A Column of Fire (90 page)

Walsingham never threw anything away.

Ned ran up the stairs to the locked room. The book containing the Paris list was at the bottom of a chest. He pulled it out and blew off the dust.

She must have been referring to her father’s Paris house, must she not? The count had a country house in France but, as far as Ned knew, that had never been a rendezvous for English exiles. And Beaulieu had never appeared in the register of Catholics living in London.

Nothing was certain.

He opened the book eagerly and began to read carefully through the names, recorded in his own handwriting a decade ago. He forced himself to go slowly, recalling the faces of those angry young Englishmen who had gone to France because they felt out of place in their own country. As he did so he was assailed by memories of Paris: the glitter of the shops, the fabulous clothes, the stink of the streets, the extravagance of the royal entertainments, the savagery of the massacre.

One name struck him like a blow. Ned had never met the man, but he knew the name.

His heart seemed to stop. He went back to the alphabetical list of Catholics in London. Yes, one man who had visited Count Beaulieu’s house in Paris was now in London.

His name was Sir Francis Throckmorton.

‘Got you, you devil,’ said Ned.

*

W
ALSINGHAM SAID
: ‘Whatever you do, don’t arrest him.’

Ned was taken aback. ‘I thought that was the point.’

‘Think again. There will always be another Throckmorton. We will do all we can to protect Queen Elizabeth, of course, but some day one of these traitors will slip through our fingers.’

Ned admired Walsingham’s ability to think one step ahead of the current situation, but he did not know where Walsingham was going with this. ‘What can we do, other than be ever-vigilant?’

‘Let’s make it our mission to get proof that Mary Stuart is plotting to usurp Queen Elizabeth.’

‘Elizabeth will probably authorize the torture of Throckmorton, given that he has threatened her throne; and Throckmorton will naturally confess; but everyone knows that confessions are unreliable.’

‘Quite so. We must get incontrovertible evidence.’

‘And put Mary Stuart on trial?’

‘Exactly.’

Ned was intrigued, but he still did not know what Walsingham’s devious mind was planning. ‘What would that achieve?’

‘At a minimum, it would make Mary unpopular with the English people. All but the most extreme ultra-Catholics would disapprove of someone who wanted to unseat such a well-loved queen.’

‘That won’t stop the assassins.’

‘It will weaken their support. And it will strengthen our hand when we ask for the conditions of Mary’s imprisonment to be made harsher.’

Ned nodded agreement. ‘And Elizabeth will be less worried about being accused of unfeminine cruelty to her cousin. But still . . .’

‘It would be even better if we could prove that Mary plotted not only to overthrow Queen Elizabeth but to murder her.’

At last Ned began to see the trend of Walsingham’s thinking, and he was startled by its ruthlessness. ‘Do you want Mary sentenced to death?’

‘Yes.’

Ned found that chilling. To execute a queen was the next thing to sacrilege. ‘But Queen Elizabeth would never execute Mary.’

‘Even if we proved that Mary had conspired to assassinate Elizabeth?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Ned.

‘Nor do I,’ said Walsingham.

*

N
ED PUT
T
HROCKMORTON
under twenty-four-hour surveillance.

Aphrodite had surely told her husband about Ned’s call, and the French embassy must have warned Throckmorton. So, Ned figured, Throckmorton now knew that Ned suspected the existence of the correspondence with Mary. However, based on the same conversation, Throckmorton presumably believed that Ned did not know the identity of the courier.

The team tailing him was changed twice a day, but still there was a risk that he might notice them. However, he did not appear to. Ned guessed that Throckmorton was unaccustomed to clandestine work and simply did not think to check whether he was being followed.

Alain de Guise wrote from Paris to say that Pierre had sent an important letter to Mary Stuart by a courier. That letter would have to be smuggled to the imprisoned Mary by Throckmorton. If Throckmorton could be arrested with Pierre’s letter in his hand, it might serve as objective proof of his treachery.

However, Walsingham wanted Mary, not Throckmorton. So Ned decided to wait and see whether Throckmorton got a reply from Mary. If she consented to a plot, and especially if she wrote words of encouragement, she would stand condemned.

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 guard room, 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 make-up 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:
Some day 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.

‘You 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 defence 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.

*

R
OLLO
F
ITZGERALD
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 parlour. 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 parlour, 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 towards 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 on to Throckmorton in the first place? Rollo realized that Walsingham’s secret service was a good deal more effective than anyone imagined.