The Piccadilly Plot (5 page)

‘You missed him,’ said a gardener, straightening from his labours as Chaloner walked past. ‘He left for White Hall an hour
ago.’

‘I thought he was ill,’ said Chaloner, wondering whether he was destined to spend the entire day traipsing around London.
He hoped not: he was cold, damp and wanted to go home.

‘He recovered.’ The man sounded disappointed; the Earl was not popular with his staff.

‘That was fast. Gout usually keeps him in bed for days.’

The gardener grinned evilly. ‘He told everyone it was gout, but if you knew what he ate for his supper, you would not be surprised
that he spent half the night clutching his innards. But a tonic restored him, and he sent for his coach shortly afterwards.
It is not far to White Hall, but the lazy goat never walks. No wonder he is so fat.’

Wearily, Chaloner retraced his steps. White Hall was the King’s official London residence, and a number of his ministers had
quarters there. It represented power and authority, as well as being the place where the King and his dissipated friends frolicked
until the small hours of the morning, doing things that invariably transpired to be expensive for the tax-payer.

The palace was ancient, but had developed in a haphazard manner, depending on when money had been
available for building and repairs. It was said to contain more than two thousand rooms, ranging from the spacious apartments
occupied by the King and his nobles, to the cramped, badly ventilated attics that housed laundresses, grooms and scullions.

Chaloner was about to walk through the gate when a carriage drew up beside him. A face peered out and Chaloner recognised
Spymaster Williamson, a tall, aloof man who had been an Oxford academic before deciding that his slippery talents would be
more useful in government. He was feared by his employees, treated with extreme caution by his superiors, and detested by
his equals.

‘I did not know you were back,’ Williamson said without preamble. ‘I thought you were still in Tangier, trying to learn why
building a sea wall is transpiring to be so costly.’

‘Clarendon ordered me home,’ replied Chaloner, shortly and not very informatively.

He and Williamson had never liked each other. They had reached a truce of sorts in the summer, after an adventure involving
some foreign diplomats, but it was an uneasy one, and Chaloner was acutely aware that it would take very little for the Spymaster
to break it.

‘What is wrong, Joseph?’ came a female voice from inside the coach. Chaloner was surprised: the fairer sex tended to shy away
from Williamson. ‘Why have we stopped?’

‘I want a word with this gentleman,’ replied Williamson, turning to her with a brief smile. ‘It will not take a moment, and
then I shall show you my Westminster offices.’

‘Good,’ said another voice. It was a man and he
sounded pleased. ‘I am looking forward to seeing the place where you spend so much time.’

Chaloner wondered whether the couple were actually being conveyed there so they could be arrested – that when they arrived,
they would find themselves whisked into a grim little cell for the purposes of interrogation. It had certainly happened before.
But Williamson climbed out of the carriage and began to make introductions. Chaloner was surprised a second time, because
the Spymaster had never afforded him such courtesy before. He was immediately on his guard.

‘These are my very dear friends Kitty and Henry O’Brien. O’Brien and I were up at Oxford together.’ Williamson addressed the
occupants of the carriage. ‘Chaloner is the fellow I was telling you about, who helped me with that business concerning the
Dutch ambassador last June.’

Chaloner was not sure whether he was more taken aback to meet O’Brien and his wife so soon after the discussion in the charnel
house, or to be informed that Williamson had friends. The only other man he knew who was willing to spend time in the Spymaster’s
company was the sinister John Swaddell, who claimed to be a clerk, but whom everyone knew was really an assassin.

He regarded the pair with interest as they peered out. Kitty’s beauty was indeed breathtaking. Red hair tumbled around her
shoulders, and there was both intelligence and humour in her arresting green eyes. He bowed politely, thinking that Kersey’s
claims about her loveliness were, if anything, understated.

When he turned his attention to her husband, he thought for a fleeting moment that she had married a
child, but O’Brien was just one of those men who had retained boyish looks into his thirties. He had fair curly hair, blue
eyes, and the lines around his mouth said he laughed a lot. They were an attractive couple, and Chaloner was not surprised
that the King had deigned to grace them with his favour. Their clothes said they were indeed wealthy, and the ruby that gleamed
at Kitty’s throat was the largest that Chaloner had ever seen.

‘O’Brien has just received some sad news,’ said Williamson, addressing Chaloner. ‘A musician from the Chapel Royal, of whom
he was very fond, is dead.’

‘Killed by one of your spies, Williamson,’ put in O’Brien sourly.

Kitty rested a calming hand on his arm. ‘He cannot hire choirboys for the dirty business of espionage, so it is hardly surprising
that some transpire to be unruly. Like that odious Swaddell. I am glad
he
is no longer in your service, Joseph. He was downright sinister.’

‘Swaddell has left you?’ Chaloner was astounded – he had thought the bond between the two men was unbreakable, mostly, he
had suspected uncharitably, because neither could find anyone else willing to put up with him.

Williamson grimaced. ‘I am afraid so.’

‘I shall miss Cave,’ O’Brien was saying unhappily. ‘He was an excellent tenor, and the only man in London capable of understanding
how I like to perform. What shall I do without him? The King liked to listen to us sing, and he will be devastated when he
hears what has happened.’

Chaloner doubted the King would care, especially if O’Brien financed some other form of entertainment. He did not usually
make snap judgements about people, but there was something about O’Brien that said he lacked
his wife’s brains, and that he was vain and a little bit silly.

While Kitty murmured soothing words in her husband’s ear, Williamson drew Chaloner to one side, so they could speak without
being overheard. ‘One of my informants witnessed what happened. He told me you tried to prevent the skirmish.’

‘But unfortunately without success.’

‘It is a pity, especially as the quarrel was trifling. I cannot say I like Elliot, but he is a decent intelligencer.’

‘He is still alive?’ asked Chaloner, recalling the vicious blow Cave had delivered, and the dagger protruding from Elliot’s
innards.

‘At the moment,’ nodded Williamson, ‘although his friend Lester fears he may not stay that way for long. And I hate to lose
him. He was making headway on a troublesome case—’

‘The Earl is waiting,’ said Chaloner, unwilling to be burdened with the Spymaster’s concerns when he had more than enough
of his own to contend with.

‘You can spare me a moment,’ said Williamson reproachfully. ‘And I am having a terrible week, what with Swaddell leaving,
Elliot attacking Cave, and more plots to overthrow the government than you can shake a stick at.
And
the Privy Council has cut my budget. Again.’

‘Where has Swaddell gone?’ asked Chaloner, not liking the notion of such a deadly fellow on the loose. Williamson had never
done much to control him, but he had been better than nothing.

‘To someone who can pay him what he deserves,’ replied Williamson shortly. ‘I wish I
could
offer him double, but how can I, when I barely have enough to make ends meet?’

‘Perhaps your friend O’Brien can secure you better funding,’ suggested Chaloner. ‘Ask him to mention it while he warbles
for the King.’

‘I most certainly shall not,’ declared Williamson indignantly. ‘It would be ungentlemanly to raise matters of money with a
friend. Besides, he is too distressed by Cave’s death. I am taking him to see my Westminster offices, as a way to take his
mind off it. For something pleasant to do.’

Chaloner regarded him askance. ‘You think that is pleasant? A heavily guarded hall filled with labouring clerks, and dungeons
below containing God knows what horrors?’

Williamson looked exasperated. ‘Then what do you suggest? I am not a man for frivolity, but I feel compelled to offer some
sort of diversion.’

‘What is wrong with a visit to the Crown Jewels or the Royal Menagerie? Or even a play?’

Williamson nodded slowly. ‘Those are good ideas. But I did not stop you to ask for advice about my social life. I want to
know why Cave and Elliot fought. My informant’s account made no sense.’

Seeing no reason not to oblige him, Chaloner gave a concise account of the squabble. When he had finished, Williamson frowned
unhappily.

‘But
why
did Cave and Elliot become agitated over so ridiculous a matter? Men do not squander their lives on such trivialities. There
must be more to it.’

‘Very possibly,’ acknowledged Chaloner, glad he was not the one who would have to find out.

‘Cave will have a grand funeral in Westminster Abbey,’ Williamson went on. ‘The Chapel Royal choir will provide the music,
and the Bishop of London will almost
certainly be prevailed upon to conduct the ceremony. It will be a lofty occasion, and I should not like it spoiled with the
taint of suspicion. I do not suppose you have time to—’

‘No,’ said Chaloner firmly.

The guard on duty at White Hall’s Great Gate that day was Sergeant Wright, a petty, grasping individual who was heartily
disliked by those soldiers who took pride in their work; those who were shirkers considered him an icon. He was an unattractive
specimen with a bad complexion, stubby nose, and eyes that were too small for his doughy face.

‘You cannot come in dressed like that,’ he declared, when he saw Chaloner. ‘You are wet, dirty and there is blood on your
coat. Someone else’s, more is the pity. Other gentlemen ushers do not—’

‘Let him through,’ came a commanding voice from behind them. The interruption was timely, because Chaloner did not take kindly
to being berated by the likes of Wright, who was no picture of sartorial elegance himself with his food-stained tunic and
greasy hair.

The speaker was Thomas Kipps, the Earl’s Seal Bearer, a tall, handsome man with an amiable face. He was dressed in the Clarendon
livery of blue and gold, and it was his duty to walk ahead of his master in formal processions. Unfortunately, the Earl liked
the ritual, and
encouraged Kipps to escort him when he wandered around White Hall, too. Such vanity was ill-advised, because it gave his
enemies the means with which to mock him – Chaloner had lost count of the times he had seen the Court rakes mimic the Earl’s
waddling gait, preceded by another of their own bearing a pair of bellows in place of the seal.

Wright was outraged that someone should presume to tell him his business. ‘How dare—’

‘Clarendon wants him,’ snapped Kipps. ‘And you do not have the right to keep
him
waiting.’

Wright stepped aside with ill grace. Chaloner pushed past him rather more roughly than necessary, hard enough to make him
stagger.

‘He is an odious fellow,’ said Kipps, once they were through the gate. ‘Do you know why he is not dismissed and someone more
competent appointed in his place? Because he once carried an important message to the King during the civil wars. Anyone
could
have done it, but His Majesty remembers Wright, and this post is his reward.’

Chaloner liked Kipps, who alone of the Earl’s household had been friendly to him on his return from Tangier. He shrugged.
‘White Hall is full of such people.’

‘He is corrupt, too,’ Kipps grumbled on. ‘He hires out the soldiers under his command for private duties, such as acting as
bodyguards or minding property. He pays them a pittance and keeps the bulk of the earnings for himself. Unfortunately, the
extra work reduces their effectiveness at the palace – they are too tired to fulfil their proper responsibilities.’

Chaloner had never been impressed by White Hall’s security. And as the King’s popularity had waned since
he had reclaimed his throne at the Restoration some four years earlier – mostly because of his hedonistic lifestyle and the
licentiousness of his Court – he needed someone a lot more efficient than Wright to ensure his safety.

Chaloner and Kipps crossed the huge, cobbled expanse of the Great Court, which was a flurry of activity as usual. A number
of courtiers had just emerged from Lady Castlemaine’s apartments, yelling drunkenly and accompanied by giggling prostitutes;
the King’s mistress was famous for her unconventional parties. Elsewhere, clerks, guards and servants hurried about on more
mundane business, and carts lined up to deliver supplies to kitchens, laundries, pantries and coal sheds.

‘Watch yourself when you see Clarendon,’ advised Kipps, pausing a moment to admire a duchess who was too drunk to realise
that she had left the soirée without most of her clothes. More chivalrous men than he rushed to give her their coats, although
they regretted their gallantry when she was sick over them. ‘Dugdale told him that you insisted on meddling in some fight
on The Strand, despite the fact that you knew he was waiting.’

Chaloner groaned. ‘It is not true.’

‘I am sure of it. I wish Clarendon had not given him such power, because the man is a despot. Every night at home, I marvel
that I have managed to pass another day without punching him.’

They were obliged to jump to one side when a cavalcade of coaches rattled towards them, the haughty demeanour of the drivers
telling pedestrians that if they did not get out of the way they could expect to be crushed. Most of the carriages bore crests,
and it was clear that the occupants considered themselves to be people of quality.

‘Adventurers,’ said Kipps disapprovingly. ‘Here for a meeting with the King who, as you will no doubt be aware, is one of
their number. So is the Duke of Buckingham.’