‘You keep watch,’ I repeated. ‘If I don't come out of that building within twenty minutes –’
‘I'm coming in to look for you!’
‘Oh no, you're not, my girl. You're going to race over the mountain and find my dad. Tell him all you know, and he'll do something. If necessary, he'll get a band of men and they'll break into the tower.’
‘Let's both go and do that now.’
‘Not likely. Tom may be all right. Or he may have fallen downstairs and knocked himself out. I'll be careful, never fear. I won't touch anything. And I'll feel every board before I put my weight on it. I've got a pistol.’
‘What use is a pistol, if there's no one there?’
I laughed and touched the brass butt where it stuck from my doublet. ‘It's a comfort, anyway, I said. And I went snaking down the fellside, just in case anyone was watching. But I didn't get the feeling that anyone was.
I ran up the stone steps on silent tiptoe. The door stood inches open. That saved me a job, anyhow, and a job I wasn't sure I could have managed without Tom's handy little tools. He must be still inside. He'd never have left the door like that.
I pushed it back cautiously and slipped inside, still holding it with my left hand while my right closed over my pistol. There was no sound from the door. He who had oiled the lock had also attended to the hinges, and the massive timber swung silently at my push. I stood still for a whole minute, listening intently and letting my eyes get used to the dimness. The windows were small and high. Shafts of sunlight slanted through them and revealed that the room was empty except for spiders' webs and a broken stool.
The floor was solid, flagged with grey slabs. All the same, I took no chances. Instead of crossing straight to the doorway of the inner room, I crept round by way of the three walls. The other room was like the first, but in one corner, built into the thickness of the outside wall, there was a spiral staircase. It led down into the pitch darkness of the ground-floor, which in these peel-towers is always used as a cellar and storehouse. It also continued upwards to the second floor, where the bedrooms were in the days when the peel was inhabited.
It was darkish over in this corner, but I could see a patch of something at the foot of the stairs. It was wet. Water, I told myself but I wondered… I bent down gingerly and poked the tip of my finger into it then straightened myself and raised my hand to the light. If it was water, there'd be nothing to see except a wet shininess on my skin.
It wasn't water. I knew that as soon as I felt the stickiness. Then I saw, on my finger-tip, a neat oval of red so dark that it was almost black.
One is used to the sight of blood. I've seen plenty of sheep killed. I've watched bear-baiting and bull-baiting and cock-fights and all the sports that we Englishmen love. But for a moment, as I stared at the dark stickiness on my own finger, I felt sick.
I pulled myself together. Perhaps Tom had merely had an accident – slipped on those tricky, twisting stairs as I'd suggested to Kit. Then, where was he? Perhaps dazed and confused, he'd staggered on down the stairs into the cellar, and fainted there. Well, it wouldn't take long to see. If he was unconscious, I'd have to get Kit to help me up with him.
I felt my way stair by stair, down into the gloom of the store-cellar. One, two, three, four… At each step I paused and listened. I wished I had a candle.
As my foot flattened silently on the fifth stair, I heard something.
Footsteps overhead, coming down from the upper storey. For a deluded moment I almost shouted ‘Tom!’ but it was well I didn't. For there were two men, and they were talking.
I stood where I was, my pistol cocked. Were they coming all the way down? No, apparently. They had stopped in that inner room which had once been the parlour. Crouching five stairs down, I could hear plainly.
‘I hope he was alone,’ said a gruff voice.
‘Getting frightened, Anthony?’ The second voice was high and mocking. I guessed that the first speaker was Anthony Duncan of Troutbeck, he of the black beard. How bad he got here without our knowing? Then I realized what had happened. We had never taken an exact count of the men leaving the tower. We had seen some depart on foot, and we had seen the last of the horses ridden away, and we hadn't allowed for one or two men staying behind.
‘I'm not frightened,’ growled Duncan, ‘but it gives you a shock. I should have thought this place was safe enough. Lucky Philip's groom spotted him.’
‘Lucky the man was using one of those glasses,’ said his companion, with a laugh. ‘Useful things – but they do catch the sunlight.’
‘I wonder how he got on to the place. I hope he hadn't talked to anyone else. I don't like it, James. We thought we were all right here –’
‘Don't worry, my dear Anthony. We'll see what Philip says. We can easily change our headquarters.’
‘The time's getting so near now. Couldn't we act sooner? It's this waiting.’
‘No; it must be the twenty-ninth. That's the day we know for certain we can deal with Bess.’
I could hear Duncan clearing his throat. He said hesitantly. ‘Do you know… exactly… how it's to be done?’
‘Why, yes! Don't you? It was Vicar's notion in the first place….’
I listened, stiff and taut on the dark stairway, as the full horror of the conspiracy was revealed.
Tom had been right. This thing was getting bigger, bigger and uglier.
The Queen was to be murdered – that we had suspected all along. She was to die in the middle of the command performance of Shakespeare's play.
It had all been thought out in devilish detail. The conspirators had looked for an opportunity – not a sudden chance, but some definite occasion that could be foreseen. Henry the Fifth offered the perfect opportunity: a date fixed weeks beforehand; the Queen seated in her chair, with no one between her and the stage; an expert pistol-shot hidden in the curtains not twenty paces away….
‘The man's name is John Somers,’ said the lazy voice above me.
I started. John Somers! I knew him. He was one of Burbage's company, a disappointed, disgruntled player of third-rate parts. I had often heard him boast of his marksmanship. He was just the kind of man to lend himself to a piece of dirty work such as this. And, of course, he'd be able to stand behind the stage curtains without any question.
‘Lucky to find such a man in the company,’ Duncan was saying.
‘Oh, most actors will do anything if it's made worth their while. Or course, he's scared for his skin afterwards, but we persuaded him. He'll fire his shot just at the moment when there's a terrific row of stage cannon. If people hear the shot, they'll think it's part of the play.’
The blood rushed to my cheeks. Of course! Those lines, faintly under-scored in the stolen copy of the play:
... the nimble gunner
With linstock now the devilish cannon touches,
And down goes all before them!
I could hear and see it all in my imagination. The Queen sitting there in her jewels, her great skirts spread like a peacock's tail; the speaker of the Chorus declaiming his lines; the splendid roar of cannon on which our manager prided himself; the faint snap of the pistol; the Queen twitching in her seat, then slowly nodding forward as though she felt sleepy, while blood gradually soaked through to her stiff outer bodice, and made a dark patch spread wider and wider round the bullet-hole….
‘H'm,’ said Duncan. ‘He counts on enough time to slip away?’
The other man's cold chuckle was more brutal than the most ferocious threat.
‘He counts on it,’ he drawled. ‘But Philip and I thought better not. Julian Nesby will be in attendance on the Queen. He's to jump on the stage and run the fellow through. That'll save awkward questions.’
‘More blood,’ said Duncan, and I could tell the shudder in his voice. He wasn't a bad man, Anthony Duncan, but weak and ambitious.
‘Of course. That's only the beginning.’
I couldn't follow the rest of their plans with the same clearness, be
cause Duncan knew them as well as his friend. So, instead of listening to a straightforward description, I had to piece together odd hints and guess, half the time, what they referred to.
Of the main plan there was no shadow of doubt. On the day fixed for the Queen's assassination there was to be an uprising in the northern counties. Simultaneously, a Spanish fleet was to cross the Bay of Biscay from Ferrol, and – not repeating the mistake of the Great Armada – make an immediate landing at Falmouth.
The high politics behind all this I couldn't pretend to grasp. I couldn't tell from their talk even whom they meant to set upon the throne of England. But one thing I realized without any telling: Sir Philip Morton and his friends were going to be the big men in the new order. Sir Philip had outgrown such petty methods of stealing common lands and marrying heiresses. He was playing for the highest stakes.
It was just then I heard, faint but clear, Kit's whistle.
So did the two men. ‘What's that?’ said Duncan with the harshness of fear in his voice. I heard him turn on his heel and stride away. In a few moments he was back. ‘All right,’ he growled. ‘Must have been that groom –’
‘Philip's man?’
‘Yes; he's riding up the valley.’
‘Philip said he'd come back himself this morning. He must have been hindered.’
Again came that whistle, piercing and urgent now. It was bitterly funny, in a way. Poor Kit was desperately warning me against the one man who was riding up the valley; yet I was already besieged, unknowingly, by the pair inside the tower. She whistled a third time. She must be frantic. I knew how I'd have felt in her place. But I couldn't answer her.
I had to make a quick decision.
Should I make a dash for it? I could shoot one of the men point-blank, and, with any luck, get out of the room before the other got over his surprise. That would mean a desperate chase up the mountain, with at least one man close on my heels, and the groom not far behind.
Or should I feel my way silently downstairs into the cellar in the hope of remaining there undiscovered? Was there any reason why the men should come down there? I knew there was one very probable reason: Tom's body might be lying there, and they might decide to remove it.
On the whole, though, the second course seemed the wiser. I would go down and crouch in the darkness. If they didn't come near me, well and good. If they did – well, I should still have my pistol. There was a sporting chance of taking them by surprise and fighting my way out.
The cellar, which a little while before had yawned like a well of horror, became suddenly a haven of refuge. I turned and took another step down.
There must have been blood on the stair. My foot slithered over the edge. I went headlong. The pistol leapt from the breast of my doublet, bounced away, and went off with a tremendous bang. My head struck the curving wall with a resounding crash, and that was the last I knew for a considerable time.
17. Held for Questioning
IN my ears was the ceaseless murmur of water. There was the fresh smell of water too. Do you think water has no smell? Horses know better. Stand by the lakeside with your eyes shut and you will never doubt that it is water which spreads in front of you.
My head ached dully. My knuckles smarted where I had dashed the skin from them. It was some moments before I felt any inclination to sit up and open my eyes.
I was sitting on a sloping shelf of grass, in front of a tumbledown stone hovel. The grass ended in a grey shingle. Then the water stretched, grey and sullen under the clouds, for a quarter of a mile or more. There was a boat, with one man in it, making for the other side, where dense woods rose steeply from the lake. The fells behind them were blotted out by low-hanging mist. As I watched, the man disappeared into an inlet, and for an instant I imagined I was now utterly alone.
‘So you've come to your senses?’ growled a deep voice, and there was Anthony Duncan towering above me. I didn't answer immediately, so he went on, not unkindly: ‘That was a nasty crack you gave yourself, but you'll be all right.’
‘Where am I?’ I asked. It's what people always ask when they come round in such circumstances, but when the view in front of you is unfamiliar, it seems the most sensible question.
‘Never you mind. Safe enough.’
I didn't feel particularly safe, though I was glad to be with Duncan, rather than the cold-blooded man I had heard talking with him in the peel. I glanced behind me. There was the old hut, moss-covered, with heather growing between its stones and a rotten door hanging crazily on its hinges. There was no sound of anyone inside. There were a couple of sycamores behind the hut, and farther back I caught a glimpse of the top branches of other trees.
‘Like a drink?’ asked Duncan.
‘Please.’
He went over to a basket, took out a pewter mug, and walked slowly down to the water's edge. I watched him with half-closed eyes, shamming faint. This was my chance. I felt sure he had no companions near, and if I got twenty yards start it would take a nimbler man than Duncan to overtake me. Once I got up the fellside, the low mists would help me, and, though they would make it harder for me to get my bearings and find where I was, that was a minor point. The main thing was to escape.
I waited till Duncan reached the shingle and stooped. I heard him grunt and his legs crack: he was a stiff-jointed rheumaticky man. I could have shouted with joy at the sound of those creaking knees. I was as good as free.
I bunched my muscles ready. His puffed breeches were most temptingly curved against the grey water. Had I been near enough, one hefty kick would have sent him flying into the lake. Instead, I sprang to my feet and tore round the side of the hut. If he had a pistol, he had no time to use it. I went bounding up a little knoll, covered with trees and bracken, and as I went I realized how much my fall had taken out of me. My legs were weak, I reeled and stumbled, but sheer will-power carried me up the hillock.
‘Come back, you fool!’ bellowed Duncan.
I ran on, ducking through bushes. I could see water ahead, shining through the leaves. I turned left. Water again. Duncan was pounding along behind me. I rushed to the right, and still I saw the steel-grey lake in front of me. By now the truth had dawned on me – we were on a tiny islet in the middle.
There was nothing left but to swim for it. There was no place to dive from; the island at this point was fringed with jagged rocks, sprinkled in shallow water. I started to wade and scramble towards the open, but Duncan reached me before I was knee-deep. He seized me like a bear and carried me back, breathless but struggling, and threw me down on the grass.
‘Little fool,’ he said. ‘Do you want to be tethered like an old goat?’
He dragged me back to the hut. In the food-basket was a length of cord ready for the purpose. He tied my ankles together; then, without cutting the cord, my wrists as well. At first he was going to fasten them behind my back, but he relented. ‘You'll need to eat,’ he said, and tied my hands in front, with enough rope to raise them to my mouth and thus, in a clumsy way, feed myself. There was a loaf in the basket, some meat, and other things, including a small glass bottle of wine. He cut a slab of bread and a slice of the meat, and shoved them into my coupled hands.
‘You'll have to manage as best you can. I'm not trusting you with a knife. Come on; you might as well eat. We may have a long wait.’
‘Wait for what?’ I asked sullenly. I bent my head and raised my hands, and started to gnaw the food. I needed it.
‘Never you mind. You'll see soon enough.’
We didn't speak again for a few minutes. I was thinking hard. I had guessed where we were. Since we certainly weren't on Derwentwater, we were probably on one of the small islets in the uppermost reach of Ullswater some miles from the peel. But why had they taken the trouble to carry me here and leave me under guard? For whom or what were we waiting?
Luckily, Duncan was even more curious than I was, and after one or two sidelong glances he could keep quiet no longer.
‘What were you doing there?�
�� he demanded roughly. ‘How much do you know?’ I could see that, big man as he was, he was secretly afraid.
‘Quite a lot,’ I answered. I wasn't sure how to handle the situation, but my impulse was to play on his fear and keep him guessing.
‘Anyone else know? Except that other man?’
That was awkward. I didn't want to stir up suspicions which might lead them on Kit's trail, or to my home. Still, it might be dangerous to let him think I was alone. There would be a strong temptation then to silence me for good and all, as I felt sure by now they had silenced poor Tom.
‘You'll know soon enough,’ I said.
His face twitched. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘We'll know all right – when Sir Philip comes. You'll talk to him. He knows how to make people talk. I'm trying to save you from that.’ He took a long drink from the wine-bottle, as if he had thoughts he wanted to forget. Then he turned to me earnestly, wiping his hand across his black beard. ‘We've got to know, lad. Our lives depend on it. You can't blame us. But I don't want you to be hurt. I know who you are, and I know your family. I don't want to start any feud. I want you to look on me as your friend.’
‘You're my jailer,’ I retorted.
‘And lucky for you I am!’
‘Why?’
‘The others aren't so soft-hearted. Talk to me, lad, before the others come. Then I swear I won't let them touch you.’
‘I know what to expect from them, once I've talked. A knife in the ribs, my clothes stuffed with stones, and a grave at the bottom of the lake!’
‘No,’ he protested.
‘What then?’
‘You'll be kept here on this island till everything's started. It's only a week, after all. We shan't care what you do then. It'll be too late to matter.'
I looked at him stubbornly. ‘I wish I could trust your friends as well as I'd trust you, Mr Duncan. But I can't. I shan't talk yet.’
He made a gesture of impatience. I knew he was desperately worried for his own sake. The conspirators must be feeling very frightened today. First Tom, then me…. They must all be wondering if there were any more of us. Clearly, they no longer felt safe in the peel, or they would have kept me there, instead of bundling me off, at such risk and inconvenience to themselves, across country to this island.
Cue for Treason Page 13