by M. J. Trow
‘El Comendador?’ Carey repeated. ‘That means commander in our language, does it not? Where are the rest of you?’ he asked sharply. ‘Where is the Armada?’
The caballero stood to his full height, feeling rather ashamed now at having thrown his sword away. ‘Coming,’ he said proudly. ‘They are all coming. And God is sailing with us.’
Carey snorted and there were sniggers from the Militia. ‘Yes, yes,’ the governor said. ‘Very colourful. Where are your ships exactly and what are you doing here?’
‘José de Medrano,’ the man repeated. ‘Capitan El Comendador.’
Carey nodded. ‘So that’s how it’s going to be. Sergeant Wilson!’ The man stepped forward. ‘You were handy when we removed the lawyer. Prove your worth now and tie this rabble together. This one,’ he prodded the young caballero with his boot, ‘is to be tied behind my horse and they are all to be taken to the Bridewell at Newport. The warden will complain but you will give him this –’ he unhooked his chain of office from around his neck – ‘and if he still complains you will be so good as to run him through. Am I clear?’
‘Perfectly, sir,’ Wilson said. He had already set fire to a lawyer; ramming his halberd through the ribs of a gaoler should not be difficult.
‘Gentlemen.’ Carey wheeled his horse to face his Militia. ‘I want twenty of you who know one end of a ship from another. The rest of you will march back to Newport under the sergeant here. Those men,’ he waved at the Spaniards, ‘are prisoners of war. Any man who abuses them will have to answer to me. But before you go.’ He looked around at the shacks and the debris thrown on to the beach, as though a city had suddenly decamped during the night. ‘I want this place burned to the ground.’
Christopher Marlowe was wandering around the mansion in mounting confusion. There seemed to be very few people about. Usually at this time in the morning it was hard to hear yourself think for all of the yelling and clashing of metal from the Militia camp just outside the walls, but today it was silent. An odd drift of smoke still curled lazily up from their cooking fires, but as he squinted into the weak sun he could see only a few women moving desultorily about. Tom Sledd was outside still working on the stage for the Masque. It was almost finished now and rehearsals, such as they were, could begin within the week, or so he said. He was to start auditioning singers and musicians soon and Marlowe made a mental note to be elsewhere, especially when the hautboys were doing their stuff. They really set his teeth on edge. But apart from Tom and the odd servant, the mansion seemed deserted.
He wandered outside and was about to call to Tom, who was moodily kicking a flat depicting a formal garden, with exaggerated perspective disappearing in an impossible dot on the fake horizon, and then saw Martin Carey scurrying across the courtyard with a ledger under his arm and a rather haunted expression on his face.
‘Martin!’ Marlowe called and the comptroller jumped as though shot.
‘Oh, I’m sorry, Master Marlowe,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see you there. I must get these books to balance, if I can. There seems to be some discrepancy …’
‘Never mind a few missing angels,’ Marlowe said. ‘Where are all the people? The Militia? Sir George?’
‘I believe they have gone to attack Mead Hole,’ Martin said as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
‘What?’ Marlowe was appalled. ‘It will be a bloodbath, surely?’
‘Sir George is certainly rather annoyed,’ the man replied. ‘I hear that Avis told him last night of the atrocities they wrought on young Thomas over there and for him it was the last straw. He mustered the Militia and off they went, at dawn.’
‘I didn’t hear them,’ Marlowe muttered.
‘They were enjoined by Sir George to be quiet, or so I understand.’ Martin Carey was keeping a weather eye out for Avis Carey, who was reputed to be on the warpath this morning, crazed with worry for Georgie.
Tom Sledd had ambled over and now put in his groatsworth.
‘One of the carpenters sent word a few moments ago,’ he said. ‘He heard from his wife’s brother’s neighbour’s lad that the Militia went marching off in fine fettle in the early hours and that some of them have been seen on the path through Quarrels Copse, wherever that might be, making their way back to Newport.’
‘Casualties?’ Marlowe asked.
‘Couldn’t tell, apparently,’ Sledd said, fingering his chin carefully. ‘I would imagine so, wouldn’t you?’
Marlowe thought fast. ‘Tom, stay here. Martin, come with me. We must get to John Vaughan as fast as we can. If there is anyone who can stop this madness, it is him.’
Martin Carey hefted the ledger in his arms. ‘I must make …’
‘The books balance. I know,’ Marlowe said, grabbing it from him and throwing it at Tom Sledd. ‘But sometimes, believe it or not, Master Martin, there are things more valuable than money.’
And, with incomprehension at the concept written all over his face, Martin allowed himself to be dragged off to the stables.
Tom juggled briefly with the heavy book, tapping the pages straight, and carried it up the seventy-one steps to the keep, counting and cursing all the way, to Martin’s inky eyrie against the battlements.
Marlowe and Martin Carey said little on their canter down the hill. The comptroller pulled his horse back all the time, making it slip and slide. Marlowe, giving his its head, had a much less painful ride and ended up at the quay a few minutes before the other animal even made an appearance. It was not hard for the money man to find the poet; he could hear him shouting several streets away.
When he actually came within sight of him, Marlowe had Page’s manservant up against a wall, the man’s collar twisted in his fist, and he was shouting in his face. ‘I said, where is he? Where is John Vaughan?’
The servant, turning an unattractive shade of blue, waved his hands and gurgled incoherently.
Master Martin touched Marlowe’s arm. ‘Let him go,’ he said. ‘You’ll throttle him if you are not careful.’
Marlowe gave the man a contemptuous look but let go of the servant’s collar and he collapsed on the floor, coughing and holding his throat. ‘I was merely trying to find out what has happened to your uncle,’ he pointed out.
‘Many times removed.’ Carey was a stickler for facts, no matter how fraught the situation.
Marlowe looked down and prodded the prone servant with his toe. ‘So, do you have anything to tell me about the whereabouts of Master Vaughan?’ he asked again, in softer tones.
The man still shook his head. Marlowe was frightening, but he would go away, eventually. Vaughan was frightening too, but there was the added risk of being turned out in the street with no character if he were to become annoyed. And that, especially if you allowed for the broken knees, would be much worse.
Marlowe turned and slammed out of the house. ‘He isn’t on the Bowe and he isn’t in the house. Where is the man?’
‘Mead Hole?’ The comptroller thought that that had already been established.
‘No, no,’ Marlowe muttered. ‘Vaughan doesn’t do his own dirty work. Perhaps we ought to look for him at the opposite end of the Island from Mead Hole. That’s where he will be.’
‘Chale, then,’ Martin said. His geography was as precise as his figuring.
‘That may have to be our next journey,’ Marlowe said reluctantly. Neither he nor his horse particularly wanted to repeat the experience of the Back of the Wight. He stood on the quay, looking down into the water under the stern of the Bowe. ‘What now, then, Master Martin?’
‘I think I will get back to the castle, Kit, if you don’t mind. Get on with my books.’
Marlowe looked around and saw nothing but the light on the water and the scutter of a rat in a drain channel. Like the castle, the quay seemed almost deserted. Where had everyone gone? The rat plopped over the side, swam to the other side of the waterway and climbed up a bundle of rags, which swayed with the faint movement of the tide. The rat was making heavy weather of i
t, pausing every few inches and sniffing, then raising its nose to the wind. Marlowe was becoming an expert on rat behaviour, living in London, and somehow this one just didn’t look right. He focused more carefully on the bundle of rags and it slowly resolved into two legs in canvas breeches and below them, under the water, a wide-sleeved jacket of the same material. The skin showed livid white and gleaming where the jacket was turning itself slowly inside out, stopped by the arms which were tied behind the back.
He hit Martin on the arm and pointed. ‘Look. A man, hanging from that groyne. How do I get across to the other side? Look, man. Over there!’
Martin focused his short-sighted, bookkeeper’s eyes across the narrow inlet and gasped. ‘Oh, God,’ he said, raising a hand to his breast. ‘Oh, God, Kit! There’s a man over there, drowned.’ And he leaned over and vomited over the side into the water.
‘That’s very helpful, Martin, thank you,’ Marlowe said, running down the quayside towards the town. ‘Hey, you men over there!’ He hailed three sailors propping up a bollard on the opposite bank. ‘Dead man in the water! Down there!’ He pointed back the way he had come.
One of the sailors turned to the others. ‘Wass’ee say?’ he asked.
‘Dead man. In the water. Down there,’ Marlowe roared.
The three stood upright, all together, like marionettes on the same string.
‘Dead man?’ yelled one. ‘Why didn’ee say so?’ And they took off at a run, matching Marlowe as he headed back towards the Bowe, still pointing.
The sailors were not wanting in application once they saw what was needed. Two of them hauled on the dead man’s legs, struggling against the weight of his body and the suck of the tide. The third jumped into a rowing boat moored nearby and, untying with a deft motion of one hand, rowed across ferryman style, using one oar off the back, and was across the narrow river within minutes to fetch Marlowe. Martin Carey was leaning against the timbers of the Bowe, looking green. As Marlowe got into the ferry, he called to him.
‘Go back to the castle,’ he said. ‘I’ll keep trying to find John Vaughan. There’s nothing else we can do.’
‘Master Vaughan’s up in the town,’ the sailor volunteered. ‘I sin him not an hour since. He’m visiting the shops. T’ain’t like him – tis usually the merchants who visit him, if you get my meaning, sir.’
This short exchange had got them across the river and, climbing up a slimy ladder, Marlowe joined the men and the bloated body on the planks of the quay.
The man lay face down, water draining from his hair and clothes and running between the boards and drumming on the timbers below, the ropes undone now from ankles and wrists.
‘Do you know who he is?’ Marlowe asked the men.
‘Ar. He’s old man Sculpe, from down Quay Street.’ One of the men squinted at Marlowe. ‘But you know him, sir. I saw you jumping from young Mary’s bedroom winder not so many weeks past, I’m thinking.’
‘This is Mary’s father? Are you certain? Turn him over.’
One of the sailors put a toe under the man’s torso and gave a kick. The body rolled over, one arm flailing out and hitting the echoing boards with a dead crack.
‘Ar,’ the first speaker said. ‘’Tis old man Sculpe a’right. ’E must’ve fallen in at high tide. These planks can be mortal slippy then.’
Marlowe felt someone had to say it. ‘His hands and feet were tied. And he had been lowered over the side, surely?’
The three sailors looked at each other and then at Marlowe, shaking their heads. Their spokesman took up his role again. ‘No, sir, if we could beg your pardon. We don’t see no ropes. And old man Sculpe, ’e be known as a powerful drinker. ’Tis but a miracle he ’aven’t fallen in the river long afore this.’
Another of the men leaned forward and said quietly, ‘And if you don’t mind I saying this, sir, you don’t want to be making too much of they ropes. I reckon it weren’t just Jem here seed you a-jumping out of Mary’s winder.’
Marlowe looked at the men, their weather-beaten faces and pale, far-seeing eyes all turned towards him. A decision had to be made, now or never. He reached into his doublet and brought out his purse. Passing each man a piece of silver, he said, ‘My mistake, men. There were no ropes. It was a trick of the light.’
The men smiled between them and at Marlowe. He felt he had been part of justice being seen to be done, even though he wasn’t quite sure why. This man had not been on Bet Carey’s list and anyway, he would not have thought that even she would fall so far to get some affection. There was one job still to do, even so.
‘I will go and tell his daughter,’ Marlowe said.
‘And we’ll fetch a hurdle,’ the spokesman said. As Marlowe walked away, the man called after him. ‘Least said, soonest mended, sir.’
Marlowe nodded, raised a hand and plunged down the little alleyway that led into Quay Street and Mary Sculpe’s house.
‘Mother of God!’ In moments like these, Captain James Norris found himself reverting to the expletives of his childhood before the Pope became the Antichrist and Philip of Spain wanted to rule the world. He dashed along the battlements of his castle at East Cowes, cursing Winchcliffe again because he still had not cut down that blasted oak tree. The thing was in full leaf now, impeding his view even more, but that was definitely a pinnace curving its way into the mouth of the Medina. More than that, it was a Spanish pinnace.
He turned to the south. There was no beacon, no flame to tell the world that the Armada had come. Yet here it was and from the north, too. Had Southampton fallen? He had heard no guns. Had the bastards raked Portsmouth, sent hellburners into the harbour there? And even now, were Englishmen dying on the beaches to the south of the Island as Medina Sidonia’s veterans fought their way ashore?
The others had seen it too; his garrison and his lackeys and everybody was rushing around, clattering up steps, buckling on swords and snatching up halberds, while all the time trying to maintain an air of calm. Stanley had his lads haul the demi-culverin into position, its black muzzle inching out over the ramparts. There was a panic of fuse-lighting, shot-loading. The spongeman rammed the ball into the barrel and the fuseman lit his fuse. The thing sparked and crackled while everybody covered their ears and turned away. The barrel burst into life, a roar of flame from its gaping mouth and the gun bucked and rolled backwards. Choking with the smoke, the gunners grabbed their ropes and held on for dear life in case the demi-culverin rolled off its housing and crashed into the courtyard below.
Norris shielded his eyes against the glare of the sky. A spray of water burst short of the pinnace’s bows.
‘Shit!’ the captain of East Cowes hissed. ‘Reload!’
Again, the hauling of the gun into position. The spongeman threw his bucket of water over the barrel, merely warm now but as the shooting went on it would become too hot to handle. The powder was thrown in, black and evil-smelling, and the nine pounds of iron was rolled in after it.
‘Damn Richard Turney to Hell!’ Norris bellowed. ‘Why isn’t he firing too? What’s the matter with the man? I told him,’ he said to his gunners, ‘I told Carey that Turney was no bloody good at his job. Now I see him in his true colours – he’s in the pay of the bloody King of Spain! Fire!’
The demi-culverin crashed again and this time the pinnace’s bowsprit was blown to matchwood, causing the ship to veer sharply as her helmsman hauled on his wheel. A cheer rose up from the ramparts of Norris Castle. This was better. They had found their range now and the next shot would rip a hole in her side that a horse and cart could rattle through.
‘For God’s sake!’ Richard Turney was rushing along his battlements, the telescope that gave him his omniscience thrown to a lackey. ‘What the bloody hell is Norris doing? Doesn’t he know his flags? That’s George Carey out there. He’s firing on his own Captain.’
‘He’s firing on his own Captain!’ George Carey fumed on the quarterdeck of El Comendador. He looked around at his motley crew. To be fair to the Essex boys, they
had done well to bring the ship around the headland, considering there was not a sailor among them, but this was too much. Their faces were white and they were squinting at the dark trees above Norris Castle to see where the shots were coming from. Carey had done all he could. He had struck the Spanish colours and raised his own standard of the white roses.
‘Shall we fire on them, sir?’ a corporal of Militia asked, seeing this option as one that might keep him alive.
‘No, for God’s sake,’ Carey growled. ‘They might be idiots enough to fire on an Englishman, but I won’t compound the problem. Anyway, can you?’
The corporal shifted uneasily. ‘Er … I’ve seen it done,’ was the best he could do.
‘Yes,’ Carey said. ‘So have I. I know for a fact the man’s only got one cannon on those ramparts. We’ll be out of his range in a minute. Shout. All of you, shout.’
‘What’ll we shout, sir?’
‘I’d like it to be “We’re going to cut your bollocks off for this, Norris” but it might be misconstrued, what with the wind. God Save the Queen. Shout that – now.’
And twenty-one voices bellowed across the Medina.
‘Are they surrendering, sir?’ Stanley asked his captain.
‘Don’t know,’ Norris said. ‘I can’t make out what they’re saying. Fire!’
And the third shot sailed out over the water, ripping George Carey’s banner to shreds and crashing into the water beyond. And El Comendador sailed on into what the Captain of the Wight hoped were safer waters.
The door was leaning ajar when Marlowe found the house and he knocked as he pushed it open. He called out, ‘Is anyone here? Mary? Are you here?’
There was no sound from inside the house and he pushed open the door into what he thought he remembered was the kitchen. A fire burned in the grate, a kettle hanging over it starting to sing. If Mary was not there, she hadn’t been gone long. He opened the little door in the wall and called up the stairs, but there was not a sound.
