The Roots of Betrayal

by James Forrester

  As he looked across the great swell of the sea, however, he noticed a head. A wave rose and the head rose and fell with it. He looked harder and saw it again.

  Raw Carew was swimming—toward France.

  60

  Clarenceux was placed in the hold with the other captured men. Skinner had given himself up shortly after Carew had leaped from the masthead. He had been soundly beaten, so that his face was bloody and one eye swollen; and then he had been whipped, so that his back was cut and sore. Eventually he had passed out. After lying on deck for a short while, he had been woken and dragged down into the ship and dropped into the hold, joining the others. All eight of them were hungry and thirsty, having had nothing to eat or drink since the previous day. All were despondent—and certainly no happier for knowing that the captain of the ship was the indomitable Sir Peter Carew.

  Clarenceux lay against the side of the ship, feeling it rolling. Everything had gone wrong. It even seemed that Raw Carew had abandoned them to their fate. The man’s instinct, Clarenceux decided, was self-preservation. That allowed him only a limited scope for saving his companions. Besides, what could he do now? He had no ship, most of his men were dead, and the few who were not were prisoners aboard a ship captained by Sir Peter. The only stroke of luck that they had had was that Sir Peter had not hanged them immediately. He was inclined to take them to London to be hanged on the dock. He wanted an audience.

  The bilge water had long since soaked Clarenceux’s feet. But his extreme tiredness meant that every so often he would drowse. When he did, he dreamed of being in a battle and lying on the ground, tied up, waiting for the victorious enemy to put a bullet in his brain. He also dreamed of being at the top of the mast of an extremely tall ship, hundreds of feet above the deck, swaying from side to side in a huge storm, trying to time his jump so that he missed hitting the boat. Lightning was striking around him. Then, at the moment of jumping, he would wake himself with a jolt, leaving his dream-self forever falling into the turbulent sea.

  “I wonder where is Raw now,” muttered Johnson. “And the others.”

  “Being eaten by fish,” replied Francis. “We are all that’s left—except Alice and Juanita.”

  “You don’t think Raw got away?”

  “How high is the main mast? He must have fallen seventy feet. He didn’t come up again.”

  “He did,” Clarenceux said in a parched voice. “I saw him. He started swimming toward France.”

  Francis laughed. “France is nearly sixty miles away.” Then he realized the truth of his words and stopped.

  There was silence.

  “He’s abandoned us then,” said John Dunbar.

  “What else could he do?” replied Francis. “He can’t rescue us all, not singlehanded.”

  There was a groan.

  “Skinner? Are you awake?”

  “He timed it—the jump,” said Skinner.

  “What was his plan?” asked Johnson.

  “Just to jump. A musket ball had gone through…through his leg,” said Skinner. He coughed and choked, and vomited. “The shot had smashed the bone and he was in a lot of pain. He reckoned he had to go then, before he grew more tired.”

  Clarenceux was amazed. “He jumped seventy feet with a broken leg? And swam away?”

  “You saw him.”

  There was a long silence as the men appreciated the courage and determination and the probable futility of the act. After a while Johnson said, “He’ll be back. He’s probably already planning how to rescue us.”

  “Clarenceux, have you spoken to the captain?” asked Francis.

  “Yes. Why?”

  “Is he going to let you go?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? You told him you’re not one of us?” said Johnson.

  Clarenceux did not want to admit that he himself was the reason the Davy had been attacked. “I took part in the fighting too.”

  “You could tell him about his family history,” said Skinner, who was now trying to sit up. “I bet he has…more than seven acres.”

  “He’s penniless. He owes the Crown more than two thousand pounds. Last year he sold Mohuns Ottery, the estate in Devon that his family had owned for two hundred years.”

  “He should join us then,” said Francis.

  Clarenceux gave a mock laugh. “There’s not much distance between him and piracy. He knows that… That’s why he’s so wary. We all know it takes a pirate to catch a pirate, so the only way he can stay on the right side of the law is to keep hauling in you lot.”

  “He must have done something wrong in the past,” said Francis.

  “He was attainted for treason along with Thomas Wyatt in the last reign. For some reason, though, only Wyatt was executed. Sir Peter was given a reprieve.”

  A long silence followed. Clarenceux shifted his position, trying to make himself more comfortable. The scratch on his arm stung with the salt encrusted on the wound. His injured hand also hurt. He tried to remember the hours at Mrs. Barker’s house. That had been a hell of a different sort, a drugged hell. He shifted again in the stinking darkness. This could not be attributed to a drug. There was no doubting its reality.

  “No money, a pirate at heart, and capable of treason. He sounds like a man who would be open to a bribe,” said Francis.

  “It would need to be a very big bribe,” answered Clarenceux. “Two thousand pounds would disappear straight away. I do not have that sort of money.”

  “Raw does,” said Johnson. “He keeps it buried in a secret location on an island.”

  “That’s a lie,” replied Bidder. “He’s always without money.”

  “He told me,” Johnson insisted. “He buried a lot of treasure from the old days. On an island.”

  “And you believed him? He’s a storyteller but you are an even better dreamer.”

  “Ireland,” muttered Clarenceux aloud.

  “Island or Ireland?” asked Francis.

  “Ireland—the barony of Idrone. The lands in Meath and Cork too.” Clarenceux sat up, trying to recall his heraldic notes on Devon and his conversation earlier in the year with John Hooker about the family of Carew of Mohun’s Ottery. Tiredness made images and ideas tumble through his mind—a cascade of knights and horses, blazons, caparisons, breastplates, surcoats, castles, women in ermine-trimmed tunics, parchments, documents…But there was something in there, something Hooker had said about Carew and Idrone.

  “Why do you say ‘Ireland’ particularly?” asked Johnson.

  “Some treasures are made not of gold or silver,” replied Clarenceux, now remembering clearly. “Some are made of the skin of a dead sheep. Vellum can be more valuable than gold.”

  He leaned forward to the piles of cold, wet stones that served as the ship’s ballast, found a rock that was large enough, and stood up. Then he started hammering on the boards above his head. After about ten minutes someone on the orlop deck heard and shouted through, “What do you want?”

  “This is William Harley, Clarenceux King of Arms. Tell Sir Peter Carew I wish to speak to him urgently.”

  61

  Friday, May 19

  Sir Peter Carew gestured to the stool and Clarenceux sat. Sir Peter himself continued to stand, the early-morning light through the eastern windows of the cabin silhouetting his robust figure. His poise was like that one might see in a portrait—chest out, proud.

  “I am a man of instinct, Mr. Clarenceux, and my instinct tells me that you are no fool, no charlatan, and no friend of the government. Most of the Catholics I have met have not deserved a moment of my time, but you—you seem to be, how should I put it? Sharper. More realistic. Yes, there will be bloodshed. But you cannot expect that I will release you on such speculation. I have orders from Cecil to return you to London.”

  “Walsingham. You know that letter came from Walsingham.”

 
; “But the orders were in Sir William’s name. And if Sir William has reasons to want you back in London, then make no mistake—I will do my duty. Your admission that you escaped from his house only confirms the need for that duty to be performed.”

  Clarenceux remained calm. “So you will stop me in my quest to find this document.”

  “Don’t I have to? Especially as that Calais pirate bastard bane of my existence has escaped—and I will lay a pile of gold on the fact he has not drowned—he has Carew blood in him. And so, if I were to lose you too, I would have nothing to show for sinking the Davy. You ask too much.”

  “A pile of gold, you say?” Clarenceux paused, tapping his fingers on the table, thinking. “You will wager a pile of gold?”

  Sir Peter cleared his throat. “It is a metaphorical pile.”

  “Would you be prepared to bet a real pile?”

  “On his not drowning?”

  “No. On the Davy having got away.”

  Sir Peter laughed, a deep fruity sound. “I have little doubt that the Davy sank. I saw her go down with my own eyes. So did hundreds of others. So did you. Why, if you wish to bet that she is still floating, then I will take your money now.”

  Clarenceux took a deep breath. “I know that she sank—but Mr. Walsingham doesn’t. He need not know that this engagement ever took place. Or that Raw Carew escaped. Remember, whatever you say, Walsingham will suspect you of complicity in his escape. But the important thing from your point of view is that I am not betting with my money; I am betting with yours.”

  Sir Peter frowned. “Mine? What do you mean?”

  “You could sail your fleet out further into the Channel for a few days. Only those aboard your ships know that you found the Davy and sank her. Only those aboard this ship know that Raw Carew escaped. If you set me and the remainder of his men ashore quietly in Southampton, no one is going to know that it was your doing—except your own men. And they will not inform Walsingham…”

  Sir Peter held up a hand. “Why do you say you are betting with my money? That is what I want to know.”

  “Have you ever heard of the barony of Idrone, in the west of County Carlow, in Ireland?”

  “Perhaps. What of it?”

  “It is rightly your inheritance. So too are various estates in Meath and County Cork, bringing a total annual income of more than four thousand pounds. It belonged to your ancestors and, after the death of your brother without a legitimate child, is rightfully yours—and could be yours again. All it takes is for you to prove your claim in a court of law.”

  Sir Peter looked Clarenceux in the eye. “Go on.”

  “Your family lost those estates in the reign of Richard the Second. They were taken by force, by the Kavanaghs. Now the English government supports their descendants in enjoyment of that possession, illegally. I know where the documents are that can prove your claim.”

  Sir Peter shifted uneasily on his stool. He stood up and walked to the window at the rear of the cabin. “And in return for the information about how I might prove my claim to this land and title, you want me to release you all and pretend the Davy is somewhere out at sea, still afloat, and still commanded by that…by my illegitimate nephew.”

  “Yes. Obviously you will need to find a lawyer. But it will be a straightforward case. You need to see two men, one who has the documents that prove your family’s entitlement to that land, and another who can prove your unbroken line of descent from the grantee.”

  “You are merely offering me what is mine by right.”

  “No. I am offering you the means to remedy a great wrong—to you and your family.”

  “Damn you, Clarenceux! I suspected that you would be trouble the moment I received that writ. I should hang you now, you and all your fellow scoundrels, but you first—for consorting with pirates, for attempted bribery, for evading arrest, for sinking one of her majesty’s ships, and for being just too clever for anyone’s good.”

  “Then you will be much the poorer.”

  Sir Peter walked to the other side of the cabin. “I cannot agree with your offer. I cannot. It goes against everything I stand for.”

  “When I said four thousand a year, I was not exaggerating. It is at least that much. It could be much more.”

  “Damn you,” said Sir Peter, walking across the cabin again. “No, I sank the Davy. That is a fact and I will not deny it. People will have seen the ship go down from the shore. And there are prisoners—they will hang. I have done my duty, and my men have paid with their lives. I will send you to Sir William.”

  “Is that your final decision?”

  “God’s wounds, yes!” Sir Peter glared at him. “I care for my name—and that is worth more than four thousand a year!”

  Clarenceux responded with silence. He let Sir Peter think about what he had just said. Then he rose to his feet, looked at the other man, walked across to the door, and undid the bolt.

  “Your freedom. Yours alone,” said Sir Peter behind him.

  Clarenceux stopped. “And the others?”

  “They will hang. I will not lie about the Davy. I will have to admit that the pirate captain who claims my family name escaped. But I will show Sir William and Walsingham that I did my duty. I will take the prisoners to London and hang them at London Dock. I need them to show that I did not come away empty-handed.”

  “The women too,” said Clarenceux, turning and looking at Sir Peter. “Your men have foully abused them. They have acted in a most ungodly manner, worse than the pirates.”

  Sir Peter raised his hands and let them fall, despondently. The proud portrait-like figure was now round shouldered. He rapped his knuckles on the table and looked up. “What is this? I receive orders to capture a man aboard a boat, and to sink it if necessary. I sink the boat, capture the man and the pirate captain, and rid the world of most of his crew. And what happens? The captain escapes, I am asked to deny the ship ever sank, the captured man walks free, and my men are accused of acting in a vile manner. How in God’s name am I supposed to accept this? And who are you to preach at me in this way? Are you telling me you did not take up arms? Do you expect me to believe you did not fight and kill my men?”

  The words hit home. The memory of the skiff supplanted all other thoughts in Clarenceux’s mind.

  Thou shalt not kill.

  He was guilty. Sir Peter was right, and nothing could remove that stain from his soul. No absolution would be enough. He tried to think of other things. He thought of Luke being shot in the head and how he himself had killed Nick Laver. He thought of Charity’s burnt torso. He thought of Skinner lying in the hold, and Stars Johnson, Francis Bidder, John Dunbar, and the others. All of them were waiting in the darkness, expecting Raw Carew to rescue them, not knowing that they were going to be taken to London and hanged. Clarenceux had seen the bodies of pirates on the dockside gallows himself. They left them there to rot—until their decomposing necks gave way. Or they fastened them just below the high-water mark, so that the water washed over them and made them stink more. Showing them putrefying was a way of showing others the stench of their sins.

  “The women too,” Clarenceux repeated. “They deserve better. They only followed their men.”

  “I am not as soft as you. I have made my inquiries. I hear that the Spanish whore who jumped in the sea would as soon cut your throat as kiss you. And the other woman, Alice—she is not a follower of men as women should be. Made of iron, she is. But you may have your whores. Now, you need to fulfill your side of the bargain. And I want it all in writing.”

  Clarenceux nodded. “First, you take the three of us to Southampton. When we are ashore, I will give you letters of introduction to the men you need to see, with details of what you need to prove your case.”

  “What if these men refuse to help me?”

  “They will help you, Sir Peter. I know that for certain. One of the men i
n question is an antiquary and a friend from Devon. He knows you; I have no doubt he will assist.”

  “And the other?”

  “The other man is me.”

  62

  It was late evening when Clarenceux, Juanita, and Alice walked along the quay at Southampton. Four men had rowed them and Sir Peter Carew into the harbor from where his ship had moored in Southampton Water, and all of them had gone to the harbormaster’s house for Clarenceux to draw up the letter of introduction and instructions for John Hooker, antiquary and Recorder of Exeter. In addition, he supplied the indenture by which he asserted that Sir Peter Carew was a direct descendant of Sir William Carew and his wife Avice, daughter and sole heiress of the lord of Idrone, who had inherited the estate in the time of King John, as well as a signed letter in which Clarenceux declared his wholehearted faith in the veracity of the descent and listed the various pedigrees he had consulted to confirm the same.

  When all was done and agreed, Sir Peter shook Clarenceux’s hand and promised to come to London for the pedigrees when the time arose; and to disembowel the herald personally if it emerged that he had lied in so delicate a matter or revealed any part of these dealings to another person. With this threat ringing in his ears, Clarenceux watched the four oarsmen take Sir Peter back toward his ship.

  No one spoke as the three of them walked toward the Two Swans. Juanita and Alice did not need to be told that a deal had been agreed between Clarenceux and Sir Peter Carew. As far as they could see, Clarenceux had not saved them so much as betrayed the others. It went without saying that he had no obligation toward any of the pirates, but equally it went without saying that a man who had fought alongside them should not have abandoned them to the justice of the gallows. Clarenceux, having agreed not to tell a soul about the deal made with Sir Peter, could say nothing on the matter.

  He followed the women into the front hall of the Two Swans. There were about twenty men inside, sitting at tables drinking and talking. His first impression was that it was a respectable wine tavern, even though he knew that it was much more than that. Alice told him to wait by the door while she made inquiries. Juanita left him with a brief word of farewell shortly after. Clarenceux sat on a bench and closed his eyes, listening to the sounds of all the conversations, inhaling the welcome and familiar odors of a good tavern: the herbs scattered in the rushes, the smell of dogs, the stale scent of spilled wine, and the savory lingering aroma of roasted pork. For a moment he almost relaxed, letting go of a tension that had twisted his mind and bound him physically since that terrible moment on the morning of Rogation Sunday, when he had found that the marriage agreement had been stolen. Almost—but not quite. He was in a strange place surrounded by people he did not know and without any money. The authorities had issued instructions for his arrest or death—and he had not yet found the document or Rebecca Machyn.