by Angus Donald
Sunday 7 May, 1671
‘He wants me to read the letter,’ Holcroft told Aphra. ‘A letter that doesn’t exist, and tell him word for word what it says. And he says he won’t part with a thousand in gold, just a few pounds. It’s not going to work, Aphra. We’ve made a terrible mistake.’
It was just after dawn on the morning after Holcroft’s midnight interview with the duke. He had hardly slept, an hour or two at most, and had risen in darkness and made his way north across London to a tall thin house in St Thomas Street, where he had thrown pebbles at the topmost window until Aphra’s sleepy head had poked out and answered his rattling summons.
Now they were in her tiny garret and Holcroft was telling her of his night’s conversation, with a great deal of agitation. Even at dawn, the air in that tiny space reeked of cabbage boiled for too long, a scent that pervaded the building.
‘Steady yourself, Holcroft.’ Aphra was heating a tiny pan of water on a spirit burner on the table, making a pot of tea for them to share. ‘It’s all going just as planned. He’s taken the bait; after all, he didn’t dismiss the whole thing out of hand, or march straight to the King’s bedchamber and denounce Ormonde. He badly wants to believe that such a letter exists.’
‘There is no letter. How can I tell him about a letter that has no form? And if he is only going to pay a few pounds, it’s not worth the trouble.’
Aphra considered telling Holcroft to use his imagination and then she remembered to whom she was talking. Instead she said: ‘First of all, it is too late to go back now – wait! Hear me out. Buckingham thinks the letter exists. If we back off he will go directly to Pratt and attempt to buy or bully it out of him. Pratt will deny all knowledge and will probably spill the information that you approached him and asked him to deliver a blank piece of paper. If we stop now, Buckingham goes to Pratt and you’re finished.’
The confidential clerk put his head in his hands and gave a low moan.
‘Holcroft!’ said Aphra sharply, breaking off from pouring boiling water into the teapot. ‘Listen to me now. All is well. There is no cause for alarm. He is merely bargaining with us – he’s trying to get the price down. You tell him that Pratt says that it is a thousand in gold or nothing. Tell the duke that Pratt is considering approaching Lord Arlington with the same arrangement, and that will stop his nonsense about a few miserable pounds. Buckingham wants the letter and he can easily afford a thousand. In truth, he could pay ten thousand without noticing the loss.’
Holcroft lifted his head from his hands. He felt sick and dizzy but he was drinking in Aphra’s words as if they were the Gospels.
‘Now pull yourself together, Holcroft, and look at this piece of paper.’ She passed him a large crisp yellowing sheet of thick paper embossed with a crest of three golden cups on a blood-red background. Holcroft scanned the short, badly spelled note: it was a barely polite refusal from the Duke of Ormonde to Thomas Betterton, master of Aphra’s theatre company, saying that the duke regretted that he was not inclined to sponsor a production of a new comedy called The Amorous Prince at the Lincoln’s Inn Theatre.
Holcroft looked at her, frowning.
‘Look at the handwriting, look at the way the writer forms his letters,’ said Aphra, taking the letter from Holcroft. ‘It is from Ormonde’s own hand, I guarantee you, not one of his clerk’s. I’ve checked with other letters that I’ve managed to lay eyes on. Look at the way he spells this word, and that one there. Note the crest at the top, and the flamboyant signature underlined with curlicues at the bottom.’
Aphra put the piece of paper back on the table and selected another. ‘Now read this and commit it to memory, if you can do so. I wrote it but you must pretend that you are reading it in the duke’s hand.’
Holcroft looked at the second piece of paper attentively. He saw Aphra’s neat penmanship and then overlaid the duke’s bold, aristocratic scrawl in his mind’s eye. He began to feel calmer.
‘Pay particular attention to this part here.’ Aphra tapped the paper with her finger. Holcroft read the paragraph indicated, then he read it again.
‘Got it?’
‘Yes,’ said Holcroft.
‘Have you committed it to memory?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good, now let’s have a drop of this tea before it gets cold. And one more thing, Holcroft. I’m going to need some money. I have very little and none at all to spare. Do you have five pounds that I could take from you?’
Tuesday 9 May, 1671
They breakfasted before dawn at the Blue Boar Inn, a down-at-heel establishment in a small alley just off the White Chapel Street, half a mile north of the Tower of London. They had stayed there the night before after coming down on horseback from Romford Market – Colonel Blood, his son Tom, William Hunt, Joshua Parrot, and an old friend of Blood’s called William Smith who was a particular type of nonconformist called a Fifth Monarchist, who hated the King and believed the end of the world was nigh. A decade before, Smith had followed the wine-cooper-turned-revolutionary Thomas Venner in his lunatic attempt to capture the City of London with fifty men in the name of ‘King Jesus’. It had been a disastrous venture.
Smith, a stocky, dark-haired man in a threadbare blue coat, had been living badly ever since Venner’s doomed insurrection, his name on the list of wanted men with prices on their heads – along with that of Colonel Thomas Blood, naturally – and he now existed in a desperate, brandy-soaked demi-monde inhabited by a mixture of religious rebels and common criminals, holy madmen and vicious murderers, constantly at the risk of betrayal by paid informers and often too poor even to feed himself.
Blood had recruited Smith, whom he had found begging for his bread in Romford Market, with the promise of twenty pounds in gold, partly out of pity and partly because he needed a good, steady man to watch the horses while the business was done in the Irish Tower, and he trusted Smith not to run if things went badly for them. Like Parrot and Hunt, Smith had been part of the ramshackle cavalry troop with a black reputation that Blood had led towards the end of the war. Blood trusted all three men with his life. He was certain that not one of them would ever betray him. However the money was to be paid when the job was done. Gold in the hand changed a man. It invited temptation and, to Blood’s mind, was a needless risk.
At a little after six o’clock, the five men set out from the Blue Boar, all mounted, each man armed with at least one discreet blade and a pair of pocket pistols. They headed down White Chapel Street and turned left just before Aldgate into the City, walking their horses down The Minories, quiet and deserted at this early hour except for a few fruit-sellers setting up their stalls, the width of the street allowing them to ride five abreast, four of them advancing like the cavalrymen they had once been, and Tom doing his best to imitate his veteran companions. Directly in front of them the Tower was rising out of the morning mists on the River Thames. They could hear the roaring of the toothless lion from five hundred yards away, a coughing grunt, that set the hairs of Tom’s neck on end, and made the horses skitter.
They changed to single file as they passed down the road on the eastern side of the Tower, eyeing the grey-green moat on their right and the high off-white walls. They passed the Irish Tower on their right and saw the curtains drawn and a large figure moving about – breakfast preparing. At the Iron Gate by the Thames they dismounted and all handed their reins to Smith.
Tom looked out at a cutter on the river, dark hulled but with brilliant-white triangular sails that passed by at a reckless speed, heading downstream towards the sea. For a moment he wished he were on it, fleeing the deed he knew he must do this morning. He wondered if his father ever felt fear. He doubted it. Tom most definitely did. He felt cold and clumsy, a little sick, the pistols too heavy in his coat pockets, banging awkwardly against his thighs.
To their newest recruit, who was securing the reins to a pole set up by the rusting remains of the open gate, Blood said: ‘Wait here, Smithy. It should not take more than an hour at mos
t. But have the horses untied and ready when we come, we may need to move fast.’
Then to the rest of them: ‘This is righteous work we do today, lads. Stay calm; follow my lead. If we get separated we meet back at the Blue Boar. Wait for the others there or leave a message. Does every man know what to do?’ There was a chorus of muted assent. Blood looked at his son. He was pale as death. His father put a warm, heavy hand on his shoulder.
‘Keep the faith, my boy, and we’ll all come up smiling yet.’
They walked on to the wharf, through a double row of dwellings, one on each side, and with the river beyond the houses on their left, past a pair of sleepy sentries at the Water Gate, who merely nodded at the now-familiar figure of Parson Ayliffe and his friends, and entered the Tower itself.
A few minutes later, the affable Reverend Ayliffe, gold spectacles perched on his long nose, his handsome nephew Thomas, the well-to-do country gentleman, and his two other guardians, the huge, lumpish and scowling Mister Paris and the smaller, scarred Mister Halliwell, both eminently respectable gentlemen in well-brushed coats and brand-new beaver-fur hats, stood outside the blue door, while the parson rapped sharply on the wood with his silver wolf’s head cane.
Talbot Edwards was not a man who often relished the dewy freshness of the early morning. He preferred to linger over his port wine during long evenings by his fire and he rarely rose before nine o’clock unless it was unavoidable. So, while he had readily agreed to hosting Parson Ayliffe’s friends at breakfast, he had been slightly appalled when the man had suggested seven of the clock as an appropriate hour to meet. When he opened his door that morning, at a quarter to seven, it must be said that he looked out at the four men waiting there with bleary eyes and a sourness of mind. He barely managed to utter a civil good morning before blurting out: ‘Breakfast ain’t ready yet. And Mistress Edwards is still making her toilet.’
Parson Ayliffe smiled. ‘Then perhaps we might view the jewels before our repast, if you are willing, Edwards. It would be a shame to disturb your good lady before she is ready to receive us.’
Edwards grunted something, shuffled back inside his house and groped for the big set of iron keys that hung on the wall behind the door. He grumbled slightly under his breath as he led the men down the winding stairs to the Jewel House, pushed open the door, and began to light all the candles in the windowless chamber. With five men in the room, including the enormous Mister Paris, it was rather crowded, but Edwards managed to ease his way through his guests, forward to the grill and, using the key on the smaller ring, he opened the padlock that secured the grill and with something of a flourish he swung open the heavy iron gate.
‘These, gentlemen, are the famous Crown Jewels of England,’ he began, ‘entrusted to me personally by His Majesty and sadly unused these ten years past since the glorious occasion of his coronation . . .’
He got no further. A pair of powerful arms seized him from behind. A black cloth was flung over his head and he found himself hurled painfully to the floor with a great weight sitting on his chest, pinning him to the earth.
‘It grieves me to do this, sir,’ said Parson Ayliffe in his ear, his voice slightly muffled by the thick, blinding cloth. ‘But I am afraid that I shall be obliged to relieve you of all the King’s jewels this morning. I have no wish to injure you, for you have been kind to us, and if you submit, and lie quiet without fuss, then no harm at all will come to you. However, if you resist, or call out, or give us the slightest trouble, I shall have no choice but to subdue you with appropriate, and even with deadly force.’
Talbot Edwards, confused, disorientated and half stifled by the folds of the black cloak over his head, lay perfectly still.
*
Robert Westbury stood with his feet shoulder-width apart, perfectly balanced, his hands behind his back. He kept his chin up, his voice level, and made his report to his master the Duke of Buckingham.
‘We know that he got the note from James Pratt, a page in the Duke of Ormonde’s service. Pratt actually came here to deliver it three days ago.’
‘Did he now?’ said Buckingham. ‘That is most interesting.’
‘But Holcroft Blood has also been meeting with a playwright, a young and pretty widow called Mistress Behn regularly. We don’t know why – certainly it is not on any regular business connected with the household. He has met with this Behn person at least four times in the past two weeks, Your Grace, three times at Pettigrew’s chophouse in the Strand, while he was supposed to be doing the mail run, and last Sunday, very early, he visited her at her house in a shabby street off Drury Lane, near St Giles. When they’re together, Your Grace, they act, well, you might say furtively.’
‘And you are sure that they are not simply lovers?’
‘There is no sign of any excessive affection, sir, no touching or kissing, and I must say that I do not believe that Blood is carnally inclined towards this woman – or any woman so far as I can tell.’
‘Indeed?’ said the duke. ‘So what do they discuss, then, if not the joyous beating of their twin hearts?’
‘Unfortunately, sir, neither d’Erloncourt nor I have been able to determine that. We have both been obliged to remain in the shadows, or at a suitable distance to avoid recognition by the target.’
‘Do they plot together? Do they connive at my downfall?’
‘I do not know, sir. They just look furtive, as I said, a bit suspicious. Would you like me to find out more? I could make an effort to befriend Blood, get him to trust me. He might then take me into his confidence.’
The duke made no reply. He stared into space, gently stroking his clean-shaven chin. Westbury felt a warm glow of satisfaction – he had known that there was something wrong with Blood, quite apart from his low birth and odd, inhuman manner. He was clearly plotting something disloyal, something against the duke. He was very glad he had taken the time to follow him discreetly when he was at liberty, and persuade Fox Cub to do the same when Westbury had his duties to perform. One advantage of arranging the rota was that it enabled him to ensure that either he or Foxy was always available to conduct their surveillance of the enemy.
‘Would you like me to try to find out more, sir?’ Westbury repeated. He disliked the sensation of being ignored, particularly after he had rendered the duke such a valuable service.
‘What? No. It may be harmless – something theatrical, or a strange kind of love affair. Anyway, I don’t believe that Holcroft could ever be brought to trust you. You fought with him once, did you not? And you were cruel when he first came. It is clear he does not like you – who can blame him: you are an odious little sneak. A bully, too, I should imagine. No, keep away from him, behave as you normally would.’
The duke fumbled in his waistcoat pocket, found a gold coin, glanced at it and flicked it at Westbury. As the guinea arced through the air, he said: ‘That is for your pains – and I thank you, too, but you need not trouble yourself any further. Oh, and send d’Erloncourt in to me at once.’
Robert Westbury walked slowly from the room, his chin sagging, his feet heavy. This was not how it was supposed to go. He had spent hours following Blood around the byways of White Hall and further afield in London, dodging into stinking alleyways to avoid detection, suffering cold, rain, sore feet and even more painful boredom. It was humiliating to be tipped like a street urchin and casually dismissed with such scant praise. But strangely he did not blame the duke – perhaps His Grace had not grasped the scale of his efforts: he would redouble them, despite what the duke had said, and with Fox Cub’s help, he’d discover whatever mischief the addle-brained guttersnipe was up to and bring him to a satisfying ruin.
*
‘Out with you, Will. Keep a good guard and sing out if anyone comes.’ Blood clapped Hunt on his narrow back and half-pushed him towards the door of the Jewel House. Hunt snatched one last look over his shoulder at the beguiling glitter of metal and priceless gems stacked on the shelves at the far side of the room, there for the taking, th
e mesh of iron bars now gaping wide, before dutifully heading up the stairs to take up his place outside.
Tom seized one of the two sceptres of state, a long golden rod with a diamond-encrusted cross at the top. He gazed at it for a moment, and weighed it in his hand. It was surprisingly heavy, a good three pounds, he thought. He shoved it into his riding boot but found it extended out of the top all the way up to his hip. Far too long. But he had come prepared: Tom pulled a steel file from his pocket and began to saw at the middle of the sceptre, golden filings spilling with every stroke. Cut in two, it would be far easier to hide about his person.
The other men were busy, too. Parrot pulled the golden orb of state from its place on the shelf and shoved it roughly into the front of his breeches – then paused to admire his apparently massive endowment with a wide grin. Blood seized the Imperial State Crown, one of the lighter headpieces worn by the King for the opening of Parliament. Made from gold and silver, trimmed with ermine and purple velvet, encrusted with rubies and sapphires and diamonds, Blood admired the priceless crown briefly and then pulled a short-handled mallet from the back of his belt and began gently beating the metal, caving in the pearl-lined arches, squashing the circle of gold flat that so that it might fit into his wide pocket.
Talbot Edwards could hear the sounds of wood battering against precious metal and it jerked him out of his terrified torpor. He sat up and tore the black cloak from over his head, staring wildly at the three men who were desecrating the treasures in his charge. He shouted: ‘Help! Murder! Thieves in the Jewel House! Summon the guard!’ Then, somewhat woozily, he stood fully upright.
Blood leaped across and lashed him around the side of the head with the heavy mallet. Edwards was knocked to his knees. But still he cried out: ‘Thieves! Thieves in the Jewel House. Guards!’ The mallet crashed once more into the back of his skull and the old man went down, blood spilling from a wide gash in his scalp, and for a moment or two he was silent.