A Column of Fire

  Sylvie remembered that Ned had to check on the local Catholics, of whom Bart was the most prominent. She curtsied.

  Bart smiled, inclined his head in a slight bow, and gave her a roguish look. "You're a sly one, Ned, to come home with a pretty French wench," he said.

  Sylvie had an idea that the word wench was not quite polite, but she decided to ignore it. The earl had an expensively dressed little boy at his side, and she said: "And who is this young man?"

  "My son, Bartlet, the viscount," Bart said. "He's just had his ninth birthday. Shake hands, Bartlet, and say how do you do."

  The boy complied. He had the same vigorous physical presence as his father, despite being small. Sylvie smiled to see a wooden sword at his belt.

  Ned said: "And this is Countess Margery."

  Sylvie looked up and saw, with a shock, the woman in the little painting. It was a second jolt to realize that in real life she was much more striking. Although older than the painting--she had a few faint lines around her eyes and mouth, and Sylvie put her age at thirty--the living woman had an air of vivacity and charisma that was like the charged atmosphere of stormy weather. She had luxuriant curly hair, imperfectly tamed, and wore a little red hat at an angle. No wonder he loved you, Sylvie thought immediately.

  Margery acknowledged Sylvie's curtsy, studying her with frank interest; then she looked at Ned, and Sylvie saw love in her eyes. Margery radiated happiness as she said hello to Ned. You haven't got over him, Sylvie thought. You'll never get over him. He's the love of your life.

  Sylvie looked at Ned. He, too, looked happy. He had a big place in his heart for Margery, there was no doubt about that.

  Sylvie felt dismayed. Susannah Twyford had been a bit startling, but had been no more than fond of Ned. Margery had far stronger feelings, and Sylvie was unnerved. She wants my husband, Sylvie thought.

  Well, she can't have him.

  Then Sylvie noticed a child of about two years, still unsteady on his legs, standing half-concealed by the full skirt of Margery's red dress. Margery followed Sylvie's look and said: "And this is my second son, Roger." She bent down and picked up the toddler with a swift motion. "Roger, this is Sir Ned Willard," she said. "He's a very important person who works for the queen."

  Roger pointed at Sylvie. "Is she the queen?" he said.

  They all laughed.

  Ned said: "She's my queen."

  Thank you, Ned, Sylvie thought.

  Ned said to Margery: "Is your brother here?"

  "We don't see much of Rollo nowadays," Margery said.

  "Where is he, then?"

  "He has become a counselor to the earl of Tyne."

  "I'm sure his legal training and business experience make him useful to the earl. Does he live at Tyne Castle?"

  "He's based there, but the earl has properties all over the north of England, and I gather Rollo travels a lot on his behalf."

  Ned was still checking on the local Catholics, but Sylvie was looking at the little boy, Roger. There was something about him that bothered her, and after a minute she realized that the boy had a familiar look.

  He resembled Ned.

  Sylvie looked at Ned and saw him studying Roger with a faint frown. He, too, had noticed something. Sylvie could read his face effortlessly and she could tell, from his expression, that he had not yet figured out what was puzzling him. Men were not as quick as women to spot resemblances. Sylvie caught Margery's eye, and the two women understood one another instantly, but Ned was merely puzzled and Earl Bart was oblivious.

  The service began with a hymn, and there was no further conversation until the ceremony came to an end. Then they had guests for dinner, and with one thing and another Sylvie did not get Ned on his own until bedtime.

  It was spring, and they both got into bed naked. Sylvie touched the hair on Ned's chest. "Margery loves you," she said.

  "She's married to the earl."

  "That won't stop her."

  "How can you say that?"

  "Because she's lain with you already."

  Ned looked cross and said nothing.

  "It must have been about three years ago, just before you came to Paris."

  "How do you know?"

  "Because Roger is two."

  "Oh. You noticed."

  "He has your eyes." She looked into Ned's eyes. "That wonderful golden brown."

  "You're not angry?"

  "I knew, when I married you, that I was not the first woman you'd loved. But . . ."

  "Go on."

  "But I didn't know you might still love her, or that she had had your child."

  Ned took both her hands in his. "I can't tell you that I'm indifferent to her, or don't care about her," he said. "But please understand that you are all I want."

  It was the right thing to say, but Sylvie was not sure she believed him. All she knew was that she loved him and she was not going to let anyone take him away. "Make love to me," she said.

  He kissed her. "My goodness, you're a hard taskmaster," he joked. Then he kissed her again.

  But this was not enough. She wanted something with him that Susannah Twyford and Margery Shiring had never shared. "Wait," she said, thinking. "Is there something you've always thought about doing with a woman?" She had never before talked like this to him--or to anyone. "Something that excites you when you imagine it, but you've never done it?" She held her breath. What would he say?

  He looked thoughtful and a little embarrassed.

  "There is," she said triumphantly. "I can tell." She was glad she could read his face so easily. "What is it?"

  "I'm embarrassed to say."

  Now he looked bashful. It was sweet. She wriggled closer to him, pressing her body against his. In a low voice she said: "Then whisper."

  He whispered in her ear.

  She looked at him, grinning, a little surprised but also aroused. "Really?"

  He shook his head. "No, forget it. I shouldn't have said it."

  She felt excited, and she could tell he was, too. "I don't know," she said. "But we could try it."

  So they did.

  PART FOUR

  1583 to 1589

  22

  Ned studied the face of his son, Roger. His heart was so full he could hardly speak. Roger was a child on the edge of adolescence, starting to grow taller but still having smooth cheeks and a treble voice. He had Margery's curly dark hair and impish look, but Ned's golden-brown eyes.

  They were in the parlor of the house opposite the cathedral. Earl Bart had come to Kingsbridge for the spring court of quarter sessions, and had brought with him the two boys he thought were his sons: Bartlet, who was eighteen, and Roger, twelve. Ned, too, had come for the court: he was the member of Parliament for Kingsbridge now.

  Ned had no other children. He and Sylvie had been making love for more than ten years, with a fervor that had hardly diminished, but she had never become pregnant. It was a cause of sadness to them both, and it made Roger painfully precious to Ned.

  Ned was also recalling his own adolescence. I know what you have in front of you, he thought as he looked at Roger; and I wish I could tell you all about it, and make it easier for you; but when I was your age I never believed older people who said they knew what the lives of younger ones were like, and I don't suppose you will either.

  Roger's attitude to Ned was, naturally, quite casual. Ned was a friend of his mother's, and Roger regarded him as an unofficial uncle. Ned could not display his affection except by listening carefully to the boy, taking him seriously, and replying thoughtfully to what he said; and perhaps that was why Roger occasionally confided in him--something that gave Ned great joy.

  Now Roger said: "Sir Ned, you know the queen. Why does she hate Catholics?"

  Ned had not expected that, though perhaps he should have. Roger knew that his parents were Catholics in a Protestant country, and he had just become old enough to wonder why.

  Ned played for time by saying: "The queen doesn't hate Catholics."

  "S
he makes my father pay a fine for not going to church."

  Roger was quick thinking, Ned saw, and the little flush of pleasure he felt was accompanied by a painful stab of regret that he had to conceal his pride, most especially from the boy himself.

  Ned said to Roger what he said to everyone: "When she was young, Princess Elizabeth told me that if she became queen no Englishman would die for his religion."

  "She hasn't kept that promise," Roger said quickly.

  "She has tried." Ned searched for words that would explain the complexities of politics to a twelve-year-old. "On the one hand, she has Puritans in Parliament telling her every day that she's too soft, and she should be burning Catholics to death, just as her predecessor Queen Mary Tudor burned Protestants. On the other hand, she has to deal with Catholic traitors such as the duke of Norfolk who want to kill her."

  Roger argued stubbornly: "Priests are executed just for bringing people back to the Catholic faith, aren't they?"

  Roger had been saving up these questions, Ned realized. He was probably afraid to challenge his parents about such matters. Ned was pleased the boy trusted him enough to share his worries. But why was Roger so concerned? Ned guessed that Stephen Lincoln was still living more or less clandestinely at New Castle. He would be tutor to Bartlet and Roger, and almost certainly said mass regularly for the family. Roger was worried that his teacher might be found out and executed.

  There were many more such priests than there had been. Stephen was one of the old diehards left over after Queen Elizabeth's religious revolution, but there were dozens of new priests, perhaps hundreds. Ned and Walsingham had caught seventeen of them. All had been executed for treason.

  Ned had questioned most of the seventeen before they died. He had not learned as much as he wished, partly because they had been trained to resist interrogation, but mainly because they did not know much. Their organizer worked under the obvious pseudonym of Jean Langlais and gave them only the absolute minimum of information about the operation of which they were part. They did not know exactly where on the coast they had landed, nor the names of the shadowy people who welcomed them and set them on the road to their destinations.

  Ned said: "These priests are trained abroad and smuggled into England illegally. They owe allegiance to the Pope, not to our queen. Some of them belong to a hard-line ultra-Catholic group called the Jesuits. Elizabeth fears they may conspire to overthrow her."

  "And do they conspire?" Roger asked.

  If Ned had been arguing with an adult he would have responded disputatiously to these questions. He might have scorned the naivety of anyone who supposed that clandestine priests were innocent of treachery. But he had no wish to win an argument with his son. He just wanted the boy to know the truth.

  The priests all believed that Elizabeth was illegitimate, and that the true queen of England was Mary Stuart, the queen of the Scots; but none of them had actually done anything about it--so far, at least. They had not tried to contact Mary Stuart in her prison, they had not called together groups of discontented Catholic noblemen, they had not plotted to murder Elizabeth.

  "No," he said to Roger. "As far as I know they don't conspire against Elizabeth."

  "So they are executed just for being Catholic priests."

  "You are right, morally speaking," Ned said. "And it is a great sadness to me that Elizabeth has not been able to keep her youthful vow. But politically it is quite impossible for her to tolerate, within her kingdom, a network of men who are loyal to a foreign potentate--the Pope--who has declared himself her enemy. No monarch on earth would put up with that."

  "And if you hide a priest in your house, the penalty is death."

  So that was the thought at the heart of Roger's worry. If Stephen Lincoln were caught saying mass, or even proved to keep sacramental objects at New Castle, then both Bart and Margery could be executed.

  Ned, too, was fearful for Margery. He might not be able to protect her from the wrath of the law.

  He said: "I believe we should all worship God in the way we think right, and not worry about what other people do. I don't hate Catholics. I've been friends with your mother . . . and father . . . all my life. I don't think Christians should kill each other over theology."

  "It's not just Catholics who burn people. The Protestants in Geneva burned Michel Servet."

  Ned thought of saying that the name of Servet was known all over Europe precisely because it was so unusual for Protestants to burn people to death; but he decided not to take that argumentative line with Roger. Instead he said: "That's true, and it will be a stain on the name of John Calvin until the Day of Judgment. But there are a few people--on both sides--who struggle for tolerance. Queen Caterina, the mother of the king of France, is one, and she's Catholic. Queen Elizabeth is another."

  "But they both kill people!"

  "Neither woman is a saint. There's something you must try to understand, Roger. There are no saints in politics. But imperfect people can still change the world for the better."

  Ned had done his best, but Roger looked dissatisfied. He did not want to be told that life was complicated. He was twelve years old, and he sought ringing certainties. He would have to learn slowly, like everyone else.

  The conversation was interrupted when Alfo walked in. Roger immediately clammed up, and a few moments later politely took his leave.

  Alfo said to Ned: "What did he want?"

  "He's having adolescent doubts. He treats me as a harmless friend of the family. How is school?"

  Alfo sat down. He was nineteen now, and he had Barney's long limbs and easygoing ways. "The truth is, a year ago the school had already taught me all it could. Now I spend half my time reading and the other half teaching the youngsters."

  "Oh?" It was clearly Ned's day for counseling young men. He was only forty-three, not old enough for such responsibility. "Perhaps you should go to Oxford and study at the university. You could live at Kingsbridge College." Ned was only mildly keen on this idea. He himself had never studied at a university, and he could not say that he had suffered much in consequence. He was as smart as most of the clergymen he met. On the other hand, he occasionally noticed that university-educated men were more agile than he in arguments, and he knew they had learned that in student debates.

  "I'm not cut out to be a clergyman."

  Ned smiled. Alfo was fond of girls--and they liked him, too. He had inherited Barney's effortless charm. Timid girls were put off by his African looks, but the more adventurous were intrigued.

  English people were illogical about foreigners, Ned found: they hated Turks, and they believed Jews were evil, but they regarded Africans as harmlessly exotic. Men such as Alfo who somehow ended up in England usually married into the community, where their inherited appearance disappeared in the course of three or four generations.

  "Going to university doesn't mean you're obliged to become a clergyman. But I sense that you have something else in mind."

  "My grandmother Alice had a dream of turning the old monastery into an indoor market."

  "That's true, she did." It was a long time ago, but Ned had not forgotten looking around the ruins with his mother, imagining the stalls set up in the cloisters. "It's still a good idea."

  "Could I use the Captain's money to buy the place?"

  Ned considered. He had charge of Barney's wealth while Barney was at sea. He kept a lot of it in cash, but he had made some investments too--an orchard in Kingsbridge, a dairy in London--and had made money for his brother. "I think we might, if the price is right," he said cautiously.

  "May I approach the chapter?"

  "Do some research first. Ask about recent sales of building land in Kingsbridge--how much per acre."

  "I'll do that," Alfo said eagerly.

  "Be discreet. Don't tell people what you're planning--say I've asked you to look for a building plot for myself. Then we'll talk about how much to offer for the monastery."

  Eileen Fife came into the room with a packet in
her hand. She smiled affectionately at Alfo and handed the packet to Ned. "A messenger brought this from London for you, Sir Ned. He's in the kitchen if you want him."

  "Give him something to eat," Ned said.

  "I've done so already," Eileen said, indignant that Ned should think she might have omitted this courtesy.

  "Of course you have, forgive me." Ned opened the packet. There was a letter for Sylvie addressed in Nath's childlike handwriting, undoubtedly forwarded by the English embassy in Paris. It would probably be a request for more books, something that had happened three times in the last ten years.

  Ned knew, from Nath's letters and from Sylvie's visits to Paris, that Nath had taken over Sylvie's role in more than bookselling. She still worked as maid to the family of Pierre Aumande de Guise, and she continued to watch Pierre and pass information to the Paris Protestants. Pierre had moved into the Guise palace, along with Odette; her son, Alain, now twenty-two and a student; and Nath. This gave Nath extra opportunities for espionage, especially on English Catholics in Paris. Nath had also converted Alain to Protestantism, unknown to Odette or Pierre. All Nath's information came to Sylvie in letters such as this one.

  Ned set it aside for Sylvie to open.

  The other letter was for him. It was written in clear, forward-slanted script, the work of a methodical man in a hurry, and Ned recognized it as that of Sir Francis Walsingham, his master. However, he could not read it immediately because it was in code. He said to Eileen: "I need time to compose a reply. Give the messenger a bed for the night."

  Alfo stood up. "I'll make a start on our new project! Thank you, Uncle Ned."

  Ned began to decode his letter. There were only three sentences. It was tempting to write the decrypt above the coded message, but that practice was strictly forbidden. If a coded letter with its decrypt found its way into the wrong hands, the enemy would have a key to all other messages written in the same code. Ned's code breakers, working on intercepted correspondence of foreign embassies in London, had benefited more than once from such carelessness on the part of the people on whom they spied. Ned wrote his decrypt with an iron pencil on a slate that could be wiped clean with a damp cloth.