Death by Disputation (A Francis Bacon Mystery Book 2)

by Anna Castle

  They looked at him blankly. He tried again. “My only prior experience in managing intelligence reports has been with my brother Anthony’s correspondence from France. We discuss all manner of subjects, including his health and his daily routine. But it’s only natural I should be concerned about his general well-being since he is my brother.”

  “I see,” Ben said. “But now you care about Tom. That seems natural to me as well, given your daily correspondence. Is it a problem?”

  “It affects the instructions I give him.” Francis paused. “Loneliness is the greatest hazard for a spy. He daren’t risk exposure, so he can never be entirely himself with anyone. I am now the only person to whom he can express himself freely. He needs me, you see, which creates an obligation.”

  “If you let him write to us,” Trumpet said, “that burden would be shared.”

  Francis had banned the friends from writing to keep Tom focused on his role. Ben had understood — Ben always did — but Trumpet chafed under the restriction, constantly wheedling for a peek at Tom’s letters.

  “He’s lucky to have so conscientious a master.” Ben’s expression was thoughtful as he poured more ale into his pipkin and grated nutmeg over it. He set the little pot closer to the fire and turned back to Francis. “How about a different metaphor? Tom is the worm with which you hope to catch your seditious fish. Are you afraid the trout will swim away with your bait? Or that the worm will wriggle off the hook and escape?”

  “That’s close,” Francis said. “I’m using a small fish to catch a larger one and fear mine will slip the hook and join the school, swimming happily away and forgetting all about his assignment.”

  “Wait a minute.” Trumpet swung his legs around to sit upright at the edge of the bed, spilling more ale in the process. “Are you suggesting Tom might become one of the people he was sent to investigate? That he might honestly become one of those narrow-minded Puritans?”

  “Yes,” Francis said. “I fear that is precisely what is happening.”

  “Impossible!” Trumpet waved the idea away with a flap of his hand. “Tom is as sound a middle-way man as anyone I’ve ever met. He doesn’t like politics, especially not the religious kind. Doctrinal disputes make his brains itch.”

  “I agree,” Ben said. “Tom hates dogmatic, self-righteous people. That’s partly why he agreed to this commission, you know. It wasn’t only for personal advancement.”

  “I know,” Francis said. “That’s to his credit. But neither of you appreciates the true character of a closely knit religious community. They can be warm and welcoming, folding the newcomer into their fellowship. Their close attention is flattering. They place themselves at odds with the rest of us — that’s what they like, that’s part of the appeal — so what we generally see is the scolding and the strictness. But inside the society, there is often great joy and a powerful sense of communion. It can be seductive.”

  The friends frowned at each other for a long moment, then shook their heads. Trumpet answered for both. “They wear brown, nothing but brown. A touch of dull black now and then. They don’t dance, they don’t wench, they don’t sit up late drinking, playing the lute, and singing bawdy songs. In short, they are nothing like our Tom. Nothing at all.”

  “He isn’t your Tom anymore,” Francis said. “At least I don’t think he is.”

  Their skeptical faces demanded proof. He had it in abundance. He leafed through the stack of letters he had put in order that morning, preparatory to this conversation. “I’ll show you some of the evidence. When Tom first went up to university, he sent back detailed descriptions of the men in the college: ages, family connections, who had which scholarship. Under my tutelage, he learned to catch the turns of phrase that reveal a man’s political leanings. He noted who was reading which books in the library, each Fellow’s major area of interest, which students were especially talented in which subjects.”

  “That sounds useful,” Ben said.

  “It is,” Francis said. “I now have an excellent sense of the persons and the life within the college.”

  “No doubt he also sent you details of what everyone wears, what everyone eats, who drinks how much of what, and who’s dallying with whom,” Trumpet said. “Tom’s a noticer; that’s not new.”

  “Indeed,” Francis said. “That habit is partly why we chose him. But his letters changed shortly after Easter.” He paused and flipped through a few pages to read a note or two. “He started sending bare lists without introduction or commentary.”

  “What sort of lists?” Ben asked.

  “Useful ones at first. The churches in Cambridgeshire, for example, with the names of their rectors. Lists of the men who attend his study groups and the colleges to which they belong. Lists of the tracts passed around in study groups with the names of their authors.”

  “He’s busy,” Trumpet said, rising to his feet and moving closer to the desk. Francis covered the letters with his hand and the boy stepped back. “He’s learned to be concise.”

  “Brevity is good, to a point,” Francis said. “He’s sending me masses of information, which it is my job to analyze. But lately his lists have taken a disturbing trend. Students who fell asleep during the divinity lecture. Men who remove their hats in church. Men who own more than one hat. Men he has met picking up letters at Hobson’s. Here’s a pair in two columns: ‘Men who were impressed that I lived in the Earl of Dorchester’s household’ and ‘Men who were not so impressed.’“

  Trumpet frowned. “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know,” Francis said.

  That startled them.

  “Here’s a diary of the times Tom took the Lord’s name in vain in the past week.”

  “What!” Ben looked troubled. “Tom loves cursing. He considers it a form of art.”

  “Not anymore.” Francis turned over another page. “Here’s a list of names paired with Biblical quotations, which I believe are judgments on the religious fidelity of the persons named.”

  “Biblical quotations?” Trumpet’s mouth twisted as if he’d bitten into an unripe fruit.

  Francis nodded. “Yes. Tom has turned his well-tuned intuition to the task of separating the sheep from the goats. He now sees everything in biblical terms.”

  “He’s playing a game,” Ben said. “He’s weary of his role and having a little fun with you.”

  “I wish I could believe that.” Francis took up the last letter. “This one consists entirely of two lines: Matthew 6:24 and Matthew 12:26.”

  Trumpet clucked his tongue. “What does that mean? I don’t know the Bible chapter and verse.”

  Francis, who had been schooled in the scriptures from infancy by his strict Calvinist mother, had not needed to look them up. “The first one is, ‘No man can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will hold to the one and despise the other.’“

  “Who does he mean?” Ben asked. “Which is which?”

  “I don’t know. That’s what worries me. The second verse is even more troubling. ‘If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand?’“

  “Uh-oh,” Trumpet said.

  “Which one is Satan?” Ben asked. “You?”

  “I don’t know,” Francis said. “Me? My lord uncle? The seditioner? Possibly Tom himself. It may signify nothing. Perhaps he had nothing else to report that day.”

  “No,” Trumpet said. “Then he would write, ‘Sorry, nothing to report.’ And add a joke or a sonnet to fill out the page. He wouldn’t send Bible verses.”

  “I agree,” Ben said. “The old Tom didn’t know the Bible well enough to play such games. Why did he choose those two verses, do you think?”

  “The first one clearly refers to himself,” Francis said. “He’s the one serving two masters: me, or more accurately, my lord uncle, and the religious zealots whose trust he must win. If one of us is right, the other must be wrong. In order to be faithful to a government which must seem very
remote, he must deceive the good folk with whom he spends his days, talking, sharing meals, singing psalms. Such communities can be all-embracing. I believe he hates me, sometimes, for seeking their destruction.”

  “That’s not what you seek,” Ben said. “You’re trying to protect them.”

  “He sometimes loses sight of that distinction. In the second verse, I believe he sees himself as Satan, striving to cast out a fellow demon.”

  “That’s mad!” Trumpet cried. “Thomas Clarady cannot possibly believe he’s the devil!”

  Francis held out a pacifying palm. “I don’t mean he thinks he is possessed. He uses the reference metaphorically. He means that he, a member of the godly community, must destroy the said community in order to save it. He’s talking about betrayal. He may have meant to quote Matthew 24:10: ‘And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.’“

  “That sounds sad,” Ben said, “but I find it less troublesome.” He rose to collect their empty mugs and returned to his stool. “Tom is unhappy about his deceptive role; that’s good. I’d be more worried if he weren’t. Perhaps the quotes are a way of displaying his new knowledge, to impress you with how hard he’s working.”

  Francis said, “I hadn’t thought of it from that perspective. Perhaps they were studying Matthew last Tuesday and those verses gave him a compact way of expressing his distaste for his duplicity.” He pinched the pleats in the ruff on his left wrist while he reconsidered the last few letters in this fresh light. “It fits. It’s cleverer than Tom’s usual —”

  “Have you both taken leave of your senses?” Trumpet began to pace the room from door to window and back again. “If Tom wanted to express anguish, he would write, ‘I feel anguished.’ He might try to turn it into a badly rhymed poem, but he would not send Bible verses.” He stopped in front of Francis’s desk and stabbed his finger at the stack of letters. “Those later lists are completely out of character, and that last letter is disturbing and strange. How can you let him think of himself as Satan?”

  Francis leaned back in his father’s oversized chair, even though there were two feet of polished oak between him and the angry lad. “You are blissfully ignorant of the centerpiece of Puritan devotion, Trumpington: the close examination of one’s own inner being. Every misstep, however slight, every lapse of prayerfulness, must be confessed and repented before your peers. That’s what study groups do, in addition to detailed analyses of biblical texts. Tom spends a substantial portion of his days knee-to-knee with his fellow devouts, the Good Book open on their laps. He’s expected to be ruthless in his self-examination, stinting nothing. Yet all the while he must conceal the monstrous truth that he joined that candid and welcoming society with the intention of exposing their leader and breaking them apart.”

  “That’s horrible.” Trumpet frowned while he absorbed this revelation. “I didn’t realize it would be so hard. It’s as if he were wearing a disguise, like a boy actor dressed as a woman, but here the audience is allowed to prod and peer inside his doublet during his performance.”

  Ben busied himself measuring ale into their mugs.

  “That’s an odd analogy,” Francis said, “but yes, I suppose it is something like that.”

  A silence fell, broken only by the pat of Trumpet’s footsteps on the rush matting as he resumed his pacing, this time with his hands behind his back. After a few minutes, he stopped again in front of Francis’s desk. “You should bring him home for a few days. Easter term ends next week. We’ll go to the theater, do some shopping on the Bridge. We’ll take him to his favorite brothel. That’ll bring him back to his old self!”

  “That’s a good idea,” Ben said. “It would give you a chance to speak with him in person as well. Surely that would be useful at this stage.”

  “Not useful enough.” Francis thought about another stack of letters, at Burghley House on his uncle’s desk. “We cannot afford the delay. Tom’s commission has ramifications spreading far beyond Cambridgeshire. My lord uncle is bracing for reprisals from King Philip if Drake succeeds in his raid on Cadiz. The drumbeat of threats from Spain grows louder every day. Our Lords Lieutenant have been advised to look to their counties’ defensive capabilities. And yet only last week we learned of a skirmish in Suffolk between Puritan preachers and the bishop’s officers that resulted in many able-bodied men being clapped in the local gaol.”

  “Where in West Suffolk?” Ben’s family was seated in that county.

  “Bury St. Edmunds and environs. Villages have been split in two by these zealots. They’re calling for actual separation from the established Church. They think the Catholic threat was extinguished with the execution of Mary Stuart and want to push the Reformation forward. But Catholics on the Continent and at home are more desperate than ever. Between them, they’ll tear our country to pieces, dainty morsels for Spain to swallow up.”

  Trumpet slapped his hand on the desk, making Francis jump. “Those things are hypothetical. Potential, not actual. Tom’s peril is real and immediate. He’s losing his mind. Can’t you see that? Tom despises those people. He doesn’t want to become one of them; he wants to stop them.”

  “Quite so,” Francis said. “And in order to stop them, he has to become one of them.”

  The friends fell silent again, their faces drawn with distaste.

  “Can’t you bring him home, even for a few days?” Ben asked.

  Francis held up his hands in appeal. “Absence would give the leader time to reflect on Tom’s involvement with the group. And Tom would lose the rhythm of his deceits and be more likely to slip. He might even lose the trust he has won through much pain and effort. Time grows short; we cannot afford such a setback.”

  “So you’re going to leave him there,” Trumpet said. “Let him flounder.” He folded his arms and glared across the desk.

  “Worse than that, I think.” Ben shook his head. “You’re going to push him farther in, aren’t you? Regardless of the harm it may do him.”

  Francis met their stony faces with resignation. He’d hoped for their approval. Now he wondered if he would be able to earn their forgiveness. It would seem the spymaster’s job could be as lonely as the spy’s.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Clarady:

  You have been chosen to excise the cancerous gall gnawing at the body of our Church. “Make speed, haste, stay not.” 1 Samuel 20:37-39. Press harder to gain admittance to the inner circle. Show them they can trust you. Join in their demonstrations of faith.

  From Gray’s Inn, 2 May 1587

  Fra. Bacon

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Thomas Clarady walked along the hedgerow on a perfect day in early May, a bounce in his step and a smile on his lips. The sky was as blue as a Wingfield’s eyes and the breeze was sweet with the scents of growing grass and apple blossoms. He breathed deeply, glad to get beyond the stink of the town and stretch his legs.

  Today was the last of the Rogation Days, when rural parishes went out together to walk their bounds. Before the invention of legal documents, people confirmed property boundaries by going out as a group to make sure the markers — posts, stones, and trees — had not been moved by storms or greedy landlords. The ancient practice still made sense; sometimes lawyers had to call upon ancient memories to supplement gaps in manor accounts.

  Tom remembered racing the other boys in his Dorset parish to be first to stand on the boundary rock and get himself whisked with the willow branch. The custom was meant to fix the boundary in the boy’s mind. Mostly it just gave you a chance to show off.

  No such prinkum-prankums went on today. The children from Sawston parish, whose fields they circled, were subdued, even a little glum. Their parents marched doggedly along with scowls of irritation on their sunburnt faces. They owed their collective ill humor to the presence of Parson Wingfield, who had brought his entire flock from Babraham to admonish the people of Sawston for their superstitious practices.

  The two parallel proce
ssions paced beside a rock wall topped with pink stonecrop and snow white saxifrage. The flutes and horns and drums of the Sawstonites competed against the psalm-chanting of the Babrahamers, punctuated by the rhythmic preaching of Parson Wingfield’s booming voice. They came to a stop at a juncture marked by a well-weathered post. The rector of Sawston’s church pronounced his words, speaking quickly as if to get the thing over with.

  “Listen to that Romish pretender,” Steadfast said, speaking loudly enough to be heard by the Sawstonites. “Burbling Latin gibberish at the crops to make them grow.”

  Tom laughed out loud but cut himself off with a quick glance at his companion. He’d grown accustomed to the Puritans’ capacity for blatant rudeness but still wasn’t sure when they were joking. They didn’t do it often.

  Steadfast’s lips quirked. Tom had gotten it right this time. He stored up the phrase “burbling gibberish” for his next report. He’d gotten the sense lately that Mr. Bacon believed he had genuinely converted to the Puritan creed; proof of the success of his performance and as good as actual praise, which he would never expect from his exacting spymaster.

  The role grew easier as the weeks went by and his new community drew him ever closer to its bosom. He’d proved his loyalty in public several times now. Last week, he, Steadfast, and three other godly lads had snuck out at midnight to cut down the maypole in Little Shelford. Afterward, they’d gone on to Babraham for a late breakfast in the parson’s home. Abstinence had served him hot bread and fresh butter with her own two hands, first among the rest.

  Today, he’d spent most of the morning walking with the Wingfield boys, Steadfast, Diligence, and Resolved. Like them, he’d kept his eyes on the parson, his favorite candidate for chief seditioner. Parson Wingfield was a hot one; a hot as they came. He made no bones about his disdain for the Book of Common Prayer and the rituals of the established Church, trusting his congregation to follow his lead. And follow they did. He brought the whole congregation — and himself — to tears of pure religious passion by preaching from the depths of his own heart. His message was seductive, if not quite literally subversive.