| |
Tom pounded down the Strand, stretching his long legs where he could, twisting sideways through clots of people. He shouted, “Move! Make way!” as he ran, always keeping his eyes on that blur of blue and white ahead of him.
He could have caught Charles if he’d reached the street a minute earlier. The murdering knave had lingered at the top of Strand Lane to watch Sir Robert’s costly gray mares trot fretfully down the road. They would soon find their way to Burghley House, which wasn’t far.
Charles and Tom had clapped eyes on one another for one long moment, and then the race began. They were well-matched as opponents. Tom had the advantage in length of leg, but Charles was four years younger and had the lead. If his destination had been in doubt, Tom would have had no hope of catching him. But the man was most likely going back to the White Bear.
Where else could he go? He had no friends here.
The crowd grew thicker around the curve at Charing Cross. The best Tom could do was a fast walk, pushing people rudely out of his way and ignoring the curses they hurled at his back.
At last, they approached the sign of the White Bear. Tom lagged his quarry by half a dozen house fronts. He ducked into a doorway as Charles cast a glance over his shoulder before entering the inn. Tom tilted his hat brim down to shield his face in case someone he knew was sitting by the front windows. Then he ducked his head and strode briskly toward the door.
He crashed into the solid body of a man about his size in height and build. The man grabbed his shoulders.
“Beg pardon,” Tom said.
“Watch where you’re going, lad.” The man had a West Country accent and a familiar voice.
Tom raised his head and looked into a pair of blue eyes exactly like his own, apart from the sprays of wrinkles around the corners. He reared back on one foot to take in the whole face — an oval face framed by blond curls and a ruddy beard, with a dimple in the left cheek.
“Dad?”
“Tom?” Captain Valentine Clarady’s face broke into a broad grin. “My boy! I found you!”
“God’s bones, Dad! You’re alive!” Tears sprang into Tom’s eyes. He let them fall, laughing and shaking his head. He wrapped his arms around his father’s chest, sobbing and laughing. “You’re alive. You’re alive.”
Valentine’s arms circled Tom’s body, hugging him tightly. “My boy, my boy.” His voice sounded husky.
After a while, Tom sniffed and pulled back. “How? Where did you —”
“It’s a long story.” Valentine clapped his son on both shoulders as if testing to be sure he was real.
Tom could not take his eyes off that beloved face. More wrinkles, he judged, and as brown as old oak. He must have been at sea at least some of the past six years.
Then he remembered his mission. “I want to hear it. Every word. But right at this moment, we’ve a villain to catch. A murderer, Dad, who tried to put the noose around my neck. I chased him inside here, but he could go out a window once he’s grabbed his stuff.”
“What are we waiting for?” Valentine grinned.
Tom laughed for sheer joy, clasping his hands and raising his tear-filled eyes to heaven. His father was alive!
“He’s fair,” Tom said as they strode into the public room. “Round face, a few inches shorter than us. Wearing blue and white, though he might be changing clothes. Not five minutes ahead of me.”
“I’ll go up the front, Son. You find the back stairs. We’ll search floor by floor.”
They hugged again, then went their ways, each trusting the other to perform his part with diligence and skill. Tom cut through the kitchen, waving at the startled cooks, and found the narrow servants’ stairs near the back door. He’d have to keep half an eye on these as he prowled the upper floors. Charles could use them to escape.
But where could he go? Travel cost money. He’d claimed utter poverty, but then he’d also claimed ignorance about that brandy. He could have a chest of silver coins under his bed, presently being poured into a leather pouch.
Tom walked on the balls of his feet, leather soles silent on the wood floor. He strained his ears for the sound of metal clinking or clothes rustling behind each door. At the back of the long building, he found one door not quite shut. He flung it open to find Charles sitting on the windowsill, one leg in and one leg out. He held a lumpy sack with the inside hand, doubtless filled with clothes.
Charles stared at him, mouth open, frozen on the sill.
Tom tilted his head back and shouted into the corridor. “Dad! I have him!” Then he took three quick strides across the room and caught Charles by the ruff. He dug in his hand to grip ruff, doublet, and shirt together and dragged his captive onto the floor. Charles kicked and turned. Tom ignored him. He pulled his knife from the scabbard at his back and set the blade under Charles’s ear. He lowered himself to one knee, supporting himself with a hand on Charles’s back. The struggling stopped.
“You should thank me,” Tom said, making conversation. “You can’t jump out a window that way without breaking your ankle. You have to perch on the sill, turn full around, and then lower yourself as far you can by your hands. Then you let yourself drop, curling into a ball the moment your feet touch the ground. If you’d gone to university, you’d know that.”
Charles’s body tensed as if to make another attempt to get free. Tom put a little pressure on the knife, and the villain collapsed with a groan.
“My room was on the ground floor,” he said. “But I was only there for a year. Leynham said it wasn’t necessary and refused to cough up the fees.”
“You could sue him for that if you weren’t going to hang.”
The captain burst into the room, taking in the situation with a proud smile. “Good work, Son.”
“This is one of my jobs, as it happens.”
“There’s a story or two there, I reckon.”
“More than a few.” Tom drank in the sight of his long-lost father. He looked fit enough. He hadn’t starved, wherever he’d been. “Were you in the Indies?” Charles kicked a little, so Tom pressed the knife a trifle harder. “Less of that now.” The kicking stopped.
“Puerto Rico. But that’s the end of the long story.” Valentine pointed at Charles with his chin. “What do we do with this churl now that we have him?”
“Good question. I can’t kneel like this much longer. I’m getting a cramp in my foot.”
“Let’s get him up.” Valentine reached down to grab Charles under his arms. He hauled him to his feet in one mighty heave. There was nothing like the seafaring life to keep a man in trim. He studied the face before him with interest. “A murderer, you say?”
“I saw him try to drown Mr. Bacon and Sir Robert Cecil by rolling their coach into the river. Not half an hour ago.”
Charles snarled at him. “You couldn’t have seen anything. That lane was empty.”
Tom caught his father’s eyes, and they shared a rich chuckle.
Valentine said, “Not what you’d call a wily rascal, is he?” He tilted his head for Tom to take one arm while he gripped the other.
Charles pressed his lips together, too late. He looked from one Clarady to the other, turning his head from side to side as if doubting his own eyes.
Tom did the honors. “Allow me to introduce my father, Captain Valentine Clarady, presumed dead for the past six years and returned by some as-yet-unexplained miracle. Dad, this is Charles Midley, a fellow ward of the queen. You’ll have heard about that from Mother, I imagine.”
“I have, though I could scarce believe it. She’s well and sends her love, by the way. I went home first.” As was right and proper. And on the way, if he’d been sailing from the west.
“We’re all well now.” Tom looked around the small room. It held a rumpled bed, a backed stool, and a small table with a bowl and pitcher. Charles’s clothes chest stood open, its contents scattered all around. A smaller chest lay open and empty on the bed. Tom had been right about the cache of coins. He saw no rope nor anything like it, and the bedposts were too short to be useful anyway.
“My room is bigger than this,” Valentine said. “And I’ve a proper bed with curtains. Let’s grab a few pairs of this fellow’s stockings. They’ll do for tying him up, as long as we don’t leave him alone.”
“We’ll lash him to the mast and order some dinner. I’ll send off a few notes while we’re waiting for the food. I want the sheriff to come collect this whoreson knave. And I think I know where Mr. Bacon can be found.”
They hustled their captive up the main staircase. They met a maid coming down. Valentine stopped her with a grin. “Look who I found.”
She clapped her hands. “Your son! Mercy, Captain, he’s the very spit of you.”
“We’ll take dinner in my room today, Jane. A full spread with two bottles of your best wine. We’re hungry, and we have a lot to talk about.” He cast a look at the scowling captive. “Just the two of us. This one will be fasting, the better to ponder his sins.”
She turned to go. Tom laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll need a writing desk straightaway.”
He and his father stiff-walked Charles to a fine large chamber overlooking the busy street. This one held a large bed with four stout posts supporting a tester and red curtains. It offered a round table with three chairs, among other amenities.
Tom and his father wrestled Charles onto the bed with his back to a post and his legs outstretched. They pulled his arms behind him and bound them with stockings. Being knitted of fine yarn, they stretched into long ropes and would be impossible to break. Charles spluttered and complained until Tom threatened to stuff a dirty stocking in his mouth.
He glared down at his former friend. “I had some sympathy for you, Midley. I understand the rage and the frustration. God knows I do! But you used me, hiding behind me. All the while pretending to be my friend. I can’t forgive you for that.”
Valentine had been listening, his face growing darker with every word. “You know, we could’ve had a rougher time getting him under control. No one would think twice about a few knocks here and there.” He curled a fist where Charles could see it.
Tom gave it some thought. It would feel good to pound Charles’s smooth, round face, but only for a minute. It would feel better to hand him over to the sheriff and think about what awaited him in Newgate. “Not worth it.”
Jane came in with a writing desk and set it on the table. Another wench followed her with a green bottle and two clay cups. Valentine gave them a bit of Clarady charm in thanks. They’d be well tipped later. He poured two cups of wine and handed one to Tom. He raised his in a toast. “To my beautiful, brilliant boy!”
“To my beloved father, home again, thanks be to God!” They drank, then Tom sat down and opened the desk. “Forgive me, but I have to get these notes off now. Someone must come collect this churl.”
He also couldn’t be certain Mr. Bacon and Sir Robert had survived. He had great confidence in Trumpet, but a coach wouldn’t stay above water for long. With a strong tide and a tardy boatman, things could go wrong in a hurry.
He sat down and opened the desk, pulling out paper, inkpot, and quill. He used his knife to pare the quill into the shape he preferred, then dipped it in the ink. He addressed the first note to Sheriff Hanton, bidding him to hasten down to Westminster to arrest the man who had murdered the Court of Wards officials. He paused for a moment, composing a brief explanation in his head.
His father patted him on the shoulder, then went to sit on the edge of the bed to talk to Charles. “That’s my boy.” He tilted his head to point at Tom. “He works that quill like a true master of his craft. You can’t see him, but it’s a joy to watch.”
Tom grinned down at his paper, wiping a tear from his eye with his knuckle.
“What’s your story, boy? What name did Tom give you — Charles?”
“Charles Midley.”
“What’d you do, then? My son calls you a murderer. Who’d you murder?”
Charles didn’t answer.
Tom looked over his shoulder. “Two officials of the Court of Wards. They were demanding fat bribes on top of the exorbitant regular fees. I lost my temper a couple of times, and that churl took advantage of it.”
“That’s low.” Valentine curled his lip at Charles. “Low and dirty. I suppose you think you’re a witty one, keeping an eye out, acting in the nick. Like a rat on the prowl for that prize crumb of cheese. I’m not saying there aren’t men who need killing. I can think of a French corsair whose life won’t be worth a cut farthing when I catch up with him. But a man owns his deeds, or what is he? No better than that rat.”
Charles spoke at last. No one could resist the pull of Captain Valentine for long. “You have no idea what they did to me and my mother.”
“Why don’t you tell me, then?”
Charles spat out his story. Tom, having heard it more than once, went back to his letter. He advised the sheriff to stop by Dorchester House and inquire after Sir Robert Cecil on his way down to Westminster. He folded the note, wrote the sheriff’s name across the front, and set it aside. He’d need a candle to seal it.
Valentine said, “You were wrongly treated. I can see that. But execution isn’t ours to deliver. If it were, the Spanish would be short a few grandees and there’d be no governor at the prison in San Juan.”
Tom turned full around. “Is that where you’ve been all these years?”
“Most of ’em. That’s the middle of the long story.”
“Can’t wait to hear it. I just have one more letter.”
“Write, write. I’ll give this cowardly cur something to chew on while he waits for the noose.”
Tom took another moment to revel in the sight of his father’s face, then turned around and pulled out a fresh sheet of paper.
Behind him, Valentine made good on his promise. “I doubt Newgate is any better than La Fortaleza. You’ll want coin, or things will go bad for you. I had a ponderous great pearl, like the one my son’s wearing. Brought that back from the farthest reaches of the Orient, I did. Bought me a clean room on the top floor and three meals a day for five years. ’Course, everything costs more in London, don’t it? Your best hope is friends who care enough to stick around.”
“Dorothy will take care of me,” Charles said.
“Who’s Dorothy?”
“A girl. A rich one. She loves me. She would never abandon me.” Charles sounded so certain that Tom couldn’t help but put another oar in.
“I wouldn’t be so sure. That’s a woman who takes care of herself first and foremost. I’m betrothed to her, Dad, as it happens.”
“Without my consent? Never.”
Tom snapped his fingers. “I hadn’t reached that thought yet. But I’m free, aren’t I? Your coming home puts me on the windy side. That contract was signed by my guardian, but since my father’s alive, the whole wardship is void. Therefore I have no guardian, and that contract has no legal force.”
Valentine grinned at Charles, pointing a thumb at Tom. “He’s a barrister now. Did you know that? His mother and I are so proud.” He shook his head at their captive, disgust written plain on his face. “You’re not much younger than him, and look at you. Tied up like a goat on the foredeck waiting for the slaughter. You’ve done nothing with yourself, by your own account, but store up grudges and murder a couple of pasty clerks in the sneakiest way. You’re a scurvy wretch is what you are. I wouldn’t have you on my ship. Your big mistake was trying to throw the blame onto my son. Don’t you know he’s the wiliest intelligencer in England?”
Tom had to laugh. He set down his quill, walked to the bed, and kissed his father on the cheek. “That’s down to you, Dad. I think about you every day. I ask myself, ‘Is this what my father wanted? What would he think of it?’”
Valentine clutched his hand. “You’re a grown man, Tom. Ready to choose your own path. I can see it in the way you hold yourself. You act like a man who knows who he is and where he’s going in the world.”
Did he? It didn’t feel that way, especially not these past few weeks. But it must be in there somewhere, or his father wouldn’t be able to see it.
Jane came in to spread a cloth on the table, shifting the writing instruments to each side as she smoothed it out. Tom asked her for a lit candle, and she left. He went back to the table.
The next note went to Trumpet, whom he addressed as Lady Dorchester in case anyone else happened to see it.
Did you get them? Are they hurt? I’m assuming they’re safe until I hear otherwise. You’ll never believe this, but my father is here. He’s alive! I found him at the Bear, which is where we caught Charles. We’re here now, about to have dinner. Not Charles, he’s tied to the bed. I’ve written to the sheriff. I told him to stop by Dor. House on the way here. All is well. Better than well, if Mr. Bacon survived his dunking. My father is alive!
Thomas Clarady from the White Bear, Westminster, this 27th of November, 1594.
He folded it and wrote, Lady Dorchester, Dorchester House, the Strand, on the front.
“Lady Dorchester?” Valentine had ambled back to the table. “Stephen’s mother?”
“His wife. Didn’t Mother tell you? Stephen’s the eighth earl now. We’re friends again, on a new footing. Her Ladyship and I were talking in an upstairs parlor when we saw that knave roll the coach down the lane.”
“Talking, were you?” Valentine’s voice held a note of fatherly skepticism that sent Tom reeling back to the last time they’d last spoken. They’d been standing on the docks east of the bridge, waiting for a boat to take the captain down the river to his ship at Gravesend. Valentine had caught wind of Tom and Trumpet’s special friendship and warned him to put an end to it.
The words still echoed in Tom’s mind. The nobility, they’re not like you and me. Touch her at your peril. One whisper of scandal and all we’ve built for you goes crashing onto the rocks.
They hadn’t crashed yet, though they’d come close. “Talking, Dad. She was my hostess. I spent a week in her house under Stephen’s protection, hiding from the sheriff.” He told his father about the last two weeks, although he didn’t explain his extraordinary fear of jail.
Valentine took a different lesson from the tale. “Lucky thing, finding the old earl up to his eyeballs in debt back then. Who could’ve known that match would ’scape you from hanging one day?”
“You always had a keen eye for a bargain.”
Jane came in with a pair of candles. Charles twisted his head around to plead with her. “You must help me, Jane. These men are deranged. You know me. I’ve been here two months. Bring Alfred up from the tavern and a couple of grooms. Save me!”
Jane bit her lip as she studied the situation. A kindhearted lass, though none too quick. At last, she said, “It’s true I’ve known you nigh on two months. And I’ve known the captain scarce two days. But I trust him, and I don’t trust you, and not just because he gives me better tips. Besides, it’s not my job to meddle in the affairs of our patrons.” She set a hand on her hip and tilted up her round chin.
Tom used one of the candles to soften the yellow wax provided by the inn. He pressed the seal his sister had given him into the wax, leaving the impression of a tiny anchor with wavy lines to represent the sea. He drew a flower on the front to mark it for the delivery boy.
He handed the letters to the maidservant and started to reach for his purse when he had a better thought.
“That varlet has a purse full of silver, I’ll wager. Search his pockets, will you, Dad?”
Valentine did as he asked, being none too gentle about it. He found a large leather pouch, which he emptied onto the table in a jangling of silver and copper coins. Tom picked out a big one and handed it to Jane. “This is for you.” While she gasped her thanks, he found a few smaller ones and poured them into her other hand. “And these are to send these letters out with the fastest boys you can find. The plain one goes to the Guildhall in the city, but the one with the flower goes to Dorchester House on the Strand next to the palace. Make sure it gets there as quick as can be.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Clarady. I know just the boy.” And off she went.
Tom clapped his hands together and rubbed them with satisfaction. This day had turned out to be the best day ever. “I’m hungry.” He grinned at his father.
Valentine had been counting the coins back into the pouch. “He’s got a good two pounds six here, not counting the farthings.”
“What should we do with it?”
Valentine scratched the beard along his jaw. It was darker than Tom’s and an inch longer, but otherwise so much the same. “No point in giving it back. They’ll just take it away from him at the jail. We’ll pay the inn first. He can treat me to my bed and board since he put us to the trouble of catching him. We’ll spend the rest on a feast at that place you lawyers like once we get your Mr. Bacon back.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Jane returned with two young men bearing large trays of plates and covered bowls. The aroma of fried whitefish and spiced apples made Tom’s stomach growl. He sat down and inspected each dish with his nose. “It could be an hour before the sheriff gets here. Plenty of time for a good meal and a long story.”
He dished up whitefish, conger in souse, and green pottage. He filled their cups to the brim. They satisfied their first hunger, then Tom took a break, leaning back in his chair. “Last I heard, the Susannah blew up in the harbor at Dieppe with you aboard. How’d you get from there to Puerto Rico?”
“I went aboard to see that all was ready. Alone, thank God. The scurviest scoundrel on the seven seas threw a bag over my head and smuggled me onto his ship. Then he lit a long fuse to fire the gunpowder in my hold and slipped away through the smoke.”
“Does this scoundrel have a name?”
Valentine nodded. “Jacques Le Bon, French corsair and long-standing thorn in my side.” He proceeded to tell a wild tale of kidnapping and deceit.
Le Bon had a crafty scheme to take advantage of the confusion following the defeat of King Philip’s armada back in 1588. News wouldn’t reach Madrid for weeks, though they’d know who to blame when it came: Sir Francis Drake, England’s greatest admiral. Philip would pay a fortune to any man who captured El Draco.
Le Bon had no intention of working that hard. Reasoning that one fair-haired Englishman looked much like another, he kidnapped his old rival Valentine Clarady and sold him at auction in Bilbao.
He’d fetched a steep price, Valentine reported with pride.
Tom laughed. “You look nothing like Drake.”
Valentine spread his hands in a wide Spanish shrug. “They didn’t know that.”
Empty dishes were replaced with full ones. The second course included salmon baked with vinegar and onions. Roast tench and florentine custard rounded out the feast.
The tale continued. Valentine changed hands a time or two, then finally managed to smuggle himself onto a ship about to set sail. Unfortunately, he’d been misinformed. Instead of going east to France, this ship sailed west all the way to the New World.
The Spanish captain sold Valentine to the governor of Puerto Rico, assuring him he could sell the captive on to the next ill-informed grandee for a tidy profit. The governor tried for five years with no takers. By then, Francis Drake had returned to the New World to sack more Spanish ports. Captain Clarady had lost his value.
The servants returned with the sweet course and a letter from Dorchester House. Valentine filled two plates with gingered bread, sugared almonds, and blackberry tarts while Tom slit the seal and unfolded the note.
He held the half-open page under his nose the way he always did with letters from Trumpet. The scent often told him where she’d written it and what she’d been doing. Civet meant she’d been dressing for court. Rosemary said she’d been out in the garden. Milk and lavender spoke of the nursery. This one smelled of lemon and beeswax. She’d written it in the library.
He caught himself and startled a bit. Just a bit, but his father noticed and quirked his lips. Tom cleared his throat and read the note aloud.
“Mr. Bacon and Sir Robert are unharmed, if soaked through and boiling mad. Mr. Bacon can prove Midley is the killer with testimony from the northman, who speaks and writes Latin, as it turns out. His notes were drenched, but he can elicit the testimony again. The northman is most willing. He dislikes Charles and remembers you buying him a beer once for no reason. Sir Robert will light a fire under the sheriff’s tail, never fear.”
Tom turned half around. “Did you hear that, Charles? You shouldn’t have been so stingy. If you’d bought the man a drink or two, he might not be so eager to see you dance the hempen jig.” Tom gave his father a sheepish grin. “I should’ve thought to speak to the poor fellow in Latin. Further proof of how distracted I’ve been.”
“My boy speaks Latin,” Valentine said to no one. “That’s the mark of an educated man. I’ve picked up a fair bit of Spanish over the years. Can’t see it doing me any good, but you never know. Dame Fortune likes to have her fun, as they say.”
Tom turned back to the table. He eyed the plate of dulcets before him, girding himself for another bout. He picked up a bit of gingered bread and asked his father, “How did you escape? That fort in San Juan is said to be unbreakable.”
“Cards. I used to play with the governor every Saturday afternoon. In the end, he owed me so much money he had nothing left to bet but my freedom. I swabbed the decks of a Spanish supply ship all the way to Saint Jean de Luz, where friends cleaned me up and brought me the rest of the way home.”
Tom shook his head in wonder. “Whoever said Dame Fortune has no sense of humor should have a look at your life. I’m glad you’re alive and glad you’re home. You couldn’t have come at a better time. I could’ve caught this murdering knave without you, most like, but I’d have been obliged to marry a woman I don’t love nor even trust.” He tilted his head toward Charles. “The famous Dorothy, who claims to love that scurvy rat. We shall see if she does — but from a safe distance.” He raised a cup. “Here’s to freedom, for the both of us!”
Valentine echoed the words and drank deeply. Then he put down his cup and set his elbows on the table, folding his hands together. “So, me boyo. Tell me more about this Lady Dorchester.”
