Will Whitaker - The King’s Diamond

‘You are not still haunting that girl?’ I asked with a laugh. I had not been down that way in a long time. Not that I had forgotten Hannah: I still stung from her mocking laughter. I meant to set myself up in the world before approaching that kind of girl again. Still, I resented the way Thomas and John had been looking for her without me. ‘You surprise me,’ I teased. ‘What mysterious men you are growing into.’ But neither of them smiled. The friendship that had come to us so easily seemed far out of reach. I was certain John could not be happy, plying the family trade he had always despised. Thomas’s malaise I understood less. He had always been private, content with himself and his books, bursting out only in his disputations with wild and quick displays of wit and learning. We walked back along Thames Street as a cold wind blew up from the river. Dusk was not far off. I said, ‘Come with me. To the warehouse: for the sake of old times.’

They followed me on to Broken Wharf. At the door to the warehouse we passed Martin Deller, sitting on a barrel with his wooden cudgel across his knee, keeping watch on the comings and goings of the wharf. He watched us through half-lidded eyes, and nodded. We stepped inside the old, familiar dimness, heavy with mingled scents, cinnamon, cloves, pepper. Thomas said, ‘And what of you and your trade?’

I still had not dared reveal my new trade to my mother; and that meant it was not safe to tell Thomas or John either. Instead I spoke to them of the alleys and courts of Lisbon, the wonderful bargains we struck, Mr William’s skill in trade, my own attentiveness and submission. I knew what I was telling them must sound vague and only half-truthful. It was the story of Mr William, not of myself. Thomas knew well enough that I dreamt of dealing in gems, though I had rarely spoken of it. I tapped the cases in irritation. I ached to tell them everything: the stash of gemstones that even now rested in the little casket, locked in the chest in my chamber, the bag of gold and silver that nestled by its side. Thomas and John were walking on together down one of the dim corridors between stacks of barrels. The sense of isolation was dreadful. I called out to them.

‘Wait! I have something to show you.’ I ran back out, round the corner into the house and up to my chamber overlooking Bosse Lane and the cracked stone court of Terra Incognita. Breathless, back with them, I opened my casket and set out on a barrel head the small hoard of stones I had brought back with me from my latest voyage. William and I had ranged as far as Naples, where I had acquired a batch of large citrines, showy things that the goldsmiths loved to carve; then there were a couple of Arabian rock crystals, six-pointed, and four or five brilliant red cornelians. John whistled. Thomas reached out a hand to cover the stones, and peered over his shoulder.

‘Our mother will kill you if she finds out.’

‘But you are not really making money?’ John pressed me. His face wore the old, challenging smile, that had a good tinge in it of envy. In reply I set before them my purse, heavy with coins that had all grown out of that first sixty crowns.

‘We shall never tell,’ Thomas said. ‘Now, put them away.’

I tossed a cornelian up in the air. ‘Why should I? What makes you so afraid?’

Thomas looked at me. ‘You have spent too long off with the seagulls, dear brother. You forget how things are, back here on dry land.’

‘Well, and how are they?’ I was beginning to be angry.

Thomas stood up. ‘Come with me, and you will see.’ I gathered the stones reluctantly back into the casket and followed him, down to the darkest end of the warehouse. We passed the various goods Mr William had bought on our last venture, the Lisbon spices, the French woad that was a cheap equivalent to indigo, the Turkish rugs. At the far end Thomas stopped at a case I did not recognise, marked in a curling hand, ‘Damascus silk’. I had heard of no such thing coming in. Nothing of the kind would be carried by our other agents, who worked the shorter routes to Flanders, and I was certain it had not been in the holds of the Rose. I kicked the case: it was heavy. I turned to the others.

‘So it is the old game. Is Thomas daring us to have a look? Shall we?’

I drew out my knife, and John, with a sombre smile, did the same. We worked away at the lid, casting glances back towards the door, where Martin still sat. At last it sprang clear. Inside were a few folds of crimson fabric, but underneath lay something hard. John pulled back the silks to reveal stacks and stacks of books, bound in pale new leather. I stared at them in surprise. The firm of Dansey had never dealt in such things. Books ranked among the goods my mother regarded as poor investments, like gems. And what book could be worth the trouble of bringing from overseas? John picked one up and opened it. The titlepage was covered in strange swirls of foliage. At its foot was a crucifix: but in place of Christ, there was a serpent twining up the cross, and on its head sat the Pope’s triple crown. Thomas said, ‘Well? Have you forgotten your Latin so soon? Or is it too dark for you? Darkness is best for such things, I promise you. This is On the Babylonish Captivity of the Church. And the author is Martin Luther.’ John dropped it as if he had been stung.

To be caught merely opening such a book meant arrest, imprisonment in the Lollards’ Tower by Saint Paul’s where the heretics go, interrogation by the Cardinal; excommunication and death at the stake. Rumours ran round of the fearsome contents of these books, of the fiery rhetoric that smashed down all you thought was sure. They said that if you once read a book of Luther you would never be the same again. We stood for some moments, staring down at them. Then I reached out my hand, touched the leather of the fallen book and picked it up. The others watched me intently. I flicked beyond the serpent on the cross, and read as quickly as my Latin allowed, jumping from page to page. The Pope was portrayed as a ruthless huntsman, demon of tyranny and avarice, the greedy shopkeeper who released souls from Purgatory for gold. I saw the powers of the priests one by one refuted. There was no such thing as the Last Rites. The priests had invented it for profit, twisting the meaning of an apocryphal verse. Priestcraft has no power to conjure the blood and body of Christ into the sacrament; the Communion is an act of Faith, and no mere Work of man. Confession too had to be Faith, not Work; the task the priests set us, contrition for all our sins, is impossible; our sins are so great, so far beyond the reach of our memories and minds. Even the best works of our lives, of which we are proudest, will turn out on examination to be terrible sins. None of the tyrannical ceremonies of a rotten Church can save us; only Faith, Faith, Faith. I read on, amazed, until Thomas struck the book from my hands.

‘That is enough. Now do you see?’

I was beginning to. My mother had no love of Luther, I was sure. But there were many in London who would pay handsomely for those books, and few who dared bring them into the country from Germany where they were printed. The profit for her in that deadly case of books was large and certain: always provided she did not get caught. It was a sign of just how confident she was in her own power, and how far she was prepared to take her policy of ruthless and finely judged risk.

Thomas put the lid in place and began forcing the nails back in with the haft of his little knife.

‘You think you can simply strike off on some trade of your own?’ he hissed. ‘She is the one who decides what is bought and sold. She chooses the risks, and takes them. What will you do if she cuts you off? I promise you, she’ll do it.’

‘What makes you so sure of that?’