Francis spent Saturday recovering from Friday’s twenty-mile return trip from Gorhambury, mostly sitting up in bed mulling over the conjectures he’d discussed with his mother, his most trusted confidante. He wouldn’t so much as hint at the idea to Tom. The risk of being wrong far outweighed any putative benefits from being right. Robert Cecil, the engineer behind Martin Marprelate, constructing the whole controversy to obstruct Archbishop Whitgift? The mere thought of explaining that to anyone new made his neck prickle as if encircled by a rough hemp noose.
He shouldn’t think about it. He mustn’t think about it. But the more he scolded himself, the more his mind refused to let it go. He needed to discuss the idea with someone else, someone discreet, who knew his uncle and cousin as well as he did. Someone like his Aunt Elizabeth.
He wrote her a note inviting himself to Sunday dinner with Tom and felt better for having taken that step. Saturday afternoon, he went out for a good long walk and then added three drops of poppy juice to his bedtime cup of spiced wine. He managed to fall asleep sometime after midnight, but even in his dreams he wrestled with his doubts.
The sermon on Sunday morning helped soothe his mind by virtue of its sheer inconsequence. The chaplain never exerted himself between terms. But Francis left the pew feeling more settled, having arrived at a viable compromise. He could not in good conscience ignore the possibility that his own cousin might be party to the greatest deception perpetrated on the English people in his lifetime.
Well, that was an exaggeration. Martin wasn’t plotting against Her Majesty’s life; on the contrary, he repeatedly claimed to love her as much as any loyal Englishman. Although that could be construed as another point in favor of the Cecils as conspirators.
Francis couldn’t ignore it, but neither could he investigate it directly. For one thing, he wouldn’t know where to begin. He could hardly have Robert followed day and night, and even if he could, it wouldn’t help. How many persons must visit his office at Burghley House on any given day? Men and women of all stations, one presumed, if he’d taken over the Lord Treasurer’s intelligencers. Any one of them might carry a slim octavo tucked into his doublet to pass on along the chain to Martin’s printer.
His uncle had asked him to catch a murderer, not Martin Marprelate. In fact, Robert had said it in so many words. “Leave Martin alone.” A suggestion or a command?
Francis determined to focus his attention — or rather Tom’s attention — on the circle of pamphleteers and whatever scraps of he could glean from the depositions taken from the sad fools Canon Bancroft had interrogated so far.
He might risk one more very delicate exploration of Robert’s potential criminality, the attractive axiom on which his theory rested. At dinner today, he would lead his aunt into a discussion of Robert’s character and elicit her opinion of his taking on so many new functions. It would be only natural to ask her who she thought Martin Marprelate might be. Lady Russell was every bit as quick-witted as the other Cooke sisters. She’d grasp the connection between those topics at once.
He dressed in his second-best suit, the lightweight black with gray silk linings. While Pinnock laced doublet to hose, Francis advised the boy to spend the afternoon practicing his catechism so as to be better prepared next time Lady Bacon came to town. A waste of breath. The minute he left the house, Pinnock would curl up on his bed with the latest pamphlet about monstrous births and fearsome beasts, sucking sweets and sipping his master’s beer.
Francis jogged down the stairs and rapped on Tom’s door. So convenient to have his assistant living in the same house. Tom had dressed in his best suit, as he always did on Sundays, and combed his curly blond locks into some degree of submission. He’d made a special effort to look his best today in the vain hope of charming Lady Elizabeth Russell into releasing three hundred pounds from his estates to pay for his special livery.
Francis couldn’t blame him for trying, though he couldn’t remember a case in which his aunt had surrendered any particle of lands or rents.
As they walked through the alley that ran between the rows of new houses in Fulwood’s Rents and on across Holborn to the river, Tom told him about his visit to Robert Greene’s house. They agreed that the tumble downstairs could well be Martin’s minion’s latest attempt to silence his opponents and that their mission was all the more urgent. But they despaired of getting a useable identification from the witnesses Tom had met so far.
“We could try setting a trap,” Tom suggested, “using Nashe as bait.”
“In an alley at midnight?” Francis dismissed the idea, partly because he couldn’t see how they could control the situation, but mainly because Robert had suggested it too.
As they approached the wharf where they would find a wherry to take them down to Blackfriars, Francis said, “Remember that we must keep our new commission a secret, even from Lady Russell and Lady Alice. Especially Lady Alice.”
“I said I would, and I keep my word.”
“I meant no offense. I’m reminding myself as much as you. I intend to ask my aunt what she thinks of Martin Marprelate, especially now that he’s begun publishing again.”
“Ha! She must be one of his greatest admirers. He’s probably living large at Bisham Abbey even as we speak.”
“I sincerely hope not. Although, I concede the possibility.” Francis could think of half a dozen well-placed widows who might be sheltering Martin or his press. “We mustn’t imply that we suspect her of that.”
“She’d take it as a compliment. One thing I like about my guardian — she isn’t afraid to express her opinions.” Tom laughed, more pacifically this time. “She’ll refuse me, won’t she?”
“I would be astonished if she didn’t.”
“Well, a man must struggle to reach his dreams, else what’s the point of having them?”
An intriguing notion, if awkwardly expressed.
They made the short trip downriver in companionable silence, enjoying the breeze skimming over the water. Lady Alice welcomed them as they entered the house, inviting Francis to visit the orchard with her while Lady Russell gave an audience to her ward.
Little had changed since Francis’s last tour of his aunt’s walled gardens, although they always afforded a pleasing respite from the city’s grime and grayness, even in winter. The orchard, though small, supplied enough fruit for the household as well as occasional gifts for Francis and Tom.
They strolled slowly around the paths, examining each detail of the gardener’s efforts and their effects. As Lady Alice pointed to this mounding herb or that flowering vine, Francis appreciated the newfound mildness of her manner. She had grown calmer and more womanly under his aunt’s tutelage. She’d kicked and flailed against her lot for a time, under the unwholesome influence of her uncle, but seemed at last to have reconciled herself with the necessary truths of life.
She was the better for it, by appearances. This observation affirmed Francis’s conviction that Tom was also better off under Lady Russell’s guidance. True, the lad had attained the ripe old age of twenty-one, but he was newly hatched as a gentleman and had a lot to learn. They should both be grateful for his aunt’s generosity.
A servant came out to call them in for dinner. They gathered around the table, with Lady Russell at the head. Francis sat on her right and Tom on his. Lady Alice sat on the other side of the table. Tom took his seat with tight lips and a set jaw. He met Lady Alice’s raised eyebrows with a slight lift of his shoulders. She frowned prettily and his expression relaxed. It would appear those two continued to communicate in spite of their rigorous separation. Happily, policing that relationship was not Francis’s job.
As the first course was served and wine cups filled, Lady Russell engaged Francis in talk about Gray’s Inn. She liked to be kept abreast of the benchers’ meetings as a matter of general interest. There was little to report in this dull season between legal terms. Some men lived there year round, as he did, but the majority went to their homes in other counties and wouldn’t come back until Michaelmas term began in late September.
The light conversation did not interfere with their enjoyment of the artfully prepared meal. The principal dish in the first course was a beautiful turbot pie, accompanied by fresh salmon, eggs in mustard, and green pottage flavored with herbs from the garden. After a desultory review of that week’s weather, Francis asked his aunt, as if only mildly interested, “Have you happened upon a copy of Martin Marprelate’s latest effort, my lady? I refer to the one entitled Theses Martinianae.”
“Martin’s works have been banned, Nephew. You don’t expect me to have copies here in my house!” She frowned at Lady Alice, who mirrored the expression.
“Of course not. But they do circulate in spite of the Stationers’ Company’s best efforts. I thought you might have caught a glimpse of it somewhere.”
“Well, perhaps a glimpse. And since you ask, I may observe that the Theses are the most comprehensive, full-throated expression of the faults in the English church, and the remedies thereunto, that I have ever read. Martin has outdone even himself.”
“He makes his points clearly, in plain language anyone can understand,” Lady Alice added. “He speaks with authority. I find it most compelling.”
They must possess a copy which they had both been studying.
Tom said, “His prose is sprightly too, alive with character. It holds your interest.”
“Too much character,” Francis said. “He’s grossly insulting toward the bishops. ‘Master John Kankerbury’? How can he expect to be taken seriously?”
Lady Russell sniffed. “None of Her Majesty’s prelates should consider himself above criticism. Are they demigods, to be worshipped? Or servants of the Lord, their congregations, and the queen?”
Francis raised up a pacifying palm. “I didn’t mean to embark on a debate about the prelacy. Everyone agrees on some of Martin’s points, such as that our priests ought to be better educated and more fairly paid. I am curious about what stimulated Martin to renew his attacks though. He seemed to have given up in March.”
“Never,” Lady Russell said, setting her fist onto the white cloth. “Not until our church is fully reformed.”
Their plates were removed and the second course served. Tom tasted his smothered rabbit and said, “This is delicious, my lady. I’ll store up the flavors in my mind to remember during our simple supper at the inn later tonight.” His gaze shifted to Lady Alice as he spoke.
An awkward compliment for either lady, especially with the curious emphasis on the last two words. Francis echoed the sentiment in more conventional terms, then asked his now-standard question. “Who do you think Martin Marprelate is, my lady?”
She gave a short laugh, a single musical note. “If I knew, would I tell you? You’d run straight to your lord uncle to deliver the good news.”
“I would have a positive obligation to do so.”
“Nor would I fault you for it.” She raised her pewter cup and took a sip, then held it while she tilted her head and regarded him with a twinkle in her eye — the same twinkle that appeared in his mother’s eyes when she meant to tease him or pose him some perplexing question. “Besides, Nephew, what makes you think Martin is a singular person? Martin Junior, author of the work we were just discussing, claims to be another soldier rising up to aid his father.”
“The styles are very similar though, aren’t they?” Francis asked. “But then I haven’t studied the complete works with sufficient attention to make that claim with confidence.”
“There you are.” His aunt seemed to feel she had made her point. “Martin could be many people, by which I mean many individuals might be Martin, or Martin might be the name of a group. Martin might be a woman, for all you know.” She winked at Lady Alice, who seemed startled by the idea. Everyone laughed.
“A woman might be sheltering Martin,” Francis said. “I was worried enough about my mother to ride up to Gorhambury on Thursday.”
“I trust my sister was able to dispel your fears.”
“More or less.” He licked his lips and asked the necessary question. “You’re not harboring Martin or his accomplices at Bisham Abbey, are you, my lady?”
“I am not, Nephew. In fact, I haven’t been there in months.” She caught his gaze and held it. “And I further assure you my servants are not harboring Martin or anyone else for any illicit purpose. You may rest content on that score. But the simple truth is that Martin is legion. Cut down one and a hundred others spring up in his place.”
“Heaven forfend!” Francis smiled in genuine relief at the direct answer. He’d expected more of the evasive teasing he’d received from his mother. “We have enough stir and tumult with only one.”
“The tumult is caused by those disrespectful, reprobrious pamphleteers who were set on by that irritable simpleton, Canon Bancroft. How anyone could imagine buffoonery to be an appropriate response to a religious debate escapes all understanding!” Pink spots flared on Lady Russell’s pale cheeks.
“That is not supposed to be general knowledge, Aunt. How did you find out?”
She clucked her tongue at the foolish question. “My neighbor, Lord Cobham, told me after church a few weeks ago.”
“Ah.” Baron Cobham was a member of the Privy Council and Robert Cecil’s new father-in-law. Francis envisioned the web of connections growing around his cousin, sitting like a hunched spider in his chamber at the front of Burghley House, where everyone eventually entered. How easy it would be to control the webs of rumor being spun about Martin Marprelate from such a vantage!
“The tumult has become lethal,” Lady Alice said. “Perhaps you haven’t heard, my lady. Two pamphleteers were murdered. Some believe they were mistaken for Mar-Martin.”
Francis frowned. This struck a little too close to the topic he wanted to keep secret. His gaze drifted from Lady Alice’s somber face to her plate, where she had arranged the bones of her rabbit in what looked vaguely like the letter A. A for Alice, he supposed, surprised at the self-absorption.
Fortunately, Lady Russell took the conversation in a different direction. “That assumption is unwarranted, Lady Alice. You can have no conception of the rough-and-tumble life such writers lead. They spend their days in the lowest sort of taverns, drinking and gambling and engaging in other unsavory acts. I have not the slightest doubt that those ‘murders,’ as you term them, were the result of the mindless violence that permeates their existence.”
“That’s a little harsh,” Tom said. “There are respectable writers, like John Lyly, for example.”
“An exception which throws the rule into stark relief,” Lady Russell said in a tone that brooked no further objection.
Francis had none to offer. Every day he wrestled with the probability that his commission was a fool’s errand and that the pamphleteers had been the victims of their individual circumstances. If it weren’t for Tom’s report about the near-escape of Robert Greene, he would almost be ready to abandon the whole enterprise. But three attempts against the Mar-Martins in a single week made too many to be mere coincidence.
Tom’s foot abruptly collided with Francis’s shin, causing him to glare at his clerk. “My apologies,” Tom said. He had also been playing with his food. He usually devoured everything the instant it fell upon his plate. Now he had shaped his piece of spinach flan into an upside-down seven, or a right-side up sickle.
A final course of fruits and sweetmeats was served and their cups refreshed. Time to broach the main topic. “I hope my Lord Cobham and his wife are getting on well with the new addition to their family. My cousin Robert, I mean.”
“As well as can be expected,” Lady Russell said. “By all accounts, he works as much as his father. He spares precious little time for his bride.”
“The press of work,” Francis said. “Were you aware, Aunt, that Robert has been placed in charge of my lord uncle’s intelligencers this past month?”
“I was not.” Lady Russell dismissed that with a shake of her head. “He’s far too young. That position demands a seasoned man with a breadth of experience.”
“I tend to agree.” Francis sensed a shuffling under the table as Tom adjusted his restless legs again. “It is a great charge for a man who’s barely turned twenty-six.”
“Too great,” Lady Russell said. “Although he has a very able secretary. From Northamptonshire, I believe. A Mr. Holiday or . . .” She wiggled her finger as if summoning the name.
Tom supplied it. “Peter Hollowell. I’ve met him.”
Francis coughed, then hid a slight shake of his head with his napkin.
Lady Russell seemed not to notice. “Hollowell, that’s right. A personable young man and a skillful assistant. I write to my nephew frequently, as you might imagine, offering him my counsel of matters of current interest. This Hollowell answers me as often as not, but he’s very polite and, I suspect, more candid than Robert would be.”
“Robert is seldom candid,” Francis said wryly, though he’d been accused of the same fault.
Tom said, “Mr. Hollowell has been kind enough to explain some of the finer legal points of wardship to me.” He apologized to his guardian with a humble grimace. “There isn’t much written, as you know, and since he’s also Mr. Cecil’s assistant in the Court of Wards —”
“Why should Robert need such assistance?” Lady Russell asked.
Francis said, “He seems to be moving inexorably into all of my lord uncle’s posts. He’ll doubtless become Master of the Court of Wards in due course.” He failed to keep the bitterness from his voice.
That would be an ideal position for him, since one might reasonably expect a thorough knowledge of the law to be a prerequisite. The office was breathtakingly lucrative. The regular fees, combined with the less openly acknowledged bribes, had built his uncle’s palace in Lincolnshire as well as Burghley House.
Lady Russell scowled into her cup, then she cocked her head toward Francis. “Your cousin Robert has always been a sly boy. I’ve always thought so, though of course I never said it to Mildred. But you know, Francis, if you looked only at the political effects of Martin Marprelate’s work, you might discover a different motivation underlying the whole affair.”
Francis smiled. This was the topic he’d been working toward. It would be better discussed in private, but if he tried to send the young people into the garden, Tom would leap to the conclusion that they were talking about his wardship behind his back and be even more cross-tempered than usual.
They would simply have to be oblique. “I had a similar conversation with my mother.”
“So she told me in yesterday’s letter.”
They smiled at one another. They were reading from the same page.
Francis glanced at young persons, who seemed fully occupied with sorting the nuts and candied fruits on their plates. He turned slightly away from them to speak quietly to his aunt. “My mother and I discussed the changes taking place on a certain advisory body.”
“Oh? What sorts of changes?”
“Young non-members attending meetings without comment from an older member, who is being distracted by complaints from unidentified sources.”
Lady Russell nodded. “All people grow old, Nephew, but they do not all grow wise. Some old people, sensing a waning of their power, try to tighten their grip by exacting impossible oaths. Other old people might object but fear ruffling more important feathers, or may no longer have the vigor to act.”
“You may be right, my lady. A loyal son, seeing a father in such straits, might move to loosen such a grip by encouraging still louder complaints.”
“Thus frustrating the first old person all the more.” Lady Russell smiled. “He might go farther, this loyal son, if he has the foresight to promote the inevitable remedy. A reformation, if you like. He might encourage those complaints to spread by protecting the complainers until their voices grow so numerous and so loud their demands can no longer be denied.”
“If he shouts too loudly,” Francis said, “he can expect to be roughly silenced.”
“Not if he reforms the advisory body, replacing that fearful old person and the rest of his party.” Lady Russell’s hazel eyes gleamed as she held Francis’s gaze.
He blinked and looked away. He’d gotten more than he bargained for here. His mother had suggested, or led him to suggest, that Robert Cecil was fostering Martin Marprelate in order to push back against Archbishop Whitgift’s aggressive oaths of compliance, which were designed to expose nonconformists lurking within the priesthood. That pushing would anger the queen, but not many others. Lawyers hated those oaths on legal grounds since they obliged a man to bear witness against himself. Under this theory, Robert and his father were acting to forestall religious conflict by means of a counterbalance that entertained the masses.
But Lady Russell seemed to be suggesting something more far-reaching: that Robert had created Martin for the purpose of fomenting conflict, inflaming public opinion to demand the dissolution of the prelacy. Not to limit the archbishop, but to eliminate him, and all the hierarchy of bishops and canons along with him. That was nothing short of rebellion and a treasonable offense.
Francis shook his head. “It’s too much. It can’t be true. It’s too uncertain, too dangerous.”
“I’m not so sure.” Lady Russell echoed her sister’s answer to the same question. She set her elbows on the table and rubbed her slender hands together. She gave him a half smile with a conspiratorial gleam in her eye. “Many people, both young and old, are unhappy with the current state of affairs. It would be well for you to bear that in mind, Nephew, while you pursue your present pursuits.”