Will Shadwell really regrets he could not do more. Like stay alive. Do you know how many die to keep you informed, you Scottish runt?
'Aye,' replied the King, belching delicately into an ornately ruffed sleeve. 'Yet tell me, Sir Henry, why are you alone of my subjects not beating a path to my door requesting favour? We do not see you at court, Henry Gresham. I see no letters from you pleading for advancement.'
The King was rumoured to despise those who did not come to him begging. The endless requests he received — and granted — for largesse were flattering to his soul, confirmation of his power.
Oh God, why I do get into these conversations!
'Sire, it is true I have done work for your State and Kingdom…'
Well, everyone's State, if the truth be known — but truth and Kingship ne'er did sit easily side by side.
'… which work has been its own reward.'
Well, that was true enough. It had to be, of necessity, for the likes of
Gresham. The miserable bastards Walsingham, Burghley and Cecil had not paid for so much as a horseshoe.
'It is also work that has needed little advertisement, and perhaps been best done quietly and discreetly. As for advancement, Fate has been kind to me. I have what I need to be content.'
'Would that the rest of my subjects felt so!' exclaimed James, sipping at the wine in the jewel-encrusted goblet he held in his hand. It was difficult to know if his enthusiasm was genuine or counterfeit.'His hand was fine, white, delicate, Gresham noticed.
'May I say more, Your Majesty?'
'Aye,' replied the King, gazing at Gresham from under hooded lids, 'you may indeed, man.' The Scottish accent had become more marked. The Scottish Court was rumoured to be far more informal than the English Court, and James exchanged words with his servants as well as his courtiers at mealtimes.
'It is in the nature of Kingship for the servant to ask of the master. Yet the good servant knows that the master who gives without being asked gives with twice the heart he might otherwise have done.'
And take that up your tight Scottish arse and do with it what you will.
King James I of All England, the first man in history to have had actual sovereignty over the two nations of Scotland and England, gazed speculatively at Gresham. This man is not drunk, thought Gresham, merely liberated by alcohol. Nor is he stupid. No, very far from stupid.
'I go shortly to Oxford. I must not offend by seeming to neglect the great University of Cambridge. Does Granville College have rooms fit for a King?'
'There is no room in the land fit for Your Majesty,' said Gresham, bowing low again.
You creeping little toad. When in Whitehall, do as the sycophants do… Yet Gresham was surprised to see a glint of humour in the King's eyes, recognising the ironic flattery for what it was.
'But certain, Your Highness, if such rooms do not exist now they will do so by the time Your Majesty grants us the honour of Your presence.'
'So be it.' The interview was ended, not impolitely. 'I shall visit you, Henry Gresham. You are near to my hunting lodge at Royston, are you not, in Cambridge? I bid you and your beautiful niece God speed and a safe journey home to your fine house on the Strand.'
Gresham let out a long breath as they emerged from the Great Hall.
'What was all that about?' asked a bemused Jane.
'I think he wants you as his mistress, and was just looking to see if you fitted the bill, so to speak,' said Gresham, and received a poke in the ribs for his pains. 'Mind you, looking at you now, it's probably the House he wants, as being more beautiful and certainly more valuable…'
‘I didn't like the sound of "your fine house on the Strand",' said Jane. 'It's ten to one he wants it for one of his stinking Lords.'
They mounted their barge and set off back to the House. The four men had drunk but were not drunk, Gresham was pleased to see. The river was a dangerous place at best of times, and in pitch dark with a fog it was more dangerous than ever. The torches set all round their boat gave each of the men a halo as the flickering light caught the moisture in the night air.
Jane curled up on to his shoulder, wrapped in a vast boat cloak. He looked fondly down on her dark head, and softly began to sing to her, a song by Tom Campion.
'Come you pretty fake-eyed wanton. Leave your pretty smiling. Think you to escape me now With slippery words beguiling…'
She turned her head to look up at him. 'I've no desire to escape, my Lord,' she said solemnly, 'unless you have truly novel plans for the remainder of this night.'
Gresham laughed softly, and then suddenly stopped.
The sound of fierce rowing came to them from somewhere very near on the river, regular, hard splashes in the water, even the sound of men exhaling hard, grunting with effort. Six, possibly eight men, rowing hard in the fog and yet with some skill, and showing no light — there was no missed stroke there, but a hard, regular and practised rhythm. Coming nearer, as far as the fog would allow noise and location to be identified.
Gresham stood and exchanged glances with Mannion. He nodded.
'Douse and arm! Douse and arm!' he hissed to his four men. He turned to Jane. 'Down, down! Into the middle of the boat. Crouch as low as you can, and cover yourself with the cloak.'
Other women would have screamed or asked fool questions. Jane merely nodded, and crouched down low in the boat's centre.
The boat moved gently, rocking in the swell.
Gresham's boat crew were well trained. A rich man's boat at night on the river was fair game to the river pirates, and Gresham's men had often needed to row him into situations where good manners mattered less than sharp blades and a stout heart. The torches at the prow, stern and sides were doused. The men set their oars at the rest position, and scrabbled in the central locker for the crossbows that were kept there, passing one apiece to Mannion and to Gresham. The crossbow was a good, one-shot weapon for the sort of engagement they might face. Once wound there was no need to draw the arm back to fire, merely a trigger to pull and release the short, lethal bolt. The trajectory was flat, ideal for short-range work, release was instant if the weapon was pre-wound, and it could then be discarded for the short boat axe that the lockers also carried. A sword was too long for the close work that fighting on a small deck required, a dagger too short. A heavy, double-sided short axe was ideal, allowing the fighter to carve his way through an enemy and knock aside, with a long knife in his other hand for really close work.
The men shipped the oars, silently, only a rustle of cloth and foot on board betraying their presence. The crossbows were well maintained, and wound without the infuriating screech that would have given them away. They drifted in silence, the fog and the darkness blinding them, the only sound the lapping of the water on the boat's hull. Both shores were too far away for what dim light might be showing there to penetrate the mist. If they kept this drifting up for too long they would be swept through, or more like smashed on to, the arches of London Bridge.
The enemy had given themselves away by stopping as soon as the torches had been doused. A nobleman hurrying home would have continued on his way. A large, expertly rowed craft showing no light and coming up from behind, and presumably marking them on their torches, that stopped when they did? It was after one thing: them.
Gresham motioned silently to Mannion to put over the tiller, sending them towards the Southwark bank and away from home. In the dark the other boat would have to move in one direction or another if it was to find its prey. Gresham, guessed the other boat would assume he would steer towards the left bank, not towards the darker and more uninhabited right bank.
He guessed wrongly. There was a sudden explosion of water and noise of rowers starting up. A large wooden prow appeared from nowhere out of the mist, smashing into their hull. Perhaps a sudden break in the mist had given their position away. Gresham would never know. A grapnel was flung over and stuck into their hull, and the eight men on the other boat made a mad rush to board.
He exu
lts in this, Jane thought, as the boats crashed together with a splintering blow. The deck lurched up beneath them. Gresham's head was flung back, and he swept up the crossbow with a roar almost of glee. Loosing its bolt, he flung it downwards and hurled himself with maniac force towards the enemy, sword upraised.
The attackers were at a disadvantage in that first moment. The torches had been doused long enough for Gresham's men to gain some night vision. The enemy had made a mistake by hitting them bow-on and not drawing up alongside. The bow of the other boat only allowed two men to stand and jump from their vessel on to the other craft. The crazy movement of both boats affected the attackers, who had to jump, more than it did Gresham's men. The enemy were silhouetted for a brief instant. One of Gresham's men, the youngest, fired high and wildly, but the other three bolts stung home in the flesh and bone of the first two attackers, sending one screaming backwards into the well of his own boat and the other into the river. Six remaining.
Gresham and Mannion held their fire for the briefest instant. The man who had fallen back into his boat caused the others coming behind to stumble momentarily while they found their feet in the rocking vessel. Gresham shot to the left, Mannion to the right. It was an old routine. One man died instantly, with the bolt through his neck. The other twisted at the last second and the bolt went through his right arm. Weakened, then, but not to be ignored.
Four remaining, with one wounded.
A blow from one of the boarders, who seemed to be wielding a mixture of clubs, swords and daggers, felled the youngest of Gresham's crewmen instantly, yet the unexpected crossbow fire had reversed the odds. A scything blow from Harry, who captained the barge, sent one of the boarders off into the river, another from young Will opened up another's face from left to right, slicing through the left eye and releasing a fountain of blood that appeared black against the white skin of the man's face.
Two left, with one wounded. The fight was over.
Mannion had not left his position in the stern. Gresham had moved down into the well of the boat, behind his men, standing over Jane. He felt rather than saw the slight tugging behind him, the deck moving in a different way beneath his feet. He swung round to see three bedraggled men hauling themselves out of the water from the side opposite the battle. Two of them were stumbling to their feet on the narrow deck, dripping water over the planks. The enemy had been cleverer than Gresham thought, and sent men round to the undefended side of the boat to catch them by surprise. The man with the bolt through his arm took courage when he saw his compatriots, and with a huge bellow lurched upright and hurled himself into Gresham's boat. It leaned viciously, dangerously under his weight.
Six boarders now to five defenders.
Gresham felt the battle lust come upon him. A red haze covered his vision. He lunged at one of the boarders who had not quite made it on to the deck. He twisted away, Gresham's axe landing where his wrists had been an instant before, but still held on. In making his move Gresham exposed himself to the man on his right, whose face suddenly took on the shape of a cross as a crossbow bolt penetrated his head from one side to another. His eyes crossed and an expression of total confusion came across his pock-marked face. 'Oh!' he said quietly, and sank to the deck. The man who Gresham had missed flipped over the hull and on to the deck, jumping to his feet.
Five boarders to five defenders.
Harry looked to have taken a broken arm, but was still swinging gamely with his left hand. Will and the other man were forcing their two remaining boarders back towards the bow. Mannion jumped down to join his master, throwing the crossbow he had reloaded to one side. Gresham made as to pull back for a mighty swing with his axe, saw the man opposite him start to lunge and bent aside, plunging his axe into the back of his head with a sickening thud as he fell past him.
Four attackers to five defenders.
Half turned, he saw a sight from Hell. The boat was bobbing erratically up and down, caught in the waves the battle had generated.
The enemy with the crossbow bolt in his arm was standing over the huddled bundle that was Jane, the boarding axe he had grabbed from the deck raised high above his head, a killing lust in his eyes. Blood from his wounded arm was falling, dripping into Jane's hair.
Slowly, so slowly, the arms went back over the man's head, as slowly, so slowly, Jane appeared to be bowing her head and scuffling about in her skirts. Slowly, so slowly, she flung up her beautiful head, and in her hands was a long, thin dagger of Spanish steel. Like a nun praying for an offering she clutched the dagger in both her hands and in supplication raised it to the man bending over her, thrusting it hard into his groin. His scream of dying agony ripped through the fog, brought even the fighting at the bow to a momentary halt with the animal scream of pure pain. The axe dropped to the deck, and the man toppled backwards, the dagger still inserted in his middle. Jane was clutching at the hilt like a drowning woman, sobbing with her own agony. She seemed unable to let go, and she toppled over with the man, ending lying on top of him in an awful parody of the beast with two backs.
Three attackers to five defenders, all forced now to the bow of the boat, all desperately fighting for their lives against Gresham, Mannion, Will, Jack and the wounded Harry.
In one fluid movement Gresham turned and hurled his axe forward into the forehead of the man in front of him. It clove his head near in half.
The remaining two men looked at their struck companion and dropped their weapons, raising their hands, looking beseechingly into the eyes of Gresham.
'Kill them,' said Gresham.
More screams rang out above the water.
Gresham turned to Jane. Very gently he rolled her off the corpse of the man she had killed, ignoring the frantic sobs that were shaking her whole body. Very gently he prised her fingers from off the hilt of the blood-soaked dagger, the blood already drying and sticking to both their hands. As she let go of the dagger, the man's head lolled back, mouth gaping, revealing his bare neck.
A string of beads, rosary beads, lay on the sweated hair between shoulder and neck.
Gresham placed an arm under her shoulder and picked her up in his arms, carrying her to the rear platform where only a short while earlier they had sat in so much state. The other boat still clung to them, the grapnel holding. It had splintered a V-shape in their side, above the water line, and the boats screeched as if in pain as the broken and exposed wood of both vessels rubbed against each other.
Jane was shivering as well as shaking, great racking sobs heaving through her whole body. He said nothing, as yet. He knew what was to come. Her eyes were wide, startled, endlessly moving in her head. They rested for a brief moment on the man she had killed, his head flung back in the agonised rictus of a shrieking death, the hilt of the dagger still sticking up into the night air like some awful erection.
He held her as she vomited over the side, her meal floating away silently downstream. The vomiting noises continued long after she had emptied her stomach.
'Why?' She turned to him, finally. 'Why?'
He did not answer, merely held her closer as Mannion and the others set about finding where they were and towing the other boat home.
Why, indeed.
Why was he being hunted on the river? Why was life a string of so many squalid little agonies, always ending in death, the smell of fresh blood?
He had the answer to neither question. As for the last question, it had been asked of humankind for all eternity, with no answer that he could believe.
He held Jane in his arms, mourning the death of innocence.
Chapter 5
Gresham had lain awake during the night, his whole body tensed with anger. There were few tears left in him, and he shed none that anyone could have seen.
He knew what life was. Two thirds of a woman's children could be swept off from life before they were months old, whilst ague, palsy and the plague could bite into the wealthiest and poorest households alike with no warning. There was only one answer. Live, whilst there was l
ife. Fight the powers that condemned men and women to know the truth of their prison yet have no means of escape. Laugh in the face of the fragility of existence.
Yet the tide of despair had swung down on him, as he had known it would, and engulfed him. The dark of the night flowed into his mind and extinguished all light. The mood came on him rarely, but when it did it threatened all that he was. He felt the pulse beating through his body, felt how frail was a human's hold on life, knew how easily the pressure of that pulse could be let out from its prison by the deftest and gentlest wielding of the knife or dagger. As the blood pounded through his head, causing an agonising pain to throb behind his eyes, the temptation to release the pressure with the sharp cleansing point of metal became almost unbearable. It was as if his blood was prisoner inside his body, screaming and pummelling to get out, as the sailors trapped between decks on the Maria had screamed and punched at the unyielding timbers in their frenzy to escape. No more pressure, no more pounding, no more pain. Release. Yet he was a coward, he told himself as he stared sightless into the dark. 'Conscience doth make cowards of us all..That man Shakespeare had it right, damn him.
His own innocence had died long since, and his survival was a matter of pride rather than of necessity. He had known in his heart that a new dawning and a first sight of the night would come to Jane, as it came to all thinking people, and that the black edge of despair would tear at her soul. The knowledge that it would come did not lessen the pain of its arrival. She had killed a man, and such a thing killed a part of the person who did the act. There was no other way. It was the way of life to demand death. So at least he would meet Jane in Hell. Yet he had reluctantly decided before the events of the previous night that any Heaven without Jane might as well be Hell for him.
He had put Jane to bed, and then gone to an old, battered chest that nowadays he rarely had cause to open. Among its contents was a bottle of a reddish fluid. The smell of it hit him as he opened it, and in a second he was back in his cot in the Lowlands, crying for the blessed liquid that would ease his pain and send him back into the numbed, drowsy state that was his only escape from suffering. The physik had been supplied by an ancient orderly. Gresham knew neither its origins nor its contents, but years later he had gone to one of the most secret and successful apothecaries in all London and described the colour, smell and taste of the physik, as well as its effect on a ravaged body and mind. The apothecary had nodded, gone to a back room and emerged with a small vial.
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