‘Was it Becket that dressed some of my Lord Burghley’s cattle in scholars’ gowns and brought them in to eat the flowers…’ meditated Dawkins as he fished a coal out of the fire with the tongs. ‘Or was that some other young drunk? I fear I am of little help to you, Mr Ames, I have seen such a parcel of fools and young gentlemen, they become as hard to tell apart as a crowd at the bullbaiting, and as noisy too…. I remember one…’
XIII
In sickness and pain are all men made equal and no man is more alone than he who wakes in pain in the pit of the night. Jerking out of a dream of hell to find no devil spitting him for roasting upon his trident, Sir Francis came to a darker hell of a house full of sleeping folk, a manservant snoring upon his trucklebed by the door, that must not be woken by his master’s moans.
They know so little, the doctors who tend to Mr Secretary Walsingham. Only the Marrano physician Nunez has the courage to blow gently into his beard and admit he knows not why Sir Francis’ humours should be so unbalanced that they make a quarry of little stones inside him where gravel has no business to be. To be sure the common folk rarely suffer from the stone in their bladders, no doubt because their humours are more robust. Some apothecaries would recommend a permanent Lenten diet, without meat, but Nunez will have no truck with such empiric nonsense and puts his faith in purging to bring out the stone quickly.
Even the Queen’s Moor in his sickbed cannot protect himself from those who love to doctor and so is he victim even to his daughter who will bring her father foul nostrums of parsley, meadowsweet and saxifrage to take when she bears in his papers in the morning.
But morning is far away, the night cold despite curtains and the pain roiling about Walsingham’s vitals forbids sleep. Every time he is laid low by the stone, he thinks about cutting. There are barber surgeons who travel about the country cutting men’s guts open to take out the stones. If their patient lives then will he recover completely, no more to be laid low. Lying with his fist clenched into his stomach and his teeth in the pillow, Sir Francis thought between spasms about the business. Could he have the fortitude to suffer his bowels being opened while he lay bound, and his bladder emptied utterly of gravel. Would the relief be worth the agony? And it was a gamble, he might not survive. ^Je is not a young man and his life is of too great use to his religion, his Queenand his country. And so each time his revolving thought comes back to God and His riddling ways. If he must suffer the pain in the faint hope that he could find some doctor who could cure him with alchemical and astrological science, then why must he do so? Could not Christ who raised Lazarus, likewise heal him? He tries not to ask so impudent a question, but there it hangs between him and the tester above, limned in fire. If God has laid upon him alone the burden of fighting the machinations of the Pope and the Duke of Guise, wherefore did He not also give a body able to bear it?
And then shame strikes in its thorny tooth, for the God that gave the burden gave the body too and knows its capacities. Did He not make a mere woman into the Queen of England and then imbue her with an understanding and a knowledge and a courage impossible to women so she might be His Champion? And although she waver frequently from the true straight path that Walsingham would have her tread and although she was not and now will not marry so she may be mastered and taught her duty, still she has ruled as Queen for twenty more years than any betting man gave her when she succeeded to the throne. Thus having made almost a man of a mere woman, can God not prop up Walsingham’s own frail temple of fleshly earth a few more years if He so choose, and if He choose not, then who is Sir Francis to question Him, who can draw up Leviathan with an hook?
Which manly stoicism lasts until the next fierce stab of the stone in his guts and he must turn his face into the pillow to muffle the whimper rising in his throat. And the worst of it is that no matter what the doctors do there will be more of this until at last he pass a pebble through his privy member in blood and agony and can at last be at ease.
Here is a certain black comedy, for in truth the Queen’s Secretary is with child of the stone.
At last come Dawn’s rosy fingers to the sky, or rather a slow winning of pale grey over dark grey and the manservant woke to light the fire and draw the bed curtains and bring his master a thin gruel that he could not touch, being too wearied with pain.
Upon this morning, Sir Francis took also some wine and a tincture of laudenum and assauged his thirst with mild beer before his daughter entered. She was small and with the look of an Italian senora, her father’s swarthy looks alchemised to ivory and ebony of her hair, a little peeking modestly from her white line cap, and her step still perky in despite of her burden. Beneath her stays lies Sir Philip Sidney’s babe and an ironic thing it was too, for here she was, married in September but two months before (at extraordinary expense) and at least six months’ gone with child. Walsingham is very far from being a fool and can calculate: on the one hand so proud a belly so early in a marriage must be a scandal, and yet upon the other, there was a wry satisfaction to him in that his daughter had understood what was needful to bring the Queen to give her permission. If the means were sinful, yet the ends showed daughterly respect for her father: Sir Francis had chosen carefully and well for his daughter, finding her in Sidney the premier knight of Christendom, one whom scholars and sovereigns liked at first audience. Why the Queen had seen fit to prevaricate and attempt to prevent so fine a match by delaying her permission, only the God who made her knew.
And Frances was a beautiful child, a good daughter. She bent and picked up his nightcap from the floor and put it back on his head, smoothing down his damp hair. But Oh God, she was carrying a posset cup.
‘Must I drink it, Frances my dear?’ he asked.
‘I think it can do no harm and may do some good,’ she said, gravely smiling. ‘This has feverfew in it with the saxifrage which I think may help the fever. Will you not take a sleeping draught?’
‘No,’ he snapped. ‘I must speak with some men of mine. How can I do God’s work if my wits are addled?’
‘Why they are already, sir, if you are feverish as you look and therefore I pray you to drink this down.’
He drank, his belly heaving at the bitterness and lay back fighting to hold down the brown brew. She brought out a piss bottle from under a napkin and gave it to him, before retiring quietly.
He had a very ugly looking water ready for her when she returned bearing bags of the papers that were turned out relentlessly by his clerks, not to mention the further tides of paper that flowed in by courier from his friends in foreign lands. He took the latest batch, ruffled through them and raised his brows.
‘Nothing from Mr Ames?’ he asked.
She was busy tending to the fire. ‘No sir,’ she said. ‘Was something expected?’
‘I had heard from Dr Nunez that there came a packet from Rouen. I am surprised Mr Ames has not…. Well, no matter. No doubt he is busy about the Mouse.’
‘Poor Mouse,’ Frances said. ‘To be watched so closely and not to know it.’
‘Hmf. He has no need to work for the Duke of Guise, he is an Englishman bom. He has brought it on his own head.’
‘Mr Ramme, Mr Ellerton and Mr Phelippes and Mr Ames are here about the same business,’ said Frances. ‘My lady mother has received them and they are breaking their fast. Is Mr Hunnicutt to attend? Or Mr Dowl?’
‘No. We are not to be disturbed unless the French come.’ He tried a thin smile and she smiled back at the old family joke which made him think that Sir Philip was a lucky man if he only knew it. But here came another spasm and though he tried to hide it, she saw and came to give him her hand to crush. When he could speak again he saw tears standing in her eyes. She looked very gravely at him for a long time: if he could have thought of the right words in time, he would have asked her what ailed her, why she was so quiet of late? If it was the babe weighing heavy in her or had he hurt her, but before he could draw up the strength, she turned away. The piss bottle was stoppered and hidden
under the napkin.
‘I like this not, father,’ she said. ‘I will send Mr Hunnicutt’s boy to Dr Nunez with it and ask him to come again.’
She was leaving, the velvet hem of her gown making the universal song of women, a swish and a rustle and the occasional flash of feet and ankles. She had turned out so well, given his own swarthiness and her mother’s ugliness, he could smile upon her again, despite the threat of the doctor’s coming which would leave him drained and exhausted from purging.
And now there was Mr Ames in the doorway, framed in honey panelling, staring at him as if a question in his mouth had been popped back into his head by the strange sight of his master smiling so fondly. Then Ames came back to himself, made his bow and stood aside to leave room for James Ramme, William Ellerton and Thomas Phelippes. Ramme was a tall elegant scoundrel, Ellerton round-faced, phlegmatic and a goodly part quicker in his wits than he seemed, Phelippes was an elderly tired man above fifty with the candle-ruined eyes of most clerks and a mind that could make a secular kind of magic with the Arabic signs for number. He refused to use Roman numerals, to which Burghley still cleaved faithfully, declaring with quiet immovability that numbers which lacked a zero were not worthy of consideration.
Ramme stroked his beard, looking quietly pleased with himself. Ames however was pink about the tips of his ears and more inclined than usual to melt into the tapestries upon the walls, which was made easier for him by the ridiculous cut velvet of his short gown. Walsingham sighed inwardly that Ramme was at the clerk-baiting again.
‘What is the news of the Mouse?’ he asked Ramme. Ramme shrugged his well-tailored shoulder, grosgrain silk slashed with taffeta, a dark ruby red upon cramoisie, black hose, black boots, and a well-set up gentleman that had taken the Queen’s eye once, only to lose it again because he could not dance and sang (as the Queen said) like a poxed pig. Ramme however was not aware of this disaster and thought extremely well of himself.
‘He makes his errands as usual,’ he said now, ‘three this week unto the Spanish embassy. One into Blackfriars, one to Fleet Street.’
‘And the French embassy?’
Ramme exchanged a glance with Ellerton. ‘Sir,’ he said unhappily, ‘I cannot conceive we could have missed him and he has not been near the French embassy since September.’
‘That you have detected.’
‘There are five watchers and Mr. Fagot upon the embassy, and eight upon the Mouse…’
‘I am aware of the numbers, Mr Ramme.’
‘But sir, he has no secret passage from the house, for we have searched it covertly, and not a soul goes forth from there that we do not observe and also follow.’
‘Then he must meet someone that goes unto the French.’
‘But every man or woman he meets, we also observe…’
‘In short, Mr Ramme?’
‘In short sir, I cannot think it is the French we need fear.’
Sir Francis clenched his fists about the sheets and prayed for patience to bear with fools. ‘Who was it brought death to the Huguenots on St Bartholomew’s day?’
Ramme looked at the floor and began to toe the rush matting like a schoolboy.
‘Who claims his niece Mary of Scots to be the rightful Queen of England?’ No answer. ‘Who has plunged his land deeper into the bloody swamp of civil war with every year that passes? Who is a master plotter and deceiver of men, who is in league with the Devil and Antichrist the Pope…. The Duke of Guise, by Christ, the bloody-handed Duke of Guise!’ Walsingham was shouting and paused only because he was over-weak for anger. He could not muster enough blood for it, he thought, he was bled white.
There was a tap on the door, Frances slid her body round it.
‘Your pardon, gentlemen, but my husband has asked if he may borrow Mr Ames to be his clerk for his Accession Day entry. His cart is in disarray, he says, or the papers are…
‘Mr Ames?’ Sir Francis asked with courteous eyebrows.
‘When would Sir Philip have me attend upon him, madam?’
‘This afternoon, at Hanging Sword Court.’
Ames suppressed a small annoyed sigh, then bowed. ‘I should be honoured, my lady.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled at him, gracefully imperious. ‘I am sure you can deliver him of his entanglement.’
‘What had you planned for this afternoon, Ames?’ asked Ramme nastily, ‘More sword-schooling?’
Ames blushed scarlet and mumbled.
‘Sword-schooling?’ asked Sir Francis, as he was meant to, but then no man becomes a master of intelligencers without a good salting of plain curiosity.
‘A most commendable step,’ said Phelippes unexpectedly. ‘Having been worsted by footpads, Mr Ames is resolved not to repeat his sorrow, and has found him a swordmaster to learn him the art of defence.’ Ramme sputtered slightly. ‘A great fat ox of a man: I would I could sell tickets for the entertainment of watching them about their work, it would make the monkey on horseback a mere stale prank.’
‘Mr Becket is a Provost of Defence,’ said Ames. ‘Perhaps you would care to play him at the veneysticks? And he has soldiered in his time.’
‘Oh?’ asked Sir Frances. ‘Where?’
‘In the Netherlands.’
‘On which side?’ retorted Ramme. ‘Spaniard? Orange? French?’
‘That is something I myself desire earnestly to discover, for if he is clean of Popery I think he may be brought to your service, Sir Francis.’
‘When was he in the Netherlands?’ asked Ellerton with his normal vacant smile.
‘In 1573. He was among the first batch of English to go to Flushing that year.’
‘Hm. Ask Walter Morgan then. He reported on the expedition for my Lord Burghley and he is a cousin of Captain Morgan.’
Ames bowed his thanks. ‘And are you progressing well with your swordplay?’ asked Mr Phelippes kindly. ‘I found I was no hand at it, never strong enough, but I suppose it is all passadoes now.’
‘Ha, no fear,’ sneered Ramme. ‘No doubt of it but the man is an English schooler, all sword and buckler play and none of your Italian pig-stickers.’
‘He knows both rapier and broadsword,’ said Ames stiffly. ‘And says he gives not a fig for styles English, Italian or Spanish but practises one he calls the Bastard style which is less pretty about the flourishes but more certain to kill your man.’
Ramme laughed. ‘Why, we shall have you on the boat to Holland next, a man of the sword no less, with such a teacher. If you are become a man of action, why sit you in your little den with your spectacles on your nose? When will we hear of you capturing a traitor?’
Sir Francis coughed. ‘Each to his own humour, Mr Ramme,’ he said severely. ‘If you were as valuable a Conner of ciphers as Mr Ames and he as excellent a priest-finder, then would I exchange your tasks. As it is, I am well-enough pleased with Mr Ames, and not so well-pleased with you Mr Ramme, since you have not yet found the conduit from the Mouse which leads to the French embassy.’
‘Sir, I told…’
‘Mr Ramme, it is my guts that are stricken by the stone, not my mind, I remember what you said and I say unto you, go out and find how the Duke of Guise threatens us. ’ His voice had risen again and here were his fists in a knot and his jaw clenched…. Wherefore in God’s name must he suffer these fools and obdurate halfwits who could not see where Antichrist’s Champion threatened all they knew, all they held dear? The Huguenots in Paris had thought themselves safe enough.
‘Now Mr Phelippes, I must have converse with you. The rest of you have my leave to depart.’
There was a dull red pain around his back again as Phelippes approached with his sheaf of broken codes. Sir Francis caught a glimpse of Ramme and Ames in the passage, Ramme making believe to draw his rapier and run Ames through with a running passado as they went by Frances.
XIV
Summer 1583
Here are sharp shards of memory, one of them mine. Agnes Fant in her chamber, by her wax candle, slowly unwinding red
silk from its paper to a little carved yew bobbin, faster and faster, her fingers catching on the thread. But the paper is blank. She frowns at it, then remembers again and holds it carefully over the candle flame. A faint scent of oranges of Seville steals by her and the writing comes clear on the hot paper.
Her children standing by their nurse Dorcas: Elizabeth, Edward, Mary and an invisible gaping hole where Catherine should be but is not, being dead of smallpox last winter. Each in turn kisses her, kneels for her blessing and then they watch solemn-eyed as the groom hands her up to her pillion seat behind him on the broad Rhenish mare. At her signal the small party of horses and packponies steps out upon the road to London. An urgent matter concerning the river meadows in dispute at Westminster Hall calls her to London, though the business of summer presses hard upon the household. Her husband is at Tilbury already, brainsick of New World fever, overseeing the fitting out of a ship in which he is a partner to find the north-west passage. The steward is shaking his head: in his experience lawsuits at Westminster can always wait, the harvest cannot. But women are prone to odd fancies particularly when with child, as they usually are, and if she must go, then go she must.
I saw her come in through Ludgate and make her way to the Fants’ London house, adorned by piratical old Sir William with chimneys like elephants and the same badge over the door. She was white with weariness and swayed as she stepped to the ground, but she stiffened herself and went into the shuttered house. Her lord and master was in lodgings at Tilbury and there had been no time to send ahead to have it aired.
[David Becket and Simon Ames 01] - Firedrake's Eye Page 7