The smugness changes to suspicion. Tyrone studies her, scratching at his bushy beard while he tries to gauge her capacity for deceit. Then he makes a little stabbing motion with the crucifix. ‘And no doubt when you get to Scotland you’ll slip away in the night, cross into England. I can’t have that.’
‘I wasn’t planning to, my lord,’ Bianca assures him in her most earnest manner. ‘I am sure Lady Constanza will be fully recovered by the time she takes ship. I need accompany her only that far. By then her servant will be quite capable of attending to her needs.’
‘The Blackamoor?’
‘The Carib – Cachorra.’
‘Is that what she’s called? A wild creature, to be sure.’
No wilder than many of your fellows, who look more like Scythian warriors of old than modern fighting men, thinks Bianca. But she says nothing, adopting what she hopes is her serious apothecary’s face.
‘Very well,’ Tyrone says at last. ‘But you’ll be guarded. And the guards will know their instructions, should you attempt to slip away.’
‘I would expect nothing less, my lord.’
As Bianca makes her way back to Constanza’s chamber, she is gripped by a fear even greater than that of what would happen to her should her attempt to escape fail. It is fear for Nicholas. He must surely be with Essex and the English army. What if Tyrone, with his superior force, decides – after all – that Ardee is the place not for parley, but for attack?
Nicholas is in favour again, at least for the moment. His Grace has pronounced him the finest physician in Christendom. Nicholas does not take this as a sign that Essex has really changed his opinion. When a man is relieved of the flux – even if only temporarily – his mood is always likely to improve. Thus it is that Nicholas finds himself in Devereux’s pavilion, listening attentively while Southampton and the other commanders attempt to talk the earl out of meeting Tyrone face-to-face. Essex has just announced that he intends to do so, without any of them being present. A privy meeting – with no close witnesses.
Their objection is both simple and direct: the earl’s enemies at court in England – by which they mean Robert Cecil – will use such a parley to his great disadvantage. His Grace has entered into a secret deal with Tyrone against Your Majesty’s express commands… who knows what traitorous pact he has made with the rebels?… Without witnesses, without secretaries present to record what was said, who is to say that your erstwhile favourite has not betrayed Your Majesty’s trust?
Nicholas recalls how fearful Edmund Spenser had been of even the merest suggestion that he had been in contact with Spain, regardless of his motives. For a man of Devereux’s importance, such an accusation could mean an appointment with the executioner.
But Essex is adamant. Following an offer of parley from Tyrone, he will array his army at the place suggested: the ford on the River Lagan at Bellaclinthe. It will be a display of strength, though everyone but Essex seems to know on which side of the river the true strength lies. But there will be no battle. He will bring the rebel leader to heel by the force of his will alone..
With Tyrone and his army absent, a strange air has fallen upon the little castle. The household suffers from the listlessness of children kept at home while the adults are out doing something interesting. Bianca’s guards have changed, too. O’Neill needs every fighting man he can muster. Only three are left to escort the Lady Constanza to the coast to take ship for Scotland, and one of those is still lame from a wound sustained in the rout of the English at the battle of the Yellow Ford over a year ago. They are civil enough, but she doesn’t doubt they would carry out their commander’s orders if it came to it.
It is the morning after Tyrone’s departure for Ardee. The dawn creeps up over the soft hills. Cockerels call forlornly to the still-smouldering campfires on the abandoned riverbank.
‘I need to speak with the steward, if you please,’ Bianca says when the change of guard outside the door to Constanza’s chamber has had a few minutes to settle himself to his duties. ‘I assume you will want to accompany me – lest I try to escape.’
On the way down to the steward’s chamber, she goes to work. Her small talk is mildly flirtatious, and clearly well received. After all, what young lad assigned to a demeaning and stultifying post in an almost empty castle wouldn’t be flattered by the attentions of a comely older woman, a woman whose dark waves of hair and amber eyes suggest – even if somewhat modestly – excitements long denied to a lowly foot soldier of the rebellion?
The castle’s elderly steward is stooped and white-haired, as reedy as anything that grows in the shallows of the Blackwater. He looks to Bianca as though he might snap if she blew on him. ‘I believe the Lady Constanza will be well enough to travel tomorrow,’ she tells him. ‘We shall need food. She is also demanding wine, for the journey.’
He rolls his eyes in the manner of the perpetually suffering. ‘I’ll have a skin made ready,’ he says. ‘You may have it when you leave.’
Bianca gives him a doubting frown. ‘I really would prefer it now. I shall need to mix a restorative into it, lest she suffers another relapse on the ride. She refuses to drink it neat, and it will take a while to infuse the wine.’
‘Can you not do that overnight?’
‘I must do the mixing in daylight; I need to be careful with the balance. Too little and it will be ineffective, too much and it may harm her recovery. Can you show me what skins you have available?’
The steward leads her to the kitchens. He shows her a collection of empty leather bladders hanging by their carrying straps from a hook in the pantry. He says, ‘The O’Neill always takes one of these when he goes out hawking.’ Then, in a sarcastic tone, he adds, ‘I trust one of these will be worthy enough for her gracious Spanish majesty?’
Bianca notes the wooden stopper has a screw thread turned into it, to ensure a tight fit. ‘This will do perfectly,’ she says, giving the steward a wink to show how she, too, has laboured under Constanza’s relentless demands.
‘Very well,’ says the steward. ‘I’ll send a full skin up to the chamber.’
‘And a jug for mixing the restorative.’
‘And a jug.’
‘One more thing…’
‘With the Spanish lady, there is always one more thing.’
A conspiratorial laugh, shared.
‘There was a wedding gift, or so I understand. Would you be good enough to wrap it in a strong cloth? There’s no point in making a display of its presence. I’m sure you have thieves here, just as we do in England. I’ll send the Lady Constanza’s servant down to collect it.’
‘I shall have it ready,’ the steward says, won over entirely. ‘I hope you bear the ride to Clandeboye without developing a chancre of the ear.’
Back in their chamber, Constanza is snoring noisily in her bed. ‘I’m not sure about the wedding gift,’ Cachorra whispers when Bianca has explained her plan. ‘Is my mistress’s. Cachorra is no thief.’
‘Of course you aren’t. But that’s why we need it. They’ll believe I’ve escaped, and you’ve run away with me because you’ve stolen your mistress’s possession. Constanza is bound to think the same. It will take away any suspicion that she was complicit in our disappearance. Besides, she’s not going to starve when she gets to Antwerp – whereas you could do with a little something to set yourself up on Bankside. Consider it recompense for all that moaning you’ve had to put up with over the years.’