His Dark Lady

by Victoria Lamb

  ‘Flay me alive rather, but do not say …’ Will belched loudly, fell silent for a moment, then stumbled forward and beat on the door with his fists. ‘Love!’

  One of her neighbours’ wives called out, ‘For Christ’s sake, let the drunken fool in or tell him to go on his way!’

  ‘Why would you not marry me? Tell me the truth now, while you are too drunk to lie.’ The words slipped out before Lucy could stop them. She stared down at him. ‘Was I not good enough for you?’

  He fell back from the door, one arm raised across his face. ‘Do not ask me that. You must not ask.’

  Slamming the shutters, Lucy climbed back into her narrow cot and sat there in the darkness. So this was what her life had become. Long nights of fear. The prospect of ruination. An unmarried woman with a child in her belly was as good as dead in this city without a protector. What was she to do? She turned the dagger over in her hands, running a finger along the blade. It was temptingly sharp, a deadly instrument she had been taught to use as a child. A swift cut of the throat and there would be silence. Yet since she was neither a murderer nor a coward, after a few moments Lucy tucked the dagger under her pillow again and tried to settle herself to sleep.

  Will called out her name a few more times before weaving away into the night.

  Twelve

  ‘I AM SICK of this house,’ Ballard complained, then waited in impatient silence until Pooley’s housekeeper had carried away the remains of their breakfast trenchers. Despite the sunny August morning, it was dim inside the low-ceilinged room, and a fire had been lit so they could more closely study the maps and plans laid out on the table. ‘We do nothing here but discuss old letters and wait for a propitious moment that never comes. Meanwhile the summer lengthens and our allies beg for news. When can we move against the Queen?’

  ‘When we are sure of the promised support from Spain and the Duke of Guise,’ Goodluck reminded him drily.

  He walked to the window of Pooley’s front parlour and stood there, hands behind his back, gazing out at the busy London street.

  ‘The dispatch of Queen Elizabeth is not our only concern,’ Goodluck continued, covertly studying each man who passed by the window. ‘Happy though her end would be, we cannot risk achieving it before our preparations for invasion are complete. After her death, we can expect half the country to rebel against Mary seizing the throne. Any rebellion will need to be put down by forces loyal to the Catholic cause, which have been promised by the Spanish King but only in the vaguest terms. I would rather have some solid confirmation from the Spanish before we move ahead with the assassination of the Queen. Talking of which, has anyone heard back yet from Mendoza?’

  His view of the street was restricted, and often blocked by passers-by. Nonetheless, Goodluck watched discreetly for signs that the house was under observation. But if it was, the agents watching them were either highly skilled or else secreted away in one of the houses opposite, for Goodluck never saw so much as a shadow out of place. Indeed, the street looked much as it had done every day since they had arrived there roughly three nights before.

  Carts rumbled past in the sunshine, each time narrowly missing a shrieking gang of ragamuffins playing tag in the street. Traders called out their wares at the market corner a short distance from the house, many standing in the cool of overhanging houses or under their own makeshift shades as noon approached. Two pretty young whores wandered past with their skirts raised above the filth, showing their ankles above their clogs. Only once did a passer-by strike Goodluck as suspicious, but although the man had paused as though to check his purse for change, glancing over his shoulder at Pooley’s house as he did so, he moved on swiftly, and Goodluck had not yet seen him return. There was certainly no indication that his message to Walsingham, giving the location of the house and the names of the conspirators within, had ever been received.

  ‘Anthony sent several letters to the French ambassador last month, while visiting his family home in Staffordshire. But he should have heard back by now, I agree.’ Ballard sounded impatient. ‘I begin to fear Mendoza’s reply may have gone up to Staffordshire and not his London house.’

  Seated at the head of the table, Pooley sighed and shook his head. ‘Gentlemen, this business is a mess.’

  ‘But all is not yet lost,’ Goodluck reassured him, turning from the window. ‘Let us be patient until the worst of the summer’s heat recedes. For myself, I find it no surprise that Mendoza has not yet written with news of the Spanish fleet. It is only August. The courts of Europe will be empty until the autumn, and all the nobles will be at their country estates. No army marches at the height of the summer, and without the army on board, the Spanish fleet will not set sail.’

  Pooley seemed much struck by the truth of this statement. He nodded vigorously in Goodluck’s direction, though without meeting his gaze. He had barely looked at Goodluck since the incident with the orange-seller. But perhaps Pooley had seen nothing suspicious. Just a man buying an orange on a hot evening.

  ‘Brother Weatherley is right, of course,’ Pooley agreed, referring to Goodluck by the priestly name he used when with the conspirators. ‘Foolish of us not to think of that.’

  Ballard stared. ‘You think we have come to London too soon? That we should wait until September?’

  ‘It’s frustrating,’ Goodluck commented, ‘yet what else can we do but wait without further guidance from Paris or Rome? Unless you would have us strike too soon and lose all advantage after the Queen’s death?’

  ‘I would have the Queen safely executed and her cousin Mary installed on the throne before we lose the few allies we have. I have heard nothing but complaints from those men who so stoutly set their names to this letter back in June,’ Ballard said, picking up the sheet on the table before him and reading it aloud. ‘Robert Barnwell, John Charnock, Henry Dunne, Charles Pilney, Edward Jones, Robert Gage, and so on. These are men who have pledged their lives and fortunes to this cause, and who now ask why we delay so long.’ He sounded bitter. ‘And where is Anthony this morning? Is he not well?’

  Pooley looked up from his contemplation of the fire. ‘He is still in bed, with a headache. He will join us as soon as it is cleared.’

  ‘Oh yes, God forbid any of us should be called upon to rebel against the state with a headache!’ Ballard muttered angrily, then sat up with a start as someone hammered on the front door. ‘Who the hell can that be? Pooley, are you expecting anyone this morning?’

  Pooley had hurried to the window and was staring out. He whirled around, his eyes wide with terror.

  ‘Five men, with papers in their hands. Queen’s guards too, armed with pikes. They have come to arrest us.’

  Ballard was already on his feet. He drew the dagger from his belt, a look of consternation on his face as one of the men at the door called out, ‘Open up, in the name of the Queen!’

  Pooley’s servant came to the parlour door, clearly terrified, and asked in a quavering voice what he should do. But Pooley merely shook his head and stared out of the window again, his wits apparently wandering. The hammering stopped, then they heard a series of loud thuds as the men outside attempted to force the heavy oaken door.

  ‘Some bastard has betrayed us!’ Ballard swore, and looked from Pooley to Goodluck, then up at the ceiling in disbelief, as if wondering whether Babington himself had alerted the authorities to their presence there.

  Goodluck stood with his back to the wall and waited, carefully not drawing his own dagger. To be arrested with as little fuss as possible was his aim, and then to ask privately for Walsingham once he was apart from the other men. It might prove useful to still seem an ally to the conspirators even after this arrest, for some of the others might need to be smoked out of hiding with cunning and false friendship rather than brute force.

  If only he had the paper about his person that Walsingham had given him, to be handed over in the event of his arrest! That would have made his mind easier. But that secret paper was sewn into the lining of his
old cloak hanging in the chamber above. He had intended to retrieve it before now, but had not been left alone long enough over the past few days.

  They heard the crash as the oak door to the house finally gave way. Sweat on his forehead, Ballard gathered together the incriminating maps and documents, including the letter with its list of names, and thrust them into the fire. Then he turned to face the parlour door, dagger in hand.

  Goodluck saw the resolute determination in Ballard’s eyes and realized that the Catholic priest intended to make a fight of it. A brave man, then. Perhaps the bravest of them all, and steadfast in his faith. Watching him, Goodluck almost hoped the priest would die here, for the agonizing death that must await Ballard and his friends on the scaffold was too horrible to be contemplated.

  One of the guards kicked open the door to the parlour and levelled his pike at Ballard. ‘They’re here, sirs,’ he called over his shoulder.

  Walsingham’s men came trooping in and ordered them to be taken away at once. ‘Master Ballard to Seething Lane, the others and their servants to the Tower to await questioning,’ the leader announced.

  So Ballard was to be given a chance to betray his friends before being acquainted with the horrors of the Tower, Goodluck thought wryly. Though he doubted that Ballard was the kind of man who would avail himself of such clemency, for he would know that death awaited him either way, even if he escaped the torture chamber.

  Goodluck recognized none of the five men who had come to arrest them, and reconciled himself to an uncomfortable few hours until he could prove his identity.

  There was a brief, undignified scuffle between Ballard and several of the guards, then the priest was overpowered and forced to his knees. While his hands were being secured behind his back, one of the men began reading out the warrants for their arrests, ‘In the name of Her Majesty the Queen.’ Two men approached Goodluck with drawn daggers, looking at him speculatively, for he was a large man and could have made their lives difficult if he had chosen to resist. But he shrugged, gave his name as ‘Brother Weatherley’, and allowed them to bind his wrists behind his back without comment, and once this had been done, followed the bound Pooley and Ballard from the room.

  ‘Here’s another still in his nightshirt,’ called one of the guards from the top of the stairs, producing a frightened-looking Anthony Babington with bare legs and untidy hair, clearly just dragged from his bed.

  The men below laughed, except the leader, who asked, ‘What is his name?’

  ‘Anthony Babington, so he says,’ the guard replied.

  The leader consulted the parchment in his hand, then shook his head. ‘Send the sluggard back to bed and tell him this is his lucky day. There is no Babington upon the warrant.’ He waved the others out into the street. ‘Come on, or you will miss the tide with these traitors. Convey them to the Tower. I shall escort Master Ballard to Seething Lane myself.’

  ‘Sir, if I could just fetch my cloak from upstairs,’ Goodluck began outside, addressing the leader, but one of the guards hit him across the back of the head with his pike and Goodluck fell heavily to the ground, unable to save himself.

  ‘Shut your mouth, Catholic!’ the guard insisted, striking him across the back for good measure. ‘You’ll not need a cloak where you’re going.’ His fellows laughed, jeering as Goodluck stumbled clumsily to his feet again, his hands still bound. ‘Now let Jackson pull you up on to the cart. The tide was already on the turn when we left the river.’

  But Goodluck had frozen, staring across the street in disbelief. In the shade of a doorway stood a familiar figure. His cap was pulled low over his face, his beard dyed bright ginger and tweaked to a point like a young man’s, and his arm was about the waist of a buxom whore, her cheap gown mussed as though the two had been kissing there in the street.

  To a casual observer, he would look like any young Londoner with money to spend.

  But it was John Twist, all right. Goodluck would have known him anywhere.

  As he watched, John nodded openly to the leader of Walsingham’s men, then slouched away down the street with his whore, not even looking at Goodluck.

  ‘Are you deaf?’ the guard demanded, and cracked him about the head again. ‘Up on the cart with you!’

  ‘Babington!’ Standing in the other cart, his hands now secured to the wooden frame, Ballard was shouting hoarsely up at the shuttered windows of Pooley’s house. ‘Show yourself, you coward! How could you betray your friends like this?’

  Not surprisingly, Ballard seemed to believe that young Anthony Babington had given away their location, for he alone of their number had not been arrested. But Goodluck knew it was more likely to have been his note to the orange-seller the other night that had brought about their arrest. Though why Babington had been spared, he could not understand. Unless Walsingham had struck some kind of deal with the young man?

  The cart into which Goodluck had been dragged started off with a jerk. He fell to the floor and stayed there this time, staring up at the timbered façades of houses in dazzling sunshine as the cart began to rumble down towards the river. Pooley knelt beside him, praying under his breath with remarkable composure for a man almost certainly facing a hideous death. Two of Pooley’s servants were pushed in behind them, loudly protesting their innocence and calling on their master to exonerate them. But he continued to pray, raising his eyes to the other cart as Ballard was driven in the opposite direction.

  Why had John Twist been at Pooley’s house for their arrest, and what secret dealings did he have with the leader of Walsingham’s men?

  John had not looked at him. But it was impossible that he had not recognized Goodluck. So what was he up to? If Twist had thought Goodluck dead before, he certainly knew that to be a lie now.

  Perhaps that was why John had been there, he thought, and for the first time felt a twinge of fear. What better way to do away with a troublesome rival than to deliver him up to the state as a traitor?

  Soon Goodluck could smell the river, such a powerful and familiar smell that he made the effort to kneel up and peer through the poles of the cart. As the road descended bumpily to the quay, he caught glimpses of the River Thames between houses, flecked with tiny scum-whitened waves in the mid-channel, a thick bluish-black along the mudbanks, dotted with boats and rafts constantly crossing between the north and south.

  A small boat awaited them at the jetty, a rough-looking skiff but handled with skill through the fast-flowing currents and eddies between the bridge supports. Chucking pitch-blackened barrels from boat to boat, the watermen glanced up curiously as they passed, their distinctive round-bottomed Thames skiffs tied up along the many quays and bankside jetties between Whitefriars and the Tower. Country visitors crossing the great bridge at Southwark peered over to see the boat pass by with its cargo of liveried guards, gentlemen and prisoners on their way to the threatening mass of the Tower of London.

  Taken in through the water-gate and up the steps, Goodluck was relieved to find himself separated from Pooley and his servants. Perhaps his true identity was known to the guards, after all?

  ‘This way,’ a gruff voice told him, and he was prodded through a narrow corridor in the darkness, then down a short flight of steps into the bowels of the Tower.

  Hearing the soul-wrenching cries and groans from cells to either side of the corridor, Goodluck knew instantly where he was. His blood ran cold and he came to a halt, turning to look at the guard behind him.

  ‘Sir,’ he said earnestly, ‘I am no traitor but one of Sir Francis Walsingham’s own men. My name is not Brother Weatherley but Master Goodluck. If you would allow me to write him a note, I am sure Sir Francis will confirm this before the end of the day.’

  The guard laughed and pushed him on with the sharp point of his pike. ‘I like your wit, fellow. But it will avail you nothing. The other who came in with you already asked the same and was granted his freedom, for his name was on the list. Yours was not, so walk!’

  ‘My name is Master Goodluck.�
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  ‘Not on the list,’ the guard repeated and shoved him between the shoulder blades. ‘Next door on the left.’

  Turning into the torchlit room, Goodluck came face to face with a man whose dark, weasel-like face he instantly recognized.

  Richard Topcliffe!

  He had never met the famous torturer before. But Goodluck had frequently seen him on execution days, watching the grisly deaths of traitors and applauding with undisguised relish when their genitals were hacked off – the prisoner often still alive and writhing in agony – and held up bleeding to the crowd.

  Topcliffe was standing by a brazier, untying a bloodstained leather apron from about his waist. He glanced at Goodluck, then spoke briefly to the guard over his shoulder. ‘He’ll be too heavy for the bar. Better strip him and put him in the chair instead.’ Throwing the soiled apron aside, he washed his hands fastidiously in a deep copper water bowl, then wiped them on a square of white linen. ‘I need the privy. Watch him until I return.’

  ‘Aye, Master Topcliffe,’ the guard muttered, awed terror in his voice.

  Goodluck heard Topcliffe leave the room and knew with a sudden cold clarity that he had only moments in which to save himself. It might be too late to avoid torture, but there was still a chance he could live through this if he acted swiftly enough.

  His numb wrists had been unfastened. Now he was stripped naked and forced to sit in a high-backed chair, his neck and forearms manacled so he could not move.

  ‘Sir,’ he murmured as the guard secured him in place, ‘I do not ask anything which might put you in poor standing with Master Topcliffe. But in a secret pocket in my left shoe is a small jewel. I beg you to take that jewel in return for your good service, and to carry a message to a friend for me.’

  Breathing hard, sweat on his forehead, the man glanced over his shoulder at the open cell door. He was clearly terrified of Topcliffe, but crouched to examine Goodluck’s discarded shoe nonetheless.