Ken Follett - A Column of Fire

‘Tell her that a stranger will come,’ said Langlais. ‘With a purse of gold.’

In Shoreditch, just outside the east wall of the city of London, between a slaughterhouse and a horse pond, there stood a building called The Theatre.

When it was built no one in England had ever seen a structure like it. A cobbled courtyard in the middle was surrounded by an octagon of tiered wooden galleries under a tile roof. From one of the eight sides a platform, called a stage, jutted out into the yard. The Theatre had been purpose-built for the performance of plays, and was much more suitable than the inn yards and halls where such events were normally put on.

Rollo Fitzgerald went there on an autumn afternoon in 1583. He was tailing Francis Throckmorton. He needed to forge one more link in the chain of communication between the duke of Guise and the queen of Scots.

His sister Margery did not know that he was in England. He preferred it that way. She must never get even a suspicion of what he was doing. She continued to smuggle priests from the English College into the country, but she hated the idea of Christians fighting each other. If she knew he was fomenting an insurrection, she would make trouble. She might even betray the plot, so strongly did she believe in nonviolence.

However, all was going well. He could hardly believe that the plan was working with no snags. It had to be the will of God.

The laundress Peg Bradford had proved as easy to persuade as Alison had forecast. She would have smuggled letters in the laundry just to please Queen Mary, and the bribe Rollo gave her had been almost superfluous. She had no idea that what she was doing could lead her to the gallows. Rollo had felt a twinge of guilt about persuading such an unworldly and well-meaning girl to become a traitor.

At the other end of the chain, Pierre Aumande de Guise had arranged for his letters to Mary to be held at the French embassy in London.

All Rollo needed now was someone to pick up the letters in London and deliver them to Peg in Sheffield; and Throckmorton was his choice.

Admission to The Theatre was a penny. Throckmorton paid an additional penny to get into the covered gallery, and a third penny to rent a stool. Rollo followed him in and stood behind and above him, watching for an opportunity to speak to him quietly and inconspicuously.

Throckmorton came from a wealthy and distinguished family whose motto was Virtue is the only nobility. His father had flourished during the reign of the late Mary Tudor, but had fallen from favour under Elizabeth Tudor, just like Rollo’s father. And Throckmorton’s father had eagerly agreed to harbour one of Rollo’s secret priests.

Throckmorton was expensively dressed, with an extravagant white ruff. He was not yet thirty, but his hair was receding into a widow’s peak which, together with his sharp nose and pointed beard, gave him a bird-like look. After studying at Oxford, Throckmorton had travelled to France and contacted English Catholic exiles, which was how Rollo knew of his leanings. However, they had never actually met, and Rollo was far from certain that he could persuade Throckmorton to risk his life in the cause.

The play was called Ralph Roister Doister , which was also the name of the main character, a braggart whose actions never matched his words. His boasting was exploited, by the impish Matthew Merrygreek, to get him entangled in absurd situations which made the whole place rock with laughter. Rollo was reminded of the African playwright Terence, who had written in Latin in the second century BC. All students had to read the plays of Terence. Rollo enjoyed himself so much that for a few minutes he even forgot his deadly mission.

Then an interval was announced and he remembered.

He followed Throckmorton outside and stood behind him in a queue to buy a cup of wine. Moving closer, Rollo said quietly. ‘Bless you, my son.’

Throckmorton looked startled.

Rollo was not wearing priestly robes, but he discreetly reached inside his shirt collar, grasped the gold cross that he wore under his clothes, showed it to Throckmorton for a second, then dropped it out of sight. The cross identified him as a Catholic: Protestants believed it was superstitious to wear one.

Throckmorton said: ‘Who are you?’

‘Jean Langlais.’

It had crossed Rollo’s mind that he might use other false names, to confuse his trail even more. But the name of Jean Langlais had begun to acquire an aura. It represented a mysteriously powerful figure, a ghost-like being moving silently between England and France, working secretly for the Catholic cause. It had become an asset.

‘What do you want?’

‘God has work for you to do.’

Throckmorton’s face showed excitement and fear as he thought what this might mean. ‘What sort of work?’

‘You must go to the French embassy — after dark, cloaked and hooded — and ask for the letters from Monsieur de Guise, then take those letters to Sheffield and give them to a laundress called Peg Bradford. After that you must wait until Peg gives you some letters in return, which you will bring back to the embassy. That’s all.’

Throckmorton nodded slowly. ‘Sheffield is where Mary Queen of Scots is imprisoned.’

‘Yes.’

There was a long pause. ‘I could be hanged for this.’

‘Then you would enter heaven all the sooner.’

‘Why don’t you do it yourself?’

‘Because you are not the only one who has been chosen by God to do his work. In England there are thousands of young men like yourself eager for change. My role is to tell them what they can do in the struggle to restore the true faith. I, too, am likely to go to heaven sooner rather than later.’

They reached the head of the line and bought their drinks. Rollo led Throckmorton away from the crowd. They stood on the edge of the pond, looking at the black water. Throckmorton said: ‘I have to think about this.’

‘No, you don’t.’ That was the last thing Rollo wanted. He needed Throckmorton to commit. ‘The Pope has excommunicated the false queen, Elizabeth, and forbidden Englishmen to obey her. It’s your holy duty to help the true queen of England regain her throne. You know that, don’t you?’

Throckmorton took a gulp of wine. ‘Yes, I know it,’ he said.

‘Then give me your hand and say you will play your part.’

Throckmorton hesitated for a long moment. Then he looked Rollo in the eye and said: ‘I’ll do it.’

They shook hands.

It took Ned a week to get to Sheffield.

Such a distance, 170 miles, could be covered faster by someone who kept horses permanently stabled at intervals along the route, so that he could change mounts several times a day; but that was mainly done by merchants who needed a regular courier service between cities such as Paris and Antwerp, because news was money to them. There was no courier service between London and Sheffield.

The journey gave him plenty of time to worry.

His nightmare was coming true. The French ultra-Catholics, the king of Spain and the Pope had at last agreed on joint action. They made a deadly combination. Between them they had the power and the money to launch an invasion of England. Already spies were making plans of the harbours where the invaders would land. Ned had no doubt that discontented Catholic noblemen such as Earl Bart were sharpening their swords and burnishing their armour.

And now, worst of all, Mary Stuart was involved.

Ned had received a message from Alain de Guise in Paris, via the English embassy there. Alain continued to live with Pierre and spy on him: this was his revenge. Pierre, for his part, treated his stepson as a harmless drudge, made him run errands, and seemed to like having him around as a dogsbody.