Good, thought Gresham, very good. Not as good as Robert Cecil, not yet, but getting there.
'I can work with Satan if I have to,' said Gresham. 'After all, I came near to doing so when I worked with Robert Cecil. As I was saying, shall we get down to business?'
The two men looked at each other. Again, Coke broke first. He glanced away, down to his long-forgotten papers.
'Then, as you said, we should get down to business. These letters that were stolen. Cecil had spies.' Coke raised an eyebrow in Gresham's direction. 'Spies other than yourself. They reported that a Cambridge bookseller had been involved in the theft. Rumour, you understand, only rumour, based on one single instance where a man who might have claimed to be a Cambridge bookseller might have tried to sell letters to one of Cecil's agents which might have been the ones 'we are seeking to find. That was one reason why the Earl thought of you to help us out, with your knowledge of Cambridge.'
'Does this bookseller have a name?'
'It is here, somewhere…' Coke rummaged among his papers. 'Ah, yes! 'Cornelius Wagner'. How very elaborate…'
A sudden, vague chill took Gresham's heart. Cornelius Wagner. There was no bookseller called Cornelius Wagner in Cambridge. Gresham knew them all. Yet he also knew of a Cornelius, and of a Wagner. Where had he heard the name?
'I had hoped to meet you with Sir Thomas Overbury,' Coke said, 'but it appears he must have been delayed…'
There was a ruckus outside the door then, shouting and a heavy thud. The door impacted inwards with a sharp crack and the servant whose head had appeared round the door earlier was flung into the room by what was clearly a hearty kick from the man standing in the doorway. The servant's head was bloodied from a cut that ran across his forehead. He was crying with a mixture of shame and anger, his hand wiping away tears and blood until they mingled and ran down his wrist to stain his shirt with a pink wetness.
'Sir!' The servant tried to speak. 'I am so sorry, I…' Coke raised a hand to silence him. The boy rose clumsily to his feet, a tear ripping half the leg of his hose. He bowed his head.
'You may go now,' said Coke, gazing at the figure in the doorway.
'Insolent pig!' said Sir Thomas Overbury as the servant scuttled past him, hand raised to ward off further blows.
As a consequence of his close relationship with James I, the vast majority of the King's correspondence was passed on to Robert Carr, unopened, for him to deal with. Carr, whose brain was small as if to compensate for his magnificent body, passed it on unopened to his oldest friend, Sir Thomas Overbury, who then dictated the answers. Overbury had brains enough for both of them. A tall, handsome figure capable of biting wit, his power as the eminence noir behind the King's favourite had added to his natural vanity and arrogance, until he was frequently described as insufferable by even the mildest men at Court. The King tolerated him because he was in love with Carr, but in truth, he both distrusted and disliked Overbury. Queen Anna, otherwise a feather-brained and overblown lapsed beauty, hated Overbury with unequalled venom. In a rare display of power, Queen Anna had forced Overbury to flee to Paris the year before. He had been allowed to return simply because without him Robert Carr had floundered under the duties imposed on him by the King. It was a very tender and fragile truce.
Overbury advanced into the room. He ignored Gresham completely. 'Your servant is insolent, Sir Edward,' said Overbury, peeling off his fine-fitting gloves and flinging them carelessly upon the table. 'He presumed to question the time of my arrival. I've been deep in matters of state. I disciplined him, as you saw. It were better, of course, to come from his master.'
Well, well, well, thought Gresham. This one is very special. He looked with amusement to Sir Edward Coke.
It must have been Overbury who supplied details of the theft of the compromising letters to Coke. Why else was he here? The loss of these letters must be truly embarrassing. For all that he had made a show of his entry, and been deliberately late to make a point, the fact remained that Overbury was here, and at Coke's bidding. Rescuing the letters would therefore give Coke huge credit in Overbury's eyes and, in all probability, the eyes of Robert Carr and King James himself. It would also give Coke a huge moral advantage in his dealings with the King should he choose to act as saviour, and, the cynic in Gresham noted, an equally huge opportunity for blackmail.
Were the letters in King James's own hand? wondered Gresham. If they were, and Coke recovered them, he held the whip-hand over James. If they were in Carr's hand they could be more easily dismissed as forgeries. Either way, Carr could lose huge favour with the King if he was responsible for the permanent loss of such damaging letters. If Carr's reputation was at stake, then Overbury would be involved.
Yet how on earth was Sir Edward Coke, a man of no small vanity himself, going to rein in his tongue in the face of this wholly offensive, reeking apology of a man? This is going to be more fun that it first seemed, thought Gresham.
Overbury sat down without invitation and knocked a few papers aside to show his superiority. His gaze wandering round the room, he finally allowed it to fall on Gresham.
'Gresham,' he said flatly, with a raised lip, an expression of total scorn and without so much as the merest nod of his head. It was extraordinarily ill-mannered. Duels had been fought and lives lost on the basis of lesser insults. Good manners were not simply outward courtesy. They were the measure of the respect in which a man was held.
Overbury swivelled his eyes round the room once more, then brought them back to rest on Gresham. Just at that moment Gresham's pupils seemed to enlarge. It was as if Gresham's gaze had decided Overbury was of no importance and looked through him in search of something of significance. Along with the eyes that did not seem to see him, Overbury was aware of the queer, sardonic half-smile on Gresham's face. It was as if he was being mocked and ignored at the same time.
'Gresham!' Overbury's venom reinforced the insult. 'Why do we need a… spy to help us in this matter?' Overbury spoke to Coke. His tone was scornful, dismissive.
Gresham did the one thing Overbury found it hardest to cope with. He ignored him completely. His eyes turned from the window at which he had been gazing, through Overbury without registering his presence and on to Coke's own eyes.
'As I was saying, shall we get down to business?' Gresham asked of Coke, outwardly thoroughly relaxed.
Overbury's mouth dropped. 'Cease your petty games, Gresham!' he announced, 'or I'll have to break your pate as I broke the servant's!'
Do I let it take its course now, or do I back down? This man would never bend, thought Gresham. So let it take its course.
Gresham waited politely for Overbury to finish, then carried on as if Overbury's words had never been spoken. So strong was the impression given by Gresham that there was only he and Coke in the room that Overbury almost had to shake himself to confirm he was actually there.
'Cecil was of the opinion that these incriminating and embarrassing letters must have been stolen from Carr or Overbury. If we're to do business, we really do need to stop playing games. I'm assuming that the letters were stolen from Overbury.' Gresham's tone made for no recognition whatsoever that Overbury was in the room with them. 'Overbury's clever enough to know how potentially explosive and destructive such letters would be. He's treacherous enough to keep them for future use against either his friend Carr or the King. He's arrogant enough and fool enough to lose them, and hated enough for any of his servants to risk stealing them if they thought that by doing so they could harm their master.'
There was a moment's silence while the enormity of what Gresham had said sank into Overbury's mind. He exploded. He leaped to his feet with a roar.
'You cur! You dog! You whore's whelp!' His sword was half out of its scabbard and he was rushing to fall upon Gresham…
… and suddenly he was flying through the air, landing to the sound of a sickening crunch followed by the sharpest stab of pain and then blissful unconsciousness.
The pain was the first thing he remembered as he came to, the sharp, red-hot pain and the bubbling noise as air tried to pass to and fro between the blood from his nose and mouth. Dimly he heard a voice. It was
