The Portuguese Affair (4 page)

‘Indeed. I do not have quite the same confidence as Dom Antonio in the readiness of the Portuguese to rise up on his behalf. His birth, unfortunately, was illegitimate. There is another, legitimate, claimant to the Portuguese throne, Catherine Duchess of Braganza. At one time a man had always a better claim to a throne than a woman, even if his birth were questionable. Now our own great Queen has shown that a woman can be a mighty monarch. The Portuguese leaders, should they decide to rebel against their foreign overlords, might well prefer a woman with a more legitimate claim. The final decision could well lie with the Portuguese
Cortes-Gerais
, whether or not to support Dom Antonio.’

‘I knew of the Duchess of Braganza,’ I said thoughtfully, ‘but did not know she might make a claim.’ So much for Ruy Lopez’s dreams, I thought, and for my father’s life savings.

‘I do not know that she will, but it is a factor to bear in mind. Now.’ He rose briskly and took out the keys to his strongbox. ‘We must provide you with coin of the realm.’

When he had unlocked his strongbox, Walsingham gazed for a moment out of the window. He had always been careworn, but in the stronger light I saw now that his skin had the yellowish grey tinge of those consumed by some inward malady. His eyelids drooped heavily with lack of sleep and the whites of his eyes were reddened. I saw him, perhaps for the first time, as a man like other men, and not as a figure of power, the spymaster moving the pieces on the chessboard of his secret world. A sick man, anxious, vigilant, exhausted by his burden of care, worn out, body and soul, before his time. Had he been my patient, I would have said:
Forget the Court and all your schemes; go home to Barn Elms and enjoy your garden this summer, for it may be your last.

Before I left with my instructions and my well-filled purse, he took me by the shoulders and studied my face as if he too were seeing me for the first time.

‘You came to us originally, Kit, because Thomas Harriot recommended you to Robert Poley for your talent with codes. And I fear that during these last years I have used you simply as a tool come conveniently to my hand. But lately I have learned more of your history and the sufferings you have endured.’

I lowered my eyes, fearing somehow that this shrewd man, fixing me with his sharp glance, might suddenly discover the truth about me.

‘You have worked well,’ he said, ‘and I hope that you find some peace or fulfilment in this journey to Portugal.’ He sighed, then added so softly I barely heard him. ‘Though I fear it is ill-conceived. When you return – if you return – I will always be glad to employ you.’

I looked up at that, and opened my mouth to speak, but he forestalled me with a smile.

‘I know, I know! Your work as a physician is of far greater importance to you. But our work is similar, yours and mine. You care for men’s bodies. I care for the body politic.’

I was astonished that he should rank me so highly and murmured some kind of incoherent thanks. I left soon after, without seeing anything of Thomas Phelippes or Arthur Gregory, the seal-forger. My purse was weighed down with Sir Francis’s heavy bag of Spanish and Portuguese coins, and tucked into the breast of my doublet was a plan of the town of
Coruña. If I felt cold at the thought of what I must do there, I had no one but myself to blame.

On my way down to
Seething Lane past the disapproving portraits that lined the hallway and thence by the backstairs I came suddenly face-to-face with Poley. I stopped with a gasp. I had believed him still to be in the Low Countries. It was a shock, the way he could suddenly appear out of the blue, like the devil in a masquerade. Would I never be rid of him? Since he had been released from the Tower, doubtless he was once again busy about the darker side of Walsingham’s affairs. He would have had no scruples about killing the agent Titus Allanby. Indeed, he might have found it less inconvenient than trying to smuggle him out of Coruña.

‘So-ho!’ he cried, seizing me by both arms, so that I could not move. ‘It is our fine young gallant. Well met, Christoval Alvarez.’

‘I have no business with you, Robert Poley.’ I spoke coldly, keeping the fear out of my voice.

‘But I might have business with you.’ He stroked my cheek and I twisted away. ‘I’m off to
Denmark. I could do with a fine young
lad
to run errands and share my bed.’

‘I too am away on Sir Francis’s business,’ I said, jerking myself free. ‘So you will need to find some other lad to suit your purposes.’

I pushed past him and ran headlong down the stairs and into the street.

On the final Sabbath before our departure I made my way to the Nuñez house to attend a service to bless the mission and pray for success. I went alone, for my father was weak and tired, and had taken to his bed. As I swayed to the hypnotic rhythm of the prayers, I wondered how many of those around me were saying their farewells, intending never to return if the attack on the Spanish garrison in Lisbon were successful. Sara’s father Dunstan Añez was there. He had invested heavily in the expedition, but would not be going to Portugal, for the Queen could not spare him from his duties as her Purveyor of Groceries and Spices. Dom Antonio, standing between Hector Nuñez and Roderigo Lopez, had come from Eton to attend the synagogue, though in Eton he was a regular Christian church-goer. The three of them were in a state of exaltation which turned me cold with apprehension. During the years since the Inquisition had come for us, I had grown fatalistic. Hopes too high, expectations of glory and triumph, seemed to me to invite a crushing blow from the hand of fate. I suppose my inherited Jewish pessimism had been further shaped by my own life and my education in the classics – a man who indulges in
hubris
must expect to incur
nemesis
.

I had been lax in attending our hidden Jewish services in recent years. Like the others in our Marrano community I was also a baptised Christian, and my mother’s father was a great Christian nobleman. As I had grown older I had become more confused about my faith, not less. Like every citizen of
England I was obliged to attend church every Sunday, or else pay a fine as a recusant. The Christian services of Elizabeth’s largely tolerant church had become comfortingly familiar to me. Even suspected Catholics who compromised and attended the Protestant services would not be examined too closely, provided they kept their Catholic masses private and did not aid the missions of militant priests sent over from France. Even William Byrd, our most eminent composer, was widely known to be a Catholic, but he was tolerated. On the whole, I found the English church accorded much with my own beliefs.

Yet the services in our makeshift synagogue – the central hall of the Nuñez house – brought back memories of my childhood, before the Spanish came. Perhaps this expedition would help me to understand whether I was Portuguese Jew or English Christian. I had seen Anne Lopez climb the stairs to the women’s gallery with her mother. They would be here at Ruy’s urging, but from conversations I had had with her over recent months, I knew that she too was troubled by divided loyalties. For her the magnet of
England was even stronger, since like her mother she had been born here. But for her father, she would hardly have counted as a Stranger any longer.

I joined in the prayers and responses as dutifully as ever, but I felt a stranger here myself, and my thoughts took me elsewhere, to my work and friends here in
London and the unforeseeable prospects which lay ahead.

The night before we were to sail from
London to Plymouth, on the first stage of our voyage, Simon appeared at our door, having somehow got word that I was leaving, though I had been careful to suggest to the players, whenever I saw them, that the likelihood of my joining the expedition was remote. I was half glad and half sorry to see him. I had come to value the friends I had made in these last few years, so his good wishes and prayers meant much to me, but I have never liked saying farewell. As for my most intimate feelings for Simon, I could hardly admit them even to myself.

I brought him into our inner parlour, where my father was dozing beside a small fire. It was a warm day outside, the spring weather having brought early and unreliable sunshine, but he had begun to feel the cold more often, so I had lit a fire to comfort him. I motioned Simon to a stool while I tucked a blanket around my father’s knees, then I poured us each a tankard of small ale.

‘So,’ he said, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, ‘you are off on this expedition against the Spanish in Portugal.’

I nodded. I did not ask where he had heard this. Actors are such very demons for gossip.

‘But why should you go? What has it to do with you? I thought you were done with that past of yours.’

‘Sometimes the past will not let you go,’ I said, watching the bubbles which formed on my ale as I swirled it round and round. ‘Besides . . .’ I hesitated. I was reluctant to admit my father’s folly. ‘Besides, my father has put money into the expedition. I am going to keep a watchful eye on his investment.’

‘Ah, so it is to be a raiding expedition. The treasures Spain has looted from the Americas!’

‘No doubt that is part of it, since Drake is to command the fleet,’ I conceded, without needing to reveal my knowledge of the plans Walsingham had shared with me. ‘But for my father and his friends, the principal purpose is to drive the Spaniards out of
Portugal and restore Dom Antonio to the throne.’

‘Will he make a good king?’

I could tell by the expression on his face that he had heard something of Dom Antonio. I could say little in the defence of such a man. Indeed, the nearer the time drew to when we were to leave, the more absurd did it seem to commit so much money and so many men to put him on the throne. Would he benefit Portugal? I doubted it. But even Dom Antonio was better than the occupation of a hated foreign power and the imposition of the Inquisition on a previously more tolerant nation.

‘Perhaps not a great king,’ I said, as diplomatically as I could, ‘but we Portuguese are his people and he will rule as a Portuguese king amongst his own subjects. The Spaniards treat us little better than they do the savages of the
New World. We exist merely to do their bidding and enrich them. If we resist, we are killed.’

‘Then why should you go back? Will you not be in danger?’

I made much of drinking my ale and thought of the missions Walsingham had set me, and of my own private plans. I could not answer that. I set down my ale and poked at the fire, which did not need it.

He gave me a troubled look and leaned forward to take both my hands in his.

‘Have a care, Kit. Your friends have need of you.’ There was something different about the way he looked at me, as though he were trying to peer into my very soul.

I felt a foolish tightening of my throat and hoped he would not notice the tears blurring my eyes. He must not find me out. He must not. It would be too dangerous by far. I must not weep or I should give myself away.

‘I shall not be fighting,’ I said. I drew my hands gently from his and got up to fetch more ale, my back to him. ‘I go merely to see Dom Antonio crowned, to watch over my father’s investment, and to lend my medical skills if they are needed.’

‘Say rather:
When
they are needed.’ He drew a deep breath. ‘I can see that your role as a physician will be valuable to them. But remember, if your ships are fired on, as surely they will be, cannon fire makes no distinction between soldiers and gentlemen observers who come merely to see a puppet king crowned. And there will be fighting ashore as well. Will you stay aboard ship? I doubt it, for I know you. Nay, you will be in the thick of it, tending the wounded, and, like cannon at sea, cannon and crossbow and musket on land will make no distinction between soldier and physician.’

‘I will promise you to set up my hospital tent well out of range of the guns.’ I spoke as lightly as I could. Burdened with my other knowledge, I had carefully pushed thoughts of the fighting to the back of my mind. ‘Come, Simon, you should be cheering me on my way with good wishes for our success. And besides,’ I said, as the import of his words struck me, ‘why do you call Dom Antonio a puppet king?’

‘Oh, now, Kit, you cannot tell me that he will be anything else? When English money and English ships and English lives have put him on the throne? When the Queen herself bears a quarter of the expense?’

‘She wants to follow up the success of the Armada by crushing Spanish power.’

‘I am sure she does. But once she has put that weak and vain man on the throne, she will not sit back gracefully and allow him free rein. You may count on it, she will expect to be paid back every penny tenfold in taxes and trade concessions. King Antonio will be tied hand and foot to Her Majesty.’

I could say nothing to this. I knew a little about some of the conditions attached to the expedition. I did not expect Simon to have guessed so much and deduced more. Yet he was clever and well-informed. He too attended the discussions of politics and world affairs, as I did, held by
Raleigh at Durham House. I should not have been surprised.

I turned the conversation then and we talked generally of how he and the other players were faring under their new patron, and whether the good weather would last so that they could begin performing at the Theatre in a week or two’s time. And whether this year the harvests would be better, and hunger less amongst the poor.