The Enterprise of England (20 page)

Amsterdam
seemed a clean and tidy small town. The people were well though not richly clothed and I saw only one beggar, a man who had lost both legs, so I took him for a former soldier. He sat on a little wheeled platform beside the steps up to one of the severely plain Dutch churches, with one of those large dogs at his side, occasionally playing simple melodies on a pipe. Berden had explained the Dutch coins to me before he left, so I picked out a small one from my purse and dropped it into the man’s upturned cap, where there were few others. He nodded his thanks, still playing.

‘You shouldn’t encourage him.’

The voice, an English voice, came from behind me and I spun quickly on my heel.

It was a fat man, in rude good health, who shook his head disparagingly.

‘We don’t like beggars in Amsterdam.’

‘But you are English.’

‘English father, Dutch mother. I bestride the Channel, and have lived in both countries.’ He laughed heartily at his own image, spreading his arms wide. Then his face darkened. ‘And as I say, we do not like beggars in Amsterdam.’

‘And how is that poor fellow to live, having lost both legs?’ I was furious, thinking of William Baker and his great good fortune in having a family and an occupation. ‘I assume he lost them fighting the Spanish.’

‘Aye, I did that.’ The beggar spoke in English, though with a noticeable accent. ‘Blown off by a cannon ball at Zutphen.’

‘A year ago?’ I said. ‘Where Sir Philip Sidney died?’

‘Aye. He was a good man.’

‘You see.’ I turned back to the fat man who had accosted me. ‘An old soldier. We should be grateful to him and his kind.’

The fat man shrugged, which brought his chest up to meet his cascading chins. ‘You have no proof. He may be lying.’

The beggar’s dog gave a low growl and the hairs stood up on his neck, but the beggar smoothed them down and whispered some words in Dutch.

‘I think not. I am a physician and I have seen such injuries before, some from Sluys.’

Why should he assume the beggar was lying? There must be many maimed soldiers in the
Low Countries after the long years of fighting. Something stirred in my memory. I was sure I had seen the fat man before. Then I remembered. The previous evening in the Prins Willem, he had been at the far side of the parlour when Berden and I had been arranging our room with the inn keeper. He had been with a group of similar men, all large and well fed, drinking heartily and, I was sure, speaking Dutch. I had not noticed him this morning, when Berden and I had been breaking our fast in that same parlour, but it had been early and not many people were about.

As if he caught some sign of recognition in my eyes, the fat man held out his hand.

‘Cornelius Parker, at your service.’ He bowed.

I shook his hand and returned the bow.

‘You are here with the army?’ he said. ‘One of our young officers?’

‘No, no. Merely a messenger, and here in
Amsterdam for a short time only, before I return to England.’

‘Well, if I can be of any service to you while you are here, Master . . .?’

‘Alvarez,’ I said, trapped by the habit of courtesy into giving my name.

His eyes widened. ‘Spanish?’

‘No.’ I would not elaborate to this importunate stranger.

‘I am a merchant here in
Amsterdam. Fine fabrics, many imported from the east, Constantinople, Ragusa, even silk from China. I would be happy to oblige you in any way I can. I have the entrée to many fine houses, and amusements of every sort.’ He leered and winked at this, which distorted his superficially amiable features and made it plain exactly what kind of entertainments he had in mind.

I simply bowed, and since it was clear I would say no more, he bowed yet again and walked off, surprisingly briskly for a man of his bulk. I realised that the maimed soldier had been listening to every word of this exchange. Exasperated, I looked down at him, smiled and shrugged.

‘He will not get any custom from me.’ I dropped another coin into the hat, a larger one.

The soldier did not return my smile but looked at me seriously, then reached up and laid a hand on my arm.

‘Be careful,’ he said. ‘That is a bad man.’

Chapter Nine

I
was oddly disturbed by this encounter. What did the maimed soldier mean, that Cornelius Parker was a bad man? I had caught a flash of something between them. In view of Parker’s condemnation of beggars and his imputation that the man might be lying about being an ex soldier, it would be understandable if it was an indication of anger and resentment on the beggar’s part, yet it had seemed like something else. As if the two men knew each other and an old hostility existed between them. Clearly the soldier spoke only limited English, so his warning had contained just those few simple words, yet as I continued my exploration of Amsterdam, I could not forget them.

I retraced my steps to the square with the public well, where a group of women were now drawing water, and turned along the street we had taken yesterday to the Earl’s house. Berden had told me to follow the street along the canal until it met another, and then turn left on Reiger Straat. It proved to be further than I expected, but I found it at last. The houses overlooking this canal, like those near the Earl’s lodging, were large and prosperous, though there was much more activity here. The cranes jutting out from the top storeys were in use at several of the houses, lowering goods on to barges on the canal or lifting other goods from the boats into the houses. This must be the heart of the merchants’ quarter of the town. I found the sign of
the Leaping Gazelle, where Sara’s cousin Ettore Añez lived, but there were many men coming and going through the front door, so I hesitated to intrude. I would return when the business of the day was over, or the following morning.

Unable to shake off the memory of the beggar’s warning, I decided to return to the church and ask him to explain just what he had meant, but by the time I had found my way back – and I managed to lose myself twice – there was no sign of him or his dog. A woman was selling hot sweet pastries from a tray hanging from her neck and I bought one. As I ate it, I asked her if she knew where I could find the beggar I had seen there that morning.

Giving me an odd look, she said, ‘I do not know, Me’heer. Sometimes he is there, sometimes not. I do not know where he lives.’

It was clear she thought it strange that I should ask. Not wanting to draw attention to myself, I gave a quick nod, as if it was of no importance, and made my way back to the inn.

That evening I decided to sit in a corner of the inn parlour, nursing a tankard of Dutch beer and doing as I had been instructed, keeping my eyes and ears open. Like the previous evening, it soon filled up with soldiers, mostly English, but a few Dutch, who came to eat and drink and play cards. They talked loudly of nothing in particular, complaints about the delays in their pay, an officer who bullied the younger men, the lack of decent boots. Nothing unusual. Very much the same kind of talk as I had heard at Dover Castle. A sudden angry argument erupted between one group of English soldiers and the Dutchmen, with accusations of slacking and cowardice being thrown about. It was starting to turn nasty when Niels Penders, the innkeeper, came through from the back room and broke up the impending fight. He was a big man, but his tactic was cheerfulness and jokes, not force, followed by free beer all round, which seemed to settle the dispute, for the moment at least.

There was nothing suspicious or even interesting in the soldiers’ talk. This evening there were few civilians in the inn, and no sign of Cornelius Parker. I wondered why he had been here the previous evening, when it did not seem to be an inn much frequented by the local Hollanders. I also wondered whether my encounter with him had been entirely a chance one. Could he have followed me? It seemed unlikely, and the idea probably sprang from the nervousness I felt at being alone in this foreign town, with no particular business to pursue. Yet I could not quite shake it off. Could Parker have discovered that I was here on errands for Walsingham, or had he seen us visiting the Earl yesterday? But why should that be of interest to a draper, a merchant dealing in expensive imported fabrics? All the Dutch merchants, I knew, suffered as a result of Spanish blockades of many of their ports. Their merchant vessels were forced to run the gauntlet of the Spanish ships which prowled the Channel, and were only able to sail down past the English coast under escort from Dutch or English warships before they could reach the Atlantic and make their way west to the New World or south to the Mediterranean and
Africa. So it was in the interests of all the merchants for the war with Spain to be brought to an end by an English and Dutch victory.

Why had the beggar warned me against Parker?

Tired from my hours of walking over the snow-covered cobbles of Amsterdam and seeing little purpose in eavesdropping any longer on the soldiers’ talk, I decided to go to bed. On the way, I asked Niels Penders to send some hot water to my room. It arrived soon after I did, carried in by a girl of about my own age, the innkeeper’s daughter Anneke. She smiled and curtseyed, and set the bucket of steaming water down beside the table that held a jug and basin. When she was gone, I dragged the clothes coffer against the door to block it, poured the water into the basin, and stripped to the skin.

For days, ever since we had left
London, I had slept in the same clothes I wore all day, and I felt tired and grubby. It was a luxurious pleasure to wash all over with the scrap of soap I had brought with me. I had no towel, but a fire had been laid in the small fireplace and after rubbing myself with my cloak I soon dried by toasting myself in front of it. I then washed out my stockings, my shirt and my undershift, wringing them out as best I could and draping them over a chair in front of the fire, which I made up with logs from a basket provided by the inn. I slipped my night shift over my head with a sigh of pure pleasure. Tonight, at least, I could sleep in comfort.

The coffer I left in place behind the door, but I laid my clean shirt, breeches and spare hose ready, in case I should need to dress in a hurry, and with that slid beneath the feather bed and blew out my candle. Within minutes I was asleep.

The next morning I woke slowly, vaguely aware of a cock crowing somewhere not far off, and the clatter of hooves beneath my window. The clothes I had washed, being of thin fabric, had dried in the night, so I folded them and packed them into my knapsack. I dressed in the clean clothes I had laid out and drew the coffer away from the door, hoping that no one would hear the noise I made. Before eating the previous night I had checked that the ostler had fed Hector, but I thought I would visit the stables before breaking my fast. It was still quite early, so it might be possible to call on Ettore Añez before he was too much caught up in the business of the day.

Hector seemed comfortable and well fed, so as soon as I had eaten I set off again on foot for Reiger Straat. There had been no further snow during the night, so what had already fallen was churned up and dirty with the passage of feet and stained with horse droppings. Perhaps because I knew the way, the house seemed nearer this time. The hoists and the barges were not yet as busy as they had been the day before, and only one man emerged from the door of the house at the sign of the Leaping Gazelle, so I decided to make my way up the shallow steps and knock.

The door was opened immediately by a smartly dressed servant who asked me something in Dutch. I replied in English.

‘Is this the home of Mijnheer Ettore Añez?’

‘Certainly, sir,’ he replied in faultless English, with no trace of accent. ‘Who shall I say is calling?’

‘Dr Christoval Alvarez,’ I said, ‘a friend of his cousin Sara Lopez from
London.’

‘If you will wait here a moment, sir.’ He bowed and climbed the stairs to the next floor, where I heard the knock on a door and the murmur of voices. I might have been in a gentleman’s house in
London, received by one of his upper servants.

The man came quickly downstairs again.

‘If you would follow me, Dr Alvarez?’

On the first floor he knocked at a door, then opened it without waiting for an answer, and I stepped inside. A large window faced the canal, filling the room with reflected light dancing off the water. As I entered, a tall man, thin and elegantly dressed, came towards me with both hands outstretched, beaming at me with genuine pleasure.

‘Dr Alvarez! My cousin has told me much about you and your father in her letters. I am delighted to meet you and to welcome you to Amsterdam.’ He turned to the servant who was just closing the door. ‘Alfred, bring us some refreshments.’

He indicated two comfortable chairs pulled close to the fire. ‘Please, please, sit down. You will take a little wine? You must tell me all the news of Sara and the children.’

It was not much more than an hour since I had eaten at the inn, but in courtesy I could not refuse. As I gave Ettore the latest news of Sara’s family, including the prospects for Anne’s marriage, the servant returned bearing a tray which he unloaded on to a table conveniently placed between the two chairs. A crystal and silver flagon of pale gold wine, two Venetian goblets, two fine linen table napkins, two silver gilt plates and another one loaded with a selection of sweetmeats, tiny sugared pastries, and marchpane shapes. It appeared that Ettore Añez lived every bit as well as the Earl of Leicester.

‘And are you in
Amsterdam for long, Dr Alvarez?’ he asked. He was far too discreet to ask what my business here was.

‘Perhaps another week or ten days,’ I said. ‘I am awaiting the return of a colleague who had business elsewhere in the United Provinces.’ I had decided that Ettore Añez seemed a trustworthy man. He was, after all, the cousin of my oldest friend. I would not tell him everything, but I could see no harm in telling him what was common knowledge.

‘We have come from Sir Francis Walsingham, carrying despatches and letters for the Earl of Leicester.’

‘You have seen the Earl?’

‘Aye, the evening we arrived. The day before yesterday.’ I paused, then thought I would venture a question. ‘When we saw the Earl, there were two men dining with him: Sir John Worthington, one of his cavalry captains, and a Dutchman, Mijnheer van Leyden. I wondered whether you knew anything about them.’

Ettore poured us each more wine while he considered.

‘I know very little about Worthington. Little more than his name, in fact. He may be a cavalry captain, but I doubt whether he has ever led a cavalry charge in battle. I understand that he is one of the Earl’s favourites, kept well away from any real fighting.’ He paused, sipping his wine, then ate a few of the tiny pastries.

‘Van Leyden, now, I do know. He is a merchant here in
Amsterdam, dealing in spices from the islands of the east. Or at least he was. Last year he lost his two largest ships, one to storms in the Indian Ocean, one to the Spanish. He was ruined, forced to sell his two remaining ships and look about for other employment. That was when he took up a position with the English.’

I understood from the way he said ‘the English’ that he did not regard himself as belonging to that nation, although we had spoken entirely in English, not Portuguese and certainly not Dutch. Perhaps, like my father and me, he felt himself still a stranger in northern Europe, even though, like his cousin Sara, he had been born here and never lived in
Portugal. The sense of being an outsider is not easily overcome, even after one or two generations.

‘What do you think of him?’ I asked bluntly. ‘Van Leyden?’

He gave me a thoughtful look in which I caught a sudden resemblance to Sara. ‘He is not generally liked. There was no great mourning when he went out of business last year. There had been talk of false weights, of spices adulterated with cheaper produce, or tainted with mould. I would say that he is not altogether trustworthy. Moreover he has been humiliated by his losses, and I believe that he is not a man to take that well. Such humiliation can make a man dangerous.’

‘Hmm,’ I said, digesting this. ‘So do you think van Leyden himself might be dangerous?’

‘Dangerous to whom?’

‘Well, I suppose to the Earl, as he seems to be on intimate terms with him, dining in his house. And also perhaps to the alliance between
England and the United Provinces.’

‘That alliance is already on quaking ground,’ Añez said. ‘Each side blames the other for failure on the battlefield. Zutphen was a disaster. Sluys a tragedy. It has reached a point where the commanders on both sides distrust each other, while the common soldiers come to blows in the streets. This is no way to withstand the Spanish, especially with a general of
Parma’s skill in command of them.’

I had not realised things were so bad. Were the fears
Leicester had expressed about treason and treachery merely this general falling out between the two nations? Or was there something more particular?

‘I believe the Earl has asked the Queen repeatedly if he might return home,’ I ventured.

‘Very likely.’ He nodded. ‘One can hardly blame the man. He is not a soldier. I am no soldier myself, but even I can understand that he has no grasp of military matters. But who would replace him?’

‘Perhaps his stepson, the Earl of Essex.’ I gave a wry smile, reflecting my view of
Essex. ‘Sir John Norreys would be the wiser choice.’

‘I agree. When you saw the Earl, did you gain any idea of his plans?’

‘No, we were not made privy to anything of such importance.’

Añez held up the wine flagon again, but I shook my head and put my hand over my glass.