“He has survived tempests at sea, so I dare say he’ll survive Her Majesty’s anger,” Joan offered kindly. She added with obvious pleasure, “I’ve heard from Will. He is making his way with some distinction in York. I owe you thanks for that, too, Richard, bringing him to Sir William Cecil’s notice. Will writes that he is mightily busy at the inquiry.”
Richard studied the sky. “He is, indeed. I’ve just been there.” How best to break the betrothal news?
“Were you? Ah, then you saw him. Good. I confess, I was laid quite low before he left. He told me a terrible thing, Richard. He said . . .” She paused with a glance at Honor.
“Go ahead and talk, you two,” Honor said, waving them away. “I’ll finish taming these weeds.” She kneeled and took up the trowel and set to work, digging around the daisies.
Richard guided his sister away from the grave. He knew what the “terrible” thing was, but he would let her have her say. “Go on.”
“Before he left, Will told me he wanted to marry the Grenville girl. Can you imagine? It turned my stomach.” With a worried look at her husband’s grave she lowered her voice as though he might overhear. “I said nothing to you because I hoped this monstrous fancy of Will’s would pass, especially when Sir William sent him to York.” She lifted her chin with a look of satisfaction. “I was right. It was a fleeting infatuation. In all his letters there is not a word about the girl. Wonderful, isn’t it, how a few hundred miles of separation can sober a young man and bend him to his work.”
Her blindness astonished Richard. “Joan, you made such an outburst he feared you were ill. He hasn’t written you about her because he didn’t want to upset you more.”
“What? You knew?”
“Yes, Justine told me they had an understanding. It was to be a secret.” He shook his head. “Like many secrets, a bad business.”
“Bad? It’s revolting. Unthinkable.”
“No, I meant—”
“That’s why I told Will my heart, and I am very glad I did. It stopped him from getting further entangled. He has escaped the girl’s snare. And now, with time, he will put this behind him. Time and work, that’s all he needs. He will forget all about her.”
Pure self-delusion, Richard thought with a pang. He looked back at Honor as she leaned to tug a stubborn weed. He remembered the first fire of loving her, thirty-five years ago. He had tried to forget her. He was married, his sickly wife dependent on him, and he had his way to make in the world. He had tried to bend himself to fidelity and work, but there was no forgetting Honor Larke.
He turned back to his sister. “Joan, your son is in love. And Justine returns his love. They have gotten betrothed. That’s what I came to tell you.”
She gaped at him. “Betrothed? No, that’s . . . impossible.”
“I know it’s hard to swallow, this hole-in-corner secrecy. They pledged their troth in private before he left. A secret. Justine told me only afterward. When I saw Will in York I told him it was ill done. But the fact is, it is done. They are eager to be married as soon as this business with the Queen of Scots is over.”
She blanched. “You must forbid it. Forbid the marriage.”
“On the contrary, I have given them my blessing. I urge you to do the same.”
She looked so stricken he was afraid she might faint. He took her arm, wanting to guide her to a bench.
She shook off his hand, red blotches of anger firing her cheeks. “How can you even consider it after your own son’s experience? Adam married a Grenville. He married misery.”
“Nonsense, Joan. There is no comparison.”
“No, this is far worse! Don’t you see? Will doesn’t know the truth about this one. He would never even consider marrying her if he knew what she really was.”
“What is she but an ardent and innocent girl?”
“She’s a God-cursed Grenville whelp!”
The harsh words brought Honor to her feet in alarm. Richard shook his head at her, a signal that he would handle this.
“Will’s wife? Never!” There was a wildness in Joan’s eyes. “Every time I looked at her I would feel sick. Every time I saw their children I would see Grenville arrows ripping Geoffrey’s flesh. No, no, it is time Will knew the truth. Past time, that is plain. He needs to know how abominable such a union would be.”
“I warn you, Joan, let them work this out between them.”
“Eight years ago you told me to keep quiet about the girl, about who her family was. I have kept that promise. But it was a bad decision you made, Richard. It was wrong, and now look where it’s led us. You must forbid the marriage.”
“What makes you think that would stop them?”
She gave a strangled gasp. Clearly she had not considered this. “If you won’t lift a finger, I’ll do it. I’ll bring him here, to his father’s grave. I’ll make him remember Geoffrey’s agony.”
Her reaction was so extreme, Richard had no words. Honor came to them and touched her sister-in-law’s arm in sympathy. “Joan, accept this marriage,” she said. “It’s for the best.”
“I would rather die!” She pushed Honor aside, grabbing the trowel from her. “Leave me! Both of you. Leave me and Geoffrey alone!” She went to the grave and fell to her knees and hacked the soil, severing flowers and weeds alike.
Richard had had enough. “I remind you that I pay for your house, your servants, your table. Give Will and Justine your blessing, or don’t expect any more money from me.”
“He’ll soon have plenty of his own. He’ll have a position at court.”
“And you think he’ll want to support you when you say you hate his wife?”
“He will hate her, too, when he knows! She will not become his wife!”
Richard groaned, angry with himself. Her perverseness had led him to make a threat he didn’t mean. He crouched beside her and said as gently as he could manage, “Open your eyes, Joan. Be part of something good. Will loves the girl. Nothing can change that.”
She stopped her digging and searched his eyes. Hers looked haggard. She asked in wounded bewilderment, “Why do you care so much about her?”
“I want peace. The feud has caused enough suffering. I want the rancor done with. I want things settled.” He caught Honor’s expression, her pained recognition that he might not have many more years. It filled him with a longing to finish this battle with his sister. He had been on the road in Elizabeth’s business with Mary, back and forth, and he was tired out from it. He wanted to be home with his wife.
“Peace?” Joan moaned. “Geoffrey’s soul will never have peace. I have no peace. Why should you?”
Richard got to his feet, done with her. “I head this family and I will have an end to this discord. My nephew will marry my ward as soon as they return to London. Get your thoughts in order and be ready to smile at their wedding. Order a new gown for it. Geoffrey always liked you in blue.”
There had been no bloodshed. It was dark but nearing dawn when Adam, alone at the helm, brought his pinnace Curlew alongside London’s Billingsgate Wharf. He still could not quite believe how his gambit on the water had worked.
It hadn’t at first. Fuentes, the Spanish captain, had sneered at his demand to hand over the King’s gold. His job was to defend it with his life. Sick with dread, Adam waved a red kerchief, the signal for Curry on the approaching White Boar to fire his cannon. Flame erupted from the big gun’s mouth and the iron ball flew, moaning in the wind. It crossed the stern quarter of the Nuestra Señora, splitting its Bonadventure mizzen mast, sending splinters flying, then plowing into the sea. The mizzen toppled in a crash of canvas and tackle and rigging that sent the Spanish crew scurrying and Adam and Fuentes flinching. That single cannon blast turned Fuentes into a rational man. That and the fierce-looking boarding gang lined up along the White Boar’s rail with raised swords, axes, and knives. With the White Boar on his heels, her fired cannon smoking like a dragon’s mouth, Fuentes had ordered the transfer of the nine chests of gold onto Adam’s smal
l boat. Adam had paid off the White Boar crew with a bucket of the King’s gold and the brigantine had sailed off into the North Sea. It wasn’t until he was on his way back to London on a swift beam reach that he noticed a slender wooden shard embedded in his wrist. Had to be a piece of the blown Spanish mizzen. So, a little bloodshed after all, just enough to redden the cuff of his sleeve. With a weary smile he tugged out the splinter, feeling very lucky indeed.
Not for long. The sea had kicked up nastily as he neared the English coast, and a new anxiety kicked up in his heart. Getting the gold had been easy. The next step—pursuading Elizabeth—would be far harder. As he brought his boat alongside Billingsgate Wharf, the city lay quiet in the darkness, and not far from Billingsgate the Tower rose into the moonlit sky. Behind its walls lay Tower Green. Would that execution platform be his final destination?
Not if he could convince Elizabeth. And he had to do that before the Spanish clamored for his head.
He hopped onto the wharf and made fast the Curlew’s lines. The King’s gold lay below deck, snug under tarpaulins. A rat scurried by him. Watching it disappear among a jumble of empty crates, he remembered offering his son a Spanish piece of eight and the boy peering at him with suspicion and asking, “Did you steal it?” Later, Adam had told Porteous, “I’m no pirate.” Now he was.
So be it.
Billingsgate was known for its market where vendors sold fish, fruit, grain from Essex, and salt from France, but mostly fish, and the residue smells from the fishmongers’ vacant stalls hung thick in the misty air. The city slept, but the smell of wood smoke and yeast told him that some baker’s apprentice nearby had already lit an oven. On the ships moored in the Pool, lantern lights hooked on spars swayed in the breeze, and faint sounds echoed across the water of men waking, coughing, clanking breakfast pots in galleys. A horse and wagon clattered by on the wharf’s cobbles. Adam walked west on Thames Street, his way lighted by the first pearly flush of dawn. To convince Elizabeth, he needed a banker.
He reached Lombard Street where the grand houses of foreign merchants stood cheek by jowl with narrow shops. He knocked on the massive door of the dark-timbered, three-story mansion of the Genoese merchant banker, Benedict Spinola.
A footman opened the door, stifling a yawn and a look of annoyance. He lifted his lantern to inspect the too-early caller and frowned at the dried blood on Adam’s sleeve. Warily, he asked him to return in two hours because his master was still abed. Adam pushed past the fellow. He climbed the broad staircase where a lavish chandelier, its candles out, hovered in gloom.
Adam pushed open the bedchamber door. “Signore Spinola?”
The sleep-rumpled man, startled from slumber, struggled to his elbow. “Who’s there?”
“Sir Adam Thornleigh. I have a catch at Billingsgate that you’ll want to see.”
18
Evidence
York was a maze of crowded streets and footpath byways, but Justine had no trouble finding Monk Bar, the imposing four-story arched gatehouse in the city’s Roman wall. Her destination was the narrow brick house that stood directly across from it. Rented for the clerks of the inquiry, this house was Will’s lodging. The early-morning sun winking through Monk Bar brightened his front door, which Justine took as an encouraging sign. She needed one. She had come to find the letters being used in evidence against Mary. Will had said his job was to make copies of them. Of course, there was no guarantee that he kept any copies in his lodging—he might keep them, if there were any, at the hall where the inquiry was taking place. But if they were here, she meant to get them.
Evidence, she thought uneasily as she crossed the street to the house. Leaving Bolton Castle, she had been given a scrap of evidence about Alice’s killer. She’d been about to mount her horse, the groom snugging the cinch under the horse’s belly for her, when a footman delivered a message from Yeavering Hall. A shabby paper with three lines of writing as wobbly as a child’s:
Dear Mistress Thornleigh,
The wine man that was running is called Rigaud. Ask
at the French Church, London.
Yr servant,
Jeremy Roper
A name! Rigaud. She felt a jolt of exhilaration. Evidence, finally. But . . . of what? Her spirits plunged again, for the carpenter’s note gave her no better sense of whether this man Rigaud was a witness to the murder or the murderer himself. Or maybe neither, just someone innocently hurrying through the churchyard. And since she could not get to London to find him, the scrap of information did nothing but torment her. The powerless feeling was maddening.
A little servant girl let her into the house, and Justine went up the stairs and stopped outside Will’s door. About to knock, she took a steadying breath. Getting the letters, if she could, meant deceiving Will, which she would rather not do. But did it really matter, since he would never know? She almost wished she could tell him. Then, once everything has come right, he’d be proud of how I managed things. But she knew the deception was necessary.
She knocked.
The door opened instantly and Will took both her hands and pulled her into the room and closed the door. “What’s happened? I hardly slept after getting your message last night. Are you all right?”
The loving concern on his face made her want to throw her arms around him and blurt out everything. But she quickly gathered her wits. She smiled. “I’m fine.”
“Thank God. You didn’t say why you were coming. I was afraid you’d been found out by Mary and needed sanctuary.”
“No, no, nothing’s changed.” She spouted the lie too brightly. Could he see through her false smile?
“So what brings you to York?” His concern for her had turned to puzzlement. “That’s a long, cold journey.” Still holding her hands, he rubbed them between his to warm them.
“It was, yes. I arrived last night.”
“Where are you staying?”
“With a friend of Lord Thornleigh. An agent from his wool trade days. On George Street.”
“Ah, near the castle. How did you get leave from Mary?”
“She offered to buy me a new lute, and it gave me the perfect chance to say the best lute maker was here. She sent me to choose an instrument, with a servant as escort. He’s at my lodging.”
He was clearly waiting for her to explain her visit. “Do you have something urgent to report to me?”
“Well . . . yes. Two Catholic churchmen from Scotland have joined Mary’s entourage. An Aberdeen priest named Rowland Baines, and a chaplain from Edinburgh, Archibald Sinclair.”
“Ah, good. We actually knew about the priest. I’ll ask around about Sinclair. Have you noted any suspicious activity between either of them and Mary?”
“No.”
“I see.” His puzzled look returned.
“The truth is, Will, I just wanted to see you. I felt terrible about the way we parted on that bleak hillside. It was the shock of hearing you quote Mary’s letters. She’s been kind to me, you see, and it made me defensive about her. But as soon as I left you I realized I’d been foolish. I came to say I’m sorry.”
His smile was so warm, so loving, she hated having to deceive him. “I said some thoughtless things, too,” he owned. “I should never have suggested that Mary has bewitched you. You’re far too clever for that.”
“Clever?” she said with a laugh. “I don’t know about that, but I do know my duty to Her Majesty.”
“Of course you do.” His pride in her shone in his eyes.
It moved her, but flustered her too, because of what she was keeping from him. “I’m sorry if I’ve startled you, turning up out of the blue.”
He grinned. “Best thing that’s happened since . . . well, since I saw you last.” The warmth in his voice told her he was remembering their kisses on the hillside. She had to turn away.
“So, this is where you live.” The room, though small, was pleasant with pale morning sunshine filtering through a mullioned window that overlooked the back garden. Birds chittere
d in a big beech tree whose bare branches snugged against the window as if for companionship. Justine took note of the desk littered with papers, scrolls, and books. Noted the closed trunk in the corner and the luggage tucked beneath the bed, including what looked like a strongbox. Were the letters inside it?
“I suppose I’m keeping you,” she said. “You must have to get to the inquiry.”
“I was about to leave when you came.”
“Oh, don’t let me stop you.” She did her best to hide her satisfaction. She had timed her visit perfectly. “I should have waited until the end of the day. I don’t want to make you late.”
“I’ll gladly risk it for a few moments with you. Come, sit down.” He was lifting a stack of books off a chair to clear it for her. Justine saw that the two other chairs were also doing double duty as bookshelves, stacked with thick volumes that looked like law books.
“Do your duties here require your whole library?” she asked with a smile. She reached the desk and flipped open a volume of Julius Caesar’s The Gallic Wars. Beside it lay a dog-eared volume of Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations. “Are you planning an invasion?”
“They are old friends. I hate to travel without them.” He looked around for a bare surface on which to put down the books. There was none. Catching Justine’s enjoyment at his predicament, he set the books on the floor and added with a grin, “You see how I need Marcus Aurelius’s advice on equanimity in the midst of conflict.”
It made her smile—Will’s orderly mind, his unfailing good humor. Looking into his amused eyes, she almost relaxed. But she did not sit. She hadn’t even taken off her cloak. She had come with a square leather satchel whose strap she had slung across her chest like a schoolboy, and she slipped it over her head. “I’ve brought you something.” Lifting the flap, she took out a hand-sized framed square of embroidery depicting a leafy tree with red apples and blue birds, a river flowing by it. She was not a skilled needlewoman. The work could have been done better by many a ten-year-old.
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