Treachery (34 page)

‘I provoke people. Sometimes on purpose. Other times, I don’t even realise I’m doing it. Just something about my face.’

He nods gravely. ‘Sometimes my uncle gives me a slap for nothing. Just for being there.’

‘Then you understand.’

‘When I’m grown,’ he announces, ‘I am going to have a ship like Sir Francis Drake, and fight the Spanish, and bring home treasure, and my uncle will never dare clout me then, and my brother won’t push me in the water or throw stones at me with his slingshot.’

‘Quite right,’ I say. ‘They will all have to call you captain. Now – let’s find this house.’

He laughs and hugs his arms closer around my neck. We walk on a few more yards. At the outskirts of the village I swing him down to the ground, gasping at the pain in my side.

I recognise the place by the girl Sara’s description: a limewashed cottage set apart from the rest at the end of the street that faces the estuary. An expanse of silted sand stretches from the far side of the road down to the mud-coloured water. Gulls patrol the beach, standing sentinel on the overturned hulls of fishing boats. I squint up at the house. All the windows are shuttered.

‘I suppose we just wait for the goodwife to go out,’ I say, casting around for somewhere to keep our vigil. A few yards along the beach is a small boat that will serve.

‘She might be out already,’ Sam observes.

‘You are sharper than me today,’ I say. ‘How will we find out?’

He thinks about this. ‘I could knock on the door and ask for her.’

‘What if she answers it?’

‘Then I just say I got a message for Jem. And they say there’s no Jem here, get on your way, and then we’ll go round the back.’

‘Good work,’ I say. ‘You are earning your keep today, Sam. Wait for me to hide in that boat. And if she’s there, walk away so she doesn’t get suspicious.’

He scampers off and I hunker down inside the boat, watching the door. At length it is opened by a short, broad woman in an apron, her hair scraped back under a white coif. She shakes her head and points up the street, then slams the door in Sam’s face. He saunters away in the direction of the promontory, then hops down the low sea wall and sits himself down on the sand to wait. I pass the time by trying to organise the facts of Dunne’s death in my mind according to the memory system I developed for King Henri in Paris, but they refuse to fit in neat concentric circles; instead they fly up and scatter like a flock of starlings. There is a splat against the boards of the boat as a seagull shits an inch from my shoulder; I flinch away and the movement sends shivers of pain through my ribs. My eyelids grow heavy; I let them drop and picture the Bay of Naples, blue and silver, shimmering tails of dolphins and mermaids arcing over the surface.

A moment later I snap them open again; Sam is standing over me, poking my shoulder.

‘You were asleep,’ he says, mildly reproachful.

‘I was not. I was thinking. What’s happened?’

He points to the street in front of us; the stout woman, a shawl wrapped around her shoulders, is waddling off towards the village, a large reed basket hooked over her arm. When she has turned a corner, out of sight, we dash across the damp sand to the cottage.

A path runs around to the rear of the house, past a garden enclosed by a wall not much higher than a man. A wooden door is set into it at the very back but this is firmly locked. From behind the wall comes the sound of women’s voices, subdued. Trees grow at the edge of the garden, branches snaking over the wall.

‘Shin up there and see if you can see anyone,’ I say to Sam, pointing to an apple tree. ‘If there is a man there watching the girls, jump down straight away. If not, try to catch their eye. We are looking for the one called Eve.’

I hoist him on to my shoulders and he grabs the lowest branch and pulls himself up, agile as a cat. He feels his way along until he is sitting in a fork of the tree, well inside the garden, his little legs swinging. From below comes a girlish exclamation.

‘You’re early for scrumping apples, little master,’ says a voice.

‘I’m not stealing,’ Sam says. ‘I’m looking for a girl.’

Ribald giggles from within. ‘Come back in ten years, sweetheart, when you’ve money in your hand,’ one of them says.

‘My master has money.’ Sam kicks his legs, nonchalant. ‘He wants a girl called Eve. He needs to talk to her.’

My master, I think. There is something oddly touching about this.

‘Your master?’ another girl asks, her voice anxious. ‘Is he a sailor?’

‘He’s off Captain Drake’s ship,’ Sam says.

There follows some discussion between the women that I cannot catch; their words come in short, excited bursts. ‘I am called Eve,’ says the same voice. ‘When can I see him?’ She sounds breathless; I already know she is going to be disappointed.

‘Now,’ Sam says, pointing down. ‘He’s right here.’

‘Tell him I am locked in, we can’t leave. He’ll have to climb up where you are.’

I curse inwardly. Sam shins obligingly along the branch and perches on the wall, motioning for me to join him. I grip the wall with both hands and pull myself up, white-hot needles of pain spearing my right side. As I emerge on to the top, steadying myself with the branches, I hear the girl say, her voice bright with hope, ‘Robert?’

Below me is a neatly kept garden, the lower part given over to orchard, the end nearest the cottage planted with box hedges and herb beds. It is large enough that here, at the wilder end, we could not be overheard from the house. Frowning up at me is a young woman, barely more than a girl, with a round, pretty face, her hair tied back in a white coif. She wears a grey smock that hangs shapelessly from thin shoulders. Though there is no sun, she lifts a hand to shade her eyes and squints hard at me. Her expression, as I predicted, is crushed.

‘Who are you?’

‘My name is Giordano.’

‘What?’

‘Never mind. Are you Eve?’

She nods, then casts a nervous glance back at the cottage. Blank windows stare over the garden. Hanging not far behind Eve is another girl, a little older, dressed in the same clothes.

‘Is someone watching you?’

She jerks her thumb at the house. ‘He’s asleep inside the back door. But he might wake. There’s a maid in the kitchen too, but she’s on our side. Only if the goodwife finds out we’ve talked to you we’ll all be punished.’

‘How will she punish you?’ I ask. My mind conjures images of pregnant young girls savagely beaten, a punishment I have brought on them through my interference.

‘Lock us in our rooms,’ she says, with a little shrug. ‘That’s all they can do here. She can’t lay a hand on us in case it hurts the babby, see.’ Her fingers stray protectively to her belly. She is barely more than a child herself.

‘Will it fall out if she beats you?’ Sam asks with relish, kicking his heels against the brick wall as if he is the spectator at an interlude.

‘Sam – I need you to keep watch at the front for me. Tell us when the goodwife is coming back. Quick, now.’

He nods, eager to obey his orders, then jumps down and scurries down the path to the street. Eve turns and whispers something to her friend; the other girl skips away closer to the house, evidently to keep watch from her side.

‘Have you come from Robert?’ Eve asks, when they are out of earshot, with the same eager smile. ‘Can he not come himself? I’ve been waiting for days and heard nothing.’

I watch her carefully, wondering what answer will best serve my purpose.

‘You were waiting for Robert to come?’

She clicks her tongue, impatient. ‘Of course. As soon as he had made arrangements, he said.’ Her face clouds with suspicion. ‘Why, what is the matter?’

‘Did you know that he was planning to sail for Spain with Sir Francis Drake any day?’

Her brow knots in confusion. ‘But that was before. He said—’

‘Before what?’

She pulls the material of her dress tight to reveal a tiny swollen stomach. She smooths a hand across it reverently. ‘Before
this
.’

‘Eve,’ I say, and my tone causes the colour to drain from her face. ‘Robert will not come to you again.’

She shakes her head, takes a step back as if to distance herself from the news. I see her eyes are brimming with tears. ‘You’re lying,’ she hisses, but there is fear in her face.

‘Listen, Eve …’ I edge my way along the branch to the fork in the tree where Sam had sat. I am closer to her now; I do not quite dare to jump down into the garden in case this guard appears, but I hardly like to shout the news I have to break from on high, like a messenger from the gods in an inn-yard play. She steps further away.

‘If you come down here I’ll scream and that brute will come out with his crossbow,’ she says. I glance at the cottage in alarm, unsure whether she is bluffing. ‘Why should I believe you? What do you know of it?’ Without waiting for an answer, she wraps her skinny arms around her chest and pouts. ‘Robert will come for me. I know he will.’

‘Eve, I need you to trust me. I have to speak with you, with no threats of screaming or crossbows, and it must be done quickly, before the goodwife returns.’ At the mention of her keeper, Eve makes a face. ‘Oh, I almost forgot,’ I add, ‘Sara sends you her good wishes.’

‘Sara? Where is she?’ She scans the wall as if I might have brought her with me. ‘Do you know her?’

‘I saw her just this morning. It was she who told me where to find you.’

‘Oh. And how does she?’ She looks down as she asks this, twisting the fabric of her dress between her fingers, fearful of the answer.

‘As you would expect,’ I say. I may as well give her the truth in everything.

She nods. ‘She will die, won’t she?’

‘Eventually. But it is an unpredictable disease, it can run fast or slow.’

‘I should like to see her again.’ She heaves a sigh that shakes her whole frame. Her hand returns absently to her belly. After a long silence, she moves closer to the tree. ‘Will you tell her so, if you see her? She was always kind. Poor Sara.’

‘I will.’ I wait. She rubs at her eye with the heel of her hand. Eventually she looks up.

‘Tell me, then. Where is Robert?’

I try to banish the image of Robert Dunne lying cold in his shroud, the stench of his flesh rotting unburied in the crypt.

‘Robert Dunne is dead, mistress. I’m sorry.’

‘No!’ She cries out, clasps a hand to her mouth and sinks to the ground, her skirts puddling around her. The other girl, stationed near the box hedges, snaps her head up and makes as if to come over; I hold up a hand in warning and swing down into the soft grass. It is a drop of little more than six feet, but it jars all my bruises and I have to keep myself from crying out. I kneel beside Eve and offer her a handkerchief. She balls it in her fist and presses it to her mouth. ‘Who killed him?’ she croaks, barely audible.

‘Why do you say he was killed?’

She blinks at me.

‘Because he was afraid.’

‘Of whom? Did someone want him dead?’

A huge sob seems to well up from the core of her being and explode noiselessly as she covers her face with her hands and her whole body shakes. I lay a reassuring hand on her shoulder and wait for the waves of grief to subside, though not without a degree of impatience.

‘Mistress Grace,’ she says, peeling her hands away to reveal red, brimming eyes. ‘Or his wife, I suppose, though she would not have known we planned to run away. He hasn’t seen her for months, not since he came to Plymouth in the spring. In any case, she is sick and like to die very soon, he says, so I doubt it was her.’

Not the last time I saw her, I think. Robert Dunne evidently knew how to please his young mistress. ‘Tell me about your plan,’ I say, gently. ‘It might help.’

‘He never meant to go with Captain Drake,’ she whispers, between ragged gulps. ‘He said he had some business to finish here with the fleet and then he would come into money and take me away, and we would raise the child as a family. Somewhere far from Plymouth,’ she adds, with vehemence. ‘And once his wife was in her grave, we would be properly married.’

I watch her: the clenched fists, the flushed cheeks, the determination. Did she really believe this would happen?

‘Did Mistress Grace know of this plan?’

‘No, but …’ She scrubs at her wet cheek with her knuckles. ‘I told someone there. The House of Vesta, I mean. She might have forced it out of them. She can do that.’

‘The boy Toby?’

She looks at me, surprised. ‘You know him?’ Her eyes narrow. ‘I never saw you there. Does she let you have Toby as well? I thought it was just—’ She bites her tongue.

‘No,’ I say, quickly. ‘I only spoke to him once. So you think Mistress Grace may have uncovered your plan and tried to prevent it?’

‘She’d have done anything to stop us if she knew,’ the girl says, lowering her voice further. ‘She wants to take the baby, see. All our babies. She thinks we don’t know, but the girls talk.’ She gestures towards the house. ‘Robert said he wouldn’t let that happen.’ She stops, swallows hard, and a fresh wave of sobbing breaks over her. ‘What am I to do now?’

‘Eve, listen to me.’ The seriousness of my tone causes her to break off her crying and sit up. ‘Something may be done for you, but you have to help me find out what happened to Robert. Do you understand?’

She gives a mute nod, her face puffy with misery.

‘Good girl. Robert died in his cabin on Captain Drake’s ship the
Elizabeth Bonaventure
. So even if Mistress Grace or his wife had reason to want him dead, they must have had help from someone on board. Did he ever mention any of his fellow crewmen who wished him ill?’

She blinks back tears and considers. ‘He didn’t like Captain Drake’s brother. Said he was too keen to throw his weight around, you’d think him the Captain-General. Robert said he had respect for Captain Drake but not for the brother – thinking he could speak to gentlemen as if he was their better, and him only the son of a farmer.’

I suppress a smile; I have heard this sentiment before. ‘But you don’t know of any particular quarrel?’

She shakes her head. ‘There was another man, Sorrell, Sewell, something like that? Robert owed him money. He said he was afraid this man would send someone to collect it before he’d had a chance to finish his business here in Plymouth.’