Of the Privy Council, only Edward Stanley, Earl of Derby, is missing. Interesting.
There is a long silence. A peal of thunder overhead. Much closer already. Wind rattles the windowpanes. Smoke is blown back down the chimney.
“So then,” she says. “We are alone.”
It is dramatic, of course, but no one contradicts her. This is something they have all feared would one day happen: that France would fall to the Catholics, and now she has, and all Christendom is united under Philip of Spain. Only Reformed England holds out: lone, isolated, and meager-powered England.
Perhaps God has forsaken them.
“But it is not hopeless, eh? Walsingham?”
This is from Sir Thomas Smith. He is smiling at Walsingham, encouraging him, and yet—
Does he already know?
Walsingham remains silent.
“Well, since Master Walsingham chooses modesty,” Smith continues, “then I shall have to blow his trumpet for him. He has—what word would you use, Master Walsingham? Procured?—procured for us, the most startling piece of intelligence imaginable, haven’t you? Something to show that God has not entirely forsaken His English nation. Something to tip the balance of power in our favor.”
The Queen is skeptical.
“What is this… intelligence?”
Walsingham closes his eyes. He waits.
Smith has the bit between his teeth. “It is material taken from the logbook of the Portuguese admiral Baltazar DaSilva.”
Now Walsingham opens his eyes to find Smith smiling at him, but his eyes are alive with malice. Smith believes he is feeding Walsingham gallows rope. The Queen is looking pleased, albeit uncertain, as if she has been promised a great surprise for her birthday.
“And what does it disclose, this material?”
“I regret to say, ma’am, that I cannot say: for as I believe Sir Thomas knows full well, the material has been taken from us.”
There is a slight recoil, not least from Smith.
“Taken from us?” he repeats. “Taken from us by whom?”
It is an act. It fools some, but not Walsingham.
“It does not matter,” Walsingham tells them.
“By God it matters, Walsingham!” Smith bellows. “It matters a great deal. It has been taken by one of your ‘espials,’ hasn’t it? Admit it, man! You have failed. This is what your nonsensical intelligencing has come to! Abject bloody failure!”
Smith is purple with rage. The Queen quiets him so that others may be heard.
“Explain, please, Master Walsingham,” she demands. “Leave nothing out.”
Walsingham takes a deep breath. He knows he is treading the very fine line between success and having his head removed by an ax.
“The document,” he begins, “which was two pages removed from Admiral DaSilva’s logbook, came to me in Paris from a source in the court in Lisbon, just this last week.”
“How did it come to you?” the Queen asks.
Francis Walsingham has eyes that some men have called hooded, and he uses them now to great effect, turning his gaze to the Queen. He need say nothing of the labyrinthine pathways that link Whitehall to the court of King Sebastião in Lisbon, and the Queen understands. She nods.
“Never mind,” she says. “Go on.”
“The recent tumult meant I had no leisure to study it, or make a copy, and so, believing our embassy to be in danger, I entrusted the document to Oliver Fellowes—may God rest his soul—to bring it back to London to place in the hands of Lord Burghley here.”
Burghley looks mildly surprised.
“Unfortunately,” Walsingham continues, “Oliver Fellowes was murdered before he left France, and the document was stolen.”
There is a mumble of respect for the soul of the dead man before business resumes.
“You did not look at it at all?” Leicester asks.
“I did, my lord, but had no time to decrypt it before the tumult overtook us.”
“It was encrypted?” This is from Burghley. He has removed his hat and is pulling his beard.
Walsingham nods. They all sit back and they all exhale. They know what that means: the Portuguese admiral Baltazar DaSilva is known first and foremost as a navigator, and an encrypted logbook can only mean one thing. He has been sailing in uncharted waters and has found something he does not wish to share with the world.
“And what do we believe he found?” the Queen asks for them all.
Walsingham must say it: “The Straits of Anian. Or so I believe.”
“The Straits of Anian? The Straits of Anian? Dear God! You had information as to the Straits of Anian?”
A babble of voices. Ten, twenty questions. How could this happen? How could he allow it? The Queen’s voice cuts through it.
“The Northwest Passage? He has found the Northwest Passage?”
For the last fifty years, every navigator in Christendom has sought the Northwest Passage to Cathay. It is the route to untold wealth, and the only way to break the power of Spain; the only way to ensure England’s safety, her freedom.
“So I am led to believe,” Walsingham tells them.
“Well,” Smith says, a sneer on his face. “We’ll only know for sure when we see Spanish convoys coming through, won’t we?”
Now the Queen’s eyes are very piercing.
“The Spanish?” she demands. “The Spanish have DaSilva’s pages?”
“I do not know who has them now,” Walsingham admits.
“Then who took them, Walsingham? Tell us that.”
This is Smith, of course.
“A woman named Isobel Cochet,” Walsingham answers.
“Cochet? She sounds like a Frenchy,” Leicester says.
“She was married to one,” Walsingham agrees.
“So it is the French who now know the location of the Northwest Passage? Not the Spanish?”
“I am sorry, Your Majesty, I do not know on whose behalf Mistress Cochet now works.”
“And why is that?” Smith wonders aloud. “Is that because she is—or was!—one of your most valued espials, Walsingham? Is that it?”
Walsingham says nothing. He loathes Smith.
“But she turned her coat, didn’t she?” Smith continues. “And now she acts for—pffft! Who knows? Not for Master Walsingham at any rate. Not for England. Not you, Your Majesty.”
The Queen raises her hand.
“So let me see, Master Walsingham, let me see if I have this straight,” she starts, her voice steely as a blade. “With our treasury empty of any coin for war; and with a Spanish fleet under Admiral Quesada
