The Other Countess (22 page)

March tried to stand up straighter but his body betrayed him, his hands trembling at his sides. ‘I have done nothing wrong,’ he stated again.

Ellie picked up his cloak, which had fallen to the ground, and buttoned it at his neck for him. She could feel him shivering and she didn’t think it was from cold.

The earl appeared, preceding the dame who was leaning on Sir Arthur’s arm as he helped her down the stairs.

‘What have we come to?’ the dame wailed. ‘Arrests in the night – honest citizens torn from their beds!’

‘I know, madam, it is quite, quite shocking,’ Ellie heard her father say. ‘But it will be sorted out and you’ll be back here without a shadow on your name. Catholic plots! Complete
nonsense. Everyone can see you are honest and loyal to Her Majesty. Just tell the earl that and all will be well.’

Ellie was by no means convinced that all would end as well as her father predicted. It was undeniable that the dame flouted the law by not attending church and March was more than likely a priest as Will had said. She was a little hazy about the legality of that – was it enough to condemn a man just for being ordained by Rome?

‘My lord, what’s going to happen to them?’ she asked Will softly as Henry boosted March on to a spare horse with his hands tied before him.

Will pulled her into the parlour and took her hand to give it an apologetic squeeze. ‘I don’t know. I saw evidence with my own eyes that March is a priest. I can’t ignore that.’

‘If he is, will that get him killed?’

Will rubbed his face, his exhaustion evident in the slump of his shoulders. ‘That depends. I can’t let him run around my county preaching sedition.’

‘He wasn’t, was he?’ To her annoyance, Ellie heard the childish squeak in her voice.

‘That’s why I need to question him.’ Will cupped her cheek with his hand and kissed the tip of her nose. ‘I’m sorry, Ellie.’

‘The dame?’

‘I hope she’s just guilty of stubborn adherence to the old ways. If she promises to reform then things will go better for her.’

‘Reform? Dame Holton?’ Ellie was incredulous.

‘To save herself from prison or worse, who knows what she will agree to?’

Ellie wasn’t so hopeful; the dame would stand her ground: it was her nature, ingrained in her like rings in an oak. ‘Please,
Will, she’s my friend. She’s kind. Whatever she has done, she will have done for a good reason, not through evil or malice.’

‘Ah, but Ellie, do you not know yet that people do many terrible things for what they think are sound principles?’

‘Like arresting old ladies in the night?’ She crossed her arms.

Offended, he took a step back, assuming the earl once more. ‘Even that. I hoped you would understand.’

She was being unfair: she did not have the responsibility to make a choice as he had done. She’d allowed herself the luxury of closing her eyes to what was going on under the roof where she lived.

‘Forgive me, Will. I do understand. Please look after them both. They’re good people at heart.’

His spiky manner softening under her concession, Will stole a quick kiss, then rubbed his nose against hers. ‘I will take care of them, don’t worry.’

Ellie watched as a subdued dame and stoic March were taken away on horseback. Of course, she would worry. She lit a candle from an ember in the banked fire and waited for her father to come back in from the lane.

‘What a disaster!’ Sir Arthur declared, sinking into the chair by the fire, the candle flickering on the mantelpiece between them. ‘I thought better of the earl than to do such a thing.’

Ellie felt the urge to defend Will. ‘He has a duty, Father. He couldn’t ignore Master March once his profession came to his notice.’

‘March is a decent person and a wise man. Did he do any harm while under this roof?’

‘No, sir.’

‘So don’t you excuse the earl to me, Ellie. And poor Dame Holton – arrested for extending a welcome to a traveller!’

‘His lordship said she’d be safe as long as she promises to behave.’

‘Behave? She’s a grown woman – not a child or a dog to be curbed!’

Her father’s sentiments were too close to her own for her to argue. ‘What can we do to help them?’

Sir Arthur frowned, steepling his fingers in thought. ‘I don’t know. I no longer have any influence with men of power. I’m nothing compared to an earl. But I’ll see what a written appeal – an avowal of their good conduct – will do.’

‘I will send their clothes and other things they might need,’ Ellie said, her mind turning to rather more practical matters. ‘And make sure the poultry are fed.’

‘Quite right. Mistress Holton was a friend to us when we needed one; it is only fair that we should prove one to her now.’

16

As evening approached the following day and shadows lengthened in the lane, Will rode the short distance back from the dower house where he had left his two prisoners under close guard in separate chambers. His spirits were rapidly tumbling into a profound depression like a rickety bridge giving way to a flood. He hated what he had to do, but the evidence was irrefutable. After long questioning, he was convinced that John March was a Catholic missionary with extensive experience of taking his message throughout the kingdom. But he was also a clever and amiable man; met under any other circumstances, Will was sure they would have liked each other. Yet he did not have the freedom to allow his personal feelings to sway him. March was guilty of hiding his profession and ministering to Catholics; if his activities went further to the encouragement of treasonous plots – well, that was much harder to determine. One thing was clear, Dame Holton knew nothing of such matters and Will was convinced she would have trumpeted them if she felt them justified as she lived without apology and without regard for the security of herself and others. Perhaps she just could not imagine being punished for keeping to what she had been told was right as a child.
Whatever the case, his ears felt quite battered by her protestations of innocence and outrage.

He swiped at a nettle overhanging the track. Their staunch adherence to their faith made Will reflect on his own grasp of the great mysteries of life. He did not have it in him to be a fanatic, being too aware of other points of view, other possibilities. Will thought of himself as a staunch member of the Church of England largely, he had to admit, because it represented the best chance for peace in the country – a peace in which people could work out the distinctive flavour of their own beliefs. Extremists of both sides left him cold.

Lacey Hall came into sight, windows burning with the glow of a reflected sunset giving the illusion that the house was on fire. He muttered a prayer, asking for wisdom in dealing with this thorny situation. Will feared he had little of his own to offer.

With terrible timing, the second party of guests, Sir Francis Walsingham and Robert Cecil, arrived as twilight fell over Stoke-by-Lacey. Even if Will had wanted to keep his apprehension of the priest a secret, Sir Henry would have prevented him. In the confusion of horses milling about the courtyard, Perceval reached Walsingham before Will.

‘Sir Francis! Good journey?’ Sir Henry asked, gesturing a groom forward to hold the horse’s head.

‘Perceval, isn’t it? Yes, yes, we endured.’ Walsingham drew his mouth into a disapproving line. A gaunt-faced, swarthy man, his long nose had a knot half way down, evidence that it had previously been broken. His strand of strict Protestantism did not approve of the dissolute behaviour of Perceval and other young bucks at court. He landed
heavily on the ground and groaned, rubbing the small of his back.

Perceval was not daunted, seeing an opportunity to raise his stock with an influential member of the government. ‘You’ve come just in time, sir. The earl here has smoked out a Catholic priest right here in his village. We’ve got him locked up.’

‘A priest you say?’ Fire of interest flickered in the depths of Walsingham’s eyes, his aches quite forgotten. ‘What’s his name?’

Will hurried over, too late to smother the blaze. ‘Sir Francis, please do come in and take your rest in my house.’

Walsingham bowed. ‘Thank you, my lord. But Perceval here tells me you have a priest in your custody.’

Will cursed Henry silently. ‘Indeed, that is so. I have the fellow secured and he’ll keep. The ladies are waiting within to greet you.’

At that hint, Walsingham nodded and deigned to follow Will indoors. Cecil and Perceval fell in behind, keeping a distance from each other like two wary dogs. Will heaved a sigh: this particular house party had the makings of a disaster.

Thank goodness for his mother. She swept upon Cecil and gave him a maternal kiss. ‘Robert! It is years since I saw you last. You probably do not remember me, but I was a great friend of your mother, Lady Burghley.’

Cecil’s pale face twisted into an unguarded smile. ‘Countess, of course I remember you. She often speaks of you.’

The countess laughed and she bent forward to whisper confidentially, ‘We were terrors in our youth, Robert. We had most of the men at court at sixes and sevens, trying to impress us.’

‘I can well imagine.’

The countess turned to Walsingham. ‘And Sir Francis, it is long since we last met as well.’

The chief minister’s smile was genuine but looked ill-suited to his face, like a bow in a boy’s hair. ‘Lady Dorset.’ He kissed her hand. ‘I see you’ve had a fine brood of children since that time.’

On this hint, the countess introduced James and Sarah. ‘My eldest girl is married, sir, and my youngest boy is at school,’ she explained.

‘Five healthy children!’ marvelled Sir Francis. ‘God has blessed this house.’ He accepted a glass of wine from a servant and drank to the countess, then the earl. ‘Forgive my eagerness, madam, but I really must hear more about this renegade priest your son has discovered. I’m not on a journey of pleasure, more’s the pity; I must have a mind to the nation’s security at all times.’

‘Indeed, sir. Then Lady Jane, Lady Sarah and I will leave you gentlemen together.’ The countess shot Will a warning look. She had been quite opposed to his holding Dame Holton.

‘I am much obliged, madam,’ replied Walsingham.

The ladies retired, Sarah snapping the door closed behind her. Will suspected she would be listening at the keyhole if their mother did not tow her away.

Walsingham cracked his knuckles then rubbed his hands. ‘Well, Dorset?’

Will gestured for them to take seats. Cecil looked vaguely interested, but he lacked the fervour plain to read in Walsingham’s face.

‘I saw the man – one John March – minister Holy Communion to his hostess, an elderly woman from my village. I immediately set in process their apprehension and have both
of them in custody.’ Will got up to pace the room, disliking the feeling that he was reporting to a commanding officer. He reminded himself that he outranked Walsingham by virtue of blood, if not age and experience. He did not have to justify his actions to him. ‘I’ve questioned both today. I judge that the dame is guilty only of adhering to the faith of her youth.’

‘Only?’ Walsingham’s eyebrows shot up his forehead. ‘She’s harboured a priest.’

‘In order to receive the sacraments and spiritual comfort. Are we to imprison every man for his faith?’

Walsingham studied the young earl with disapproval. ‘It is not the wrong-headed beliefs that most concern us. You can’t have forgotten the Pope has ordered his followers to strike at the Queen, and thus at the very stability of our country.’

Will gave a jerky nod. Of course, he knew this: the very reason he had proceeded with the arrests in the first place.

‘You may tolerate their beliefs, but should they succeed in toppling order, you and I will be the first on the bonfires they’ll light to purge the country of all but followers of their own Devil-spawned creed. They make no secret of their plans.’

Cecil coughed discreetly. ‘But, sir, you must allow that only the most rabid of the followers of Rome advocate such a path.’

‘Must I?’ asked Walsingham in an icy tone. ‘The Queen of the Scots sits in our prison stirring up plots with her very presence and most likely with her active participation. Our security is a frail thing that can be undermined by the action of even one man with the determination to strike at the heart of our realm. Queen Elizabeth’s safety is paramount. We can take no gambles with so important a matter.’

‘That goes without saying,’ Will conceded. ‘But Dame Holton has no desire to attack the Queen. Her attention is only on local matters. She is more concerned with the church furnishings than issues of state.’

‘Hmm,’ grunted Walsingham, not agreeing but dropping this minnow of an argument for the bigger fish. ‘I’d like to interrogate March myself. Hand him over to me and I’ll see to his questioning.’

This would mean a long spell in the Tower and close acquaintance with the rack for March. Will remembered his promise to Ellie. ‘I’d be delighted if you would assist me with my investigation but I still have not had enough time to determine how far the matter penetrates into my lands. I am loath to send him away prematurely; he might be of great assistance in uncovering other threats to our peace and security.’

His argument appeared to be correctly phrased to appeal to the chief minister. ‘You think you can persuade him to inform on others?’

Will didn’t think that for one moment, but he wasn’t going to admit to it. ‘I’ve only had the prisoner under arrest for a day; many things are possible.’

Walsingham scratched his beard, smoothing it into a dagger-sharp point. ‘True. I find much use in informants and double agents. Often it pays well to let such people go in order to capture much larger prey.’

Will hadn’t thought as far as releasing March but this was a promising avenue. ‘I will be guided by you in this. I have no experience in grooming an informant for my use.’

‘You’ll have to learn, Dorset. Burghley says you’re his man in Berkshire so you’ll need your own network. It’s an
expensive business, mind, and you’ll get little from the Queen’s coffers for the purpose.’ His face soured. ‘She likes the fruits of spying but is less keen on paying for the planting.’