One day in October, while Ned waited anxiously to see what Throckmorton would do, a gentleman of the court called Ralph Ventnor came to Seething Lane to say that Queen Elizabeth wanted to see Walsingham and Ned immediately. Ventnor did not know the reason.
They put on their coats and walked the short distance to the Tower, where Ventnor had a barge at the wharf waiting to take them to White Hall.
Ned fretted as they were rowed upstream. A peremptory summons was rarely good news. And Elizabeth had always been capricious. The blue sky of her approval could turn in an instant to lowering black clouds--and back again.
At White Hall, Ventnor led them through the guardroom, full of soldiers, and the presence chamber, where courtiers waited, and along a passage to the privy chamber.
Queen Elizabeth sat on a carved and gilded wooden chair. She wore a red-and-white dress with a silver-gauze overdress, and sleeves slashed to show a lining of red taffeta. It was a youthfully bright outfit, but it could not hide the passage of time. Elizabeth had just passed her fiftieth birthday and her face showed her age, despite the heavy white makeup she used. When she spoke she showed irregular brown teeth, several missing.
The earl of Leicester was also in the room. He was the same age as the queen but he, too, dressed like a wealthy youngster. Today he wore an outfit of pale blue silk with gold embroidery, and his shirt had ruffs at the wrists as well as the neck. To Ned it looked absurdly costly.
Leicester seemed pleased with himself, Ned noticed with unease. He was probably about to score points off Walsingham.
Ned and Walsingham bowed side by side.
The queen spoke in a voice as cold as February. "A man has been arrested in a tavern in Oxford for saying that he was on his way to London to shoot the queen."
Oh, hell, thought Ned, we missed one. He recalled Walsingham's words: Someday one of these traitors will slip through our fingers.
Leicester spoke in a supercilious drawl that seemed to imply that everything was absurd. "The man was armed with a heavy pistol, and he said that the queen was a serpent and a viper, and he would set her head on a pole."
Trust Leicester to rub it in, Ned thought. But in truth the assassin did not sound seriously dangerous, if he was so indiscreet that he had been stopped when he was still sixty miles away from the queen.
Elizabeth said: "Why do I pay you all this money, if not to protect me from such people?"
That was outrageous: she was paying only seven hundred and fifty pounds a year, nowhere near enough, and Walsingham financed much of the work himself. But queens did not have to be fair.
Walsingham said: "Who is this man?"
Leicester said: "John Somerfield."
Ned recognized the name: it was on the list. "We know of Somerfield, Your Majesty. He's one of the Warwickshire Catholics. He's mad."
The earl of Leicester laughed sarcastically. "So, that means he's no danger to Her Majesty, does it?"
Ned flushed. "It means he's not likely to be part of a serious conspiracy, my lord."
"Oh, good! In that case his bullets obviously can't kill anyone, can they?"
"I didn't mean--"
Leicester overrode Ned. "Your Majesty, I wish you would give someone else the task of protecting your precious person." He added in an oily voice: "It is the most important task in the kingdom."
He was a skilled flatterer, and unfortunately Elizabeth was charmed.
Walsingham spoke for the first time. "I have failed you, Your Majesty. I did not recognize the danger posed by Somerfield. No doubt there are many men in England who can do this job better. I beg you to give the responsibility to one of them. Speaking for myself, I would gladly put down the burden I have carried so long, and rest my weary bones."
He did not mean this, of course, but it was probably the best way to handle the queen in her present mood. Ned realized he had been foolish to argue. If she was annoyed, then telling her she need not worry only irritated her further. Humble self-abnegation was more likely to please.
"You're the same age as me," the queen shot back. However, she seemed mollified by Walsingham's apology; or perhaps she had been led to reflect that in fact there was no man in England who would work as hard and as conscientiously as Walsingham to protect her from the many people, mad and sane, who wanted to assassinate her. However, she was not yet ready to let Walsingham off the hook. "What are you going to do to make me more secure?" she demanded.
"Your Majesty, I am on the point of destroying a well-organized conspiracy against you by enemies of an order quite different from John Somerfield. These people will not wave their weapons in the air and boast about their intentions in taverns. They are in league with the Pope and the king of Spain, which I can assure you Somerfield is not. They are determined and well financed and obsessively secretive. Nevertheless I expect to arrest their leader in the next few days."
It was a spirited defense against the malice of Leicester, but all the same Ned was dismayed. This was premature. An arrest now would bring the conspiracy to an early halt, and in consequence they would not get evidence of Mary Stuart's complicity. Personal rivalry had interfered again.
The queen said: "Who are these people?"
"For fear that they may be forewarned, Your Majesty, I hesitate to name names"--Walsingham looked pointedly at Leicester--"in public."
Leicester was about to protest indignantly, but the queen said: "Quite right, I shouldn't have asked. Very well, Sir Francis, you'd better leave us and get back to your work."
"Thank you, Your Majesty," said Walsingham.
Rollo Fitzgerald was anxious about Francis Throckmorton.
Throckmorton was not like the men who had been trained at the English College. They had made a life commitment to submit to the rule of the church. They understood obedience and dedication. They had left England, spent years studying, taken vows, and returned home to do the job for which they had prepared. They knew their lives were at risk: every time one of them was caught by Walsingham and executed, the death was celebrated at the college as a martyrdom.
Throckmorton had made no vows. He was a wealthy young aristocrat with a romantic attachment to Catholicism. He had spent his life pleasing himself, not God. His courage and determination were untried. He might just back out.
Even if he stayed the course, there were other dangers. How discreet was he? He had no experience of clandestine work. Would he get drunk and drop boastful hints to his friends about his secret mission?
Rollo was also worried about Peg Bradford. Alison claimed Peg would do anything for Mary Queen of Scots; but Alison could be wrong, and Peg could prove unreliable.
His biggest worry was Mary herself. Would she cooperate? Without her the whole plot was nothing.
One thing at a time, he told himself. Throckmorton first.
He would have preferred to have no further contact with Throckmorton, for security, but that was not practicable. Rollo had to know whether everything was going according to plan. Reluctantly, therefore, he went to Throckmorton's house at St. Paul's Wharf, downhill from the cathedral, one evening at twilight, when faces were hard to make out.
By bad luck Throckmorton was out, according to his manservant. Rollo considered going away and returning at another time, but he was impatient to know what was happening, and he told the man he would wait.
He was shown into a small parlor. A window looked onto the street. At the back of the room, a double door stood a little ajar, and Rollo looked through to a grander room behind, comfortable and richly furnished, but with a pungent smell of smoke: the manservant was burning rubbish in the backyard.
Rollo accepted a cup of wine and mused, while he waited, over his secret agents. As soon as he had established communication between Pierre in Paris and Mary in Sheffield, he would have to make a tour of England and visit his secret priests. He had to collect maps from them or from their protectors, and confirm guarantees of support for the invading army. He had time--the invasion would take place in the spring of
next year--but there was much to be done.
Throckmorton came in at nightfall. Rollo heard the manservant open the door and say: "There's a gentleman waiting in the parlor, sir--preferred not to give his name."
Throckmorton was pleased to see Rollo. He took from his coat pocket a small package, which he slapped on the table with a triumphant gesture. "Letters for Queen Mary!" he said exultantly. "I've just come from the French embassy."
"Good man!" Rollo jumped up and began to examine the letters. He recognized the seal of the duke of Guise and that of Mary's man in Paris, John Leslie. He longed to read the contents, but could not break the seals without causing trouble. "When can you take them to Sheffield?"
"Tomorrow," said Throckmorton.
"Excellent."
There was a banging at the front door. Both men froze, listening. It was not the courteous tap of a friendly caller but the arrogant hammering of someone hostile. Rollo went to the window and saw, in the light of the lamp over the door, two well-dressed men. One turned his head toward the light and Rollo instantly recognized Ned Willard.
"Hell," he said. "Walsingham's men."
He realized in a flash that Ned must have had Throckmorton under surveillance. Throckmorton must have been followed to the French embassy, and Ned could undoubtedly figure out why he had gone there. But how had Ned got onto Throckmorton in the first place? Rollo realized that Walsingham's secret service was a good deal more effective than anyone imagined.
And in a minute Rollo would be in their hands.
Throckmorton said: "I'll tell my man to say I'm out." He opened the parlor door, but he was too late: Rollo heard the front door opening and the sound of demanding voices. Everything was moving too fast.
"Go and stall them," said Rollo.
Throckmorton stepped into the entrance hall, saying: "Now, now, what's all this racket?"
Rollo looked at the letters on the table. They were unmistakably incriminating. If they contained what he thought they did, they would condemn him and Throckmorton to death.
The entire scheme was in jeopardy, unless Rollo could get out of this in the next few seconds.
He picked up the letters and stepped through the half-open door into the back room. It had a window onto the yard. He opened it swiftly and clambered through. As he did so he heard the voice of Ned Willard, familiar to him since childhood, coming from the parlor.
In the middle of the yard was a fire of dead leaves, kitchen sweepings, and soiled straw from the stable. Looking farther down the yard he saw, in the shifting red light of the bonfire, the outline of a man approaching through the trees. He must be a third member of Ned's team, Rollo reckoned: Ned was meticulous, and he would not have omitted to cover the back exit from the house.
The man shouted at Rollo: "Hey, you!"
Rollo had to make a split-second decision.
Throckmorton was doomed. He would be arrested and tortured, and he would tell all he knew before he was executed. But he did not know the real identity of Jean Langlais. He could betray nobody except the laundress, Peg Bradford; and she was an ignorant laborer who would do nothing with her worthless life but give birth to more ignorant laborers. Crucially, Throckmorton could not incriminate Mary Stuart. The only proof against her was in the letters Rollo held in his hand.
He crumpled the letters and threw them into the bright yellow heart of the fire.
The third man ran toward him.
Rollo stayed precious seconds to see the paper flare up, blacken, and begin crumbling into ash.
When the evidence had been destroyed he surprised the third man by running straight at him. He gave the man a violent shove, causing him to fall to the ground, and ran on past.
Rollo ran down the length of the yard. It led to the muddy beach of the river Thames.
He turned along the waterfront and kept running.
In the spring of 1584 Pierre went to watch the marchioness of Nimes being evicted from her house.
Her husband, the marquess, had got away with being a Protestant for decades, but Pierre had been patient. The country house in the suburb of St. Jacques had continued to be a center for heretical activities even after Pierre's great coup in 1559 when he had had the entire congregation arrested. But now, in 1584, Paris was in thrall to an unofficial group called the Catholic League, dedicated to wiping out Protestantism, and Pierre had been able to haul the marquess before the supreme court called the Parlement of Paris and have him sentenced to death.
Pierre had never really been interested in the old marquess. The person he really hated was Marchioness Louise, now a glamorous widow in her forties. The property of heretics such as the marquess was confiscated, so his execution had left her destitute.
Pierre had waited twenty-five years for this moment.
He arrived just as the marchioness was confronting the bailiff in the entrance hall. He stood with the bailiff's men, watching, and she did not notice him.
She was surrounded by the evidence of the wealth she had lost: oil paintings of country scenes on the paneled walls, carved hall chairs gleaming with polish, marble underfoot and chandeliers above. She wore a green silk gown that seemed to flow like water over her generous hips. When she was young every man had stared at her large bust, and she was still shapely.
"How dare you?" she was saying to the bailiff in a voice of authority. "You cannot force a noblewoman to leave her home."
The bailiff had undoubtedly done this before. He spoke politely, but he was unyielding. "I advise you to go quietly, my lady," he said. "If you don't walk you'll be carried, which is undignified."
She moved closer to him and pulled back her shoulders, drawing attention to her breasts. "You can use your discretion," she said in a warmer voice. "Come back in a week, when I will have had time to make arrangements."
"The court gave you time, my lady, and that time is now up."
Neither haughtiness nor charm had worked, and she allowed her despair to show. "I can't leave my house--I have nowhere to go!" she wailed. "I can't even rent a room because I have no money, not one sou. My parents are dead and all my friends are terrified to help me for fear that they, too, will be accused of heresy!"
Pierre studied her, enjoying the tears on her face and the note of panic in her voice. It was the marchioness who had snubbed young Pierre, a quarter of a century ago. Sylvie had proudly introduced him to the young Louise, he had uttered some pleasantry that had displeased her, and she had said: Even in Champagne, they should teach young men to be respectful to their superiors. Then she had pointedly turned her back. The memory still made him wince.
He relished the reversal of position now. He had recently been made abbot of Holy Tree, a monastery that owned thousands of acres of land in Champagne. He took the income for himself and left the monks to live in poverty, in accordance with their vows. He was rich and powerful, whereas Louise was penniless and helpless.
The bailiff said: "The weather is warm. You can sleep in the forest. Or, if it rains, the convent of St. Marie-Madeleine in the rue de la Croix takes in homeless women."
Louise seemed genuinely shocked. "That place is for prostitutes!"
The bailiff shrugged.
Louise began to weep. Her shoulders slumped, she covered her face with her hands, and her chest heaved with sobs.
Pierre found her distress arousing.
At that point he came to her rescue.
He stepped out of the little group by the door and stood between the bailiff and the marchioness. "Calm yourself, madame," he said. "The Guise family will not allow a noblewoman to sleep in the forest."
She took her hands from her face and looked at him through her tears. "Pierre Aumande," she said. "Have you come to mock me?"
She would suffer even more for not calling him Pierre Aumande de Guise. "I'm here to help you in your emergency," he said. "If you would care to come with me, I'll take you to a place of safety."
She remained standing where she was. "Where?"
"An apart
ment has been reserved, and paid for, in a quiet neighborhood. There is a maid. It is not lavish, but you won't be uncomfortable. Come and look at it. I feel sure it will serve you temporarily, at least."
Clearly she did not know whether to believe him. The Guises hated Protestants: why would they be good to her? But after a long moment of hesitation she realized she had no other options, and she said: "Let me put some things in a bag."
The bailiff said: "No jewelry. I will inspect the bag as you leave."
She made no reply, but turned on her heel and left the room with her head held high.
Pierre could hardly contain his impatience. Soon he would have this woman under his control.
The marchioness was no relation to the Guises, and stood on the opposite side in the religious war, but somehow in Pierre's mind they were the same. The Guises used him as their adviser and hatchet man but, even now, they disdained him socially. He was their most influential and highly rewarded servant, but still a servant; always invited to a council of war and never to a family dinner. He could not be revenged for that rejection. But he could punish Louise.
She returned with a leather bag stuffed full. The bailiff, true to his threat, opened it and took everything out. She had packed dozens of pieces of beautiful silk and linen underwear, embroidered and beribboned. It made Pierre think about what she might be wearing beneath her green dress today.
With characteristic arrogance she handed the bag to Pierre, as if he were a footman.
He did not disillusion her. That would come, in good time.
He led her outside. Biron and Brocard were waiting with the horses. They had brought an extra mount for the marchioness. They rode out of the Nimes estate, entered Paris through St. Jacques Gate, and followed the rue St. Jacques to the Petit Pont. They crossed the Ile de la Cite and made their way to a modest row house not far from the Guise palace. Pierre dismissed Biron and Brocard and told them to take the horses home, then he escorted Louise inside. "You have the top floor," he told her.
"Who else lives here?" she said anxiously.
He answered truthfully. "A different tenant on each floor. Most of them have done work for the Guises in the past: a retired tutor, a seamstress whose eyesight has failed, a Spanish woman who does translations occasionally. All very respectable." And none willing to risk losing their place by displeasing Pierre.