A Dangerous Trade: An Elizabethan Spy Thriller

by Steven Veerapen

  ‘Scotland?’ she said. He noticed it came with mingled scorn and disbelief. He tossed his head, his fringe flying. It was something to do to avoid her eyes. ‘Why?’

  ‘Just to fetch some things down from … there.’ He realised he had no idea whereabouts in Scotland Heydon was taking him.

  ‘So you’re going up through the north?’

  ‘That is the way to Scotland,’ he smiled. ‘Yes.’ She didn’t smile back. Instead, she seemed to be frowning, a little line creeping across her smooth forehead. It wasn’t like her to ask stupid questions – that, he suspected, was more like him. ‘Why?’

  ‘No reason. And why does high and mighty Sir Philip want to go?’

  ‘He doesn’t.’ Irritation flared and, without realising it, Jack felt his hand tighten on the package of pastry, crushing it. ‘I mean, why shouldn’t he? The earl has custody of the queen and Philip works for him, so he goes where he’s sent. And he can hardly go alone.’

  ‘Can he not find someone else to go with him?’

  ‘No,’ said Jack. He was bored of the conversation now. ‘It won’t be for long. We just have to go there and back.’

  ‘I see. Well thank you for telling me. When are you off?’

  ‘Tomorrow.’

  ‘Be careful, Jack. Please. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to – remember that. And remember that there are folk who’ll probably be watching the road up there and back.’

  He leant in and kissed her, meaning it. ‘I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Just … just mind how you go. And mind who you talk to.’

  He watched her scurry away, wondering what on earth she meant. Amy was a sharp girl – he suspected she already knew that he had turned his mind towards the old faith. If that was all that was worrying her, she had no need. Philip was an ordained priest. He travelled with the protection of God. No, if Amy was worried for anyone, it should be for herself, stuck in a moving prison full of heretical soldiers.

  It was only when she had gone that he looked down and realised he was still holding the little napkin of sweets. Somehow, he had crushed it. He cursed silently, regretting his temper. Still, he supposed it would still be edible. It would do him and Heydon on the road north.

  ***

  They left early the next morning. Amy watched them go from a window in the castle. When they were out of sight, she pulled the shutter closed. It didn’t fit all the way and she gave up trying to force it.

  The whole household was already up and about and, as Amy considered what she would have to get counted and packed, her mind turned to Brown. It wasn’t a day on which she could see him. He was always strict about that. If she had information, she had to wait until a Saturday. Even then, she must whistle the correct tune if she had something to impart. If he heard anything else, he would stay away. It was, he said, of critical importance that no one know of their meetings. If word got out that Cecil had men spying on the household, it might destroy the honest channels of communication between the Shrewsburys and the government. Amy liked the countess – Bess was a big, capable woman – but Brown was quick to tell her that as long as what she told him tallied with what the earl and his wife told Cecil, all would be quite well.

  What her meetings meant, though, was more than just a furtive excitement. It was more too than a desire to protect Jack from himself and Heydon. In truth, she had begun to grow lonely. Her fellow maidservants barely spoke to her now – and then tersely, with the weight of their words and hers hanging between them. Brown was strange, even spooky, but he was someone to talk to – and not about linens and cloths.

  Grudgingly, she began to tramp through the hall, now spartan and barely furnished. Her eyes were on the ground and she jolted when she felt a large mass loom up in front of her.

  ‘You, girl – what are you about?’ She looked up into the narrowed eyes of the countess.

  ‘Sorry, my lady,’ said Amy, dropping a curtsey.

  ‘Haven’t you got something to do?’ Bess folded her arms. She looked like she had had little sleep. Amy supposed that the role of a gaoler’s wife must be a tiresome one. Neither Bess nor Shrewsbury liked the place, but Queen Elizabeth had forbidden the earl from leaving their new charge even for a day.

  ‘Yes, my lady.’ Amy began to back away and to the side.

  ‘Wait. You are still newly come into our household. How do you find it? Are you liking your time here?’

  ‘No, my lady.’ The words were out before Amy thought better. Bess frowned and then a smile split her broad face.

  ‘Ah, I remember you now. The honest chit. It’s this castle I fancy you dislike. Well, I can’t blame you for that. You joined our household at a hard time.’

  ‘Yes, my lady. Only …’

  ‘Well? Speak your piece.’

  ‘I find the other servants here don’t take to me. They don’t take to my tongue.’

  ‘Then you had best see that you stop it up when you’re around them, my girl. You’ve made some enemies, is that it?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘Then unmake them. Make unfriends into friends. And then if they still don’t like you, they can go to the devil, can’t they?’

  ‘Yes, my lady,’ said Amy, smiling despite herself.

  ‘You take it from me – sometimes you have to feign a little to make life a little less to bear. If ever I have cause or let to get away from the place, though, remind me to watch out for you.’ Bess looked down. Clutched against her chest was a collection of spooled coloured threads. Amy looked at them longingly as the image of a little shop drifted into her mind – she in the back sewing and Jack at the front, smiling at every customer. The countess shattered the image, looking back at Amy and winking. ‘Now, be off with you and don’t let me find you moping again. I have enough to do keeping my guest entertained.’ Then her voice took on a wistful tone. ‘Enough colours here to make her another new periwig. Ach, shall today’s conversation be France or Scotland or what’ll it be at all…’

  Bess seemed to have forgotten Amy entirely. She stomped off towards Mary’s apartments, muttering darkly to herself. As she disappeared, a goose walked over Amy’s grave. There, she thought. That is the woman you are betraying. That is the mistress to whom you owe loyalty, and about whom you’ve just been looking forward to whispering about in the shelter of her own parklands.

  Her hand wandered to her bosom. She had kept the vial on her, shuttling it between clothes, sleeping with it secreted under her bodice where it could jab at her ribs. Maybe it would be best if she just swallowed it all herself and there made an end to a world full of secrecy and deceit. The thought, depressing and grim, had no time to fester. Besides, it was only the weak, evanescent feeling that she imagined everyone might have when they realise that they’ve involved themselves in something that might overwhelm them. Before it could grow, Queen Mary herself appeared, a harried-looking Bess behind her.

  ‘We think not to be confined. Your chamber is finer, and I would that we work our needle there,’ she was saying.

  ‘As you like, your Majesty.’

  Amy flattened herself against the wall and Mary sailed past. As she did, she smiled down, a tired ‘isn’t this all a dreadful to-do’ smile. Her hair today was blonde, looped up under a cap studded with pearls. Amy had heard that she had had to crop her hair close during her flight out of Scotland and that was why she had taken to a variety of wigs. Cattily, she wished silently that it would never grow back straight or fair.

  Queen and countess passed out of her sight when a thought struck her. Hitherto she informed Brown only of pointless things – things that should confirm what the Shrewsburys would likely be telling Cecil and Queen Elizabeth anyway. Yet, as she thought of Mary Stuart and her little pearls and her little smiles, another thought occurred to her.

  Men had been coming and going from the Scottish queen, her husband and Heydon included. But more importantly, they had been having private talks with her. When it was her turn to gather the royal par
ty’s bedsheets and take them for cleaning, she had always waited at the door until one of the queen’s minions had delivered them. Yet no one would pay any attention if she went right in and took what she was there for. In fact, it would probably be welcomed by Mary’s servants. On the heels of the thought came the realisation that if Brown wanted information – not warmed-over stuff, but the Scottish queen’s private whispers – she could seek them out. No one would bother about a lowly maidservant bustling about with bedclothes. She could move like a wraith. And if Mary Queen of Scots was up to something under the earl of Shrewsbury’s nose, then Brown could tell Cecil, and Cecil could have that great lady taken away and locked up in the Tower of London. Let’s see her, thought Amy, turn the keeper of the Tower into a Catholic slave.

  5

  Travelling meant taverns. It meant an endless parade of inns, each operated by the same band of ostlers, suspicious tavern keepers, and the occasional pretty barmaid who indicated by her manner whether she was as available as the place’s rooms. It meant, too, backside-numbing riding and the itch of sweat as it gathered under the armpits and down the back of shirts. Jack loved it. At each stop, he tried to memorise the layout of the town and the inside of each tavern. The whole world seemed to change: the flat lands of the midlands had turned bumpy, and then hilly, and then opened into yawning valleys misted with curtains of cool, refreshing rain. This was making memories. It was being a new person in every new place.

  They had stabled their horses and took benches in the wood-beamed hall of an inn somewhere on the north road. Jack didn’t know the name of the town, but the building called itself The Red Lion. Jack sat down and waited whilst Heydon got them some ale. He swept over when he had been served. He seemed to sweep everywhere, Jack thought, walking across every room as though he was its master. A knight in a tale of chivalry. ‘The finest south of the Tweed,’ he announced, setting the wooden mugs down before them. Heydon looked excited, as though lit from within. He was wearing all black – priestly clothes, he had joked – but with a rich furred vest over his doublet. He had stopped hiding his cross and it sat between the bushy lapels.

  ‘You were a time,’ said Jack.

  ‘I was asking after the village. I know Darlington.’

  ‘Where are you from? I mean, before you travelled.’

  Heydon looked around the tavern. Apart from a couple of young boys playing dice across the room they were alone. ‘The north.’

  ‘You sure seem to know a lot of folks up the north road.’ Since they had left the midlands and entered the north of England, Heydon had enquired after a plethora of names Jack didn’t know. Rolleston; Dacre; Norton; Hall; Stanley. And then there were the names he did know: Northumberland; Westmorland; Norfolk. He kept quiet when Heydon spoke with his succession of grave and stony-faced associates.

  Sipping at his ale, Heydon looked at him over the rim. He licked the foam from his upper lip and then waved an arm about the room. ‘The north, mate. This fine land. It’s the backbone of England. And what does that woman in London think of it?’ He snapped his fingers. ‘That’s what. Oh, she expects – demands – loyalty but she wouldn’t set foot up here. Knows what would come of her if she did. So she sends up new men – rats, men of no family – and has them tell good honest northern folk what she wants doing. We’re oppressed, Jack, held down. You, me, all of the north.

  ‘They won’t stand for it. They’re not standing for it. But,’ he added, lowering his voice, ‘they’re like lambs without a shepherd. Too many ideas, too little … too little knowledge. They’re all at sixes and sevens – in pursuit of their own designs, not trusting to one another. A mass of sheep in need of someone to bring them together. More like herding cats.’

  ‘Mass,’ said Jack, laughing awkwardly. ‘Well that suits you them.’

  Heydon appraised him for a moment. ‘Not word games, mate. Nobody likes jests with words.’ Jack felt colour creep up his neck and he bent his head to his mug.

  The door to the tavern banged open and both their heads turned. A man Jack didn’t recognise came in, swaggering. He was well dressed, his furs outstripping Heydon’s. He nodded at them, before making his way over to the bar. Jack was about to take another drink when he saw Heydon staring at the man’s back through narrowed eyes. ‘One of your friends?’

  ‘No. Have you seen him before?’

  ‘No.’ Jack looked at the slim back again. ‘I don’t think so. Have I?’

  ‘You should have. I reckon he was in Topcliffe.’ Jack cast his mind back. He couldn’t remember which place Topcliffe was.

  ‘He’s following us, do you think?’

  ‘It wouldn’t surprise me.’

  ‘But who is he?’

  ‘I don’t know. One of Cecil’s men, maybe.’

  A chill ran through Jack. He had never seen Secretary Cecil, but he had heard rumours about him. A rich old knight of gentleman stock. The kind of man you would bend your knee to even though he wasn’t noble. It was his job to keep eyes on every corner of the kingdom. On every corner of the world, some people said. Was that the kind of man that becoming a Catholic made an enemy of? How easy would it be to bring such a man down – especially for a horse keeper?

  ‘Stay here,’ said Heydon, drumming his fingers briefly on the table.

  ‘What – where are you going?’

  ‘I’m going to lock our things up in our room. The tapster has given us lodging upstairs. I’ll be right back. Keep an eye on our friend over there.’

  Heydon disappeared up a narrow wooden staircase beside the bar, their packs tucked under his arms. Jack did as he was bid. The man who might have been from Cecil took his own mug of ale and seated himself on a bench on the opposite side of the room. He dabbed delicately at his mouth with a silky napkin after every sip, but his eyes never left Jack. Irritation and then anger replaced fear. Who was this fool anyway – this fool who didn’t even bother to hide that he was watching him?

  As Jack felt truculence rise like a cork, Heydon reappeared. He let it go. ‘All done?’

  ‘All done. Any word from him?’

  ‘Not one. He’s just sitting there watching me.’ Jack let his voice rise on the last two words.

  ‘Easy there, mate. No need to fire him up. I’ll find out later if the tapster has seen him before. Let’s not let him spoil our ale.’

  They drank awhile in silence. The appearance of the watcher seemed to call for it, and Jack was glad. If they talked, he didn’t yet trust himself not to let something slip about what they were doing. The tavern began to fill up, men pouring in from the fields and the shops. Heydon didn’t speak to any of them, and Jack thought he sensed a nervous kind of energy building in him.

  ‘It’s getting late now, don’t you think?’ said Jack, when the place had begun to rock with drunken singing and laughter and profanity. ‘I mean, if we’re to make a good start in the morning. Down south.’ He had decided that lying loudly might be a good way to throw anyone listening off their scent. Heydon laughed. Again he drummed his fingers on the table, stood up and turned. He peered through the close pack of bodies.

  ‘Shit,’ he said.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘He’s gone.’

  ‘I didn’t see him leave.’

  ‘He didn’t go upstairs, did he?’

  ‘No – I’d have seen that, wouldn’t I? He must have crept out when someone came in. Is that bad?’

  Heydon took a deep breath. ‘No. No, I suppose not. He’s fishing – casting out lures. Whoever he is he can’t know anything or he’d not be here. He’d be flying south looking for reward. There are knaves like him up and down the country. They creep about and if they see anything or anyone they suspect of something, they follow. Hoping to hook a great sturgeon to slice up and serve to Cecil and the London masters. Idlers. Come on.’

  They pressed through the crowd and up the stairs, Heydon in the lead. He opened the door to their chamber and entered. There, bent over their bed, rifling through their packs, stood t
he spy. Heydon threw himself into the room. ‘Jack, close the door,’ he hissed.

  ‘I’ve got you fellows to rights,’ smiled the stranger. He had Heydon’s rosary beads looped through his fingers and he raised them up. His smile disappeared. Heydon launched himself over the bed, his fist flying out. It caught him in the stomach and the man doubled over in shock.

  ‘Knave,’ cried Heydon. ‘Jack, help!’

  Jack stood irresolute. The stranger recovered, his eyes lighting up with fury. He bared teeth, some of them missing and threw himself forward. His hands came up, the beads held taut between them. ‘Jack!’ The man pushed Heydon back onto the bed, bringing the rosary up to his throat. He pressed down, his hands on either side of his neck. Heydon bucked, his knee shooting into his attacker’s groin, making him moan.

  With the stranger yelping, reaching between his legs, Heydon rolled sideways off the bed. He got to his feet and squatted, his hands twisted into fists. ‘Come on then, you stinking prick,’ he hissed. ‘Come on then.’ The rosary fell to the floor, the string snapped. The beads flew in all directions. Jack took another few steps forward, his drawn dagger at his hip.

  As Jack watched, mouth agape, Heydon and the spy flung themselves at one another. They had hold of each other’s shoulders, their fingernails singing into the clothing, knuckles turning white. For a few seconds they seemed to hold in that absurd position. It was like a strange tribal dance. They fought for dominance, circling on the spot. As they twisted, the man’s back appeared before Jack. He looked down at his dagger. He moved it up, as though to sink it in. Before he could move, Heydon sank low, catching the man under his centre of gravity. He gave him one hard push, and the spy fell backwards. He almost seemed to totter on to the blade. Jack felt the clothing resist it. He felt his wrist weaken. And then Heydon pushed again. His tightened his grip on the dagger, holding it steady as Heydon pushed the shocked man onto it.

  Still, he fought back. He tried to twist as the steel sought his kidneys. And then a slow scream burst from his lips. Before it could reach a great pitch, Heydon punched him hard in the throat. Their victim flopped. Still he was skewered on the point of Jack’s dagger. ‘Twist it, Jack. Finish him!’