Cutthroats of the Coast

Chapter 30 - Doctor Matthew West in Conversation

My evening with Doctor Levi was convivial. I spent the first civilized moments I had had since leaving Oxford all those months before. For a brief moment, the ever present weight of fear and anxiety lifted and I knew again what it was to be in gentle company.

My rags were taken away by the simpleton, Youssef, and I was allowed to wash the prison filth from my limbs before I put on the clean white jellaba that was left for me. Wearing clean linen was a rare treat. I could not remember the last time I had changed it. The jellaba was a pleasant garment, a kind of long, hooded shift that proved commodious when sitting cross-legged in the Eastern manner.

"If there is nothing I can give you other than relief from drudgery for this night, then at least let it be clean clothes," Levi said, as he sat picking at a bowl of olives, watching me rinse myself clean at his well in the corner of the courtyard. By that time I had taken on the appearance of a lusty fellow, lean of limb, flat bellied and strong. Hardship, life at sea and the galleys had crafted muscles upon me that Samson would have envied. However, there was no semblance of Delilah in Levi's eyes. Rather, he looked at me as I had seen some anatomists do at lectures in Oxford when presenting their cadaver, or an assayer regarding their silver.

Despite this unsettling moment, we retired to a small room that opened on to the courtyard. We talked of places we had been to, books we had read and the gossip we had heard, whilst moths dashed themselves into the flames of candles, or fastened themselves to the intricately pierced lamp that hung over our heads.

Admittedly, my knowledge of the Court of His Britannic Majesty was almost a year out of date in comparison to Levi's intelligence regarding the Sultan, his favourites and their movements. Even so, I learned with pleasure that it was not just Merry England that found the Stuart king's amours an entertainment most piquant.

"So a whore rules by means of your king's cock?" laughed Levi.

"I would not say rule, and I would not say that Mistress Nell is a whore. At least not to her face. But then the whole court is whoring its way through every young woman in London, and not a few from elsewhere. I am surprised they have the energy. Even a bull must rest."

Levi's eyebrow raised a little at that. "And you have experience?"

"I grew up on a farm."

"That's not what I meant. In my experience, once a man has lost himself in lust, nothing can sate him. It is like an affliction of the brain. He pursues depravity to an ever greater extent, losing himself in fleshly sin. There are many in this town lost in this way."

For a moment, I thought of Morgan. Fleshly sin. Depravity. "Aye, mayhap you have something there," I said. "But what of your Sultan?"

"The man is cruel..."

"That is the way of kings."

Levi nodded politely and continued, "And no better than the men you have described already." He paused to sip from an elegant glass that he raised to his lips. Leaning forward he placed the glass down and began to whisper like a man plotting against the King, his words tumbling out in a torrent as if eager to be heard before Levi thought better of himself. "I have heard that he will take the head of a slave for the merest fault. 'Tis mere chance that the man who holds his horse's reins lives to hold them again. He is fickle and enjoys keeping his courtiers guessing. Who will be sawn in half next? Who knows? But when the Sultan wears yellow robes, all the court crawl on their bellies, for he signals his desire to kill by that colour."

"I have known men of a similar disposition. I would say that men of power have a propensity to acts of unwonted cruelty," I said, thinking of Morgan again. "But forgive me, I interrupted you."