Palmer indicated that he was to help himself. ‘But the news is good, I hear,’ he said amiably. ‘You may soon be released.’
‘And not before time,’ declared Bishop warmly. ‘His incarceration is illegal, immoral and all O’Neill’s fault – he told terrible lies about the Major, just because he is my friend.’
‘It does not matter,’ said the Major listlessly. ‘But promises have been made, and I hope they will be kept. I have certainly fulfilled my end of the bargain – at great personal risk, I might add. It is dangerous being taken to White Hall when there are rumours of assassins at large.’
‘What will you do when you are released?’ asked Bishop. ‘Produce pamphlets outlining the wicked injustices you have endured?’
The Major smiled thinly again. ‘No, I shall go home to Norfolk, and spend my time writing tracts that urge peaceful solutions to our country’s problems.’
‘I do not blame you for wanting to escape London,’ sighed Palmer. ‘When this war with the Dutch is over, I shall take up my new appointment in Rome, and I will never return here either.’
‘Both my dear friends will leave?’ cried Bishop in dismay. ‘But what shall I do without you?’
‘You will manage,’ said Palmer, with an indulgent grin. ‘Just as you have done since the Major was thrown in the Tower and I went to Venice. And there are always letters.’
‘But that means using the Post Office,’ said Bishop, following the Major to the table. The dog, scenting food, began to bark, an irritating yip that hurt the ears. ‘And I would sooner die. Incidentally, did you hear about Knight? He was an honest man, and unlikely to have been guilty of corruption. O’Neill is probably behind those false charges, too.’
‘Speaking of the Post Office, that explosion was a terrible business,’ said le Notre. Chaloner was glad the subject had been raised; it would spare him a jaunt to the Tower.
‘I imagine O’Neill arranged it,’ said Bishop immediately. ‘To win sympathy, so that folk will not complain about his ineptitude as Postmaster.’
‘It is certainly possible,’ said the Major, nodding slowly. ‘He is not a very nice man.’
‘Do you have any other suspects?’ asked Chaloner hopefully.
‘I am afraid not,’ came the disappointing reply. ‘Although I hope we never see its like again. I was with Clarendon in White Hall when it happened. Five dead, poor souls. My family motto is nil admirari, but I was amazed by that, and not pleasantly so either.’
‘I was so close that I was blown off my feet,’ added Palmer. His expression was bleak; the experience continued to haunt him. ‘I would have been killed if someone had not yelled a warning.’
Bishop kissed his dog’s head. ‘She knew something was amiss, because she started to whine. It encouraged me to leave, and so I was on Dowgate Hill when the cart went up. I returned when the smoke had cleared, though, to inspect the aftermath.’
‘I was visiting my friend Storey,’ said le Notre. ‘He lives next door.’
‘Were you?’ asked Chaloner innocently. ‘He told me he was out.’
‘Did I say Storey?’ Le Notre gave a careless wave of his hand. ‘You must forgive my poor English. I meant to say Wood. He was not in either, but his footman gave me permission to wait in his parlour. I heard the bang, although I did not see the explosion.’
Chaloner nodded, but le Notre’s ‘poor’ English did not explain why he should have used the wrong name. There was something oddly disturbing about the Frenchman, and Chaloner could not help but wonder what was his real purpose in London.
Many people were prepared to put aside personal, political and religious differences for the sake of music. Chaloner was one of them, and although he thought Bishop a buffoon and he was deeply suspicious of le Notre, he forgot their shortcomings when Palmer produced a chest of viols. The instruments had been made in Milan, so the quality of the craftsmanship was exquisite.
They played airs by Rognoni and Ferrabosco, because Palmer had acquired a taste for them while in Venice. He was an excellent violist, while le Notre bowed with a careless panache that matched his character. The Major was technically sound, but his performance was mechanical and devoid of passion; Chaloner suspected he would be a better musician if he was a happier man. Bishop was by far the weakest of the quintet, at least in part because he allowed his dog to distract him. Chaloner was on the verge of running the thing through when Palmer finally suggested that Bishop might like to listen for a while.
The music immediately improved, and Chaloner soon became lost in it. Thus he was startled when the Major set down his bow, and said he should return to the Tower. It was well past nine, and he was bound by his curfew. Chaloner could not believe the time had passed so quickly.
‘When did you say your book will be published?’ le Notre asked Palmer as they repacked the instruments in their boxes. ‘Rational and sensible though it is sure to be, it will still set London alight, and I must remember to stay in that day.’
‘I aim to calm troubled waters, not stir them up,’ objected Palmer in alarm.
‘Of course you do,’ said le Notre. ‘However, it will take more than a few pages to soothe London’s apprentices. They gather to mutter on every street corner these days. Perhaps that is why the comet is here – to warn us of looming riots and mayhem.’
‘Lord!’ muttered Bishop, hugging his dog so fiercely that it yelped. ‘I hope you are wrong.’
‘Will your treatise address the fact that the King should not have the wherewithal to dispense with Lent?’ asked le Notre, and suddenly there was no humour in his eyes and his French accent was considerably less marked.
‘Lord, is that the time?’ blurted Palmer. The King might have made a cuckold of him, but he was still unwilling to indulge in treasonous talk, even with friends. ‘We must see you away, Major, or you will be late. I shall summon your yeomen.’ He virtually ran from the room.
‘How do you know Palmer?’ asked Chaloner, after the nobleman had gone. Le Notre he could understand – they would have met at Court – but Bishop and the Major were unusual acquaintances.
‘Through a shared love of fine art,’ replied Bishop. ‘And good music.’
‘And I met him when we conspired to assassinate Cromwell and he provided me with a handgun,’ added the Major. ‘Unfortunately, Spymaster Thurloe arrested me before I could use it.’
‘Is there a political leader you have not taken against, Major?’ asked le Notre. ‘You opposed the old King so fiercely that you are rumoured to be his executioner; you plotted to kill Cromwell; and now you are in the Tower for annoying the current regime. Does no one please you?’
‘Not really,’ replied the Major with quiet dignity. ‘They are all as bad as each other.’
Chaloner was inclined to agree. Then Bishop’s dog made a bid for escape, forcing its loving owner to scamper after it, and le Notre went to advise him on how best to catch it. Chaloner used the opportunity to corner the Major alone.
‘I was hoping we would meet,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Clarendon wants to know whether you have any new information about the Post Office.’
The Major regarded him uneasily. ‘If I did, I should tell him myself. Besides, Gery is in charge of that investigation, not you, and I took an oath not to discuss the matter with anyone else. Gery terrifies me, and I dare not risk his displeasure by speaking out of turn.’
Chaloner proceeded with his questions anyway. ‘Why did the postal clerks in the Foreign Office decide to talk to you, specifically?’
‘They do not talk to me,’ replied the Major, although he was obviously uneasy discussing the matter. ‘They write. And they confide because they trust me to handle the information in a way that will not endanger them.’
Chaloner regarded him thoughtfully. ‘Your freedom depends on a successful outcome to the Post Office business, but Gery is not up to the task. You may never have what you want, regardless of the risks you are taking with your own life and those of your friends.’
> The Major closed his eyes despairingly. ‘Do you think I do not know that? Gery and Clarendon decline to listen to all I tell them, and only take note of the parts that catch their interest. I am horribly afraid that they are concentrating on a minor matter when a bigger one may be brewing.’
‘What bigger one?’
‘I cannot say.’ The Major’s face was white. ‘I told you: they made me promise that any information I gleaned would be shared only with them.’
‘I am in the Earl’s household,’ argued Chaloner. ‘I am one of them.’
‘You are not! You are regarded with just as much wary hostility as I am – I have heard Gery rail about your Parliamentarian past.’ The Major’s voice was bitter. ‘It is all that stupid Wood’s fault. He could have passed my message to anyone, so why did he have to pick Clarendon? I never wanted to be in this vile position.’
‘Not even if it means a chance of freedom?’
The Major managed a smile. ‘That is the only thing that keeps me sane. But please to do not ask me any more. I dare not give Clarendon a reason to be angry with me, because he will use it as an excuse to renege on our agreement. You see, by setting me free, he is essentially acknowledging that my imprisonment is illegal, and he hates admitting that he is wrong.’
Bishop had caught his dog, and Chaloner could hear Palmer returning with the yeomen. There was not much time left. ‘You are a patriotic man – you must be, or you would not have brought the matter to the attention of the authorities in the first place – so surely you can see that preventing trouble is more important than some vow you were forced to take? Or even than your freedom?’
The Major looked wretched. ‘I know, and I am sorry. But I will die if I do not leave the Tower soon. I do not expect you to understand.’
Chaloner did understand, and sympathised more than the Major would ever know. He started to ask more, but the guards had arrived, and the Major took the opportunity to scurry away. His hand was on the door knob when there was an explosion of smashing glass.
Chapter 6
Chaloner dived to the floor, his first thought that another gunpowder-loaded cart had ignited. But there was no ear-shattering blast, and when a second crash followed the first he realised that the sound came from stones being lobbed through the windows from the street outside.
‘What is it?’ shrieked Bishop, shielding his dog with his arms. It was barking wildly.
‘It must be a mob,’ replied le Notre. He had taken refuge behind a cabinet, and did not seem as alarmed as Chaloner thought he should be. ‘Or apprentices. But why pick on this house?’
‘Because I am Catholic,’ explained Palmer. He swallowed hard. ‘Or because my wife is …’
Chaloner leapt to his feet and darted through the house to the back, where he found a door that led to one of the churchyards. It did not take him many moments to creep around to Thames Street, where he saw that a crowd had indeed gathered to hurl rocks at Palmer’s house. It was too dark to see what they were wearing, so he could not tell whether they were apprentices or just louts intent on mischief. He crept forward, past All Hallows the Great, then stopped in surprise.
A man was watching the attack from the safety of the church porch, his unnaturally white face gleaming eerily in the dark. It was Oxenbridge. He started to turn when he sensed someone behind him, so Chaloner leapt forward and grabbed him by the throat, pushing him back against the wall. There was enough light from Palmer’s house to illuminate the man’s button-black eyes, and Chaloner was reminded yet again of his sister’s unsettling doll.
‘What are you—’ he began, but Oxenbridge shoved him away with surprising strength, and suddenly there was a sword in his hand. Chaloner drew his own, then struggled to fend off the furious attack that followed.
Chaloner was not a fanciful man, but he was unsettled by Oxenbridge’s peculiar visage, and his disquiet hindered him in the ensuing struggle. By the time he had forced it to the back of his mind, the sound of clashing steel had alerted the stone-throwers. Oxenbridge’s lipless mouth curved into a grin when three blade-wielding men drove Chaloner into a corner, where they kept him pinned down so that Oxenbridge could strike what would certainly be a fatal blow.
‘Stop!’
The stentorian cry echoed along Thames Street, and Chaloner saw Palmer running towards them, rapier in hand. The Major, his yeomen, Bishop, the lapdog and large bevy of servants were at his heels, although there was no sign of le Notre. Oxenbridge issued a hiss of frustration when his men melted away into the dark churchyard. He followed, although not before he had fixed Chaloner with a look that made the hair stand up on the back of the spy’s neck.
Chaloner pulled himself together. Why was he allowing himself to be intimidated? Oxenbridge was just a man. He started to run after him, but someone grabbed his arm. It was Palmer.
‘No,’ the nobleman said softly. ‘You do not want to antagonise him.’
‘But he launched an attack on your house. He may do it again if—’
‘I shall report the incident to the proper authorities, and they can deal with it,’ said Palmer in the same quietly reasonable voice. ‘It is the sensible thing to do.’
‘There was a note attached to one of the stones,’ said the Major unsteadily. He gave a wan smile. ‘It seems the assault on your hapless glass was my fault.’
The message, written in bold black letters that could be made out even in the gloom, carried a grim warning. It read, The Major will die.
The encounter with Oxenbridge had unnerved Chaloner, and he did not feel like going home to Tothill Street, despite the fact that Hannah’s absence meant he could play his viol again. Instead, he walked to his rooms at Long Acre, which were closer – no mean consideration, given the plummeting temperatures.
Long Acre had once been fashionable, home to men such as Oliver Cromwell and John Pym, but it had turned seedy after the Restoration, and was now known for its taverns, brothels and an astonishing number of coach-makers. It was always busy, even at night, which suited Chaloner, as it meant he could blend in with the crowds, although it was often noisy and uninterrupted sleep was never guaranteed.
The house in which he rented rooms was four storeys high, and he had the attic. The old Parliamentarian named Stokes lodged on the floor below, and Chaloner glanced up at his window as he entered the building. A lamp burned as usual; Stokes had reached the age where sleep was elusive, and he often read well into the night.
Chaloner climbed the stairs, then wished he had gone to Tothill Street when he unlocked the door to find ice on the inside of the windows. He went to bed wrapped in blankets that were stiff with frost, but woke at midnight when a group of apprentices began bawling revolutionary songs in the tavern opposite. They were ones his company had sung during the wars, and the memories they evoked were mixed – camaraderie and pride, but also fear, grief and helplessness.
A rival band attempted to silence them, and a fight ensued. Chaloner went to the window when it spilled out into the road, and saw a pitched battle in progress, knives and sticks flashing in the dim light cast through the tavern door. Then he spotted a man with a faded blue hat and red cloak. It was the musician, lurking in a doorway as he watched the mêlée with unconcealed delight. Clad only in breeches and shirt, and with no weapons whatsoever, Chaloner charged down the stairs.
Unfortunately, the musician detected something amiss when a half-dressed man began to dodge through the mass of cudgels and blades towards him. He whipped around and disappeared down an alley. It took Chaloner several minutes to reach it, by which point his quarry was long gone. He searched for a while, but it was too dark, and he was not equipped for a lengthy chase.
He returned to Long Acre to find the brawl had escalated. He was punched once and kicked twice before he reached his door, only to discover that two drunks had taken refuge there. He shoved past, recognising them as patrons of the Antwerp Coffee House – they had been there the previous day when he had visited it with Dorislaus. He closed the
door behind him, but their voices were loud and he could not help but hear what they were saying.
‘This would not have happened in Cromwell’s day,’ one was declaring. ‘He knew how to keep order. Not like this licentious King.’
‘Mr Bankes will be keen to read an eye-witness account, though,’ slurred the other. ‘I shall write him one and leave it at the Antwerp. If he likes it, he will send me some money.’
‘Why would he be interested in a spat between two packs of hotheads?’ asked the other. ‘I thought he only wanted information about the Post Office.’
‘He appreciates stories about any aspect of London.’
‘You should be careful. We none of us know him, and he might transpire to be a Royalist. You do not want to be helping one of them.’
‘No, he will be a Roundhead, like us,’ predicted the other, ‘waiting for the revolution that will oust this corrupt regime. He might even be John Fry himself, come to lead us to victory. He sent me sixpence for my account of that villain Harper, you know.’
‘Harper? You do not want to tell tales about him, man! He might find out.’
‘I do not care. He is a venomous devil, and I do not want him in my city.’
The fighting eased at that point, and they took the opportunity to stagger away. His mind full of questions, Chaloner climbed the stairs to his attic. Who was Bankes, and why was he so intent on gathering information? Could he be John Fry? And was Harper really as dangerous as the two drunks seemed to think?
He turned his thoughts to the musician. The riot was the second violent incident at which he had been present. Was it coincidence, or had he played the revolutionary songs that had caused the skirmish? And had he run away because he had something to hide, or because most itinerants were wary of people who looked at them too hard?
Chaloner went back to bed, and woke as dawn revealed a cold, dismal world of frost and clouds. A familiar tapping on the roof told him that the red kites had assembled there, ready to swoop down on any carrion or rotting meat in the street below. These magnificent scavengers were a common sight in London, and he had often thought that they did more to keep the streets clean than the men who were paid to collect rubbish.
Death in St James's Park: 8 (Exploits of Thomas Chaloner) Page 16
