Prophecy

Chapter Four

Salisbury Court, London

27th September, Year of Our Lord 1583

It feels as if I have barely closed my eyes when there comes a soft, insistent knocking at the door of my chamber. Dawn is just creeping around the edge of the shutters; only bad news brings callers this early. I bundle myself into a pair of under-hose and a shirt to unlatch the door for my impatient visitor, steeling myself, but it is only Leon Dumas, the ambassador’s clerk, who hurtles into the room so quickly in his haste not to be seen that he almost knocks me backwards and cracks his head against the sloping ceiling. Here on the second floor of the house, under the eaves, the rooms are designed for people of my height, not his.

Dumas rubs his forehead and sits heavily on my bed. He is an earnest young man of twenty-seven, tall and skinny with thinning hair and slightly bulging eyes that give him a permanent expression of alarm — though I cannot help feeling that this has intensified since I persuaded him to share with me the ambassador’s correspondence. Now he looks up at me with those big eyes and a pained frown, as if the knock on the head was my doing as well. He is fully dressed.

‘Leon. You are up with the lark — is something the matter?’

He shakes his head.

‘I only wanted to warn you — my lord ambassador has already gone down to his private office to make a start on the day’s correspondence. He was up half the night reading the letters from Mary Stuart that Monsieur Throckmorton brought from Sheffield, and now he sets about writing his replies. He wants them delivered to Throckmorton’s house at Paul’s Wharf before nightfall today — apparently Throckmorton rides for Sheffield again tomorrow at first light.’

‘Good. So Throckmorton expects you some time this afternoon?’

‘I believe so. Castelnau will spend the morning writing his letters and ciphering them and I must be there to assist him. Then he will leave me to write out the fair copies while he and the rest of the household are dining, and when he has eaten he will approve and seal them and I will be dispatched.’

‘So …’ I run over the timing in my mind. ‘We will need to work quickly. Have you seen the letters from Queen Mary?’

He shakes his head, a nervous, twitching motion.

‘No. But the packet is in his writing desk.’

‘Read them while he is out. If you do not have time to make a copy, at least get the sense so that you can relay it. But it may be that she has sent him a new cipher — they change it often for fear of interception. That we must copy, if it is there.’

Dumas swallows hard and nods, sitting on his hands.

‘If I don’t have time to make two copies of his reply before he wants it sealed …?’

I pace the room for a moment, considering.

‘Then we will have to pay a visit to our friend Thomas Phelippes on the way to Master Throckmorton. Don’t look so alarmed, Leon — Phelippes is so gifted in the art of interception, I suspect he may be a wizard. No one will see anything amiss.’

Dumas looks miserable and jiggles on his hands more vigorously.

‘But if we should be caught, Bruno?’

‘Then we will be thrown out into the street,’ I reply solemnly. ‘We will be forced to join a troupe of travelling players. We can offer ourselves to play the ass for Christ’s entry to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.’

‘Bruno —‘

‘Ah — I know what you are going to say. Very well — you can be the front legs.’

‘Must you turn everything to a joke?’

Despite himself, he smiles, while I remember Howard’s sharp insult from last night. A glorified jester. Was that really how they spoke of me in Paris? Queen Elizabeth keeps an Italian fool at court, who goes by the name of Monarcho; am I to be compared with him? It stung because I recognised the truth of it: with no money, land or title to my name, I must make myself indispensable to men of wealth if I hope to thrive, and I have learned the hard way that most men of wealth would rather be entertained than enlightened. But might I not hope to do both? That, at least, was the intention of the book I was now writing, which would set forth my new ideas about the universe in a style that could be read outside the universities, by ordinary men and women, in their own language.

I sit beside Dumas on the bed and put my arm around his shoulder to chivvy him into better spirits.

‘Courage, mon brave. Think of the coins chinking in your purse, if nothing else. You could hop across the river to Southwark and find yourself a willing girl in one of the bawdy-houses. That would put a smile on your face. Besides —‘ I turn with a sigh towards the window, where a pale light slides through the gap in the shutters and slants across the bare boards — ‘I don’t yet know what we are involved in here, Leon, but if we do our work carefully, a great many people may end up owing us their lives. Including,’ I add, in a whisper, as the young clerk’s eyes threaten to pop out of his head, ‘the English queen herself.’

I step out at around eleven into a golden autumn morning, as if the half-hearted English sun were belatedly trying to atone for its absence all through the cold, damp summer. In the embassy garden at Salisbury Court, the trees are a riot of colour, almost luminous against the blue with the dusty sunlight behind them: crimson, ochre, burnt amber, delicate greens still lingering from the summer, all gaudy as the coloured silks Sidney and his friends wear to parade around court. I am dressed, today as every other day, in black; a lone sombre shadow in this landscape of colour. For thirteen years I wore the black habit of the Dominican order; later, when I scraped a living teaching in the universities of Europe, I put on the black gown of doctors and academics. Now that I am free of the constraints of a uniform, I still wear black; it saves me the trouble of thinking about it too much. Fashion has never held much interest for me; sometimes I wonder how the young dandies can move about freely in their costumes, puffed up as they are with ballooning breeches and sleeves, slashed so that the rich linings show through in contrasting colours, or choked by their vast ruffs of starched lace. My only indulgence with the retainer Walsingham pays me is to buy clothes of good quality cloth, shirts of fine linen under a black leather jerkin, cut to fit close to my body, no material wasted. Sidney teases me that I am wearing the same clothes every time he sees me. In fact, they are many different copies of the same clothes; I am fastidious about clean laundry, and change my linen far more often than most of the Englishmen I know. Perhaps this comes from those months I spent running from the Inquisition when I first fled the monastery at Naples; when I slept in roadside inns in the company of rats and lice, sometimes walking miles in a day to put enough distance between myself and Rome, with only the clothes on my back. To recall that part of my life even fleetingly makes me start to itch all over and want to change my shirt.

Through the scattered patterns of bright leaves I walk the length of the garden as the morning grows warmer, a book unopened in my hand. Beyond its boundary wall I hear the cries of boatmen on the river, the soft lapping of the waves against the muddy shoreline. Fowler’s note asked me to meet him at three o’clock today at the Mermaid Tavern on Cheapside; there is nothing for me to do until Dumas has finished copying out the ambassador’s secret letters and is ready to take them to young Master Throckmorton. If luck and timing are on our side, we can take the letters to Walsingham’s man Thomas Phelippes in Leadenhall Street on the way, have them opened, copied and resealed, then Dumas can deliver the originals to Paul’s Wharf while I take the copies to Fowler at the tavern.

I have spent the morning in my room, trying to make some progress on my book. Since my return from Oxford in the spring, this has been my chief occupation; the work that I believe will turn all the established knowledge of the European academies on its head. In the same way that Copernicus’s theory that the Sun and not the Earth lies at the centre of the known universe sent ripples through Christendom, forcing every cosmologist and astronomer to reconsider what they believed to be fact, so my treatise is nothing less than a new and enlightened understanding of religion, one that I hope will open the eyes of those men and women who have a mind to comprehend it to the possibility of unity. My philosophy is nothing less than a revolutionary understanding of the relationship between man and that which we call God, one that transcends the present divisions between Catholic and Protestant that have caused so much needless suffering. I have some hope that Queen Elizabeth of England has a mind equal to understanding my ideas, if I could only secure a chance to present them to her. To this end I have been passing my days as often as I can in Dee’s library, immersing myself in the surviving writings of Hermes Trismegistus and the neoPlatonists, as well as other, secret volumes, full of hard-won wisdom and ancient knowledge, books of which Dee holds the only copy.

But since the night of Sidney’s wedding and the murder of Cecily Ashe, I have been drawn back from the world of ideas to the present violence I hope one day to end. My mind will not settle, so I have brought a book out to the garden, where all I do is scuff the scattered leaves and dwell on the image of Cecily Ashe stretched out on a bed in Richmond Palace in her gentleman’s clothes, her bruised and distorted face, the mark cut into her breast. The death is no longer my business, I suppose, and yet the image of her corpse nags at me; last night I dreamed about the murder, dreamed I was chasing a shadowy figure with a crucifix through the mist in an abandoned graveyard until finally he turned around and I glimpsed beneath his hood the face of Doctor Dee.

This murder reminds me too closely of the deaths I witnessed in Oxford in the spring; this was not violence done in the heat of the moment but a cold-blooded killing meant as a symbol, a warning. But of what? And if it had been the young suitor Abigail had mentioned, what calculated planning he must have put into his work! To woo a young woman for the best part of a month with sweet words and expensive presents, with the intention all along of leaving her cold body as a blank page on which he would write his own message in her blood. I picture the girl Cecily, the way Abigail had described her delight in her secret liaison, the innocence of that first love at seventeen, never imagining that she was inviting her own destruction. Perhaps inevitably my thoughts follow this path to another young woman whose life had been destroyed by falling in love: Sophia, the girl I had known in Oxford who had briefly touched my own heart, though I did not know then that she had already given hers to a man who betrayed her and almost killed her. As if to prolong the discomfort, my memory gropes further back, to Morgana, the woman I had loved two years earlier when I lived in Toulouse. She was in love with me, but as I had neither the money nor the position to marry her, I had slipped away quietly one night to Paris without saying goodbye. I had thought I was doing the right thing, leaving her free to make the marriage that would please her father and give her a life of ease, but she too had died before her time. Was her life also cut short because she made the mistake of falling in love?

I will never know, but I remember the look that passed between Walsingham and Burghley across the body of Cecily Ashe and feel a profound wash of relief that I have no daughter to fear for. Despite the unseasonable warmth, I shiver. The fragility of these girls, how vulnerable they make themselves when they put their trust in men. If I were a praying man, I would pray that the maid Abigail remains safe. As it is, all I can do is hope that the killer believes his message has been understood. If not, he may feel the need to write it again.

All this musing has brought me to the end of the garden. Turning back along the path towards the house, I am almost bowled over by a small beribboned dog chasing a ball made of rags and chased in its turn by a girl of about five years who comes flying through the piles of leaves, her hair and her blue gown whipping behind her. The ball rolls to my feet and I snatch it up just before the dog reaches it. I hold it aloft and the dog’s yapping grows frantic as it leaps and twists off the ground, its eyes fixed on my hand. The little girl slows to a halt in front of me, her expression wary; I lob the rag ball to her over the dog’s head and the child is so surprised that she catches it, more by accident than design. The dog flings itself at her and she scoops it up into her arms, giving it the ball, which it worries with a comical growl, as if it had subdued a great enemy.

‘Pierrot, tu es mechant!‘ the child scolds.

‘Pierrot?’ I ask, crouching so that I can look her in the eye. ‘He’s a boy?’ She nods, bashful. ‘So, the ribbons?’

‘He likes them.’ She shrugs, as if this should be obvious. A woman’s voice comes from beyond the wall.

‘Katherine! Katherine, viens ici! Ou es-tu?’

Marie de Castelnau appears in the archway that divides this part of the garden from the more manicured paths nearer the house. The rich light touches her hair as she brushes a stray curl away from her face, giving her a faint halo; she is frowning but as her gaze alights on me and her daughter, her expression softens and she slows her pace towards us.

‘Ah. Monsieur l’heretique. Bonjour.’

‘Madame.’ I bow.

She bends to the child and lays a hand on her shoulder. ‘Katherine, take Pierrot inside, look — your shoes are all dirty now and it’s nearly time for your lesson. You can play in the garden afterwards, if you have worked hard.’

Katherine sticks out her bottom lip. ‘I want to have my lesson out here.’ She points at my book. ‘Monsieur l’heretique is allowed his books outdoors.’

Marie glances at me and smiles, half apologetic, before turning back to her daughter.

‘Well, Monsieur l’heretique is allowed to do all sorts of things that are not proper and you had better not follow his example. He is very wicked.’ She winks.

The child looks up at me, her mouth open, waiting for confirmation or denial; I make my eyes wide and nod.

‘I’m afraid it’s true.’

She giggles.

‘Go on, off you go,’ Marie says, sharper this time, patting the girl’s back. Katherine scampers away, the little dog bleating at her heels.

‘I’m sorry — my daughter thinks that is your name now.’ Castelnau’s wife laughs and falls easily into step beside me, folding her arms across her chest, as we begin to walk slowly back towards the house. ‘It’s what King Henri calls you. It is meant affectionately. On his part, I mean,’ she adds hastily, glancing quickly sideways and then back to her feet.

‘You spoke to King Henri about me?’

She laughs again, a gentle, fluting sound.

‘No. But your name came up often when I was with Queen Louise. I have known her since we were girls. The king misses you, apparently. He says there are no original thinkers left in Paris now that Monsieur l’heretique has abandoned him for London.’

‘Well, it is kind of him to say so.’ We walk in silence for a few paces, the sun warm on our faces.

‘I must say, I was intrigued to meet you,’ she continues, after a moment, and there is a silkiness in her voice that sounds a warning note. ‘Queen Louise said you were a great favourite among the ladies in Paris.’

‘Was I?’ This is news to me; there were idle flirtations at the Parisian court, but nothing worth the notice of the queen consort, as I recall. After my experience in Toulouse, I had vowed to devote my energy to writing and to harden my heart against the possibility of love.

‘Oh, yes, indeed,’ Marie says, lightly touching my arm and allowing her hand to rest for a moment, ‘because you were a great enigma, apparently. There were many stories told about you, but no one ever got close enough to sort the truth from the rumours. And of course you frustrated all the ladies by never choosing any of them, which only fuelled the gossip.’

‘I had not the means to marry.’

‘Perhaps you had not the inclination?’ she says, with a sly smile. I pause and look at her. Does she mean what I think?

‘There have been women,’ I say, defensive. ‘I mean to say, I have loved women, in the past. But I have always had the misfortune to fall for the ones I cannot have.’

She smiles, as if to herself. ‘Isn’t it always more interesting that way? But I did not mean to imply what you thought.’ A brief hesitation. ‘You know it is said of Lord Henry Howard, though?’

‘What — that he doesn’t look at women?’ I recall Howard’s fist thumping on the table the night before, the blaze of his eyes. Perhaps that would account for his air of suppressed rage.

‘He has never married. Although,’ Marie adds, leaning in with a confidential air, ‘it may only be that he has been put off marriage by example. You have heard why his brother was executed?’

‘Treason, I thought?’

‘Yes. But the exact nature of his treason — you did not know? The Duke of Norfolk intended to marry Mary Stuart and so become King of England when she returned to the throne, after they were rid of Elizabeth.’

She nods enthusiastically, waiting for a response, her blue eyes lit up with the thrill of her story, as if she has told me something she should not. She is standing inappropriately close, her hand still on my arm, and we have now walked far enough to be visible from the house. Instinctively I glance up and see a figure standing silhouetted there, watching us, but though I shield my eyes and squint, I cannot make out who he is. Immediately I take a step back from Marie, as if her mere proximity makes me guilty of something. I am already betraying Castelnau on one front; the last thing I want is for him to suspect me of dealing dishonestly with him on another.

‘Henry Howard does not wholly trust you,’ she says, her tone suddenly serious. ‘Because of your breach with Rome. But my husband defends you and says you are a true Catholic and a friend to France, whatever strange philosophies you may toy with. And Howard responds that if you were a true Catholic you would have been reconciled to the Church by now.’

‘What are you asking me?’

‘I don’t know. I suppose I find you something of an enigma, too. They can’t both be right. I must confess that I have never met a true Catholic who was happy to be excluded from the Church. Why do you not repent and find a bishop to give you the sacrament of reconciliation?’

‘I was excommunicated for leaving the Dominican order. If the excommunication were lifted, I would be obliged to return, and I fear I am not made to be a monk.’

She gives me a knowing look, half-smiling, at this; she assumes I mean for the obvious reason. She assumes wrongly: I mean because I cannot accept being told what to think. A monk copies the wisdom that already exists; he is not supposed to discover a new philosophy of his own.

‘Well, Monsieur l’heretique — I shall not give up on you. I will pray for your soul. Perhaps with patience and prayers, we may bring you back to the fold.’

She laughs then, and skips ahead of me, holding her skirts away from her shoes to kick at fallen leaves. I do not know what to make of this woman. Perhaps she just enjoys gossip and is starved of company at the embassy, but she strikes me as too shrewd for that and there is something in her manner that makes me guarded. I can’t be sure if she is flirting with me to amuse herself, or if she suspects me to be more or less than I appear and is trying to catch me out; either way, I determine that I must not be flattered or beguiled by her attentions into giving anything away. One thing at least is certain: there is a great deal more to Madame de Castelnau than a pious Catholic wife. But her news about Howard’s brother is worth knowing.

‘So is the position still vacant?’ I call out, as she pauses to pick a sprig of purple heather from a bush at the side of the path. ‘Mary Stuart’s husband, I mean?’

She turns, shredding the plant between her fingers and scattering the pieces.

‘Why, are you interested?’ Her clear laugh rings across the garden. ‘I must warn you, Bruno — that lady’s husbands are unusually prone to misfortune. The first died of an abscess, the second she had blown up and the third died insane in a Danish prison. And the Duke of Norfolk lost his head for merely aspiring to be the fourth.’

At that moment the figure watching from the house detaches himself from the wall and is revealed to be Claude de Courcelles, his blond hair reflecting shards of light as he bounces down the steps towards us.

‘Madame — your daughter is looking for you to begin her lessons.’ He effects a fussy little bow, impeded by his ruff, and sends me a scathing glance. Marie tosses her head and tuts.

‘Where is her governess? She should be dealing with her. Can I not have a moment’s peace?’ With a rustle of satin, she hitches up her skirts to climb the steps to the house. ‘By the way, Courcelles,’ she says airily, over her shoulder, ‘Bruno is thinking of marrying the Scottish queen. What do you say to that?’

‘My congratulations.’ The secretary offers me a thin smile, hard as ice. ‘Although you may find she prefers a gentleman of independent means.’

‘I hear she is not that choosy,’ Marie calls from the doorway. ‘Apparently she is monstrously fat these days.’

Courcelles and I watch her lithe figure disappear into the recesses of Salisbury Court and exchange a glance. With exaggerated courtesy, he gestures for me to lead the way.

‘You’ve heard the news from court, I suppose?’ Fowler says in his lilting accent, as I slide into the settle opposite him at the Mermaid. The tavern spans the fork between Friday Street and Bread Street on Cheapside, east of the great church of St Paul’s, and is popular with merchants and professionals; most of the men crowded around the wooden tables are dressed in well-cut cloth with feathers in their caps and meet here to argue over deals and contracts, shipments, lawsuits, loans. Behind the hubbub of lively conversation and the occasional oath you catch the chink of coins. The air is warm and yeasty; after casting my eyes around for some moments I have found the Scotsman tucked into a table at the back of the tap-room, sitting in a spill of sunlight scored with diamond shadows from the window panes. The high-backed wooden settles effectively barricade us in our corner from any prying eyes or sharp ears. When I shake my head, he leans in closer, pushing his fringe out of his eyes. ‘I was at Whitehall this morning. They have arrested Sir Edward Bellamy for the murder of the queen’s maid.’

‘Really? Was he the girl’s lover, then?’

‘He says not, but it turns out to be his clothes she was wearing when they found her. The young fool forgot that his monogram was embroidered on the shirt.’

‘But he denies the murder?’

‘Naturally. He says they were old clothes the girl asked him to sell her, but apart from that they had barely spoken before. It’s true that it’s an old trick these maids use for slipping out in disguise, but it seems he is not believed about the rest. They have dragged him kicking and screaming to the Tower and the girl’s father has ridden down from Nottingham breathing hellfire and demanding satisfaction. Poor fellow will have made a loss on his investment.’

Fowler makes a grim face and sits back while a serving girl arrives to fill our pots of beer from an earthenware jug. She attempts to exchange pleasantries but soon concludes that my companion and I are too sober and dull to be out for any merriment. When she has gone, he raises his beer towards me.

‘Your good health, Doctor Bruno. I am glad we finally have the chance to talk. I have heard glowing reports of you from our mutual friend.’ He arches his eyebrow to indicate the secrecy that binds us.

‘Likewise, Master Fowler.’ I clink the pot briefly with his. He gives a curt nod, indicating the table with his eyes, and slides one hand underneath it on to his lap. It takes me a moment to understand him; feeling a little foolish, I draw from inside my doublet the copies of Castelnau’s letters lately made at the house of Thomas Phelippes and slip them across my lap into Fowler’s waiting palm. With practised fingers, he tucks them deftly away inside his clothes and wraps both hands around his tankard of beer. I glance briefly over my shoulder around the tavern, but the exchange appears to have gone unnoticed.

‘Thank you. I shall take these back to Whitehall this afternoon,’ he murmurs, barely audible.

‘May I ask you something?’

‘Please.’ He opens his hands in a welcoming gesture.

‘What exactly do you do at court?’

For the first time, he laughs, and his face relaxes. His fringe falls across his forehead again as he dips his head and he pushes it back, revealing keen blue eyes.

‘I make myself useful. You know how it works at the English court — the same as anywhere else, I suppose. Noblemen send their sons to recommend themselves to the queen in the hope of advancement. The difficulty is that there is only one queen and dozens of hopeful courtiers all chasing her favour.’ He pauses to take a draught. ‘So you end up with a lot of young gentlemen who have nothing to do all day but hang about the galleries and halls in the hope that the queen might pass by at some point and take notice of them. In the meantime, there is ample opportunity for them to gamble away their fathers’ money, or trap themselves in a hasty marriage because they’ve got some girl with child, or bluster their way into dangerous duels. And when they find themselves in trouble, they are often too afraid or ashamed to ask their fathers for help.’

‘Which is where you come in.’

‘Which is where I come in. They are very inexperienced in the world, some of these young lads, and often lonely — they want advice and someone to listen. And I have good connections in the City — I know lawyers who can make unwanted marriage contracts go away, find solutions to bad debts, that kind of thing. People who can arrange loans discreetly. This way, I learn everybody’s business around the court, their affairs, their complaints, their alliances, sometimes even the state of their souls. All those snippets of information that interest our mutual friend.’

‘I can see how that would be useful. And they trust you, these courtiers?’

‘They are grateful to me. I am known to keep a confidence. But I suspect at least half of them don’t even remember my Christian name, which is all to the good.’

I regard him with interest. His face is beardless, his hair mid-brown and his skin pale. Only his eyes are particularly memorable; they burn with an intense light, sharp and alert. With his soft manners, he melts easily into the back ground, the ideal observer. I begin to understand his value to Walsingham.

‘But with all the confidences that come your way, you heard nothing to make you suspect this Sir Edward before he was arrested?’ I ask, keeping my voice low.

‘He was one who lived quietly. He always seemed a gentle sort.’ Fowler looks perplexed for a moment, then drains his pot and raises a hand for more beer.

‘Do they suspect a religious motive for the killing?’

‘I know no more than I have told you. Apparently he has a cousin who was once fined for refusing to attend church, but then most families have one of those. Edward Bellamy was not among those suspected of dangerous papist leanings, if that’s what you mean. But I dare say they will get a confession from him in the Tower, one way or another. They will want this business wrapped up quickly so the queen may sleep easy in her bed.’

His fingers curl slowly into a fist and stretch out again as he says this; I wince. It is better not to think about what they do in the Tower. In the summer I saw a prisoner after the interrogators had finished with him; death would have come as a blessing. This thought triggers another memory.

‘Is he a handsome man, this Sir Edward?’ I ask, as the serving girl reappears with her jug. Fowler looks surprised, and amused.

‘I can’t say I’ve considered him in those terms. It’s not how I usually assess young men.’

‘Nor I,’ I add hastily. ‘I only wondered — you know: if he had seduced the girl or forced her.’

Fowler is still looking at me with a curious expression.

‘Now that you mention it — I don’t suppose he would be accounted handsome to women. He has a slight disfigurement — what we call in English a hare lip — and he is rather sickly looking. Not that a spell in the Tower will do much for his looks, either.’ He picks up his beer and we consider this in silence for a moment. Then he leans in closer. ‘But we must concentrate on our own business. Any further news from the embassy, besides these?’ He pats his breast, where he has tucked the letters inside his doublet.

‘Nothing much since last night.’

Leon Dumas and I had walked to Thomas Phelippes’s house after dinner with the packet for Throckmorton to take to Sheffield Castle, Dumas fretting and griping the whole way and continuing to do so all the while Phelippes was expertly removing the seals from Castelnau’s letters to Mary so that we could make our own copies for Fowler to pass on to Walsingham. To my eyes the resealed letters bore no trace of having been intercepted, but Dumas was almost feverish with anxiety when he set off again to Paul’s Wharf to make his delivery; I had to buy him a drink and wait for him to calm down before I was willing to send him on his way.

‘Turn up on his doorstep in this state and you may as well hang a sign around your neck saying “I’ve given all these to the Privy Council first”,’ I told him. Dumas had wrung his hands. ‘What if she can tell they’ve been opened?’ he bleated. ‘Queen Mary, I mean? Castelnau will kill me!’

‘By the time they get to Mary, they will have been through so many people’s hands, how could anyone point to you?’ I sighed. ‘Besides, Castelnau could not kill a soul,’ I added. ‘Although I wouldn’t put it past some of his friends.’

Now, the originals have been taken to Throckmorton in time for his departure tomorrow and Dumas is on his way back to the embassy. Thus far, the system is working smoothly. I wrap my hands around my mug and lower my voice.

‘The ambassador sends Mary a long letter — four pages, all in code. But his clerk has managed to take a copy of the new cipher, so that should be straightforward. It’s in the package you have. And Lord Henry Howard sends her a copy of his book against prophecy in which he signs himself “votre frere“.’

Fowler nods. ‘How touching. He would have been her brother by marriage, if his own brother’s plot had succeeded. Was there anything concealed inside the book?’

‘No. Phelippes checked when he opened the package.’

Fowler grows thoughtful. ‘Then the book itself must contain some message, or some significance. One of us will have to read it. You are the scholar, I believe.’

I roll my eyes in mock protest. ‘I’ll find myself a copy. At least I will be better armed to argue with him over dinner next time.’

Fowler smiles, but lifts a finger in warning. ‘Be very careful around Howard, Bruno. He believes his family has suffered more than any from the Protestant reforms and he is quite willing to be ruthless in return. The Howards forfeited the lands and titles of the Duchy of Norfolk when his brother was executed, and he has been biding his time for revenge.’

‘And now he wants a war.’

Fowler grimaces.

‘It begins to look that way. None of them really cares about Mary Stuart, they all use her as an excuse to pursue their own interests. But they are quite willing to plunge England into war to achieve them. Has Mendoza visited Salisbury Court yet?’

‘The Spanish ambassador? I am not sure I would recognise him.’

‘Oh, you’ll know Don Bernadino de Mendoza if you see him. Looks like a bear, voice like a war drum. As soon as he comes to speak privately with Castelnau, let me know and I can tell our mutual friend. If Howard and the Duke of Guise can secure Spanish money, all this talk of invasion might grow into more than words.’

‘Isn’t the talk of treason enough, if the queen knew?’

He gives a brisk shake of his head. ‘The queen will not make accusations against Howard or Mary Stuart — nor the ambassadors of France or Spain, for that matter — without absolute proof that they mean her or the country harm. They are all too powerful. And I mean proof that can be held in front of their faces in a court of law. Our friend wants this business to progress far enough that someone spells out their intentions on paper and signs their name to it.’

‘It’s a dangerous game to play.’ I find myself unreasonably irritated by the easy assurance with which he asserts Walsingham’s intentions, as if he is privy to Master Secretary’s innermost thoughts on a daily basis. I recognise also that this is only jealousy on my part; an irrational wish that I were as intimate with Walsingham, or as trusted.

‘Certainly.’ Fowler presses his lips together until they almost disappear. ‘Though it’s no game. I understand from my sources in Paris that Guise is already mustering troops, to be deployed whenever they have the word that England is ready.’

His sources in Paris. He talks as if he is an old hand at this intelligence business, though he can’t be more than twenty-six or —seven.

‘Have you served him long? Our friend, I mean.’

He shrugs.

‘A few years.’

‘And how did you come to be involved in all this?’ I ask, waving a hand vaguely to indicate the web that Walsingham weaves around himself, and which we do not name.

His mouth curves into a half smile.

‘Adventure, at first, I suppose. My father is a respectable Edinburgh burgess who intended me for the law. But when I arrived in Paris a few years ago to pursue my studies, I was surprised by the number of disaffected young Englishmen I found there — converts out of Oxford and Cambridge, tempers running high, all ready to whip up a Catholic rebellion against the English queen.’ He pauses to take a drink. ‘Of course, it’s easy to talk about revolution among your fellows from the safety of a Paris tavern, and it was mostly bluster, but I soon came to see that one or two among them were sincere, and knew something of significance. All I had to do was sit quiet and nod in the right places, and they assumed I was of their mind.’ He glances cautiously around. ‘But I was also sharp enough to realise that what I learned among them might be of considerable value to others, so I waited until I gathered a hoard of useful tidbits and then I presented myself at the English ambassador’s house. It was he who put me in touch with our mutual friend. Afterwards I returned to Scotland and set myself to work cultivating friendships among the few prominent Scottish Catholic lords, those who favour Mary Stuart. I travel back to Edinburgh now and again to keep up with the politics there. It’s essential to our friend to know their intentions, and it seems I have successfully passed myself off among the Catholics there and here as one who supports their cause.’

‘Very enterprising of you.’

He inclines his head as if to say, Perhaps.

‘It was the first time in my life I felt I’d chosen a path for myself, instead of following what my father laid out for me. That was exciting to me.’ He shrugs, implying that I am welcome to think what I like of this.

‘And what of your religion?’

‘Religion?’ He looks surprised. ‘It was never my principal motive, strange as that may sound. Yes, I was raised in the Protestant Church, but I have often felt I have more in common with moderate Catholics than with the more extreme devotees of my own faith. Excessive religion of any kind is dangerous, in my view. Elizabeth Tudor understands this, I think.’

I nod, with feeling.

‘And you?’ he prompts. ‘I know you call yourself a Catholic at Salisbury Court.’

‘It’s a question of freedom,’ I say, after a while, looking into my mug. ‘There is no freedom of thought under the rule of the Inquisition, no freedom to say What if? and then to imagine or speculate, and in such a climate, how can knowledge progress? The book I am writing now, for instance — in my own country I would be burned just for setting those ideas on paper. So when Wal—, when our friend approached me, I agreed because I thought the intellectual freedoms of Elizabeth’s England worth defending.’

‘But you have still not told me your religion,’ he says, with a knowing look.

‘I have been charged with heresy by Catholics in Rome and Calvinists in Geneva,’ I counter, smiling, ‘and when it comes to factions, I side with neither. My philosophy transcends both. But for that, you will have to read my book.’

‘I await it eagerly,’ he says, lifting his mug with a mischievous glint in his eye.

We sit in companionable silence for a few moments, finishing our beer.

‘But don’t you ever feel …’ I shake my head, lay my hands on the table. ‘I don’t know. Guilty?’

He regards me with those clear, serious eyes.

‘For betraying trust? For having more than one face? Of course,’ he says, and smiles sadly. ‘To feel no guilt would mean you had no conscience, and our friend would never trust a man with no conscience, for there would also be no loyalty. I placate my conscience with the thought that if I must betray someone on a personal level, I do it for the good of the country.’

I nod, thoughtfully; this is the argument Walsingham has always presented to me. What he doesn’t tell you is that personal relationships are often the more compelling, and that to betray someone whose trust you have won pulls against human nature.

‘You feel this keenly though, I think,’ Fowler whispers, studying me carefully. ‘You are fond of the ambassador.’

I acknowledge this weakness with a tilt of my head.

‘He is the one good man in Salisbury Court.’

‘He is trying to please too many people,’ Fowler says, as if this is the definitive judgement on the matter. ‘That is what will undo him. But guard yourself against sentiment, Bruno. If he ends up assisting with plans for a Catholic invasion, he is a traitor, regardless of his good intentions.’

‘I know this.’ I catch the sting in my voice; again, I find I resent his tone of seniority, and am ashamed of myself for it. Does he imagine I need to be told how to perform my role in the embassy? Perhaps I am being over-sensitive; it is a valuable warning for anyone in our business, as I learned to my cost in Oxford.

‘Of course.’ Fowler sits back, holding his hands up as if to mitigate any offence. ‘And for now, it is all about the letters. This enterprise depends on you and your friend the clerk.’

We pay for the beer and press our way through the crowded tavern, emerging into the slanting afternoon light. The weather has improved the mood of the Londoners; as we walk down Friday Street, people smile and greet one another, remarking on the unseasonable warmth, instead of shoving you aside with their usual grim-faced determination. Fowler and I walk in silence at first, subdued by our conversation; only now, as I watch the passers-by cheerfully going about their business, am I able to understand the weight of the work we are engaged in. We are talking about nothing less than a possible invasion, by France or Spain or both, whose ultimate aim is to unseat Elizabeth and bring England back under the control of Rome. And what will become of her Protestant subjects then, these ruddy-faced market traders and broad-hipped goodwives merrily sidestepping the horseshit on the cobbles as they wave to one another and call out for the hundredth time that you’d think it was July, wouldn’t you?

Sidney and Walsingham were both in Paris during the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre of 1572, when ordinary Huguenot families were systematically slaughtered in their thousands by Catholic forces and the city’s gutters ran with Protestant blood. This, I know, is what Walsingham fears above all: the same happening in the streets of London if the Catholics take power again. In Paris, there are plenty of people who murmur that the Duke of Guise was responsible for the bloodshed on St Bartholomew’s Day.

‘This is where I leave you,’ Fowler says, as we reach the corner of Watling Street. ‘If you need to get a message to our friend, you can reach me at my lodgings close by the cock-pit on St Andrew’s Hill.’ He pauses, laying a hand on my arm. ‘Watch who comes to Mass at Salisbury Court this evening. See if Howard brings any Englishmen we don’t already know about. And keep an eye on Archibald Douglas. He is not quite the drunken boor he pretends to be.’

‘Then he is a master of deception,’ I say. ‘I wonder that Castelnau and Howard put up with his manners.’

‘They tolerate him because Mary Stuart tells them to. And Douglas trades on the fact that she is deeply in his debt. You know it was he who engineered the murder of her second husband, Lord Darnley?’

‘The one who was blown up?’

‘The very one.’ Seeing my eyes grow wider, he smiles. ‘That is why Douglas may not go back to Scotland — there is a warrant out for his arrest. He is a notorious intriguer, and suspected of other political conspiracies to murder besides. And he is devilishly clever in the way he works his hooks into people — witness the fact that King James likes him, though he is suspected of murdering James’s own father. Women apparently find him beguiling.’

‘There is no accounting for women’s likes,’ I say, picturing Douglas’s three-day growth of silvered stubble and his belches. Fowler rolls his eyes and nods wholeheartedly, as people step around us. ‘What’s the story about the pie?’

‘Ah, you had better have that from the horse’s mouth.’ He grins. ‘Only Douglas can give that tale the savour it deserves. I’m sure your chance will come. Well — we shall meet again soon, Bruno. Meanwhile, bring me word if any Spanish envoy sets foot in Salisbury Court. Good luck.’ He nods briefly, turns on his heel and is swallowed into the colourful jostling crowds.

The sun has sunk lower over the rooftops as evening eases in, washing London in forgiving amber light that flashes from window panes as I make my way home through the city. On a day such as this, I begin to think I could perhaps learn to feel at home here. Above me, a riot of painted signs creak gently in the breeze, emblazoned with bright pictures proclaiming apothecaries, chandlers, barber-surgeons, merchants of cloth and wine and taverns named for animals of every kind and hue — black swans, blue boars, red foxes, white harts, hounds, hares, cocks and even unicorns. At each side of the thoroughfare a steady stream of people press by: street vendors crying their wares, men with cages of squawking chickens swinging from poles across their shoulders, women with baskets of oranges balanced on their heads and pedlars with wooden trays fastened around their necks full of all kinds of oddities — combs, quills, buttons, brushes and knives, sometimes all jumbled together. In the vast churchyard of St Paul’s, which is more like a marketplace, beggar children thread barefoot through the crowds, importuning the better-dressed ladies and gentlemen, while on one corner a ragged man stands playing a battered old lute and singing a forlorn song, hoping to be thrown a few coins. The smell of cooking meat fights with the stink of rotting refuse, and the richer sort hold pomanders and posies of flowers close to their noses to keep the vapours at bay.

As I cross the courtyard, past where the former shrines and chapels are now fallen into disrepair or turned into stalls for booksellers and traders, a pamphlet-seller steps in front of me, thrusting his wares in my face. I almost dismiss him, but the image on the front of his pamphlet catches my eye and I take one to look more closely. Here, again, are the symbols of Jupiter and Saturn conjoined, beneath a bold title: End of Days? The fellow selling it holds out a hand for his penny, his fingers waggling impatiently. He has his hood up, despite the sun; a wise precaution, since I can see at a glance that neither the printer nor the author has dared put his name to this piece of work, meaning that it is printed illegally. Intrigued, I scrabble for a coin and walk away, bumping into people as I read the thing. The anonymous author writes with a doom-mongering tone: he has attempted to cast the queen’s horoscope from her nativity and tie his dramatic predictions to the coming of the Fiery Trigon, the terrifying alignment of the great planets whose symbols decorate the front. Queen Elizabeth’s days are numbered, he writes; God will smite England with war and famine and her disobedient subjects will cry out for a saviour. Inside, there is a woodcut of a devil prodding a man with a pitchfork. I tuck the pamphlet into my jerkin to save for Walsingham, though I imagine if he has not already seen it, he soon will.

I have barely closed the front door behind me at Salisbury Court when Courcelles materialises out of the shadows beside the staircase, as if he has been waiting for my arrival.

‘There is a boy here says he has a letter for you,’ he announces, resting one delicate white hand on the carved wooden eagle that decorates the end of the banister. ‘He has been here the best part of the afternoon and, try as we might, we could not persuade him to leave it for you, not even for a shilling. Nor will he tell us who sent him. He says his instructions are to put it into your hands alone and it was a most urgent and confidential matter.’ His fine eyebrows arch gracefully as he says this; evidently he expects me to offer some explanation.

‘Then I had better see him,’ I reply evenly, though my pulse quickens. I think first of Walsingham, then Sidney, then Dee; any one of them might want to contact me as a matter of urgency, but Walsingham would surely not arouse suspicion by sending an obviously secretive message directly to the embassy, and Sidney is still on his honeymoon, as far as I know. That leaves Dee, and my gut clenches; has Ned Kelley done something to him?

Courcelles presses his lips together and points me in the direction of the stables at the side of the house. There I find a skinny boy of about twelve years old sitting miserably on a straw bale, picking at his fingernails while the stable hands jeer at him in French. He shows signs of having been in a scuffle.

‘I am Bruno. You have something for me?’

He leaps to his feet as if stung, and pulls a crumpled letter out from inside his jacket. He wears no livery but he is not poorly dressed. He beckons me closer and passes me the letter as if it contained secret intelligence.

‘From Abigail Morley.’ His voice is barely a whisper. ‘She said I must only put it in your hands, sir, though they tried to take it from me.’ He glances resentfully at the stable boys, who twist awkwardly and look away.

‘You did well.’ I find a coin for his trouble and see him out of the side gate, before pausing in a pool of shadow, away from curious eyes, to tear open the letter. It is written in an elegant, curling hand; Abigail asks me to meet her tomorrow at eleven in the morning at the Holbein Gate, Whitehall. She says she is afraid.