A Traitor's Tears (28 page)

‘No, sir.'

‘I'm relieved to hear it. There were three copies made of the original cipher, I believe. You have been working with one of them – this one. There are two others, presumably somewhere in the clerks' room. Humphrey, please go and collect them and bring them here. And not a word to any of the clerks about this monstrous translation.'

Humphrey went out. Walsingham said, ‘If this were to become common knowledge, it would be the scandal of the century. I would never live it down. It could ruin me. You realize that?'

‘Yes, I do.'

He twisted round in his chair and looked at me directly. His dark eyes were hard and piercing but he had gone pale, for all that. ‘Do you believe that this is a forgery? Or not?'

‘Of course it is.' I fumbled for the right words. ‘My lord Burghley has known you; the queen has known you; I myself have been acquainted with you for many years. If you had Catholic leanings, they would have been noticed. It's almost impossible for a man in the positions you have held to hide these things. And I'm sure that all your income, from whatever source, is properly accounted for.'

‘I could still have a strongbox hidden under my bed,' said Walsingham dryly. ‘I haven't, of course, but that's what would be said. Ah, Humphrey. Thank you.' His secretary had brought the other two copies of the cipher. He held out a hand for them. ‘I shall destroy all these copies, personally. I imagine Wyse himself has disposed of the original. Humphrey, may I assume that you, like Mistress Stannard here, feel certain that this outrageous piece of correspondence did not emanate from me?'

‘You certainly may, sir.'

‘Why?'

‘I've known you too long, sir. If you did wish to … encourage … er … Catholic missionaries, you would go about it quite differently. You wouldn't be arresting them quite so enthusiastically, for one thing. And think of the plots there have been, where you could have given secret encouragement! Instead, you did all you could to bring the conspirators to justice. This' – Humphrey put out a thick forefinger and flicked my translation disdainfully – ‘is crude. The work of a most unskilled conspirator, I would say. Your own name, put blatantly at the end, instead of using a code name! Acknowledgement of a payment, but no amount is mentioned. A poor sort of receipt! Talk of safe houses but only a vague promise of details.'

‘Thank you. My own feelings entirely. But,' said Walsingham, ‘where in the world does Roland Wyse come into all this? Why did he replace the genuine original with a tarradiddle about an illicit loom?'

‘Trying to protect you, sir?' suggested Humphrey.

‘Even though he loathes me?' said Walsingham. ‘I'd have expected him to pounce on a letter like this with positive joy.'

‘So … none of this,' I said wearily, ‘makes any sense at all.'

‘No. Although …' Walsingham was frowning. ‘He
did
exchange the real original for a false one. Why? I do begin to think that the fact that Mistress Cobbold, Jarvis and Wyse all met in Jarvis's cottage, just before two of them were murdered, may have some significance, though I can't guess what. I can only say, Ursula, that I now agree that there are questions needing answers.'

‘Where would Wyse be by now?' I asked. ‘Well on his way to Dover, surely.'

‘Yes. With John Ryder as his superior officer.' For once, I saw Walsingham look confused. ‘I can hardly put a man under arrest for
not
seizing an opportunity to damage me! I will send word to Ryder and tell him to put Wyse under surveillance. Though not, as I said, arrest. I'll question him when he is back in London.'

‘Do you now feel that my doctored wine could have significance?' I asked.

‘
If
it was doctored. Dead mice don't prove that. But the tinkering with that letter … I'll get a queen's messenger on the road to Dover immediately, with word to Ryder. He'll be easy to find – he's on official business and his party is being accommodated at the castle. I can then leave it to him to decide whether he tells Wyse that he is wanted for questioning, or whether just to keep a discreet eye on him until they're all back here in London. I shall instruct Ryder to finish the business in Dover, though. He might as well, after taking my men all that way.'

‘I can take the message to Ryder!' I said. ‘I'd like to. Until all this is resolved, Roger Brockley is in danger.'

‘You will do nothing of the kind. This is work for a queen's messenger. I am aware of your care for your servants,' said Walsingham, ‘but I have never approved of involving women in affairs of state. Women have emotions that are too volatile.' No wonder, I thought, Queen Elizabeth had sometimes thrown things at Walsingham. ‘Where is Roger Brockley now?' Walsingham enquired.

‘Not in London,' I said.

Walsingham produced his disconcerting smile. ‘You travelled alone?'

‘I've done so before,' I told him.

‘You fear that I might send men to apprehend him. I do know that the warrant has been re-issued. I will let Brockley alone for the moment. I'll try to get some sense out of Roland first. I suggest that you simply go home.'

‘Yes, sir,' I said.

‘W
e're going to Dover,' I said to the Brockleys when I rejoined them at The Boar. ‘I am certainly not going home. I want to talk to Ryder myself. Walsingham's leaving it to him to decide whether he tells Wyse of the position he's in straightaway, or merely keeps a watch on him until they're all back in Whitehall. I want him to question Wyse at once – because I want to hear the replies! And if he manages to present us with a believable explanation of the extraordinary things he did with that cipher letter, something that will convince Walsingham, something that makes Wyse look like an innocent and put-upon victim of circumstances, well, Dover is a port. You two can get away. And you will, at once. I'll brook no argument.'

‘Oh, ma'am!' said Dale, miserably.

‘I think madam is right, Fran. Though I must say,' said Brockley, ‘that I'm finding it harder and harder to imagine any kind of reasonable explanation! Wyse will be hard put to it to invent one! We seem to have got into the realms of madness. Every new thing we discover makes the muddle worse.'

‘I know,' I said. ‘Yet somewhere there
has
to be an explanation! Two dead bodies need some accounting for!'

‘Mistress Cobbold could just have been murdered by a prowler,' said Brockley slowly, ‘and Jarvis by footpads.'

‘A prowler?' I said. ‘In broad daylight, in her own garden, where people could have been wandering out to find her, or looking out of windows, or gardeners walking in? And just footpads to account for Jarvis's death? He met Wyse
and
Mistress Cobbold, on the day of her death, and then Wyse tinkered with a cipher letter found on Jarvis's body. No, there really is some thread connecting all these things but what it is, heaven knows. Heaven and, I think, Master Wyse.'

Brockley said, ‘Queen's messengers ride fast. We may meet them all coming back. Then Fran and I will never get to Dover at all.'

‘I expect the enquiries into Ballanger's loom may take a few days,' I said. ‘Walsingham said he'd instruct Ryder to finish them before turning for home. But you're right all the same, Brockley. We should set off forthwith.'

We worked out that by riding steadily, we could be almost halfway to Dover before dusk. The queen's messenger, of course, would use the royal remounts provided on every main route and could travel much faster. He might even ride through the night, though I didn't think the urgency was great enough to justify that. Wyse wasn't fleeing. The messenger could have a night's sleep and arrive in Dover next day in good time for dinner. We were taking our own horses all the way and couldn't hope to catch up, but we need not be that far behind, just the same.

We reached Dover during the afternoon of the following day and pulled up on the outskirts, to consider what to do next.

We were hot and tired. It was a beautiful day but the sun was too warm for comfort, and we were all, people and horses alike, dusted over with the pale chalk of the track. Around us were grassy hills where sheep were grazing, and high on one of the hills were the mighty walls and towers of the castle. In the distance, the Channel was a sparkling blue, dotted here and there with shipping.

‘Ryder and the rest are staying at the castle,' I said. ‘But if they're poking their noses into Ballanger's weaving sheds, we're more likely to find them there. We'd better find out where Ballanger works. Well, we do the usual thing, I suppose. We ask a vicar or an innkeeper.'

‘Try an innkeeper,' said Brockley. ‘We're all hungry and thirsty. We haven't had any dinner or anything to drink for hours, and nor have the horses. Besides, we need an inn for the night. We're not expected at the castle. We're not official.'

We had been to Dover before and could remember where to find the inn where we had stayed. It was called the Safe Harbour and we had found it satisfactory. We made for it, and Brockley was pleased to find the same ostler there. He was easily recognizable because of the gaps in his front teeth and the droop in his left eyelid. He remembered us as well. We knew he was a reliable man and, for once, Brockley was happy about leaving our horses in his care. Then we all gathered up our saddlebags and made our way round to the front entrance and into the vestibule.

‘Well, here we are,' Brockley said. ‘Will you bespeak some ale and things to eat for us, madam? I'll do the enquiring about Ballanger.'

The innkeeper came hastening down the stairs as soon as he heard us arriving in the vestibule, and he didn't disappoint us. The inn could provide rooms for the night; there was a cool parlour where we could partake of refreshments; and yes, the landlord did know of Ballanger's establishment and could direct us there. In fact, the place was only a hundred yards away; we had passed it as we rode in. Standing in his front doorway, the landlord pointed it out to us.

An hour later, our parched throats slaked with ale and our hunger pangs assuaged with cold pigeon pie and fresh bread, we set forth on foot for the Ballanger weaving shed. The horses, their hides now wisped clean of chalk dust, were left in peace in their comfortable stalls, with filled managers and buckets of well water.

There was nothing secretive about the weaving sheds. Ballanger's was a long timber building with a slate roof and a row of windows running, as far as we could see, right round the front and side walls. A wide double door opened on to the street and a cart, with a big grey horse between the shafts, stood in front of them. Bales of raw wool were being unloaded and carried inside.

Though not quite in the businesslike fashion one might have expected, for the men with the bales all seemed to have heads cocked towards sounds from within, and we noticed raised eyebrows and the exchanging of meaningful glances.

‘I think we're in luck,' Brockley said. ‘Something's going on – maybe Ryder and the rest are in there.'

No one took any notice of us. We edged past a skinny youth clutching a bale nearly as big as himself and slipped inside to find ourselves in a place like a big, untidy cave. It had a flagstone floor and a door at the rear had the look of an internal door and presumably led into a further extension of the building. Above us, the ceiling was high, a criss-cross of beams supporting the slate roof and there were three glazed skylights, which amplified the light from the numerous windows. One could understand why natural light was so important. Fire would always be a danger in such a place, for one side of the cavernous room was full of piled up wool bales, to which the new delivery was being added, and the air was full of wool fibres, floating in the shafts of light from the windows. The naked flame of torch or candle would be perilous here.

The centre of the floor was occupied by two big looms, though at the moment they were silent. The weavers were at their posts but giving all their attention to what was happening on the side of the room opposite to the bales. This was open space, except that half a dozen men were standing in it, involved in an intense discussion. Ryder and his squad were not, however, among them. We stepped out of the way of the bale carriers, and moved to stand by the wall and assess the scene before us. Still, no one seemed to have realized we were there. We were able to listen unchallenged.

It took only a moment or two to identify Julius Ballanger, because just as we entered, someone addressed him by name. In any case, his well-fed frame and his smooth face, his confident stance and his broad, plausible smile would have marked him out as the man in charge, even though he was in working clothes: boots, breeches, loose shirt and sleeveless jerkin, with a round cap on his head, no doubt to keep wool fibres out of his hair. Beside him was a leaner man who had the air of a chief assistant. The others, who formed a group facing Ballanger and his companion, were dressed more formally, with ruffs and doublets and slashed hosiery. Ballanger was now refuting something that had been said to him. We cocked our ears.

‘… you have yourselves agreed that where there is a demand, a growing crowd of would-be customers, then a supply will be forthcoming from somebody. People like the worsted cloth. If they can't get enough of it, at a reasonable price, in England, they'll buy from abroad, and pay more. They'll still buy from somewhere. So why should we in England not provide it for them, yes, and sell some of it abroad ourselves? It will bring in money, help to make England prosperous! You accept all this – you've said so, here, this afternoon, under this very roof. So why, now, are you trying to attach strings to it? Why on earth should I have to pay Danegeld to you, in return for a licence to make my loom official?'

‘Danegeld?' said the foremost of the be-ruffed gentlemen, a dignified figure with a neatly trimmed fair beard and a hat with a definitely expensive brooch in it.