by Karen Brooks
Papa stared at me and, instead of answering, folded me in a crushing hug.
When I’d asked Mamma this question, she hit me so hard I fell against the furniture. My curiosity sent her into a flood of sobbing that lasted for days. Angela later explained that Mamma had thought I was referring to the babies she had lost and why she had outlived them all. I would never, ever have dreamed of asking the question if I’d thought Mamma would interpret it in such a manner. But my apologies fell on deaf and hostile ears.
Why was life so contradictory? Why were people? I wished for the hundredth time they could be placed in chests protected by locks that were only opened to fulfil a particular purpose. How much easier everything would be. Instead, we human beings were all jumbled together like a washerwoman’s laundry, impossible to separate, the dyes often running from one into the other, sometimes staining indelibly.
As I raised the pins in the lock one by one, wedging them in place with another piece of thin metal, the other tumblers clicked and the lid opened. I stood back as Papa lifted it, squinting slightly, sighing and grinding a knuckle into one eye. I opened my mouth to speak, then closed it again. The comfort of being able to discuss anything with my father, the closeness we’d once shared, was no longer available. I had to respect that. He would reveal his malady to me in his own time.
Much to my surprise, though I’d completed the task he’d given me, Papa didn’t ask me to leave. Instead, he gave me a couple of keys to file, and I made no effort to hide my delight. Thus I passed the last hour or so of daylight in the position I’d once occupied every afternoon: by my father’s side. In another part of the workshop, Kit tinkered with his master lock, while Matt and Samuel hammered freshly forged metal and Dickon was set to sweeping. Aware of their curious eyes, I bent to my task, basking in my father’s approval. I would not risk spoiling that for anything, not even to confirm what I was now certain was true — that Papa was losing his sight.
That afternoon set the pattern for the following weeks. I spent my waking hours between the parlour and the workshop, my routine broken only by another trip to the theatre (Caleb was brilliant as Gorboduc, though I thought his writing far superior to that of Sackville and Norton and told him so). Papa had me testing his locks and opening those of customers who’d either lost or damaged their keys. Twice I was summoned back to the workshop after dark and given much more complex locks to open. One evening it was a great sea chest that took up much of the space in front of Papa’s workbench. I laboured over it with my back pressed against a table. Another night, a leather cylinder containing rolled documents awaited my tools. Secured by multiple locks, it only required one to be unfastened to open the entirety. Problem was, if the wrong one was chosen, the cylinder would remain locked. Once I tripped the ward in the second lock, the rest unfastened. It was then I discovered that if the cylinder had been tampered with in any other way, a type of fluid that ate parchment (and potentially fingers) would have been released. Removing the sac of acid with the utmost care, I passed it to Papa, who took it outside for disposal. A man I’d never seen before and who, despite Papa’s protestations that he should wait in the shop, insisted on remaining by my side while I opened both the chest and, a week later, the cylinder, took the items away (the chest with the help of hired men) before I could see the contents. Somehow, I knew these things had been opened for Sir Francis. The locks were not English; the chest had travelled far, and apart from the scratches on the wood and the battered iron bands ringing it, smelled of not just the sea, but of adventures and danger as well. The cylinder was more sinister still. Along with the complicated locking mechanism, it was carved with strange markings. When I asked Papa if we were opening them at Sir Francis’s behest, he neither confirmed nor denied it. I wondered if the man observing would report to his master who was responsible for unlocking the items. For the sake of Papa’s pride and reputation, I hoped not.
Lulled into a false sense of security, allowing memories of Sir Francis and Papa’s request to recede, my days fell into a rhythm. As we spent more time together, Papa and I began to repair our tattered relationship. It wasn’t that we exchanged words or discussed what had happened, it was more that the silences became shared blankets in which we wrapped ourselves, content, able to predict each other’s needs, just as we had of old. Even the apprentices began to grow accustomed to my presence and would forget I was there and talk openly. I made no mention to Mamma of what I was doing. I knew she would disapprove. The way she maintained her distance when I greeted her every morn and asked for her blessing each evening, I believed her ignorant of the new arrangement.
The churning river slowed as ice clogged its currents and Christmastide approached. The house transformed, adorned in a kirtle of bay, rosemary, ivy and holly, their perfumes mingled with wood smoke and cinnamon from the kitchen. Carollers strolled the darkening streets, their candles guttering in the wind, their lanterns steady. Evenings became more companionable as Yuletide approached, replacing the urgency of working shortened days and the effect of this upon business. Everything moved at a different pace, like the lazy motion of cogs in a clock winding down. Legs of mutton and pork were delivered, as were extra ale, wine and spices so Mistress Pernel could work her magic. When Master Gib, our general help about the house, couldn’t be found, one had only to look in the kitchen, where he often sat sampling his wife’s brawn and pies. Likewise any of the apprentices, sent on an errand, would often amble back via the kitchen, lingering by the door hoping for a taste. It was so achingly familiar. Even Mamma’s indifference to preparations didn’t have the power to dull the occasion as it once did. Memories crowded my mind. Music, feasting, dancing, singing, all of us cramming into church, blessing the neighbours, and the sharing of wassails. There had been some good times over the years.
There had also been Mamma. I recalled her disregard for the lovely lock and intricate, delicate key I’d so carefully designed and Papa had crafted the Christmas before I left. Her disdain for my efforts still stung. How she always turned her cheek as I stooped to kiss her, muttering a half-hearted blessing. How she had excluded my name from her wassail, completely unaware of her omission until Papa sought to make good her mistake. Only, it was no mistake and all present knew … I’d simply fixed a smile to my lips and pretended the ache that ploughed my chest wasn’t there. The relief I felt when Mamma pleaded a megrim and retired to her room before the dancing was unbecoming in a child, and the resultant guilt staunched any joy I felt from her absence.
Then there were the two Christmases I spent with Raffe. Those memories were buried deep and I refused to allow them to surface. I was home. It was Yuletide.
Despite rumours of Catholic plots and King Philip of Spain planning a vast enterprise against the realm, especially now Portugal was within his grasp, the new year started peaceably. Within our household, murmurs of papists, recusants and those who would harm our sovereign or country were treated much like the fanciful stories I once read — as things that belonged only in the realm of the imagination or happened elsewhere. My fear of being sent away slowly faded, and I began to believe that this would be my life now — working with Papa, helping Caleb, running errands for Angela, exchanging gossip with Comfort, avoiding upsetting Mamma and becoming part of my family once again.
Thus, when the messenger pounded on the door in the second week of January with a note from Mister Secretary demanding Papa and I present ourselves at his house the following day, I was caught unawares and my heart, the organ I had sworn to cast out, quickened.
I’d been naught but a clay-witted fool.
PART TWO
An Exceptional Pupil
Between the years 1580 and 1590 England was exposed to a greater danger from Roman Catholicism and its adherents than it had ever been or ever was to be.
— Conyers Read, Sir Francis Walsingham, Volume II, 1925
Therefore, men have instilled in women the fear of infamy as a bridle to bind them as by force to this virtue, without which t
hey would truly be little esteemed; for the world finds no usefulness in women except the bearing of children.
— Baldassare Castiglione, The Book of The Courtier:
The Third Book, 1528
SEVEN
SEETHING LANE, LONDON
Friday the 13th of January, Anno Domini 1581
In the 23rd year of the reign of Elizabeth I
We left the house before the clock struck one the next day. Papa was dressed in his church best, while I wore my obligatory black, the wedding band tight on my finger, a thick cloak over my shoulders, my hood covering my coif. Kit was left in charge of the workshop and the apprentices given strict instructions. As we stepped from the shop onto Tower Street, Papa took my arm. I wrapped my hand around the sleeve of his doublet and drew succour from his woollen cloak brushing against me. It was almost like old times, except it wasn’t. When the note arrived, Papa had simply said Sir Francis may have found employ for me, I should dress well and be ready on time. I tried to ignore the questions buzzing like bees in my head and to concentrate on our walk, to register each and every step, reminding myself that though my nerves were afire, I wouldn’t allow them to show. Was I not embracing Castiglione’s mediocrita, the studied nonchalance that was my preferred state?
Grey clouds slumped above and frigid winds buffeted us as we tucked chins to chests and swerved around shallow banks of blackened snow. Caparisoned horsemen waded through the slurry and the Christmastide leavings overflowing the street’s central ditch, shouting at those in their way. A weariness infected the streets, despite the presence of scampering urchins and the occasional passage of a gentlewoman or well-dressed man. Not even the smells of baking and pottages bubbling or the grand facade of the Bakers’ Hall mitigated the gloom. In contrast to the day I first met Sir Francis, when everything had been bathed in gilded hues before the storm broke, today wore a patina of age and need.
Toothless women, some with frowsy children clutching their threadbare skirts, loitered at the entrance to Mark Lane. Men squatted with their backs against buildings, begging for groats, their filthy hands cupped in desperation, their faces pleading with passersby. Fumbling for a coin in the little purse that dangled from my wrist, I broke away from Papa and pressed one into a frail old man’s palm. His mumbled blessing was quickly lost in the clatter of cartwheels and barking dogs. A group of vendors trundled by, and as I rejoined Papa, he offered a smile.
‘Times like this, it’s as if naught has changed,’ he said, taking my hand again and patting it into place on his arm. ‘You were always kind, Mallory.’
I wished I could tell Papa that nothing had changed — that I hadn’t. But that would be a falsehood and we both knew it. The old Mallory, the cocky young girl with dreams and hopes and a stubborn belief in the milk of human kindness, was gone. As, I feared, was her goodwill towards men — with the exception of Papa and, of course, Caleb. Still, that Papa could say such a thing kindled a warming flame of gratitude within me.
It took less than half an hour to cover the distance to Sir Francis’s house, which lay at the top of the ridge in Seething Lane. Situated in the parish of St Olave, not far from the church of All Hallows Barking, but nearer the junction of Crouched Friars and Hart Street, it was an imposing residence. A corbelled house rising to three storeys with a steeply thatched roof, the lower section was half-timber, half red bricks laid in a diagonal pattern. The top two storeys were a combination of wood and white-washed daub and projected over each other, as if the entire house was peering with more inquisitiveness than was seemly upon the street directly below. There was glass in all the mullioned windows, and lush velvet curtains were partially drawn across them. The land accompanying the house was of healthy proportions and the bare spindly branches of trees stretched over the high wall that protected it. Beyond the wall, the roof of an imposing mews and a series of outhouses and stables could be seen. The area outside the house was swept clean, the snow pushed into mounds at the sides. The polished front door possessed a large, beautifully designed lock that at first glance appeared to be made in the Dutch manner. As we drew closer, I recognised the work around the escutcheon, a series of exotic flowers, the tendrils of which extended into branches that transformed into spirals and scrolls. The keyhole emerged from this, a cloverleaf in a metal garden that required a folding key to open it. It was lovely. It was also Papa’s craftsmanship. I glanced at him for confirmation. He gave a brief nod before rapping sharply on the wood.
Papa had been commissioned by Sir Francis to provide his locks and keys. How long had they known each other? What other projects might they have embarked upon together?
The nearby church bells began to toll the hour, the first note of a musical conversation that echoed over the city. From here I had a clear view to the Tower and to the Cage, a place of punishment where, even today, a wicked soul was slumped. The long shadow of the Tower’s high stone walls was accentuated by the dismal afternoon light. The houses that rested in darkness at its foot appeared to huddle together, as if against the cold. Above the walls loomed the grand White Tower, its colour not so much that of its name but rather the ashen pallor of the decaying heads on the spikes atop London Bridge. To the left of the fortress were open fields dotted with a peculiar mix of gibbets, stocks in which knaves languished, as well as laundry left spread over bushes to dry. Folk loitered, jeering and throwing rotten missiles at the captives in the stocks, while scavengers with ribbed dogs searched the fields for wild fruit, herbs and anything useful that may have been thrown among the piles of refuse teetering in the wasteland.
Overall, it was a sorry view to greet from one’s doorstep, and I wondered how Sir Francis and his family bore the daily reminders of misery, crime and hardship. Perchance they saw God’s will enacted via secular justice, but as I saw a fight break out among the scavengers, the notion fled. These men and women only fought to stave off hunger and fill their stomachs. Did necessity make them varlets?
The dull reverberation of bells hadn’t yet ceased when the door opened sharply and a man of some years ushered us in, locking the door behind us, the decorative folded key he used jangling against others tied to his waist. The hall was spacious, darkly panelled but also mercifully warm. A staircase dominated the far end, one arm ascending into the airy spaces above, the other descending into the shadowy ones below. Smells of lemon, orange and another fresh scent wafted in the air. Upon the wainscoting hung miscellaneous swords, a pike and halberd and a huge leather shield, as well as a coat of arms featuring a tiger’s head. Next to that was a portrait of the Queen, elegant in a huge ruff and heavily embroidered garment. Her deep-set dark eyes, so bold in her pale face, appeared to latch on to me, and I found myself drawn to her again and again, wondering in a fit of fancy if she could see me. Below her portrait hung that another of a woman whom I guessed might be Sir Francis’s wife. She stared at us too, her painted eyes blank, her smile fixed. She looked neither happy nor unhappy — much like the Queen. Fronds of dried ivy were stacked on top of a cabinet, and a bucket of pine-cones sat atop a stool — explaining the smell I was at first unable to identify.
From the rooms beyond came sounds of domesticity — the clash of pots, the excited bark of a dog and voices raised in conversation. There was a bright female laugh followed by a volley of coughs.
As we were led through the hall and into a corridor, I tried to get a sense of Sir Francis, his home and family, but the doors leading to other rooms were closed. The only sign of life aside from our silent guide was a large ginger cat that shot past, hackles raised. Papa and I were shuffled down some stairs, along another corridor, and ushered into a large windowless room filled with desks and tables piled with papers, scrolls and books. The walls were lined with cabinets and chests. The room contained at least a dozen men and was a veritable picture of activity. Two were engaged in an earnest conversation that ceased the moment we entered, before resuming. Quills scratched busily, papers were moved from one table to another, and candles burned — so man
y candles. The smell of lemon was strong, as was a bitter, pungent odour that may have been tallow. The air was thick with smoke. We were escorted swiftly through. I could not have described the men or their business, except to say it appeared urgent, important and cloaked in gloom.
At the end of the room was a door and after a smart knock we were bade to enter by a low, familiar voice. Our guide gave a small bow and indicated we should go in. With a tug of his doublet and a brief nod, Papa did so, and I followed.
Despite the numerous candles burning, the room was quite dark and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust. A figure rose from behind a large wooden desk. My chest constricted and I swallowed rapidly, sinking into a curtsey as Papa bowed beside me.
