A Dangerous Trade: An Elizabethan Spy Thriller

by Steven Veerapen

  ‘Are they on the rise?’ He knew Heydon would know who ‘they’ were.

  ‘Dunno. Nothing has come in. I’d think so. Men have been mustering up there. Couldn’t delay them. Stupid bloody fools. To wait all this time and then act in passion and fury. And I have letters from Queen Mary. To friends at Court. To tell the usurper to disregard any tales that the countess might tell of her.’

  ‘But … the countess is her friend.’

  ‘A prisoner can’t be friends with a gaoler. Or a gaoler’s wife. Her Majesty is sending out many such letters by all means she has, to the usurper herself, even. One at least will get through. Make the old witch of Windsor feel safer that her captive is behaving.’ He touched a hand to his hat. ‘Busy cap. Well, the more stuffing the warmer it’ll keep my head. Here, we can take a pair of these brutes.’ He began unlatching the paddock of the earl’s reserve horses.

  ‘Hey. Hey, Mr … sir – Jack – you can’t be doin’ that. Leave them, they’re mine!’ It was the young groom of the reserves. He had been curled up sleeping on a container of hay in a corner. He rubbed his eyes as he spoke.

  ‘Shut your mouth, you little varlet,’ said Heydon, shards of ice in his voice. ‘Or I swear I’ll cut your nose off it and watch you eat it.’

  ‘Wha?’ the little boy recoiled as though struck.

  ‘I swear to you, boy.’

  ‘Philip – Mr Heydon,’ said Jack. He was surprised at the depth and strength of his own tone. ‘Don’t speak to him like that. He’s a child.’ Heydon stopped his menacing advance between the disinterested horses and turned to Jack, anger mixed with disbelief on his features. ‘I mean it. I don’t like seeing a child spoke to like that. It’s cruel. Leave him be.’

  ‘Very well, Jack.’ The anger melted away into nothing, and a look of contrition took its place. ‘Well said. Yet we are taking these brutes.’ He turned back to the groom, who looked torn between fear and irritation at being called a boy. ‘The earl said we could go. If he didn’t say how we could go, I doubt he expected us to be walking. So we’re taking these, and you can complain at your leisure, brat. I mean,’ he said, with a sidelong look at Jack, ‘my good young sir.’

  They rode out as soon as Jack had bundled up, taking the reserves from the unprotesting but unhelpful lad. Before long, orange-tinged trees were a blur beside them. ‘Hurry, hurry, will you? This is it, mate. I’m not proving your mettle this time. This time you must prove yourself before God.’

  Heydon’s words carried into the wind. They also chimed in Jack’s mind. Divine absolution or his wife – why did he feel like he was being asked to choose? There could be only one. He would have to decide how to tell his friend that on the road.

  As they rode away from Tutbury, Jack wondered what he meant by ‘proving your mettle this time’. He wondered more why the countess’s going had suddenly lit such a raging fire under Heydon.

  They were a day behind them, but his friend seemed intent on cutting the gap.

  6

  Bess strode around the chamber, picking things up, inspecting them, putting them down. A candlestick. A gilt coffer. A pewter tray for sweetmeats. ‘We’re welcomed, then,’ she said finally. A curt nod to no one in particular. ‘Good.’

  They had been installed in apartments in Windsor Castle, not far, apparently, from the queen’s own. All were furnished, tapestries from floor to ceiling and rugs so thick Amy sank down when she stepped on them. She moved off to one side whilst the countess’s other attendants saw to their tasks. There was little she could do but wait to be called, and to try and make herself invisible until then.

  She watched the ritual of unpacking and preparing Bess to be undressed and changed, but her eyes didn’t see it. During the days and nights on the road, and on the short journey across the river, she had thought about little but what had happened on the morning they left. Twin lumps had grown on the back of her head and lower on her neck. With the knowledge that someone had tried to stop her from coming – possibly to stop the whole party from coming – had grown a resolve. She would have to find a way to let someone know. Perhaps Brown was here. She had seen, on coming into the castle, that the place buzzed with messengers, men in travelling suits, stern-faced politicians. It occurred to her to speak to the countess and have her intercede, but she couldn’t face that. It would be an admission that she had been acting secretly in the household. It would make her feel sneaky, dirty, small. Better that she find someone who looked trustworthy and whisper in their ear: a priest called Heydon was at work for the queen of Scots, and he might have some wicked design in hand. She replayed the conversation in her head for the thousandth time. ‘I’m going to Court,’ she had said. ‘But so am I.’ She was certain of it. And if Jack was coming to Court it would be with the priest. That could only be bad.

  ‘Stop mooning, girl.’ Amy’s eyes focused and she looked up at Bess. ‘You’re not employed to stand around dreaming.’ She gestured towards a door with her bedchamber. ‘You don’t want to stay out here with the men, do you? Get yourself in there and help pin. I can’t see the queen in this.’

  Amy followed and together she and Bess’s gentlewoman undressed her, patted at her face and arms with damp cloths, and laced her into one of the gowns they had brought. The countess then sat on a cushioned chair whilst her woman applied powdery white cosmetics and some red paste from a silver dish. ‘Shift yourself, girl,’ she said out of the corner of her mouth. ‘I don’t want you strutting around the Court looking like a drab from Southwark.’

  ‘Yes, my lady.’

  Amy changed into her gown and edged towards the mirror, eager for a look at herself. The russet darkened her eyes and made her look quite mysterious, she thought. Almost a gentlewoman herself, were it not for the cap, still tied under her chin. ‘Take that cap off,’ said Bess. ‘You look like a fool in it.’ Amy did so and was pleased to see that her curled hair had survived the journey mostly unscathed. She had tied little strips of cloth in it carefully each night to maintain the curls. ‘The queen and Sir William have graciously allowed me to call on them in the audience chamber. And the new man, Walsingham.’ Bess’s voice retained is usual blustering timbre, but Amy detected a note of anxiety. She was squeezing the pomander in her lap rhythmically. ‘You can wait here with the gentlemen, girl. And you,’ she said, slapping away her gentlewoman’s hand, a small brush still in it. ‘I … I will speak with them alone.’

  Amy felt a wave of disappointment descend. She hadn’t expected to be allowed to accompany Bess into Queen Elizabeth’s presence – of course not – but it was frustrating to be so near and yet so far from the rooms in which decisions were taken. Knowledge was power, and she had that. But she could not get near the rooms in which power was turned to action.

  Eventually the countess’s toilette was finished, and she marched off, out of her bedchamber and through her rooms. Her woman remained, plonking herself down on the vacated seat and beginning to make up her own face. Amy sidled towards the door, unnoticed. 'I … I’ll see if the gentlemen need anything mended.’ A disinterested sniff. Good.

  Bess’s gentlemen attendants were already at play, someone having produced the pack of cards that had made frequent appearances on the journey south. Amy walked past them, ignoring their guffaws and cries of ‘cheat’. She left the countess’s apartments and stepped outside, aware that she had no idea where she was going. Windows faced her, looking out on gardens. It was a courtyard, she knew from coming in. The corridor ran in either direction. They had entered earlier from the right. She went left. Eventually she found a broad staircase and climbed up it. At the top was a guard in green and white, twirling a stave. ‘Are you lost, madam?’

  ‘No.’ Amy tried to fix her features into a look of nervous worry. ‘Yes. I … my lady of Shrewsbury – I wait on her. She’s gone up to see the queen and her ministers. I forgot to give her gifts.’ The guard said nothing. ‘Gifts for the queen,’ she added lamely. Perhaps tears would avail her of something, but she could conjure none.<
br />
  ‘You’ve to go around the staircase.’ He pointed to Amy’s left with his stave. Then straight ahead of you is her Majesty’s dancing chamber. It opens into the audience chamber. You’ll not get in there. The countess is gone ahead of you, I showed her myself. Wait in the dancing hall and pray God your mistress is in a forgiving mood, eh? Don’t cry now, mistress.’

  Amy smiled her thanks and hurried off in the direction he’d given. Clinking and scuffing sounds chased her – the double doors opposite the dancing hall seemed to be full of people clearing up the remains of dinner. The little hall, a frothy room painted in white and gold with stars on the ceiling, was empty save two halberdiers at a door to her left. They were small men, no taller than her, but their upraised chins tried for more.

  She was at a loss, then. She had no intention of speaking to anyone in front of the countess. What she wanted was to know where the powerful people hid. She might catch one of them coming out. Not the queen, certainly, nor Cecil. They were far too frightening. But the other man Bess had mentioned – a new man – he would surely have time for her if she could make him listen, make him believe. He might listen to her worries that a priest was coming to Court – and she would have to explain also why she had left the post she’d been given as the Scottish queen’s executioner.

  ‘You cold?’ She started, before realising that one of the guards was speaking to his fellow.

  ‘A bit. It’s them bloody grooms, lazy bastards. Ain’t never bringin’ up logs.’

  ‘Go and get some.’

  ‘You go and get some!’

  Amy took advantage of their argument to wander into the room unnoticed, pretending that she was examining tapestries, hoping to blend into them. The black-and-white tiled floor was sanded, presumably to stop dancers slipping, and she let stepped lightly. On the same side of the room as the door into the audience chamber was a recess that led to a narrow spiral staircase. She recognised it immediately as a service entrance. When the dancing got hot, people like her could slip up unnoticed and pass around refreshments. She ducked inside and drew her back up against the undressed stone wall. She let time tick past, losing track of it. Eventually she heard the guards shuffle and poked her head out. She jerked it back a fraction as she saw Bess move past them. She was alone, and she paused for a second in the dancing hall before drawing her hand up to her brow and lowering her head. For a moment her shoulders slumped in what looked like defeat and then, overcoming it, she gave her steadying nod and departed.

  But the others had not come out.

  Amy swallowed. She had wasted her time. They all probably had some private means for leaving – there would surely be a private exit from the audience chamber. And now she would have to invent some excuse for having wandered away from their apartments. Then the door opened again, and she drew breath. The halberdiers fell to their knees and Amy had a brief impression of peach and cream, a cloud of vivid red surmounting it. Queen Elizabeth walked out of the chamber, a woman fussing at her back.

  She knew she should pull back into the stairwell, avert her eyes, hide, but there was something fascinating about seeing the famous woman. Elizabeth paused, her head swivelling above a high ruffled collar as she made an irritated noise at her attendant. As she did so, her black eyes, glittering currants, rested briefly on Amy’s. Widened a fraction. Moved on. Then she turned again and left the chamber, a ship in full sail.

  So that was the great Elizabeth. Rather long faced, but her forehead was high and prominent, her nose long and thin. Handsome rather than beautiful – she had none of Queen Mary’s sweetness, but a dollop more intensity about her. The guards barely had time to rise before the door opened again and two men emerged, one grey-bearded and the other solemn and, Amy thought, rather handsome. Both had rolls of paper under their arms.

  Amy moved out into the dancing hall. ‘Sir,’ she cried, her voice coming out in a strangulated whisper. ‘Sir, may I please speak with you? Please.’

  ‘What’s this, Sir William?’ asked the handsome man. ‘A mistress telling tales?’

  ‘I’m busy, Francis,’ said the older man, his eyes widening in bemusement. ‘If our friend in France writes you, come straight to me. Now, see what she wants and send her on her way.’

  ***

  Jack’s eyes rolled over the wooden shopfronts and tenement houses of London Bridge. The usual gallimaufry of languages rose to his ears. Foreign visitors always thronged the bridge, eager to gape at the sight of the rotting heads and picked-clean skulls of the famous. The stories had spread far and wide since the days of the old king, Henry VIII. Yet even the eagle-eyed were bound to be disappointed. Queen Elizabeth was a merciful woman and the visitors often had to make do with a cold cut of pie, indifferent ale, and maggoty apples from crooked vendors. There were no heads on spikes. Would Norfolk’s, Jack wondered, become one of them?

  They had left Tutbury days before and headed directly for London. It was only after two days’ hard ride that Heydon realised their error. Though the roads east and south were busy with messengers, none had had any word of the countess of Shrewsbury. She must, they realised too late, have led her group on a more direct southerly course, making straight for Windsor Castle. The news seemed to bother Heydon immensely. He had grown short with Jack, scolding and snapping at him to move himself, to whip his horse.

  Distant church bells announced the time. Late morning. Jack and Heydon separated, the latter going off to do what he would only describe as ‘transacting business’. Seizing some time alone, Jack wandered the bridge. It was here that he had been supposed to shoot at Elizabeth. He looked up at the houses. Jagged, thatched things, crooked, overhanging the water. Little alleys ran between some of them and he edged through the crowd, slipping in bits of sludgy muck that the recent rain seemed to have sloughed off the roofs.

  There was no railing. At the end of the alley the side of the bridge simply dropped off into a whirling brown-and-grey void. Below him some hardy men were straining a wherry’s oars, fighting the rapids. They had no passenger, and the grunting and boasting rose to meet him. A man in a leather apron joined him. ‘Christ Jesus, they’re going for it, those lads!’ Leather apron held out a crust of bread and Jack took it, smiling his appreciation.

  ‘They’ll make it, and no mistake,’ he said between swallows.

  Below, the oarsmen crested a ripple of water and surged forward, into safe water. Cheers went up from other wherries and boats that had stopped to watch their vaunting. Caps were thrown in the air. Leather apron took off his, a flat brown thing, and waved it. Feeling silly, Jack did the same. It felt good, to be part of a crowd of people with nothing on their minds but the day’s pleasure and foolery. The boat continued on its way, and the others got back to their business of ferrying passengers too. Leather apron clapped him on the back. ‘They made it, by Christ. Brave bastards, them.’ He wandered away and Jack kept staring into the water. He imagined what might have happened if they hadn’t. They would be sucked under, the water forcing its way up their noses and down their throats. No one would try and help, not seriously, for fear that they would meet the same fate. Hardy men like them, of course, might make a swim for it, their muscles straining. But women, pampered people in padded clothing – they would sink to the bottom in minutes, fear crippling them.

  It was wrong. The image was tinged by a visceral sense of wrongness that gnawed at him. If you believe in nothing you fall for anything, he thought. He believed now - he believed that killing Elizabeth – and maybe others – was wrong. A wrong thing to do. He clung to the growing sense of wrongness not, he told himself, because he was a coward, but because it was his. He felt it. He owned it. It was something he believed in all by himself.

  ‘Though I’d lost you, mate.’

  Jack turned to see Heydon. Under one arm was a long, thin brown chest, made of some lightweight material. ‘Not easy. Lots of fellows around asking questions. Seeing if there are any strangers in town.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Cecil’s men.’
r />   ‘I can’t do it, Philip.’ Jack’s eyes were fixed on the box.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I can’t do it. I’m sorry. I won’t do it.’ He thought to lighten the mood. ‘I mean, I couldn’t hit a cow’s arse with a lute, anyway.’ His friend gave a ghost of a smile. ‘I … I’ll find some other way to … to God’s grace.’

  He braced himself for the storm. He had never seen Heydon mad – frustrated, yes, as he often was in recent days – but never truly angry. To his surprise, his friend smiled. ‘Don’t worry, mate. God won’t ask us more than we can do in our conscience. But you’ll be there if I should act? To give me strength and pray awhile with me? We are – I mean, we are brothers, aren’t we, in our fashion?’

  ‘I’ll go with you. But I pray you think of some better path. You don’t have to do this either. It’s … it’s…’

  ‘It’s God’s will. And the…’ He looked around again. ‘The Holy Father won’t be long in making it known. You’ll come with me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. We can ride once we pass along bankside. It’s really in train now, mate.’

  They left the alley, recovered their horses from the hitching post, and walked them into a cacophonous fury of animals rearing in different directions, curses, and whip-cracks.

  ***

  Amy kept wanting to laugh as she spoke. It was absurd, but she couldn’t seem to control the maddening itch that jerked at her cheeks. Jack’s awkward grins made sense suddenly. Her husband must have been a nervous lad all the time.

  The handsome man, Mr Walsingham, had led her to a corner of the dancing hall. ‘And I didn’t know who to speak to,’ she babbled.

  ‘Suppose you tell me what ails you, mistress.’ Walsingham’s voice was cool but not unkind. October sunlight fell on them from a recessed window. Outside it was just possible to make out moving figures below, tiny and insignificant.