True, it could have been aimed at the Earl and not at him; they had been close enough together. And Cumberland too had enemies, notably the Spanish and the French and probably some inherited Border feuds as well. But when Carey felt which way the bolt’s tail was pointing and traced the line of its flight across the stream, he thought it was at chest height where he had been standing in the moment he heard the trigger. Behind him had been a low wall and some bushes. Carey waded back across the pond as the wrestlers calmed themselves and started climbing out and drying themselves. Bets were being settled. He peered over the wall. The ground was soft but well printed with many feet and no way of telling among them.
“Or do you think it was you he was after?” The Earl was already on the bank, rubbing himself down with a linen towel. Carey shrugged and followed him, hoping to use the towel as well since he hadn’t brought one.
“I don’t know, my lord,” he said, blinking at the tree where the crossbow bolt was buried.
“Well, it wasn’t an accident, that’s sure,” Cumberland said, handing him the dank towel. “With a bolt that size, whoever shot it wasn’t after duck.”
Carey shivered suddenly but only because he was wet and the sun was setting. He rubbed himself briskly, finished, and pulled his shirt back on. Typically the Earl was now chuckling and shaking his head so his earring flashed.
“By God, Carell’s done ye some good. That was fast. Do you find a lot people trying to kill you at the moment, eh?”
“Well yes, my lord, I understand the Grahams have my head priced at £10 in Dumfries.”
Cumberland hooted. “Not nearly enough, the skinflints. I’ll tell ’em to put it up to £50 at least.”
“Your lordship is too kind,” Carey said smiling, although he still felt cold. That was far away on the Borders where he rarely went anywhere without a padded jack reinforced with steel plates on his back, and Dodd behind him. For God’s sake, this was Oxfordshire in fat, soft southern England. It wasn’t supposed to happen, whoever the assassin had been aiming at. And who the hell had tried it?
***
Emilia Bonnetti was dousing herself in expensive rosewater to clean herself as there were no such things as proper baths in this peasant bog. She knew how persnickety the old English Queen was and had an intricately smocked fresh shift to wear under her stays. Her beautiful crimson silk gown had been left in Ireland, alas, that goddamned hellhole of a country. No doubt some uncouth chieftain’s wife was wearing it now. Dante Aligheri was completely wrong: Hell was a green boggy place where the air was constantly damp from the equally constant rain and the people were charming, intelligent, sometimes remarkably good-looking but lethally unpredictable. Only God knew how near a thing it had been for herself and her husband; only she knew how nearly they had died.
She had borrowed a dancing gown from the wife of one of the musicians who probably made a very good thing out of it, seeing what the woman charged. The gown was tawny, which did not suit her colouring at all but would have to do as there was no choice. Her slippers were also borrowed, a different shade of tawny, and didn’t fit properly.
She was in a peasant’s main room, getting dressed with the few other women at Court who were neither ladies-in-waiting nor maids of honour; they were wives of lesser courtiers mainly. Maids of honour, pfui. Dishonour, more like. Emilia had heard of Raleigh’s proceedings with Bess Throckmorton and was shocked. She had been a virgin when she married and it had taken some work to stay intact when her cousins came calling. However, once you were legally married and had given your man an heir, it didn’t matter in the least what you did, in her view. Bonnetti himself was well aware of what she did and they often planned one of her campaigns together over a jug of their wine. On her part, she ignored his activities with chambermaids. They were excellent business partners. The wine made good profits when everything went well and the customers actually paid up; much more profitable was the trade in information. The barrels of goods and gold that went back to the Hague to pay for the wine would often have secret compartments with coded news in them from Signor Bonnetti to keep the stupid English Customs and Excise men and the pursuivants happy. Her own methods were better.
Tonight she had two quarries: one she had taken before, the tall chestnut-headed, disgracefully handsome cousin of the Queen, with his piercing blue eyes and his (she had to admit) quite polished manners. The other…well, she would have to be very careful not to actually catch that one or the whole plan would be ruined. She had only to wing him slightly, as it were.
Once that had happened…She pulled the corner of her eyes and carefully brushed on kohl to make them seem even darker. She never used belladonna for that purpose as she liked to be able to see what she was doing.
A lady’s tiring maid was sewing in place the unfashionable square neck and small lawn ruff that stood up awkwardly behind her head. Even the woman’s small attendance had cost her tuppence, for God’s sake.
Emilia’s hair was in an artful chignon—that had taken her hours to achieve—partly covered by a lacy little cap and her jaunty hat with a pheasant feather in it.
She had no pattens to protect her slippers from the mud, but Oxford’s men had laid old rush mats on the path to the large tent that covered the orchard. The English were good at that kind of artifice because of their miserable climate. That whole part of the village was already filling with brightly dressed people, though the candles weren’t lit yet. The banquet wasn’t set either but you could hear the musicians tuning up.
It certainly wasn’t time to arrive, so she retreated again and watched from the open horn window as the activity gradually built to a crescendo. She was watching for one man in particular, that chestnut-headed son of a king’s bastard, an espionage plum she meant to pluck.
Emilia bit her bottom lip and frowned. Every time she thought of him, her stomach fizzed like a firework with anger and…well, yes, with desire. She was far too old and experienced to imagine that she was feeling love, but Jesu, her brain stopped working properly every time she looked at him.
No. She must concentrate. She had two aims. One was to be introduced to the Earl of Essex and begin the delicate process of impressing, attracting, and befriending him. She didn’t know how much M. le deputé would want for that valuable connection—of course he hadn’t mentioned a price, was himself far too wily.
She had had to leave her best pearl necklace with the musician’s wife as a deposit and most of her bracelets and rings had been hocked either in Dublin or Oxford. At least she had her new gold and garnet necklace from George around her neck. Could she find something else Carey wanted? Perhaps? She hoped so.
Her fingers fumbled a little as she drew on her small kid gloves and pick up her fan. She had put extra red lead on her cheeks, knowing she would appear sallow in this goddamned tawny velvet that the pink and insipid Englishwomen liked so well. She had artless black ringlets escaping down her neck and a stylish hat…and she had herself.
And she would have Carey that night.
Saturday 16th September 1592, afternoon
Henry Dodd rode Whitesock and the mare into the main inn-yard at Bicester on Saturday afternoon and hired the luxury of a whole room to himself. He saw to his animals, ate steak and kidney pudding in the common room, and had a mug of aqua vitae to settle him for bed.
Then the barman looked sideways at him and asked, “Where’s your warrant, then what gets you half-price for booze?”
“Ah…” said Dodd, this being the first he’d heard of a warrant.
“Your horse has the Queen’s brand on him,” said the barman, frowning. “Stands to reason you’ve got a warrant unless you’ve prinked the pony.”
That sounded like something that meant “steal.” Dodd frowned back. “No, I haven’t.” And in his view, he hadn’t. He’d received the horse quite rightfully in the course of settling a dispute with the horse’s previous owner, but they might not look at things sensibly down here in the mysterious South where nobody spoke proper
ly or seemed to care what surname a man bore.
“Ay,” said Dodd, drinking his brandy, “Ah’m riding wi’ a message from ma Lady Hunsdon to her husband the Lord Chamberlain.”
Later he would remember the man sitting by the fire with a gaunt hawklike face and a wide-brimmed hat who looked up at that. At the time he didn’t properly notice.
“Hmm. Where are you from anyway?”
“Berwick,” lied Dodd on general principles. None of the soft Southrons had heard of Carlisle and there was nothing wrong with a little misdirection. Especially as he didn’t of course have any kind of warrant with him at all. For good measure he added, “I serve the Lord Chamberlain’s son, Sir Robert Carey.”
The barman was wiping the bar now, still not looking at him. Dodd smiled and lifted his mug to him, paid for his board and went upstairs. He was still dressed as a gentleman in a smart grey wool suit of Sir Robert Carey’s and he carried a sword, but nobody knew better than him that he was in fact, thank God, no kind of gentleman at all and never would be. He was a tenant farmer and Sergeant of Gilsland, in charge of one troop of the Carlisle guard, that was all.
By the South’s ridiculous way of looking at things, he had in fact stolen one of the Queen’s horses from the Queen’s vice chamberlain and he had no intention of explaining the circumstances to anyone at all until he had caught up with that bloody man Carey. He got into a bed that didn’t smell too bad and fell asleep instantly.
He woke in the darkest part of the night with the thought “Time to go,” ringing through his head.
He dressed quietly, getting better at putting on his complicated suit. Moonlight shone through the luxurious Southern panes of glass. Holding his boots, he went to the door, unbarred it, and found it had been locked on the outside.
“Och,” he said disgustedly and sat on the bed. No doubt there was someone sleeping on the other side of that door, waiting for him. Perhaps it was something to do with the damned warrant the barman had asked about. He went to the small glass window that opened onto the courtyard, which he knew had a gate that would also be locked at this time. The stables were directly below on this side of it, the kitchens on the other side. He needed at least one horse.
No help for it. Perhaps it was a pity to mess up the comfortable little room but there was really no help for it. From the moon’s position he thought he had a couple of hours until dawn so best to get started.
Softly he tapped the floorboards—too solid. Then he tapped the wall between him and the next room. Withies, lightly plastered. He hadn’t an axe but he did have a broadsword which he would now have to sharpen.
It took some strength and sweat to do it quietly, but he broke through the plaster low down behind the bed, smelling of where the bedbugs had their hiding places and then through the withies on his side, pulled them outward to a panicked exodus of creepy crawlies. The filling was only rubbish and then there were the withies for the wall on the other side. Working as quietly as he could, a giant rat up to no good, he weakened them with his sword and broke them, brought kindling over from beside the luxurious fireplace and built it up against them. Then he lit the tallow dip from the watchlight and lit the small bonfire. He had some aqua vitae left so he sprinkled it about around the fire to catch when it got hot enough.
He sat back on his haunches and watched the flames catch, enjoying the sight as always, the feeling of power as fire flowered where it shouldn’t, then caught himself and pulled on his boots, buckled his sadly blunted sword on his hip and picked up his hat.
The flames were climbing the wall and had gone partly through. He took the jack of ale left on the table and kicked through the wall bellowing “Fire! Fire!”
A fat man in his shirt and two boys sharing the trundle bed in the next room started up, all shouting with fright. Somebody further away took up the shout.
Dodd slung ale all around the fire, but not on it, kicked some more of the wall, put his hat on his head and ducked through the flaming hole he’d made into the next room where the fat man was desperately scrabbling on his breeches and trying to move his strong box. The two boys had already opened the door and run. Dodd went through onto the landing, found a big man lying across his door just waking up and kicked him twice in the cods.
Then he went back to the merchant. “Shall I help ye carry that, sir?” he asked politely, speaking as Southern as possible.
“Yes, yes…”
So he and the fat man in his breeks and shirt carefully carried the interestingly heavy locked box onto the landing, down the stairs crowded with other frightened customers, some of them in very fine velvets half put on.
He took the lead, elbowed through the throng, and helped carry the box out into the courtyard where there was a fine mizzle. It must have been dry recently for the thatch over his room was well alight now, billows of smoke going up and the rats coming out of the roof squeaking. The innkeeper was straining to open the big gates to let his neighbours in to help.
“Thank you, sir,” puffed the merchant, “If I may give you…”
“Nay sir, glad tae help, I must see after my horse now.”
Dodd slipped away from the man and went into the stables where a brave but stupid boy was trying to lead the horses out without blindfolding them first.
Dodd went to his own nag and put his hat across the beast’s eyes and put the bridle on. “See ye,” he said to the frightened boy struggling in the next stall with a rearing kicking mare, “Dinna let them see and they’ll let ye help them.”
The boy put his statute cap across the mare’s eyes and she started to calm down. Dodd got another bridle from the wall and put it over her head. He couldn’t bring himself to grab a different horse, seeing as how none of them was a patch on Whitesock. The boy had followed his advice and managed to bridle two more horses.
“Ah’ll take them out,” he said to the boy who was coughing hard and disappearing as the smoke filled the stable. “Just unhitch the others and drive ’em before ye, then stay out of the stables.”
The hayloft above was likely to catch soon and Dodd didn’t want the lad on his conscience as well. Then, slowly and gently, Dodd took four snorting horses through the door and out into the courtyard where he let all but Whitesock get away from him. They helpfully caused much more confusion there along with two hysterical dogs and an escaped pig, and disrupted the bucket chain. Bless the mare for her common sense; she headed straight for the open gate and he swung himself up on Whitesock shouting, “I’ll fetch her back!” and galloped straight out of the gate and up the road, leaving the other horses for dust and catching the mare’s reins as he passed her.
Two miles up the road in the darkness he could still see the glow of the fire and could hear no hooves behind him. He started to laugh then. Well, it was funny. Here in the South nobody seemed to have the least idea about anything. Imagine thinking that locking the door on him would stop him?
Saturday 16th September 1592, evening
Hughie’s ears were burning as Carey praised him for the work he’d done on that Court doublet. It had been a pleasure really; it was a lovely piece of work by a fine London tailor. It would be a pity to put a knife through it, and quite difficult as well because of the quadruple thickness, the heavy embroidery and pearls, the padding. So he wouldn’t do that.
Carey changed his shirt and left the other on the floor as he hopped about putting on his hose. Hughie helped him into the canions and trunkhose, held up by a waistcoat of damask. The doublet weighed many pounds, Carey went “ooff” and made a wry face as his shoulders took the weight, though he must be used to wearing a jack that weighed much more at about fifty pounds. Hughie then had to tie and retie the points at Carey’s back three or four times to get them at exactly the right length so that they held the doublet and trunkhose together but allowed him to dance. Carey took his long jewelled poinard, having left his workmanlike broadsword in the Cumberland armoury.
Hughie coughed. “Will Ah be attendin’ ye at the dancing, sir?�
�� he asked. He had brushed his woollen doublet and cannions, just in case. Carey’s answer was a swift critical glance, sweeping Hughie head to toe and somehow making him blush again. There was a curt nod. It seemed Hughie passed muster.
They walked with a herd of other gallantly overdressed young men to the orchard which was now a glowing palace, the fruit still left on the trees making a sweet fresh scent to battle with the rose-scented candles and the raucous smell of men and wine.
The musicians sat and stood in a corner on the new boards of the dance floor. They were playing loudly—it would be a noisy night as the boards creaked and thundered under the boots and slippers of the Court.
Of course all the local gentlefolk were there with their unmarried daughters and sisters—the women tricked out in as much costly splendour as the men or indeed more, wearing tokens of their dowries. They gathered in shy drifts near the banquet tables and the high stands of candles.
The Queen wasn’t there yet, nor were the great lords of her Court—the Earls of Essex, Oxford, Cumberland. Carey hesitated as he looked at the groups of henchmen and courtiers and then made some kind of decision, took up a place near the Earl of Essex’s men. He started talking to a man with a sharp Welsh face.
Hughie stood behind him near the canvas wall, watching carefully, wishing his Edinburgh doublet was better fashion since all the other servingmen were very fine in good wool or even velvets with brocade trim.
Many of Essex’s henchmen were in tangerine and white which suited nobody except the ones who were rosily ginger, and not really even them, Hughie thought critically.
They all waited, talking quietly while the music tinkled in the background, conducted by a short round man. Every so often he would pick up and play a different instrument.
Hughie jumped. Trumpets had sounded, the short man stood up and waved his arms, there was a rustle of tension, the sound of boots on boards. Hughie craned to see the red and gold livery of the Gentlemen Pensioners of Her Majesty’s Guard. They fanned out and stood by the entrances and by the carved wooden seat with an awning of brocade lions set at the end of the dance floor.
Air of Treason, An: A Sir Robert Carey Mystery (Sir Robert Carey Mysteries) Page 7
