Yet he was not glad he had done so. For if historians have called the Parliament of 1376 the Good Parliament, they have done so with hindsight. To those who took part, it was a melancholy affair.
Everybody was angry. The government had lost a war and was looking for money; the Church, which owned a third of England, was already being pressed for contributions by a needy Pope.
Even before the chancellor’s speech, Bull had realized the session would be difficult. It was usual for some members to bring petitions with them, for redress of grievances, but this year everybody seemed to be carrying a scroll of parchment. As they crowded into the Chapter House and sat, tightly packed round the walls, there was an air of expectancy. They took an oath: “Our discussions shall be private, so that every man feels free to speak his mind.” But Bull was still astonished when, as soon as this was done, an ordinary country knight strode to the lectern in the middle and calmly declared: “Gentlemen, the money we voted last time has been squandered. Until we are given a proper accounting, I think it’s time we refused to pay.”
The ailing king, half paralysed by a stroke, had not come to the council chamber, and so it was John of Gaunt who received the Commons men in the council the next day. Normally only two or three of the Commons men stood humbly before the king and barons. Yet this time, not only had they chosen a speaker to represent them, but the entire Commons insisted on standing with him in a solid and threatening phalanx in the Painted Chamber. Worse yet: addressing Gaunt in the formal Norman French that such occasions still required, the Speaker coolly informed him that the Commons was not satisfied with the handling of funds. “In short, some of the king’s friends and ministers have misused them, sire, and we demand that they be brought to account.” Until they were, the Speaker said, the Commons refused even to discuss whether they would grant the king any money at all. It was not a petition. It was a demand. It was an impertinence. It was unthinkable.
But the king was weak and the humble Commons were going to have their day.
They went on for weeks. The Commons accused ministers, who were found guilty and dismissed. They even – ultimate impertinence – had the poor old king’s mistress, who had certainly lined her pockets, sent away. This process of accusation by the Commons at once acquired a name. In Norman French it was ampeschement: it meant embarrassment. Spoken in English it became: impeachment.
The Commons got everything they wished. And though John of Gaunt secretly vowed to get even with them, and in particular cursed the London contingent, whom he rightly held responsible, the Parliament finally closed without granting more than half the taxes needed.
So another landmark in English constitutional history was made. Just as London had won her mayor and the barons their charter, now the humble Commons had imposed their Speaker and the practice of impeachment. In this way the first miles down the long road towards a later democracy were paved, not with ideals, but with opportunism and a series of medieval tax revolts.
Yet as he went home on the last day of the Good Parliament, Bull felt nothing but depression. The sight of the old king being savaged by the Commons men had only reminded him of his own mortality. It was also the spirit of the thing he did not like. It was against the proper order of the universe. So he was not in a good temper when he reached his home to find James Bull awaiting him.
Young James was forthright.
“So are you suggesting,” the rich merchant replied, “that if you marry my only daughter and I die, this would ensure my fortune staying in the family? Your name being Bull, that is.”
The honest young man nodded.
“I thought it was a good idea, sir,” he said.
“But what,” Bull enquired, “if I were to have a son? Or do you not think that likely?”
James looked at him with a faintly puzzled expression.
“Well I shouldn’t think it’s likely now, sir, is it?” he said.
There had been three occasions, since Tiffany was born, when Bull had thought he might have an heir. His wife, who was often poorly, had always miscarried. But he still secretly hoped for a son, and it was still, in theory, not too late. He looked at the frank young man with no pleasure, therefore, and paused, gazing out over the Thames for nearly a minute before replying.
“I’m grateful to you for bearing me in mind,” he said quietly. “And should I need you, I will send for you. Good day.”
Some time later, as his family crowded round him to ask how the interview had gone, young James Bull, his honest blue eyes only slightly puzzled, replied:
“I’m not sure. But I think it went rather well.”
Geoffrey Ducket liked his master Fleming and the grocery business. Chaucer had persuaded Bull to settle a small amount of money on the boy, which he promised to give him when he had completed his apprenticeship. “Then,” Chaucer explained, “Fleming will either let you take over, or you can start up on your own.”
It was only recently that the ancient Company of Pepperers, who dealt in spices, had merged with a group of general wholesalers who, since they sold in gross quantities, were known as the “grossers”. The new Grocers Guild was large and powerful. They and the Fishmongers vied with the Wool and Cloth Guilds for the city’s greatest offices. But of all its many members, few were more modest than John Fleming.
He had a little stall in the West Cheap, by Honey Lane, though he kept his goods in a storehouse behind the George. Every morning he and Ducket would leave Southwark and push their brightly painted handcart across London Bridge. And when the bell of Mary-le-Bow signalled the end of trading, they would return and Ducket would lock their modest takings in a little strongbox he kept under the floor of the store.
Ducket loved the store. Before long he could go round it with his eyes shut and, opening any sack or box, tell by the smell what it contained. There was the sweet smell of nutmeg, the rich aroma of cinnamon. There were saffron and cloves, sage, rosemary, garlic and thyme. There were hazelnuts and walnuts, chestnuts in season, there was salt from the salt beds on the east coast, dried fruit from Kent. And of course, there were the little sacks of black peppercorns, the most valuable commodity in the grocer’s trade. “All the way from the Orient, by way of Venice,” Fleming would say. “This is the grocer’s gold dust, young Geoffrey Ducket. Purest gold.” And his eyes would take on a faraway look.
Fleming was scrupulous. He would weigh every item with the utmost care on the little scales he kept on the stall. “I’ve never been taken to the Pie-Powder court in my life,” he would say of the little court where the city authorities dealt with complaints in the market each day. He had never sold short measure by so much as a clove.
Once, soon after Ducket’s apprenticeship began, a fellow was found guilty of selling stale fish. He and his master watched as he was led along the Cheap on a horse with two bailiffs carrying a basket of fish behind him. At the end of the Poultry, opposite Cornhill, stood the wooden stocks. A heavy wooden yoke was put across the man’s neck and then, as he stood immobilized, they burned the fish under his nose and left him there for an hour before releasing him. “It doesn’t seem so terrible, does it?” Ducket remarked. But Fleming gazed at him with his thin, sad face and shook his head.
“Think of the shame,” he said. And then, very quietly: “If they’d done that to me, I would have died.”
Ducket soon discovered another peculiarity of his master. Though Fleming did not possess any books of his own, and would anyway have struggled with the Latin or French in which they were all written, he had a fascination with all forms of learning and would seek out those who had it and do his best to engage them in conversation. “Time spent with a man of learning is never wasted,” he would say earnestly. And if Ducket’s godfather Chaucer were mentioned, he would declare: “There’s a distinguished man. Go to see him whenever you can.”
The George was one of over a dozen inns on the main street of Southwark known as the Borough. It lay on the east side near the Tabard. And though the bishop’s bro
thels were not far away on Bankside, the George, like the other inns, was a respectable house patronized by people coming up to London on business and by pilgrims about to take the ancient Kent road to Rochester and Canterbury. Behind the tavern was a small brewery. Over the main door, as was the custom at most inns, there was a stout pole, seven feet long, on which hung a small bush. Inside was a large hall where, at night, poorer travellers would sleep; around a little courtyard on three floors were chambers for the better off. In the evenings the place was always busy, with trestle tables set up in the hall.
Over the George, Dame Barnikel splendidly presided. In the mornings, she might be seen emerging cheerfully from the little brewery where, like most tavern-keepers, she brewed her own ale. In the evenings she sat by the bar where ale and wine were served. Behind the bar but always within reach was a heavy oak club in case of trouble-makers. On the bar before her, a huge and ancient Toby jug in the shape of an alderman. While she acted as master of ceremonies, Amy helped serve the guests; but Dame Barnikel never allowed Fleming to do anything. “He has his business and I have mine,” she would explain.
But Dame Barnikel was happiest of all when she was brewing ale, and sometimes she would let young Ducket watch her. Having bought the malt – “it’s dried barley,” she explained – from the quays, she would mill it up in the little brewhouse loft. The crushed malt would fall into a great vat which she topped up with water from a huge copper kettle. After germinating, this brew was cooled in troughs, before being poured into another vat.
And now the real miracle began, as Dame Barnikel approached with a wooden bucket of yeast. “God-is-Good, we call it,” she explained. For the yeast caused fermentation, producing froth and – this was the miracle – more yeast. “We sell it to the bakers,” she said, “whenever we brew.” And often the apprentice would see her, growling contentedly to herself as she breathed the thick, rich aroma from the frothing vat and spooned the yeast in, murmuring: “Manna from heaven. God-is-Good.” Dame Barnikel’s rich barley ale was renowned.
As for his master’s daughter, he liked the quiet girl, but for the first two years he was in the household they had not spent much time together. He, after all, was a humble apprentice and she a shy, eleven-year-old girl. In the last year however, since Carpenter had come into her life and she had gained self-confidence, their relationship had grown into an easy friendship; and the three of them would often walk out to Clapham or Battersea together, or go swimming in the river on a warm summer afternoon. And if recently he had noticed that she was really not bad-looking, he had not troubled to think much about it.
It was on a pleasant day, shortly after the Parliament had ended, that he accompanied Amy and Carpenter on an excursion, to Finsbury Fields, a pleasant stretch of drained ground just outside the city’s northern wall, where the Londoners practised archery.
Although the first, rudimentary firearms had just begun to be seen, English weaponry still meant the massed longbows, made of best English yew wood, which had wrought such devastation at Crécy and Poitiers. The Londoners had a formidable contingent of bowmen, of whom Carpenter hoped to be one. Ducket watched with interest therefore, as Carpenter took up his position, bow in hand, arm extended, back straight and waited eagerly for him to loose the first arrow.
But nothing happened. The stocky fellow just stood there, perfectly still. When Ducket asked, “Aren’t you going to shoot?”, he only answered: “Later.” And after a further pause, seeing Ducket puzzled, he said quietly: “Pull my arm.”
With a shrug, Ducket did so. But to his surprise, the arm remained rigid. He pulled again: still nothing. And, strong though he was, the boy found that short of knocking him down, he was utterly unable to break the bowman’s position.
“How do you do that?” he asked.
“Practice,” Carpenter replied. “And patience.” And when Ducket asked how long he could stand like that, he said: “An hour.”
“You try,” Amy suggested. But after a couple of minutes Ducket began to fidget, and soon he could stand it no more. “I’m off,” he said. When he looked back, Carpenter was still there, perfectly still, with Amy sitting on the ground, watching him admiringly.
He was rather surprised, returning to the George, to find Dame Barnikel, arms impressively folded, waiting for him. “I want to talk to you,” she began. She fixed him with a baleful look. “How do you think young fellows like you get a start in life?”
“Hard work,” he suggested, but this elicited only a snort.
“Time you grew up. They marry the master’s daughter, of course. Bed,” she suddenly roared. “That’s where it all gets done. Get in the right bed and you’re set up for life.” Even now, Ducket was not sure what she meant, but her next words left him in no doubt. “Do you really think I’m going to pass all this,” she waved at the George, “to that moonfaced little Carpenter? Do you think I want him to marry my daughter?”
“I think she likes him,” he offered.
“Never you mind. You just get in there,” she ordered. “You take that girl from him. Don’t you take no for an answer, if you know what’s good for you.” And she stomped off, leaving Ducket uncertain what he should do next.
If there was one matter about which Bull felt he could congratulate himself, it was the upbringing of his daughter. With her fluffy hair and her soft but bright eyes, Tiffany was such a pretty little thing that she almost compensated for his lack of a son.
Tiffany was eleven when she was told it was time to think of a husband. It happened on her father’s birthday, one sunny afternoon in June. It was the first time she had been dressed as a grown-up.
Her mother, who had looked rather tired of late, had brightened as she took this business in hand. First she slipped a silk undergown over the girl’s head; this had close-fitting sleeves with silk-covered buttons all the way from elbow to wrist. On top went an embroidered gown of blue and gold that brushed the floor. Then, despite her protests, she parted Tiffany’s dark hair in the middle, pulled it very tight, made two plaits which she then wound and pinned into circles over her ears. “And now you look like a young woman,” she said with pride. The effect was simple and charming. And though Tiffany had no breasts to speak of yet, and was quite small, as she saw the effect in her mother’s little silver hand-mirror, she smiled with pleasure. The outer gowns had slits like pockets at the hips, and as she slipped her small hands into these, between the soft silks, it made her feel deliciously feminine.
A large company had gathered at the house. There were several prominent mercers. Young Whittington had come. At Tiffany’s request, Ducket too, neatly dressed in a clean, simple linen shirt, had also been invited. Chaucer could not be there since he had an appointment at court, but he had come by in the morning with a present that had given Bull huge delight.
There was also one other couple, whom she had never seen before: a young man and a nun. The nun, she learned, was named Sister Olive and came from the convent of St Helen’s, a small but fashionable religious house just inside the city’s northern wall, where rich families often placed their unmarried daughters. Sister Olive had a pale face and a long nose; when she smiled, it was with becoming piety; her large, soft eyes were modestly downcast. Her companion was her cousin, a pale, long-nosed and serious young man called Benedict Silversleeves. Both, it seemed, were distant kinsfolk of Tiffany’s mother. The girl found them rather intriguing.
If at first she felt a little shy in her adult dress, she was soon put at ease. Whittington came over and made much of her; Ducket gazed with a frank admiration that greatly pleased her. Several of the merchants and their wives came to talk to her. She was rather flattered too when Sister Olive came across the room, raised her brown eyes, composed her mouth into a demure smile and told her that the dress was very becoming. “But you must talk to my cousin Benedict,” the nun then said. And before the girl knew what was happening, she found herself being gently led across the room. It made her blush for a moment, for she had never spoken
to a strange young man before, in these new, adult circumstances. More unnerving still, it seemed he was important. An old London family, a student of law, destined to go far: the nun had imparted all this information before they even reached him. “And of course,” she added quietly, “he is pious.”
She was relieved, therefore, when the young man made himself pleasant. His expression towards her was grave, but very courteous. He spoke of the latest city affairs, of the rapidly deteriorating health of the old king, of things she would know about, asked her opinion and seemed to value it. She felt flattered and grown-up. She decided, looking at him, that, if his nose was long, it gave him a certain solemn distinction; his dark eyes were intelligent, if a little mysterious. His tunic and hose were black and of the very best Flemish cloth. She did not quite know if she liked him, but she had to admit that his manner, if a little formal, was faultless. After a while, he politely excused himself and went over to talk to her mother about the merits of certain shrines.
But the highlight of the party, which Bull soon called them to inspect, stood on the table in the centre of the room. This was the present he had been given that morning. “And trust clever Chaucer,” Bull cried in delight, “to think of such a thing.” Indeed Tiffany had never even seen such an article before.
It was a curious object. The main component was a circular brass plate, about fifteen inches in diameter, with a hole in the middle through which there was a pin. On the edge of the plate, at the top, was a ring so that the plate could be held up or hung, and on the back was a sighting device by which the user could measure the angle of objects in the heavens. There were also a number of discs that could be fitted into place over the pin on the front side. Both sides were covered with lines, calibration marks, numbers and letters which, to Tiffany, looked like so many signs of magic.