The idea of leaving, just because of a spot of the old Black Death, hadn't even occurred to Drake yet. Both of his wives had died quite a while ago, his elder children had fled, there was no one left to talk sense into him except Daniel. Cambridge had been shut down for the duration of the Plague. Daniel had ventured down here for what he had envisioned as a quick, daring raid on an empty house, and had found Drake seated before a virginal playing old hymns from the Civil War. Having spent most of his good coins, first of all helping Newton buy prisms, and secondly bribing a reluctant coachman to bring him down within walking distance of this pest-hole, Daniel was stuck until he could get money out of Dad – a subject he was afraid to even broach. Since God had predestined all events anyway, there was no way for them to avoid the Plague, if that was their doom – and if it wasn't, why, no harm in staying there on the edge of the city and setting an example for the fleeing and/or dying populace.