Chapter 6
Late July, 1598 Scotland
Their arrival in Scotland was an anti-climax. Blustery, sharp winds chased them up the coast, threatening a storm that never quite happened. They saw numerous other sail, but none seemed to want to follow their exact course, none seemed threatening. Gresham eyed with grim memories the towers of Dunbar Castle, perched on its twin rocks, and the vast three-towered bulk of Tantallon Castle, but no boats scuttled out to chase the Anna, and Tantallon seemed deserted. There was no quayside berth for them at Leith, but the anchorage seemed half empty by the side of the bustle of London. A cloud of smoke, coal and wood seemed to hover permanently over Edinburgh, even though it was the middle of summer.
The first disappointment was horses. All they could seem to hire. were small nags, underfed and as grumpy as their owner. Still, Gresham had dressed in the most sober and sombre manner to avoid attention, and the horses were at least in keeping with his clothes. The second disappointment was what was rumoured to be one of the best hostelries in the city. It was dark, cramped and stank of stale piss, where previous inhabitants had clearly not bothered with chamber pots. He set Mary, the maid, and his three men working to scrub the rooms, even cajoling some hot water out of the kitchen and some half-decent soap. He left the job to Jane's ministrations. She seemed settled now, quiet but calm, and had made no mention of her brush with the master since it had happened. Before Gresham left, he noted that she had donned a simple smock, and was on her hands and knees, scrubbing away like a washerwoman. How extraordinary to move so quickly and easily from being the most beautiful woman at Court to this. Dick had returned to the world of the sane alongside her after the battle, yet Gresham could detect no familiarity between the young man and the beautiful girl of the same age. Whatever else Jane had mastered, she had the ability to send out the strongest possible signal to any interested male that she was not available. If rumour was to be believed she was the first woman in England to turn Essex down.
Gresham and Mannion set off to get the sense of the city. James held Court at Holyrood Palace; it was a poor thing from the outside compared to the Palaces Elizabeth owned. The forbidding bulk of the castle and Arthur's seat dominated the city, overlooking the stinking pond that they call Nor' Loch. It was not a place to bring cheer to the soul, Gresham thought.
Cameron Johnstone was the name Gresham had been given when he had asked for a contact in Scotland. A thin, straggly lawyer dressed from head to toe in black. Part of his garb would have been fashionable in London five years earlier, but part showed a strong French influence. The impression of legal respectability was spoilt by a thin scar that ran from his chin to just under his right ear. His accent was as thick as Scottish rain, but understandable. His office was also clean, and Gresham and Mannion had learnt enough about life in Scotland to relish what seemed to be the absence of fleas on both their host and his furnishings.
'Ye'll be wanting refreshment?' asked the man, and a fat servant girl with freckles and great plump cheeks brought in wine. It was good. French, by the look and the taste, and had kept well.
Something nagged at the back of Gresham's mind. He knew he had never talked with this man before, never met him face to face. But had he seen him before? There was something vaguely familiar about the slightly shambling figure, the way the head was held slightly to one side…
'Now,' said the man, 'I'll be of the mind that you'll no want to be wasting your time or mine. Any friend of the Earl of Northumberland is a friend of mine — though not of all my countrymen, I might add.' He allowed a brief grin to flit across his features. The Percy family, Earls of Northumberland, had been fighting the Scots, when they had not been fighting their own King, for time immemorial. It was a relationship based not so much on love and hate as familiarity and hate. Percy had business interests in Scotland, had recommended this man and had provided him with a letter of introduction.
The lawyer glanced at Percy's letter. He listened as Gresham gave his invented story of being told of a Scots couple who had briefly lived in the village from where he had rescued Jane, who had paid a local man to look after the girl while they were away 'for a few months' and who had never come back. East Linton, that was the name of the village they claimed to have come from. Jeffrey was the name that had been given, said Gresham. Angus Jeffrey and, perhaps, a Belinda Jeffrey. He knew it was not much, but it was all he had to go on. Johnstone looked at Gresham, having taken brief notes, and Gresham felt he was being looked into and through.
'Well,' the lawyer said, 'East Linton's maybe twenty, twenty-five mile out of town. No a long ride for a gentleman such as youself. You have good horses, do you?'
Gresham said where they had hired their nags.
'Aye,' said the lawyer, 'well, it's always a guid thing to help old animals in their distress, but I think we can do a wee bit better than that for ye.' He rang a small bell by his side, and a man his own age came in. 'My client here will be needing some decent horses. And some others taken back to where they belong. Sir,' he turned to Gresham, 'will you trust my man to find you mounts?' Gresham nodded. 'In which case, might I suggest you wait here for the hour or so it will take my man to acquire them? Will you remind me how many men there are in your party? And the lady, of course.'
'There are…' Gresham wanted to say six men and the lady, but stopped himself in time. Poor old Tom was drifting onto the Essex or Norfolk coast now, if he was lucky, and if he was luckier might even get a pauper's burial. Or he was full fathom five; down among the dead men until his bones — and his broken nose — were returned to sand. 'There are five men. Myself, my… secretary here…' Gresham motioned to Mannion, who he had promoted to a secretary in case the Scotsman was conscious of rank and wanted to boot out the servant, 'the girl and three male servants. Oh, and we'd better add in the maid, if she ever recovers from her sea-sickness.'
Mary could have been shot, skewered, ravished and drowned when the Anna was attacked and, had they lost the battle, would almost certainly have had three of the four administered to her. Despite being locked in a cabin while the battle raged above, hearing men die and scream and so on, she had hardly mentioned those passing inconveniences, preferring instead to keep up a continual and very taxing diatribe against the sea and all surfaces which did not stay still. Gresham had only shut her up by threatening for the journey home to put her in the rowing boat and tow it however many hundred yards behind the Anna that it took for them not to hear her whining voice.
'Will the lady and her maid require a small carriage, then?' asked the lawyer.
Gresham thought about it. 'Does the weather look set fair?' he asked. Something of a rather good summer's day appeared to be emerging from under the smog. Jane could ride well, and so could the maid after a fashion. It would do both of them good to be out in the open, and they would probably be more comfortable on horses than in a hired, bone-rattling carriage.
'It will be fine,' said the lawyer firmly, as if God communicated these things direct to him, 'for at least two more days. Ten mile a day will be enough for you with ladies, I believe? There is a good inn at East Linton. It is on the main route, of course.'
Gresham made a decision. 'They can ride, in the first instance. Can you get us a carriage and horses, for it to ride with us should the weather change, or for the return journey?'
Had he made a mistake? The lawyer did not blink, nor did anything in his expression change. Gresham had been introduced by Northumberland not as a nobleman or a courtier, but simply as 'someone who holds my trust', which in the diplomatic language of the day put Gresham as little more than a senior employee. The cost of the small coach would be the same as that for all the horses put together. By ordering it as a reserve Gresham had revealed that money was no object to him. Ergo, either Gresham was not what he appeared, or someone very wealthy was paying for the trip.
'Will you grant me the pleasure of entertaining yourself and your
… secretary to dine with me over noon?' This lawyer was no fool. Then again, few lawyers Gresham had met had been fools. Total and utter bastards, yes, but fools, no.
Under normal circumstances Mannion would have perked up at the offer of food, slugged back whatever was left in his drinking vessel and started to loosen his belt a notch. Instead he looked up at Gresham with unusual respect, and said in a passable middle-class accent, 'We do have business elsewhere in the city, sir, as I am sure you are aware.' Mannion was dressed like a secretary, and appeared as comfortable as a wolf suddenly asked to don a woolly fleece. Despite this, his combination of servility and disapproval was superb.
'I can tell the time,' said Gresham dismissively. 'I would be delighted to accept your offer. You are most kind.'
'I apologise for the humbleness of the fare,' said Cameron Johnstone. 'You are very welcome, but
