Marbeck and the Double Dealer (20 page)

‘I know not – will you cease questioning me?'

No further words passed. Both men were relieved to be of use after the tedium of the past days. In a few minutes, alert and armed, they made their way out of the inn into the murky light of early dawn. There in the street stood Nicholas Prout, hatted and muffled against the chill. With him was a well-armed pursuivant, the same man who had stood beside Marbeck in the fencing hall and looked upon the body of Giacomo Ottone.

‘At last.' The messenger eyed the two with his customary air of disapproval. ‘May we proceed now?' He set off up Red Cross Street, the others following.

‘Where are we going?' Marbeck asked. ‘And what's the—'

Prout raised a gloved hand. ‘I'll convey my master's orders,' he said stolidly, ‘if you'll hold your peace. Can you do that?'

Reining in their impatience, Marbeck and Gifford exchanged looks. But they fell into step, allowing Prout to lead the way along the street. The soldier brought up the rear.

‘Very well.' Having marshalled his facts, the messenger began to relay them. ‘I've no need to go over the projection, have I, that you spoke of with Master Secretary? But I'll say one thing: I never knew such a flurry of despatches, not since the Armada – or even the Queen of Scots business. Anyhow, it's brought a result in the end, that's put Sir Robert in a poor humour.' He sighed. ‘Loyalty comes cheap nowadays, is all I can say.'

They had turned into the Barbican and were tramping westwards. Dawn had barely broken, but already people were about. ‘Will you get to the nub of it, Prout?' Gifford said, his patience exhausted. ‘Whom do we seek?'

‘I am coming to it,' Prout retorted. ‘Will you let me get there in my own time?'

They were at the crossing with Aldersgate Street, whereupon something struck Marbeck so forcibly he almost stopped in his tracks.

‘What's wrong?' Prout slowed down, frowning at him.

‘Nothing . . . Tell us, if you please.' Marbeck began walking again, but his thoughts whirled. They were retracing the route he had taken three days back, when he followed the bogus archer from Finsbury Fields to West Smithfield . . . A suspicion had formed, but he kept it to himself.

‘As I said –' Prout drew a breath – ‘reports have come in thick and fast. Not all the ones Master Secretary wanted, but enough for him to take a decision. One stood out like a jewel in a dunghill, it seems. Tried to tell him rumours about the new Spanish fleet are all lies. According to this report, which the sender claims to come from a new source, the fleet's not bound for Ireland, but is a new Armada. It's supposed to come sailing into the Channel as before – and it's only forty ships.' He grimaced. ‘He must think Master Secretary's a fool to swallow that. There was other stuff too, but it's by the by . . .'

The messenger trailed off, but Gifford would wait no longer. ‘The traitor, Prout!' He put a hand on the other's sleeve. ‘In God's name, who is the subject of your warrant?'

There was a moment in which Marbeck expected a rebuke from the messenger. Instead, the man met Gifford's eye.

‘The report came from number nineteen,' he said. ‘That's where we're bound – he lives by St John's. Ex-soldier, by the name of—'

‘Saxby.'

Marbeck spoke the name before him, prompting sharp looks from the others. There, in Long Lane, the little group stopped.

‘Saxby – the one without a leg?' Disbelief was on Gifford's face. ‘That's absurd!'

Prout glared at him. ‘Do you doubt Master Secretary's judgement?'

‘Well, mayhap I do . . .' Gifford began. But he looked at Marbeck, a frown on his face. ‘You questioned him, didn't you?' he went on. ‘You said you'd sounded him out . . .'

‘I did,' Marbeck said, not really listening. ‘But I may have questioned the wrong Saxby.'

The others were silent. The soldier stood aside, impatient with the delay. But Prout was frowning at Marbeck.

‘What say you?' he demanded. ‘Speak now, for I've to serve a warrant on Thomas Saxby, then take him to the Marshalsea. Do you know some reason I shouldn't?'

Slowly, Marbeck shook his head. The truth, he saw, had lain just beyond his vision all along. He pictured the grim hovel where the ex-gunner lived, and the spirited woman who had stood by him. He saw Saxby's haggard face, in the Red Bull in St John's Street, as he told how his wife had nursed him back from near-death, shared his hardship . . . and he remembered the look in the woman's eyes, as she took the coin he had given, to aid her in her poverty.

‘No . . . there's no reason not to go there,' he said to Prout. ‘Master Secretary's right: nineteen is the false agent. Only nineteen isn't one person, but two – one who runs errands and carries messages, because the other cannot. She's the one disguises herself as a man.' He faced Gifford. ‘Mulberry's a man and wife – and her name is Anne.'

D
awn had broken by the time the four men marched down the narrow, refuse-strewn street in Clerkenwell where Marbeck had walked a month before. This time, however, people stepped aside in alarm at sight of the heavily armed group. Thomas Saxby was known to possess firearms, and both Prout and his guard carried pistols. Their orders were to capture the man alive, Marbeck and Gifford to assist if required. But now that it seemed both Saxby and his wife should be arrested, everything had changed.

There had been heated words back in Long Lane, but the dispute was short. Once Marbeck had spelled it out, it made sense even to Nicholas Prout. Saxby's lameness was beyond doubt – if he was a double-dealer, he must have had help. Marbeck almost believed he could picture Anne sitting in the gloom when Silvan had tried to persuade him to turn traitor. How long had it been since such an offer was made to the embittered ex-soldier – and to his wife, too? It now looked as if the false physician Gomez had recruited them. In spite of himself, Marbeck had to admire the Portuguese. He had been tortured unto death, yet had not revealed the identity of his double agent in London. Now Silvan was their master. A grim resolve formed in Marbeck's mind. Once the Saxbys were taken, surely a path could be laid to the other?

Now, at Prout's order, the group halted. The messenger glanced at Marbeck, who pointed to the last house in the row. He and Gifford loosened their swords. The other man readied his short pistol.

‘There's no light,' Gifford said. ‘They're still abed.'

‘We'll break the door in,' Prout said. ‘We take Saxby; you two follow and take the woman. Can you accomplish that?'

‘Most amusing,' Gifford muttered, but was ignored.

‘If he tries to fight, aim to wound,' Prout told his man. ‘Disarm him at all costs.' He threw a questioning look at Marbeck.

‘There are stairs at the rear, as I recall,' Marbeck said. ‘But he sleeps on a pallet on the ground floor. He had an old wheel-lock, though it wasn't primed.' He shrugged. ‘Yet, with all that's happened lately, they may be on their guard.'

‘Why do we wait?' Gifford jerked his head towards the tumbledown dwelling. ‘By the look of that door, one good push will cave it in.'

With a grunt, Prout gestured them to take their places on either side of the doorway. No sooner had they done so than he clapped his guard on the shoulder, but the man needed no prompting. In a moment he had thrown his body against the timbers, which gave way at once. He and Prout hurried in, the messenger shouting as he went.

‘Thomas Saxby, I arrest you in the Queen's name! Show yourself!'

But the answer was as immediate as it was unexpected: a deafening roar. Close behind Prout, Marbeck ducked instinctively. There had been a red flash, and the air was now filled with powder-smoke. He was aware of a grunt and a body crashing to the floor: the guard had been shot.

‘Get back, or I'll fire, too!'

It was a woman's voice. Prout fell forward, stumbling over his pursuivant, while it was all Marbeck and Gifford could do to avoid falling over him in turn. They blundered into the house, scattering to left and right.

‘Throw down your weapon! One warning is all I'll give!' Prout cried. He was on his knees, coughing in the smoke. Peering through it, Marbeck saw Saxby's bed where he remembered it, but it was empty. He had barely time to register the sight of someone crouching in the corner – then came another pistol-shot, and this time Prout fell. But even as he did so, the messenger fired his own weapon. The result was a cry – and the figure in the corner collapsed.

‘Prout . . . are you hit? Speak, damn you!'

It was Gifford. Turning, Marbeck saw him bending over the wounded man. Beside them, the guard lay groaning.

‘I can fadge for myself – attend to your duty!'

Gifford's face showed relief: Prout was not badly hurt – but immediately his gaze swept past Marbeck's shoulder.

‘Look out!'

Marbeck snapped round, almost too late. He saw the dagger and weaved aside. But the blade jabbed his torso, slashing his padded doublet. There was a stab of pain in his side. He staggered, but managed to grab the arm of his assailant. At the same time he looked up into a narrow face: a woman's face, contorted with hatred.

‘You whoreson javel!' Anne Saxby cried. ‘I'll spike you!'

But Marbeck held her, tightening his grip. Falling to a sitting position, he used both hands to force her wrist backwards until she dropped the poniard. And though she fought him, she was slender and had little strength. Soon she sank to the floor, panting with the effort.

‘Jesu, what a coil . . .'

Gifford appeared, to seize Anne from behind. She struggled, but knew she had lost. In a moment she had been yanked to her feet, her arms pinioned. Only then did Marbeck get up, breathing hard. There was a wetness on his left side; he glanced down, saw the stain.

‘Is it bad?' Gifford asked.

He shook his head. The two eyed each other, then looked to their prisoner. She was slumped, head bowed.

‘She fired the second shot,' Marbeck said.

‘I know.' Gifford nodded towards the corner. Now that the powder-smoke was clearing, the crumpled figure of Thomas Saxby could be seen, wearing the same old jerkin that Marbeck remembered. He lay half on his side, his ruined leg stuck out at an angle. Beside him was the pistol with which he had shot the guard, before Anne had fired at Prout. Prout's answering shot, however, had found Saxby and not his wife.

‘I'll hold her,' Gifford said. ‘You'd better see . . .' He broke off. There was a murmur of pain: Saxby was alive. And at once Anne's head flew up.

‘Tom!' she screamed.

Marbeck stepped across the room and got down on one knee beside the ex-soldier. The man's eyes were open, though he remained still. A welter of gore was spreading outwards from his body, pooling on the floor.

‘You . . .?' His face drawn with pain, Saxby narrowed his eyes. ‘I know you, do I not?'

Without answering, Marbeck lifted the man's wrist and felt his pulse. Then he looked down at the terrible wound and finally leaned back. His expression was enough.

‘So . . . I'm to perish at home?' Saxby let out a sigh. ‘Then, I thank Christ it's here, and not in some Irish swamp.'

Marbeck made no answer.

‘Please – let me go to him!'

He looked round, to see Anne straining against Gifford's grip. ‘I beg you!' she cried. ‘He should die in my arms . . . for the love of Jesus!'

‘Let her be with him.'

It was Prout who spoke. Marbeck and Gifford turned quickly to see the messenger on his feet. He was stooping, one arm hanging uselessly. Blood ran from it and dripped to the floor.

‘We've made enough of a farrago already,' he breathed. ‘And any man should be allowed to make his peace.'

Gifford hesitated, but Marbeck shifted his gaze to Anne. ‘We'll sit him up,' he said.

There was a moment before Gifford unwillingly released his prisoner. Anne darted forward and fell to her knees beside her husband. Between them, she and Marbeck raised the man's limp body and turned it, so that he could rest with his back to the wall. He winced with pain, but made no further sound. There he sat, his face ash-grey, blood seeping through his jerkin.

‘Gifford and I can question him,' Marbeck said. ‘We'll wait to the end, then make full report.'

‘So be it,' Prout murmured. He looked to his guard, who was also bleeding profusely. ‘I'll get him to a surgeon,' he added in a dull voice. He looked like a spent old man.

‘Not on your own, you can't,' Gifford said. ‘Yet, if he can stand, we may move him between us. But two of us should be here,' he added, with a nod towards Anne. ‘I'll bind her hands—'

‘Whose warrant is this, Gifford?'

Prout's voice was savage. Gifford blinked at the expression on the man's face. But Marbeck recognized the look: the same one he had seen that night in Gracious Street, outside Ottone's fencing hall.

‘Let Prout look to it,' he said.

He turned back to Anne, who sat beside her husband, holding his hand. Tears stained her cheeks, but she was silent. Behind him Marbeck heard Prout and Gifford lifting the wounded guard up, but he didn't look round. There were murmured voices, and, further off, the noise of people gathered in the street. Then Prout and his man were gone, and Gifford was back.

‘What in God's name made you turn, Saxby?'

Marbeck looked up, saw no sympathy in Gifford's gaze. His fellow intelligencer gazed sternly upon the pair of unlikely traitors and shook his head. ‘What did they offer you – gold?'

There was no answer. Anne refused to look at her captors, but kept her eyes on her husband. Despite everything, Marbeck sensed love flowing between these two ragged people. Yet, like Gifford, he knew he had a task to perform. With an effort, he got to his feet, to see that his companion had found a stool and was placing it behind him.