Rory Clements - The Heretics

As he came over the rise of a hill and steadied his mount, Boltfoot realised that something was amiss. A bugle was blaring and soldiers were streaming in through the main gatehouse. He dug his heels into the horse’s flanks and urged it on towards the avenue of oaks that lined the approach.

Through the wind at his ears, he heard shouting, then two gunshots and screams from somewhere within the palace grounds.

Suddenly, there was movement at the gatehouse. A man in a golden mask and lavish robes emerged on foot, stumbling backwards like a stag at bay. He had his arm around a woman’s neck, a short sword poised to strike her, holding a squadron of soldiers at arm’s length.

Boltfoot slid down from his horse and drew his cutlass. He had no plan, but he saw a man with a sword to a woman’s breast and knew he had to stop him. The man was not looking behind him, so he did not see Boltfoot loping towards him, dragging his club-foot along the soft grassy path.

Out of the corner of his eye, Boltfoot saw soldiers approaching from the left and right. They halted, uncertain what to do, but Boltfoot did not hesitate. As he came up behind the man and the woman, the man turned and rasped, ‘Get away!’

Boltfoot slashed down with his cutlass on to the man’s sword arm. The action dragged the swordpoint through the woman’s gown, but the man had already lost his grip. The blade flew up into the air and spun away from him. The man screamed, his forearm shattered by Boltfoot’s crushing blow.

The woman fell to one side, out of the man’s grasp. Boltfoot was immediately on to him, wrestling him to the ground. ‘Assist me!’ he shouted to the soldiers.

As he struggled, Boltfoot saw the glint of a blade out of the corner of his eye. Suddenly the woman was on her knees beside him, a dagger in her hand. As Boltfoot held the assailant down, she lunged forward and thrust her dagger deep into the man’s throat.

Shakespeare had had his fill of Newgate. It was a place of pain, the ante-room to slaughter. He had visited Father Robert Southwell there, and then Frank Mills. Each time the stench of death and ordure grew stronger. Yet now he was there again, to talk with the one called Dick Winnow, the only survivor of the band of assassins. He had been picked up five miles from Nonsuch and after initial denial had confessed all.

He lay in chains, his body broken by the rack. In the morning he would face the bloody passage to death known as hanging, drawing and quartering — godly butchery, as some would have it.

Shakespeare looked on him with pity and spoke softly. ‘I believe you are a sea captain, Mr Winnow.’

‘I was. Yes.’

‘Tell me your story. .’

Winnow’s voice was faint but clear. ‘My father was a fisher out of Yarmouth in Norfolk, but he and my mother held to the Catholic way, the true way, and were ever harangued by the parish priest and the justice with fines for recusancy. From an early age — from birth, almost — I was cut adrift from the society of my fellows. After my father was lost at sea, a mocking letter arrived, unsigned, that said his boat had been deliberately holed before he sailed. “ So drown all papists ,” it said.’

Shakespeare listened in silence. The tale had the ring of truth; many had been persecuted for their religion. His own family had suffered at the hands of Topcliffe and others. He nodded.

‘I inherited money on my father’s death, but I knew that I could stay no longer in Yarmouth without committing murder or being murdered, so I invested it all in a bark to take me away from Norfolk. I desired only to live in peace and hoped to earn my wealth trading between the coasts of England and the countries of Europe. But it was not easy, for my faith seemed to follow me like a slavering dog. Mariners did not like to serve with me, nor pilots. Then I heard tell that money was to be earned bringing sherry wines and tobacco from Andalusia, to break the embargo. But it was an ill wind that sent me there, for I was seized by the Inquisition and condemned as an English spy. That is, until Regis Roag and Ovid Sloth came to my aid. They said I could help them rid England of the Protestant tyranny.’

‘What did Roag promise you?’

‘He said that many thousands of lives would be saved by a simple act of justice. Good English men and women, now suffering under the yoke of a heretical dictator, would be set free. I knew what he meant, for I saw how my family had suffered. It was not spoken of, but I think I knew all along that my own survival was impossible. Yet it seemed a worthy use of my worthless life.’

‘Who was behind the conspiracy?’

‘I am not certain of its origins, but Roag was the leader and Sloth had the means. He was desperate for gold. He owed a great deal to Spanish moneylenders and was being threatened. The crafting of those swords of fine, sharp Toledo steel that we concealed within wooden toys: that was Sloth’s doing. He also provided lodging, and assistance for us to perfect our skills as players and swordsmen. But authorisation had to come from the casa de contratacion . A man may not fart on that coast without the house of trade’s permission. The casa dithered and debated the matter for many weeks, but their decision never seemed to be in doubt and we departed at the allotted time. I suppose they reasoned that the death of Elizabeth could do nothing but enhance the claims of the Infanta Isabella to the throne of England.’

‘Did the conspiracy begin in Spain?’

‘No, here in England, that is all I know. I was told no more than I needed to know. None of us was.’

‘Who were the others, the men who died at Nonsuch?’

‘The Fitzgerald brothers, Hugh and Seamus. Ovid Sloth found them in the Irish College at Salamanca, where they were training for the priesthood. They were obedient and too stupid to know fear. They wanted nothing more than to fight and kill.’

‘There were two more men. .’

‘Ratbane and Paget. They were lower than dogs, dredged up by the Spanish from the barrel of the renegade English regiment of the Low Countries. They would do what they were told and would not blink in the face of enemy fire. They spent their days fighting and their nights whoring and drinking. They are better dead.’

Winnow was in great pain. As well as the rack, he had been beaten without pity. He shifted position and groaned.

Shakespeare pressed on. ‘Tell me about the College of St Gregory. Did you meet Persons? What of his assistant, Joseph Creswell? What was their part?’

‘They came to me when I was held by the Inquisition. I could not swear what they knew of the plot, but I can tell you that Roag visited them often. He needed Father Persons’s influence with the casa. But though Roag needed him, he did not trust him or anyone else at the college. He thought there were spies in their midst.’

‘Was there talk of one particular spy?’

Winnow looked up at Shakespeare through a watery, blood-lined eye. ‘I heard of one young man, caught writing a coded letter and taken to the Castillo de Triana. Was he yours?’

‘What was his name?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What became of him?’

‘You must know what the Inquisition does to heretics.’

Shakespeare felt sick at heart. Poor Robert Warner. A mere twenty-one years of age, he had been so courageous in agreeing to work under cover at St Gregory’s. Revulsion welled up in Shakespeare at the thought of the Inquisition. It was a perversion of everything that Christ had stood for. And as for the traitor Persons, the Englishman who had blessed the Armada, he must have known everything. He had connived at cold murder — the killing of Loake, Trott, poor Ambrose Rowse, Anthony Friday, and the Queen of England herself.