The fugitives sword, p.35
The Fugitive's Sword, page 35
part #1 of Lord's Learning Series
Suddenly the weight of the gold became heavier in Jorrit’s hands.
“What—what shall I do with it?”
The Schiavono laughed.
“That is a question most would already have an answer to. But in your case, I would suggest you let me keep it for you—or most of it. You will need it to purchase a good horse.” As he spoke, the Schiavono was taking another much larger pouch from the chest and putting it in his coat.
A horse?
That made Jorrit blink. He’d not ridden a horse before let alone imagined he might ever own one.
“Are we going somewhere?” he asked. “I mean, somewhere not at sea?”
“We are indeed going somewhere and not at sea,” the Schiavono agreed. “But first we have someone to visit.”
That ‘someone’ turned out to be Captain Vroomen.
Jorrit had thought the Schiavono must have been avoiding him as even at the funeral they had kept well away from him. For some reason the captain was not at his house that morning, wherever that might be. He was on Star of the Sea, waiting in his cabin. With him were two armed men who Jorrit didn’t know. The Schiavono hesitated briefly when he saw the men and Jorrit realised that he had not expected them to be there. But if their presence troubled him, he didn’t show it.
“You wanted to see me and see me here,” the captain said. He was sitting by his table and the two men were standing behind him. “Now what’s this about? You said it has something to do with Alonso, or I would not be giving you the time.”
The Schiavono gave his partial bow that was more of a respectful nod and Jorrit quickly followed suit.
“It does concern Master Carrasco. But first I have something for you.” He put the heavy money pouch on the table and the sound it made surely told the captain what it contained. Frowning he reached over and opened it, tipping the coins into a golden heap on the table. “What is this?”
“Gold,” the Schiavono said, “to make black white, foul fair, wrong right, base noble, old young, coward valiant and to pay off all that I owe you. Your share of the cargo from De Zeekat.”
“My share of that will come from the investors not from you,” the captain said scornfully. “What is this really about? And be quick to say—I have other work today.”
The Schiavono shook his head.
“You are mistaken. I am the one who registered De Zeekat as a prize so all you are entitled to from it is that share. The other investors have all been duly compensated with their portion too.”
There was a sudden appalled silence and Captain Vroomen’s mouth opened as if he was about to speak but he said nothing. It was the Schiavono who spoke into the silence, his words sounding as if he had chiselled them from ice.
“You put me on that ship with too few men to sail her, a leaking hull, a storm closing in and a Dutch fleet at hand. You took everything of value that you could carry, leaving only what you had to. You did all that deliberately with one purpose in mind. That I and those you left with me would go down with the ship. But unfortunately, you forgot something. You forgot you had left the surviving crew of De Zeekat in the hold.”
“Vile heretics,” the captain growled. “I should have put them all to the sword.”
“Heretics or no, I told them that if they truly believed they were predestined to perish then they should stay in the hold, but any who believed that they might yet work for salvation were welcome to come and help save themselves and ship.” The Schiavono paused and his tone took on a lethal edge that made the hair stand up on Jorrit’s forearms. “You left me and the men you put on that ship to die. You know it, I know it, they know it—and our fellow investors know it. You never expected me to bring De Zeekat into Dunkirk.”
“That’s a vile calumny!” the captain snapped, his face darkening. “I could call you out for less.”
“Is that a challenge?” the Schiavono asked, his hand now resting on the hilt of his new sword and a hint of anticipation in his voice. “I promised Master Carrasco I would not harm you, but if you wish—”
The captain waved the suggestion away angrily.
“What I wish is to know what all this is about? You have stolen De Zeekat, and I can challenge your claim.”
“You could,” the Schiavono agreed. “That is part of the reason we have the prize tribunal to settle all such disputes. But you would stand alone. Our fellow armateurs have already acknowledged my claim—and that,” he pointed to the gold on the table, “is your share. They are also happy to back the idea of trading my claim to De Zeekat in exchange for Master Carrasco’s share in the Star. They seem to think I am an asset to their venture, and they were very unhappy at the way you undermanned a prize ship putting their cargo at risk. I think it has made them question your judgement.”
The captain shot to his feet, face made ugly by fury.
“You will not have any part of the Star. You might have cozened Alonso and the investors, but you have not cozened me.”
Jorrit held his breath. The Schiavono met the captain’s furious glare with his Baltic gaze and inclined his head as if in regret.
“But it is not yours to say whether I do or do not have that share. It has already been agreed—should I wish to do so. However, I am willing to forgo the option and simply sell De Zeekat once it has been through all the necessary arbitration. If you are willing to do just one thing in exchange.”
Captain Vroomen lowered his head like a bull might before it charged.
“Insolent puppy. I’ll not suffer your threats and extortion and I won’t let you have any part in the Star.”
“It is not extortion,” the Schiavono said, “to ask for the return of something that is already mine, something that you took from me.”
That made the captain lift his head, frowning now.
“Something that is…?”
Jorrit saw the moment he realised as his expression changed. In his own mind there was the voice of Master Carrasco. He will have it from you anyway one way or another, I promise you.
Captain Vroomen’s face twisted into a snarl. He drew the sword at his thigh in a way that made Jorrit, convinced he intended to use it, take an instinctive step back. But instead, the captain threw the weapon onto the table between them.
“There,” he snapped. “Take your damn sword and get off my ship.”
The Schiavono slid his hand into the hilt of the sword where it fitted neatly as a glove, as if it belonged. Then he lifted the blade so the sun caught it and Jorrit was briefly dazzled.
“Thank you,” the Schiavono said, and smiled.
Epilogue
21 March 1624 (Old Style) or
31 March 1625 (New Style)
It was late morning when Matt Rider got back to his modest house in Rijkevorsel from another turn of escort duty. A duty that involved making sure the waggons got through carrying the supplies so desperately needed by the eighty thousand men who were now engaged in the herculean task of investing Breda in a stranglehold. He was tired and ill-tempered. His horse had caught a hoof in a pothole following a skirmish that had cost him three men. Now she had gone badly lame, and it seemed he might have to lose her as well. She was a very good horse and that left a bitter taste in his mouth even before he considered the cost of replacing her.
He didn’t recognise either of the two strangers who sat at his table, eating his food and talking with his wife, but that was only because his mind was so distracted with his own woes. They were both well dressed, though one was much better clad than the other, taller too. In fact, come to think of it, the shorter one looked less like a man and more like a boy. Then the taller stranger looked around and Matt had an odd sensation in his chest. Almost as if he had expected this to happen, even though he had long since given up on that being true.
“So, you’re not dead then,” he said, taking in fully the quality of the cloth in which Schiavono was dressed and thinking how much he had grown in the last four months. “I was wondering if I should be looking for a new apprentice.”
Schiavono got to his feet and gave a tight bow.
“My apologies for my long absence, sir. I was unavoidably detained. But I hope now to be able to continue my apprenticeship with you as before—if you are willing.”
There was something new in the young face that made it very plain to Matt that if he agreed it would not be at all ‘as before’. There was still the same arrogance, but now there was something else that had not been there when Schiavono left for his dangerous work in Breda four months before. Signs of hardening and calculation. Matt thought he could see the first signs of an all too familiar cold ruthlessness and that was not something he was pleased to find, but there was also the burgeoning confidence of experience, something vanishingly rare in one so young.
“And who is this?” he asked, not wanting to be pushed into giving a final decision just yet. Not until he had a chance to be sure that the Schiavono who had returned was someone he still wanted to know.
“Jorrit Muyskens, sir. He wishes to join the company, but for now he is my servant.”
“An apprentice with a servant? That’s a novel notion.” Matt took a seat as he spoke and nodded to his wife who brought him a plate of food with her own hands. He captured her for a kiss. “Thank you, mo bhean álainn.”
The boy, Jorrit, was looking uncomfortable and glanced up at Schiavono for reassurance, which was not forthcoming because he was busy pulling some documents from a scrip at his belt and putting them on the table.
“I have not forgotten your rule on spoils. These are what I have come by for the company,” Schiavono said, pushing the papers across the table. Matt paused, food halfway to mouth as he caught a glimpse of the amount of money written on the top sheet. Carefully lowering his hand, Matt wiped his fingers on his breeches before picking the paper up to see more clearly what it said. Then the next. And the next.
The last was an agreement making Matt, should he sign it, an equal partner in his own mercenary company.
“And who,” he asked, as his mind took in the implications of the amounts involved and what it could mean for them all, “is Philip Lord?”
Schiavono inclined his head slightly.
“That, sir,” he said, “would be me.”
The same afternoon, in Theobalds, King James lay on his deathbed, though neither he nor those around him knew it yet. His physicians were sure he had a tertian ague of the kind from which his recovery was pretty much assured and indeed he was already showing signs of getting better. Mary Villiers and her son went together into the king’s bedchamber with a special medication she had acquired.
They would assure the king it was based on mithridate and assure him it had been used successfully to treat the fever of not only Buckingham himself when he had been so ill the previous year, but of the Earls of Warwick and Totnes too. And, against the advice of his physicians, after it had been tasted, they would successfully encourage the king to allow them to apply it as a treacle plaster to his skin and to consume it in a draught.
He would die a few days later.
And that evening, in a house on Lange Voorhout in Den Haag, Lady Catherine de Bouquelemont was preparing herself to meet Duke Christian, Administrator of Halberstadt and the man to whom she was soon to be formally betrothed. She was helped by Xenie, her most trusted maid who had arrived at Den Haag several weeks late her ship having been damaged by bad weather and forced to take shelter on the French coast.
It would be, Kate knew, a loveless match—he seeing her as a substitute for the unattainable woman he truly worshipped and she having turned to him from desperation. But Kate reminded herself sternly, many marriages began on less auspicious foundations than that, and since it was what her life must be, she was determined to make the best of it.
However, even as she dressed in her finest to please the man she would marry, whose children she would bear and with whom she must spend the rest of her days, her thoughts somehow could not entirely escape the memory of an arrogant youth with a disturbingly brilliant turquoise gaze.
To her surprise, she had seen Philip Lord only once more after their first meeting. That encounter had left her sure he would want to speak further with her. But instead, he seemed to avoid her entirely. Their second meeting had been brief and formal. He had stood by the door as if keen to make his escape, his shoulders stiff and his gaze avoiding hers. When he spoke, it was in a dispassionate tone to explain the provision he had made for her return to The Hague and as soon as he had delivered the necessary information he had turned to go.
But she had seen the change in those piercing eyes as he first read the letter from King James and noticed how he had folded it in haste but pressed it by his heart. And the ring she had been given to pass to him was still on his finger when he made a very formal and reserved farewell. Since she owed him her freedom if not her life and the message, she had been charged with by the king had been delivered, she had honoured his request not to mention him to her queen.
Kate had taken time on her return to Den Haag to find out the poem, a stanza of which Philip Lord had spoken so spontaneously when he first saw her, ignorant then of her ability to understand English. She discovered that those lines were the opening of a sonnet and reading it all the way through left her with an inexplicable feeling of sadness and loss. As if she had looked but for a moment through an open doorway into a beautiful garden, and now that door was shut for good.
Set me whereas the sun doth parch the green
Or where his beams do not dissolve the ice,
In temperate heat where he is felt and seen;
In presence prest of people, mad or wise;
Set me in base or yet in low degree,
In long night or in the shortest day,
In clearest sky or where mists thickest be,
In lusty youth or when my hairs are gray.
Set me in heaven, in earth, or yet in hell;
In hill, or dale, or in the foaming flood;
Thrall or at large, alive whereso I dwell,
Sick or in health, in evil fame or good:
Hers will I be, and with that only thought
Content myself—although my chance is nought.
Check out the first book of the Lord’s Legacy Series to learn more about
Philip Lord and his epic destiny.
The Mercenary’s Blade
Author’s Note
It is always a challenge when writing historical fiction, to make it clear where the author has placed smudgy pawprints over historical events to make their story, and where they have drawn on the known historical record.
For example, Frances Villiers did indeed have a secret illegitimate child at this time and Kate’s experiences at court include verifiable historical details such as the masque performed that year, the troops being raised and the doubts about their purpose, the narrow escape from drowning Mansfeld endured, the presence of Christian of Brunswick, and many other details which a scholar of the period would recognise, whilst no doubt tutting at my character dancing through them. Even the unlikely named Hanging Sword Alley was (and is) a real location in London, and was known for having a fencing school, although, alas, not one run by Venturo di Zorzi.
Equally, whilst Captain Vroomen and his crew are most decidedly not historical individuals, they represent a group of people who did exist. The Dunkirkers were originally a Spanish naval fleet based in the port, but to this was added a growing, privately funded, flotilla of licensed privateers. Although they began operations in the 16th century in support of the Spanish fight against their rebellious Dutch provinces known as the Eighty Years War, it was only after the end of the Twelve Years Truce in 1621, that they reached their full power. Then, for over two decades, despite all attempts to blockade them in their home port, the Dunkirkers devastated Dutch merchant shipping and that of their English allies. They may even be credited as a cause of the First English Civil War since it was mostly to counter their threat that the infamous Ship Money had to be raised.
This surge of piratical success was due to the development of a new type of ship by the shipwrights of Dunkirk: the fragata. It had a more slender and lower profile and was smaller than other warships of the time. It also had the advantage of carrying oars as well as sails. These could be deployed for manoeuvring or to gain the advantage when there was little, or an opposing, wind. Tragically, no painting or design sketch remains to us of what these vessels, the forerunner of the frigate class of warships, actually looked like, so I have had to employ an educated imagination to describe Star of the Sea.
Today the 1624 Siege of Breda is best known to us from the painting ‘The Surrender of Breda’ by Diego Velázquez. This shows Justin of Nassau bending knee before a very gracious Ambrogio Spinola, Marquess of Los Balbases. But at the time it was best known for the sheer scale of the thing.
Breda was superbly defended by its extensive fortifications and the waterways about it. By the expectations of the time no siege could endure long enough or be made close enough to force a capitulation. But Spinola organised the investment of the city with patience and skill. He mustered a huge besieging force of around 80000 men, who both besieged the city and manned and protected the network of supply lines needed to maintain it running back deep into the Spanish Netherlands. The city eventually surrendered after nine months as the copious supplies they had stored finally ran out and all attempts at relief had failed. It is also true that whilst those supplies included many luxuries, no one had thought to stockpile tobacco. In the opening months of the siege, before it became a tight noose about the city, tobacco smugglers would make the hazardous passage in and make a very good profit from doing so, provided they evaded capture.
It is also worth mentioning that the tale of the city being captured from the Spanish before (in 1590) by Dutch soldiers sneaking in on a peat barge, as Jorrit and his friend Seppe played out, is also true. The barge was kept on display until the Spanish destroyed it when they retook the city. A small piece of the barge was saved and is, I believe, on display in the Stedelijk Museum in Breda.
