The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O.: A Novel

by Neal Stephenson

  Sir Edward says he regrets to inform Tristan that Sir James set sail back in April, and Tristan begs his pardon and asks him does he think it might be possible to make an investment anyhow, toward future returns?

  Then Tristan goes on a bit and begins to speak in tones of wonder and reverence, as if he were merely musing aloud to himself, of Hither India. There is one thing in particular he goes on about, and that’s spices called turmeric and saffron, the both of which create a cheery yellow-orange dye for silks and cottons—fabrics easy to obtain in Hither India. And now it’s Sir Edward I’m watching, as his face becomes a marvel of interest. Suddenly he says he’s a mind to speak to the Earl himself and see about such an investment, and if Tristan will come to see him in two days’ time, he will happily inform him of the possibilities. Tristan falls all over himself with appreciation and gratitude, honors Sir Edward as if Sir Edward were a king and himself a peasant, and then with some assistance from me (whom Sir Edward never once regarded directly), removes himself from the building.

  But not before making certain that Sir Edward knew he could find some pleasant behind-the-door diversions at the Tearsheet Brewery in Southwark, for which I am much obliged.

  “That was nicely done,” I said, as we walked back toward the riverbank. “Why did you go on about that dye color? Why did that hook him?”

  “He is betrothed to a lady of Elizabeth’s bedchamber,” Tristan answered. “We studied portraits of her. She is very taken with that particular color, and it is a difficult color to come by with English or even European dyes. Theirs seems to be a match of affection as well as opportunity, so I guessed that he would know her preferences, and also want to know how to please her. Seems I guessed correctly.”

  “Is right you did,” I agreed. “Although not so much affection he doesn’t want the odd discreet diversion. I thank you for that as well.”

  “It seemed the least I could do for the time you’ve donated to my cause today.”

  We squeezed round a tight corner into a larger street. He might more easily have dropped back and let me go ahead of him. If he had, things might have come out differently. But intent as he was on the conversation, he was desirous of remaining abreast of me, his eyes upon mine. He tried to pass through a space too narrow for the both of us. In doing so he brushed—I don’t say banged into, or jostled, but merely brushed—the shoulder of a tosser in fancy dress and a long face, leaning against a wall sucking on a long-stemmed pipe, and sulking. He probably hadn’t managed to get an audience with old Elizabeth like his ma told him to expect he would. Tristan didn’t even notice; but in the corner of my eye I saw this tosser giving my man a sharp look.

  “I would be happy to strike up a working relationship with you, Tristan Lyons, so I would,” I said. “I can imagine all manner of ways we might be of mutual benefit. So if you’re ever in Southwark again, stop in.”

  He paused a moment and regarded me. And I regarded him back, as it pleased me to do so. But at the same time I threw a glance back at the tosser in the fancy dress, who had dislodged himself from the wall, and was now giving Tristan a thorough inspection from hat to shoes and back up again.

  I took Tristan’s arm firmly and pulled him along.

  “What’s troubling you?” he asked, with a glance back over his shoulder.

  After we had put a bit more distance between ourselves and that unsavory fop who seemed to have taken such an interest in my companion, I said, “Farthing for your thoughts.” As you’ll have collected, milady, I was after learning whether Tristan knew of Strands and the like.

  “Did I seem at all familiar to you, when I first met your eye?” he asked.

  So yes. He knew something of it. “Let’s not bandy words,” I said. “Whoever Sent you—whoever you cooked up this plan with—knows perfectly well that it’ll never suffice to do this on one Strand only. Hence all of your preparations. Learning to pronounce my name. Looking at paintings and noticing the colors of dyestuffs and such.”

  “It would be idle to deny it,” he said with a nod of his fine chin.

  “It’s in many another Strand that I’m even now meeting you again in like manner, walking these streets, having this conversation.”

  “As I understand it, yes.”

  “You understand it well enough, ’tis plain,” I said, “and it’s little trouble for me to Wend my way to those Strands—or snáithe as we say at home—and meet with you there and then and further enjoy the pleasure of your company.”

  “I would like that very much,” he said. “Are there others like you I might work with as well?”

  “Don’t get cheeky, lad,” I said. “Let’s see how you can make things worth my while first, and then I’ll decide if I want to cut anyone else in.”

  “If you make yourself my ally, it’s quite possible. So think about what I might be able to offer you.”

  “Oh, I will,” I assured him. “I already am. Now, if you’ve a good witch to Send you,” I continued, “have her Send you to arrive yesterday.”

  “Why?”

  “This is Monday. Had you arrived yesterday, everyone would have been at Sunday services. Not that I mind finding you naked in my closet each time you return, but it will be simpler if you arrive when things are quiet.”

  “Will you skip Sunday services to meet me?”

  “If you want to pay the fine I’d be receiving for failure to appear.” And since he seemed to be considering this, I said, “No, I cannot, lad. I cannot afford to be seen as shirking my religious duties, it’s suspicious enough that I’m Irish and over here, while there’s an armed uprising against the English back at home. But you’re not on the rolls anywhere, so your absence won’t be noted. Come on Sunday and dress yourself, now that you know where I keep the shirts and breeches, and just wait for me.”

  We were having this conversation as we came down King Street to the Whitehall Stairs, where I planned to find us a ferryman. There were plenty of wherries out there since the tide was heading out, and traffic’s easier eastward. I slowed my pace as I surveyed the scene.

  Then someone barreled into me from behind, knocking me off balance.

  I stumble and my shoe gets caught in a tear in my petticoat, and I’m falling to my knees when, faster than I can think, there’s Tristan catching me and helping me to right myself. But in doing so he jostles the rude bastard who’s almost knocked me down. By the time I’ve got my balance and my wits back, that bastard has spun on his heel to confront Tristan. They’re standing arm’s length apart. I recognize him as the tosser who followed us.

  This fop—who doesn’t look like much, hardly any manlier than Sir Edward—instantly draws back to a distance, puts his right hand on his rapier and draws it out, no more than the width of two fingers, but enough to send a message. Other people coming and going on the steps give him a wider berth, but otherwise continue their business on and off the wherries.

  “Stand off, villain!” says the fella with the rapier, pompous and angry. “What business have you touching me so rudely?”

  Tristan catches himself. “Good morrow, my lord, pray excuse my abruptness.”

  “Once you have explained yourself, I might.”

  Tristan blinks, then says, “’Tis my sister you just knocked to her knees there. I’ll let it be if you will.”

  The fellow looks utterly astounded, and then laughs in Tristan’s face. “What, that common whore? That slattern? She’s not your sister, you lying knave. ’Tis she owes me an apology, for being in my way.” He turns to me and commands me: “Apologize!”

  “She owes you no apology, sir,” says Tristan, very calm.

  “Let it be, Tristan,” I say sharply, and I’m using my best London accent, which Tristan notices with surprise. He’s sharp enough to understand I’ve a reason for it. “Pray pardon me, m’lord,” I say to the fellow. “I did not hear you coming.”

  Tristan says nothing. But the set of his mouth shows a kind of annoyance and the tosser with the rapier notices. He draws the
rapier a little farther.

  “Do you take offense at my behavior toward this whore?” he demands of Tristan.

  “He doesn’t,” I say.

  “Shut up, whore,” he says. “Tell me yourself, sirrah, assure me you understand this bawd is in the wrong here, and for even thinking of defending her, you are too. Say so and beg apology.”

  I recognize the tosser now—he’s been a customer at the Tearsheet of my mate Morag, the Caledonian wench. He’s a terrible mean streak and he loves his violence. It’s not apologizing he wants from Tristan—it’s a fight.

  Tristan is still standing there. I sense he’s about to vomit with the rage, although he looks calm enough. “To avoid a disruption of the Queen’s Peace, I will apologize whole-heartedly,” he says, but of course that just feeds the fellow’s ire:

  “If that’s why you’re apologizing, I reject it,” he says. “I demand you acknowledge you’re wrong for insulting and challenging a nobleman. And now you’re being insolent as well.” He draws the rapier fully from its sheath. “Will it take a taste of steel for you to find your manners?”

  “I have no weapon,” Tristan says, still quiet-like.

  The nobleman laughs. “So?” he says.

  “Would you strike an unarmed man?”

  He laughs again. “That makes it easier to strike him, doesn’t it?” Around us, folk are still hustling by, and by now we’ve missed a few wherries. I want to catch one while the tide is with us, and I certainly don’t want to get ourselves stuck here.

  Now the nobleman looks around, as if expecting an admiring crowd.

  In truth, almost everyone’s giving us a wide berth. There are only two exceptions. Standing off at a distance, observing matters carefully, is a gentleman with a long, sharp yellow beard, dressed in those sorts of clothes that look dark at first glance but on closer examination are splendid. Closer to hand, three paces behind and to one side of the tosser, is another courtier, old enough to be the fop’s father, dressed as if he’s on his way home from a Dutch funeral.

  “But I’m happy to give an advantage to one who so desperately needs it,” continues the tosser. “George,” he says to the old git in the neck-ruff, “lend this varlet that rusty meat cleaver you have hanging from your belt. I’ll take my apology in blood.” Very familiar he is, and cheeky in his description of George’s sidearm, which looks a perfectly respectable weapon to my eye, but George takes no offense; I reckon these two know each other well, and that George is some manner of retainer or vassal.

  “You’ll be fined again, Herbert,” says George, who for one so long in the tooth and so weedy in his attire is, I confess, a bit fierce-looking.

  “The fine’s a trifle,” Herbert says breezily. “Lend him your sword.”

  George tosses his cape back, reaches across his body, and draws the weapon, which turns out to be as old and out-of-date as his clothing: it’s a heavy, single-edged backsword of the old school, such as you’ll see Protestants toting about at home, the better to wave menacingly at Irish folk. He offers it hilt-first over his arm to Tristan, who declines to take it. “I pray you accept my pardon for all offenses uttered,” Tristan says. “I’ve an ailing mother in Southwark and I would fain meet her within the hour.”

  “If she ails enough, you can meet her in heaven in half that time,” says Herbert. “Take the sword.”

  Tristan remains where he is.

  Herbert, without warning, slashes at Tristan’s face. He’d have taken Tristan’s nose off if Tristan’s reflexes were not so fast. But like a dragonfly avoiding a bird, my Saxon has ducked the blow, grabbed the hilt of the offered backsword, and swung it around to face his attacker. Old George, no fool, steps back to give them room. A passing washerwoman utters a little shout of fear and scurries off, and suddenly I notice nobody else is on the steps now but the four of us, and sure I’m sweating in the hazy September sun much more than I was moments ago.

  The fight was fierce but very short. Wherever Tristan comes from, they must use swords because it’s confident, strong and graceful he seemed to me. But I think whatever their swords are, they can’t be rapiers. He looked like he was dancing, like he’d learned steps he could perform very well, but Herbert—although far less elegant and less muscle on him—was so accustomed to the weapon that using it was like walking or eating for him.

  Their fight moved them down a couple steps and then back up, and nobody watched overtly as they might back home, here in the city people mostly hurried away up on the road, or if they were on the river, they kept rowing toward the Westminster stairs or the nearest sandbank to disembark. Herbert was wielding his slender blade like an Italian fence-master, darting in from this angle and that, and it was all Tristan could do to set his thrusts aside with herky-jerky movements of the backsword. It looked ponderous even in his strong hands.

  Suddenly, I didn’t see how, the backsword went flying out of Tristan’s hand and Herbert had him flat back against the stairs—his sword actually pinning Tristan against the stone by virtue of having pierced through the shirt, vest, and jerkin just at the side of Tristan’s neck, and then Herbert stabbed it into the crevice between the rise and tread of the stone steps. Tristan was stuck. It seemed a fancy move from a fellow not likely capable of fancy moves.

  “To fall for such an easy and old-fashioned technique,” said Herbert, making a tch-tch-tch’ing sound. “A stupid error—and a fatal one.”

  But then a gloved hand came down, gently but firmly, upon Herbert’s wrist. An extraordinarily fine glove it was, made of white kid, with intricate embroidery.

  Herbert hadn’t seen this coming. Nor had I. Both of us looked up into the face of the gentleman I had noticed a minute ago—the finely dressed chap with the sharp yellow beard. “Who are you, sirrah, and how dare you?” Herbert demanded, and tried to wrench free of the other’s grip. But the white kid glove held firm.

  “I am the gentleman’s second,” said the man with the sharp yellow beard. He had an accent—’twas ze he said instead of the, like a German. He glanced over at George, then returned his eyes to Herbert’s face. Or perhaps I should say eye, for he was wearing a tall hat with a broad brim, gorgeously plumed, and in the best style of all the young blades, he’d pulled it down low to one side, concealing his left eye. “You have your second,” the German continued, flicking that eye momentarily at George, “and so ze honorable tradition is zat your opponent in ze duel should have one also. Is it not so?”

  “It is so,” Herbert admitted, “but you do not even know this varlet.”

  The German shrugged, giving me cause to admire the exquisite silk lining of his cape. “Zis in no way alters ze honorable tradition. As you will know. Being a man of honor.” And the German now turned his head to look about at the crowd of onlookers that had gathered during the pause in swordplay. The scarlet plume in his hat wafted first this way, then that. Herbert looked up to see that there were now many witnesses. Some of whom were gentlemen—capable of giving testimony and of being believed by a judge.

  The German’s intervention had worked; Herbert’s humours had cooled. He looked down at Tristan. “Go ask the wet-nurse how to escape next time. But first give me apologies. Varlet.”

  The German released Herbert’s wrist, spun away, and walked off into the crowd.

  “I apologize,” said Tristan stiffly, from his awkward supine position.

  “For what wrongs precisely, sirrah?”

  Tristan took a moment as if trying to remember what his sins were. “For daring to show such insolence to one of my betters.”

  “Apology accepted.” He withdrew his sword, stood upright, and casually sheathed his blade. “If it happens again, ’twill be your throat I pierce and not the clothes around it,” he said, then gestured to George (who had retrieved his backsword and was inspecting it for damage). They walked down the steps, took the next wherry, and sailed off downstream.

  Tristan got to his feet before I could move to offer him a hand. He shook his head slightly, looking spoo
ked. “Well there’s a lesson in that,” muttered he to himself. “Learning from a fight choreographer has its limits.” He gave me a reassuring smile. “It’s been a very fruitful day.”

  And to make a quick end of it, Your Grace, back we went along the Thames, and back to the brewery, and then I Sent him back to where he came from, which is farther into the future than I had dreamed, hundreds of years it sounds like. I’ve kept Ned Alleyn’s stolen costume for his next visit.

  So that is the tale of Tristan Lyons, whom I’ll surely see on many another snáithe as I Wend my way thence.

  And in conclusion, let me tell Your Majesty that nobody in London seems at all aware that the Spanish are about to land at Kinsale; that Penelope Devereux, sister to the traitor Essex, has been divorced by her husband Lord Rich for having an affair (and bastard children) with Mountjoy, known to yourself also as Charles Blount, known to yourself also as “Lord Deputy of Ireland.” They have but one son, Mountjoy Blount, and himself is four years old, but I do intend to put a curse on him that all of his children will be still-born or idiots, and so that line will end.

  And now I shall close with great love and regard to Your Majesty, as I am off to enjoy my one personal indulgence: the honey-love of a full night spent in the arms of my sweetheart. My life is naught but secrets that I either keep or destroy on your behalf; sure it does my soul good to have one small nugget of mine own.