cost of serving as mayor was likely to prove too high for comfort. The mayor was expected to provide refreshments for all the aldermen at the start of today and then finance a grand ball in the evening for a large group of civic and county dignitaries. Compared with the businesses the majority of the aldermen owned, his own was a modest affair. He had never seen the need to exert himself to grow it any larger. He’d already borrowed all he could and it might well not be enough.
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  Finally, there was his wife, who had steadfastly refused to attend the procession on the grounds of a sick headache. She would probably absent herself from tonight’s ball as well. She had recently become prone to sick headaches when faced with some event or dinner which she didn’t want to attend. It had not escaped Belton’s notice that the vast majority of these involved his colleagues on the aldermanic bench and their wives. He had long ago become convinced that his wife was ashamed of him. Now it was going to be plain to everyone.

  Belton shook his head again, trying to rid himself of these gloomy thoughts. ‘I’ll show her,’ he told himself fiercely, ‘and all the rest of those who look down on me. My plans for this year as mayor are going to shake things up and reveal my true worth, see if they don’t. People are going to be amazed!’

  Still, try as he would, he could not quite escape the feeling that, rather than his life moving upwards into sunlit fields, it was starting on a long descent into darkness and misery.

  ‘The procession is ready, Mr Mayor,’ announced one of his two mace carriers.

  ‘We will start then,’ the new mayor replied. ‘Call the aldermen!’

  Time to go, time to move into the light and play the part that would transform his life, if he could grasp the opportunity with enough energy and determination.

  The procession slowly formed outside the guildhall. It was led by a man wearing a complex, painted wood-and-canvas dragon, suspended by straps over his shoulders. His upper body and head was inside the beast and he could use levers to make it flap its painted wings and clap its jaws together, thus giving the beast its common name of “Snap”. Snap would dart from side to side, snapping its jaws at the crowd and producing roars of mingled delight and terror.

  Behind Snap came the two “Whifflers”, dressed in scarlet satin breeches, white satin jerkins and hats decorated with a cockade of feathers and ribbons. They carried blunted swords which they brandished to clear the way for the civic worthies following them. Helping them were the “Dick Fools”, clowns wearing painted canvas coats with their red and yellow cloth caps adorned with fox’s or cat’s tails and small bells. Then came the solemn procession of aldermen in their civic robes and, finally, the mayor’s party, headed by the sword bearer holding the great sword of justice aloft, the symbol of the mayor’s role of judge as well as magistrate. Its presence was a singular honour for the city. Few mayors were permitted to be preceded by such swords.

  At last, behind the great sword, came the new mayor, resplendent in his scarlet and fur robes and with his gold chain of office about his shoulders. His two mace bearers followed him, each with a silver and gold mace resting on one shoulder. Finally, the procession concluded with a long line of members of the common council in black robes. Thus they proceeded to St George’s Church, Tombland, to be greeted by the clergy and choir in their vestments. After a service within, the whole procession wound its way back to the guildhall, cheered by whatever crowd remained. When it reached the guildhall again, the procession broke up and the aldermen and new mayor departed to the house of the outgoing mayor, to be treated to a lavish meal. In the evening, the Mayor’s Ball would round off a day of festivities.

  Throughout, Mayor Belton did his best to smile and nod to the meagre crowds, though his inward parts were knotted with fury at thoughts of his wife’s absence and the expected snubbing from most of the aldermen at the point when the formalities ended. Sure enough, after the procession had returned to the guildhall, the other aldermen, released from their set part in the proceedings, pointedly omitted to cluster around to offer him the usual congratulations. Instead, they hurried away, intent on the meal to come, leaving him to divest himself of his civic finery and follow on alone.

  It was the final insult. His mind was now made up. He would prove to them what fools they were, or die in the attempt.

  2

  September 18th: The great open marketplace of the city of Norwich lay bathed in the rich sunshine of autumn and was full of bustling, noisy life. Stallholders called out their wares to attract customers and servants hurried to and fro, intent on getting whatever they had been sent to buy and returning home before the housekeeper, or the mistress, upbraided them for dawdling and gossiping, when they should have been intent only on their errand. On the far side of the market, the terrified calls of beasts, literally being led to the slaughter, added to the cacophony, while closer to the side beyond which Mr Ashmole Foxe’s house lay came the chorus of shouts from the fishmongers trying to sell the last of their stock before it went bad.

  ‘Herrings! Lovely plump herrings! Fresh today from Yarmouth! A dozen for a penny!’

  ‘Best cod, a pound weight for a ha’penny! Get it while it lasts!’

  ‘Dozen oysters! Still fresh! Only tuppence!’

  Then an indignant squeal as someone found their purse had been cut from its laces or their pocket picked, followed by the sound of running feet as the child who’d done it ran away, skilfully avoiding the grasping hands of the bystanders.

  ‘Thief! Stop thief! Grab the little bastard!’

  This was Norwich in the early years of the reign of the third King George. A large city, full of life of every kind, and only just now demoted to being England’s third largest city after London, due to the rise of Bristol and the growth of the trade across the Atlantic to the American colonies.

  Foxe loved it.

  As usual, he walked past the mighty mediaeval church of St Peter Mancroft on the southern edge of the market, crossed the road leading to the Hay Market behind the church and, after that, he turned sharply to his left. The smart shops along this side of the huge open space had given it its name of “Gentleman’s Walk”. Here the wealthy merchant or gentleman might find luxury goods of every kind, dispensed by shopkeepers well attuned to the whims of customers with full purses and little else to do but spend their money. Here too their wives might find the latest fabrics and haberdashery, ready to be made up into gowns and petticoats according to the latest fashions. And here, nestled between a milliner and a tailor, lay Foxe’s favourite coffeehouse; neat, exclusive and serving the best coffee and chocolate in East Anglia.

  After completing his walk around the other two sides of the marketplace, Foxe returned home that day in an unusually idle and carefree mood, despite the fact that he had been forced to drink his coffee alone because his friend Captain Brock was away taking his wife to visit some relatives. The rest of the day lay before him, free from any appointments or commitments. He could do exactly what he wished—if only he could think what that might be.

  This lack of purpose was mostly down to boredom. Mrs Crombie ran his bookshop for him without much intervention on his part. His principal interest, rare book sales, had yet to rouse itself from its usual summer doldrums. Though only just over thirty years of age, Foxe was a man of considerable wealth with no need to exert himself unduly to maintain an enviable style of life.

  What was now putting an edge to his sense of aimlessness was the lack of a mystery to solve. There had been the usual petty crimes in Norwich over the first part of the year—highway robbery, theft, assault, even murder—but none of them had been serious enough to involve him. It was now many weeks since he had been asked to investigate anything at all.

  He was also feeling lonely. Nicholas Foxe and his aunt, Foxe’s cousin Harriet, had stayed with him during the early part of the summer while they searched for somewhere to live on their move from Thetford. They had provided him with ample company, if only for a short time. All too soon they had found suitable accommodation and moved out, leaving a distinct hole behind them. Nicholas was also deeply involved in his new legal practice, working hard to justify the offer of a partnership. As well as a natural wish to do well in his chosen career, becoming a partner would allow him to make a formal proposal of marriage to Miss Maria Halloran, eldest niece of Alderman Halloran. Unlike his elder cousin Ashmole, he had a clear purpose in his life and knew what was needed to achieve it. Foxe envied him.

&nb
sp; None of these counted as the most pressing issue contributing to Foxe’s mood of ennui. That was his love life—or rather the almost total lack of it. Foxe reckoned he’d been abandoned, first by the Catt sisters and then by Lady Cockerton, to whom he’d been unusually faithful for several months. These experiences had left his emotions so badly bruised that he was wary of any other close involvement with any woman.

  Even his closest current lady friend, Mrs Danson, was about to leave Norwich to start a new life elsewhere. Although she had told him months ago that she intended to move away, Foxe had retained a small hope she might change her mind. That hope was gone, for she was to leave in two days’ time.

  His own behaviour had hardly been of a kind likely to weaken her resolution to move away of course. Although he enjoyed the lady’s company a great deal, and was well aware of her other attractions, Foxe had held himself back from seeking anything more than friendship. After two experiences of getting deeply involved with a woman, only to discover he felt more for them than they did for him, he had grown too wary of anything other than the most superficial involvement with the opposite sex. And that he could always purchase at a suitable bordello.

  Back at home on that particular morning, Foxe once again sat in his library staring into nothingness, as he had so often done of late. He even omitted his normal visit to the shop to talk with Mrs Crombie, fearing that his uncertain mood would somehow communicate itself to her and any customers present in the shop. The day now promised to be the same as so many had been of late: dull, aimless and empty.

  As he sat doing nothing, Foxe brooded on this gnawing sense of incompleteness and lack of hope for the future. In his own estimation, he might very well face a life empty of anything to stir his blood. Worse, he didn’t know how he might change things for the better.