Philip Gooden > Quotes

“are four main routes out of London and we might be moving on any one of them. North, into the flat lands beyond Finsbury Fields. Westward, down the river in the direction of Greenwich. Or perhaps eastwards – although on that route the cart would have passed through Holborn and Westminster, and a prudent driver might prefer to steer away from crowded places. These directions all involved traversing relatively law-abiding areas of the city. On the other hand, if we had crossed the river either by the bridge or ferry, we would have moved south through my own patch of Southwark. This was no particular source of comfort. Were I planning to take someone prisoner and carry him off to a secret destination, this is the direction I would take. Everyone knows that the law and authority of the city do not stretch far on our bank of the Thames. Men and women who have stumbled into trouble recognise that they have a bolt-hole here. Even those on the right side of the law but afraid of its frown – boatmen, for example, or the owners of bearpits – feel instinctively that they are at home south of the water. Respectable figures like the players of the Chamberlain’s Men are resident in Southwark. Master WS, he lived in the Liberty of the Clink, did he not? Though not Master Richard Burbage, no, he lived with seven little Burbages somewhere oh-so-proper north of the river . .”
― Philip Gooden, Sleep of Death