turning in his bed, he had allowed the unthinkable to enter his mind. What Mannion was doing would inevitably be extraordinarily dangerous, however he set about it. Could he face life without that hulk of a man by his side? He prayed he might never have to find out.
Anna had continued talking. 'Oh, I agree,' she said. 'Women cannot be trusted with secrets. They need simply to be told what to do. Or sold to men with the pox. Or just used generally, for the convenience of a man.'
It was so close to his actual thoughts that he nearly let the colour flood into his cheeks. 'We're not out of danger. We must hurry to leave, in case the Italian changes his mind, pockets what gold he has and takes more for revealing us. If we're taken in and you're, asked about Mannion, you really won't know. There's nothing better than sincerity.'
She pursed her lips, a gesture making it clear that belief was at least suspended if not totally dismissed. George intervened.
‘I’m sure he's acting in your best interest,' he said, feebly. She flashed a brief smile at him, as if saying thank you to a big brother, and then turned again to Gresham.
'So you can lie to save a friend. I as a mere woman can do no such thing. That is fine. Now I understand.' She was clearly seething underneath.
Privately, Gresham doubted Jacques Henri was in town. Their arrival had not raised the clamour he had expected in Lisbon, there being enough clamour in that city as it was, but neither had it gone unnoticed. Jacques Henri would surely have heard of their presence by now, and come rushing to them. Either he was absent, or regretting his engagement. Anna had made it clear the matter had been arranged without her consent. Yet how clear was she whether the famous Monsieur Henri was a willing partner, or simply coerced?
The address they had been given turned out to be a vast ware-house with a presentable stone house attached. Yet it was as quiet as a mausoleum. They were quite an entourage, Gresham, Anna, two maids and seven of Gresham's servants, all on hired horses, with the two resplendent guards provided by the Governor General, and an interpreter. Several street urchins had gathered at a safe distance, offering their comments in Portuguese on the whole array, and the usual waifs and strays of any city had gathered to watch — maids out on errands, apprentice boys making a short journey last a long time, the occasional boy risking a thrashing by missing his lessons to be out in the sun. The man who had seen the Three Horsemen of the Apocalypse was not one of the guards. He was on sick leave, Gresham had been told as he had enquired solicitously.
The senior guard had tried to hide his horror at Anna riding with them. Clearly he thought it desperately improper for the girl to rush so to meet her intended. Surely the men should have met first of all, agreed what to do, and only then allowed the girl to enter into the scheme of things? 'Ah!' said Gresham, 'but she's importunate to meet her intended! I can hardly hold her back. I've no heart to stem the passion of her love for this man!' he declaimed, enjoying how annoyed this made Anna. Not that an outsider would have noticed her annoyance. Gresham was becoming adept at reading the tiny flickers on her face.
It soon became clear that the problem would not have to be resolved on that day at least. Furious hammering at the door of the house produced nothing but a wizened old man, his face darkened by the sun and cut through with tiny, deep lines, who eventually emerged through a postern gate carved out of the great door into the warehouse yard. No, the interpreter established, Monsieur Jacques Henri was not in residence, had not been so for some months now. It was not known when he was expected back. The warehouse was empty. The last consignment of goods from Goa had been sold before his departure, the last rolled Turkish carpets sold, the great bales of wool disposed of at less than full price. It was believed that the merchant was seeking new markets, new outlets, new products. He had gone north in June, to the Flat Countries, the interpreter said. Flat Countries? It could only be the Low Countries, the Netherlands.
'Why would the fat merchant go to a war zone?' asked Gresham. 'The whole area's been at war for years. Parts of it are like a desert, so I'm told. What profitable trade could there be there?'
'I hope he has gone there because he has realised that it would be sinful to take me as his wife,' said Anna, 'and because he is too much of a fat coward to shoot himself he hopes that one or both of the armies in the Netherlands will do it for him.'
'Do you say that about all your friends?' asked Gresham.
'He is not my friend,' she replied. 'Any more than you are. He is a fat pig.'
They saw nothing of Mannion for the remainder of that day, or that night, when Gresham, George and Anna attended a glittering reception held by the Governor General. Gresham had half hoped to see the legendary Marquis of Santa Cruz there, but no, he was told, the Marquis had too many pressing demands on him. Nor was Mannion there the next day, when they rode out to see Lisbon and its sights, or the day after when they were permitted to leave the city boundaries and ride out in the glorious countryside surrounding the city. It was on the fourth day that Mannion reappeared, quietly and without fuss, a strange grimness in his manner.
'And where have you been?' asked Anna, her insatiable curiosity finally getting the better of her.
'Presenting a visiting card,' was all that Mannion would say.
Chapter 8
October 1587 — May, 1588 Cambridge; London; Lisbon; the Netherlands
It was a tricky job, dragging the cannon out of a ship. Like taking out a tooth. Firstly the barrels had to be taken off the short wooden carriages and properly slung. Each weapon was massively heavy, but unevenly balanced, with more weight at the breech than at the tapered muzzle. The lifting tackle had to be exactly positioned to avoid the gun swaying and splintering the timbers of the vessel. Poorly tied knots, a frayed rope or a pole not seated firmly on the ground and you risked the whole thing crashing down onto the deck. Never mind the people, in one such incident only last year the gun had gone right through the hull and was resting on the sea bed. It was a miracle they had been able to save the ship.
The sailors looked on glumly as the last of the guns were swung overboard, and laid in their padded nest on the vast carts, then to rumble off to be stored in the great armoury at the Tower of London. The disgruntled manner of the seamen was not because they were being laid off with the ships. That had been part of a sailor's lot in the winter for as long as mankind had been daring to set sail. It was fear. A number of the men looked nervously down the reach of the Thames to the sea, as if they half-expected to see a Spanish galleon bearing down on them, its cannon ready to belch destruction into London. Now that the fleet was being stepped down for winter, what was there to stop the Spanish if they chose to come?
Holding one possible answer was Walsingham, sat in front of the remnants of a frugal meal, gazing out over the River Thames. He had taken a tenancy at Barn Elms ten years earlier, falling in love with the combination of its quiet solitude and the easy access to London from the tiny village of Barnes. He had complained fiercely at the decision to step down the fleet, to no avail. Money! Money! How dare they preach saving to him, the man who had spent out his own fortune to keep England's borders its own! Thank God in his wisdom that Santa Cruz was ill again. Had it been otherwise, he knew what he would have done in Santa Cruz's position when he heard, as he would surely hear, that the English fleet had been put to bed for winter. He would have ignored his King, taken a squadron of fifteen ships up the Channel risking wind and weather, sailed them into Plymouth or even up the Thames and landed five thousand troops. Let England stop Parma then with a hornet's sting already working its poison in its belly! Oh what tactics, daring, or fifty of the best ships could dash out from Lisbon, and do to the English fleet exactly what Drake had done to the Spaniards in Cadiz.
It could still happen. King Philip was sending ever more urgent messages to Santa Cruz, demanding that he sail now, even in the depth of winter. The moment the first agent in Lisbon reported back that yards were being stepped, supplies being loaded for just such a venture, then this half-manning nonsense would cease. Walsingham guessed Her Majesty would move with unseemly haste, her dignity in disarray at the prospect of her old knees bending to King Philip of Spain! Then let us see the sycophantic Burghley rush to support the immediate re-manning of the fleet, the noble Lords of Leicester and Essex suddenly feel the foundations of their vast castles tremble beneath their feet!
Yet it was history repeating itself. For most of Elizabeth's reign her soldiers and the idiot nobles sent to lead them had proved a false saviour, just as even a fully-manned English fleet might do now. It had been espionage
