‘Hmph,’ said Drake, relaxing. He did not seem immune to flattery. He fumbled about on the table and found a gold toothpick. Raising it to his lips, he said, ‘I am well glad that no ship I’ve yet met leaks as much as our court of England. Ay. Well glad.’
Lewgar hesitated a moment, took a breath, and said, ‘we have heard too of the lost ship, the Sparrowhawk. Lately returned from the sea. Where it was long thought lost.’
This time it was Drake’s turn to stiffen. ‘What know you of that?’
‘Only what we have read,’ said Marlowe. He hurried on. ‘I have an uncle, sir, who lives by the Devon coast. He wrote me of it.’
‘You’re a Devon man?’
‘My uncle is.’
‘You don’t sound like a man of my country.’
‘I have been long at the university, sir.’
‘Ay,’ said Drake. ‘I can smell it on you.’ But he seemed to warm a little, picking at his teeth and working his small jaw whilst staring into space. ‘I suppose you’ve heard, then, of the tales of lost gold.’
‘We have, sir,’ said Lewgar, hardly daring to breathe.
‘Ay, and much of it nonsense. As you say, all England knows that we took the Spaniards’ gold. It would do no good in old Philip’s coffers.’ He chortled. ‘Enough, ay, enough to make her Majesty smile and clap her fair hands. Yet we lost enough. It happens. The Sparrowhawk took on and bested a carrack out of the southern part of the New World. The Spaniards’ great treasure stores.’ He frowned. ‘Yet she was wounded in the broil. I sent her home to England for safety – ahead of the Elizabeth – before I took the Pelican north alone. The Golden Hind, I should say. She earned that name then, ay, and threefold in the double.
‘And, alas, the sea took her. Took her and took Queen Elizabeth’s gold.’
‘And the crew?’ asked Lewgar.
Drake shrugged. ‘God bless them. Good men, good mariners. I sent her back with only enough to sail and protect her. Needed every man I could retain. And yet … even so small a crew … all lost.’ His tone belied his words; there was no trace of remorse. It was said that Sir Francis Drake went hard on his men. ‘It is a danger of seafaring – another one you must consider if you think to embark on the life. The sea doesn’t forgive. It takes.’ There was a moment of silence as they all lowered their heads. Drake shrugged again, breaking it. ‘The loss of all – of ship, crew, and men … This much, I think, is put about in alehouses and taverns, is it not?’ He gave them a narrow-eyed look.
‘It is,’ conceded Lewgar. No one had ever said a word about the crew, not that he’d heard. There had been no bodies on the wreck. At first he had thought that nothing unusual – sea creatures would have taken care of them. Now – now, he suspected that whoever had taken control of the ship, whoever had relieved it of its cargo, had almost certainly killed them all and given them to the depths. He wondered if the commander of the fleet had given any of the treasure he eventually brought back himself to the widows and children who might have been left behind. Probably not.
‘A sorry tale. It is even sorrier to see dead men mocked by nature in the casting up of the wreckage,’ concluded Drake, his tone edged with condemnation.
Lewgar debated whether or not to tell him that it was an ill-fitting tale given the condition of the ship. Instead, he asked, ‘is it common a thing for a ship to sink and then be risen?’
‘There’s a fine question.’ The old captain hunched over his table. ‘I should say no. No, it isn’t common. Well, you are both men of mathematics.’ He said the word with a sneer. ‘Do you say it is possible?’
‘No,’ said Lewgar. ‘I should think not.’
‘Hmph. No. A ship buried in the sand might be uncovered, but not a vessel lost to the depths. Cursed, that ship. Cursed.’ Drake clasped his hands together, as though in prayer. Lewgar fought the urge to roll his eyes. It seemed all men of the sea were fond of superstition.
‘We have heard it whispered also, Sir Francis, that the ship carried back some great treasure.’ As always, Marlowe’s voice turned wistful at the name. ‘El Sol Dorado.’
Drake made an inarticulate sound in his throat. ‘Ay? Ay. So the Spanish king claims. So he wrote to our Queen. Great imperial delations, accusing me of being a low, common pirate, stealing his great treasure.’
‘It exists?’ asked Lewgar, his throat drying. ‘There was such a treasure? What was it?’
Amusement again passed Drake’s small, fleshy lips. ‘I cannot say,’ he said. ‘Secrets of the Queen’s realm. Only the heathens of the New World know what their foolish treasures signify. Me, I should have had the whole lot turned over to her Majesty to be melted down into good, honest English coin.’ He sighed, his smile fading. ‘I took no great inventory of the captured gold.’ He gave them a hard look. ‘It was very little. Very little. Listen to me, not broad-mouthed rumour mongers or that old Spanish fox. He increases his losses to increase his complaints! The Sparrowhawk captured not enough even to warrant a good inventory. Some small coins, some papers. As I said, it was sent back to Plymouth. It never arrived. So I learned when I returned myself.’ His gaze sharpened. ‘A fine pair of venturesome men you are, to focus on the past. You are yet young. You ought to look ahead, not behind. Forget the Sparrowhawk. It’s a dead thing. Like all dead things, it ought to have the damned good grace to stay dead.’
‘You will engage us?’ asked Marlowe, beaming.
Drake tilted his head on one said, appraising them. ‘I intend no new voyage for some months yet, you kinsman of a Devon man.’ This he said as though it were a mock insult, and he smiled at it. ‘Yet I own that the Queen’s men prefer that gentlemen of learning sail. I don’t know why.’ Another deep breath, and he looked away from them, as though they suddenly ceased to amuse them. ‘If you seek to serve me, make yourselves readier. I have no time to fill two green and callow lads’ heads with the truth of life at sea. I’m a man of business and much traffic to conduct and I’ve had a bellyful of London and its people. I would be out of this foul-aired city in the coming days, and back to Plymouth. Whole town reeks like a bilge after a week out of port. Get you gone. Speak to a man who has time and love enough for men of gentle learning.’
‘Who, Sir Francis?’ asked Lewgar.
‘Raleigh. Our new-minted knight, good Sir Walter. Who daily grows in credit. He has sent his fleet out to the New World, with our hopeful English souls. Sent back the two savages who long dwelt with him, too.’ A grin lifted his cheeks, narrowing his eyes from below. ‘I’ve no wish to be burdened with a pair of reading college whelps. Yet Sir Walter has just lost his pet scholar. Man called Harriot – Oxford man – who sailed with the voyage to the Americas. Hmph. Spent his time learning the savage tongue.’ The grin faded, and his eyes rolled, as though to say, ‘silly fool.’ Instead, he said, ‘Raleigh is your man, my book-reading friends. He’s the man who loves to feed a scholar.’ With a sigh, grudgingly, he added, ‘if you win his favour, I shall consider you. Go now. I should like to sleep a little after my dinner.’
Bowing in acknowledgement of their dismissal, they backed out of Sir Francis Drake’s inner chamber.
Two things chimed in Lewgar’s head.
Only the heathens of the New World know what their treasures signify.
Spent his time learning the savage tongue.
Had this Harriot, who’d so recently sailed away with the savages, learnt anything of them? And if so, had he passed it on to the Queen’s favourite?
***
‘He’s a rude and lusty fellow,’ said Lewgar, when they were back out and blinking in the street. The thick, heady smells of Drake’s dinner had made him light-headed, a little sick, and the earthier reek of the street was welcome.
‘I’ve heard of this Harriot,’ said Marlowe.
‘And I’ve heard of the savages,’ said Lewgar. It had been a year or so since England had bristled with excitement at the arrival of a ship from the New World that had borne on it two naked savages. Rumour held that they had been pa
raded about the streets, shocking women with their shaved heads and their childish and wild ways. Since then, the novelty had worn off. They had been lodged in Sir Walter Raleigh’s mansion, taught shame, and dressed up in good English clothes. Since the initial great buzz, Lewgar had forgotten about them. As had, he supposed, most of England.
Except Sir Walter Raleigh, who was said to have kept them close, for scientific observations.
‘Sir Walter might by now have learnt to speak with them in the savage tongue,’ he said. ‘If this scholar of his learnt it.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Marlowe.
‘They might have told him what this treasure is. This golden sun.’
‘But not where.’ He began stalking off down the street, his head down. A group of women parted, tutting, to make way for him. Lewgar followed, nearly colliding with a heavyset young man in ill-fitting clothes who stepped into his path.
‘Watch it,’ the brute scowled.
Lewgar gave him a look. ‘Be gone from me,’ he said, not hiding his distaste. But he stepped around the creature, and hurried on to catch up with Marlowe, not glancing backwards.
‘What ails you, Marlowe?’
‘Hm? What? Nothing.’ He resumed his stride.
Lewgar hissed to himself. Marlowe’s moods, though he had grown used to them, were frustrating, tiresome even. ‘For the love of God, what is the matter?’
They paused at the turning for Carter Lane. Whinnying and the stench of dung filled the air from its multitude of stables. Marlowe took off his hat and ran a hand through his hair, in a vain attempt to tame it. ‘Did you find that a fruitful visit?’ he asked.
‘Fruit– yes. Yes. He has given us another name. All is orderly. We build upon knowledge.’
‘He told us nothing new. He told us what is jangled in alehouses. What is laughed at by those who give a fillip to the old Philip. And … very little, he said. Very little gold. A small cargo and some documents lost, along with the men.’
‘Yes. Scarce enough for an inventory. Yet. Yet. He would say that, wouldn’t he? To make small the loss?’
A ghost of a smile raised Marlowe’s little lips. ‘Ay, I suppose he would.’
‘A little gold and scraps of paper. Perhaps those had value. Writings on ships, on the condition of the New World, and so on. Your master, I think, would consider it a great victory to have letters and writings the Spanish have made of their possessions abroad.’ A short laugh burbled. ‘Perhaps El Sol Dorado is a great piece of a gold-edged paper!’ Marlowe, to his surprise, didn’t laugh, but frowned. ‘At any rate, we can’t pry knowledge from Drake’s head, even if it lies there.’
‘I’m sorry, Thomas. I had hoped for more.’
When he answered, Lewgar was surprised to find that he was the one excited, thrilling with the chance to go further, to learn more, to put together the pieces of what seemed an ill-fitting and rent garment. ‘Yet perhaps that tells us something. In itself, I mean. I suspect Sir Francis knew more than he told us. Yes, I do. And that means that there is indeed more to discover. He seemed … discomfited at the loss of the treasure. Even the mention of it. His men, the Queen’s men – all must have seen what we saw in that ship, whether they boarded her or not. Their belief – the story given out – they must be shaken to see it doesn’t hang together. And it struck me,’ he added, ‘that Drake would have his loss buried. Forgotten.’
‘As would I, were I him. I cannot imagine the old Queen is happy to know that her stolen gold didn’t sink as she and her master mariner thought. I imagine she’s shaking in her fine shoes at what’s become of it.’
‘Yet he knows,’ said Lewgar, ignoring the irreverence, ‘indeed, that it was not buried at the bottom of the sea. That it is out there somewhere. He called the Sparrowhawk cursed. Cursed, perhaps, because he knows that dead ships don’t ape Lazarus. As he said, a sunken thing doesn’t rise from the depths. No, he knows that someone spirited away that gold – and – and did God knows what with the ship these past years. Whilst he was sailing through hell’s teeth across the world. And he doesn’t know who, or what, or where. Yes, he was worried about that damned ship and its history.’
Marlowe seemed to brighten. ‘Think you he has men set upon the truth himself?’
Lewgar considered this. ‘I cannot say. Perhaps.’
‘God’s toenails. That is all we need. More hares in the chase.’
‘Hm. Would … would your master …’ he lowered his voice. ‘Walsingham. Would he be grieved to know that Drake had his own men engaged on the same business? On finding the same treasure?’ He knew that courtiers were like fighting cocks, each striving to show his own strength and ability.
‘Yes.’ Marlowe looked away. As always, he seemed to grow cagey at the mention of his employer. It was almost a relief to know he could hold his peace.
‘Well, perhaps he hasn’t. Drake, I mean. Perhaps he wishes the whole thing forgotten. Buried under richer victories.’ As he said it, he was impressed by his conviction. ‘Yes. He struck me as that manner of man. One who looks forward, not back.’
Marlowe turned back to him with a smile. ‘Well, then, Thomas … well said. I’m sorry. I weary of this venture. I hoped it might move with more speed.’ He put a finger to his lips. ‘On the subject of the crew of the ship. There is a mystery within a mystery. He gave us no names.’
‘Secrets of the realm,’ said Lewgar. ‘Or so he would say.’
‘Yet the men must have had wives, sweethearts, children.’
‘I did consider it. Likely he gave them nothing for their loss.’
Marlowe pinched at his lower lip, peeling at skin and frowning at the resultant spot of blood on his finger. ‘They might have been drawn from all over England, these lost men. If only we could know something of them. If only any had survived.’
Lewgar almost laughed. ‘We can hardly speak with men who have been drowned. Or slain and thrown to the sea.’
Marlowe gave a mischievous look up, wiping his finger on his doublet. ‘Can’t we?’
‘What? Speak with the dead?’
‘Can’t we?’ he asked again. Before Lewgar could answer this piece of nonsense, bells rang out from the nearby St Mary Botolph. ‘Come. I could eat some dinner myself, late as it is for me.’
Together, they tramped back towards the river and took dinner in a small ordinary on Cousin Lane. Over it, they spoke of gold, and the art of their deception, and laughed at Drake’s scorn for book learning. There was no denying it; Lewgar felt that he had enjoyed playing a false part, even if it was only an exaggerated version of himself. There was something enjoyable, something cheerfully mad in it – an orderly and studied kind of madness. When they departed, twilight was already chilling the air, and their wherry launched into choppy waters as it crossed the river.
Alighting at Long Southwark, they turned in for a cup of beer and to use the jakes in the first alehouse on London Bridge, and then made for The Tabard. The shadows were heavy as they passed the turning for Barms Street, which ran eastward just south of the tower of St Olave.
‘I always say,’ Marlowe was laughing, ‘that any man is a fool who takes a wherry below the bridge. He is asking to be showered in a fellow’s beer-bright piss.’
‘A fine thought,’ said Lewgar.
‘Fine,’ burped Marlowe. ‘Ay, it is a lucky man who is wetted by the piss of so bright a fellow as Kit Marlowe.’
Lewgar didn’t answer this, though he smiled vaguely. The day’s beer – strong beer – had threatened another episode of that coarse drunkenness he had seen in Wembury.
He was thinking this, worrying over it, staring at the ground, when the world turned darker. He looked up, his brows lowering.
‘Watch it.’
Confusion drowned him. The words, the face, were familiar – the thick body, the poor suit of mismatched clothes. ‘You!’ he gasped, realisation dawning. The fellow who had stepped out in front of him in Dowgate. ‘You follow us!’
The young man didn’t answer.
12
At first, Lewgar thought that he’d been punched. He couldn’t connect the small blade with the dull pain in his side. As he might have reacted to a punch, he hopped back. His hands scrambled for the source of the pain.
A scream tore over him.
The young attacker looked up, startled, his eyes widening. He lifted his dagger – a little thing it was, cheap – upwards.
What…?
Lewgar’s mind was working too slowly for what happened. Marlowe flew past him, rolled past him, like a cannonball, hurling himself at the creature. ‘He … dagger…’ said Lewgar. His voice came out in a surprised gasp, barely above a whisper, whipped away by the speed of Marlowe’s flight.
‘Eyaaah!’
The force of the assault pushed the young man backwards, off his feet. He careened wildly towards a plaster wall, twisted, trying to raise his arm again, and fell to the ground. Marlowe was on him, raining down blows with his small hands, scratching, tearing, screaming himself.
Windows banged open above. Cheers and catcalls fell out of them.
Lewgar watched, transfixed, as Marlowe wrestled the fellow. Clouds of dirt rose around them, looking misty in the low light.
And then the brute gained the upper hand, using his greater weight to push Marlowe off. The smaller man landed on his back with a whump. Immediately, he threw himself sideways and began rolling on his side. The street sloped down towards the central sewage gutter and he went with it.
The dagger again glinted in the man’s fist. He seemed unsure whether to throw himself down on Marlowe or to stand and fight on.
Do something!
Lewgar’s pain seemed to have numbed, to have gone. He leapt, his arms spread, on the wretch’s back, his right hand crawling over frieze, finding the creature’s wrist and trying to push it away, the other snaking around his neck. His legs hooked the fellow’s thighs. They lurched drunkenly together for a moment, as though locked in a crazy game, before the man took two halting steps forward, bucking and barking.
The Queen's Gold: A Christopher Marlowe Spy Thriller Page 12
