The Licence of War (64 page)

Lady Beaumont thought of her mother at prayer, fingering each bead of the rosary, and that soft murmuring, like a lullaby:
Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructis ventri tui, Iesus …
“No, sir,” she said, with an effort, “though I thank you, and may God bless you in your work here.”

“I swear that wizard’s bowl was bringing us ill luck,” Antonio declared, rereading his magnificent offer while Diego dusted off their saddlebags. “I hope you will stop sulking over it.”

“I’m amazed, Don Antonio, that
you
should be in such high spirits,” said Diego. “Had you stayed in Seville, you would have had His
Majesty’s commission months ago. We’ve achieved precisely nothing in England. You came to destroy the peace of James Beaumont’s kingdom, but you’ll leave him happy in it as a pig in its sty. She and your Lorenzo, and even that doltish Thomas have proved immune to our ruses. And you’ve got hardly an English farthing out of the family.”

“That’s not true: I had a good bit of money from Thomas, and for the past month we’ve eaten and drunk like lords in this house. Besides, Iturbe has my advance payment, and I’ll have yet more when I arrive in Spain.”

“We may have a difficult journey home, beforehand, and who knows what awaits us there.”

Antonio paused to reflect. Teresa might believe him dead, in the half year since he had written to her from London. And was Juana still at Gaspar’s, dreaming of revenge on her Monsieur Beaumont? How deliciously perverse it would be to fuck her soundly, turn her out, and then raise her Lorenzo in the de Zamora household. Yet as he watched Diego stuff their meagre possessions into their bags, he thought the youth had a point: why quit the field of battle without a victory?

He marched to the door.

“Where are you off to?” Diego asked.

Antonio swung about. “You should address me more respectfully, Diego, if you wish to grow any older.”

Diego’s face darkened. “You got rid of the bowl, didn’t you. You couldn’t bear that it might give me power over you. You,
El Valoroso
, were scared of it, and of me.”

“Don’t be so conceited,” said Antonio. “It
was
stolen from you, though not through magic: a little elf took it, probably on her husband’s instruction. I nearly caught her in the act.”

“Catherine,” whispered Diego. “I should have guessed.”

“Thank God she put an end to your dangerous games.” Antonio unlatched the door. “Take our bags downstairs. Then exert your wiles on the Captain’s servants and find out what gossip you can about him.”

“Yes,
master
,” Diego said, rudely.

Antonio sauntered out and along the passage. From another chamber, he could hear Iturbe singing, over the splash of water; the Captain was at his ablutions. On the stair, he listened for a moment to young James Beaumont’s infant babble from Mary’s chamber. She had not emerged in the four days since she had been brought to bed; a wise custom given how dreary most women looked after childbirth. He descended to the entrance hall and asked a footman where he might find her ladyship; and he grinned to himself when the man said she had just gone to the herb garden.

The door to the dovecote was open. Elena sat on a rung of a ladder that extended up to the roof, where the birds had their nesting holes. Her hands were pressed together like a supplicant’s, and he recognised her words, in Latin. “Are you reciting a novena to speed me on my journey?” he inquired, startling her as he came in. “Or are you praying that the seeds of revenge I have sown within your family will not take root?”

She raised her eyebrows. “What
do
you mean?”

“I gave your sons the answer to a mystery that has puzzled them since childhood: they are but half-brothers. Although they may deny it to themselves, the truth is planted. They’ll fall out over the estate, I promise you, and carry the sin of at least two de Capdavila y Fuentes generations into a third. As for you, Elena, you’ve made the best of a sorry bargain: you exchanged wealth for the man you loved.” Antonio approached, holding out his arms. “Remember what we felt for each other. Your cold façade hides a soul in torment, full of lost hopes and dreams, and memories that I have awakened.”

“Antonio,” she said, in a bored tone, “you dwell in the past, trapped by your own lost hopes and dreams. They have addled your brains. God has blessed you with a chance to redeem yourself, in honourable service to your King. I am praying that you will become a better man for it.”

Antonio had a mind to slap her, or crush her to his chest and revive her ardour with a passionate kiss. Instead, he pointed at the clay floor. “I happen to know his lordship’s treasures are buried here.
What will you pay me not to inform the rebels when I get to London?”

For a second, the colour washed from her face. Then she shook her head slowly. “That Diego, your little spy.” She withdrew from her skirt pocket a small box and held it out to him. “Here’s
your
treasure. I never wore it. You can present it to one of your daughters, and scandalise her with the story behind it.”

Antonio picked out the medallion. “Our bad blood, Elena – of Moors and Christians. I think I’ll wear it myself.” He slipped the chain over his head, tucked the medallion inside the neck of his shirt, and tossed aside the box.

She rose and smoothed down her skirts. “Excuse me, now. I must attend to my visitors. There is a spade in the corner, and you have a few hours before we say goodbye. If you are so sure about his lordship’s treasures, I suggest you start to dig.”

“Woman, you are tough as a pair of old boots!” He offered her his arm, which she accepted with a flicker of a smile. “I shall accompany you. You have not won,
querida
,” he said, as they left the dovecote. “Bad blood will always surface. And what a sinful concentration of our blood flows in the veins of our son! I joked to him about the Hapsburgs and their interbreeding, but they have nothing on
him
.”

He saw her expression alter abruptly, and not because of his little quip; Elizabeth was racing up the path towards them as though chased by a pack of wolves. “What is it, Elizabeth?” she cried.

“Catherine,” Elizabeth panted.

Elena ran after her, round to the front of the house and up the steps; and Antonio followed, with the faintest misgiving.

Lord Beaumont and Capitán Iturbe stood side by side in the entrance hall while Anne and Elizabeth restrained Catherine, who was struggling like a tigress, her hair flying, her dress ripped at the front. The object of her fury, Diego, was pinioned by Iturbe’s servants, his cheeks dripping blood.

“Don Antonio,” said Lord Beaumont sternly, “your valet is a knave who has grossly abused our trust.”

“I beg pardon, my lord – what crime has he committed?” asked Antonio.

“He crept up on Catherine in her chamber and accused her of stealing from him. Then he accosted her. Thank heaven she had the strength to fend him off and call for help. The Captain and his men were able to rescue her in the nick of time.”

“Permit me to deal with him outside, my lord.” Antonio wrenched the youth from Iturbe’s men and kicked him in the rear so hard that Diego stumbled through the doors, tripped on the steps, and landed spread-eagled in the courtyard. Grabbing him up by the collar, Antonio dragged him a short distance away, and spat in his face, “
Hijo de puta
, what devil possessed you?”

“She nearly scratched out my eyes,” Diego whined.

“
Cierra el hocico o te corto los cojones.”
Antonio kneed him in that tender spot and he crumpled to the ground, howling and clutching himself. “
Levanta el culo, desgraciado,”
ordered Antonio, and turned for the house.

Lord and Lady Beaumont were on the steps with Iturbe, who said, in a horrified voice, “What a conclusion to your visit, Don Antonio.”

“He shall be punished severely, my Lord Beaumont,” said Antonio, “and I must apologise for the dreadful shock to Mistress Catherine. Look at us – we are all in a state of nerves! My lord, let’s share a glass of your fine Malaga to restore us, and bid each other a proper farewell before our party sets out.”

He expected Lord Beaumont to acquiesce, with his gentle bonhomie, but his lordship’s face rivalled Elena’s in its cold reproof. “No, sir: the Captain is determined to ride out at once. You could not be our guest forever, Don Antonio, much as we appreciated your invigorating company.”

Veech had ordered out a troop of militia to comb the streets of Cripplegate, on report that a tall, dark, foreign-looking man had been
spotted in the area. He himself had gone to Southwark, and spent fruitless hours searching there, even breaking into the house at Blackman Street. It was empty, and the neighbours could tell him little he did not already know about its inhabitants. He left a couple of men to watch it, and around ten o’clock, decided to check on the Tower.

Long before his skiff moored by Traitors Gate, he heard drunken singing. Only one sleepy guard was on duty to salute him as he clambered out. “I had a taste of ale, sir, courtesy of the chief gaoler,” the guard confessed. “But you should see most of them – they’ll have thick heads to pay, tomorrow.”

Veech stiffened, sensing trouble. “Bring me the keys to Lady Hallam’s cell.”

The guard came back with a heavy bunch. “Those boys from the Bands are soused to the gills! I tried to wake ’em, sir, but they’re sleeping as the dead.”

Veech hurried up to the cell. The men assigned to her door were slumped snoring on the flagstones. The door itself was locked, however, and through the spyhole, he glimpsed the outline of her body beneath her blanket, and her dark hair on the pillow. “Lady Hallam,” he yelled, fitting the key into the lock, “I bid you, get up.” She did not move, even at the grinding of the bolt. He flung open the door, rushed in, and tore aside the blanket. Lady Hallam, as he might have predicted, was a construct of straw, bundled clothes, and a moth-eaten wig.

At two in the morning, Laurence heard a series of rhythmic taps on Pembroke’s kitchen window, and let Jem in. “She’s safe in Bermondsey, sir,” Jem whispered.

“Well done, Jem, well done. None of you was caught or injured?” Jem shook his head. “Thank God. No sign of Veech?”

“No, sir, but militia are searching high and low for you and her ladyship, and for us Barlows. There’s a guard posted in Blackman Street. We have to make tracks.”

“Will you leave London?”

“Leave London?” echoed Jem, as if the very idea were preposterous. “London is the centre of things. Barlows could not be anywhere else! We’ve a wealth of places to hide ’til the hue and cry dies off. What about her ladyship? She wants to join you here.”

“She
can’t
,” insisted Laurence, terrified of the danger to her, and to Pembroke. “She must find her way to Oxford in her disguise. You tell her, Jem: she and I must stay apart, or your courage and hard work will have been wasted.”

“How will
you
get out? We might help you, sir.”

“No, you’ve risked far too much as it is.” Laurence gave him more money, some for Isabella’s journey and most of it for the Barlows. As he and Jem hugged goodbye, tears pricked again in his eyes. “Thank you all, my dear friends. This may be the last time we see each other, Jem.”

“Don’t you count on it, sir,” said Jem, with the stolid assurance of his late uncle. “Fortune favours the bold. She’s a lady, so she’ll look after you. And remember,
your
work ain’t done: you owe us the death of Veech.”

“T
here’s bound to be talk at Westminster,” Pembroke commented over breakfast, when Laurence told him of Lady Hallam’s rescue. “Will your anonymous friends spirit you as cleverly out of the City?”

“No, my lord,” said Laurence; he had passed the remains of the night wishing he could have accepted Jem’s offer.

“Would you borrow my horse once more?”

“Thank you, but I prefer to take my chances on foot. I’ll leave when it gets dark.”

Pembroke shoved aside his plate. “You won’t have a chance in hell, sir. There will be militia everywhere.
Now
what’s the matter?” he demanded of his equerry, who had entered with a peculiar look on his face.

He came over to Pembroke, and said in a hushed voice, “My lord, a sack of coal just arrived at your door.”

“Why should I care to know – and why are you whispering?” inquired Pembroke.

“It is no
ordinary
coal.”

Laurence scrambled upstairs to his chamber for his pistols. He cocked them and listened, his heart somersaulting in his chest, for the tramp of militiamen’s boots in the hall below. Instead he heard Pembroke call out, in a sardonic tone, “Mr. Beaumont, you will never guess what I found in that sack.”

Laurence went to the top of the stair and saw Pembroke walk forward with his equerry, who was supporting a bedraggled, dirty boy in a cloth cap and soot-stained jerkin and breeches.

——

Laurence carried Isabella into the chamber next to his and placed her on the bed. He could feel the jut of her bones through the coarse woollen garments. He took off the cap. Her hair had been cropped to her shoulders; it used to graze the base of her spine.

“I could not resist coming to you,” she said. “Can you forgive me?”

“Oh yes, my love, I’d forgive you anything,” Laurence replied sincerely.

“How foolish I was to ignore your warnings about Veech and that baker’s apprentice, although Mr. Draycott is not a rat, but a fine, honest man.” She told him her story, beginning with the evidence Veech had given Draycott to plant at her house and the terrible day of Barlow’s arrest, for which she blamed herself; her imprisonment and Lucy’s death; Sir Montague’s betrayal; and her trial and sentencing, unbeknownst to Draycott, who had gone on his noble mission to Digby. “He loathes Veech, who cost him his marriage and threatened to hurt his children,” she concluded.