Amy He would force himself to think of Amy.
The Admiral, some five hours after Robin had begun his vigil, finally rode out through his gates alone on horseback and clattered down the cobbled Strand, heading into the heart of London. Thomas rode well and knew his way through the winding, cluttered, and filthy streets of the city. He was, Robin learned as he followed, a popular figure in town, calling friendly greetings to men, women, and children of every rank and occupation. And as each of them called back to him, Seymour sat taller and prouder in the saddle, as though such fame and popularity enlarged him. Such support could, Dudley realized, mean the difference between the Admiral’s rebellion succeeding and failing, and from the look of it, the common people were on his side.
Robin’s quarry made directly for St. Paul’s, riding into the cathedral’s courtyard. Far from being a sedate cloister, the place was a seething marketplace of booksellers and peddlers, food stalls and auctions of horseflesh. Robin did as Seymour had done, paying a groom to take his mount, and followed the Admiral into the nave of the great cathedral, London’s most outrageous meeting place. Here was a preacher in the pulpit shouting his sermon over a mass of Londoners engaged in anything but prayer. The aisles and pews teemed with courtiers, merchants, and prostitutes. Lovers shamelessly embraced in shadows along the walls, and victuals were hawked and purchased over the marble-topped tombs of England's kings and queens.
Robin watched Seymour as he moved through the crush, here attempting to appear less conspicuous than on the streets and clearly scanning the faces to find his assignation. Even before Seymour was aware, Robin Dudley noticed a small, rough man wearing a strange array of once fine but now filthy clothing making straight for the Admiral. To his surprise the man grabbed Seymour in midstride and whipped him round by the arm to face him. Instantly Seymour’s hand found his blade and the blade found his attacker’s throat, poised for the cut. Short though he was next to Seymour, the man bristled with contempt and showed no fear whatsoever. Some folks round the pair were momentarily taken aback by the sudden contretemps, but most, mired in their own business, ignored it altogether.
Robin pushed through the crowd to be privy to the next action. He arrived within earshot just as the stranger uttered the words “Black Jack” and Seymour, still bristling at the stranger’s rude introduction, sheathed the dagger and released the man from his grip. Keeping well behind an effeminate courtier taking great pains to choose the perfect leather gauntlets from the dozen pairs spread out before him on the tomb of King Ethelred, Robin Dudley was able to hear Seymour’s entire exchange with his companion, who, it was now apparent, was a pirate. The man was angry and spoke with surprising impudence, thought Robin, to so high a nobleman.
“I tell ye, they’re harrying our bloody ships again, and me captain don’t take it too kindly, what with yer fine promises of safe conduct an’ all.”
Seymour looked genuinely alarmed at the news. “You’re sure they’re naval vessels and not private ships?”
“D’ye think we’re idiots, sir? We know a naval vessel when we sees it.”
“And the names of the ships?” Seymour demanded.
“The Princess Mary and the Avenger were two that I remember.”
Robin could see the Admiral’s forehead crease as he strove to put a captain’s name to a ship.
“I’ll see to it,” he said finally
“And how’ll ye ‘see to it,’ Admiral?”
The man’s impertinence, Robin could see, was starting to grate on Seymour’s implacable reserve. “I will have the captains arrested and replaced with more … tolerant men, men who know how to obey my orders. You tell your captain that.”
“Aye.”
The pirate abruptly turned to go but Seymour pulled him roughly back by the collar till they were nose to nose. The little man’s feet dangled off the ground. “And you tell Captain Thompson I will not wait much longer for an accounting of what’s mine. If it is short, God help him.” He dropped the man’s shirt and his feet hit the ground.
“I’ll gladly tell him of yer threat, Admiral,” was his derisive retort.
“Do that, you scurvy piece of scum.”
The pirate spit dangerously close to Seymour’s boot and, with a final defiant look, turned and disappeared into the throng. As soon as he was gone he was forgotten, and Thomas resumed his original search.
The man he sought waited half hidden behind one of the cathedral’s massive columns, his eyes darting nervously from side to side. He was of middling age, florid faced, dressed in a doublet all black but of the richest fabric and finest cut. It was a man young Dudley did not readily recognize. The two men were quite apart from the crowd and, maddeningly, Robin could get no closer than twenty feet without appearing suspicious. He therefore was able to hear only snatches of their conversation. Fuses, artillery, light cannon — they were speaking of Thomas Seymour’s armory!
Robin doubled back and disappeared into a nearby group of gossiping courtiers and emerged into the open space near Seymour and his conspirator as close as he dared. He walked slowly, as though he himself were looking for someone, and overheard Seymour in an urgent voice saying, “Half the purse now and the rest only if you take delivery on the powder before Wednesday next.”
The next words were drowned out as a gentleman shouted loudly that a pickpocket had robbed him. A scrambling chase ensued down the central aisle, knocking over half a dozen clerics and a chestnut vendor. By the time Robin could resume his eavesdropping, Seymour was saying, “A penny a day per soldier, and ten thousand troops. Who knows how long —?”
The Admiral grew suddenly silent. Robin felt Seymour's eyes boring into the back of his head. He was forced to move on. Blast it! He had lost his opportunity to discover the armory’s whereabouts. Robin lost himself in the crowd again but turned back in time to see Thomas placing a heavy purse in the gentleman’s hand. The two men parted, leaving in separate directions.
Seymour, happily for Robin, did not leave the cathedral but joined a group of nobles engaged in a noisy debate about enclosures. Meanwhile, however, his coconspirator was heading for the door. Who was he? Robin had never seen the man at court, though that meant nothing. He could follow the stranger, but this meant losing the trail of Seymour today, and that would never do. By the sound of it, the rebellion was imminent. The man might or might not lead him to the armory. All he needed was a name.
Blessed Jesus! The black-suited gentleman had stopped to speak with a whore whom Robin estimated to be no older than Elizabeth. An idea struck him suddenly, and he moved directly to a trio of prostitutes sharing a bawdy laugh near the cathedral door. When they saw the tall, handsome boy approaching, they began to hoot and throw kisses his way. The prettiest one quite brazenly tugged at her bodice till a rosy nipple popped out. The sudden sight of it left him momentarily speechless before the women.
“Ew, such a pretty young gentleman,” said one.
“Why, ‘e’s blushin’,” said another.
“Makes ‘im all the prettier, I think.”
They cackled lasciviously.
“Well then, young gent,” said the oldest of the whores, “what ‘ave you in mind? All three of us at once?”
Robin was smiling now despite his urgent mission and said playfully, “I may look green to you, ladies —”
“Ew, now we’re ladies, says ‘e.”
“— but I wager I’m man enough to take you on one after the other.”
They shrieked with raucous delight.
“A letch at your age,” said the youngest. “Why, good sir, you ought to be ashamed. Should ‘e not be ashamed?” she asked her cohorts.
“Please, come close. I have a favor to ask,” he whispered suddenly and pulled them round him. They were baffled but highly intrigued, and so they waited in silence to hear his request. “See that gentleman all in black with the sweet young woman by the door?”
“Slag Maggie, you mean?” asked the oldest whore, pointing with her chin at Seymou
r’s liaison and his prostitute.
“The very one. I’ll let you have everything in my purse if you tell me his name.”
“‘Ow do we know you’ve anything in your purse worth ‘avin’?” asked the middle whore.
Robin removed the pouch from the waist of his doublet and discreetly displayed its contents.
“A rich young lad, as well as ‘andsome,” observed the youngest with growing interest.
“Why, that’s Lord Brockhurst,” announced the oldest whore with great authority.
“I know Lord Brockhurst,” said Robin, withdrawing his purse, disappointed, “and that is not him. I thank you for your time, ladies,” he said and turned to go.
“I ain’t ‘ad ‘im,” he heard the youngest say as he moved away.
“Nor I,” added the middle whore.
Robin grew alarmed to see Slag Maggie taking the arm of the black-suited gentleman and the pair making for the door. Thankfully the crowd was slowing their progress, and the man would stop occasionally to greet someone he knew.
“Wait!” cried the middle prostitute to Robin. “We’ll find out ‘is name, just you wait.” She pulled her friends to her and whispered to them. “Stay ‘ere,” she ordered Robin, “and don’t spend the contents of that purse o’ yours, y’ear.”
A moment later the whores had dispersed into the crowd. He watched them assail, one by one, every unengaged prostitute under the roof, some that were in midtransaction, and even a few gentlemen who Robin supposed had at one time employed them, and point questioningly to the man in black. Sometimes the women would be forced to drag their source to a place from which they could see the gentleman better. Robin watched with amusement as the youngest girl hoisted herself up onto a pew seat for a better view. Within moments she had returned, breathless and bursting with her intelligence, but Robin put a finger to his lips to still her until the others had returned. They both did so a few minutes later, and none too soon. The man in black and Slag Maggie were disappearing out the great cathedral doors.
“All right, ladies, at the count of three. Pray for consensus or you’ll not have your purse.” They gave each other a hopeful look. “One, two, three,” he counted.
“Lord Kendall!” they all cried at once, then screamed with delight, falling upon Robin with hugs and kisses.
Finally he pulled from their embraces smeared with face paint and dusted with powder. He smiled and held out his leather pouch. “That was a brilliant bit of espionage, ladies.”
“Don’t underestimate a whore who can make a week’s wages without spreadin’ ‘er legs,” said the middle girl, plucking the purse from Robin’s hand.
“And what might our benefactor’s name be, then?” asked the oldest prostitute.
“Robert Dudley, son of John Dudley, Lord Warwick.”
“Warwick? Never ‘eard of’im, never ‘ad ‘im,” she said. The other two concurred. “Must be a right upstandin’ gent, ‘cause between the three of us, we’ve ‘ad all of’em been ‘ad.”
“My mother will be very pleased to hear that,” said Robin jovially, “but now I’m off. And thank you very kindly for your good work.”
He turned and was instantly lost in the crowd, though for several moments more he could hear their laughter and the eldest whore crying out after him, “Don’t be a stranger now, young Robert!”
Though previously Robin Dudley had dreaded the loss of daylight as he sought to tail Thomas Seymour — first from St. Paul’s and later from the Royal Mint accompanied by an employee who Robin supposed or hoped was his accomplice in treason — the young man now held it as his good fortune that the sun had finally set, the ever-darkening shadows shielding his espionage in the cloak of night.
Seymour had met the man briefly on the steps of the mint at closing time, pretending it a chance meeting with only a few words exchanged. They had parted and the unnamed employee had quickly hired a litter, disappearing into the slapdash web of London streets. Remounting his horse, Seymour had ridden off after him. Robin had followed both, careful to keep a discreet distance between himself and the men, who were already carrying on in a covert manner. He had every reason for suspicion and was frantic at the thought of losing them in the crush of the workdays end. More than once Robin Dudley found himself separated from Seymour and the litter by carts and carriages and masses of tradesmen leaving their home businesses and shops to make for the nearest tavern. Darkness came quickly to the narrow London streets and even tinier lanes, their houses’ second and third stories jutting farther and farther into the street's midline.
But Robin was secretly pleased to find a fresh usefulness for his precise and subtle command of the horse beneath him. A quick swivel, delicate steps in place, even a graceful leap, avoided several mishaps and kept the objects of his pursuit always in his sight.
As young Dudley watched, the litter headed down a short dark lane whose end was the front of a three-story house covered in trellises and ancient vines of ivy. This, he assumed, was the mint employee's residence. The as yet unnamed man climbed out of the transport, and the two litter bearers, relieved of their load, trotted back up the street, passing Seymour as he clattered past them to his destination.
Now Robin paid a boy to guard his horse and peered round the corner to see the Admiral tie up his mount to the post in front of the mans house. The mint employee opened the front door, admitted Seymour, and closed it behind them. Only then did Robin steal furtively down the lane.
By the time he reached the house and took his place in the shadows beside the ground-floor window, the two men were already deep in conversation. Robin had no way of knowing what vital intelligence had already been lost to him. Further, the window was closed, and it was only by the grace of Thomas Seymour’s booming voice that Robin could hear any part of their dealings.
“… delivery of powder … Holt Castle … gold shavings… see the cache now…”
To Robins dismay, the mint employee began climbing his stairs, and Seymour followed till both men were out of sight. Hardly considering the consequences of his act, Robin moved to the front door and carefully tried the handle, but the old mechanism creaked loudly and set a dog inside to barking. In moments footsteps could be heard as the owner traipsed back down the stairs to learn the cause of the commotion.
Robin flattened himself against the front wall, losing himself entirely in a profusion of ivy. The door opened and the man peered out. Seeing nothing but a stray cat padding across the cobbles, he quickly shut the door.
Dudley slumped with relief, sure that the man would have heard his wildly pounding heart, and in the next moment was gifted with a most extraordinary bit of luck. Above his head Thomas Seymour threw open the window of the second-floor chamber and, leaning out over the sill, sucked in a lungful of air. Robin, still hidden in the ivy, remained still as a post. Now he could hear the other man return to the upstairs room and the conspirators’ conversation begin again.
Quickly Dudley extricated himself from the leaves and stood back to survey the situation. The two men’s voices were now too muted by distance to hear distinctly. He must get nearer to them. A full moon had just risen and the added light allowed Robin to make out the instrument of his success.
Beneath the thick curtain of ivy lay its age-old vines, some of which were thick as a boatman’s arm.
He was unsure that the uppermost branches would support his weight, or if they grew close enough to the open window to give him access to the conversation. And in the moonlight anyone coming down the street would clearly see him in his clandestine pursuit. But there was no time to think. Now action was all that counted.
He began to climb.
He had to move with the utmost stealth, for the unnatural rustling of the leaves on this windless night would surely alert the two men of his approach. But speed was crucial as well. The incriminating words he needed desperately to hear might already have been spoken, and all of this would have been for naught. His sinewy muscles and youthful grace did not desert
him as he placed each foot and hand higher on the vine and pulled himself up. Thankfully the distance to the second floor was none too great, and with a last blessed bit of luck he found a narrow foothold four feet below the window ledge.
“Gods precious blood, Sherrington!” Robin heard the Admiral exclaim with disgust. “Is this piddling pile the best you could do after all this time?”
Finally, thought Robin, the mint worker had a name.
Hardly daring to breathe, he grasped the sill with both hands and hoisted himself just high enough to peer into the window. What he saw were the two men standing over an open wooden cask piled with what appeared in the candlelight to be a mound of gold shavings.
“Piddling pile, my lord?” spat Sherrington. “I’ve risked my neck every day for a year to shear those coins to pay for your bloody rebellion, and what thanks do I get?”
Robin ducked out of sight as Seymour swung round and began pacing the room.
“ ‘Tis your rebellion too, sir,” said Seymour, “or so you would have had me believe.”
“You are dreaming, my lord Admiral,” said Sherrington contemptuously. “If you search your memory for the truth, you’ll remember our dealings were the result of blackmail, with me the victim.”
“True,” replied Seymour. “You’d already started your little ‘shaving’ operation, but I thought you agreed that there was no better use for it than removing that worm of a man from power.”
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