The Secret World of Christoval Alvarez

by Ann Swinfen

  ‘Aye. And then disappeared. It seems he managed to slip over to France, where I suspect he has had a meeting with Thomas Morgan in the Bastille. That’s a fine prison they keep in Paris, where a man wanted here for conspiracy to kill the Queen can hold court freely.’

  I could not see where this was going. ‘What is this errand for me that you have in mind?’

  ‘I have composed a letter to the Scottish queen in Barnes’s hand, or rather to her secretary, Curll, vowing Barnes’s allegiance to her cause and making the sort of vague promises these fellows deal in. A few hints about Morgan, and some information about Babington’s plans that could be known only to his inner circle.’

  ‘And to us.’

  ‘Aye. And to us. It is written in one of their usual ciphers and I have used their code names: “Roland” for Barnes himself, “Thomas Germin” for Morgan, and “Nicholas Cornelys” for Gifford. All these details should convince Curll that it is genuine.’

  ‘Stirring the pot?’

  He gave a sour smile. ‘Aye, stirring the pot. Our problem is that Babington is now flitting about like a demented woman. One minute he’s in his own house near the Barbican, next he’s in lodgings at Hernes Rents in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. A few days later he has taken himself off to lodge with a tailor just outside Temple Bar, on Fleet Street. Why does he keep changing his lodgings, when he has a fine house of his own in London? I do not like it. Now he has not been seen for two days. He may have left London for his estate in Derbyshire, or he may have gone to Lichfield. He was there earlier this year when he wanted to spy out the land for rescuing the Scottish woman.’

  ‘What has this to do with the letter supposed to come from Barnes?’

  ‘I want them to realise they must stop shilly-shallying and make a move. I’ve had Barnes suggest to Curll that Mary should contact Babington as the best hope for her rescue. All the correspondence has been too vague and general up to now. We need a positive commitment.’

  He took off his glasses and looked at me. ‘This is where you come in. Sir Francis told you that there would come a time when your youth and honest face would be useful to us. Now is the time. I want you to go to Chartley as our messenger boy and deliver this letter. You are just a simple boy, you understand, working for Barnes. All you have to do is to deliver the letter. They may want you to take an answer. You can do that, can’t you?’

  It was rare of him even to ask, though I realised he was not really asking.

  ‘I suppose I might,’ I said, with no great enthusiasm. ‘I suppose Sir Francis will make arrangements with the hospital, as usual.’

  If Phelippes heard a note of sarcasm in my voice, he did not react.

  ‘It will be attended to. You leave first thing in the morning. I will draw you a map. I suppose you will want that same horse again – Horace, was it called?’

  ‘Hector,’ I said. ‘His name is Hector. I go alone?’

  ‘Of course. You are just a messenger boy. I will see that you have appropriate clothes.’

  ‘Perhaps I could collect them now,’ I said, ‘to save time in the morning.’ I did not want to find myself obliged to dress here in Phelippes’s office.

  I went home with the bundle of somewhat unsavoury clothes under my arm, to find that my father had not yet returned from the hospital. It was fortunate that, while I was away in Sussex, Dr Stevens had finally employed a new assistant and had also been able to discard his cane. Unless there was a sudden outbreak of one of the summer illnesses, my father should be able to manage without me for the few days I would be absent in Staffordshire. I had begun to worry that, if Walsingham continued to demand my services, I should lose my position at St Bartholomew’s. During the last few months almost half my time had been taken up by Sir Francis’s intelligence work. Both he and Phelippes continued to say that they believed this summer would bring their projection to fruition, but I could see no real sign of it. I could understand Phelippes’s frustration and his need to prod the conspirators into action.

  I scrawled a hasty note to Simon, for I had promised to come to a rehearsal of a new play tomorrow, something I had been looking forward to, for I had never seen how Burbage worked the magic which converted a sheaf of inky pages into the world of a play in which the audience could lose itself. Having met most of the actors by now, I knew that managing them, persuading them to work together and not parade their own talents at the expense of others’, must be like herding mountain goats in a thunderstorm – all rushing off in different directions.

  One of our neighbours had a son who would run errands for a ha’penny. I gave him a ha’penny to take my note to the Theatre and promised him a slice of cake when he came back. While he was gone, I tried on the clothes I was to wear into Staffordshire. They were of a fairly uniform mud colour: breeches, jerkin, thick woollen hose and an ugly knitted cap. Appropriately anonymous. However, the hose itched dreadfully in this hot weather, especially where they rubbed on the partly healed gash in my leg, so I was determined to wear a thinner pair of my own. There was a light cloak in case of rain. I studied myself in the spotted mirror I kept in my chamber. With the cap pulled well down and perhaps a dirty face, I could pass for a messenger boy. Trustworthy and discreet, but too young to be a danger to anyone. It was odd how the simple clothes made me look younger. The doublet and small ruff I normally wore added several years to my age.

  I turned sideways to the mirror. It was a blessing that I was almost as flat-chested as a boy. Even at sixteen and a half I had still not developed a womanly figure. All my growing had gone into height, but the day might come when it would be difficult to pass myself off as a boy. A well-padded doublet, however, can hide much. Indeed, some of our young gallants look as round-breasted as pouter pigeons. Without a doublet I felt more vulnerable, but I could always wear the cloak, unless the weather was so hot that it would arose suspicions.

  The boy returned from the Theatre soon after I had changed back into my normal clothes, saying he had given the message into Simon’s hands. Between mouthfuls of cake he added that the gentleman had wished me God speed on my journey.

  ‘Are you going away again, Master Alvarez?’ he asked.

  ‘Only for a few days, just into Staffordshire.’ I might as well have said the Spice Islands from the look in his wide eyes. So the neighbours had noticed my various absences. I hoped they would not be traced back to Walsingham.

  Just after dawn the next morning I was on my way, having collected the forged letter and map from Phelippes, and Hector from the stable. It would be a long journey, about a hundred and twenty-five miles, Phelippes reckoned. At the very least it would take me three days, riding from dawn to dusk. Had I been an official messenger on state business, I could have commandeered a change of mounts at regular intervals, but I was posing as a boy sent by Barnes, so I must ride one horse all the way without tiring him.

  The easiest route was to head west along the river first, as far as Windsor, then turn north on the Oxford road.

  ‘You must judge for yourself,’ Phelippes said. ‘It took me four days to make the journey to Chartley earlier in the year. You should be able to reach Oxford today, for you are a more experienced rider than I am. But it must be fifty or sixty miles. If you find it is late and the horse is tired, you will need to stay the night before you come to Oxford. It is a well travelled route, so there will be plenty of clean, respectable inns. In Oxford, try the Mitre. After Oxford, Warwick should be a suitable stage, not as distant as Oxford is from London. Then you should reach Lichfield by the evening of the third day. That will be the shortest stretch. The next morning you will be able to make the short ride to Chartley.’

  ‘How far is that?’

  ‘Less than twenty miles.’

  ‘I had not realised it was so far.’

  I could see that the distance, and the time it would take me to travel it, irritated him. He was anxious to set his plan in motion with the forged letter and he was used to sending trained riders with despatches, who, with t
heir constant changes to fresh horses and their hard riding, would probably make the journey to Lichfield in just two days. Well, it could not be helped. I was not going to drive Hector too hard.

  At first it was not as pleasant a ride as my journey to Hartwell Hall some weeks before. In the full heat of summer the road was covered with loose dust which flew up everywhere, filling my lungs and peppering my eyes with grit. The road to Windsor was also very busy, crowded with carts and carriages as well as riders. Even when I turned on to the Oxford road it was not much better. Once the crowds thinned out a little, however, I set Hector to an easy canter, the road was less dusty, and the miles slipped by more easily.

  At midday we stopped in a grassy meadow by a stream, where I ate some cheese and a hard-boiled egg, and I let Hector graze for half an hour. As I sat with my back to a tree, I nearly fell asleep. The heavy June sunshine was thick with the drone of bees and I had slept little the previous night, anxious about the journey. If Hector had not blown a wet and grassy breath in my face, I might have slept the day away.

  As it was, we were still ten miles from Oxford by late afternoon, according to the fingerpost but, despite having cantered much of the way, Hector did not seem unduly tired. I decided to carry on, holding him down to a walk the last five miles or so. We rode into Oxford, my eyes taking in greedily the honey-coloured stone of the colleges, the flower-filled gardens, and the rivers. Being high summer, it was out of term time, although I noticed several older scholars, the college fellows, in their academic gowns, which reminded me achingly of my father at Coimbra University. And there were bookshops! But I had no money for books, only the money Phelippes had given me for my lodgings.

  I found the Mitre Inn, mentioned by Phelippes, and paid for a room to myself as well as stabling for my horse. It was only when I sat down to eat the mutton stew served in the inn parlour that I realised how tired I was. I had been in the saddle for twelve hours and the muscles of my legs and back made me all too aware of it. As soon as I had finished eating I retired to my chamber, along a meandering corridor linking the maze of rooms. I pulled off my boots and cap, and lay down for a minute on the bed. When I woke it was full dark. Groaning a little from my stiffening muscles, I stripped down to my shift and fell into bed. I can vouch for the comfort of the Mitre’s beds, for I did not wake again until broad daylight.

  In the morning I asked the innkeeper how far it was to Warwick. He scratched his head, then called out to the potboy.

  ‘How many miles to Warwick, Henry?’

  The potboy also scratched his head. ‘Forty, forty-five miles, I reckon, master.’

  ‘Good,’ I said. ‘Thank you. Far less than I rode yesterday.’

  ‘Came from Lunnon, did you, lad?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘That’s a good way, that is.’

  He looked at me respectfully, but I was glad he called me ‘lad’. It seemed I looked the part.

  We left Oxford, heading north on the Banbury Road, leaving the church of St Giles on our left, and reached Warwick by the late dusk of this summer’s day. Even though it had been a much shorter ride, by now Hector was tired, and so was I. However, we found one of the inns Phelippes had suggested and by the next morning were on our way again.

  The road from Warwick to Lichfield ran through fat farming country, deep in the heart of England. This whole journey had laid open England to me, for until this year I had barely stirred outside London. I did not feel particularly grateful for my service to Walsingham, but in my heart I admitted grudgingly that it had opened my eyes to my adopted country. It was not the land of my birth, which I had grown to hate. But this country, less dramatic, less ostentatious, was becoming very dear to me in recent months. I was beginning to understand why Englishmen, normally reticent and reluctant to show their feelings, could become so passionate about their love of this land. I found it difficult to put into words, but I felt somehow nourished by it, embraced by it. The countryside smiled at me, and I smiled back as I rode. This was a country worth fighting for.

  My inn at Lichfield was near the cathedral, so the bells tracked the hours for me during the evening and into the night. Until I reached the city my mind had been concentrated on the long journey, but now I began to grow apprehensive of presenting myself at Chartley Manor. The name had been no more than that, a name written on letters, a place somewhere in Staffordshire. A house where the Scottish queen lived with her exiled court under strict supervision. Somehow, it had not seemed quite real. Tomorrow I would ride up to it, and present a letter which was a forgery, posing as what I was not. My whole life was a lie, in my pretended skin as a boy, but now I was play-acting again, this time as a servant boy, messenger for a renegade Catholic, who had entered the country illegally and was offering his services to the Scottish queen.

  Except he wasn’t.

  It was Phelippes who was spinning this web.

  As far as I knew, Barnes was still in London with Barnard, one of the chief players in the conspiracy, who was urging Babington to action, along with the double agent Poley. But what if Barnes had left London and come himself to offer his service to Mary? Having been a courier for Walsingham, he would know the route in detail, could probably even afford post horses along the way. Even if he had been in London when I left, he might have overtaken me on the way.

  These were irrational fears, but they kept me awake, listening to the cathedral bells sounding out the hours. I began to feel sick with apprehension.

  Phelippes had drawn me a second map, showing the route from Lichfield to Chartley, so that I would have no need to draw attention to myself by asking the way. It looked simple enough. A road northwest out of Lichfield, through the village of Rugeley. Onwards about as far again and I would meet a crossroads. The road to the right led to Uttoxeter and Chartley Manor was a short way along this road. I would also see the ruins of Chartley Castle in the same estate.

  Hector was well rested after our much shorter journey yesterday, only about forty miles. We ambled along at first and I noticed that the hedges here were thick with blackberries, though they would not be plump and ripe for some weeks yet. Hector tossed his head and turned his ears to catch my voice, as if he expected me to urge him on. Even Hector knew we could not put this off any longer. A gentle canter took us through the village of Rugeley and on to the crossroads, where I slowed Hector to a walk. The last mile or so to the house seemed to pass too quickly, and now I was there.

  ‘I have a message for Master Curll,’ I said to the manservant who opened the door. It might have been any gentleman’s house, if it were not for two armed retainers watching the same door, and no doubt more round the back of the house. I had tied Hector to a hitching ring in the gatepost, where he stood irritably swishing his tail at the flies that rose from the bushes.

  ‘Give it here then.’ His manner, to this slightly grubby messenger boy, was extremely curt.

  ‘I’m sorry sir.’ I gave him an urchin’s winning smile. ‘I was to give it into the gentleman’s hand myself.’

  ‘You’d better come in then.’

  He led me briskly along a corridor toward the back of the house. I had time to note that the rooms, though perfectly comfortable, were in no way royal. The man threw open a door.

  ‘Master Curll, message for you.’

  A harassed looking man turned from his desk and half stood, then seeing me sank back into his chair and held out his hand for the letter. I took it from the leather pouch at my belt and handed it to him. For the brief moment that our hands were joined by Phelippes’s forgery, I had a sense of some terrible destiny. There were our hands together. His hand had inscribed dozens of letters that I had deciphered and transcribed with my hand. I could now write his hand as easily as my own. And the letter passing between us, written in one of his own ciphers, was a link in a fatal chain. So sharp was my sense of horror that I nearly snatched it back again.

  He ran a knife under the seal and unfolded the paper, then glanced up at me.

  �
��Take the boy to the kitchen, Jackson, and see that he has something to eat.’ He gave me a thin, absent-minded smile. ‘There may be an answer.’

  I nodded and followed the servant out of the room.

  It must have been an hour and a half before I was summoned back to Curll’s room.

  ‘Now, lad – what is your name?’

  I was startled. I hadn’t thought to give myself a name. ‘It’s Simon, sir.’

  ‘Well, Simon, I want you to carry another message. Not back to your master, at least not yet, but to someone in Lichfield. Can you do that?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  He held out a sealed letter to me. ‘This is to be taken to Sir Anthony Babington. He is staying at the White Hart in Lichfield. Can you do that?’

  ‘Certainly, sir.’

  Did he think me an idiot? However, I put on an obliging smile and tucked the letter into my pouch.

  ‘Here’s a shilling for you.’ He put the coins into my hand, but I resisted the temptation to bite them to test their worth. Simon, the real Simon, would have chided me for overplaying my part.

  I touched my woollen cap in a kind of salute, bowed, and allowed the same manservant to see me out. Before we reached the front door, I heard a cascade of pretty laughter from upstairs. Was that the Scottish queen? I had not seen so much as the whisk of her skirt.

  Hector and I took our time returning to Lichfield. I was at a loss what to do. The letter I was carrying might be vital to Walsingham, but it must be delivered – sometime – to Babington. Without Anthony Gregory’s skills, I could not open it, copy it and reseal it. If I took it straight to London now, it would be nearly a week before it reached Babington back in Lichfield. Would that arouse their suspicions? Yet I knew I could not simply hand it over unexamined.

  I decided to make discreet enquiries about Babington at the White Hart before I came to a decision about what to do with the letter. I stabled Hector at my own inn, the Swan, then took myself round to the stableyard of the White Hart, where I found an ostler forking dirty straw out of a recently emptied stall. The manure was still steaming.