The Last Protector Read online

  ‘My dearest Catherine, how kind of you to come, and so soon.’ She embraced her, which took Cat by surprise, and then turned to Hakesby, who bowed unsteadily. ‘And this must be …’

  ‘My husband,’ Cat said. ‘Mr Hakesby.’

  ‘Madam,’ he said in a voice that creaked with emotion, ‘I am honoured to make your acquaintance.’

  ‘You flatter me, sir,’ Elizabeth said awkwardly, as if the making and receiving of compliments did not come naturally to her. She turned back to the older lady, who had risen to her feet. ‘And this is my dear godmother Mistress Dalton, whose house this is.’

  The introductions were barely over when the door opened again and the servant led in the man they had met in the courtyard.

  ‘My cousin Cranmore, up from the country to see his physicians,’ said Mistress Dalton, staring at the floor.

  ‘We have already met, madam,’ Hakesby said. ‘We passed one another in the courtyard.’

  Mistress Dalton lowered her voice, though her words must still have been audible to Cranmore. ‘He is practically blind, poor man, and to make matters worse, the light hurts his eyes most cruelly.’

  ‘A terrible affliction,’ Hakesby said loudly. ‘How long have you been in this condition, sir?’

  Cranmore turned his head towards the sound of Hakesby’s voice. ‘Too long, sir, too long. My sight began to go when I was a young man. But in these last few years it has worsened rapidly until I’m in the state you see me now.’

  ‘Can the occulists help? Or a physician?’

  ‘They say they can, and they take their fees. I smear my eyes with their ointments, but I’ve yet to notice any improvement.’

  A servant led them into dinner, which was served in the next room. The food was plain though plentiful, probably sent in from a nearby tavern. There was no wine, only water and small beer on the table.

  Cat and Mr Cranmore spoke little, leaving most of the conversation to others. Hakesby’s unusual vigour continued. His cheeks were ruddy, and his movements less tremulous than they had been yesterday. It was as if the excitement of the occasion, the honour of dining with the Protector’s flesh and blood, had effected a miraculous cure.

  Mistress Dalton and Elizabeth Cromwell were attentive to him. They asked about his work, showing a remarkable appetite for information about the Dragon Yard contract and about his collaboration with Dr Wren on the plans for a new St Paul’s Cathedral to replace the one destroyed in the Fire. It was by no means certain, he told them, that the project would go ahead. There were those who argued that restoring the cathedral would be better than replacing it – far cheaper and more quickly achieved.

  ‘It is nonsense,’ Hakesby said, showering crumbs over the table. ‘The old cathedral was practically ruinous even before the Fire. A new St Paul’s would be the glory of London for centuries to come.’

  ‘What a God-given talent it must be,’ Elizabeth Cromwell said, ‘to conjure great buildings to rise from the ashes. And to work on St Paul’s itself – why, it is the very heart and soul of the City.’

  ‘I sometimes fear I shan’t see a single stone put in place in my lifetime,’ Hakesby said, beaming with pleasure at the compliment and spilling sauce over his shirt cuff. ‘The King doesn’t agree with the Court of Aldermen, the Aldermen are at loggerheads with the Dean and Chapter, and the Bishop thinks that no one has a right to an opinion but himself. But the greatest problem of all is the want of money. A cathedral worthy of London will take tens of thousands of pounds to build.’

  ‘Very true, sir,’ Mistress Dalton said. ‘But in the end is not the money always found for these great buildings? Take Whitehall, for example. I shudder to think what the Banqueting House must have cost, but somehow King James raised the money to do it.’ Her lips tightened to a thin line of disapproval, and then relaxed as she went on: ‘But perhaps you were not in London then, sir.’

  ‘Indeed I was, Mistress Dalton. At the time I was apprenticed to a surveyor who did much work for Inigo Jones. I learned much at Whitehall, and from Mr Jones.’

  Elizabeth, who was sitting next to him, asked, ‘Did you work there again, sir?’

  ‘Oh yes. I was much at Whitehall in your grandfather’s time. And your father’s.’

  ‘Then you probably saw me as a little girl, playing some childish game, and didn’t even notice me.’

  ‘That would have been impossible, madam,’ Hakesby said, looking flustered. ‘I – I’m sure that even then your – your—’

  ‘Perhaps you saw me as well, sir,’ Cat said, to save her husband the embarrassment of finding the words for the compliment he obviously thought was necessary. ‘As I told you, Elizabeth and I sometimes played at Whitehall together.’ She shot a glance at Elizabeth. ‘Bowling a hoop.’

  ‘That palace is such a rabbit warren,’ Mistress Dalton said, frowning at Mr Cranmore, as if Whitehall’s architectural confusion were morally reprehensible and he were somehow to blame.

  Mr Cranmore cleared his throat but said nothing.

  ‘Did you visit Whitehall much yourself, sir?’ Cat asked, feeling the poor gentleman was being ignored.

  He turned his head in her direction. Within each lens of the green glasses were tiny, distorted reflections of the window behind her. ‘Rarely,’ he said in his soft, slushy voice. He rubbed his fingertip on the table, as though trying to erase an invisible spot. Something stirred in the depths of Cat’s memory. ‘Indeed,’ he went on after a pause, ‘I rarely come to London, if I can help it.’

  ‘Where do you live, sir?’

  But Cat was too late. As she spoke, Cranmore stuffed a morsel of bread into his mouth, effectively stopping the conversation.

  ‘I used to know the palace well,’ Elizabeth said to Hakesby. ‘Where else did you work there?’

  He turned back to her. ‘On the royal apartments before your grandfather became Lord Protector and moved into them himself; naturally he wanted alterations made. But mainly I worked on the Cockpit buildings – your grand-parents lodged there a few years before.’

  ‘Oh, I remember! I visited my grandmother there when I was still in leading strings. And later on, of course, we lived in the Cockpit ourselves for a time. How I loved the place! Catty and I played shuttlecock in the garden and ran wild in the park.’ She appealed to Cat, who could not remember Elizabeth ever calling her Catty, any more than she could remember calling Elizabeth Betty. ‘Did we not, my love? Do you remember?’

  ‘Not very well,’ Cat said.

  ‘Well, I do. Happy, blessed times.’ She swung back to Hakesby and put her hand on his sleeve, a gesture that made his face light up as if he had been touched by an angel. ‘But there’s such a strange thing. My memories of the Cockpit are dreadfully confused. The layout of the lodging changed so much in my childhood. It confuses my infant memories, for I cannot overlay them on the later ones.’ She withdrew her hand. ‘Am I very foolish to think of these things, sir?’

  ‘Not in the slightest,’ Hakesby said. ‘It is perfectly natural to wish to – to remember those places where we have been happy. Old buildings contain the history of those who used to live in them.’ He looked across the table at Cat. ‘Is it not so?’

  ‘No doubt, sir.’

  ‘For example,’ Mistress Dalton said, looking at Hakesby, ‘was there not a chamber with a painted ceiling? It used to open into the passage from King Street in the old days, I think.’

  ‘We used to play there when it was wet,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Do you recall it, Cat?’

  Hakesby looked unhappy. ‘I can’t bring it to mind, Mistress.’

  ‘If only,’ Elizabeth said in a soft voice, bringing her lips closer to Hakesby’s ear, ‘if only …’

  ‘If only what, madam?’

  She smiled at him. ‘If only there were plans of the Cockpit as it was then, in those days. I don’t suppose by any lucky chance you have any still?’

  Hakesby nodded. ‘Yes, quite possibly.’ He drew himself up in his chair. ‘I try to make it a rule to keep
copies of my plans and surveys. Sometimes one can show a design to prospective clients, or sometimes it’s useful as a memorandum to remind oneself of a detail here or a detail there that might be—’

  Mistress Dalton coughed. ‘Elizabeth, my love, you mustn’t pester Mr Hakesby. He’s our guest, and I cannot allow it.’

  ‘It is no trouble, madam,’ Hakesby said. ‘None in the world.’ He turned back to Elizabeth. ‘If it would please you, I shall see if I can lay my hand on the Cockpit survey, and the plans for the work we did for your grandfather and later for your father. Then you will be able to overlay them with your memories.’

  ‘Oh sir,’ Elizabeth said, peering at him with her bright little eyes, ‘that would be so very obliging of you.’

  Mr Cranmore stirred in his chair. Cat glanced towards him. He was rubbing the invisible spot on the table again. Something shifted in her memory. She sucked in her breath sharply, aghast at the possibility that had opened up before her.

  ‘Are you quite well, my dear?’ Elizabeth murmured, leaning forward, all sympathy and smiles and narrow eyes. She lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘A spasm? We women suffer so, do we not, and the gentlemen have not the slightest understanding of it.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Freshly Killed Pigeons

  Saturday, 18 January – Sunday, 2 February 1668

  WHEN COOK ISN’T looking, the scullery maids come into the kitchen yard to meet stableboys. The boys bring the maids ribbons. The boys fondle the girls and the girls giggle. The boys put their hands up the maids’ skirts and make them squeal.

  Ferrus lies in Windy’s kennel and waits for Master to call him. The later Master comes in the morning, the more drunk he was last night. Master sleeps in Scotland Yard. But Ferrus sleeps here, on the Cockpit side of the palace. He doesn’t know why, but that is how it has always been, for ever and ever, even before Mistress Crummle came to live here.

  The maids and the stableboys chatter like birds. The gentles have been fighting each other over the river. One’s dead. A lord is like to die of his wounds. Perhaps the King will chop off the heads of the others. It’s the Duke’s fault, they say: not their duke, my lord, the fat old soldier who sometimes lodges at the Cockpit: another duke.

  Kill, kill, kill, Ferrus thinks, let them all kill each other.

  I was much shaken by the duel. I had witnessed the killing of one man and the wounding, perhaps fatal, of another. Without the assistance of Wanswell and his fellow watermen, I might have suffered violence or worse myself. I had already seen too much violent death in my life, and I still had not become accustomed to it. I was a clerk by trade, after all, not a soldier.

  Afterwards, I slept badly, and drank too much wine in the hope of numbing my senses and blurring my memory. What made it even more unsettling was my suspicion that this business wasn’t over as far as I was concerned. Buckingham and his servants now had even more reason to dislike me. Jenkins was dead, and Shrewsbury wounded. Buckingham and the other three were in hiding. But that would not stop the Duke from directing his affairs and managing his hatreds.

  On Saturday afternoon, Mr Williamson called me to his private room in Scotland Yard. He told me that, despite his wound, my Lord Shrewsbury was to be moved from the house in Chelsea where he had been since the duel.

  ‘They’re taking him to Arundel House,’ he said. ‘A risky business – I would have thought that jolting him about could reopen the wound. Presumably they’ll go most of the way by river, and pray the weather is kind. His people must think he will be safer among his kin. The Howards look after their own. And of course they’re all papists together.’

  Arundel House was between the Strand and the river, a stone’s throw from my own lodging at the Savoy. It was another rambling mansion, and its best days were long since gone. Many of these riverside palaces were being rebuilt or sold piecemeal for redevelopment. No doubt Arundel House would go the way of the others, probably sooner rather than later. I had heard that the Howards had offered part of the garden to the Royal Society, for them to build their headquarters. Perhaps that would be the start of it.

  ‘They say my lord is mending well,’ Williamson went on. ‘Which is why I want you to go there tomorrow after dinner, once he’s settled into his new quarters. They will be expecting you. You will give him a letter from Lord Arlington – merely a few words to wish him well; a courtesy.’

  ‘But if the Duke of Buckingham is having Arundel House watched,’ I said, ‘would it be wiser to send someone who would not be recognized?’

  Williamson gave me a hard stare. ‘If I want your advice, Marwood, I’ll ask for it. While you’re there, see how my lord does. I want your opinion of his condition.’

  ‘I’m no physician, sir. I—’

  ‘I’m aware of that. But you’re not altogether stupid either. And there’s something else you can do. Lord Arlington has a message for Lord Shrewsbury as well, and he doesn’t want it committed to paper. If you get the opportunity for a private word, tell him that Lord Arlington stands in his debt, and that he promises the Duke will pay dearly for what he has done. But be discreet in all things, and urge my lord to be the same. If you can’t find the opportunity to pass on the message without being heard, leave it.’ He gave me another stare. ‘But I am sure you will contrive it somehow.’

  He dismissed me, but as I was leaving he called me back.

  ‘Have you heard the rumour about my Lady Shrewsbury?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘They say she was at the duel herself. She was disguised as a page boy and stood among the Duke’s servants. And afterwards she lay with him. He was still wearing his shirt. It was stained with her poor husband’s blood.’

  ‘But I saw no page boy there, sir. Nor any blood on the Duke’s shirt.’

  Williamson moistened his lips. ‘What a pity. But it’s a useful story to have about town, nevertheless.’

  After dinner on Sunday, I walked across from my lodging in the Savoy and presented myself at Arundel House. I gave my name at the gate, where there were two servants dressed in the Howard livery and armed with swords; Lord Shrewsbury’s hosts were taking precautions.

  The entrance courtyard was large but unimpressive. It was lined with old buildings, many of which were unexpectedly humble. There was also an ancient hall of crumbling stone, with a ramshackle lantern on its roof. A manservant took me across the court to a tall range of buildings west of the hall, where the family had its apartments.

  Here the grandeur was more in evidence. The place was crowded, for like all great people the Howards surrounded themselves with retainers, dependants and relations as a mark of their importance. I was led upstairs to a chamber overlooking the garden and the river beyond. It was empty. The walls were hung with tapestries. Halfway down one of the longer sides, a small coal fire burned sullenly in a large and elaborately carved marble fireplace. It made little difference, for the air was cold and damp.

  The servant asked me to wait while he enquired if his lordship was well enough to see me. I stood by one of the windows. The garden was strewn with statuary in poor repair. To the right, a long gallery stretched down to the river, with a battlemented viewing platform at the end. The trees and bushes swayed in a stiff easterly breeze. Beyond the garden lay the bleak prospect of the Thames in winter at low tide. The sky, the water and the mud were shades of grey.

  I turned to face the room. An oak armchair with a high back stood facing the hearth. As I approached it, hoping to warm my hands, I discovered that I was not after all alone. A hand was resting on the arm of the chair. At the sound of my footsteps, a periwigged head appeared, and beneath it was a familiar face.

  ‘Marwood,’ Mr Chiffinch said. ‘I might have known.’

  I bowed, thinking furiously as I did so. William Chiffinch was the Keeper of the King’s Private Closet, and a man whom the King employed about his most secret business. He and I knew each other better than either of us liked, for once or twice it had pleased the King to employ me; Chiffin
ch had acted as the middleman for such commissions. Mr Williamson and Mr Chiffinch disliked each other, and they both particularly disliked the fact that they were occasionally obliged to share my services.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Mr Williamson sent me to enquire after my lord’s health. To see how he did after his journey here.’

  Chiffinch rubbed his lips, which were stained a reddish purple with the wine he had taken at dinner. ‘I see.’

  His head vanished abruptly. I heard him sigh. I stood closer to the fire, taking care not to block its heat from him.

  ‘The master has a word with the servant,’ Chiffinch said suddenly, ‘the servant sends the boy.’

  I said nothing. His meaning was clear enough: Lord Arlington had ordered Williamson to send a message to Shrewsbury, and Williamson had given me the task.

  ‘In this case,’ Chiffinch went on, staring at me, ‘the master has a most particular interest in my lord’s health, does he not? Since he was responsible for this … this absurd revelry in the first place.’

  I had thought from the first that there was more to this business than Williamson had seen fit to tell me. Now I knew for certain. Chiffinch had overestimated my knowledge of the matter. He had as good as told me that Arlington was behind the duel. Once I knew that, the rest fell into place: Lady Shrewsbury’s infidelity was merely the pretext for this; Arlington and his ally Talbot had encouraged the duel in the hope of killing Buckingham, their principal political enemy, or at least disgracing him and undermining his power.

  If Chiffinch knew this, then the King must as well. He had probably sent Chiffinch here to assess not only Shrewsbury’s health but his state of mind. It was a delicate matter. The King needed the services of both Arlington and Buckingham to get his business through Parliament.

  A door opened at the far end of the room, and a manservant appeared. He bowed to Chiffinch. ‘You may attend my lord now, sir.’

  They kept me waiting another hour. I took Chiffinch’s place in the chair and wrapped myself in my cloak. At last the servant returned and asked me, civilly enough, to follow him.