The Licence of War (65 page)

“How many of us must want Veech dead. I do, and I’ve not even met him or seen him at close range.”

“He is a ghastly creature, Beaumont. Sir Montague had an idea that some harm was done to him, twisting him and filling him with hate.”

“Does he still wear a brace on his knee?”

“Yes, an ingenious contraption. He might not walk without it. But there’s something else wrong with him. He’s tall and broadly built, and yet … I can’t describe it.”

“Price said there was a soft aspect to his features.”

She nodded vigorously. “A softness that ill matches his deep voice and otherwise masculine appearance.
I
last saw him three days ago, when the extra guard was put at my door. He didn’t threaten me, for once. He simply asked for my wedding ring, a showy jewel from Sir Montague. And as he reached for it, his sleeve pulled back a little, and I noticed that his hand and the skin above his wrist were nearly devoid of hair.”

Laurence pulled back his own sleeves and held up his hands. “So are mine.”

“You’re not like him.” Isabella looked away, as if trying to remember. Then she quoted, “ ‘And Jacob said to Rebekah, his mother,
Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man
.’ He should be a hairy man, with his thick brows almost knitted into one.”

“Well,” said Laurence, “I can’t explain it.”

“Explain to me this: why is the Earl hiding you? Is he a friend of yours, from before the war?”

“No, and you must keep secret how he’s helping us – Digby, above all, must never know.”

“I promise. But what are we to do? We can’t stay here together, can we? Where will we go?”

“Let me think about that.” He smiled at her. “You’re very tired.”

She hid her face in the pillow. “And I am so aged, and ugly.”

“You are as beautiful as always, though you do need a scrubbing,” he said, comforted by her vanity, and kissed her on the cheek. “Now sleep. You can bathe when you wake.”

On his return from the evening session at the Lords, Pembroke showed Laurence a broadsheet. “Lady Hallam’s disappearance is a source of public wonder.”

“ ‘She is undoubtedly a witch, who cast a spell over her vigilant gaolers last night, and magicked herself into a boy ….’ ” Laurence frowned at an intriguing detail: the gravediggers who had buried her maid claimed that a finger was missing from the girl’s hand, obviously stolen by Lady Hallam for a magic charm. “It
is
true that she owned a black cat. What about Sir Montague, and his debauches in the Strand? Is there any truth to
them
?”

Pembroke emitted his braying laugh. “He could not have been an active participant. He must have lusted as vainly for his wife, the impotent old reprobate. He sold
her
to the very devil, to eke out a few more years of life for his rotten carcass. As the poets and moralists say,
we are only granted what we most desire when we can no longer enjoy it. Ah well, at least we can enjoy his wine.” He called for his equerry to bring glasses and a bottle of Sir Montague’s claret. “A health to our witch upstairs,” he proposed.

“And to Sir Montague’s few more years,” said Laurence.

When they had emptied their glasses, Pembroke sank into his armchair. “I used to be so certain of what I most desired: power, temporal and spiritual. It was a dream I have relinquished. My present dream is far less ambitious: to end my days at Wilton surrounded by my surviving children and my grandchildren, and by my collection of art.”

“You and my father share a similar dream.”

“And you, sir, what’s yours?”

“My immediate dream is to vanish with Lady Hallam into thin air, and leave you in peace,” Laurence said. “But of late, I’ve had more nightmares than dreams.”

“
I
have long been plagued by a recurring nightmare. I am in the Banqueting Hall, with His Majesty and Prince Charles, who commands that I be taken away, and hanged, drawn, and quartered, and that my head be stuck on Traitors Gate.” As well it might have been, Laurence thought, though he did not interrupt. “And next, Mr. Beaumont, the
King’s
head lolls about on his neck, falls, and drops into my lap. I cannot shake it off, as though it is glued there. You may say the dream was a product of my guilty conscience, yet at the time I had designs upon His Majesty’s life, I honestly felt no guilt.”

Do you now?
Laurence was tempted to ask. Although the image of the royal head disturbed him, he was not altogether surprised that he and Pembroke had both dreamt of the King’s death. He considered telling Pembroke how the conspiracy to regicide had been based on an erroneous horoscope; but in the end he merely observed, “Perhaps our dreams unbury what we daren’t admit to ourselves in our waking hours.”

“Yes, perhaps. Before we retire, sir,” Pembroke announced, in a different tone, “I shall order my coach for seven of the clock tomorrow
morning, to go on a visit to my friend the Earl of Bedford at his Woburn estate. Like me, he was of the peace party at Westminster. He shifted allegiances too often between King and Parliament to deserve either side’s trust, for which he has my sympathy, and he was pleased to quit politics. He is Lord Digby’s brother-in-law, in fact – Digby married his sister, Anne.”

“What a small world it is, among noble families.”

“Your father did well to bring in fresh blood by marrying your mother.”

“I believe her world in Spain was even smaller, in that regard.”

Pembroke stood, and picked up his cane. “You and Lady Hallam shall travel with me out of London.”

Laurence gaped at him. “But, my lord—”

“I have never yet been impeded by the militia,” Pembroke continued, with his former, masterful authority. “If she’s as convincing a boy as she was today and if you don’t object to huddling beneath my seat in the coach, I think we can outwit them.” When Laurence tried again to protest, Pembroke talked over him. “Wait and listen to what I want in exchange: those letters of mine and Radcliff’s that you gave to the King. Then our debts will be cancelled, Mr. Beaumont. I shall sleep easier – and I might even be rid of my nightmare.”

From the window of his bedchamber, Laurence looked out at a forest of stars above the roof of Whitehall Palace. Whatever they might portend was no less of an enigma to him than the transformation in Pembroke. A man who had attempted last year to kill him was risking everything to save him and Isabella. Was it for the letters, or did Pembroke seek the forgiveness of a higher power than the King’s for his past treachery? Or had loneliness and boredom drawn him again into flirting with danger?

Laurence heard his door creak open. He turned to see a phantom drift through, shut the door, and glide into his bed. Without a word, he threw off his clothes and lay down beside her. Neither of them
spoke, until the stars faded and the sky had lightened to a pale silvery grey.

How fragile she was, he thought, without her lush curves; and how bereft of worldliness, without her luxuriant hair and her exotic perfume. Yet her spell was as strong over him. “It’s dawn,” he murmured, “and we’ve been awake all night.”

“I slept all day.” She caressed the scar on his shoulder. “This is new. Where did you come by it?”

“I was wounded escaping from London, in January. Isabella,” he went on, after a short silence, “Pembroke has offered to smuggle us out in his coach. You must wear your boy’s disguise and sit next to his driver. I’ll be hidden inside the coach, under his lordship’s seat.”

“Oh thank God. I am so eager to leave. But what will happen to us, Beaumont, if we succeed?”

“We’ll go to Oxford. Then I must return to His Majesty’s camp.”

She exhaled a quick, impatient breath. “What will happen between
us
? No other man has lain with me, since we bade each other goodbye. I want none other than you. Oh Beaumont, why did I let Digby persuade me into that counterfeit of a marriage? Could we somehow undo my mistake?”

Laurence groaned and rolled over, covering his face with his hands. “You have a husband, and I have a wife.”

“As Digby wrote to me – the girl your mother had chosen.”

“No, I married her sister, Catherine.”

“Catherine Beaumont.” Isabella spoke as if tasting the name. “For these last hours you were able to forget her.” Laurence said nothing: Isabella was right. “Are you in love with her?”

“No. But I am extremely fond of her, and I owe it to her to make her happy. I chose her because … she’s the opposite of her sister. She’s had a hard life. She has the falling sickness, and she was mistreated by her family.”

“And you pitied her.”

“I don’t pity her in the least. I admire her. She has a free spirit and a brave heart, like you.”

Isabella shifted in bed and took away his hands. “Then you still love me.”

“With all
my
heart and I always will.”

“Have you been faithful to her until now?”

“Yes, though to be frank, I haven’t yet spent an entire night with her. The war has intervened. But my marriage is
not
a counterfeit. I can’t leave her, Isabella.”

“Will you tell her about
us
?”

“She knows of you. About this, I won’t, unless she asks.”

Isabella studied him, as though tracing every inch of his body and recording it to memory; and beneath the heat of her gaze, he felt the blood rush into his groin. “Beaumont,” she said, “we’re not done with each other.” She knelt over his hips and took him inside her. As they moved together, he seemed transported to that fateful moment, on a cliff near Cádiz at the very end of Spain; he was aiming a pistol at his own temple, staring down at jagged rock and swirling tide where the gulls soared and swooped. He depressed the trigger and the ball blasted past, deafening him. And he saw Isabella’s eyes widen at exactly the same time, as if she too had heard the explosion of fire.

After the initial, tantalising news of Prince Rupert’s northern victory, the King’s camp at Evesham had received uncertain, often conflicting messages, some optimistic and some alarming. Digby had read that cartfuls of dead and dying Royalist soldiers had been seen trundling through the gates of York, but he refused to believe this possible. Meanwhile, the King fretted about his wife, lying weak and helpless with her little daughter at Exeter: scouts brought word that Essex was within two days’ march of there. His Majesty had written urging Rupert to go to her aid, yet in the absence of any communication from the Prince, he could wait no longer to address the threat.

The royal army pressed into the southwest, travelling in one day a full seventeen miles to Coberly, a village not far from Cheltenham. Digby was settling to bed when a royal page summoned him to an impromptu midnight meeting of Council. He dragged himself over, yawning, to find the King ashen-faced. “An express has c-come from my n-nephew, and others who f-fought in the n-north,” His Majesty stammered, and asked Culpeper to read the reports aloud.

A major defeat had been inflicted on the Prince by the allied armies of Parliament and the Scots on the moors outside York. He had lost much of his Foot and heavy artillery, his cavalry had been scattered far and wide, and he himself had narrowly avoided capture. They could not precisely estimate the number of dead, but it might be close to four thousand. After the battle he had withdrawn to York, but that garrison would soon have to surrender. Short of powder and weapons, he was nonetheless gathering his regiments of Horse, and would retreat through Lancashire, with the aim of seeking safe haven at his headquarters in Shrewsbury. In a poignant aside to the King, Rupert mentioned that his faithful companion, Boy, had perished on Marston field.

None of the King’s Council dared state the obvious: that it had taken almost ten days for the King to learn that the north was all but lost to him; a stunning failure of intelligence. For the rest of the night, Digby lay awake bemoaning the disaster, and not solely for the Royalist cause: his own assiduously planned scheme to pit Rupert against Wilmot and drive Wilmot from power was unravelling.

“As soon as I have seen my family, Capitán, I’ll ride for Madrid to take up my commission,” Antonio said to Iturbe. “How pleased my Teresa will be to welcome her Odysseus home from his travels. She must have wondered at my fate.”

From the deck of the ship, they were staring out towards the mouth of the Thames, while Diego investigated the berths below.
Diego had moped peevishly for a while after his outrageous conduct at Chipping Campden, but Iturbe’s genial company on the road had forced him to behave; and the Envoy had shown them all unstinting hospitality once they had arrived in London.

“Don Antonio,” said Iturbe, “I regret to announce that an unanticipated business will prevent me from sailing with you. I must stay in England until it is arranged to my satisfaction. I heard of it only yesterday, and I did not wish to spoil our last evening together. Now, keep that purse I gave you safe, on the voyage. There are often thieves among the crew.”

“I’ve experience of English thieves to last me a lifetime,” Antonio said. “And the Envoy gifted me a fine rapier that I won’t hesitate to use, should any brigand cross me.”

“Then I need not worry for you,
El Valoroso
,” laughed Iturbe. After more courtesies, they parted. He strode off along the gangplank, and became lost from view in the crowds upon the dock.

Today the sun shone down out of a cloudless sky, as though to augur Antonio’s swift passage to Spanish shores; and the scent of fish and seawater in the air, and the mewing cries of gulls, reminded him of the port at Seville. He began to dream of the happy surprise with which Teresa would receive news of the honour King Philip was bestowing on him.

“Did you say goodbye to the Captain?” Diego had returned very quietly to the upper deck, his bag slung over his shoulder. “If so, it’s time for us to do the same.”

“What rubbish are you talking?” asked Antonio.

“I’m not going with you. I confided in the Envoy about my situation, and he offered me a place at the embassy as his clerk.”