A Queen's Champion, page 4
Jerome held up the shirt to admire it before reversing it and pulling it over his head. “White as snow. Thank you.”
Lizbet smiled. “It’s kind of you to say so.”
“Lizbet’s got a liking for you,” Jack said, when Lizbet had departed from the room, the empty basket on her hip.
Jerome was also watching her leave as he buttoned up the doublet. “She’s a kind lass, with a heart of gold.”
Jack laughed. “You’ve obviously never been on the wrong side of her temper, have you?”
“No I haven’t, and I’ll try not to either,” Jerome said, smiling.
“Ah, so you’ve a liking for her as well,” Jack laughed, and elbowed Jerome. “You might have been a Knight of the Order, battled against the Turk, but that’ll never put you in good stead to win an argument with Lizbet, will it Richard?” Jack finished and turned to look at his brother.
“Undoubtedly not,” Richard replied.
†
Several hours later the remains of a meal lay on the table. Six pigeons, their bones now picked clean, sat next to a trencher strewn with brown crumbs marking where a pie had once been. A slab of pale yellow crumbly cheese shared a plate with the remains of an oat loaf. Jack twisted a lump from the loaf and, adding cheese to it, tucked it into his mouth before pulling the ale jug closer and seating himself opposite to his brother.
“Now what?” Jack asked, his eyes on the task of pouring ale from the jug into the pewter cup on the tavern table.
“Jerome is going to find out if he can secure the labour and materials we need here to repair her. He’s fairly sure he can, but it might take a few weeks,” Richard said.
“So until then we are stuck here? My French is good and my Italian, I’ve even got a smattering of Arabic and Maltese and now it looks like I’m going to have to learn a whole new language. Christ! Have you heard them? There’s only one word in ten that sounds like English.”
“One of the few benefits of being acquainted with Chester Neephouse I suppose,” Richard said grinning. Neephouse had been a university student from Newcastle who Richard had known during his time at Cambridge. Richard had outwitted him before they left Italy, subverting his wine contracts and directing them in Christian Carter’s direction. Then adopting the northern lilt he added. “Bide your time laddie.”
Jack scowled at him. “You still didn’t answer my question, when she’s sea worthy then where do we go?”
“Let’s see if we can turn an honest profit, shall we?” Richard replied, his fingers drumming on the table top.
“Honest? You?” Jack blurted, spraying crumbs across the table.
Richard frowned. “Why not? I told you before, Carter is paying way more than he should to have goods brought into his warehouse in London. I’ve money, he has the merchant contacts, and I’m hoping we can work together on a venture. There are some goods that bring in a very high price, and the Santa Luciana can let us do that. So we can become honest merchants.”
“Honest merchants with a stolen ship?” Jack pointed out.
“Details!” Richard replied grinning, waving a hand dismissively in the air. “Jerome is willing to remain as her Captain, and you cannot deny he had some skill in that quarter, so with a good crew we can take her anywhere.”
“I don’t like the sound of ‘anywhere,’ that’s far too vague for you - where are you thinking exactly of taking her?” Jack asked watching his brother carefully.
Richard smiled. “I hadn’t given it much thought.”
“Liar!” Jack reached across the table and gave his brother a shove, “You’ll have given it hours of thought, and you just don’t want to tell me.”
“Am I that obvious?” Richard’s voice was filled with mock hurt.
“I’m waiting, where exactly are you thinking of taking her?” Jack pressed, the look on his face telling Richard he was not about to be led away from the question he wanted an answer to.
“The Indies,” Richard replied.
“What! That takes years, if you come back at all. What am I supposed to do?” Jack sounded horrified.
“Come with me?” Richard said simply.
“I hate the sea, I hate boats, what part of that did you forget about?” Jack shot back, his voice raised. “If you think I am going to spend years on board that stinking hulk you can think again.”
“It doesn’t take that long, Jack. Think about it. It’s the perfect escape,” Richard soothed.
“Perfect! Have you lost your mind?” Jack continued.
“We are not welcome in England, the Order are breathing down my neck and watching my every move, if we leave on the Luciana nobody can track us. We will simply disappear,” Richard replied, then added, “You might even get to like being on a ship.”
“That is never going to happen,” Jack replied darkly. “Why the Indies, can’t we take her somewhere else?”
“You mean somewhere closer?” Richard replied.
“Yes,” Jack said bluntly.
“If we take her on a voyage like this we can leave our past behind us, are you not tired of being chased? Don’t want to be free? I don’t want the Order standing behind me watching every move I make and wondering when they will call on me to act,” Richard said.
Jack let out a long breath. “What about Emilio?”
“We will have to divest ourselves of the Knight, shouldn’t be too hard,” Richard replied. “I am tired of being the subject of someone else’s will, why not just turn our backs on it?”
“You have been considering this for a while?” Jack assessed accurately.
Richard avoided answering the question. “The Order’s threat was not an idle one, Jack. How else can I keep all of us safe, how else can I avoid having to do their bidding? This is an opportunity to leave, and I can’t leave you behind. If you say no then I will not go.” Jack was silent for a few moments, regarding the inside of the ale cup. “Has Jerome taken a ship as far as the Indies?”
“He has charts, Jack, he’s a skilled sailor…”
“He hasn’t, has he?” Jack cut in.
Richard tried a different approach. “Jerome spent nine years with the Order on their ships…”
“That might be the case, but the Order have never sailed to the Indies, have they?” Jack countered.
“Pierre Desceliers produced detailed charts for the Order of …” Richard tried.
“Jerome has never been to the Indies. Just say it!” Jack slapped the palm of his hand down on the table.
“Alright! Jerome has never sailed a ship to the Indies. There, are you satisfied now?” Richard said, exasperated. “But he has...”
“Charts! Yes, you told me,” Jack interrupted, then fishing beneath his shirt he produced the cross he wore, “and I’ve got this but it doesn’t make me the bloody Pope does it?”
“Let me get Jerome, maybe he can convince you,” Richard, exasperated, rose from the table.
Jack shrugged. “I doubt it, but go on then.”
Richard brought Jerome over to the table, and the pair sat opposite Jack. Jerome took from a leather tube a long rolled parchment, using the ale jug and three pewter cups he weighted it down until it lay flat before Jack.
Jack stared at the chart. The large sheet was crammed with drawings, compass headings, each area of land annotated with tiny letters. Cities were drawn and titled, routes were marked out in red lines along which depictions of men on horseback rode, some had carts moving along them, and those further down had camels and elephants. Where the region was mountainous ink drawings of hills were included on the map, where land was low lying there were marsh plants, and forests were marked with trees. The seas were filled with drawings of ships, not unlike the Santa Luciana, fish leapt above the waves, mermaids lounged on rocky outcrops and strange lines threaded their way across them.
“I’ve never seen anything like it?” Jack said.
Jerome, obviously pleased with Jack’s comment, smiled widely. “It was drawn by Pierre Desceliers, a Dutch cartographer for King Henri of France.”
Jack’s eyes flicked up from the map to meet Jerome’s. “It’s the Order’s coat of arms in each of the corners, not Henri’s?”
“Pierre is another man in the pay of the Order. He made this chart for the French King, and then made a copy for the Order, and this is the copy,” Jerome said running his hands lovingly over its surface. “One of the most detailed maps, if not the most detailed, in Christendom.”
Jack stood back up and folded his arms. “How come you have it then?”
Jerome’s voice suddenly became stony and cold. “I was charged with collecting it from Venice, the journey to Malta was never completed.”
Jack smiled. “I would imagine Emilio would be delighted to see this, shall I get him?”
“Jack, no. This is not the time for argument. I wanted to show you this, and the prospects it could offer us, not incite Emilio’s temper.” Richard cut in. “As Jerome says we have at our disposal one of the most comprehensive maps ever made, and we can use it to our advantage.”
Jack returned his attention to the map; hands flat on the table, he leaned over it again. His confusion was worsened by the fact that the text facing him was the right way up, and then at the half way point on the map, it switched over so that it was the right way up for Jerome and Richard standing on the opposite side of the table.
“This is England,” Richard’s forefinger tapped the map, drawing Jack’s attention towards an island he recognised on his side of the map. “London is here, and Newcastle, where we are now, is here. And here is France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and even Malta.”
Jack’s eyes followed Richard’s fingers as he moved them to indicate each of the countries.
“Now the usual route from the Indies has always been from Venice, here, across the sea and then overland along these established trade routes.”
A candle burned in a holder and Jack pulled it closer to the map, his eyes following Richard’s finger as he traced it across the map.
“The problem with these routes, are that every section of them are subject to separate control. When the goods arrive in Venice, the Doge, whether he trades in them or not, places a tax upon them before they can be moved into Europe. The ships coming in to Venice do so unmolested by the Turk as they pay dues to the Ottoman Empire, the goods come out of Constantinople, Acre and Tripoli – merchants have brought them overland on wagon trains and trade them here before they are shipped to Venice. Overland the wagon trains are controlled and taxed, every stopping point on these routes adds more and more cost to the final bill. At every stage there is another pair of hands wanting a share of the profit. What starts out here,” Richard tapped the city of Calicut on the map, “ends up here at twenty times the price and that’s before merchants like Carter get a chance to make a profit from it.”
“So you are planning to use the Santa Luciana to go to Constantinople?” Jack asked.
Richard shook his head. “We’d end up still paying too much. The goods have already had to travel from Calicut, across the sea to here and then overland, they have been through too many hands already. We need to get to here.” Richard tapped his fingers on Calicut again.
“But there’s no way through, unless there is a river here, between Alexandria and whatever that place is called,” Jack’s finger traced across the land south of the city to the closest sea.
“Qolzum,” Richard provided the translation.
“There’s no passage through, it’s overland, and the safest routes are from Constantinople and Acre,” Jerome joined in, indicating the route with his hand.
Jack’s eyes narrowed. “Why don’t you just tell me what you have in mind, rather than making me guess at it?”
Jerome smiled. “We go this way, round the bottom of Africa and then back up towards Calicut.”
“This way we control the whole journey, we can contain the amount we spend on bringing the cargo back, none of the profits need to be shared,” Richard cut in quickly.
Jack leaned over the map and measured England with his hand. From top to bottom was about a hands span in length on the map. “One, two, three, four, five six… so it’s about six times the length of the England to journey to the bottom of Africa?”
“Well…” Jerome tried but Richard quickly cut him off.
“Yes, about that, and about the same back up the other side to Calicut,” Richard said.
Jack looked between them. “Surely that’s not going to take that long? Why are most of the trade routes over land from Constantinople then? Surely shipping it round this way would be quicker?”
“It is quicker, and the Portuguese and some Spaniards are already are doing this, but if you lack maps and skills then it’s not a simple task, remember the overland routes from the East have been in place for hundreds and hundred of years, this is the traditional route, the processes and practices are well known and men like Chester Neephouse will continue to rely on them,” Richard explained.
“So if it is about twelve times the length of England why do men talk about this journey taking years?” Jack asked suspiciously.
“Many ships trade on the way there, they don’t go out with an empty hold, they trade at various points, taking pewter and cloth with them, this takes time, then on the return route they trade again in some of the goods they picked up in Calicut,” Richard explained quickly.
“And you propose to go straight there and straight back?” Jack asked.
“Exactly that, we can maximise the profit from the journey that way. Make the return journey quickly, reduce the risk of damage to the cargo, and make as much profit as possible,” Richard announced confidently.
“So how long will this journey take?” Jack asked.
“Well, that depends …”
Richard cut Jerome off again, asking instead, “How long does it take to sail from Scotland here, to the South Coast, Jerome?”
“With a fair wind, we could complete that in four days,” Jerome replied.
“So four days times twelve lengths is …” Jack began to perform the mental arithmetic.
“Just forty eight days, Jack,” Richard supplied the answer.
“I can work it out for myself,” Jack replied a little grumpily.
“So the return journey would take less than a hundred days. Come on, Jack, that’s not that long, and think of the money we could make,” Richard said.
Jack was silent for a few minutes, his eyes following the route Richard had proposed. At length he asked. “And if you bring back a cargo you have a market for it? Will Carter take it?”
“He’d be mad if he didn’t, we will be able to undercut all of the other merchants trading in these goods, and don’t forget Carter now has Court connections,” Richard replied, sensing now that Jack was beginning to warm to his idea.
“What goods are you thinking of?” Jack asked directly.
“Spices and silk. You’ve said yourself, Jack, the Santa Luciana is not a merchantman, she doesn’t have the space to carry a large cargo, but a small valuable cargo would be perfect.”
Jack laughed. “As long as we don’t get boarded and lose it!”
“The Santa Luciana is a fast and agile ship, Jack, she can outrun and outmanoeuvre almost anything she comes up against,” Jerome said.
Jack raised his eyebrows.
“When she’s repaired, Jack, and I will rearm her,” Richard said.
That comment got Jack’s full attention and there followed a discussion that ran on for the rest of the evening on how best to re-equip the Santa Luciana as a fighting ship that a smaller crew could handle. Jack eventually left them when Froggy Tate called for him to join them at cards.
“That was a little unfair of you,” Jerome said as he removed the pewter cups and began to roll up the map.
“Was it?” Richard replied innocently.
“Yes it was, you know England is not drawn to scale, it’s ten times the size it should be on the map,” Jerome rebuked.
“Oh well, it was a trap of his own making then,” Richard said grinning.
†
Gulls argued above him, behind him was the sound of the town, of the men working on the boat, of cart wheels on the cobbles, of two men bartering on the quay. Richard tried to ignore it. Could he ignore England? Could he really take the Santa Luciana to the Indies? Once she set sail from Newcastle, repaired and seaworthy and fully crewed then surely he was beyond the reach of the Order? If those he cared about were with him then they too would be beyond its reach.
Lizbet would have little objection, and Jack, after the previous night's discussion, he was sure would agree to one last voyage on her. He had lied to Jack, he wasn’t intending to take her on one last voyage, there would be more. Was he planning to leave forever?
His eyes were watching a small fishing boat make its way towards the sea The boat turned, rounded the headland and a moment later it was gone. The Santa Luciana could do that. Sail from the river, into the sea and disappear.
Was attempting escape the act of a coward? After all, the situation he now found himself in was one of his own making. The Order of St John wanted eyes and ears at Elizabeth’s court, should that ever happen, and he was not fool enough to think that they would readily forget about him. There would be another task they wanted completing, another man they wanted removed, another secret they needed trading. It would make him a spy against her Court. Could he tolerate that? To keep those around him safe he would have no choice.
Unless he escaped.
Richard knew he just needed to clear his mind of all those things he had thought were a part of his future, his father, his brother’s place at Court, his place at Court. His future, and his brother’s were now blank.
The money Carter had that Richard had claimed from his father he could obtain before they left, that was the last action he needed to complete. He’d leave enough with Carter to ensure Catherine’s future was secure and then surely his debts were paid. Catherine had helped his brother escape from debtor’s goal and him from a contrived trial by battle at Burton, and both of them owed her their lives.
