A Masterpiece of Corruption

by L. C. Tyler

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ I say.

  ‘Thank you. I’ll let him know. He feels that we missed a chance to kill you at Gray’s Inn. But I told him that you were dependable. I told him you were what you appeared to be and no double agent. I told him I knew your father.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I say.

  ‘Absolutely dependable – that’s what I told him. All that family – completely dependable.’

  I think briefly of my mother. Does Ripley include her? It would be difficult to fault her long and unthinking adherence to the Stuart cause. I hope he does not know that my ‘cousin’ is now actively courting Cromwell.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say again.

  ‘I told Brodrick how much your family has suffered in the King’s service. You could scarcely be an adherent of the Republic.’

  Suffered? I wonder what stories my father can have told Ripley. It is true that he followed the King’s army as a surgeon and must have experienced the usual hardships of a long and ultimately unsuccessful campaign. But the decision to go into exile was his and his alone. I have no evidence that he regrets it or wishes himself home in Essex with my mother rather than in Brussels with his mistress.

  ‘You know my father well?’ I ask, if only to draw the conversation away from Brodrick and missed opportunities.

  ‘Our paths have crossed occasionally. We have both spent some time in Bruges, and indeed more recently in Brussels.’

  ‘We are not alike in temperament,’ I add, not wishing him to think I am the whoring drunkard of whom my mother has spoken with so much pious regret.

  Ripley looks me up and down.

  ‘True. You are no soldier. Your courage is of another sort. You would undertake things that your father might not. And I trust your word. Of course, if you were deceiving us, I would look foolish. My judgement would have been sadly at fault. It would be a stain on my reputation that I would need to efface, coûte que coûte. Brodrick is rash and impulsive but ultimately forgiving. I, conversely …’

  ‘You are different?’

  ‘Exactly. I never forgive, Mr Cardinal. Forgiveness is a weakness that I cannot afford. If somebody betrays me, I hunt them down. If they run, I follow. If they go to earth, I dig them out. There is nowhere I cannot find them.’

  I do not ask if that includes under the tables in the library of Lincoln’s Inn.

  ‘My own sentiments entirely, Sir Michael,’ I say, with what I hope is a Cavalier swagger. ‘I too never forgive a slight. But effecting Cromwell’s death may not be as easy as I thought. This other person that you said would attempt the assassination if I failed …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It might be better if we worked together, he and I.’

  ‘Ah, I see. You’d like me to tell you his name?’

  ‘If you would be so kind.’

  ‘Hyde didn’t tell you who it was?’

  Another question whose answer I shall have to guess.

  ‘No,’ I say.

  Ripley smiles. ‘That’s because we didn’t tell him. And I can’t tell you either.’

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because if you fail, you will be captured and tortured. You know that. The less you can tell them, the better. You will die happier in the knowledge that you have not betrayed us in any way.’

  ‘Is it Sir Richard Willys?’ I ask.

  Well, that has surprised Ripley. ‘Willys? Why on earth would it be Willys?’

  ‘We met in his chambers at Gray’s Inn.’

  ‘If you say so. I don’t recall. Perhaps it would be better if you did not recall it either.’

  ‘Who is he?’

  ‘Sir Richard Willys? You surely know that at least?’ Ripley looks at me oddly. Though it is dark I fancy I can see his hand tightening on the hilt of his sword.

  For a moment I say nothing. Things look bad, but I can always make them worse.

  ‘He’s a lawyer,’ I say tentatively. ‘A lawyer … and a loyal supporter of the King.’

  Ripley looks at me in puzzlement and not for the first time. ‘Did Hyde recruit you specifically for this mission?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘Because of your father?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘You had no other contact with our party in Brussels?’

  ‘No,’ I say.

  ‘Not ever?’

  ‘No.’

  Ripley stares at me again, then he finally releases the hilt of his sword. I hear it slither back an inch or two into the scabbard.

  ‘Then Hyde might have briefed you better,’ he says. ‘He, or indeed your father, might have told you more, since your life might have depended on it.’

  He shows, however, no sign of wishing to make up for Hyde’s omission.

  ‘But I have survived,’ I say.

  ‘I think,’ says Ripley, ‘that you have no idea how lucky you have been. Let us hope, Mr Cardinal, that your luck holds.’

  I have been allocated a small part of a small chamber in one of the more obscure recesses of Hampton Court. A tiny leaded window looks down, a long way down, on a dim and narrow courtyard, the function of which is unclear, but from which the smell of drains rises. I am to share this room, for as long as my presence is required at Hampton Court, with another junior member of the Protector’s household.

  ‘Esmond Underhill at your service,’ he sniffs. I do not think he has caught a chill. I think this is the way he always speaks. ‘Of Colchester in the fair county of Essex. Formerly Corporal of Horse in the service of my Lord Lambert. I now serve His Highness the Lord Protector as a clerk in the Post Office.’

  He seems unreasonably proud of each of these achievements. He does not have the air of a soldier, but Lambert’s troops were noted for the soundness of their political principles as much as the strength of their arms. I wonder if he would be impressed if I told him I am here in a double capacity as a spy for the Sealed Knot and Mr Thurloe. I doubt it. I don’t think he is impressed by things other people do.

  ‘My name is Grey,’ I say. ‘John Grey. Clerk to Mr Milton.’

  ‘Grey?’

  ‘That’s right,’ I say.

  Underhill wrinkles his nose and sniffs again, drawing up copious quantities of snot into some inner recess. ‘What’s Milton like to work for? He writes poetry, doesn’t he?’

  ‘So I’m told.’

  ‘Takes all sorts.’

  That could be an observation on Underhill himself. The constant activity of his nose, the sharp cheekbones, the thin, insipid face – they all recall to mind some nocturnal carrion-feeder. His claws are black with a nameless filth. His clothes are little better. But he is my companion for tonight at least.

  ‘Which bed would you prefer?’ I ask.

  ‘Either is fine with me,’ he says. ‘But would you care for a drop of brandy first, Mr Grey?’

  ‘You have brandy?’

  He produces a glass bottle, stopped with a cork and three quarters full of a pale amber liquid. ‘The very best,’ he says. ‘French.’

  ‘Thank you but no,’ I say. ‘I occasionally tried brandy when I was at Cambridge, but my head will not stand it. Even a little makes me act like a brainless fool.’

  Underhill smiles sympathetically. ‘But just a sip?’ he enquires. ‘Surely that would do you no hurt?’ He tips the bottle slightly so that he may better admire the golden liquid as it splashes to and fro behind the green glass. ‘Smooth as a lady’s cheek. From the Lord Protector’s own cellar. Don’t ask me how I got it and I might even let you try a second sip. Come! You may never taste its like again.’

  I shake my head, older and wiser than he. ‘I’ll take the bed on the right, then,’ I say.

  My Lady Pole

  I am aware that the sun is shining brightly through the small window. I have been dreaming that somebody was winding a rope round my head, then pulling it tighter and tighter. The blood pounds in my ears. My mouth is dry. I could swallow the contents of a well at a single draught. I can’t have had a drink of an
y sort for a week.

  Except possibly, now I think of it, about half a bottle of brandy, allegedly from the Lord Protector’s cellar.

  Underhill has departed about his business and the left-hand bed is vacant. The right-hand bed is still full of me, although the day is well advanced and I should be somewhere else. I sit up suddenly and the room spins round. I stand and it is at least no worse. I am, I notice, fully clothed, so that is one potential problem solved with no expenditure of energy on my part.

  Excellent.

  In one corner of the room there is a basin of filthy cold water, the remains no doubt of Underhill’s morning ablutions. I plunge my head into it, thus meeting the need for hygiene and penance at a stroke. Then I forget that I must not breathe when my head is under water and emerge coughing and spluttering. I go to the window and try to calculate the time of day. Ten of the clock, perhaps? The sun never rises high at this time of year but it has, it informs me, been up and doing for some time while I slumbered.

  I dry my face on what I believe must be Underhill’s spare shirt, for he deserves no less. I think back to twelve hours or so before. Surely (he said) I would at least take a sip of his brandy – politeness dictated that. Did I mean to insult him? Was it not (he said) some of the finest brandy I had tasted? And a second sip would only help me sleep, he said, taking the bottle back from me. I observed in passing that I knew a fine song about drinking brandy, suitable for any company except that of ladies and Puritans and priests and magistrates, such as my stepfather. Underhill said he was no Puritan and (he promised) no stepfather of mine. I said amen to that, thou good and trusty companion. And then … and then …

  I think I may have asked him in a confidential fashion who might wish the Lord Protector dead. I remember that he reacted with shock – then, when I assured him (at my third attempt) that I spoke merely in a conjectural manner, he considered this carefully.

  ‘My Lord Fairfax,’ he said, ‘has a great grudge against His Highness.’

  ‘How so?’ I asked, though perhaps (thinking about it) with less cunning than I then imagined.

  His face approached mine in a conspiratorial manner.

  ‘Fairfax was a better general than Cromwell. It was Fairfax that won Naseby. Cromwell was no more than his deputy. After that victory, Fairfax was ruler of England. Ask anybody who remembers those times. But Cromwell snatched the prize away. Fairfax knows he should be the Lord Protector. And he wouldn’t be calling himself Highness or toying with a crown.’

  ‘Would he not?’

  ‘No. He’s proper nobility, see. Lord Fairfax of Cameron, he’s rightly called. Cromwell’s just a jumped-up nobody, near blinded by his first sight of gold and ermine.’

  This seemed to me no way for an officer of the State, however minor, to talk. A little brandy obviously loosened his tongue. I offered him the bottle back and he returned it to me.

  ‘But Fairfax has married his daughter to the Duke of Buckingham,’ I said. ‘Is he too not dazzled by gold and ermine?’

  ‘Black Tom Fairfax is a wily old fox,’ said Underhill. ‘He knows an alliance with Buckingham is the way back to power.’

  ‘Cromwell is seeking to arrest Buckingham,’ I said. I returned the bottle to Underhill. He tipped it back.

  ‘Precisely,’ he said, wiping his lips. ‘A declaration of war if ever there was one. It’s an insult to Fairfax, ain’t it? It’s showing him he don’t have the power even to protect his own daughter’s interests. A proud man like Fairfax won’t be able to stand that. They was strangers before, but now he and Cromwell are mortal enemies.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘That is so, my friend. Now, have some more brandy.’

  If I stopped drinking, then Underhill would too, I reminded myself. I was drinking for England.

  ‘What about General Lambert?’ I passed the bottle back.

  ‘An honourable man. Won’t hear a word said against my Lord Lambert.’

  ‘But an enemy of His Highness’s?’

  ‘He’d have cause enough, wouldn’t he? Lambert was supposed to be Cromwell’s chosen heir – perhaps the greatest general of them all and loyal to the Good Old Cause. Then all the talk started of Cromwell becoming King and his eldest son, Richard, succeeding him. Lambert spoke honestly to Cromwell and advised against it. Cromwell, to be fair, turned down the Crown but he never quite dropped the idea that he might be succeeded by a member of his own family. He rather liked that, in fact. So, he gave Lambert a pension and told him to piss off home. Lambert is in honourable exile, so-called, in Wimbledon. Not too far away to be out of touch with the court, though. He’s too clever to fall for that.’

  ‘So, he might be plotting to kill His Highness? He might see him as a threat to the Republic?’

  ‘My Lord Lambert is too good, too high-minded to stoop to assassination.’

  ‘Anyone else?’ I asked.

  ‘Have you considered Dr Bate?’ he asked slyly.

  I shook my head and Underhill chuckled as he passed the bottle back to me. I wiped his spittle from the neck and drank. Smooth as a viscountess’s cheek.

  ‘Did you hear that there was an attempt on His Highness’s life?’ I asked. ‘Somebody tried to cut his saddle girth.’

  ‘No, I’ve heard nothing about that. His saddle girth, you say? That’s clever. Do they know who it was?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘They have no clue at all?’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  And Underhill smiled.

  Or at least, we spoke in something like that manner. I would not care to vouch for the precise words used, but that was the sense. I remember I later asked him about Sir Richard Willys and he laughed and said it was a difficult problem or an intractable problem or an awkward problem … but it was the exact phrase that seemed to so amuse him. It amused him even more that I failed to see the joke. And then … And then …

  Doubtless it will all come back to me in due course. In the meantime I see that I have thrown Underhill’s shirt into his basin of dirty water, which is a shame for him.

  I descend the stairs quite slowly and set off for the kitchens and a large draught of small beer.

  The dial, high on the gatehouse of Clock Court, shows that it lacks but one hour to a winter’s midday. Octava hora. High above me, the sun shines on the red-brick battlements and their white stone capping. Down here, in the depths of this echoing quadrangle, shadows lie over the worn flagstone. The ground is still covered with a rime of frost, except for a line of footprints that slants across it. While I slept, others have been active in the Lord Protector’s service. The air is bitingly cold and I think it may snow again very soon, but my thoughts are as clear and bright as the one small patch of blue sky above me. I even see Aminta before she sees me. As she leaves a side door, I stride over and greet her.

  ‘Where have you been?’ she demands. She wears a green riding costume, which fits snugly round her small waist. A large hat shades her eyes. In her hand there is a whip, which she taps against her soft leather glove.

  ‘Here,’ I say, indicating Middlesex in general.

  ‘In bed, no doubt.’

  ‘Underhill gave me too much brandy,’ I say.

  ‘Who or what is Underhill?’

  ‘A clerk who gives me brandy.’

  ‘To what end?’ she asks.

  ‘In a spirit of generosity,’ I say. But I doubt I am right. It is a Christian act to give somebody drink when they are thirsty, but Underhill’s actions were, judged by this very proper standard, almost saintly. ‘I needed to keep him drinking. I needed to get information out of him,’ I add.

  ‘And what information did he get out of you?’

  This is a question that I have asked myself several times this morning. What exactly did I tell Underhill? I certainly gave him my name – but then I am here as John Grey. The Sealed Knot know who I am. Thurloe knows who I am. There is no need to dissemble on that score. I’m fairly sure I did not tell Underhill that I had travelled here with Cromwe
ll. Or did I? At one stage we were very good friends. There is something that troubles me slightly.

  ‘I swore him to secrecy,’ I say.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘Idiot. Who does Underhill work for?’

  ‘The Post Office,’ I say.

  ‘Which reports to?’

  ‘Mr Secretary Thurloe,’ I say. ‘But Underhill is merely …’

  ‘Employed by Thurloe.’

  ‘So word of this may get back to …’

  ‘Thurloe. If you’re lucky,’ says Aminta.

  ‘And if I’m not?’ I ask.

  ‘Then, dear cousin, to whoever he really works for.’

  I wonder who the bill for the brandy will be sent to. Still, what he said about Fairfax was interesting for all that.

  ‘Now, have you been able to talk to Cromwell about Roger’s lands and titles?’ says Aminta. ‘Which of course are also my lands and titles, so I very much hope you have.’

  ‘No,’ I say. The longer answer is that I shared a coach with the Lord Protector for a couple of hours and forgot, but I find I prefer the shorter one.

  ‘It is fortunate that I am now here in person then,’ says Aminta.

  ‘You travelled here this morning?’

  ‘You failed to return home last night, suggesting that Cromwell had moved here for a few days. I hired a horse and followed, riding side-saddle in the freezing cold along muddy roads, while you travelled by coach.’

  ‘You heard that?’

  ‘It is the one thing that everybody seems to know about you.’

  ‘So,’ I say, ‘you plan to gain access to Cromwell and speak to him about the reversal of the attainder?’

  ‘No, I had planned that you should do that. You have, after all, impeccable Republican credentials and your stepfather fought on the winning side, albeit that your real father, like mine, instinctively supported the losing one. But there are also others whom I can approach, who may not have a position at court but who are not entirely lacking in influence. Roger’s family is connected to that of the Duke of Buckingham, who in turn is married to the daughter of General Fairfax, who may well still have Cromwell’s ear. Of course, the fact that there is a warrant out for the Duke’s arrest does not help things, but the connection is there for all that.’