'So,' mused Parma, after a moment's thought, 'at last, here is Henry Gresham. The young bastard who dances with the Queen of England, the man who is one of Walsingham's trusted recruits, the brave adventurer who makes his name fighting for England at Cadiz, the controversial academic, the man of fabulous wealth who survives an attempt by Drake to kill him.' He paused. 'And the man who all this while has been spying for Spain.' He paused again. There was a slight smile on Gresham's face. 'The man who attends Mass once a week, at huge personal risk, not just now, but for years,' Parma went on, 'and whose allegiance to his faith overwhelms his allegiance to what he sees as a corrupt state. The man whose reports are deemed among the most important and secret to reach the Escorial Palace, and some of very few sent in their entirety on to me. The man who admits he has been forced to do things to damage the Spanish cause, such as corrupting the chief armourer in Lisbon, so as to retain his credibility with his English masters and to prove himself to the heretic Walsingham. Spain's great secret. The man — the very young man — they talk of in whispers as Spain's secret weapon. The man whose real name is known only to the King, to a single one of his private Secretaries and, recently, to me.'
Henry Gresham bowed his head in acknowledgement. The sense of relief was almost palpable, the sense of no longer having to deceive. 'And the man who would like passage to Spain,' Gresham stated. To end deception, and to join the Armada. I have vital knowledge of Drake, of the English fleet. I must be there to advise the Duke!' He was pleading now. The thought of having come so far and not be there at the climax was unthinkable, obscene.
There was a glint in Parma's eyes. 'You have heard the news that your Walsingham is dead?'
Gresham's expression did not change. 'I had not heard, my Lord,' he replied. 'But it was expected.'
The Duke of Parma looked deep into Gresham's eyes. 'We will talk,' he said. 'And you will tell me everything.'
'I have much to tell you, my Lord,' said Gresham.
Neither men noticed that there was a small gap in the planks beneath their feet, a gap not covered by carpet or a thick layer of rushes. Nor did they notice the briefest flicker, as if someone had been crouched beneath the floor listening, and had moved to their exit.
Chapter 9
28th May — 6th August, 1588 The Battle of Portland Bill
What the hell am I doin',' Mannion asked, 'on a bloody Spanish ship, surrounded by bloody Spaniards and fighting for bloody Spain? I hate fuckin' Spaniards! Unlike you!'
They were standing feet apart on the deck of the San Salvador, unbothered by the heaving of the choppy seas. The smell of the Spanish ship — the sweet and sour tang of olives, the acidic tang of cheap wine, distinct from the raw, thinner smack of English beer, the richness of garlic and herb — was unfamiliar, exotic. The ship drove through the water in stately progress, rather than rising and falling upon it. The garish paint on the upperworks and on the vast castles at bow and stern, full even now with fighting men, was an alien world. There was no chance of the Captain of the San Salvador lending a hand with a rope, as Drake sometimes did. There was deep segregation on board the Spanish ship, and an even deeper hostility between the sailors and the soldiers.
'You chose to come,' said Gresham, more saddened than he dare admit by his friend's misery. ‘You knew it was likely to happen. You knew I had to be here.'
'Are you sure you shifted the money?' Mannion was obsessed that their betrayal of England would leave them penniless.
'I've told you’ said Gresham tiredly, 'the money's safe. You may be servant to a traitor. You won't be servant to a poor traitor.' He turned to face Mannion, more in retaliation than to elicit information. 'And the arrangements for the girl? You're sure they're watertight?'
'More than this bloody ship!' muttered Mannion. 'She knows where she has to be and when. Her passage's booked on the vessel, and it's a good one. She's got money. She knows where to go and who to go to when she gets to Calais.'
He had hated telling her the truth, before they left for Flanders. 'You'll be compromised when I'm revealed as a Spanish spy,' he had said to her.
'But why do people need to know? Why can you not continue in hidings?' Anna had said, looking round almost in desperation at the newly-won world and lifestyle about to be wrenched from her, lost in this world of double and treble betrayal.
'If I'm to do my duty I must get close to Medina Sidonia, be allowed to advise him. After that I'll never be able to hide as a Spanish agent again.'
'First you ask me to betray Spain, then you ask me to betray England! Is this fair?' She was close to tears.
'No,' he had said, 'not fair. Not fair at all. But I have a duty. I gave my word. I want you to survive. That's all.' He could not remember ever having had a heavier heart. In all probability he would never see London again, never dive into Excalibur's pool. The Fellowship of Granville College would gloat over his disgrace. He had made Mannion arrange for Anna to take ship to Calais, booked lodgings, appointed an agent for her before embarking with Cecil to the Netherlands. He had given her enough money to buy a small estate in France, set herself up as an independent person. It would only be a matter of time before someone as beautiful as her found a good husband, he reasoned to himself. They would be panting at her door.
They had left the party in Flanders, saying they were following a lead to the increasingly mythical Jacques Henri. They had boarded the ship for Spain and fought vicious, wintery contrary winds. Gresham had become frantic with worry at the delay forced upon them, and it had taken a second ship to get them into Lisbon in the face of even more foul weather, arriving the day before the Armada sailed.
'This is a bit different’ Mannion had said, on their arrival in Lisbon. Medina Sidonia had worked a miracle. The sense of purpose, of efficiency was in stark contrast to their earlier visit. The greatest fleet the world had ever seen lay out there in the harbour, weighing down the ocean with its power.
The final irony was that it had been almost impossible to get on board one of the Armada's ships. The vessels were ringed by guard-boats, to stop desertion. They had finally begged and bribed passage on the only available boat, taking a parcel of fruit and additional wine out to the Captain of the San Salvador from his wife, and then bribing their way to a place on her decks. The passport Gresham carried from the Duke of Parma was a potent weapon on board one of the Spanish ships. It had been useless with the illiterate and ignorant guards. So it was they had sailed with the Armada.
If God was smiling on King Philip's Enterprise of England it was at best an ironic gesture. Within hours the fleet was facing weather that would not have disgraced a December storm. Then, when more and more stores were opened the water was found to be nothing more than green slime, and the cheese and dried meat infested with rot whose stench made men gag. Drake's rampaging on the Spanish coast had borne a dividend, but so had a fleet kept too long in harbour. Soon the seas were dotted with discarded, rotting foodstuffs, the trail left by the Armada, such sea birds as were brave enough to venture out feeding frenziedly. Three weeks out of Lisbon several ships had been battered to such an extent that they could not dream of entering a battle, sickness was soaring and the fleet had hardly reached Corunna, still just off Spanish land.
'E'll 'ave to take us into Corunna,' said Mannion, continuing his uncanny ability to predict the actions of the Spanish. It was inevitable: Sidonia ordered the fleet into Corunna for repairs and to take on new supplies, sending the sick ashore so as not to infect the healthy. As if in final revenge, a savage gale scattered two-thirds of the ships through the length and breadth of the Bay of Biscay.
'Bugger this for a lark!' said Mannion, with religious intensity, gazing longingly at the shore line as they were blasted by the ferocious wind out to sea, every rope and spar complaining, water cascading along the length of the deck, jagged splinters where the top tier of the after-castle had once been.
He was more cheerful when the San Salvador finally made it into Corunna and for the first time in weeks he could set foot not only on shore but in a tavern. 'Bout bloody time!' he muttered darkly. 'Thought you wanted to get on the flagship?' he asked Gresham, back against a rock as they looked out at the mass of shipping. A full wineskin was clutched firmly in both hands, like a mother hanging on to its newborn baby.
'I've got to meet Sidonia first,' said Gresham. 'Spanish nobility make the English look like democrats. He's a
