Read Online The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins by Antonia Hodgson - Free Book Online Page A

mist.
    There was a loud thud against the wall behind us. We both started in alarm.
    Thud . Again, louder this time, something slamming hard on the other side of the wall.
    ‘What is that?’ Kitty whispered, crawling closer to the wall to listen.
    I fumbled for my tinderbox, sparked a light. As I lit the candle, a woman cried out.
    ‘ Ahh! Ahh, God. Yes! ’
    Kitty clapped a hand to her mouth. Started to giggle.
    The bed thumped again, and the woman yelped.
    I stared at the wall in astonishment. Next door was Joseph Burden’s house. People didn’t fuck one another in Joseph Burden’s house. We exchanged excited looks. ‘Who is it, do you suppose?’
    Kitty put an ear to the wall. ‘Alice? Alice and Ned?’
    ‘No. Their rooms will be up in the attic.’
    She listened closer, frowning in concentration. ‘It can’t be Judith. I suppose it must be Alice.’
    ‘With Stephen?’
    There was a long, shuddering moan, then silence. Kitty pulled a face. ‘Ugh. That wasn’t Burden , was it?’
    We threw up our hands in horror at the idea – then sniggered like children. Joseph Burden, proud member of the Society for the Reformation of Manners, was fucking his housekeeper. Well, well.
    ‘Oh! Your gift!’ Kitty said, then reached under the bed and lifted out a handsome wooden box. She slid it towards me, a little nervous.
    I put the box on my lap and rested the lid on its hinge. Inside lay a dozen packages, narrow and flat. I took one out and opened it up, conscious of Kitty watching for my reaction. Nestling in the envelope was a long, translucent sheath folded in two and tied loosely with a thin piece of ribbon. A condom.
    ‘I ordered them from France, for the shop. They’re made from sheep’s intestines.’
    How arousing. ‘Yes. I’ve er . . . I’ve used them before.’
    She slipped her hand in mine. ‘So . . . we don’t have to wait, any more.’
    Her face gleamed in the candlelight. So young, so pretty. This was her gift to me, then. The last of her innocence. I brushed her hair from her face. She smiled, nervous, and looked deep in my eyes.
    Tell her. Tell her why you ’ ve waited this long. Tell her that you want to marry her first and take care of her. That you want it to be different from all the other times. Tell her that you ’ re afraid if you don ’ t wait, she will never have cause to marry you.
    Tell her that you love her, damn it.
    I opened my mouth . . . and the words died in my throat. ‘I’m . . . I’m rather tired tonight, Kitty. After all that’s happened . . .’ And it was true, save for my lie of omission.
    Her eyes softened with concern. ‘Oh. Of course,’ she agreed, embarrassed, shutting up the box at once and slipping it beneath the bed. She touched her lips to my cheek. ‘Of course.’
    I blew out the candle and we lay in silence in the dark.

Part Two
     
     

 
     
    On now – the procession carries them to the narrow stone bridge and the Fleet ditch. He smells it long before he sees it: a stinking slurry of shit and offal. Not so much a river as a running sore, oozing its way down to the Thames. Thank God it is a cold, sharp day in March, not the dense heat of summer. The wind whisks the stench away down south towards Blackfriars. Hawkins closes his eyes, his body swaying as the cart turns on to Holborn Hill.
    ‘Murderer!’
    An old woman ’ s voice pierces the air. His eyes snap open. She screams it again and he sees her, a stranger in the swirling crowds, her face twisted with hatred. Others take up the call, shouting curses down upon him.
    ‘Monster!’
    ‘Burn in Hell!’
    How they hate him. Not just for the life they think he took, but for the life he squandered. A young gentleman, given every opportunity. Money, good health, an education – all wasted.
    A gang of apprentices leans out of a tavern window, waiting for the cart to pass below them. As it does, they throw a hail of stones at him, laughing at the sport. They are drunk and most of their