The Rebels of Ireland (24 page)

“Doctor Pincher.”

Pincher stiffly inclined his head. Wentworth continued to stare at him rudely. He seemed to be thinking of something.

“You have a lease on some lands down in South Leinster?”

“I have.”

“Hmph.”

And with that, the Lord Deputy walked straight past him. The man in green followed after.

Pincher stood speechless. He went on a few paces and then stopped. He wanted to turn round and go home, but that would mean following close behind Wentworth. So instead, he continued across the Liffey and did not turn back until Wentworth was safely off the bridge and out of sight. Then, shaking with fury and vexation, he started home.

He knew what it meant. Wentworth had been insulting, but Pincher did not take that personally. It was all part of the man's infernal scheme of things. The Lord Deputy was busy enriching himself, of course—what else would a man in public office do? But probably for the first time since Strongbow had come to Ireland four and a half centuries ago, the king's representative there was actually interested in improving the revenues of his royal master.

Not a month went by when Wentworth didn't grab land or rents from somewhere. Often as not, it was the new English settlers who suffered. It was certainly true that the plantation men had often taken many times the land they had legally been allotted; now Wentworth was making them pay the price. Some of that extra land was going to be taken back to produce crown revenue, or for resale. And if this rule applied to the lands of the king, then it applied to the lands of the king's church, too. Church leases were being called in or renegotiated with a new and ruthless efficiency. And now,
evidently, the greedy eye of the Lord Deputy had lighted upon the lease of his own little estate down in South Leinster.

In the last years, Pincher had been active upon the land. Ever since he came out of jail, he had made a trip south once every year, when the weather was fine, to pass by the land he leased in South Leinster, and, of course, to visit his living down in Munster, where he would preach a sermon and do the accounts. In both places, he had certainly let in the light. The Munster living had been cleared for a good profit, and was now so productive that he had even been able to give the poor curate a small increase in his little stipend. In Leinster, so far, he had only cut down some of the woodlands, just enough to pay the lease and give him a modest profit.

His lease was perfectly legal. It was signed and sealed, and it had years to run. The rent was outrageously low, of course, but it was legal. Not that he supposed for a moment that this legal nicety would matter to the blunt and brutal mind of Wentworth. He means to attack me, Pincher thought, and he has just told me so. And if Wentworth succeeded and Pincher lost this income, what would be the result? He'll have more money to spend on his cursed candles, his golden altarcloths, and his popish ceremonies in Christ Church, the doctor thought bitterly. He was so upset that he could not even bring himself to walk back past the cathedral, but returned along Wood Quay instead. One thing at least was certain. Before Wentworth gets it from me, he thought, I'll strip the place bare.

So he was not in a very good temper when, upon reaching his lodgings, he found Jeremiah Tidy and his son Faithful dutifully waiting for him.

It certainly wasn't Tidy's fault if Pincher heard his request without enthusiasm. The sexton could hardly have presented his case better. He began very humbly. The doctor had honoured him with his acquaintance all these years and Pincher knew that he and his wife were only simple people. Though loyal, he added quietly—a fact that Pincher
acknowledged with a slight inclination of his head. But thanks to their admiration of the learned doctor, young Faithful had not only been brought up in strict adherence to Calvinist doctrines but had also received an education. In fact, he had excelled at his studies. Pincher had been aware that the boy had gone to one of the little Protestant schools in Dublin, but knew little else of his attainments.

And now, it seemed, Tidy was desirous that his son should make the greatest step of all and go to Trinity College as a young scholar. His father could undertake to meet the costs involved—though naturally for a man like himself it would be a sacrifice. He had thought that Doctor Pincher might think it a lack of courtesy if he did such a thing without consulting him first, and he hoped that perhaps the learned doctor might give young Faithful his support for his candidacy.

It was the sort of request that had been made at Oxford and Cambridge for centuries. Sons of prosperous yeomen and merchants, and even of humble craftsmen and peasants, had gone to those hallowed colleges and risen, through the Church or the law, to great heights. The teaching fellows of the colleges themselves might well have started life as poor scholars. And though Trinity was intended first for the sons of the new Protestant settlers who called themselves gentlemen, there were humble young men there, too. Why, therefore, should Pincher have given the verger and his son a frown of disapproval?

Partly, of course, it was because he was already in a state of fury about Wentworth. But as he gazed at Tidy now, he felt a certain sense of aggrievement. Tidy might bemoan the state of things at Christ Church, but he was still snugly embedded there while he, Doctor Simeon Pincher, was utterly excluded. Tidy no doubt continued to enjoy all the fees and other benefits from the cathedral, which allowed him to send his son to university. And now he wanted him to put in a good word for the boy. Faithful Tidy would go to Trinity under his aegis—the very thing he had failed to accomplish for his own nephew Barnaby. It was decidedly irksome. He turned to the boy.

“You have studied hard?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Hmm.” He had, had he? Pincher suddenly addressed him in Latin, with a question about his reading of Caesar.

To his surprise, the young man replied readily in Latin, gave him quite a full answer, and ended with a quotation from the great man. Pincher tried some more questions. All were well answered in Latin. Pincher gazed at the boy and found himself scrutinised in turn, respectfully but intelligently, by a pair of bright eyes set wide apart. He was impressed but did not show it. Had the boy a recommendation from his school? Tidy produced a letter, which Pincher tossed on the table but did not read. However annoyed he felt, he had already decided to take the young man, for the sake of his kindly mother as much as anything. But he wasn't going to let these people think he was an easy touch, so he stared at them so sternly that it almost seemed like a scowl. And it was this bleak look that caused Jeremiah Tidy to play his final card.

“I wouldn't be troubling you, Your Honour, if you hadn't always been so good to us, a great scholar and a Cambridge man such as yourself.”

A Cambridge man. That strangely obsequious tone. Despite himself, Pincher involuntarily winced.

“We shall see, Tidy, what can be done,” he said with resignation, and waved them away.

The Tidys had gone about a hundred yards when Faithful turned to his father.

“What was that about Cambridge?” he asked.

“Ah.” His father smiled. “What did you notice?”

“As soon as you said Cambridge, he looked as if something had bitten him.”

“It's my secret weapon, you might say. I noticed it years ago. Must've been something he did at Cambridge, I suppose, that he doesn't want anyone to find out. But he suspects I know it. Makes
him nervous. So I let him think that I'll take care of him if he takes care of me.”

“But what was it?”

“His secret? I've no idea.”

“Don't you want to know?”

“I don't need to know. Better if I don't. All that matters to me is that if I say Cambridge, he'll do what I want.”

Faithful digested this piece of wisdom thoughtfully.

As they came near to Christ Church, his father indicated that Faithful was to follow him into the cathedral. There was no one else in there. They had the place to themselves as Tidy led his son to where the long rope hung down from the bell, hidden far above, which summoned the people to prayer. Tidy stopped beside the bellrope and looked at his son carefully.

Jeremiah Tidy had been saving up this little lecture for many years. Now it was time to deliver it.

“You see this bellrope, Faithful?” Faithful nodded. “What is it?” his father went on. “Just a length of rope. That's all. Nothing more. A man could hang himself with it, or he could climb up it. For myself, my son, I have made my life by pulling on it.” He paused and shook his head in wonderment at the strange simplicity of the thing. “By pulling this bellrope, Faithful, I earn the right to live in the precincts of this cathedral. And what sort of place is the precinct of Christ Church?”

“It is a Liberty,” answered his son.

“A Liberty,” echoed his father. “Like the Liberty of Saint Patrick's Cathedral or any of the other great cathedrals of Ireland. And what is so special about a Liberty?”

“We live under the rule of the Dean.”

“Correct. We do not answer to the Lord Mayor of Dublin, nor to the king's sheriff, nor even hardly to the Lord Deputy. The Liberty is like a little legal kingdom, Faithful, in which the Dean is the only lord. And we enjoy all the privileges of the Liberty. I have lodgings which are almost free. I can trade from my house—which I
do—without needing to belong to a city guild or having the freedom of the city, for both of which you have to pay. Nor do I pay any of the profits of my trade to the Dublin corporation.” He smiled. “I enjoy all the privileges of the city, yet I pay no taxes. And all because I pull this bellrope.”

These were by no means all the benefits of being a servant of the cathedral. Like all such ancient foundations, Christ Church took care of its own. All kinds of folk, from the verger and the vicars choral who sang in the choir, to the humblest sweeper and scavenger, found shelter and sustenance in its nooks and crannies. All kinds of perquisites and customary charity were given out, from shoes and gowns to food and fuel. When the great candles on the altar reached a certain low point, for instance, Tidy would replace them and take the remains home. His family enjoyed the finest wax candles, but never had to pay for them. Above all there were the innumerable little fees which the laity paid for every service he performed, the greatest of which, of course, was the ringing of the bell.

“It makes no difference, Faithful, whether they are High Church or Calvinist, papist or Puritan, they will always wish the bell to be rung,” Tidy declared. “And all I have to do is pull this rope. A fool could do it. But it has made my fortune.” Though he was careful never to let anyone guess it, Tidy had by now amassed a fortune that was quite equal to that of Doctor Pincher.

“And now, Faithful,” he concluded, “you are going to climb up this rope to a higher sphere entirely. You could become a lawyer and even a gentleman; and one day you'll look down upon me as a humble, ignorant sort of fellow. But remember: it was this bellrope that got you there.”

While this homily was in progress in Christ Church, Doctor Pincher, who had not stirred from his seat since the Tidys left, was engaged in some deep thoughts of his own. But these did not concern the Tidy family at all.

If Doctor Pincher had more cause than ever to hate the king's Lord Deputy, he was not alone. The Puritan party hated him for his
High Church; the New English settlers hated him for attacking their land titles. The Earl of Cork himself, meeting Pincher in Trinity College, had confided to him: “We'll bring this cursed Wentworth down one day, I promise you.”

Over in England, Pincher was aware, the situation was different but even more tense. There, the Puritans were so disgusted with Charles's Church that they were starting to leave for the new American colonies—not just in a tiny trickle, as in the previous decade, but in regular convoys. A little army of useful craftsmen, small farmers, and even some educated men was removing itself from England's shores forever. Even more significant politically was the fury of the gentry. With the help of new taxes which he had been able to extract through the law courts, Charles had found that, so long as he stayed out of costly wars, he could get by without calling a Parliament to vote him extra funds. As a result, England had now been ruled by the king alone, without any Parliament, for the last seven years. Parliaments had been called, and listened to, for centuries. They might be collections of country gentlemen and lawyers, but they represented ancient English Liberties, and to many of the solid, landed class who led the community, this was clear evidence that King Charles, who believed he had a divine right to do what he liked, was on his way to imposing a tyranny. Gentlemen in Ireland might be at some remove from all this, but they were well aware that politically this represented a powder keg.