As Warboys strode off, Boltfoot gazed without emotion at the three men in black. They had finished their hole and were busy starting a fire of twigs and dried dead-wood. They said nothing to him. He was bound and they were armed with skenes and firearms. He could see that they had his own caliver and cutlass, too.
With the fire under way, two of the black-robed men strode across. Boltfoot watched, powerless and motionless, as they dragged the coffin into the hole in the ground. It was a shallow hole, and the top of the coffin was no more than twelve inches below the surface. He did not try to struggle against his bonds, for it would merely use up valuable energy; he must stay as still as stone. Without ado, they lifted him up and dropped him with a bone-jarring thud into the coffin, then hammered down the lid with iron nails. Boltfoot was on his back, his face close to the lid. His arms, tied behind him, were pressed agonisingly into the small of his back. The weight of his body drove his wrists hard into the ungiving elm.
There was a grey speck of daylight, a breathing hole, otherwise darkness. A tube of metal was suddenly pushed down into the breathing space, then he could hear the sound of earth being thrown on to the casket above him. After a few minutes, there was silence. He was alone and buried. He could not move. All he could do was struggle for breath through the tube. Or scream. And he had no intention of screaming.
Two members of the royal guard beat a drum roll, then the herald in his royal tabard trumpeted a fanfare and called order. Standing beside him, the Master of the Revels, Edmund Tilney, grey and stooped, rose to his full height on his rostrum in the royal stand. ‘The horses are at the start!’
The Queen, still fanning herself, for the day was warm and close, sat between Essex and old Thomas Heneage, her ever-faithful friend. She paid no heed to Tilney and continued to talk confidentially to those near her.
Shakespeare watched them from a distance of some thirty yards. If Essex saw him, it did not register on his face.
‘If the Barb filly wins the Golden Spur,’ Ana Cabral whispered into Shakespeare’s ear, ‘it will not matter a half-penny apple what little Cecil says. The Queen has a private wager with Essex and if her hobby loses to Conquistadora she has vowed to admit Don Antonio to the presence-chamber. If her Great Henry wins, then she will boot Antonio across the narrow sea to France. I believe she is torn, for I am told she enjoys the company of charming, indiscreet men — and that is Don Antonio. I am told, too, that she calls him traitor and would have none of him — and yet she is intrigued by him and delights to hear tales of all his doings.’
‘We shall soon find out.’
The Queen was so close now it occurred to Shakespeare that Ana could stride towards her from the crowd and shoot her through the throat or heart with a wheel-lock pistol before any guards had a chance to stop her. How many conspiracies and attempts had there been on her life in the thirty-five years she had reigned? He had lost count, and yet still she presented herself to her people as though she had not a care for her safety. Shakespeare could not help but admire her courage. Nor could he help wondering about the motives of Ana Cabral. He turned to look at her and saw her gazing at the Queen.
‘She looks very vulnerable, do you not think, Dona Ana?’
‘ Hmm?’ Ana appeared lost in a dream.
‘The Queen. She is in her sixtieth year. I have not seen her in many months. She seems smaller, more frail.’
‘If you say so, sir.’
‘What do you wish from us, Dona Ana? What is your purpose in coming to England?’
She smiled and frowned at the same time. ‘Why, pleasure, sir, of course. I am a daughter of Spain. I want music and strong limbs, rich wines and little deaths. What else would I wish? I fear I do not understand the question, though, for you know that I am here merely as consort to Don Antonio.’
He thought back to the room at Gaynes Park where she lay with Perez’s insolent secretary. Their eyes had met when he opened the door. She had seemed unconcerned by his prying gaze, had even seemed to enjoy his looking upon her coupling; likewise, she had seemed unconcerned that her lover Perez took peasants for bedmates and spent much of his days in an opium haze.
‘Are you an assassin, Dona Ana? Would you kill our Queen? ’ Shakespeare suddenly realised he had spoken his thoughts out aloud.
She looked at him, puzzled, then laughed. ‘What a strange, forward man you are, Mr Shakespeare. I am a pleasure seeker, nothing more. If Don Antonio’s interests lie elsewhere, I will seek gratification where I may.’ She smiled at him, reached out and squeezed his hand.
He recoiled from her touch, as if bitten by an adder.
Chapter 27
It was wrong to have the warm hand of a living woman touch him. Shakespeare looked at his hand as though it were on fire.
Ana looked at him with questioning in her eye, then looked away, back at the track.
The horses had started at a strong pace. There were six in the race. They had two miles to go, two laps of a prepared circuit. The vidame, dazzling in purple silks, was easily distinguishable from this distance. The Barb’s black coat shone as she settled in the middle of the small pack. The rider of the hobby, Great Henry, was the Queen’s finest jockey from her stables at Eltham. He was small and light, yet exceedingly strong, with such power in his forearms that in a driving finish few ever bettered him. He took Great Henry straight to the front and galloped on by a couple of lengths; it was the only way the horse knew to run; go to the front and stay there. At six years of age, he had never been beaten, and had won the Golden Spur twice before. Most of the crowd’s money was on him. They knew him and loved him and he had been trained with this, the premier race of the year, in mind. He had already beaten the other four English horses, which meant the Barb should be the only threat to his dominance. How could an unknown three-year-old filly from France, even one so well bred and conformed as Conquistadora, have Great Henry’s measure?
The horses were into the home straight. Great Henry was a length to the good, galloping with power and resolve, hugging the inside track. The vidame, purple silks billowing, had not moved a muscle nor raised his whip on Conquistadora. The other four horses were trailing in their wake. Now, they came within a furlong of the finishing post. Great Henry was thundering home like a champion. But then, with a sudden kick of the vidame’s spurs in the barrel of the black Barb, Conquistadora surged forward and was past the Queen’s hobby in three strides. The crowd’s roar died and a gasp went up in its place. The vidame’s young filly had beaten the Queen’s champion.
Shakespeare did not see it. Had he looked, he would have seen Essex bowing deeply to his sovereign and kissing her hand with fervour while she affected to sulk. But Shakespeare had already turned to walk away, nodding coldly to Ana as he went. This was all vanity. No concern of his. There was no more for him here. He strode off, down towards the river.
The day was bright, but he was lost in a fog. He thought of all he had to do. Get Antonio Perez or Ana Cabral or both of them to Cecil. Find the prince of Scots, if he was there to be found. Find the powderman. Somewhere there was a clockmaker who had colluded in terror and murder. Find the clockmaker.