by Peter Tonkin
*
He had just started to march forward once again when Sir Charles Davers pushed through, also on horseback. ‘The Council have closed off Whitehall at Charing Cross to our rear,’ he said grimly. ‘They have mobilised their troops and barricaded the road.’
‘What does that matter to us if they close that door after we have already left?’ demanded Essex a little wildly. ‘We are marching on the City, not on Charing Cross! What is the next church we pass?’
‘St Dunstan’s in the West,’ answered Cuffe. ‘I’m sure that congregation will join us, despite St Clement Danes’ reluctance.’
Reassured, Essex nodded and set off, sword high, shouting, ‘For the Queen!’
But no supportive crowds came boiling out of Bell Yard or Chancery Lane as Essex led his army past them. And, noted Poley, the doors of St Dunstan’s in the West remained as resolutely closed as did those of St Clement Danes. The windows all along Fleet Street stood wide but the doors beneath them also remained shut. Even Fetter Lane, also to their left, was utterly empty and when he looked up it in passing, and, had it not been for the wild cries of Essex and his followers, it would have been eerily silent, especially for a Sabbath. Nevertheless, they pushed on, past Hanging Sword Court on their right, past the Fleet Street conduit which stood in the little square at the end of Shoe Lane on their left with Salisbury Court on their right. Salisbury Court led down to Salisbury House where the hated Cecil might be squatting even now. It was short enough to tempt Essex to attack the house it led to, thought Poley. But it was so narrow the army would have to go in single-file along it and even in this mood, Essex had to see how dangerous that would be. So, on they strode over the Fleet Bridge and onto Ludgate Hill. Then on down the hill, past the end of Old Bailey to the Lud Gate. ‘Named for an ancient king of Britain,’ Cuffe explained. ‘It is said that King Lud built London even before the Romans came and that he is buried hereabouts.’
Poley nodded. Whoever it was named after, Lud Gate was impressive. He found it odd that he had never really thought of it as a fortification before. Never really considered the walls that stretched away on either side of it as possessing any military significance. But then, he thought, he had never before been part of an army invading the City beyond. It stood nearly five stories high, more than forty feet by his reckoning, extended in its centre to fifty feet or so by a tower. At street level, it followed the traditional pattern of many other gates. There were two smaller openings for pedestrians, ten feet high and four feet wide. These stood on either side of a wider, taller opening some twenty feet high and more than fifteen feet wide designed to accommodate the road and any traffic passing up and down it. As he and Cuffe followed Essex, his gaudy banner, and his immediate supporters along the roadway beneath the central arch, Poley glanced up. There was even a portcullis there, held in its fully elevated position. He idly wondered whether it could be lowered or whether, like the entire fortification, its primary function was little more than decorative these days. But then his attention switched from looking upward to looking forward, for there at the bottom of Ludgate Hill stood St Paul’s Cathedral.
It seemed to Poley that the ancient cathedral might well have stood as a symbol for much that Essex was fighting against. The shell of the great old building had fallen on hard times in so many ways. Farmers drove their sheep to market through it. Starving beggars sought refuge against the elements within it – shelter but scant relief. And, depending where such wretches chose to shiver, scant shelter in any case. The great steeple had been struck by lightning three years after the Queen ascended her throne, and collapsed, tearing a great hole in the roof. The damage had been lauded by her enemies as an act of God against the heretic queen, bastard spawn of a heretic king. But whether or not that had been the case, nothing had been done – or even attempted – by way of repair. Poley knew many a foreign visitor who had been shocked into simple disbelief that nothing had been done to restore such a holy site. It had once been the jewel of London. Now, like much of the rest of the city, it stood in dire need of love and money. Money that all too easily found it way into the coffers of the Council and their acolytes instead of into the welfare of the city and its citizens.
The churchyard itself was a vast market where, on an average day, a man might purchase everything from a book to a bawd; a slim volume of odes to a goodly basket of oranges. But today was clearly no average day, thought Poley grimly. St Paul’s churchyard was all-but deserted. The Cross Yard in the far section of the cathedral grounds was usually packed with men and women eager to hear whoever was preaching from the open-air pulpit that stood there. It was this pulpit from which the Earl planned to deliver his rousing speech. But it seemed to Poley that the only people there to hear it were the men already following Essex, Southampton and the rest. Well over a hundred spilled into the churchyard, joining Sir Christopher’s vanguard who were waiting, hesitant, around the empty pulpit. More than two hundred armed men thronged the place, waiting for their leaders to reveal the next section of their plan to rouse the city and take control of the council, court and country.
*
Because he had planned to do so, the Earl climbed into the pulpit and looked down on his assembled troops. Because he had planned to give a speech and could think of nothing else to do, he began to speak. ‘We are the last hope for our beloved Queen and our country. Look around. You can see that the men her Majesty is surrounded by have nothing in their minds but the acquisition of money and power. Money and power which they simply pass to their offspring never thinking about their country and its citizens. Her Majesty must one day yield to time and nature, the same as any mortal being. They know that, and their desire to cling to power has led them to look to Spain for the succession. They will put the Infanta on our throne so that their grasp on power will never be loosened. And they know too well that we are the only men to stop them. Only we can thwart their plans and…’
The crowd stirred. Monteagle and the Percy brothers forced their way through. ‘My Lord!’ called Monteagle. ‘The Council have closed the churches. Every one has been ordered to keep their doors closed and their congregations must remain inside until we have passed them by. It is not that no-one wishes to follow you. No-one can!’
‘And, worse than that, My Lord,’ called one of the Percy brothers, though Poley could not see which. ‘Lord Burghley is out with a squad of heralds…’
‘I shot at him,’ said the other brother. ‘But I missed…’
‘You are declared traitor My Lord,’ concluded Monteagle. ‘You and all we who follow you. Traitors.’
Amid the angry outcry that greeted this announcement, the Earl climbed down from the pulpit, but stopped half way when his head was on the same level as those of his mounted followers. Poley and Cuffe were close enough to hear his muttered conversation with Southampton. ‘It is Sheriff Smythe we must rely on now,’ said Essex. ‘He must help us or all is lost. And I must reach him before this word that we are called traitors does.’ He looked around desperately and Poley shook his head as Southampton realised that Gracechurch Street was much more than a stone’s throw away. Sir Charles Danvers provided an answer. ‘Baron Cromwell has gone on ahead, My Lord, and will have warned the Sheriff of your approach. Take my horse and you will be in Gracechurch Street all the sooner.’
He dismounted and stood beside young Tom Fitzherbert, ruffling his hair. ‘Your page, your colours and I will lead your footsoldiers on behind you, fear not!’
Poley frowned. He might have joined this rag-tag army at Cuffe’s request, but now that he was here he wanted to stay as close to Essex as possible. Something he would find it hard to do if the Earl galloped off on Danvers’ horse.
‘But My Lord!’ he said, the urgency in his tone freezing Essex in the act of mounting. ‘To go on ahead alone. And mounted! You would present such a perfect target! Lord Burghley has been shot at. So I believe has been Sir Walter Raleigh. You could all too easily be gunned down were you to go on horseback. We have g
ained not one gesture of support from the men and women looking down from their windows on either side of the streets. Who’s to say some of them might not be working for the Council, or friends of Sir Walter Raleigh, seeking revenge?’
Essex stepped back down. ‘A fair point,’ he allowed. He raised his voice. ‘Come then, my brave companions, let us march to Gracechurch street together. Let my banner lead the way. FOR THE QUEEN!’ he bellowed and was off, with Tom Fitzherbert at his side.
They followed him, flooding into the streets behind him and spreading from side to side until the walls and doors of the houses on either hand contained them like a river in spate. The mass of bodies was so tight-packed, that those on horseback, led by the Earl of Southampton, observed Poley, soon left to find alternative routes. Those on foot quick-marched behind the Earl along Watling Street, then straight on into Budge Row and London Stone before turning left into Abchurch Lane which led to Lombard Street and so along to the right turn that took them down into Gracechurch. ‘It is like the German legend of the Pied Piper,’ said Cuffe excitedly, his eyes shining. Poley, who knew the ancient story from his travels in Saxony, cynically wondered whether that made them all spellbound rats – or doomed children.
*
Gracechurch Street was home to the Leadenhall Market. It was closed for the Sabbath. But, reckoned Poley, even had it been open it would have been empty – just like the streets they had been following to get here. Just like, indeed, the Cross Keys tavern where he and Joan Yeomans had been accosted by Wolfall, Frizer and Skeres on the day his downfall began.
Sheriff Smythe’s house was doubly easy to find because it was opposite the tavern and Baron Cromwell’s horse was standing tethered outside it. The Earl went in. Poley and Cuffe crowded close behind. There was no room for them in the house itself and no question of actually entering. But they could see in through the ground floor windows that the Sheriff was greeting the Earl with all due form and courtesy. But the expression on his face was hard to read. Which, thought Poley, was sinister in itself. The conversation became so animated that those, like Cuffe and Poley, who could see into the room started to become restless. Baron Cromwell came out with a report as to what was going on in the hope that it would ease the tension. ‘Sheriff Smythe says that his hands are tied,’ he shouted. ‘He cannot lift a finger until he gets permission from the Lord Mayor William Ryder. The Earl has given him permission to go and see the mayor at once. We will await his return.’
That was all.
As they stood there thronging Gracechurch Street, it started to rain; an icy, sleety rain. Those who had thought to bring cloaks as well as swords in that first fine frenzy when they streamed out into the Strand, pulled then tight. Those who had not, stood and shivered. Cuffe and Poley were amongst the latter group. The chill gripping their bones made worsened by what they could see inside the Sheriff’s house. The Earl was apparently so hot, his shirt was soaked with sweat. He took off his doublet and, with Sir Christopher’s assistance, pulled his shirt off altogether, scrubbing his chest and armpits with the bunched-up linen. Then he threw it aside and called for a clean one. The Sheriff’s household hurried to obey but no sooner was the Earl fully dressed again than he was calling for service once more.
It was early afternoon now and, like his shivering army outside, the Earl had consumed nothing but bread and small beer so far today. A fat capon obviously destined to be the Sheriff’s Sunday dinner appeared in front of the Earl who tucked in apparently without a second thought, pausing only to offer a leg to Cromwell and a wing to Sir Christopher. He was certainly paying scant attention to the hungry men standing shivering outside. He had just eaten his fill, when the mounted contingent arrived, led by Southampton and Fernando Gorges. It was clear that they had taken time to get cloaks and hats; and, from the look of them, thought Poley, they had also dined. They dismounted and crowded into the room with their leader. Several bottles of wine appeared. But as their leaders ate and drank, a whisper seemed to percolate through the assembled troops. ‘Sheriff Smythe will not return. There is no army of apprentices ready to aid us. Lord Mayor Rider will not help. He has declared the Earl a traitor and has had the news heralded through the City, just as Lord Burghley has. Anyone who leaves now will not be charged. Anyone who stays, dies.’
‘Can this be true?’ Cuffe was aghast.
‘It seems likely enough,’ said Poley grimly.
‘Then we are lost!’
‘There was always a chance it might come to this,’ observed Poley gently, with genuine sympathy. He was simply torn between his duty as he saw it to the Council, Cecil and the Queen and the friendship and duty his undercover self owed the men and women who had taken him in and befriended him. Who, in short, he had betrayed in return. In all his long experience in this dark game he was playing, he had never felt so conflicted. Not even when young Thomas Babbington, in the midst of the most horrible and agonising death imaginable called, ‘Do not hurt my poor Robert…’ because the poor deluded lad was still in love with the man who had betrayed him, his associates and the captive queen he worshipped.
As much to get away from Cuffe’s uncomprehending, pleading eyes, Poley took action. He crossed to the Sheriff’s door and pushed it open. He strode in past Cromwell before the surprised young Baron could stop him. And he entered the room that Essex occupied with his aristocratic friends. ‘My Lords,’ he said to the men grouped round the table. ‘Neither the Sheriff nor the Mayor will aid you. You are called traitors all throughout the City and for all I know all throughout the land. Your cause is lost.’ He turned on his heel and left.
*
Striding out through the door once more, Poley was struck by the manner in which the Earl’s army had shrunk. For the last hour and more they had been behind him as he looked in through the window into the sheriff’s house. Now he was looking directly at them and it was plain to see that more than half of them had slunk away. The men and women living on Gracechurch Street, including the Smythe family, were still watching events from their upper windows, as though this was some pageant being enacted for their benefit. A pageant that had started out as a History, but was descending into Tragedy. And, soon enough into Farce, he suspected.
Southampton and Fernando Gorges led the Earl’s inner circle out into the icy drizzle of the afternoon. The Earl followed them, cloaked, hatted and nearing the end of his tether. ‘We do this for the Queen!’ he bellowed up at his audience, whose stony faces showed how completely they were unmoved either by his appeals or by his predicament. ‘It is the Council who are the traitors! They do not seek the Queen’s good or the country’s! They only seek to enrich themselves and their offspring. They only seek to be certain of clinging to power once Her Majesty finally yields to the dictates of time and mortality. They do not care who succeeds to the throne as long as they can control the new monarch, make sure of their powers and privileges and let the rest of us all go hang or burn! They have sucked the wealth out of the city and the country like the leeches and lampreys that they are!’
In the echoing silence that greeted his agonised pronouncement, a lone, anonymous, voice called. ‘You and your fucking Irish army! That’s what leeched the good out of me and mine! And much good has it done any or all of us.’
The Earl span wildly around. ‘Who… Who… Who…’ He choked on his rage and fell into gasping and coughing. Poley was almost sorry for the man.
Almost.
‘Come away, Robert,’ said Southampton gently. ‘Let us return to Essex House and review the situation. The place is well fortified and easy enough to defend if the Queen will have it so. And we will still be able to send her messages directly.’
‘And we have four hostages, remember,’ added Fernando Gorges. ‘Important men, friends to the Council…’
‘Very well then,’ said Essex. ‘Back to Essex House. Come, my brave lads. Follow me home!’
‘’Tis always darkest before the dawn,’ said Poley quietly as though plucking the platitudes from th
e Earl’s own lips, his tone dripping with bitter irony. ‘Stand by me shoulder to shoulder and we can win through yet!’
‘Well said, dear Robert,’ said Cuffe. ‘That is the spirit which will help us to victory!’
Poley could not bring himself to answer. Instead he fell in beside his all-too-gullible friend and turned to follow their leader. Someone had managed to get a spare horse and the Earl was helped into the saddle. Then, with a glance around, he set off, with Tom Fitzherbert at the mount’s right shoulder, thew Essex coat of arms held high and proud. The mounted contingent walked their horses; Essex’s and Southampton’s experiences in Ireland teaching them the dangers of letting cavalry get too far ahead of infantry in a potentially dangerous situation. The infantry that followed close behind the horses now, however, was a mere shadow of its former self. If Essex realised that his troops had melted away – as so many had done in Ireland – he gave no sign. Fernando Gorges, however, kept glancing pensively over his shoulder, as did Cromwell and Sir Christopher. The weather moderated swiftly so that the mid-afternoon was dry with watery sunshine giving a little almost illusory warmth. The improved weather did not lead to any improvement in the atmosphere, however, thought Poley. The audience had grown bored with the pageant and the upper windows were as tight closed as the lower windows and the doors. The streets they followed, Gracechurch, Lombard, Abchurch and Watling Street with its easterly extensions, back to Paul’s Churchyard remained eerily silent and deserted.