The Best of Men (43 page)

“Those was his orders, sir,” said the other man. “I am in charge, in his absence.”

“And who are you?” snapped Laurence, willing them not to ask the same question.

“Ensign Crawley, sir.”

Laurence glared at him until he looked down at his boots. “Well, I suppose I must deal with you.” He took the parchment from his doublet and proffered it to the ensign, who broke the seal with grubby fingers and inspected it officiously. Laurence tried not to laugh: the untidiness of his own writing had frequently earned him criticism, but in this case its legibility was not helped by the fact that Crawley had the letter upside down.

Crawley gave him back the parchment and nodded to his companion to pass him a bunch of keys. “This way, sir,” he said to Laurence. They went through an archway into another chamber, less stinking than the last, where the cells were divided by walls rather than bars, each with a wooden door into which a small peephole had been cut for the benefit of the guards. “What does Lord Say want with him, sir?” Crawley asked Laurence, his tone now deferential.

“He’s not just a murderer but an enemy spy. He will be interrogated and then hanged.”

“That ancient fellow? I’d never have thought it.”

“He’s a known witch, too,” Laurence added, for good measure.

“That I can believe,” Crawley said.

“Has he had any visitors?”

“Yes, sir. Someone else from the university, a Dr. Clarke, has come every day, to bring him food and books. And not a moment ago, I let in his nephew.”

“His
nephew
? At this hour?”

“Yes, sir. He came with a basket of provisions. I ain’t seen him before, sir.”

As Crawley fitted a key into one of the doors, Laurence stayed his hand and peered through the peephole. Inside, Seward was lying on a pallet, half obscured by a huge, familiar figure standing over him. “Open the door quietly and go back to your post,” Laurence whispered to Crawley.

Moving away so that he would not be seen as it swung wide, he cocked his pistols. As he stepped into the doorway, pistols raised, Seward saw him and let out a cry. Tyler turned and with amazing speed hoisted Seward up as if he weighed less than a child, holding him in front of his own body like a human breastplate.

“Good evening, Mr. Beaumont,” he said softly, his face registering no surprise.

“Good evening, Mr. Tyler,” said Laurence. “Sorry to have missed you on the last occasion.”

“More narrowly than I missed you at Aylesbury. I spent a few weeks in bed nursing my shoulder after that. And you clipped off my earlobe.” Laurence risked a glance at Seward, whose eyes were now shut tight. “So,” Tyler continued, in the same calm voice, “I can be more use to you alive than dead. In fact, I might tell you some things that you’d like to know.” He paused, and then went on less patiently, “Put down your weapons, and let’s agree to be out of here.”

He moved just a fraction, perhaps to gauge Laurence’s response, and exposed his face. It was the best that Laurence could hope for, and he fired with the pistol in his left hand, praying that his aim was true.

At such short range the impact of the shot sent Tyler flying against the wall. His face was blown open, one eyeball hanging loose from its socket on a strand of flesh, the other socket a well of blood. Seward had collapsed on the floor. “I thought you’d never do it,” he murmured to Laurence, as the guards ran in.

“Don’t give me any trouble,” Laurence ordered him, for their benefit, “or I’ll shoot you, too. He was another Royalist agent,” he said
to them, nodding at Tyler. “No doubt passing messages to this fellow. We’ll find out soon enough, even if you take a little persuading,” he said nastily, to Seward.

“Did you have to kill him, sir? We could have arrested him for you,” said Ensign Crawley, examining what remained of Tyler’s visage.

“You couldn’t arrest your own mother. Search the body.”

Crawley’s efforts yielded no more than a knife and a few coins, while the basket that Tyler had brought for Seward contained only a loaf of bread and a slice of meat pie.

“Put the prisoner in irons,” Laurence said next.

“Sir, we’ve got none to spare.”

“Then tie his hands behind his back and take him to the main gate. Carry him if you must. And don’t you try me,” Laurence spat at Seward, afraid of any error that might give them away. He marched ahead of them through the gaol and past the astonished prisoners. Out in the courtyard, he could see the sky paling with dawn. More soldiers came to gawk, although they maintained a respectful distance.

Crawley was hovering about nervously, like a schoolboy waiting for his master to leave. “What shall we do with the dead spy, sir?”

“You can fuck him up the arse for all I care,” Laurence replied. “I’m going to remember you, Ensign Crawley. Next time you slack off, I’ll have you stripped of your rank and flogged senseless. Good day to you.”

“Good day, sir,” said Crawley, saluting shakily.

With a brutality that was not lost on the soldiers, Laurence seized the rope around Seward’s wrists and hauled him out through the gate and into the street beyond. To Laurence’s relief, his horse was where he had left it. He lifted Seward into the saddle, mounted behind him, and kicked the beast into a gallop. Neither of them spoke until they neared Merton College, when he slowed it to a trot.

“That was a fine performance, Beaumont,” Seward told him, in a remarkably strong voice.

“It was pure luck,” said Laurence. He knew what they were both thinking: had he come on stage a minute later, Seward would have been dead.

“There was method to his madness, I grant you, but he could have got you both killed,” observed Clarke, as he arranged a pillow for Seward to sit up in bed.

“I should not want Beaumont for my superior officer,” Seward jested gaily, rubbing at his wrists where the rope had chafed them. “He nearly bit that poor ensign’s head off. Didn’t you, my boy!” Beaumont said nothing. He was watching them both, eyes narrowed and glittering like those of a cat about to fight. “What’s the matter with you?” Seward asked. “You should be in high spirits after your marvellous feat of daring!”

“Was it Sir Bernard Radcliff’s name that you held back from me?” Beaumont exploded furiously.

Seward stared at him. “Yes, it was.”

“And it was you who gave him the code. Why didn’t you say it was yours when I first showed it to you?” Beaumont tore the orange sash from his waist and hurled to the floor. “You lied to me – or you concealed the truth, which is just as bad!”

“I planned to tell you but fate intervened.”

“That’s no excuse.”

“I know,” Seward conceded, his joy deflating; he felt suddenly frail and helpless. “How did you find him out?”

“Your story first,” Beaumont said, grabbing a chair for himself.

“Very well,” Seward sighed. “My acquaintance with Radcliff began six or seven years before your time, Beaumont. He’d studied at Cambridge for his bachelor’s degree, and he was interested in the great Hermetic teachers, in cryptology, and astrology, of course, which
was why he’d sought me out. We often discussed codes, both ancient and new, and the code he used in those letters was one we had worked on together.”

“My God,” exclaimed Beaumont. “Go on.”

“He had such a quick mind,” Seward said, remembering. “And I took such pleasure from instructing him that I grew almost giddy with it. I saw in Radcliff someone to whom I could pass on the learning of my great masters, Dee and Fludd. Indeed, I thought then that I would never find a better student. But over time I became uneasy, as he showed signs of worldly ambition. He had a mind to preferment in the foreign embassies, because the estate he would inherit in Cambridgeshire was on such poor land that it could barely keep a gentleman’s household.” Beaumont frowned as if this meant something to him, though he did not interrupt. “And then we had a disagreement. He wanted me to teach him the art of scrying. I felt he was not ready for it and would use the knowledge for venal purposes. So I refused. That was why he broke with me. I never saw him again.”

“He already had most of what he wanted from you.”

“Far more than I realised. I not only taught him to cast horoscopes, for which he had a genuine aptitude, but I revealed to him part of what I knew about a Hermetic order, the Knights of the Rosy Cross.”

“And who are
they
?” Beaumont asked brusquely.

“A Protestant Brotherhood dedicated to the enlightenment of Europe, to freedom from the yoke of Rome, and to the revival of learning in politics, the arts, and the sciences based upon the mathematical and alchemical synchronicities between microcosm and macrocosm.” Seward hesitated, catching Beaumont’s annoyance with his long-winded answer. “They seek a revolution, my boy, as well as a revival: to cast off centuries of misguided, superstitious scholarship that has accumulated ever since Aristotle’s teachings were bastardised by the Roman Church. Dee was almost certainly connected with them, and I know Fludd was,
though he always denied it. Radcliff had heard that I had been Fludd’s student and must have thought I was a member of the order.”

“Well,
are
you?”

“If I were, I would not tell even you.”

“What could Radcliff expect to get out of this Brotherhood?”

“Secret knowledge brings many kinds of power,” Seward murmured.

Beaumont let out a harsh breath. “Can you be more precise?”

“Please, Beaumont, I am too weary to discuss such deep and complicated things just now, but to give one obvious example, the power to control others and bend them to your will. A power most useful in politics.”

“He failed with you.”

“Ultimately, yes, and he would be unable to gain admittance to the Brotherhood for the same reason that I would not teach him how to scry. There – now you know everything,” finished Seward, dropping his head back upon the pillow.

“Not quite,” Beaumont said, in a low voice. “Why did you hold back on me?”

“Out of selfish fear,” Seward replied sadly. “I have had so many troubles in the past, and so many false charges brought against me. I did not want my association with Radcliff to come out into the open. I am ashamed of myself, Beaumont. Can you forgive me?”

Beaumont gazed at him for a moment, then smiled. “Of course.”

“Now I have told you my story. It is time for yours.”

Beaumont rattled his off, ending with his glimpse of Radcliff’s writing on the letter. “And here’s what I’ve been thinking,” he said, “though I can’t prove any of it. Radcliff is working for the Earl of Pembroke, who is negotiating in secret for a peace. But what if these negotiations are a cover for some less noble scheme? Why should he be courting the Secretary of State
and
Dr. Earle?”

“Earle was his chaplain,” Clarke put in.

“Earle is also Prince Charles’ tutor. And my father says Pembroke had a grudge against the King. Wasn’t he dismissed from office as Lord Chamberlain for some offence?”

“Hardly sufficient to turn him into a regicide!”

“That’s where my theory falls down,” Beaumont acknowledged.

They were quiet for a while; then Seward said, “Do you remember, Beaumont, the design on that sword? Of roses. And the form of the sword is like a cross.”

“And Mr. Rose is the name that Radcliff’s been using. So what does all that mean?”

“Radcliff and his master are employing the Brotherhood’s symbols for more than their correspondence, which may hint at a yet broader aspiration on their part.”

“Good Christ! Isn’t ruling a kingdom by proxy enough for them?”

“Maybe not. Their whole purpose in committing regicide might be to adopt a course from which our present monarch has thus far refrained, to the disappointment of many an Englishman. If the master of the conspiracy could establish himself as the young prince’s protector and restore peace to the kingdom, he would then be free to enter the foreign war in full force in order to crush the Hapsburg Empire, and perhaps Rome itself.”

Beaumont made a little whistling noise through his teeth. “I can’t imagine anything worse than to drag England into that quagmire.”

“If he succeeded, however, he would be seen as the saviour of the Protestant faith and the champion of a new empire. And I suspect he wishes to invoke the Brotherhood’s blessing for his actions,” concluded Seward, shuddering at the idea.

“What would be wrong with that? You just said the Brotherhood aims to free us from the yoke of Rome.”

“On the contrary, Beaumont, it would be a disaster! The Knights of the Rosy Cross seek spiritual and intellectual enlightenment, whereas
he is seeking worldly power for its own sake! They would never sanction the murder of a Protestant king, nor of any king at all! This usurper would spit upon their symbols: the cross, an image of Christ’s suffering and the suffering that we must all endure to reach wisdom, and the rose, the symbol of love.” Seward paused; Beaumont was frowning in concentration, the same look he used to wear as a student when puzzling over some difficult lesson. How much he had risked at the Castle to rescue an old man, Seward thought, wanting to hug him. “Eros’ crown was made of roses, my boy,” Seward continued, “but the rose is also a symbol of secrecy – Eros gave a rose to the god of silence. The Brotherhood does not wish to be known – its alchemical secrets can be too easily abused. Had I not been so foolishly deceived by Radcliff, I would never have trusted him with such knowledge.”

“Eros is two-faced, both creative and destructive,” said Clarke.

“And can make a man blind, as I was. Radcliff may also have blinded his master, tempting him with more prophecies, such as the one he made about the King’s death.”

“Do you believe in prophecies?” Beaumont asked abruptly.

“Yes, but, as they say, we must beware of false prophets.”

“How can you tell the false from the true?” he persisted, with an interest that surprised Seward.

“The true have nothing to gain by their predictions and take no reward for them. Beaumont,” Seward went on, “after Radcliff left Oxford, I heard that he had become secretary to a member of the House of Lords. I did not inquire who.”

“It might have been Pembroke. I should ask Ingram about that.”