I take up my pen in this difficult time in order to hold a record of the events in London, during the previous week, and the subsequent matters pertaining to Jack Blackjack and the queen.
First, Sir Thomas Parry had invited me to visit him at Longleat to discuss certain matters relevant to our Lady Elizabeth and her future. The kingdom was in a state of great confusion and dismay. The queen was considered to be unwell, and her physicians had recommended bleeding and cupping and to the best of their abilities had sought to improve her physical health and general wellbeing. However, it was known that she had made out a new will, and in that she exhorted her subjects to defer to her husband, Philip of Spain. This was not an injunction that could easily be obeyed.
Queen Mary was, of course, a staunch Catholic lady, and adhered to her creed with determination and conviction. She saw it as her maternal duty to her subjects to ensure that they were all obedient to the Pope, and sought to gently persuade them to follow the Holy Catholic church by use of pyres, whips and brandings.
It need scarcely be said that Lady Elizabeth despised such treatment of the people of her realm. She was convinced that the church of her father was the true church, and she was of a mind to allow all those who agreed with her to follow the church services as King Henry had provided. That itself was known to many in the land, and the fact led to a number of men declaring that they would not support Lady Elizabeth.
For that reason Sir Thomas Parry and I were engaged with other men who were also devoted to the safety and protection of Lady Elizabeth. We were dedicated to ensuring that, were Queen Mary to die – may the good Lord protect her soul – there would be enough men to serve Lady Elizabeth. Were the throne to fall vacant, many would vie for it. The throne of England was coveted by many – by the French, by the Spanish, no doubt by the Scots too. Sir Thomas had warned me that there were suspicious movements of weapons throughout the realm, but especially around York, Gloucester and even in the Scottish Marches.
Our bounden duty was to remain with our lady and see to it that no assassin’s knife could find her. And to plan how to foil any attempt by militants to wrest the throne from Mary, for the succession could easily be broken, and a new pretender could try to take the realm for his own.
Thus there was a need to ensure that our own men were capable of fighting to protect her, in some cases possibly removing those who could become obstacles to Lady Elizabeth’s safety.
This was the reason for many of my visits to Sir Thomas Parry and Lady Elizabeth: to ensure that the armouries were filled and prepared, but also to meet to discuss those who wished harm to our lady, and decide whether one or two could be removed in a non-temporary manner.
On the seventeenth of the month I was once more discussing affairs with Sir Thomas at Longleat, when a messenger arrived. I have a small contingent of loyal servants in London, and had left firm instructions that if any matters required my involvement, I wished to learn at once.
It was some four years before that I had first encountered Jack Blackjack – or Peter the Passer, or Hugh Somerville, or Jack Faithful, or Jack of Whitstable, or John of Smithfield – the damned rogue had an alias for every day of the week. At first I was wary of the man. He was plainly the worst form of vagabond, a sly type who would dip his hand into a purse as soon as smile a greeting. When I met him, during the time of the rebellion against Queen Mary, he was useful in discovering a message that could have had significant importance for many in the realm, and it became clear to me that this was, behind the duplicitous, womanizing, drunken exterior, a most competent intelligencer and assassin. Rarely have I seen a man so efficient at the task of ending other men’s lives.
I proceeded to employ him, thinking that he could be useful in a number of situations – such as removing foreign agents, or English activists eager to destabilize the queen’s realm. Now, with the queen’s apparently increasing frailty, there was a need to see to it that those who would obstruct Lady Elizabeth’s accession were removed. That meant that a man like Blackjack could be usefully employed. He was the paviour that filled the potholes in Lady Elizabeth’s path to the throne, potentially. God forbid that Queen Mary might die, of course. But were she to slip from this mortal coil, Blackjack could be utilized to smooth the safe rise of Lady Elizabeth.
The news from London was not, therefore, to my taste.
‘God’s ballocks!’
Sir Thomas eyed me coldly. ‘Master Blount, I trust you have reason for such an outburst?’
I passed the letter to him. He took it, eyeing me, and cast a glance over the paper. ‘Damn his eyes! Could he not have rescued Jack from the damned constable? What do you pay him for?’
He referred to my man, Sam Cutpurse, a man named for his skills, who had been posted to watch over Blackjack and protect him from harm. And this was how he viewed his task: to allow Blackjack to walk into a waiting posse and get arrested.
‘Where is he being held?’ Sir Thomas demanded.
I could not assist him. There was no news as yet, but we both knew that it would be an insanitary and unhealthful gaol. Death by starvation or prison fever were still considered natural causes in the coroners’ rolls, and Sir Thomas had no desire to lose a useful servant any more than I did.
‘You have to have him released,’ he blurted, hands in the air in quick anger. ‘In God’s name, with the kingdom teetering on the edge of a precipice, I do not wish to have to procure a fresh assassin!’
‘No, Sir Thomas.’
‘What will you do?’
‘I will have to ride back and see what is to be done. Sometimes a constable can be bribed to release a felon; sometimes a felon can be set free on a magistrate’s order. I will see what must be done to secure his discharge.’
‘Very well – you had best succeed, Blount, or I’ll be having your ballocks on a plate!’
‘Yes, Sir Thomas.’
He glared at me, as he would when trying to assure himself that his message was received. ‘Very well. Let us complete our discussion before you have to depart.’
After I sent the messenger to find food and drink to refresh himself, and ordered that my own horse be prepared, Sir Thomas and I discussed the weapons in Lady Elizabeth’s armouries, the noblemen who could be relied upon to join her cause, those who might be persuaded with gifts or the promise of future honours, and then, finally, those who were not to be trusted, those who had set their faces against her utterly, and those who were so devoutly Catholic that they would see any possible rise on the part of Lady Elizabeth to be anathema.
‘There are too many in London who claim to support the Catholic Church and have declared themselves opposed to our lady’s stance,’ Sir Thomas mused. He had written eight names on a parchment, and now stared at them as if mulling which would be the most dangerous, which the least. ‘These all have access to men and arms. Sir Edmund de Vere is utterly against our lady. He has a number of friends who are possibly not so strong in their views, and who could be brought to our cause. But while de Vere is there, he is likely to pollute their minds. If he were out of the way, it would assist us.’
‘I will see to it.’
Sir Thomas looked at me. ‘Ensure that it is not a matter that can bring embarrassment to our lady. There must be no hint that this is a political act. I understand a man can easily fall into the river of late. The banks of the Thames are notoriously treacherous. I understand that de Vere is a keen supporter of the stews down by the bear garden.’
‘I have heard that he is a keen patron of the Cardinal’s Hat,’ I said.
‘So I believe. It would be a good place for him to meet with a terrible accident,’ Sir Thomas mused. ‘Perhaps he might fall into a bear’s cage, or into the mastiffs’ pit? Do make sure he enjoys his last evening, Master Blount.’
I smiled grimly. ‘You want him to enjoy his last hours?’
‘No. I want him too exhausted to defend himself.’