The Rage of Fortune

by J. D. Davies

  ‘I see now. Perhaps, then, you should be glad that Hungary is land-locked, else we would have the greatest navy in the world.’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘We commonly call ourselves a land of a thousand lords and three million beggars, Master Trevor. Imagine the number of galleys we would be able to man.’

  ‘Ah. Yes. I take your point, my friend. I take it entirely.’

  We step off the remains of the Golden Hind, and begin to make for the dockyard gate.

  ‘Well, friend Horvath,’ says John Trevor as we walk, ‘have you ever seen such a place as this Deptford?’

  ‘Never, Master Trevor. It is truly a wonder of the world.’

  This is a lie. I have seen the Arsenale of Venice, and it is ten times the dockyard that this is. But the English do not take well to being told that they do not have the best of this, or the largest of that.

  ‘Excellent. You are a good man, friend Horvath. A very good man. Now, I have commanded a room to be prepared for us at the Gun Tavern. And then, tomorrow, I have arranged the meeting that you have begged me for since we first met.’

  ‘He will see me privately?’

  ‘Indeed he will. It is a rare honour, you realise? But I think he will be interested in the story that you have to tell, friend Horvath. Very interested indeed.’

  At last, my mission prospers. God willing, the end really is justifying the means.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Dowager Countess:

  The spring came, I was with child once more, and my husband was pacing the tiny rooms and narrow corridors of Ravensden House like a caged lion. He was irritable beyond measure, denouncing all and sundry for their perfidy and incompetence. Not the Queen, of course – never, ever the Queen – but the likes of Essex, Cecil, Raleigh, Leveson, and especially the last of these.

  ‘Sweet Mother of Jesus, now he’s got command of a fleet going to the Azores! How many arses did he have to lick for that?’

  ‘The Azores, Matthew? That is a good voyage?’

  ‘Perhaps the best voyage of all, my love. With good timing, fair winds, much luck and great skill – skill that Sir-Fucking-Richard-Fuckwit-Leveson certainly does not possess – an English fleet on station at the Azores might capture the entire Spanish treasure fleet from the New World. All the bullion that pays for Spain’s vast armies and armadas, Louise, just imagine that. We’ve all tried in our day – Drake, Hawkins, Essex, myself – and all failed. True, I once captured one galleon, the Virgen de Guadeloupe, which had become detached in a storm, and the treasure on her was fabulous enough. But Fate would really kick me in the balls if it decreed that Dick Leveson should be the man to succeed where England’s greatest seamen failed.’

  I cared nought for Dick Leveson or anyone else. But there was one thing that the Earl had said which certainly made me care.

  ‘Just how much treasure did you capture on the Virgen de Guadeloupe, husband?’

  He looked at me blankly. Then his eyes went to his feet.

  ‘There were considerable expenses,’ he said in a barely audible mumble. ‘And naturally, those who invested in the voyage had to be paid their shares. The Queen, above all. Then there were mortgages on outlying estates that had to be redeemed. Debts of various sorts, notably those I inherited from my father. And there was much work to be done at Ravensden Abbey, and at Alnburgh Castle, our Northumberland property, and here at Ravensden House—’

  ‘I see little evidence of expensive work done here, My Lord.’

  ‘Foundations,’ he mumbled. ‘And my second wife had extravagant tastes. And my third, if truth be told.’

  ‘Then how much treasure remains?’

  Now he bristled. ‘A wife should not tax a husband with such things. It is not fitting – it is not the humility and obedience promised in the marriage ceremony—’

  Pregnant or not, I was prepared for an argument. If necessary, I was prepared for the sort of argument that entails the throwing of smaller items of furniture. But just then, our pageboy entered – young Barcock, who is now old Barcock, our steward here at Ravensden Abbey. He handed the Earl a note, and my husband tore eagerly at a wax seal bearing a crest that he evidently knew well.

  ‘I’m sorry, my dear,’ he said, ‘we shall have to return to these matters on another day. I have a summons. A most urgent summons. To Secretary Cecil, at his palace of Theobalds. Perhaps there has been a divine mercy and Leveson has dropped dead, in which case, God willing, I might be offered the Azores command!’

  Even in my angry and suspicious state, I had to admit that such an injunction from the most powerful man in England overrode my interest in the financial condition of the House of Quinton. And if my husband was indeed to take a fleet to the Azores, and if he captured the Spanish bullion fleet, then my doubts would be assuaged in any case, and we would live in gilded clover for the rest of our days.

  But neither of us knew the truth, nor realised what a deadly course of events was being put in train.

  The Earl of Ravensden:

  Theobalds was a hellishly remote place, far out of London, even beyond Enfield. But as I rode toward it, I could only be impressed. Cecil’s father, the crafty old Lord Burghley, had built it as a palace fit to accommodate a visiting Queen, and that it most certainly was. Behind a large gatehouse and an enclosing wall rose a lofty building, very nearly as grand as Richmond, with two hexagonal corner towers very much like those of Nonsuch, and a square central tower reminiscent of that at Hampton Court. Huge, elaborate gardens stretched out behind it. A cynical man might wonder where the Lord High Treasurer of England had found the prodigious amount of coin necessary to pay for such splendour.

  I was very nearly at the gatehouse when I saw a most unexpected sight: Robert Cecil himself, riding out towards me. A hunchback does not sit well upon a horse, and the Principal Secretary was evidently not a natural horseman. But there he was, ensconced upon the saddle of a fine grey palfrey, clad in a red velvet doublet, of all things. I suppressed my astonishment at the sight.

  ‘My Lord of Ravensden,’ he said. ‘You are welcome. You will ride with me? I like to take the air of an afternoon. A man can be cooped up too long amidst the mountainous papers of state business.’

  I cannot quite judge what did more to put me off my guard: the Secretary’s revelation that he enjoyed the eminently normal gentlemanly pursuit of riding out of an afternoon, or his air of informality, bordering very nearly upon that infernally suspicious state which men call ‘friendliness’.

  We rode west, out into the woods and parkland that surrounded Theobalds Palace. Cecil’s foresters and warreners touched their caps or foreheads as we passed. Meanwhile, the Secretary talked of the problems of pollarding this tree, or draining that fish pond.

  At length, I lost patience with his play-acting the part of the honest yeoman.

  ‘Your pardon, Master Secretary – but may I ask the cause of your summons to me?’

  Cecil glanced across at me, seemingly displeased at being interrupted.

  ‘Well, now,’ he said, ‘it strikes me that I could have many causes for summoning you, My Lord. For example, I could raise the subject of your recent duel with the Earl of Essex. Your entirely illegal duel. We could discuss the length of sentence that would be appropriate for such a flagrant breach of Her Majesty’s peace.’

  Judas’ prick, how did he know -?

  ‘Master Secretary,’ I said, ‘that was entirely Devereux’s fault!’

  ‘Of course it was, My Lord. And, of course, you will know more than enough of how matters stand between myself and the noble Earl to know that I am not displeased to hear you say that. As I’m sure you would upon oath, if I required it.’

  Was that it, then? Had I been dragged all the way to Theobalds simply for Cecil to recruit me as a witness in his ongoing war against Robin Devereux, with a threat of arrest for duelling dangled in front of me if I refused?

  ‘Of course,’ I said.

  ‘And then there is the matter of your
new Countess. I will be blunt with you, My Lord. Many about the court, and in Parliament, think it the height of perversity for an Earl of England to marry a Papist in an age when we pursue and execute Papist priests, and are at war with a Papist power. The simple act of being a Catholic in England today is taken by many as proof of treason. So there are many who would use your marriage against you, My Lord, to question your loyalty to the Queen.’

  ‘Master Secretary, I must protest—’

  ‘No, My Lord,’ said the hunchback, cutting me off, ‘in truth, the childish quarrels of the nobility, and your choice of a wife, are of little concern to me. And I have even less concern for the ludicrous fears and suspicions of the rude multitude.’ He looked away into the distance, then turned back to me. ‘But you have been unfortunate, Lord Ravensden,’ he said. ‘Would you not say so?’

  ‘Unfortunate, Master Cecil?’

  ‘Indeed. I would say you have been unfortunate. As I told your man Iles at the time, we had ample intelligence that the Spanish were about to send a new Armada against us, but it was your report of the fleet you had seen in the Groyne that made the greatest impact on the people. Why, they cried, Lord Ravensden is a great seaman, a true English hero, and he has seen the Armada, ergo it must be real. Consequently, and entirely wrongly of course, as soon as the Invisible Armada was exposed as a chimera, much of the blame attached to your name. The blame, that is, for striking fear into the hearts of the people, and causing a great mustering of the army, navy and militia. A very expensive mustering. A mustering that disrupted the harvest. An expense that greatly displeased the Queen.’

  ‘None of that was my doing, Master Cecil!’

  ‘Of course not, My Lord. You know that. I know that. But people will insist on seeing things so very differently to reasonable men like ourselves, and perceptions can be so very difficult to dislodge, don’t you find? And then, of course, you were doubly unfortunate to be at Calais when the Spanish galleys ran the Straits. Again, My Lord, you and I know that there was nothing you could do. You had no wind, and your testimony was amply confirmed by our noble ally, the Admiral of Zeeland. But people hereabouts, for example, who have no understanding of winds and tides – nor of ships themselves, come to that – why, such people merely know that the Earl of Ravensden was at Calais when the Spanish went past him. And look at the havoc General Spinola has wreaked, these last months. All the prizes he has taken, and so forth. Why, there are even those who dare to suggest that, because the Earl of Ravensden has a Papist wife, he has turned Papist himself, and deliberately allowed Spinola to slip through the Straits. No doubt after receiving a vast bribe from the Pope, delivered by means of Jesuit agents.’ He laughed, but it was a dry, cold laugh. ‘Such are the times we live in. But that is the way of it, My Lord. Perception is all, and the perception of you has become unfortunate, shall we say. That is even the case with Her Majesty, alas, despite my best efforts to convince her of your good service and stoutness of heart.’

  The lying little shit.

  Of course, I did not believe a word of it. Robert Cecil speaking out on my behalf to the Queen was as likely as the Pope dancing a gavotte stark naked in Westminster Abbey. And he could have added himself to the ignorant country folk of Enfield and Cheshunt who had no notion of what a ship was; it was no secret that Secretary Cecil favoured those craven coxcombs who cried up the new galleys that were being built as a jerk of the knee following Spinola’s successes. But none of that could detract from the fundamental and unsettling truth of what he had said: both the Queen and the people blamed me for the two dire naval debacles of the last half-year, at least in part because of my marriage to Louise-Marie. And that was why Brick-beard Leveson, not I, would shortly be under sail for the Azores.

  ‘Master Secretary,’ I said – and now I was humble, penitent, even imploring – ‘Master Secretary, I pray you, get me a command at sea, that I might restore my reputation!’

  Cecil shook his head. ‘Alas, My Lord, it is very difficult. The Queen has taken against you – yet again, I might add – and all the commands are spoken for. Besides, there are peace talks at Boulogne, and if they prosper, the war could end any day. If it did, of course, the fleet would be paid off, and there would be hardly any commands at all. It is difficult for you – yes, I see that. I see it quite clearly, Lord Ravensden. And I see that what a man in your position needs is a chance to prove yourself to the Queen. For if you can redeem yourself with her, the mood of the fickle multitude toward you will change in the blinking of an eye.’

  ‘Give me such a chance, Master Cecil! In the name of God, sir, I will do my utmost, whatever the chance might be!’

  We were riding up onto a little hillock, from which a view of the countryside stretched south, past windmills and church towers, to the smoke of London. For some minutes, Robert Cecil said nothing, seemingly intent only on looking out over the vista before us.

  ‘Tell me, My Lord,’ he said at last, ‘what do you know of affairs in Scotland?’

  Scotland? What in the name of the Virgin’s piss did Scotland have to do with anything?

  ‘Only – only the common talk of the streets, Master Secretary. That the King of Scots is so keen to assert his right to—’

  I pulled back, suddenly aware of the enormous, even treasonable, error that I had very nearly committed.

  ‘You may speak freely, Lord Ravensden. Look around you. No man can overhear us. But if it reassures you, I shall say it instead. The King of Scots is so keen to assert his right to succeed Her Majesty that he is asking his Parliament for the money to raise a great army, to invade England if necessary.’

  ‘A mad notion, Master Secretary.’

  Mad for reasons that surely not even this Cecil could know –

  ‘Quite so, quite so. Perfectly mad. But the King’s behaviour is troubling, Lord Ravensden. Erratic, even. Some might wonder whether such a man is fit to be King of England—’ Cecil paused and looked at me, and I thought, Does he know? Can he know? – ‘even if only one day in the very far distant future, of course. God save the Queen.’

  ‘God save the Queen!’

  No, he did not know. Or at the very least, he was not certain. Thanks be to God, there was one secret left in the island of Britain that Matthew Quinton knew, and Robert Cecil could only conjecture at.

  ‘Yes, King James has become a problem. There is no doubt of that.’ Aye, a very particular problem to Robert Cecil, who is known to favour the Infanta Isabella – and if Jamie Stuart came to the throne at that moment, nothing could be more certain than that his old ally Essex would be the new chief minister of England, and the hunchback would be the man under arrest. ‘A solution to this problem has been put to me, My Lord. It is a daring proposition. Most daring indeed, in truth. It requires bravery and skill. Above all, it requires discretion. There can be no written record of it, and if it were to miscarry, both Her Majesty and I would deny any knowledge of it. Would you be prepared to accept a mission on those terms, Lord Ravensden?’

  So that was it. Take all the risk upon yourself, Quinton, my lad, and if at all goes dreadfully wrong, you are on your own, perhaps even to the extent of taking the solitary walk to the scaffold. But what choice did I have? None, by God, and Robert Cecil had known that from the very outset. Which was precisely why he had sent for me, of course.

  ‘With respect, Master Secretary, I am a man presently without honour or employment. Serving the Queen in any way is the summit of my ambition. But if I may ask, Mister Cecil – what would it profit me, if I agreed to undertake this mission?’

  ‘In gold, nothing at all. Indeed, it will cost you a large sum, for you will need to set out one of your own ships. But carrying off such a bold venture as this would put both the Queen and I in your debt, Lord Ravensden. I think you may be confidently assured of further preferment at sea, for instance. Who knows, it is not beyond the bound of possibility that the Queen would look favourably on you for the command of a fleet for, say, the Azores or the Carib Sea – or, if t
he war really does end, perhaps of a squadron against the Barbary pirates. And, of course, you and your new wife would be welcome at court. Very welcome indeed.’

  Perhaps the serpent in Eden had a hunched back, I thought. I could see traps everywhere. But I could see the prizes, too – myself an admiral, and Louise-Marie at court, where she should belong, regardless of her faith. And yet I had to know more before I committed myself. I did not trust this Cecil, any more than I had trusted his father.

  ‘Master Secretary, I must know more of what is entailed.’

  ‘Of course. But it would be best if you had it from the man who instigated the entire business, My Lord. And even if you do not trust me, as I am sure you do not, I believe you will trust him. In fact, I am certain of it, for blood can trust blood, can it not? Come, let us go and talk to him.’

  We rode back to the great house, riding through the gatehouse into the outer court, where we dismounted. The Secretary led me inside. The interior was just as splendid as the exterior, with the finest Flemish tapestries vying for space with huge portraits of the Queen and of Cecil’s father, the formidably white-bearded Lord Burghley. Servants, of whom there seemed to be an inordinate number, bowed low to the crooked little Secretary, even though he held no noble rank whatsoever.

  Cecil took me through into a large library, the walls lined with huge oak bookcases that stretched from floor to ceiling. I did not notice the other man in the room at first, for he was at the far end, close to the window and standing close to the shelves. He was deep in contemplation of a tome that he must have taken down from its place. At first, he was not aware of our approach, but when we were just a few feet from him, he turned and smiled in recognition.