‘Then the same applies to Kitty,’ argued Chaloner.
‘Only if he lets her into the family purse. She may as well be poor if he ekes out every penny. Incidentally, I received a report from one of my old spies when you were out. It seems Fitzgerald is not the only one who has plans for tomorrow.’
‘Yes?’
‘Leighton has arranged for the Adventurers to dine aboard Royal Katherine at dusk. It will be a glittering occasion, and several dozen Adventurers and their spouses are expected to attend.’
‘In Woolwich?’
‘Yes – that is where Royal Katherine is moored.’
‘Do you think he arranged it so that he and his cronies will be away from the city when Fitzgerald strikes?’ asked Chaloner uneasily. ‘Or, if Leighton is Fitzgerald’s master, that he plans to keep the Adventurers alive, because he cannot be secretary if there is no corporation?’
Thurloe sighed tiredly. ‘Who knows? We have too many questions and too few answers.’
‘There is one thing we can do,’ said Chaloner suddenly. ‘Williamson refuses to arrest Fitzgerald of his own volition, so we must persuade the Earl to order him to do it. Perhaps the plan will founder without Fitzgerald to see it through.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Thurloe, although he did not look convinced. ‘What then?’
‘The Swedish Ambassador is visiting White Hall at noon, and all our suspects are likely to be watching the ceremonies. It will afford me a final opportunity to eavesdrop.’
‘Then I shall join you,’ determined Thurloe.
‘No!’ Chaloner was horrified. ‘It is not a good idea for ex-spymasters to invade White Hall.’
‘Credit me with some sense, Thomas,’ said Thurloe irritably. ‘I shall go in disguise. And do not say it is a risk I need not take, because I was doing it before you were born.’
Chapter 10
Chaloner arrived to find White Hall in turmoil, because preparations for the ambassadorial visit had been left until the last minute. The Banqueting House was full of frantic servants, and there was an air of emergency as they tried to make everything ready in time. The situation was not helped by the number of courtiers who had appeared to ‘help’. They included the King, who seemed to know what he was doing, and a vast array of earls, dukes and lords, who did not.
Chaloner walked inside, dodging around six footmen who were struggling to carry an enormous painting of a Turkish bordello. It had been used for the play that had been performed there recently, but it was too large to hide with ceremonial cloths – and was hardly a suitable backdrop for diplomatic ceremonies – so the King had ordered it removed. Judging by the strained expressions on the men’s faces, this was easier said than done.
‘The blue ones, man!’ Buckingham was shouting to another minion, who had been charged with hanging flags. ‘We keep the red for the Russians, and today’s visitor is Swedish.’
‘I shall ensure the ambassador does not take umbrage,’ drawled Lady Castlemaine. ‘I can think of something that will make him feel welcome.’
Chaloner glanced at her once, and then looked again because he could not quite believe what he had seen. She had donned a flimsy shift that did nothing to conceal her elegant curves, and had adopted a posture to show them to their best advantage. He was not the only one whose attention had been snagged: virtually every other man was staring, too.
‘She was wearing a gown over that when she first arrived,’ said Kipps, making no effort to disguise his admiration. ‘But she gave it to the Queen, who said she was cold.’
Chaloner looked to where he pointed, and saw Katherine standing forlornly to one side. The robe was too long, and trailed rather ridiculously on the floor. Hannah, who was with her, beckoned Chaloner over.
‘I see someone caught your eye,’ she said frostily.
‘She caught Hyde’s, too.’ Chaloner gestured to where the Earl’s son was hurrying towards the Lady, divesting himself of his coat as he went.
‘What is he doing?’ asked Hannah, amused. ‘Does he intend to ravage her? The King will not appreciate that. Not in front of all these witnesses.’
They watched Hyde drape the garment around the Lady’s shoulders. Irritated, she shrugged it off, but the King happened to glance around at that moment, and was patently furious to see his mistress sharing herself with the world. He surged towards her and had it buttoned around her in a trice. He muttered something to Hyde, who flushed with pleasure.
‘Hyde will be even more unbearable now,’ said Hannah in disgust. ‘Smug little b—’
‘Why all the fuss?’ asked Chaloner quickly, looking around at the chaos. The Queen was within earshot, and he did not think she would approve of a lady-in-waiting calling her secretary names. ‘The Swedish ambassador’s reception has been planned for weeks. I read about it in The Newes.’
‘Yes, but no one reminded the Court, and it was only remembered this morning,’ explained Hannah. ‘So the King roused everyone out to make ready in time. The Queen and I have been asked to make sure all the paintings are hung straight. I am sorry I did not come home last night, by the way. I was at Brodrick’s soirée until dawn.’
‘I missed you,’ lied Chaloner, not bothering to mention that he had not been home either.
‘Brodrick had invited a lot of Adventurers,’ said Hannah disapprovingly. ‘They do nothing but party these days – they are having another one tomorrow, on Royal Katherine. O’Brien is going, too. He is flattered by the invitation, but it will not induce him to join – Kitty is too strongly opposed to slavery. But here comes the Queen. Be nice to her, Tom: she is in low spirits today.’
‘Meneses has abandoned me,’ said Katherine bitterly in Portuguese. ‘Hannah said his interest would last only as long as he thought I had money to give him, and it seems she was right. I should have listened to her.’
‘But Meneses is here, ma’am,’ said Chaloner, puzzled. ‘I saw him when I came in.’
‘Yes, but he has shifted his affections to Kitty O’Brien. Of course, he will make no headway there, because her heart belongs to Joseph Williamson. Breaking sacred wedding vows seems to be the way of this horrible Court.’
Chaloner was not sure what to say, given that the King was nearby, laughing heartily with his paramour. He was, however, aware that such remarks were dangerous for both of them, even when spoken in a language that few, if any, courtiers would understand.
‘Please, ma’am. Someone might hear—’
‘Why should I not say what I think?’ she flashed, tears sparkling in her eyes. ‘People accuse me of undermining the English throne by refusing to produce a baby. So why should I not speak treason, since people believe it of me anyway?’
‘Who believes it of you?’ asked Chaloner gently. Hannah was glaring at him, assuming he had introduced whatever subject was upsetting her mistress.
‘Everyone!’ whispered Katherine miserably. ‘Someone went into my favourite purse yesterday, and left me a terrible letter. It said the murder I had commissioned will occur tomorrow. I have commissioned no murder, but who will believe me when I deny it?’
‘Burn it,’ said Chaloner urgently. ‘As soon as possible. And make sure nothing remains, not even ashes. Do you have any idea who might have put it there?’
‘I do not think my ladies-in-waiting would stoop so low, not even Castlemaine. And the only men to have set foot in my apartments recently are my husband, Hyde and Meneses.’
‘Meneses,’ said Chaloner, a solution snapping into his mind. ‘And now he shuns you?’
Katherine bit her lip, and he saw he had been overly blunt. ‘I suppose Meneses might have done it,’ she admitted unhappily. ‘Revenge, because I cannot repay his friendship with gold and titles.’
More tears glittered, but Chaloner was spared the need to make some comforting remark by the unlikely figure of Dugdale, who approached with a patently false smile. He bowed elegantly to the Queen and turned to Chaloner. The grin stayed in place, but his eyes were hot with anger.
&
nbsp; ‘How dare you approach the Queen,’ he said. He spoke mildly, to disguise the hostility in his words. ‘If you wish to speak to royalty, you request an audience through me. The protocol is perfectly clear on this point.’
‘Thomas is being told he cannot talk to you,’ explained Hannah icily, when the Queen turned questioningly to her. She shot Dugdale a glare of dislike, not a woman to stand by while her husband was being unjustly attacked. ‘In future, he must ask this gentleman first.’
‘It is protocol, ma’am,’ reiterated Dugdale defensively. ‘And he has no right to break it.’
‘Does that mean he must request your permission to talk to his wife, too?’ asked Hannah archly. ‘Because that it what he was doing when you stormed over and interrupted us. There are protocols about that, too – and you have just broken them. Now go away, before I complain to Clarendon about your shabby manners.’
Dugdale stared at her in astonishment, but Hannah glowered at him until he bowed to the Queen and left, muttering under his breath that the Earl wanted to see Chaloner at once. Chaloner grinned, delighted to see him put so firmly in his place.
‘Vile man!’ exclaimed Hannah, watching him go. ‘He makes my skin crawl.’
Chaloner left her blackening Dugdale’s name to a Queen who barely understood, and went to see what the Earl wanted. Dugdale intercepted him, his face dark with anger.
‘And do not address her in that foreign tongue, either,’ he snarled. ‘The King issued express orders that she is to be spoken to only in English or French. How dare you defy him!’
‘I did not know,’ said Chaloner, supposing he should not be surprised. No monarch would want a wife who gabbled away to people in a language he did not understand.
‘Well, you do now,’ snapped Dugdale. ‘And if you do it again, I will tell him, and it will bring you more trouble than you can possibly imagine.’
Chaloner was sure it would, and was equally sure that Dugdale would relish every moment of it.
Clarendon’s contribution to the preparations was overseeing the refreshments. He strutted up and down the tables, adjusting a bowl here and a platter there, sampling as he went. Hyde was with him, screening his father’s antics from the other courtiers by placing himself in their line of vision. Chaloner did not blame him: Buckingham and the Lady would have ridiculed Clarendon’s comically gluttonous behaviour for months if they could have seen what he was doing.
Dugdale and Edgeman were smirking, amused both by the Earl’s brazen greediness and by Hyde’s efforts to conceal it. Brodrick was slumped in a chair, his face grey and his eyes more bloodshot than usual. He was careful to look away from the mounting piles of food.
‘You cannot still be unwell?’ the Earl was saying to him. ‘Are you sure it was because you spent so long at your prayers this morning? Not because of your soirée last night?’
‘Yes,’ said Brodrick tightly. ‘Spending hours on one’s knees takes its toll.’
‘Perhaps you should sit down to pray in future,’ said the Earl kindly. ‘God will understand.’
Brodrick had the grace to wince.
‘Tell me, cousin,’ said Hyde maliciously. ‘Who joined you in this holy marathon?’
‘Friends,’ replied Brodrick curtly. ‘Why? Would you like an invitation next time? I have never imagined you to own sufficient mettle, but if you think you can handle the challenge …’
‘I can handle any challenge issued by you,’ stated Hyde sneeringly. ‘And I—’
‘Chaloner,’ interrupted the Earl, bringing an abrupt end to the burgeoning spat, ‘are you here to say you have foiled these devilish plots? Tomorrow is when the sky will come tumbling down, according to the letters Henry intercepted, so you must have answers by now.’
‘Some, sir,’ replied Chaloner, itching to say that he might have had more if his employer had not sent him on so many fool’s errands. ‘But not enough to prevent a crisis.’
‘I have a snippet that may help,’ said the Earl. ‘You asked about Meneses yesterday, and I happened to run into the Portuguese ambassador last night. I mentioned Meneses, and he said the fellow is in London at the moment. Apparently, he has been visiting the Queen.’
‘So it is his real name,’ breathed Chaloner. ‘But why did he deny being Governor of Tangier?’
‘Does my intelligence help?’ asked the Earl, straining to hear what he was saying. ‘Are you assailed by a blinding light that will allow you to see answers to everything?’
‘Not quite,’ said Chaloner. ‘But it is helpful. Thank you, sir. However, there is one thing you can do to avert a catastrophe: issue a warrant to arrest Fitzgerald.’
‘Why? Is he the one who plans to murder Pratt?’
‘Possibly,’ hedged Chaloner, unwilling to say more with four Adventurers listening. He did not want Hyde, Brodrick, Dugdale or Edgeman to repeat his suspicions to their cronies.
‘I need more than “possibly”,’ said the Earl. ‘He has powerful connections, and I have too many enemies as it is. Unless he is the one stealing my bricks?’
‘You will never lay hold of that villain, father,’ interjected Hyde. ‘So you may as well tell Chaloner to stop wasting his time. Or—’
‘Look at Kipps!’ exclaimed the Earl suddenly, pointing to where the Lady had shrugged off Hyde’s coat, and was parading around in her indecently flimsy shift. ‘His eyes are all but hanging out of his head! Such brazen lechery is inappropriate, and I shall have words with him later.’
‘I will do it,’ offered Dugdale eagerly. ‘The man has ideas above his station, and—’
‘Many courtiers do.’ The Earl glanced at his son. ‘Including these reprehensible Adventurers. They are not good company, and I would certainly dismiss any member of my staff who had the temerity to join them. I wish you had not accepted their invitation to enrol, Henry.’
‘I accepted because it is a good way to win the friendship of men who have been our enemies,’ replied Hyde tightly, as Dugdale and Edgeman exchanged a brief but uneasy glance. ‘It is politically expedient, and it represents a chance to make some easy money.’
The Earl did not deign to debate the matter, and addressed Chaloner instead. ‘You have less than a day to find answers, because I will have these brick-thieves by tomorrow. No one steals from me and evades justice!’
At that point, it was discovered that the painting of the Turkish brothel would not fit through the door, and the Earl and his retinue were among those who hurried to tell the hapless footmen what to do about it. Brodrick made no effort to follow, and as he looked so ill, Chaloner took a piece of bread from one of the baskets and handed it to him, indicating that he would feel better if he ate. The Earl’s cousin nibbled the offering without enthusiasm.
‘I must be getting old,’ he muttered. ‘I do not recall feeling like this after a late night ten years ago. And other events are lining up relentlessly, when all I want is a quiet evening in. There is this affair, which is likely to drag on until the small hours, and then Leighton has organised a feast with a nautical theme aboard Royal Katherine tomorrow. I hope I am not seasick.’
‘How far will you be sailing?’ asked Chaloner.
Brodrick shuddered. ‘Nowhere! She will be tied to a bollard at Woolwich. But I know from my last visit that she rocks horribly, even when fastened to a pier.’
‘How well did you know Cave, the singer from the Chapel Royal?’ asked Chaloner, recalling that Brodrick’s love of music had earned him many connections in such quarters.
Brodrick blinked at the sudden change of subject, but answered anyway. ‘Not well, although I am sorry he came to such an ignoble end. Of course, he was a fearful liar.’
‘What did he lie about?’
‘He claimed he was commissioned to organise music for the troops in Tangier, but it cannot have been true – I doubt they are interested in Italian arias. Ergo, he went there for some other purpose.’
Chaloner stared at him. He had also been sceptical of Cave’s declared mission, and Kitty O
’Brien had expressed reservations, too. ‘What other purpose?’
‘Personally, I believe he was one of you – an intelligencer. Sent to Tangier to spy.’
‘What evidence do you have?’
‘None whatsoever,’ replied Brodrick airily. ‘But what else could he have been doing?’
‘Perhaps he went there for business. A lot of men are making themselves very rich from Tangier, as you will know from being an Adventurer.’
Brodrick shook his head. ‘We are thriving, but we have a monopoly. No one else is licensed to trade there – it would be illegal – and Cave was not one of us. However, I suppose he might have gone to capitalise on all the corruption surrounding the building of the sea wall.’
‘That would not be easy. You do not simply arrive and demand a cut of the profits.’
‘Well, then,’ said Brodrick, tossing the half-chewed piece of bread back into the basket as he stood. ‘My point is proven. Cave was an intelligencer. After all, he was killed when he returned by one James Elliot. And who is Elliot? Spymaster Williamson’s creature!’
Chaloner gazed after Brodrick as he shuffled away. Was that the real reason for the duel? To prevent Cave from telling anyone what he had learned in Tangier? But Cave had died more than a week after his return, by which time he would already have made his report to whoever had sent him. And who had sent him? As Elliot had done the killing, it was unlikely to have been Williamson. Did that mean the Spymaster had ordered Cave’s murder?
But from what Chaloner had seen of the spat, it had been Cave who had engineered the quarrel. He shook his head slowly, not sure what to think.
It was not easy to convert the Banqueting House into a state room after its interlude as the King’s personal playhouse, and the difficulties were compounded when the ambassador arrived early. The King, pursued by valets still fussing with his ceremonial finery, rushed into the Great Court to greet him, hoping to gain the frantic servants and their noble helpers a few more minutes to prepare.
The Piccadilly Plot: Chaloner's Seventh Exploit in Restoration London (The Exploits of Thomas Chaloner) Page 31
