Prince - John Shakespeare 03 - (25 page)

‘Nick, this is bleak. We fear an attack is imminent, an onslaught far worse than anything yet ventured … and yet I make no progress.’

‘Tell me more, John. Confide in me.’

Shakespeare gazed at him. His battered face looked like a windfall apple that had been kicked by boys and was turning to mush. Henbird could be trusted; his face told its own tale. ‘It is true, I need your help. Our enemies attack on all sides. I fear I am missing something. We must find him.’

‘The prince of Scots?’

‘The tale is bruited all around court.’

‘The city, too. People in the ordinaries and taverns speak of little else. I have heard it said that certain great nobles of the Romish faith are plotting how they may proclaim him King of England.’

‘Do you have names?’

‘The usual. Southampton, Lord Strange, Northumberland, the imprisoned Arundel …’

‘This is all conjecture, yes? Mere tittle-tattle.’

‘Perhaps, but it does amaze me how quick such talk spreads. Suddenly a word said in jest turns to established fact. One ember will start a forest fire.’

Shakespeare sighed heavily. ‘And do the gossips talk of a link between this pretender prince and the powder outrages?’

‘How could they not?’

Shakespeare paused. He had to trust Henbird. He needed him. ‘I can tell you, Nick, that five thousand pounds of gunpowder is missing. Five thousand pounds to spark the flame. Perhaps more than that. What will they do with such an amount?’

Henbird’s eyes widened. Such an amount could wreak havoc. ‘Have you discovered anything from the first two outrages, John?’

Only that I no longer have a wife
, he almost said. Instead he nodded grimly. ‘Joshua Peace found some metal fragments. He believes they came from a clock, that the powder in the second blast was lit by a timing device. Frank Mills is supposed to be finding the artificer.’

‘Did the first blast have such a device?’

‘Not that is known.’

‘Perhaps they were experimenting in the second blast.’

‘It had occurred to me. It had also occurred to me that there must be few enough clockmakers capable of designing and constructing such a thing. Frank Mills is instructed to find the clockmaker but is making painfully slow progress. Do
you
know clockmakers, Nick?’

As if a key had clicked into a lock, Henbird’s attitude suddenly changed. ‘John, I have had a worrying thought.’

Shakespeare caught his friend’s shift in mood. ‘Does this mean something to you, Nick?’

‘Yes, I fear it does. My mind goes to the hellburners of Antwerp …’

Chapter 31

B
OLTFOOT DID NOT
make it beyond the castle boundary before collapsing. William Sarjent found him slumped forward across a broken block of ragstone and helped him back into the tower. Now darkness had fallen and Sarjent was gnawing at a hunk of bread, washing it down with ale. He gave a little meat and ale to Boltfoot, but Boltfoot could not take much before the bile rose in his throat.

Sarjent’s eyes were fixed on Boltfoot, who sat in silence inside the desolate and derelict castle. ‘I think it only fair to tell you something, Mr Cooper,’ Sarjent said slowly. ‘I am an intelligencer working directly to Lord Burghley. I have been operating in secret, investigating the disappearance of gunpowder for some weeks. I had penetrated the secret militia of Mr Holy Trinity Curl and his treacherous band of malcontents long before you blundered in with your club foot. You should have told me what you were engaged on when you rode off from Three Mills. I could have saved you much pain. More importantly, I could have saved my inquiry. They are now alerted. You have done much harm.’

And you should have kept me informed
, Boltfoot felt like saying to William Sarjent. But argument used up energy, and he had little enough of that to spare this night. What he did manage to say was, ‘How did you find me?’

‘I knew of this place already from my investigations. They train out here with powder. It is safe for them, for none come here but seabirds, a few stray sheep and foxes. I came here to spy on them – and found you instead.’

‘If you knew of Curl and his band, why have they not been broken up by pursuivants or the royal guard?’

‘Mr Cooper, you have been in this business long enough to know the answer to that: I had to find the source of the powder and I had to identify their chiefest man. Lord Burghley fears that powerful merchants, even men of nobility, are involved in this conspiracy. Knagg of Three Mills was supplying Curl with powder, but that hole has been plugged. Who are the puppet masters, though? How shall I find them now? My work is ruined by your bungling.’

Sarjent’s words had reason. Yet, even in his present weak state, Boltfoot’s instinct was strong. He did not like any of this, nor did he like Sarjent and his swaggering ways.

‘The Scots sorcerers, what have they to do with Curl and his band?’

‘Ah, the witches. They are not the common rump of Mr Curl’s rebellious band. I know something of them. They have another purpose.’ Sarjent took a swig from a flagon and passed it to Boltfoot. ‘I fear they have treated you most cruelly, Mr Cooper. Did you tell them aught?’

Boltfoot looked at him with mild contempt but said nothing.

‘Good. That is good. Then let us pool our knowledge and bring what we know to the Cecils, for I have reason to believe an attack of some nature, some insurrection, is coming, and soon.’

Boltfoot tried vainly to struggle to his feet. ‘Let us requisition a boat and make our way to London … we must make haste.’

‘We will, Mr Cooper. But surely you had already got word to Mr Shakespeare before you were brought here?’

‘Yes,’ Boltfoot lied without hesitation, as he had told the same lie to Warboys and Curl before being brought to this place. ‘Yes, Mr Shakespeare knows all about Curl and his band. And he will be mighty concerned about me by now.’

‘Well, you are safe.’

‘And he will be most grateful to you, Mr Sarjent, for saving me from certain death. As am I …’

Sarjent was silent for a moment. It had not escaped Boltfoot’s notice as he spoke that Sarjent’s hand was close to his belt where he kept his wheel-lock and his dagger. The hand hovered there, like a kestrel fluttering the tips of its wings, as if deciding whether to swoop on a shrew or move on to tastier prey. The hand moved on and took the flagon back from Boltfoot. ‘That is good, very good,’ Sarjent said at last. ‘It is fortunate that I was able to help, as I once saved Captain-General Norris on the field of blood. Did I ever tell you of that day?’

‘No, Mr Sarjent, I do not believe you did. Perhaps you would tell it to me now, while I drift off to sleep, for I need rest.’ There was another question that Boltfoot wished answered, but he would not ask it. He wanted to know why, if there was an imminent threat of insurrection, did they not simply descend this hill to the creek below and enlist the aid of some passing fishermen to get them to London without delay. He did not ask him because he knew the answer. He smiled wanly at his companion. ‘I trust you will understand that I need to sleep, Mr Sarjent. If you must go, leave me here to rest. Otherwise stay and let us move from this place at dawn.’

Shakespeare felt a cloud of fear descend. The hellburners of Antwerp. He knew of them. ‘Nick, this is terrifying to think on …’

‘But it could make sense. You say they have five thousand pounds or more powder. That could be used for a series of attacks like the Dutch market outrage, or one so huge that it would shake England to its very foundations. If Philip wanted vengeance for Antwerp and for the Armada, if he wanted to sow discord and create havoc, what better weapon?’

‘Maybe more than five thousand pounds. How much powder was used in the hellburners?’

‘Seven thousand pounds in each, all topped up with slabs of stone, ploughshares, scythes, sickles, rusting iron and nails, sharpened staves. It was the most deadly weapon ever conceived. A thousand or more Spaniards died in a single blast. The roar was heard fifty miles away. They were still finding the scattered bodies many months later.’

‘God’s blood. If that is what they have planned for us …’

‘It is only surmise …’

‘But as you say, Nick, it makes sense.’

Henbird wiped his nightshirt sleeve across his mouth. The aroma of brandy hung heavy in this fine chamber. A servant arrived with cold cuts of various fowl, slices of manchet bread, some cold beef and kidney pudding. Shakespeare had lost his hunger, but he accepted a platter with good grace.

‘Eat, John, eat. You need strength. Do you know of Federigo Giambelli?’

‘I know of him. We have never met.’

‘But you know he is in England, yes?’

Shakespeare nodded. Giambelli was the engineer from Lombardy who had devised the infernal hellburner machine for the Dutch defenders of Antwerp. He was now in the pay of the English, engaged on various defensive works around London and the south coast. ‘But where – here in London?’

‘Sometimes. I believe he is presently on the Isle of Wight, completing the Carisbrooke earthworks. I am pleased to count him a friend. But more importantly than that, I know with whom he deals. In particular I know a clockmaker who has worked with him and will certainly understand the workings of such a device as was used at Antwerp and, more recently, at the Dutch market. After you were dismissed from Walsingham’s service, Giambelli and this clockmaker were engaged by Mr Secretary to design and build a series of defensive hellburners. Nothing ever came of the plan, for the Queen refused to outlay the money needed, and then Mr Secretary died. But if anyone will know about timing devices, this clockmaker will be the man. His name is Peter Gulden – Gulden of Gutter Lane. That is but a few streets from here. We can go to him at first light.’

Shakespeare understood. As he picked at the food, he summoned up his recollections of the Hellburners, or
Hellebranders
as the Dutch knew them. In the spring of 1585, messages from the Low Countries to Walsingham’s intelligence network in London had been hot with news of them. They had come into existence at a time when the Duke of Parma, general of the Spanish armies in the Low Countries, was besieging Antwerp and had built a barrier of ships across the river Scheldt to stop supplies reaching the city.

Federigo Giambelli was there. He was an ambitious military engineer from Mantua who had tried to sell his expertise to King Philip, but had been rebuffed. Now he offered his services to the city of Antwerp, believing he had a way to break through this impenetrable siege barrier. Ordinary fireships – ships piled high with firewood and set ablaze – would be too easily doused by the Spanish soldiers guarding the barricade. Giambelli’s hellburners would be a different proposition. And the city fathers of Antwerp agreed to his plan.

Two seventy-ton ships, the
Fortune
and the
Hope
, were appropriated for the purpose. Giambelli had these vessels stripped down, then built enormous chambers deep in their holds. Shakespeare tried to imagine how they looked. He had heard that the chambers were like funnels, built of brick and stone – forty feet long and three feet in diameter. The chambers were packed solid with good corned gunpowder. More stone slabs and old scrap metal were piled high above the chambers to compact the powder and maximise the blast. False decks were then built above the huge bombs so that the Spanish would not know them from the far less dangerous fireships they had encountered in the past.

As Shakespeare recalled it, the last problem Giambelli faced was how to light the powder. In one of the ships, the
Fortune
, he used a slow-burning taper. He saved his masterstroke for the other vessel, the
Hope
. For this one, he enlisted the aid of a local clockmaker, who designed a timing device that would bring down a lever at a given time, soon after the ship had drifted into the Spanish barricade. This lever would turn a serrated steel wheel – much like a wheel-lock pistol – sending a shower of sparks into the powder.

When the ships were ready, the Dutch sent ordinary fireships towards the barricade, as a decoy. These were easily extinguished by the Spanish, who were much amused by the feeble efforts of the Dutch. Then came the hellburners, disguised as fireships by the burning of a few smoke-belching twigs and branches on their decks. The
Fortune
drifted into the riverbank and its fuse fizzled out. The
Hope
, however, reached its target. The unsuspecting Spanish swarmed all over it with their pails of water. And then the clock lever dropped, steel span against flint and sparks flew into powder …

‘One thousand dead?’

‘Possibly more, John. But some believe the effects were far greater than that. Signor Giambelli insists that his hellburners gave England victory over the Spanish Armada.’

‘Surely no hellburners were involved?’

‘No, but the Spanish did not know that. When the English sent commonplace fireships towards the Armada near Calais, the Spanish convinced themselves they must be hellburners. They were in utter terror – panic ensued. The Spanish dispersed and were never able to regroup in good order. That, asserts Signor Giambelli, is how the battle was won for Drake and England.’

‘Let us go to clockmaker Gulden now. We cannot afford to wait.’

‘It is mere conjecture, John,’ Henbird replied, ‘but you are right, of course.’

Shakespeare gazed on Henbird’s black-bruised face. ‘I will go, Nick. You stay here. Return to your sickbed.’

The watchman, lantern in hand, called the hour of eleven and eyed Shakespeare with suspicion. ‘Where are you going after curfew, master? Only whores and thieves are abroad at this time of night.’

‘Queen’s business,’ Shakespeare said sharply. ‘You can light my way.’

The watchman, a stocky fellow of middle years, grumbled, suddenly unsure of himself. ‘Find your own way,’ he said and turned away.

Shakespeare grabbed him by the collar of his thick woollen jerkin. ‘No, you light my way. Take me to Gutter Lane.’

The watchman, half a foot shorter than Shakespeare and ten years older, considered for a moment whether to summon other members of the watch for assistance. Instead, grudgingly, he shuffled forward as ordered. It was only a few hundred yards eastward and took them little more than ten minutes. The house was in darkness. Shakespeare banged his dagger haft at the door and kept banging until it was answered by a nervous-looking serving girl in her nightgown and cap.

‘I am here to talk with Peter Gulden.’

The girl stood well back from them. ‘He sleeps, master.’

‘Wake him. This is Queen’s business.’

She scuttled off into the house. Shakespeare dismissed the watchman, then stepped into the hall. It was a large, well-appointed room. Clockmaker Gulden was clearly a wealthy man.

He appeared shortly, pulling on a doublet over a hastily applied shirt and breeches. The clockmaker was a tall, weak-built man with high cheekbones and almost no hair on his pate. He wore a beard, trimmed short, but no moustache. He looked as if he had spent too many long hours stooped over a workbench, eye fixed to a magnifying glass, working at his intricate springs, pallets and toothed wheels.

‘Peter Gulden?’

‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘But who are you, sir?’

‘My name is John Shakespeare. I am an officer with Sir Robert Cecil. I apologise for waking you at such an hour, but I have important business with you.’

Gulden clearly had been in the depths of sleep for he rubbed his eyes and stretched his aching back. He had a good-humoured but worried face, with blue eyes that might have twinkled had he not been so sleepy. ‘What sort of business could Sir Robert have with me, Mr Shakespeare? I am a clockmaker.’ His brow creased in bemusement.

‘I am told you worked with Signor Giambelli on a project to build English hellburners.’

Gulden nodded. ‘That is true, yes. In the late eighties. But it came to nothing.’

‘You were working on the timing devices?’

‘I was.’

‘I can tell you, sir – though it is not to be repeated – that the recent gunpowder blast in the Dutch market involved a timing device.’

‘That is deeply shocking, Mr Shakespeare. I had no idea.’

‘Are you Dutch, sir?’

‘I am, yes, but I have been here for years.’

‘You must know most of the clockmakers of London.’

‘Indeed, I am sure I know them all. There are no more than twelve of us to my knowledge.’

‘Could any of them have made a timing device such as the one used in the market?’

‘Why, all of them would be capable, I am sure. With patience, such a thing would not be demanding for one versed in the clockmaker’s art, certainly not one experienced in constructing domestic table clocks. The hardest part would be making the timing device accurate enough to operate within a minute or so of the required time. Too quick and the attacker might be blown up, too slow and the device could be discovered and disabled.’