The Heretics (29 page)

He found Godolphin’s officer, Chiverton, and asked him to take him to the sick man who was being housed near the kitchens.

The room contained a bed and the personal possessions of the cook. A large man was on the bed, snoring. He looked nothing like the other captives who were, to a man, lean and wiry seafarers of one sort or another. This man was flabby and looked as though he had not done a day’s manual labour in his life.

Shakespeare touched his shoulder. The man grunted and turned over. He shook his shoulder a little more firmly. ‘Sir, I must speak with you.’

Suddenly the man was awake. He glared at Shakespeare as he struggled to adjust his immense bulk so that he sat upright against the wall.

‘I am John Shakespeare, an officer of Sir Robert Cecil. I am questioning all those set free from the Spanish galleys. I am told you have some ailment, but I must ask you to identify yourself.’

The man stared at Shakespeare for a few moments, as though weighing up his options, then emitted a gurgling noise from somewhere in his gullet. His chins and his chest quivered and his breathing was laboured. ‘I am sick. Bring me brandy . . .’

Shakespeare nodded to Chiverton.

‘Can you at least tell me your name?’

‘Sloth. Ovid Sloth of London. Is that what you wish of me? The brandy, if you please, lest you want a corpse on your hands.’

‘I have heard of you.’

The brandy arrived and Shakespeare put the goblet to Sloth’s lips. He drank greedily, then coughed, and at last sank back against the cushions.

‘Is that better, Mr Sloth?’

‘Indeed, yes. Indeed. Now, what is it you require of me?’

‘You are a merchant, are you not?’

‘Yes, yes.’

‘Where were you captured?’

‘Brittany. And I would thank you to find me passage to London as soon as possible. I am a busy man. I have wasted enough of my precious time in a Spanish gaol and upon their stinking galleass. I cannot spend yet more time in this foul dungeon.’

‘This is not a dungeon, Mr Sloth. This is a perfectly good bedchamber, which has been vacated for you at the expense of its regular incumbent. Why were you in Brittany?’

Sloth struggled to rise. ‘First help me up from this filthy midden of a bed. There is a miasma of contagion here, I know it.’

Shakespeare grasped him under the arms and helped raise his enormous bulk from the bed. ‘Now then, Mr Sloth, I asked why you were in Brittany.’

Sloth breathed deeply, his chest heaving and juddering. ‘Use your wit. Why do you think I was in Brittany?’

‘You tell me. And talk to me in a civil manner or you will find me a most unpleasant interrogator.’

‘To buy wine. What else would I get from that benighted, war-torn finger of land? Talk to the master at Vintners’ Hall if you wish to know more, for you will discover I am an assistant of the vintners’ court.’

Shakespeare ignored his bluster. ‘And did it not occur to you that you might fall foul of the Spanish armies there?’

‘Mr Shakespeare, do you enjoy a goblet a wine? How do you think it is come by? Do you think merchants cease trading simply because there is a war on? Anyway, I had not heard of any embargo on French goods. Is Henri of France not our friend? Indeed, I had thought Brittany liberated from the Spanish yoke last autumn when Frobisher and Norreys took the fort of El Léon. It seems I was mistaken for Norreys has now abandoned Brittany and gone to Ireland. What I demand of you is this: how is a man to make an honest guinea if he cannot trade in safety? Ask this of young Cecil, if you would, for it is the brave English merchants that supply the treasury. Why does he abandon us to the dirty Spaniard? We must be protected!’

‘Did you travel to Brittany alone, Mr Sloth?’

‘No, I did not. But they kept my clerks and servants. I am to send them gold if I want them returned, which will not happen. Why should I pay gold for them when I can find men aplenty in London?’

‘I am told you are sick.’

‘It is true I am not in good health. I am not a young man and these weeks of privation have done me much harm. I must get home to recoup my strength. I am exhausted.’

Shakespeare, too, was tired. He would have liked to postpone further questioning until morning when he might think more clearly, but he pressed on. ‘Tell me about the ship you were on. Did you communicate with other Englishmen?’

‘Those fish-stinking peasants taken prisoner from their boats? What might I have to say to them, do you think?’

‘I was thinking of the English pilot.’

‘You mean the damnable traitor Richard Burley. Yes I encountered him, and I spat on his shoes.’

‘Did you talk with him?’

‘No, Mr Shakespeare, though he tried to engage me in conversation.’ Suddenly Sloth slumped on to the bed, clutching at his chest.

‘Shall I send for the physician?’

Sloth shook his head as he panted. Finally he spoke, his words coming out in short, harsh bursts.

‘In God’s name . . . find me a ship . . . out of here . . . to London . . . I will pay you well . . . ten pounds in English gold, sir. If I do not get home, I know I shall die . . .’

Oh I will get you home
, Shakespeare thought.
Though you may not like the mode of transport I have planned for you, nor your travelling companion.

‘Answer me one more question, then you may sleep and so may I. Was there another Englishman aboard the galley, a man close-coupled with the Spanish officers? Not Burley, in whom I have little interest, but one with long hair and a short beard and the bearing of a man of breeding?’

Sloth’s brow creased and it seemed to Shakespeare that he seemed a little alarmed.

‘Does the question disturb you? Do you know of such a man?’

‘No . . . I know nothing of such a man.’ Sloth fell back into the cushions. ‘Get me that physician, sir . . . before my heart gives out . . .’

Regis Roag held Beatrice in his arms. They were spread naked across the covers of a bed, a large, ornately carved oak bed with four posts and an embroidered canopy above and all around them, enclosing them. Beatrice drew slowly on her pipe, opened her lips and watched the smoke rise, and dissipate into the canopy. She was used to the name Beatrice now; could no longer bear to think of the heretic name her father and mother had given her.
Sorrow Gray
. Was that a name or a sentence of despair?

She sighed, rolled over and laid the pipe under the bed-curtain on the floor. With the sinuous movement of a cat, she crawled across to Regis and stroked his chest with kisses.

‘Beatrice?’

‘Yes?’

‘I prayed for this every day.’

‘As did I.’

He looked in her eyes and saw the madness there. He knew well that she was insane, as crazed as a fox bitch on heat. He had always known it; he could not resist it. But that was because he could control her demons and bend them to
his
will.

‘Do you harbour doubts?’

Her fingers tightened like little talons on his skin. ‘Do you?’

He laughed. ‘Even Christ had doubts. And yet I am here, am I not, back from fair Seville? And I have the men. In all, six of us. Enough. Good men, perfectly fitted for the task, as long as all else is in place. Do
you
have doubts?’

She sat astride him and held his arms down, her short, boyish hair flopping about her face as she gazed down at him intently.

‘No. Never. Not one. A tidal surge of blood would not sway me from my purpose. I will rejoice when the blessed Mary’s holy Inquisition is returned to these shores and when the ungodly are consigned to the fires of hell in the market squares, to cleanse our land. This is His word. How could I doubt it, when we have sold our souls to God?’

His hands ranged down her slender frame, his fingers playing from her small breasts to her delicate ribs. He kissed a nipple, then held her face between his well-tended hands and admired his handsome reflection in her eyes.

‘But what of Sloth?’ she said.

‘We
had
to leave him. There was no other way. The journey from Spain to Brittany and onward to England has left him sick and exhausted. We had to move from Mount’s Bay at great speed. He could not ride, nor could we carry him here. He would have threatened us all if we had tried to bring him.’

‘Will they not torture him and discover all he knows? He will betray us—’

‘Fear not, sweet serpent, he knows his part and we will retrieve him. As soon as word comes through.’

‘And do the other men all know their parts? The little one, the Irish ones, the two hard-bitten ones? In truth I would not trust those last two to tether a horse.’

‘I will take them and Winnow. You take the Irish boys, Seamus and Hugh. Do what you have to do and then we will meet again at the appointed place.’

‘Are they strong enough in will as well as arm? Will they really help us rid England of the beast for ever?’

‘Trust me, Beatrice. I can smile—’

‘—and murder while you smile?’ She bit his neck and felt him rise beneath her thighs. ‘I will trust your sail-needle and your God-given prick, my king of men, for I know what they both can do.’

Chapter 29

S
HAKESPEARE
WENT
TO
Ovid Sloth again and woke him roughly.

‘Lucifer take you, can a man not rest!’

‘I am here to offer you passage to London, Mr Sloth. My man Cooper will accompany you on one of Drake’s ships. You will disembark at Falmouth and, from there, Mr Cooper will find a vessel bound for Gravesend or elsewhere in the Thames.’

‘I do not wish to go with your serving man.’

‘This is not an option for you, Mr Sloth. It is what you will do whether you desire it or not. And in London, you will be detained in your house until I have asked you more questions, possibly in the presence of Sir Robert Cecil. I am not happy with the story of your venture to Brittany, nor the manner in which you have returned. Do you understand?’

‘No, sir, I do not! I am a free-born Englishman, a freeman of the City of London and an assistant of one the greatest of livery companies. I have endured monstrous privations at the hand of the Spaniard. Am I now to be ill treated by my own countrymen? I will
not
be escorted like a common felon!’

Shakespeare looked at him coldly. ‘I am afraid you will, at the point of sword and pistol if necessary. Good day, Mr Sloth. Be ready at noon, for that is when your ship sails, and you will be on it. I wish you a pleasant voyage.’

He left Sloth and found Boltfoot, who was not happy at the prospect of taking Ovid Sloth to London, and even less so at the thought of making even part of the journey on one of Drake’s galleons.

‘You will have assistance, Boltfoot. I am sending another of the freed prisoners with you, a Mr Ambrose Rowse. Require of him what help you need, for I will recompense him.’

Shakespeare wanted Rowse in London, for he was the only other man who had seen and heard the unidentified Englishman.

As he strode through the castle, seeking Godolphin, he thought over the events of these past days. Was it mere coincidence that Beatrice Eastley had been heading west when the Spanish attack came? Instinctively he felt there was a link and that it somehow connected back to events in London and Wisbech: the death of Garrick Loake; the letter to the Jesuit William Weston in Wisbech Castle. Could this Spanish strike, like a bolt of lightning, be the true meaning of the letter found aboard
The Ruth
?

The possibilities remained jumbled in his mind like the stones of a fallen house. Somehow, he knew, they all made a whole, but for the moment they looked like nothing but rubble. The thing that made the least sense was this attack on Cornwall. Why would Spain authorise such a raid and then vanish into the haze? Yes, it had been a blow to English morale, yet was it worth risking ships and fighting men just for that? England had suffered no material loss to its military machine, And it was likely to serve as an alarm to the Privy Council that defences along the south coast must be strengthened. How would that help Spain?

Shakespeare put these points to Godolphin, who agreed that he too was puzzled by the Spanish action.

‘Do they have more ships? Is there still a full Armada waiting to strike? Or do they plan to attack Drake and Hawkins in Plymouth Sound? I have had reports of sixty vessels in the Manacles off the Lizard. Another speaks of forty vessels to seaward of Mount’s Bay. And yet I have not seen them. Did you discover anything from your interrogations, Mr Shakespeare?’

‘Only that there were four hundred fighting men aboard, from the ranks of General del Águila’s regiments, and that their pilot was an English renegade named Richard Burley.’

‘I know of him. He is notorious along this coast for his treachery. We cannot take chances, so I will build our defences here, and send word to St Mawes and to the Scillies to prepare likewise. If the Spanish do attack again, however, we may still be found wanting. We need new levies and more powerful shot and armour. It would be best if you return to Cecil straightway and request assistance.’

Shakespeare nodded. That was his plan. What he did not mention to Godolphin was the presence of the unknown Englishman; that intelligence was for Sir Robert Cecil’s ears alone. First, however, he had business to attend to, here in the west.

Shakespeare tethered his horse deep in the woods and moved slowly towards his goal. Every few steps, he stopped and listened. His searching gaze swept the rich, ancient woodland of oak and ash and chestnut. He moved on until he could see Trevail Hall, then he stopped and nestled into a bed of leaves to wait until nightfall.

He could hear the yelping of a pack of hounds in their kennels and the whinnying of horses. From his hide, he saw men in workman’s attire going about their business. One man in the dark apparel of a steward or a lawyer walked to the stables where a groom waited with his grey mare, saddled up. He mounted and rode away along the tree-lined drive.

A little later he saw the serving man who had given him directions to the Godolphin estate a few days earlier. He was deep in conversation with another man, who patted him on the back before departing into the house.