“Where is he going? Scotland, Spain, France? Clarenceux speaks the languages. He has the knowledge.”
Richards started to draw an imaginary map on the table surface with his finger. “The seas might be very wide, but with clear sightlines, a captain can patrol a thirty-mile-wide stretch of water with one ship. Admiral Lord Clinton can control the sea lanes north to Scotland by sailing just fifteen miles off the coast of East Anglia. Not many people will sail far out into the North Sea-certainly not more than thirty miles from land. As for Sir Peter Carew, he can patrol the Channel by placing two or three ships in the sixty-mile stretch between Cherbourg and the Isle of Wight.”
“Sir Peter takes his messages from which port?”
“Portsmouth.”
Walsingham nodded. “It’s seventy miles to Portsmouth. A good messenger can do that in about fourteen hours, with a change of horses. It is now ten of the clock. He could be there tonight, and Sir Peter could receive a message as early as tomorrow. If the pirates are sailing to Spain, how long will it take them, with a fair wind?”
“Three weeks. Longer with a southwesterly.”
“And Scotland?”
“They could be in Edinburgh in ten days.”
Walsingham sat at his table. “I will write immediately. We will send urgent messages in Cecil’s name to Admiral Clinton by way of Boston and Sir Peter Carew by way of Portsmouth.”
“What will you order?”
Walsingham looked up in surprise. “To arrest Clarenceux, at all costs.”
“And if the pirates fight back?”
“Well, all the more force will be required. I do not doubt Her Majesty would rather risk a few ships than her throne. If it meant us being rid of Raw Carew, so much the better.”
53
Carew looked westward with his hand shielding his eyes from the late-afternoon sun. The breeze was full in his face, ruffling his hair. “Furl the sails and drop anchor,” he said. They were on the sterncastle, three miles off the Kent coast. “We can’t make headway against this.” He glanced at Clarenceux and Kahlu. “Are you hungry?”
Clarenceux’s ribs felt sore, his clothes were rough, the wound in his hand stung terribly. Other parts of his body that had been beaten were still tender.
“Yes.”
Kahlu made a noise and gestured. He stood up and went down to the main deck.
“How did he lose his tongue?” Clarenceux asked.
Carew tied the whipstaff securely against the side of the sterncastle and sat down on an upturned keg. “Slavers. They cut out negroes’ tongues for resisting branding and attempting to escape-women as well as men. They all fear that. But Kahlu was never going to stop trying to escape. They caught him once and cut out his tongue. That made him all the more determined. He escaped again. We were sailing in the Santa Teresa off the coast of Africa when he appeared in the water. When we pulled him out and spoke to him, he seemed not to understand us. I pointed to myself and said ‘Carew.’ He pointed to himself and tried to say the same thing. Skinner thought he was trying to say ‘Kahlu’ but unable to say the ‘l’ because he had lost his tongue, so we took that to be his name. Later we discovered that he thought that ‘Carew’ was our word for ‘captain.’ He was a chief of his tribe.”
“Why doesn’t he return to his own people?” asked Clarenceux.
“Because they would kill him. They will have another chief by now, one who can talk.”
Carew looked down at the deck. He picked up a splinter of wood and started picking the grime out from beneath his fingernails. “That was four or five years ago now. He’s a loyal man-the most loyal. A good fighter too. Always dependable. If I was going to sail around the world with just one other man, I would take him.”
Clarenceux squinted in the sunlight and looked up at a small bird perched on the rope nearby. “What about the others? Have they all been with you long?”
“Some are new recruits. Alice has been with me for many years-I knew her before the fall.”
“The fall?”
“Of Calais. She was a washerwoman’s daughter in the house where…” His voice trailed off and he looked away for a moment, across the sea. “Old James Miller survived the wreck that claimed my father’s life nineteen years ago. Most of the men aboard the Mary Rose that day drowned-either they were below deck or they were caught in the ship’s antiboarding nets. Miller kept his head and cut his way out through the nets before the ship started to go down.
“John Devenish and Hugh Dean-they were on a boat that was captured by Spaniards. I found them working in the galley when I, in turn, took command. They were the sole survivors of their original ship. Francis Bidder ran away from Oxford because he did not want to obey his father and become a priest. I thought he was a spy, so I locked him in the hold and threw him in the sea-just like I did to you. He’s educated and has a good memory, which makes up for his quietness. He will remember anything you tell him and can do difficult sums very quickly. Luke-he was recruited by Alice in Dartmouth. She heard him playing the fiddle and took him to bed. When she sailed, so did he.”
Kahlu and James Miller came up to the sterncastle with a wooden bowl of meaty broth and some bread, one passing the bowl to the other at the top of the ladder. Skinner came along behind with a selection of wooden mugs, which were handed around. He filled a mug from the bowl and handed it to Clarenceux: lamb stewed with salt, onions and thickened with oats. Globules of fat were floating on the surface.
“What about you?” asked Clarenceux, watching the steam from his broth swirl away in the breeze. “You mentioned the fall of Calais. But what drove you to sea?”
Carew lifted the mug, sipped some of the hot stock, and wiped his mouth. He held up his hand, showing the enameled ring on his middle finger. It flashed in the sunlight. “This. It was the only thing I ever got from the Carew family. My father was captain of the Rysbank Tower at Calais twenty-five years ago. After his first wife died, he took a fancy to my mother, who was only about seventeen. She became pregnant with me. When she realized, fearing for her future, she asked him for some protection. He refused to acknowledge her child and told her not to presume to speak to him again. She stole this ring from him that day, determined that I should have some reminder of who my father was.”
Clarenceux looked at it, the three black lions on a golden background. “I have seen a similar one.”
“You met my father? Where?”
“I did meet him at the siege of Boulogne, but he must already have lost that ring by then. Your uncle, Sir Peter Carew, was wearing an identical one: Or, three lions passant sable. I tend to notice these things. I suppose there was a third ring as well. Your grandfather, Sir William Carew, had them made for his three sons. The one given to your other uncle, Sir Philip, I daresay is somewhere still in Malta.”
“What is he doing there?”
“He was killed by the Turks.”
Carew nodded. “What else do you know about my family?”
Clarenceux thought back to his study and the manuscripts that he had considered recently in preparing for his visitation of Devon. “Mostly heraldic things, not many stories. Coats of arms, seats, lands, estates, and titles. Your family motto is J’espère bien-which means ‘I hope well’ or ‘I hope for good.’ Your ancestors had extensive lands in Ireland. They used to yell the name as a war cry in battle, ‘A Carew, a Carew.’”
Skinner spat a piece of gristle over the side of the sterncastle. “How is it you know more about his family than he does?”
“Because I am a herald. It is my business to know who is descended from whom, and which lines of which armigerous families have died out and how. If your ancestors had a coat of arms, then I would know about your family too.”
Skinner looked at him. “My father had just seven acres. He also had seven children. I didn’t go to sea to seek my fortune. I went looking for food.”
“And look what fine fare a seafaring life has delivered,” said Miller, lifting his mug. “As for a fortune,
you’ve seven acres less than your father.” He helped himself to some dregs from the bowl and looked at Clarenceux. “What about you then, herald? We’re told you’re looking for a woman who was on this boat. Are you in love with her?”
“He wants to kill her,” said Skinner.
Miller grinned. “That sounds like love to me.”
“She has taken something of mine. I want it back,” said Clarenceux.
“Worth being nailed to a table for?” said Miller, looking at him over the top of his mug.
“It might stop a war. It may prevent the persecution of Catholics in England. People must learn to tolerate one another’s religious beliefs.”
None of the men said anything. Several shifted uneasily.
Carew broke the silence. “We have no talk of religion aboard this ship, Mr. Clarenceux. No talk of God or Jesus or the saints-no discussions of Catholics or Protestants. If you can’t throw your religion over the side, keep it to yourself.”
54
Tuesday, May 16
Clarenceux was woken by his need to urinate. He lay still, sensing the gentle swell of the sea. A thin light was creeping through the windows. The Spanish woman Juanita was walking between the bodies of sleeping men, steadying herself with a hand on the mast, trying not to wake anyone as she made her way back to the women’s quarters.
Clarenceux threw off his blanket and went up the ladder. More men here were sleeping on deck, under the pink sky of dawn. Others were on watch. No one was speaking. There was a great tranquility. The sea was calm; apart from the lapping of the water against the hull, there was no noise. The ship did not creak as it had done the previous day.
Clarenceux went to the side of the boat and relieved himself. He watched the ripples of the waves across the wide expanse to the horizon, and saw the mainland in the distance. He looked up at the sterncastle and saw Carew standing there, silhouetted against the sky. He went up the ladder and joined him.
“Don’t you ever sleep?”
“I’ll sleep when I am old.” Carew continued looking out to sea. “When Denisot gave the plans of Calais to the French, he betrayed England. He betrayed the Crown too; there can be doubt about that. So what was he doing in London?”
“I dare say we will have an answer to that question when we find Rebecca Machyn and her brother,” replied Clarenceux. “The last time I saw her, she behaved strangely. She said she was going away and would probably never see me again. She and Robert Lowe must have planned with Denisot how they were going to escape from London.”
“Two hundred pounds is a lot of money just to take two people to Southampton. And Denisot himself was not on the boat. He did not escape. That means he was not trying.”
Clarenceux leaned on the gunwale. “How long do you think it will take us?”
“To get to Southampton? The wind has changed direction to a southeasterly, which is better. Four days maybe?”
Clarenceux gazed across the sea, watching the gulls swoop down and fly just above the waves. “Widow Machyn and her brother might be miles away from Southampton by then.”
“We will go after them.”
Clarenceux looked at Carew. “Why are you so desperate? This goes beyond revenge.”
“Denisot did not just take away my hometown. He took away all the people who protected me, all the people I loved. He took away the women in the house where I grew up. He took away everything.”
“You mean, when he betrayed the town.”
“Then, and immediately after.”
“Was it a house of ill repute, where you grew up?”
Carew smiled. “Ill repute? You mean ‘was it a whorehouse’? Yes, it was. My mother turned to prostitution to keep us after her father died, the year after I was born. She was a good woman. All of them in the House of the Three Suns were good women. They had the biggest hearts, and they were always kind to me as a child. When my mother died, I was ten years old. The other women took on her role, trying to send me to school and paying for the weekly fee by taking in extra clients. It was my mother’s desire that I should learn to read and write and not suffer the indignities of poverty. The others tried to continue what she started. I hated school and ran away to sea. Now, when I think back, I feel ashamed.” He scanned the horizon, as if looking for something that might resemble hope. “For a long time it made me want to weep. Then it made me want to kill. Now when I feel I might cry, I do not shed tears. I shed blood-other men’s blood.”
He turned to face Clarenceux. Despite what he had just said, there were tears in his eyes. “It was because of religion. That is why no word of religion is to be spoken on my ship. No Bibles, no prayers. Never. Now you understand.”
55
Clarenceux did not speak to Carew again for the rest of the day. He saw him bustling about the ship, giving orders, talking to everyone. Although just over one hundred feet in length, there were more than sixty people aboard, and as conversations over the day revealed, there should have been more. Clarenceux had never seen a ship so untidy, in which everyone was free to scatter their possessions. It was only later in the day that he realized why: these were not their possessions. The only things that seemed to be regarded as personally owned by the crew were weapons and musical instruments. It mattered to Hugh Dean that he had his pistols, and to Luke Treleaven that he had his fiddle. They were not the same men without them. Plates, mugs, mallets, spoons-all these things served the same function whoever owned them. The men and women aboard treated all such things as property in common.
The women aboard were “in common” too. No one referred to them as whores to their faces. Juanita was attractive but had a fiery temper and was as likely to stab a man as surrender to his advances. Charity was pretty and calmer than Juanita. She was more timid too and, as far as Clarenceux could see, more considerate. Occasionally he saw one of them in a corner with a man, or slinking off to the orlop deck hand in hand with someone. Alice seemed to be in charge of the women, and she presided over an area of the main deck reserved for their exclusive use. Apart from that, every other area was shared. The traditional distinction of ordinary sailors living before the mast and officers behind did not hold aboard Carew’s ship. Everyone went everywhere. Thus no one gave much thought to keeping any area tidy. The captain’s cabin was soon as untidy as the rest of the vessel. The surgeon’s cabin was similarly despoiled. Alice took some ointments and salves from the surgeon’s medical box; the rest were soon scattered underfoot. There being no surgeon aboard, no respect was paid to the tools of his trade. Technical instruments became general-purpose saws and knives.
Not long before midday, they hauled anchor and started once more to head into the wind, taking a course further out to sea. Clarenceux noticed various mariners about the ship carrying platters of food. He went down to the galley in the hold and was served by those tending the ovens. The ceramic bowl held a portion of salt beef and pea stew. He helped himself to an apple and some prunes that were in a basket and returned to the upper deck. The prunes were good, better than the stew, and Clarenceux was amused to see so many of the mariners ignore them. Most of them thought that only meat really counted as food fit for a man.
Nothing much happened that day. Clarenceux watched, talked to people, washed his wounds, helped carry food, picked up some of the broken ceramic things on the main deck, and observed Carew exercising command. Life aboard ship, he reflected, was more intense than on land. So many people were gathered doing so many different things in such close proximity. It was unlike a manor house where you might have just as many people doing just as many things but over a far larger area. At sea, lives overlapped. Sounds were different: always there were voices. Physical movement and feeling was different, because there was so much less space. People even looked at one another and things differently. Arguments broke out simply because there was nowhere else to go. Men rushed to settle disagreements between crew members-aware that trouble could easily spread or escalate into violence. Late that evening, John Dunbar, the gun
ner, exchanged harsh words with a Breton called Jean, who was supposed to be learning from him how to load and fire the cannon. Carew himself swiftly intervened and confiscated Jean’s dagger, thereby saving both men: Dunbar from being stabbed and Jean from being hanged from the yard. Clarenceux was impressed. The chaotic state of the deck and the stench and mess everywhere made the ship seem as if she was running herself, or rather, that no one cared how she was run. Very clearly that was untrue: the captain and many of the crew did. But they were concerned only for the people, not the broken and cast-aside things strewn across the decks.
Clarenceux left the main deck shortly afterward. He went up to the forecastle and leaned out, looking over the sea. He heard Carew give the order to change tack, then shout as the lateen sail was swung across the sterncastle. He stayed where he was, his mind shifting between the events he had witnessed aboard and his experiences on land. He felt uncomfortable even thinking back to Mrs. Barker’s house, remembering how he had gone there with guns to intimidate the Knights. He had been naive.
He thought of his family. He imagined Awdrey at Summerhill and his girls playing there in the hall. How were they managing without him? Awdrey was no doubt worried. He missed her conversation, telling him what she thought he should do. He missed the ordinariness of their lives together. He missed his daily routine: sitting down with his heraldic manuscripts and piecing together some ancient family’s lineage and claims to coats of arms and titles. He missed knowing what his wife was doing while he was working. When he thought of her, and of his daughters’ laughter, he felt again that sense of incompleteness that one has in an empty house.
He heard footsteps. Carew slapped him on the shoulder and leaned across the gunwale next to him, holding the dagger he had taken from Jean.
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