A Queen's Spy, - [best books under 200 pages .txt] 📗

He was forced to try to find sleep in the room that doubled as a store with twelve other men, several empty barrels, a broken plough and jumbles of household debris the owner thought was still of some use. But the room was dry, and well heated by the number of slumbering bodies.

 

†

 

The other sleeping men grunted as they pulled covers tight to fend off the cold blast of air that heralded Mat’s entrance. It was only Jack, unable to sleep, who saw Mat in the doorway. Alarmed that something had happened he was on his feet in a moment, but Mat had already retreated from the fetid quarters. Stooping he retrieved his fallen cloak and, wrapping the folds tightly around himself, stepped over the sleeping men and followed Mat.

“You stand there and look innocent don’t you, eh?” Mat challenged.

Jack said nothing, his confusion growing as his mind groped for some fact to allow him to understand Mat’s aggressive tone.

Mat did not leave Jack ignorant for long. Jack soon knew how eager Mat was to let him know of the mistake he had made and that there was no doubt as to where the blame lay.

“Why the Master trusts you with anything I have no idea! You’re a bloody fool, Jack, and a dangerous one at that.” Mat remained furious, “I hope you know what you’ve done, and I hope the Master makes you suffer for it.”

Mat also carried with him Richard’s instructions for Jack, and the means, in the form of a weighty silver purse, to carry them out. The aim was to divide again what Jack had reunited, to break down the band into smaller groups, none of which knew where the others resided, the only link between them being Jack who directed them, and Richard who instructed him. The division was simple enough. Small groups were dispatched during the day to locations specified by Richard and given custody of a portion of the money they were due: enough for lodgings, enough for wine and women, enough to keep them until they were contacted again.

Two groups were dispatched as journeying labourers who came every year from the villages to work in the fields. A few more new faces would not be commented on. There was some general complaint. No one fancied weeks of toil over the plough for labourer’s wages. However, as he pointed out, Jack’s portion of the coins made them the best paid farm workers in all of England, something none could disagree with. They went by foot; soil turners didn’t own horses. A third party went, under the guise of traders, to a village where annually a horse fair took place. For a few weeks, they gathered and variously drank, wenched, and insulted each other boisterously in the haggle over horseflesh; the horses from those who had left on foot went with them. Jack had thought Richard had been idle when he had been in London, now he knew a little of what had occupied his time.

Mat passed on the detail verbally to Jack after he returned to the inn. Jack’s face was grimly set, his back straight, the strain of the initial shock gone from him. The morning’s work had made a considerable dent in the money Mat had passed to Jack, who guessed it comprised almost Richard’s entire stock of coins. Jack calculated that Richard must have scant means for his own support, having passed on almost all of what he had.

Jack eyed Mat who had remained with him as he had executed the plans during the morning. “Has he enough?” It was the first reference to his brother that had been made since Mat had spoken harshly to him before daybreak.

“Aye, Dan’s with the Master, don’t worry about that,” Mat said, and then added, “Jack you’ve done well this morning. If you wanted to make recompense for what you did, you have set out on the right path.”

Jack accepted Mat’s words in silence. The instructions that he passed on had been executed without fault. Jack brooked no argument that day from anyone and by midmorning they were all departed separately from the Inn at Carney Bridge.

There were only the two of them left now. Following Richard’s directions, they remained at the Inn at Carney Bridge for two more nights, and then they made the short and uneventful journey to Lord Byrne’s.

 

†

 

Jack judged the Manor when it came into view to be an affluent enough place. Hazeldene’s walls were in good repair, fences stood sturdily, and the land around was ordered and well controlled. Hazeldene had grown from an original Norman stronghold to more of a country residence. Wings had been added in an unplanned manner, the outline in the last light of the afternoon showed rooflines at a dozen differing levels. In one wing the low sun glinted in the diamond glass panelled window, its uneven facets reflecting the light like the rippled surface of a pond. Byrne, Jack assessed, was not short of money. His nerves had returned again as they rode up the final stretch towards the gate, unsure of the reception he would receive. Their horses moved at a slow amble. Jack saw that the gates to the enclosed courtyard stood open, but until he turned a slight bend in the path ahead he was denied a view of the interior.

“Looks like a pleasant enough place to spend a few weeks, doesn’t it?” Mat said, inclining his head towards Jack.

Jack didn’t reply – his thoughts were elsewhere – and he was not looking forward to the encounter with Byrne. It was only four days since they had left London and there was a good possibility that the communication Richard was supposed to have sent to Byrne to advise of their arrival had not preceded him. The moment would not be one to relish if he had to inform their employer that, albeit temporarily, the mercenary leader he had hired was indisposed. The even more unpleasant knowledge that this was his fault dogged Jack’s every waking hour. The agony of it was worse because, whichever way he looked at it, he could see no way that he would have acted differently. Richard had warned him and he had casually ignored his words and left the inn. If the warning had been couched in stronger terms, or even if he had been aware that Peter was trying to find their lodgings, Jack would still, he was sure, have decided he could outwit Harry’s lackeys and exchange his sword for silver. It was a hard and bloody lesson indeed.

The two horses, side by side, turned the bend in the path. Jack’s view of the courtyard was not complete, but Mat, who had ridden round the outside, was the first to see fully into the confines of Hazeldene.

“There, Jack, near the stable door! It’s the Master’s horse,” Mat said quickly.

“Dan could have ridden it here,” Jack replied, his eyes intent on finding a further sign of his brother.

“Maybe,” Mat agreed.

Jack’s mind ran through the possibilities; the most favoured one, that his brother had preceded him, he did not want to hope for.

Their horses drew level with the gate and passed on beneath the Norman arch. Jack was loosening a foot from a stirrup as his mount drew to a stand when the evidence came to him of Richard’s presence. From behind him came his brother’s level voice in pleasant conversation with another. The words he could not discern, but the sound of it was unmistakable.

Jack dropped from the saddle and turned a little uneasily towards the brother he had almost killed with carelessness. Richard was descending the stairs from what was probably the main hall. His partner in conversation, a young woman, was standing smiling in the doorway. Richard had evidently been taking his leave of her.

Jack was not prepared for this encounter. Did Richard know how Harry’s men had found him? If he did, the pleasant expression on his face as he approached did not tell him so.

“I trust the journey was a pleasant one?” Richard dropped down the last two steps. Jack, temporarily at a loss for adequate words, said nothing. “Dan,” Richard continued, “will show you where to go.” Jack turned to see the big man lumbering towards them. “I will no doubt see you later.”

“Where are you going?” Jack said, recovering himself.

Richard stopped. His grey eyes met Jack’s for the first time. “To while away some pleasant hours in the company of a lady,” he said. His face lost its pleasant expression and he added, “The cost, however, is extremely cheap: a few lessons of chess.”

Oh God, he knew. The thought avalanched through Jack’s brain as he watched his brother turn his back and ascend the stairs once more towards the hall door.

 

 

 

Chapter Six

Bedfordshire – May 1553

 

†

 

After some enquiry, Jack discovered that Richard had been allocated quarters within the main house. He found the general area and, in the process of trying to locate the precise room, met Dan as he rounded a corner. The big man came towards him, blocking his path. Behind Dan was a short corridor containing two doors, one on either side of the passage, which then came to an abrupt end.

“I want to see him,” Jack said quietly.

“You can’t,” Dan growled firmly but equally as quietly.

“Why not?” Jack retreated a step down the corridor as Dan continued to come towards him.

“Why do you think?” Dan said angrily.

“He seemed…”

Dan did not let him finish. “Seemed all right this afternoon? Is that what you were going to say?” Dan brought his face close to Jack’s. “And if he’s all right you can set yourself on a journey to heal your own soul. No point in Jack suffering if the rest of the world’s back to rights, is there now? Well, you don’t look too closely do you?”

Jack didn’t wait for Dan to conclude his lecture but ducked under his right arm and spun quickly past him to the nearest door. The expression on Dan’s face told him he had the right room. It took only a moment for him to turn the ringed handle, lifting the latch on the inside, and slide through the opening, closing the panel behind him. Dan stood alone in the corridor. His hand hovered near the door for only a moment before dropping back to his side.

A single candle lit the room, its flicker in the draft of air the only movement. Stationary on the threshold, Jack watched the sleeping man. Richard was obviously not immobile in slumber for the sheets were in disarray. Though grasped in a sleep-clenched hand, they had slithered from his naked body. So, Jack gained his first knowledge of something his brother must have taken pains to conceal.

The brand from the lash, long since healed, spoke to him in parallel scars from the exposed back. Sweat pooled then ran in minute rivulets down the tracks of the whip marks, further dampening the already sodden sheets. Jack stared, comprehension dawning of another gap in his knowledge of his brother’s life. Drawing his eyes at last from the signs of punishment, he looked at the bandages that covered the fresh wound. Even in the dim candlelight, the skin’s pale hue still showed. Hair, darkened to raven-black with perspiration, clung to a cheekbone, its dark veil hiding the expression of the sleeper. Richard breathed out and Jack held his own breath as he watched the other’s