‘Fresh bread, Mama, see! And cheese and sausage and – what is this?’ She held up a greasy packet.

‘Some cooked meat,’ I said. ‘Mutton. I was not sure whether you would be able to cook fresh meat.’

‘I can cook,’ she said proudly. She was a different child now the fears of the night were over. I could see that she was well able to care for her mother.

‘There are olives as well,’ I said, ‘and some dried plums. And here is a flask of small ale.’

Her eyes glowed as she held up the food for her mother to see. Even the little boy seemed more animated than before.

‘Before you eat, Teresa,’ I said, ‘will you take me to Paolo? I want to see whether there is anything I can do for him.’

She looked longingly at the food, but led me willingly to the cottage next door, which was another almost identical, though even more bare of possessions.

‘Paolo,’ she said, ‘this is the doctor who helped Mama. He says he can help you.’

I saw a big man seated on a stool beside the far wall, where he could lean against it for support. He clutched a heavy stick in his hand which I suspected he might have used to club me if I had tried to come here without Teresa. There was a dirty cloth wound round his head as a bandage, one of his cheeks was cut and bruised, the eye above it surrounded by blackened and yellow flesh. The stick, I guessed, was to help him walk, for his left leg, bare below his workman’s tunic, was deeply slashed, almost certainly by a sword. The torn flesh was crawling with flies.

At a nod from me, Teresa slipped away and I drew cautiously nearer to the man.

‘I am Dr Christoval Alvarez,’ I said. ‘Thank you for the wine last night. It gave Teresa’s mother enough strength for the final effort.’

He grunted. ‘The babe will survive?’

‘Aye, she’s strong and healthy.’

‘So were we all before you came.’

‘I am no part of what has been happening here.’

‘You’re Portuguese,’ he said. ‘I can tell from the way you speak.’

‘I was. I live in London now, where my father and I serve at a hospital for the poor.’

‘So what are you doing here?’

‘I’m a physician, as I said, and I would like to help you if I may. Has anyone looked at those injuries?’

‘Not likely, is it? If you want, you can.’

He leaned his stick against the wall and began to unwind the dirty cloth from his head.

For the next hour we exchanged few words as I cleansed and treated his wounds. The head injury was unpleasant, but relatively clean. The sword slash needed stitching. The black eye and the cut cheek, once salved, could be left to heal. Through it all he endured the pain stoically, only grunting a few times.

When I had finished, I unloaded the rest of my basket, for I had kept some of the food for the injured man. He merely nodded his thanks, but I saw the gleam of hunger in his eyes. As he fell upon the bread, tearing off great chunks and stuffing them into his mouth, I packed up my satchel and spoke casually, not looking at him.

‘Do you know of a tailor in the town, by the name of Titus?’

It was a risk, but I would have to take risks if I was to find Walsingham’s man.

He considered, chewing the bread, then breaking off a piece of cooked mutton and studying it, before it followed the bread into his mouth.

‘No tailors in this part of town.’ He spoke through the food. ‘Folk down here, the women make their clothes. Men like me, who don’t have a woman, buy from the market stalls or trade with a neighbour.’

‘But there are tailors?’

‘Up there.’ He jerked his head, indicating the higher parts of the town. ‘Where the rich folk live.’

His expression showed his opinion of rich folk.

‘Not living safe inside the walls, not if he’s a tailor, you may be sure. But just outside. There’s a street of tailors’ shops near the wall of the old town. So the great folk need not soil their satin shoes by walking far to place their orders.’ He leered at me, so I could see the fragments of meat and bread sticking to his strong teeth. ‘Though for all I know, those people may summon the tailors to their houses and not stir a step. There’s likely no one left there now.’

He threw a handful of olives into his mouth, then spat the stones, one by one, on to the dirt of the floor. ‘Portuguese like you, is he? Titus an’t a Spanish name.’

‘I know very little about him,’ I said cautiously.

He considered a moment. ‘I did hear, two-three weeks ago, some craftsmen were sent for to up to the citadel. Carpenters and such. Don’t know if they wanted tailors.’

There was a note of contempt in his voice. To a working fisherman, a man who plied a needle could hardly be called a man.

I left the basket and the remains of food with him, and made my way to the top of the lower town, just below the walls, to the quarter where he said I would have found the tailors before the town was ransacked. There was still occasional firing from the citadel, but it seemed they were saving their gunpowder for the next assault by the English troops. Nevertheless, I did my best to keep walls and buildings, such as were still standing, between me and the line of fire. As far as I could see, our own troops were lying low as well, for it was nearing the heat of midday, when it would be exhausting to make an attack. They would probably wait until the cool of the late afternoon.

The lower town, however, was not deserted. Burying parties had been sent into the streets, so the captain must have spoken to Sir John about the danger from unburied corpses. The men appeared to be some of the untrained soldiers, under the command of experienced officers. All of them had cloths tied around their faces as some small protection from stench and disease. They had good reason, for the merciless sun was turning the town into a charnel house.

I was sweating profusely by the time I reached the quarter where Paolo said the tailors had their premises. This street was not so badly damaged as some. Like the English camp, it was protected by an out-thrust spur of rock from the cannon fire. Nor had it been much troubled by our looting soldiers. Most of the food and drink would have been down near the harbour, either in the naval warehouses or the town market. There would have been few portable valuables to be found here either. Churches had gold and silver candlesticks and crosses and church plate. Wealthy houses, if the soldiers had managed to find any, would have yielded all manner of small, rich items. Here in this street there was little but the tools of the tailors’ trade, and I could not imagine one of the looters carrying off a heavy bolt of cloth when he could pocket a gold and silver pyx worth a hundred times its value.

The shops were mostly intact, but deserted. I went from door to door, knocking and calling out in Spanish, but got no reply. I was near to giving up when I met an old woman stumbling up the steep street with a string of onions. When she saw me, she clutched them to her breast like a precious child. I held up my hands, palm out, conciliating.

‘I mean you no harm, Señora,’ I said. ‘I am looking for a man called Titus. Someone told me he lived near here.’

She glared at me suspiciously, as if she did not believe me, but when I made no move to steal her onions, her face eased a little.

‘Señor Titus, aye, he lived here until a few weeks ago. He’s with the garrison, lucky bastard. Sent for to make new uniforms before the foul heretics came.’

‘He’s up in the citadel now?’

‘He will be, unless he ran away, like every able-bodied man in this part of the town, the cowards. They left those of us who couldn’t run to fend for ourselves.’

There was no answer for that.

‘Do you think I could gain admission to the citadel?’

‘I don’t see why you should.’ She was looking suspicious again. ‘None of us can, the poor townsfolk. It’s only the rich folk up there. Who are you, anyway?’