And you should have kept me informed, Boltfoot felt like saying to William Sarjent. But argument used up energy, and he had little enough of that to spare this night. What he did manage to say was, ‘How did you find me?’
‘I knew of this place already from my investigations. They train out here with powder. It is safe for them, for none come here but seabirds, a few stray sheep and foxes. I came here to spy on them — and found you instead.’
‘If you knew of Curl and his band, why have they not been broken up by pursuivants or the royal guard?’
‘Mr Cooper, you have been in this business long enough to know the answer to that: I had to find the source of the powder and I had to identify their chiefest man. Lord Burghley fears that powerful merchants, even men of nobility, are involved in this conspiracy. Knagg of Three Mills was supplying Curl with powder, but that hole has been plugged. Who are the puppet masters, though? How shall I find them now? My work is ruined by your bungling.’
Sarjent’s words had reason. Yet, even in his present weak state, Boltfoot’s instinct was strong. He did not like any of this, nor did he like Sarjent and his swaggering ways.
‘The Scots sorcerers, what have they to do with Curl and his band?’
‘Ah, the witches. They are not the common rump of Mr Curl’s rebellious band. I know something of them. They have another purpose.’ Sarjent took a swig from a flagon and passed it to Boltfoot. ‘I fear they have treated you most cruelly, Mr Cooper. Did you tell them aught?’
Boltfoot looked at him with mild contempt but said nothing.
‘Good. That is good. Then let us pool our knowledge and bring what we know to the Cecils, for I have reason to believe an attack of some nature, some insurrection, is coming, and soon.’
Boltfoot tried vainly to struggle to his feet. ‘Let us requisition a boat and make our way to London… we must make haste.’
‘We will, Mr Cooper. But surely you had already got word to Mr Shakespeare before you were brought here?’
‘Yes,’ Boltfoot lied without hesitation, as he had told the same lie to Warboys and Curl before being brought to this place. ‘Yes, Mr Shakespeare knows all about Curl and his band. And he will be mighty concerned about me by now.’
‘Well, you are safe.’
‘And he will be most grateful to you, Mr Sarjent, for saving me from certain death. As am I…’
Sarjent was silent for a moment. It had not escaped Boltfoot’s notice as he spoke that Sarjent’s hand was close to his belt where he kept his wheel-lock and his dagger. The hand hovered there, like a kestrel fluttering the tips of its wings, as if deciding whether to swoop on a shrew or move on to tastier prey. The hand moved on and took the flagon back from Boltfoot. ‘That is good, very good,’ Sarjent said at last. ‘It is fortunate that I was able to help, as I once saved Captain-General Norris on the field of blood. Did I ever tell you of that day?’
‘No, Mr Sarjent, I do not believe you did. Perhaps you would tell it to me now, while I drift off to sleep, for I need rest.’ There was another question that Boltfoot wished answered, but he would not ask it. He wanted to know why, if there was an imminent threat of insurrection, did they not simply descend this hill to the creek below and enlist the aid of some passing fishermen to get them to London without delay. He did not ask him because he knew the answer. He smiled wanly at his companion. ‘I trust you will understand that I need to sleep, Mr Sarjent. If you must go, leave me here to rest. Otherwise stay and let us move from this place at dawn.’
Shakespeare felt a cloud of fear descend. The hellburners of Antwerp. He knew of them. ‘Nick, this is terrifying to think on…’
‘But it could make sense. You say they have five thousand pounds or more powder. That could be used for a series of attacks like the Dutch market outrage, or one so huge that it would shake England to its very foundations. If Philip wanted vengeance for Antwerp and for the Armada, if he wanted to sow discord and create havoc, what better weapon?’
‘Maybe more than five thousand pounds. How much powder was used in the hellburners?’
‘Seven thousand pounds in each, all topped up with slabs of stone, ploughshares, scythes, sickles, rusting iron and nails, sharpened staves. It was the most deadly weapon ever conceived. A thousand or more Spaniards died in a single blast. The roar was heard fifty miles away. They were still finding the scattered bodies many months later.’
‘God’s blood. If that is what they have planned for us…’
‘It is only surmise…’
‘But as you say, Nick, it makes sense.’
Henbird wiped his nightshirt sleeve across his mouth. The aroma of brandy hung heavy in this fine chamber. A servant arrived with cold cuts of various fowl, slices of manchet bread, some cold beef and kidney pudding. Shakespeare had lost his hunger, but he accepted a platter with good grace.
‘Eat, John, eat. You need strength. Do you know of Federigo Giambelli?’
‘I know of him. We have never met.’
‘But you know he is in England, yes?’
Shakespeare nodded. Giambelli was the engineer from Lombardy who had devised the infernal hellburner machine for the Dutch defenders of Antwerp. He was now in the pay of the English, engaged on various defensive works around London and the south coast. ‘But where — here in London?’
‘Sometimes. I believe he is presently on the Isle of Wight, completing the Carisbrooke earthworks. I am pleased to count him a friend. But more importantly than that, I know with whom he deals. In particular I know a clockmaker who has worked with him and will certainly understand the workings of such a device as was used at Antwerp and, more recently, at the Dutch market. After you were dismissed from Walsingham’s service, Giambelli and this clockmaker were engaged by Mr Secretary to design and build a series of defensive hellburners. Nothing ever came of the plan, for the Queen refused to outlay the money needed, and then Mr Secretary died. But if anyone will know about timing devices, this clockmaker will be the man. His name is Peter Gulden — Gulden of Gutter Lane. That is but a few streets from here. We can go to him at first light.’
Shakespeare understood. As he picked at the food, he summoned up his recollections of the Hellburners, or Hellebranders as the Dutch knew them. In the spring of 1585, messages from the Low Countries to Walsingham’s intelligence network in London had been hot with news of them. They had come into existence at a time when the Duke of Parma, general of the Spanish armies in the Low Countries, was besieging Antwerp and had built a barrier of ships across the river Scheldt to stop supplies reaching the city.
Federigo Giambelli was there. He was an ambitious military engineer from Mantua who had tried to sell his expertise to King Philip, but had been rebuffed. Now he offered his services to the city of Antwerp, believing he had a way to break through this impenetrable siege barrier. Ordinary fireships — ships piled high with firewood and set ablaze — would be too easily doused by the Spanish soldiers guarding the barricade. Giambelli’s hellburners would be a different proposition. And the city fathers of Antwerp agreed to his plan.
Two seventy-ton ships, the Fortune and the Hope, were appropriated for the purpose. Giambelli had these vessels stripped down, then built enormous chambers deep in their holds. Shakespeare tried to imagine how they looked. He had heard that the chambers were like funnels, built of brick and stone — forty feet long and three feet in diameter. The chambers were packed solid with good corned gunpowder. More stone slabs and old scrap metal were piled high above the chambers to compact the powder and maximise the blast. False decks were then built above the huge bombs so that the Spanish would not know them from the far less dangerous fireships they had encountered in the past.
As Shakespeare recalled it, the last problem Giambelli faced was how to light the powder. In one of the ships, the Fortune, he used a slow-burning taper. He saved his masterstroke for the other vessel, the Hope. For this one, he enlisted the aid of a local clockmaker, who designed a timing device that would bring down a lever at a given
time, soon after the ship had drifted into the Spanish barricade. This lever would turn a serrated steel wheel — much like a wheel-lock pistol — sending a shower of sparks into the powder.
When the ships were ready, the Dutch sent ordinary fireships towards the barricade, as a decoy. These were easily extinguished by the Spanish, who were much amused by the feeble efforts of the Dutch. Then came the hellburners, disguised as fireships by the burning of a few smoke-belching twigs and branches on their decks. The Fortune drifted into the riverbank and its fuse fizzled out. The Hope, however, reached its target. The unsuspecting Spanish swarmed all over it with their pails of water. And then the clock lever dropped, steel span against flint and sparks flew into powder…
‘One thousand dead?’
‘Possibly more, John. But some believe the effects were far greater than that. Signor Giambelli insists that his hellburners gave England victory over the Spanish Armada.’
‘Surely no hellburners were involved?’
‘No, but the Spanish did not know that. When the English sent commonplace fireships towards the Armada near Calais, the Spanish convinced themselves they must be hellburners. They were in utter terror — panic ensued. The Spanish dispersed and were never able to regroup in good order. That, asserts Signor Giambelli, is how the battle was won for Drake and England.’
‘Let us go to clockmaker Gulden now. We cannot afford to wait.’
‘It is mere conjecture, John,’ Henbird replied, ‘but you are right, of course.’
Shakespeare gazed on Henbird’s black-bruised face. ‘I will go, Nick. You stay here. Return to your sickbed.’
The watchman, lantern in hand, called the hour of eleven and eyed Shakespeare with suspicion. ‘Where are you going after curfew, master? Only whores and thieves are abroad at this time of night.’
‘Queen’s business,’ Shakespeare said sharply. ‘You can light my way.’
The watchman, a stocky fellow of middle years, grumbled, suddenly unsure of himself. ‘Find your own way,’ he said and turned away.
Shakespeare grabbed him by the collar of his thick woollen jerkin. ‘No, you light my way. Take me to Gutter Lane.’
The watchman, half a foot shorter than Shakespeare and ten years older, considered for a moment whether to summon other members of the watch for assistance. Instead, grudgingly, he shuffled forward as ordered. It was only a few hundred yards eastward and took them little more than ten minutes. The house was in darkness. Shakespeare banged his dagger haft at the door and kept banging until it was answered by a nervous-looking serving girl in her nightgown and cap.
‘I am here to talk with Peter Gulden.’
The girl stood well back from them. ‘He sleeps, master.’
‘Wake him. This is Queen’s business.’
She scuttled off into the house. Shakespeare dismissed the watchman, then stepped into the hall. It was a large, well-appointed room. Clockmaker Gulden was clearly a wealthy man.
He appeared shortly, pulling on a doublet over a hastily applied shirt and breeches. The clockmaker was a tall, weak-built man with high cheekbones and almost no hair on his pate. He wore a beard, trimmed short, but no moustache. He looked as if he had spent too many long hours stooped over a workbench, eye fixed to a magnifying glass, working at his intricate springs, pallets and toothed wheels.
‘Peter Gulden?’
‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘But who are you, sir?’
‘My name is John Shakespeare. I am an officer with Sir Robert Cecil. I apologise for waking you at such an hour, but I have important business with you.’
Gulden clearly had been in the depths of sleep for he rubbed his eyes and stretched his aching back. He had a good-humoured but worried face, with blue eyes that might have twinkled had he not been so sleepy. ‘What sort of business could Sir Robert have with me, Mr Shakespeare? I am a clockmaker.’ His brow creased in bemusement.
‘I am told you worked with Signor Giambelli on a project to build English hellburners.’
Gulden nodded. ‘That is true, yes. In the late eighties. But it came to nothing.’
‘You were working on the timing devices?’
‘I was.’
‘I can tell you, sir — though it is not to be repeated — that the recent gunpowder blast in the Dutch market involved a timing device.’
‘That is deeply shocking, Mr Shakespeare. I had no idea.’
‘Are you Dutch, sir?’
‘I am, yes, but I have been here for years.’
‘You must know most of the clockmakers of London.’
‘Indeed, I am sure I know them all. There are no more than twelve of us to my knowledge.’
‘Could any of them have made a timing device such as the one used in the market?’
‘Why, all of them would be capable, I am sure. With patience, such a thing would not be demanding for one versed in the clockmaker’s art, certainly not one experienced in constructing domestic table clocks. The hardest part would be making the timing device accurate enough to operate within a minute or so of the required time. Too quick and the attacker might be blown up, too slow and the device could be discovered and disabled.’
‘Give me a name, Mr Gulden. Of the dozen clockmakers you know, who might do such a thing? Who would attack your people?’
‘Oh, Mr Shakespeare, what a question!’
‘But one that must be answered.’
‘It is not something I have ever considered.’
‘Consider it now.’
‘Well, I suppose none of the Dutch. There are four of us, all refugies from the endless war. Nor the Huguenot, Sieur Josselin. Never was there a more kindly man. One of the English, I suppose, for was it not an attack on strangers?’
‘What are their names?’
Gulden suddenly put his hand to his mouth. ‘You know, Mr Shakespeare, I have just had a terrible thought. I believe I may know the man you want.’
‘Yes?’ Shakespeare was impatient now.
‘He is a man I have had much trouble with over the years. He has accused me of taking his trade, for when I first came to London my premises were within two doors of his in Goldsmiths Row. He has insulted me in the street in the worst, most ungodly language and has had his apprentices throw stones through my windows and at my servants. I think he resents all strangers, perhaps because his clocks are so poor in comparison to ours. He has never built other than church-tower clocks of iron and steel, but wishes to learn our ways with finer machines…’
‘But you believe this man has the skill necessary to make a timing device?’
‘Oh yes, most certainly. He has learned enough.’
‘His name, Mr Gulden, give me his name and where I may find him.’
‘His name is Walter Stacker. Like me, he has moved from Goldsmiths Row. You will find him near St Paul’s in Knightrider Street, to the east of the Doctors Commons. It is a poor house. You will know it by the clock on its wall. The time is always wrong.’
Chapter 32
Shakespeare waited in the dark shadows on the other side of the road from the house, observing it, waiting. He was neither tired nor hungry, but alert and expectant. For the first time in days, he felt he was moving, that he might be drawing close, that he would find a way to the men who had killed Catherine.
The occasional flicker of light through the drapes showed that the house was not asleep. Something was happening. Something would happen soon. He could feel it in his blood and in his tingling flesh. He was suffused with energy and a dreadful rage.
The street was almost deserted, save for the occasional night animal, crying for a mate. A pair of late-night revellers in the gowns of lawyers traipsed by but did not see him in the darkness. He was as still as stone, his eyes fixed. At last he saw a light by the window closest to the front door, then the door opened and a figure stepped out. The figure was that of a man. The man hesitated, looked up and down the street, then set off eastwards. Shakespeare followed him, softly, keeping his distance.
&nbs
p; He could take the man at any time, but he wanted to see where he was going.
The rented warehouse by the glassworks in Crutched Friars was empty now, save for a drying heap of dung and the two people who stood by the great double door. Laveroke, also known as Baines and by a dozen other names, held a pitch torch and looked about him. All the gunpowder was gone. The air was thick with dust.
‘How many barrels in the end, Mr Laveroke?’
‘Two hundred and ten. Each of a hundred pounds. That must be more than twenty thousand pounds, Dona Ana.’
Ana looked at Laveroke’s handsome face. His teeth shone white. When would she see him again? Another month, another year, five years? It was always pleasant when their paths crossed. He was full of energy, clever, merciless. She was the chief and the thinker, Laveroke the foot soldier and killer.
‘And is it now packed tight in the vessel?
Laveroke laughed. ‘As tight as a bull in a cow. There are no holes in this Sieve.’
Ana did not laugh. ‘We need to be clear now,’ she said. ‘We need to be precise on our roles. Timing is everything. No one must fail. It is a simple plan: an assassination in Scotland, a powder blast, an uprising in London. If each of these three parts succeeds, this tinder-dry island will blaze like a dead oak… and fall.’
The two of them stood in silence a moment. Ana said this was simple, but they both knew the plan had been long in the devising. These two people were the only ones outside the Escorial who understood it in its entirety. Its success depended on no one else understanding it.
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