Golden cargoes, p.1
Golden Cargoes, page 1
Contents
Cover
Also by Fiona Buckley
Title Page
Copyright
Part I: Wedding at Evergreens
Chapter One: One May Morning
Chapter Two: Asking Why
Chapter Three: Allheal and Camomile
Chapter Four: Knights and Maidens
Chapter Five: Gems and Jaguars
Chapter Six: Nothing To Be Done
Chapter Seven: Reversing an Hourglass
Chapter Eight: Fighting for the Wrong
Chapter Nine: Trade Secret
Chapter Ten: Taking Sides
Chapter Eleven: Floods, Mud and Migraine
Chapter Twelve: The Heaviness in the Air
Part II: Treasure Hunt
Chapter Thirteen: Lawful Complaint
Chapter Fourteen: Assignment
Chapter Fifteen: The Goldsmith’s Tale
Chapter Sixteen: An Inhospitable House
Chapter Seventeen: Mad Jack Johnson
Chapter Eighteen: Two Cats: One Mouse
Chapter Nineteen: A World Has Ended
Chapter Twenty: Precedence, Pigsties and Byres
Chapter Twenty-One: Lanterns in the Night
Chapter Twenty-Two: Sheer Obstinacy
Chapter Twenty-Three: The Anger Grows
Chapter Twenty-Four: Heavy On The Wing
Chapter Twenty-Five: Rope and Nails
Chapter Twenty-Six: Loosing the Knot
Chapter Twenty-Seven: A Proper Use For Freedom
Also by Fiona Buckley
The Ursula Blanchard mysteries
THE ROBSART MYSTERY
THE DOUBLET AFFAIR
QUEEN’S RANSOM
TO RUIN A QUEEN
QUEEN OF AMBITION
A PAWN FOR THE QUEEN
THE FUGITIVE QUEEN
THE SIREN QUEEN
QUEEN WITHOUT A CROWN *
QUEEN’S BOUNTY *
A RESCUE FOR A QUEEN *
A TRAITOR’S TEARS *
A PERILOUS ALLIANCE *
THE HERETIC’S CREED *
A DEADLY BETROTHAL *
THE RELUCTANT ASSASSIN *
A WEB OF SILK *
THE SCENT OF DANGER *
FOREST OF SECRETS *
SHADOW OF SPAIN *
* available from Severn House
GOLDEN CARGOES
Fiona Buckley
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
First world edition published in Great Britain and the USA in 2022
by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd,
14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE.
Trade paperback edition first published in Great Britain and the USA in 2023
by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.
This eBook edition first published in 2022 by Severn House,
an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.
severnhouse.com
Copyright © Fiona Buckley, 2022
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. The right of Fiona Buckley to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0922-1 (cased)
ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0927-6 (trade paper)
ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0921-4 (e-book)
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Except where actual historical events and characters are being described for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is purely coincidental.
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PART I
WEDDING AT EVERGREENS
ONE
One May Morning
Ursula’s Narrative
I remember it so well, that green and gold morning in the May of 1589. As we rode along the track through the woods, the scattered sunshine through the canopy of leaves was strewn before us like a largesse of golden coins. We were happy and as we rode, we sang. We were going to a wedding.
There were six of us. To begin with, there was myself, Mistress Ursula Stannard, in my late fifties by then, but still mercifully hale, my hazel eyes still clear, my hair still dark and my seat still easy on Jaunty, my bay gelding. Beside me rode my seventeen-year-old son Harry, well grown and every day becoming more like his father. He had Matthew’s loose-limbed build and Matthew’s dark colouring and his strong-boned face, with the same little trace of asymmetry.
I could never look at Harry without remembering Matthew, with whom I had known both ecstasy and heartbreak. I could only hope that Harry would not inherit his father’s passionate instinct to adopt causes and give his all to them. As yet, Harry was young and merry and hadn’t shown any such tendencies. At the moment he was still rejoicing over the horse I had given him for his birthday, the previous February. The horse was a tall flea-bitten grey with a mane and tail like silver and the head carriage of a prince. Indeed, Harry had taken one look at him and declared that Prince must be his name. My adopted son, sixteen-year-old Benjamin Atbrigge, riding just behind us, was content for the time being to use Splash, one of our all-purpose horses, but in another year, when he too became seventeen, I must in fairness give him a new horse, too.
At home in Hawkswood we were rearing a pretty young mare, who in another year would probably suit Ben. Her name was Windfall and her history was extraordinary, but she herself was simply a good-looking animal, not a weight-carrier, but very suitable for Ben, who was slight of build. Like Splash, she was what my manservant Roger Brockley called a failed skewbald, for she was mostly chestnut but with white splashes here and there.
Ben had come to me after a tragedy in his own family, and to this day he was a quiet lad, occasionally prone to nightmares. He was more studious than Harry, according to Peter Dickson, their tutor. Dickson wasn’t with us, for he was now too old to ride. He had told me that Ben was gifted with figures, which Harry was not, and quite Harry’s equal in all other subjects. I had wondered whether he might one day become our steward, when the present one, Adam Wilder, retired. Soon, I would have to talk to Adam and Ben about all that.
For today, however, Ben was a wedding guest like the rest of us, and he too was singing, though his voice was apt to crack, to his embarrassment. Still, he was able to laugh at it. We had taught him the value of laughter, which his father had failed to do.
My other companions were Roger Brockley and my personal maid Fran Dale. Fran was Brockley’s wife but somehow I had never got out of the habit of calling her by her original surname of Dale. Brockley was nearing seventy now, but was still as upright as a young pine on his dark chestnut Firefly, who was also old, but was defying time with sharply pricked ears and a gallant tail carriage. Dale was the same age as me and was not a good rider, but I had given her an ambler, a little blue roan mare called Blue Gentle, and in her saddle, provided we didn’t travel too fast, Dale felt safe and didn’t tire too soon. She and Brockley were only technically servants. With good reason, I regarded them as friends and insisted that when we visited other houses, they should be treated as such and not consigned to servants’ quarters.
The final member of the party, and the lustiest singer of us all, was my cheerful groom Eddie Hale, driving a cart drawn by a temperamental mule who was called all sorts of things (she invariably balked when asked to wade across a ford) but was a sturdy animal for transporting baggage.
Today her cart was piled high with boxes and hampers, so that we could all wear fine clothes for the wedding day. Brocade dresses, starched ruffs, best doublets, carefully folded shirts don’t fit well into saddlebags, and our saddlebags in any case were full of plainer clothes and accessories. According to the letter of invitation from the bride’s mother, Mistress Joan Mercer, the actual date of the wedding could not be set until the sons of the house could be present. They were seamen, apparently, as their father had been, but were expected home at any moment, though their mother could not be sure of the date.
We knew that they each captained their own ship, and sailed together as partners. The Peregrine and the Osprey were trading vessels. The boys were back from their latest voyage but had goods to dispose of and also to buy and were not at the moment at home though they soon would be. We had been invited to stay in good time, and would remain at Evergreens for as long as it took for the boys to come home and the final marriage arrangements made. We might well be there for a month or two.
Our invitation was a courtesy, a sign of respect. After all, I was the owner of Evergreens. Mistress Mercer was my tenant.
The journey was only twenty-five miles or so, which we could cover in less than a day, even riding at leis ure, and it was so very pleasant to be on a joyful errand. Last year, England had been threatened by an invasion from Spain, but the shadow of Spain was lifted now. Without concern, I had left my steward Adam Wilder and my head housemaid, Phoebe, in charge of Hawkswood, and I was free to enjoy this May morning.
My first and best-loved home was Hawkswood, a pleasant house with wide grounds and farmland, within easy reach of the towns of Woking and Guildford. I had inherited it from my late husband Hugh Stannard, and done all I could to maintain it well, but I knew that one day I must resign it to my son. The Sussex house, Withysham, was altogether mine, for it had been a gift from Queen Elizabeth, a reward for certain services that I had performed for her. It was run for me by a competent steward, and I moved my household there now and then, to allow for a good cleansing and sweetening to be carried out at Hawkswood. One day I would live there all the time. Or most of it. I knew I would visit Hawkswood often, as long as Harry made me welcome.
Evergreens too was a gift from the queen. It had a garden and a small home farm, and it stood close to, but did not own, a tiny village called Cutpenny. It was Joan Mercer’s daughter, Arabella, whose nuptials we were to attend. She was apparently betrothed to a landowner in the district, a Master Sylvester Waters.
An excellent match, so Mistress Mercer’s letter had said, since Master Waters was both well off and personable. She had been able to provide the bride with a respectable dowry but Master Waters had asked for Arabella’s hand because he was truly in love with her.
We are all so happy. The moment my sons come home the precise date can be settled, but they are expected within two weeks. The house is full of excitement.
Thinking about that letter as we rode along, I recalled that something about it had given me a curious jog in the mind, but I hadn’t worked out why. Nor did I wish to search for an explanation now, because the track ahead had widened a little and taken a gentle upward slope. ‘Let’s canter,’ said Brockley. ‘Eddie, you’ll just have to tow that devil’s spawn of a mule as best you can.’
‘She won’t canter unless she feels like it but I dare say I’ll catch you up in the end,’ said Eddie.
Light of heart, we cantered.
Evening was drawing on as we approached Evergreens, but at this time of year the days were long and the sun was still well above the western horizon, throwing its light before us.
The house stood in a little valley, with the slopes of the North Downs rising to our right as we approached. Just before we reached the gatehouse, the track branched to the left, leading downhill to another, deeper valley, in which the village of Cutpenny stood; we could see its roofs and hearth-smoke, and far away beyond those, a glimpse of smoke from the chimneys of Caterham, the nearest town. The land was hilly to our left but the hills were lower than those of the downs except for a single heavily wooded one close by, which rose steeply and all alone.
Harry looked at it with interest and then pointed. ‘Somebody lives up there, right at the top. I can see chimney smoke!’
‘But what a place to live!’ said Ben. ‘It must be a struggle either to get down that hill or to climb up it!’
‘There’s a zigzag path,’ I told him. ‘A horse can do it easily. Though I’ve never been up there. We may have time to do that during our stay.’
Two minutes later, we came to the lodge. It was a modern building, thatched and half-timbered, and occupied by a keeper called Joe Jankin. Mr Jankin had a rotund wife and a tribe of youngsters ranging from infants to lads in their teens. I didn’t care to speculate on how they all fitted into the lodge; their sleeping arrangements must have been congested, to say the least of it.
Jankin came out to greet us along with his second boy, Robbie, who was sent off at a run to announce our arrival at the house. I asked after Will, the eldest lad.
‘Gone to sea along with Mistress Mercer’s sons. Allus liked climbing trees, Will did. Now he’s climbing rigging. Hope to heaven he don’t fall off and land in the sea and drown, but there, he allus did hang on to tree branches like one o’ they monkeys. My two elder girls have got wed. ’Mazing how they grow up. But we allus have a few young ’uns coming up to fill their place.’
I wished the family well, nodded to Brockley, who was ready with a tip, and we made our way up the track to the house itself.
Evergreens was much older than its lodge. It was built of grey stone, not that much of the stone was visible, for most of the walls were covered with ivy. ‘That needs trimming away from the windows,’ Dale remarked, and Brockley, laughing, said: ‘We’re not here to give orders about cutting the ivy back!’
And so, in good spirits, talking of zigzag paths and ivy, we arrived at the front door of Evergreens, and stepped into as thorny and tangled a tale of passion, cupidity and dreadful deeds as ever I had met, in a life which had been far from protected. So tangled, indeed, that I will at times have to ask someone else to describe their part in it. The beautiful May morning was so deceptive …
We slipped out of our saddles as a couple of young grooms – I recognized one of them as Mr Jankin’s third son, Hal, who was distinctive because his face was nearly all freckles – came to help with the horses and the mule.
At the same moment, Mistress Mercer’s butler, Charles Page, a dignified man with a gold chain of office worn over a black doublet, came out of the main door to welcome us. We followed him inside and found Mistress Mercer awaiting us in the entrance hall. I saw to my surprise that her dull brown gown had no farthingale, that her cap was askew and her ruff crooked. My surprise was because although I had only met her twice before, I had formed a definite impression that, like Page, she valued her dignity.
She had been a good tenant during the two years that she had occupied Evergreens, but I had never taken to her. I knew that she had been married young, so that she had a daughter and two sons, all by now in their twenties, though she herself was not yet fifty. Her face was unlined but her complexion never looked cared for and her large grey eyes had whites with long outer corners, which gave her a curiously fierce expression. At the moment, though, I felt sympathetic because she looked quite distracted and I wondered why. She was smiling, however, and her hands were held out in welcome.
‘So here you are. Have you been riding all day? You must be tired. Please come in. I have ordered a supper, hare pie, with nutmeg and almond fritters to follow. And I have some excellent wine that my sons brought home from their last voyage. They are such good boys.’
At our previous meetings, she had been taciturn. Now, she was positively rattling. ‘They take cheeses and cloth, iron and leather and tin, and raw materials and made goods to our colonies in the New World, you know – if you sit down here, Page will help you to get your boots off – and they bring home the most wondrous things. Arabella and I have beautiful matching bracelets of pure gold. Your rooms are all prepared …’
‘Our hostess seems flustered,’ Brockley said into my ear as we handed our cloaks to a maid and seated ourselves on the bench in the vestibule, so that Page could help us off with our riding boots and bring us the soft slippers provided by the house. The vestibule was big and was probably a remnant of a former great hall, which had at some time had a ceiling put in so that rooms could be built above, and had also been cut in half. The other half was now the parlour. Both vestibule and parlour had pairs of antlers as decorations.
‘Her letter was excitable,’ I whispered back. ‘But perhaps, with a wedding to organize …’
Page was back with the slippers, having made accurate estimates about sizes. They all fitted, and Mistress Mercer was hovering, wanting to show us into the parlour. ‘We are so happy to be here,’ I said, as we followed her in. ‘And for such a glad occasion. When will we have the pleasure of meeting the bride?’ I took a seat on a cushioned settle. ‘Arabella, that’s her name, is it not? I haven’t met her before. Your letter mentioned that she’s twenty, just the right age for marriage.’
Mistress Mercer plumped herself down into a chair and then, taking us all aback, burst into unhappy speech. ‘Oh, this is dreadful! When I sent out the invitations it was because Master Waters wanted me to, wanted me to put the arrangements in hand at once, and naturally I paid attention to his wishes. Arabella has been brought up to know her duty; when I told her that she was to marry Master Waters, I never thought she would object, let alone persist in objecting, trying to defy me! I had already sent the invitations out. Now, I don’t know what to do. I never dreamed she would behave like this, never …!’
