'And are you sure of this?' asked Cecil.
'Yes,' said Walsingham. 'I am.'
'And who was the girl?' asked Cecil.
'Lady Mary Keys,' said Walsingham flatly.
The colour drained from Cecil's face. Interesting, thought Walsingham, very interesting.
'Lady Mary Keys… the sister of Lady Jane Grey?' asked Cecil, his voice almost a whisper.
'The same,' said Walsingham. 'Lady Jane Grey, whose blood-claim to the throne of England was sufficient for her to be declared Queen for nine days, placed there by unscrupulous relatives before being removed by Queen Mary and executed for her folly. So you see, the blood of Tudor Kings flowed through Lady Mary Keys, enough of it to make her sister Queen for nine days. In that sense, if in no other, I suspect Henry Gresham's first name was chosen with some care.'
'And why have you told me this, Sir Francis?' asked Cecil, his eyes staring now.
Why, thought Walsingham? Because breeding is the one thing you will never have, and the lack of it frightens you. Because I do not know if you are acting for your father, for yourself, for the Queen, for Leicester, for Essex or for someone whose existence I am not yet aware. All I know is that Henry Gresham features in your plans, and that this news will make you fear him that little more, and in your youth and inexperience that fear might make you reveal just a little more.
'I have told you,' said Walsingham, 'because men of our position should trust each other. Were you to find out from other sources what I have just told you, you might consider that I had been withholding information from you. You are a rising star. I would wish to have your complete trust.'
'Does Gresham know who his mother is? That he is… distantly related to monarchy?'
'That I do not know. Yet it would not surprise me. Henry Gresham is a rather deep young man, who may know more than even I suspect.'
Cecil had emphasised 'distantly related', Walsingham noticed. Good. He suspected that Cecil already resented Gresham's good looks and fine body, as well as the independence his money brought him. Only in intelligence were they a match for each other, Cecil's superiority resting simply on his awareness of Gresham being a bastard. And now Walsingham had taken that away, and as well as unsettling him had perhaps gained an inch more of Cecil's trust.
'Are there others who know the truth about his birth? Others at Court?' asked Cecil.
There! Walsingham had sensed it. The tremor, the flicker of something behind the words. Walsingham sensed that for Cecil much rested on this answer.
'It is possible,' said Walsingham, appearing to think the question over for a few seconds, as if it had never occurred to him before. 'But if you were to ask me to guess, I would say… no.'
Cecil visibly relaxed. His parting was as quick as he could make it, only just the right side of civility.
So what did Walsingham now know, he mused as the dust settled after Cecil's departure? Cecil was involved in a plot of some sort or another, and Henry Gresham was probably little more than a pawn in it. Yet for Gresham to play his part it was necessary for those who wielded power in the Court not to know that Gresham had been born not just on the wrong side, but on the wrong side of a very expensive blanket. Well, Walsingham was a long way from an answer, but in the slow, measured and remorseless manner that had served him so well over the years he was gaining a little more information all the time. And Henry Gresham? Walsingham had no doubt that he had lessened Gresham's chances of survival, but Gresham had been a volunteer to join the murky world of espionage. He would sink or swim, as plain luck and merit dictated. Just as Walsingham had had to do when he was a young man.
*
The Merchant Royal had mercifully sailed to London, berthing at Deptford. Gresham felt as if the journey from Plymouth to London would have succeeded where a Spanish galley and Drake and his enemies had failed, and killed him at last. He had pleaded with the Captain to be first off. Their arrival on deck would be the talk of every tavern in London the first minute one of the Merchant's sailors made it ashore. He had tried to explain the situation to Anna, felt that he owed her that at least.
'Someone wanted me killed on Drake's ship. I can't be certain of who it is. The minute the ship docks the story will be out in London, and for all I know whoever wants me dead will try again. I can't use my own house in case it's being watched, and George's house in London will be as well watched as my own. We have to smuggle ourselves to an inn, and not even a good one. It has to be one where people don't always want to be recognised…'
'What death warrant is out on me?' asked Anna. 'Apart from the social death of having nothing to wear, no servants to care for even my basic needs and no home to go to. Nor any parents to find in this nonexistent home!' Her tone was cold. 'You tell me that my… guardian is rich, a person who speaks with the Queen of England.' She gave a sharp laugh. ‘Yet he and his ward have to disguise their passage through London as if they were criminals. I believe this is a rich person,' her voice was loaded with scorn, 'a friend of the Queen!' She cursed the hot tears she felt rising up in her eyes, turned her back on both of them quickly before they could see.*1 think you are both criminals, and liars.' Her voice was steady.
Gresham was losing what little patience he had. Mannion looked as if any moment he would take the girl and put her over his knee.
'My being made your guardian and your stupid coming aboard the Daisy means that we are now associated, seen as being together. Any enemy of mine will be an enemy of yours!'
'This is a poor country, where honest women cannot safely walk the streets,' she said scornfully.
'It's a country fighting for its existence,' said Gresham, 'and I'm sorry you've been caught up in that fight. Either way, my life is at risk if when we leave this ship I am recognised, or if I am recognised by your presence. We're lucky. We'll land after the sun's gone down. We can shroud you in a cloak…'
'There is a simpler way,' said Anna in a matter-of-fact voice.
'There is no simpler way,' said Gresham. Needle shafts of pain were beginning to shoot through his head, and he had never felt more tired, the exhaustion a physical presence pressing down on him. 'I've already-'
'Dress me as a man,' said Anna simply. 'Or as a ship's boy. They have clothes on board, clothes that will fit. What news is there in a ship's boy leaving a ship? Particularly if his hair is crammed under a cap and his face blackened with dirt.'
There was a stunned silence. Gresham and Mannion looked at each other aghast.
'Don't be ridiculous!' exploded Gresham. 'Young girls can't go around in trousers, for Heaven's sake!'
'Please stop talking like a father when you are only the age of a son. And a very young son at that,' said Anna, her voice as sharp as a sword being taken out of its sheath. Why were these men so… stupid. How long did it take them to see the obvious? 'If you really think we're in danger, two seamans and a boy going ashore will attract far less attention than two men and a woman.'
'Seamen. Not seamans.' Gresham looked her over. He guessed her hips were quite boyish, pleasantly rounded for sure but nothing like the vast, child-bearing mountains some women carried. But her breasts
… even under a loose-fitting linen shirt…'
'Now you've inspected the goods at length, do you want to buy?' Anna's voice was acid, stinging, having been insulted by the mental undressing to which her body had been subjected. 'Shop can't stay open all day…' It was a phrase her favourite nurse had used. Gresham controlled the flush that threatened to creep into his face. Damn! Had he been that obvious?