Witch from the Sea

by Philippa Carr

  I sat listening to his voice and it was as though he created before my eyes the fulfilment of a dream. He was going to make our country great—not through war which to my father had always seemed the way to do this, but through trade. To ply peacefully throughout the world practising legitimate trading would prove more profitable, Fennimore was implying, than riding the high seas armed with guns and cannon, boarding, robbing, fighting, killing—sometimes acquiring a prize of great worth and as often suffering loss as well as death.

  “The time has come,” he cried. “The troubles between the Low Countries and the Spaniards have crippled them both. What fools men are to kill when they might trade peaceably! At one time Antwerp was a centre of great wealth—one of the greatest in the world. The closing of the Schelde three years ago finished that. We have still to contend with Amsterdam. They’ll be our rivals for a while. That is good. Rivalry is necessary. It is the spur.”

  He leaned his elbows on the table and contemplated my father earnestly.

  “I prophesy that in the next decade we in this country will build a merchant fleet which will be the envy of the world. We have come through a great ordeal victorious. It is not for us now to gloat over our enemies but to go on to greatness. Our derision cannot hurt them—our trading ships will. We have to beat the argosies of Venice, the tartanes of Marseilles. God and our seamen have taken care of the galleys of Barcelona.”

  I clapped my hands together and then I flushed because everyone was looking at me.

  “Congratulations, Captain Landor,” I stammered. “I … was quite carried away.”

  He smiled at me then and it seemed a very long moment that we looked at each other.

  “The trading ships would have to be equipped with guns,” my father said.

  “There is no doubt of that,” replied Fennimore warmly, “for there will always be pirates. We must be ready. Our shipyards should now be working at full strength. We need ships, ships, ships.”

  “England has always had need of ships,” said Carlos.

  “But rarely as urgently as now. We have this breathing space. I doubt the Spaniards will ever recover from the trouncing they’ve had. Our rivals will be the Dutch. We must be prepared to meet the challenge.”

  “And this,” said my father, “is what you wish to speak to me about.”

  “Captain Pennlyon, your praises are sung all along these coasts and farther. The Queen herself has spoken of you as one of the guardians of the realm.”

  “God bless her,” said my father. He lifted his glass and we all drank to Queen Elizabeth.

  “May this be the beginning of a new era,” said Fennimore earnestly. “The great age of peace, trade and prosperity because of these great blessings.”

  “Amen,” said my mother.

  My father looked at her and I saw the faint smile which passed between them; I knew then that she would persuade him to consider Fennimore’s proposal, whatever it was going to be, and that he would.

  After that the conversation became more general.

  Jacko had two of the new medals which had been struck to commemorate the victory. We all laughed over the one on which was engraved “Venit, vidit, fugit,” a play on Julius Caesar’s “I came, I saw, I conquered.” With the Spaniards they had come, seen and fled.

  My father kept gazing at it and chuckling over it.

  My mother said: “The Captain has suffered a great bereavement. He has lost his Spaniards. What shall you do, Jake, with no one to curse, no throats to cut, none to run through with your sword?”

  “I doubt not,” he said, his eyes flashing fire at her, “that there are some lurking in that poxy land who will yet feel the steel of my sword.”

  Edwina commented that she had heard that Robert Dudley’s death had caused the Queen great sorrow. “She truly loved him,” she said. “What a pity she could not have married him. I believe she would have been happy to do so.”

  “She was too wise for that,” said Fennimore. “She is a great Queen. England comes first with her. She would let no man come between her and her duty to her country.”

  “I like the medal,” said my mother, “which stresses the fact that she is a woman and that a woman was at the heart of our victory. ‘Dux femina facti.’ It is a heartening thought … for us women.”

  “She is an unusual woman, don’t forget, and she wears a crown,” said Jake. “’Twould be a sorry state of affairs if all women thought they could govern men.”

  “’Twould be worth a try,” retorted my mother. “You have all been saying—and my husband in particular—that we have just had the most resounding victory ever known. And a woman was at the heart of it. I like that medal.”

  “There were men who served her well,” pointed out Fennimore. “But perhaps they did so because she was a woman.”

  Edwina said that in her opinion men and women should work together. There should be no rivalry between them. They should be complementary one to the other.

  “If men would remember that, there would be complete understanding, between the sexes,” said my mother.

  Penn said: “Is it true that Robert Dudley was poisoned?”

  There was a brief silence at the table. It was not usually wise to discuss such matters freely, but over the last weeks we had all grown a little less careful.

  Court affairs were always of the utmost interest to us, none the less so because, being so far from London, we usually heard of them some time after they had taken place. This distance may well have made us perhaps more reckless than we would have dared be had we lived closer to the Court.

  My mother said she had heard that Robert Dudley’s countess was enamoured of her master of horse, Christopher Blount, and there were rumours that Dudley had been murdered by her that she might change husbands.

  “Well, he had his first wife thrown down the stairs,” said Penn, “so he can’t complain if his second poisons him.”

  Everyone laughed and Romilly said: “Hush, Penn. You must not say such things.”

  “Why not, if they’re true?” He was looking at Jake for approval, but Jake said nothing. I believed he was still thinking about those trading ships.

  “There is no proof that they are,” said my mother firmly. “Now,” she went on, turning to Edwina, “tell us of the recent rumours.”

  Edwina’s stepfather, Lord Remus, had a post at Court and this meant that visitors from London called now and then at Trewynd Grange. Also, Edwina’s mother wrote to her regularly and she consequently had the latest Court gossip and scandal.

  “There has, it seems, always been gossip about Robert Earl of Leicester,” she said. “Naturally there would be because of his closeness to the Queen. It is said that she was heartbroken when he died. She will miss him. But I don’t think she ever forgave him for marrying, and it is true that at Court they are saying that the poisoner has died of a dose of his own medicine.”

  It was an irresistible subject—the amours of the Court—and one of the most amorous of Court gentlemen had been Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. We talked of poison then. How it was being used more and more effectively. There were so many secrets of the poisoner’s art and many people died mysteriously. Leicester had had a reputation of being an expert in the field.

  We all knew the story of the Queen’s passion for him and how his first wife Amy Robsart had died mysteriously. The general verdict was that he had had her put out of the way, and because the Queen was known to be passionately in love with him at the time, she dared not marry him. When Mary Queen of Scots had lost her head at Fotheringay—and that was not much more than a year before—there had been a great deal of talk about the Queen, Amy Robsart and the Earl of Leicester, because Mary had been in a similar position. Her husband Lord Darnley had been murdered and she, Mary, had married the Earl of Bothwell, his murderer. It was said that that was the fatal step that led to Fotheringay. Our own Queen was admired for her astuteness. She had not married Leicester but had kept him hoping and dancing attendance on her.
When he, realizing the Queen would never marry him, had married someone else, the Queen had hated Lettice, his wife. Rumour had it that Leicester had even been married before that and in secret to Lady Sheffield and that he had poisoned her husband that he might do so. Then later, when he had wished to be rid of her, he attempted to poison her too.

  “Her nails began to wither and her hair fell out,” said Edwina. “The Queen suspected there was some sort of liaison between them and had them watched. It’s strange how she still remained faithful to Leicester in spite of everything.”

  “Our Queen is a faithful woman,” said Jake. “An example to you all.”

  He looked at my mother who was suddenly silent, remembering I think how not so long ago she was ill and suspected Jake of trying to rid himself of her. How foolish of her! I realized she knew that now.

  “Yes indeed,” said my mother. “For she was sorely tried. Leicester hoped for years that she would change her mind and marry him, but she never would. That old scandal would have been revived! How hard it is to live down a scandal!”

  “But he did marry the Countess of Essex,” I said.

  “And when the Queen heard,” put in my mother, “they say she was heartbroken and she was furious with him.”

  “She all but sent him to the Tower,” said Edwina. “But she relented and she has hated Lettice ever since.”

  “And now he is dead. Do you really think it was poison that killed him?” I asked.

  “With poison one can never be sure,” said Edwina. “If it is true that Lettice was in love with Christopher Blount and that Leicester was trying to poison him and was given one of his own concoctions by his wife …”

  “Would that be possible?” I asked.

  “Yes, indeed it would.”

  Edwina should know. She was descended from a witch. I was never quite sure how far back but her mother was the great-granddaughter of one, I believe. My mother told me she used to tease her adopted sister about it.

  Edwina talked of herbs then; for she had built up a big herb garden at Trewynd. She was very interested in the uses of the plants and whenever we were not well we always first asked Edwina if she knew of a cure before consulting apothecaries or doctors.

  She had just learned that woodruff was good for the liver and she was working a cure on one of the grooms at Trewynd. Fennimore became quite interested then—far more than he had over the chatter of Leicester’s affairs. In fact I feared he was a little bored by all that.

  He said: “You must find something that will cure sailors of their ills on long voyages. Food is a great problem and also keeping sailors healthy. They suffer from terrible diseases—scurvy is one of them. If you could grow a herb that would cure that you would be performing a great service.”

  Edwina said she would study the matter, but her herbs were of the simple sort and she merely picked up information here and there.

  “It may be the cure is simple,” he answered.

  Then he began to talk again of sea and the trade he hoped would come to England.

  I watched from my window the rowing-boat take Fennimore Landor out to his ship. As I stood there I heard someone come into my room and, turning, saw that it was my mother.

  She came over to the window and together we looked at the carrack out there on the faintly moonlit waters.

  “A fine ship,” said my mother. “What did you think of her captain?”

  “I thought he was a man with a purpose.”

  “There was no doubt of that. It sounded very sensible to me.”

  I was pleased and showed it; she looked at me intently.

  “I liked him,” she said. “I liked his earnestness. He’s an idealist. And that’s a good thing for a young man to be.”

  “This idea of trading,” I said, “how much better than fighting!”

  “There will doubtless be fighting involved in it,” replied my mother grimly. “Men never seem to be able to get along without that.”

  “Do you think he wants some sort of partnership?”

  “I gathered he wanted your father’s help.”

  “Do you think he will give it?”

  My mother was thoughtful. Then she said: “He might. As a Captain who has been accustomed to see a prize and take it, he will find it a little difficult to adjust himself to legitimate trading, I doubt not. But I fancied he was less sceptical as the hours passed than he had been in the beginning.”

  “Shall you persuade him?”

  “My dear Linnet, do you think anyone could do that?”

  “I think you could.”

  “Why, the very fact that I thought it a good idea would make him try to prove it wasn’t. So you liked the captain, Linnet?”

  “I thought as you did that he was earnest … serious and dedicated to his plan.”

  “If your father joined him in some enterprise doubtless we should see a good deal of him. I discovered where he comes from. Farther along the coast towards Falmouth.”

  “Not so very far from here then.”

  “No.” There was a slight pause. Then she said: “Edwina had some good news she whispered to me. What do you think? She is going to have a child.”

  “I’m so glad. She has long wanted that to happen. I thought there was something different about her tonight. Now I come to think of it, she seemed to be hugging some secret.”

  “It won’t be a secret for long. Of course it’s early days yet. But I’m so happy for her. She and Carlos have been married … why, it must be seven years.”

  “It’s a long time,” I agreed.

  “I know exactly how they feel.” Her eyes had that glazed look which they had when she looked back into the past. Then she was right back in the present looking straight at me. “The greatest happiness, Linnet, is to hold your own child in your arms. I remember …”

  Suddenly she put her arms about me and held me close to her for a few moments. I knew she was thinking that I should marry soon and have children of my own.

  And the thought had been put into her head by the arrival of Captain Fennimore Landor. It meant that she liked him; that she would persuade my father to help him in his venture; and that from now on the young man might well be a frequent visitor at Lyon Court.

  By the time Trade Winds sailed out of the Sound, my father had arranged that there should be a further meeting with the Landors. Whether my mother had persuaded him or whether he had been impressed by Fennimore’s earnestness I was not sure, but the fact remained that he was interested in his ideas and had said in a few weeks’ time he would visit them for further talks.

  I was delighted and I believed my mother was too when an invitation came for us to join the party.

  “What women have to do with trade, I fail to see,” growled my father.

  My mother retorted: “Of course a woman should know what kind of business her husband is involved in. In any case the invitation is for me and I shall accept it on behalf of Linnet and myself.”

  My father had gone off on a short trip and Jacko was with him, so it was arranged that my mother and I, accompanied by her maid Jennet and two grooms, should make the journey to Trystan Priory, the Landor’s home, by road.

  It was early November when we set out; warm, damp and misty; the hedgerows were festooned with glistening cobwebs and the bare branches of trees made a lacy pattern against a grey sky. A touch of colour was supplied here and there by patches of golden gorse which was always with us. I remember my father’s once saying that the only time a man should not make love to a woman was when the gorse was not in bloom, the implication being that the gorse bloomed all the year round.

  I was excited. I was sure there was something in the air that day which told me that I was on the verge of adventure. It must have something to do with Fennimore whom I was looking forward to seeing again.

  “What a gloomy day,” said my mother, as we rode along side by side.

  “Do you find it so?” I replied; and she laughed suddenly. She seemed very happy. I read her th
oughts. I was eighteen years old, marriageable. Every mother wants to see her daughter married; she dreams of grandchildren. My mother wanted that for me and she had decided that Fennimore was a good choice. She had been impressed by his sincerity; perhaps too she thought that he did not live very far away and she would see me frequently if I married him. It was a sad point with her that she was so far from her own mother whom she adored.

  Yes, I was in high spirits that morning. Adventure was in the air, discoveries, marriage, children, the right of every woman to love and reproduce. There might have been some warning in the mist, but I could not sense it. Nor did my mother, for she was as eager for what was awaiting us as I was.

  The road took us through country lanes with high green banks and hedges in which a few wild flowers lived on as a reminder of the riot of colours they had offered at different times of the year—some campion, dead-nettle and shepherd’s purse and every now and then we would have a glimpse of the sea, greyish, silent on this still windless day. We met few people, only a party on horseback like ourselves who called a greeting, a pedlar whose pack we stopped to examine, a farmer at work on his land. We had made good progress on that first day and before darkness fell we reached an inn where we spent the night. The landlord had a good roasted ox and ale which we ate and drank in the parlour before retiring to our room. My mother and I slept in the big bed and Jennet on a pallet on the floor. The grooms lay in the stables and as soon as it was light we were off, our horses rested and ready for the day’s journey. There would be one more inn stop and then we should arrive at Trystan Priory.

  In spite of the excitement which possessed me, I slept soundly and so did my mother and we were up early and ready to continue at dawn.

  The second day was like the first. The country changed a little though; the coast was more rocky, the countryside stark; it lacked the lush greenery of our Devon scenery; and on that night we came to The Traveller’s Rest.