mother, no sisters to help. Would you look after her? Stay with her a while to be sure all’s well with the babe?”
A while? Isabel thought with a touch of dismay. “How long?”
“A few months. She’s not young. It may be a hard birth. Hard for both.”
Not young. And not one of us. “Adam,” she said, “how did you come to marry a Grenville?”
He looked down the street. “A long story.” He stood up.
“But one I want to hear.” She stood as well.
He looked at her. “Are you all right now? Can you go on?”
“Adam, I have a right to know. Carlos and I need to start back home soon, but you’re asking me to postpone that to stay with Frances. I want to know about her. Did you marry her to end the feud? Or was it despite the feud? Do you love her so very much?”
He let out a bitter laugh. “Ask her.”
“Stop this. You’re as bad as Mother and Father. They go back and forth to the palace in some secret business but never say a word about what it is. They put on happy faces as though they’re just going there to play cards, but I know something is seriously amiss.”
They stood face-to-face on the busy street. His look darkened. “They’re hoping it will all go away. It won’t.”
“Adam, what is happening? Why won’t any of you talk to me?”
“Because what’s happening doesn’t concern you.”
“Not concern me? I’m part of this family!”
“Well, you’re not part of what’s going on in England. Not anymore. You’re Spanish.”
“I have as much English blood as—”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“Then what?”
“You’re Catholic.”
The word fell between them like a tree trunk.
So that’s it, she thought with a shiver. Her own family didn’t trust her. They thought of her the way those men who had attacked her did, as a “papist.” Except her family put on smiling faces. False faces.
She took a deep breath to steady herself, and looked away.
Adam said, an apology in his voice, “Isabel, it’s the coming child that matters.” She looked back at him and he said, “I care very much about the child.”
She saw that he did care, deeply, and it touched her. But she had had enough of being shut out of this family. She put all the steel she could into her voice. “If you want me to do this, if you want me to see to the welfare of your wife and child, then tell me everything. If you won’t, I swear I will book passage on the very next ship bound for Spain and then sail home to Peru. Decide, Adam. Now.”
4
The Borderland Threat
“Y ou always were the stubborn one.” Adam’s frustrated smile told Isabel that he was going to tell her what she wanted to know. They set out walking again, and although she still felt tender and bruised from the rough handling of her attackers, she kept up with her brother’s stride, impatient to hear. Turning south on Walbrook, they passed a cluster of livery halls—Chandlers Hall, Cutlers Hall, Skinners Hall—but Adam didn’t speak until they turned onto Thames Street. A warren of narrow streets led down to the river a few hundred feet away. He guided her down one.
“First,” he said, “Father is advising the Queen’s council about buying munitions in the Low Countries. No one knows Antwerp better than he does, and its merchant networks.”
Of that much, Isabel was well aware. As a wool cloth merchant with business on both sides of the Narrow Seas, their father had always kept a house in Antwerp. When she was a child the family had lived there for a time. But what was this business about munitions? She put that question aside for the moment and asked, “And Mother?”
“She helped arrange a visit of the Scottish Earl of Arran, all in secret. She kept him in Sir William Cecil’s house on Canon Row, and the Queen met him in private.” He added with some vigor, “The rumor that the Queen wanted to talk marriage with the Earl is nonsense. It was just a political meeting. She sent him back to Scotland. He can do some
A while? Isabel thought with a touch of dismay. “How long?”
“A few months. She’s not young. It may be a hard birth. Hard for both.”
Not young. And not one of us. “Adam,” she said, “how did you come to marry a Grenville?”
He looked down the street. “A long story.” He stood up.
“But one I want to hear.” She stood as well.
He looked at her. “Are you all right now? Can you go on?”
“Adam, I have a right to know. Carlos and I need to start back home soon, but you’re asking me to postpone that to stay with Frances. I want to know about her. Did you marry her to end the feud? Or was it despite the feud? Do you love her so very much?”
He let out a bitter laugh. “Ask her.”
“Stop this. You’re as bad as Mother and Father. They go back and forth to the palace in some secret business but never say a word about what it is. They put on happy faces as though they’re just going there to play cards, but I know something is seriously amiss.”
They stood face-to-face on the busy street. His look darkened. “They’re hoping it will all go away. It won’t.”
“Adam, what is happening? Why won’t any of you talk to me?”
“Because what’s happening doesn’t concern you.”
“Not concern me? I’m part of this family!”
“Well, you’re not part of what’s going on in England. Not anymore. You’re Spanish.”
“I have as much English blood as—”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“Then what?”
“You’re Catholic.”
The word fell between them like a tree trunk.
So that’s it, she thought with a shiver. Her own family didn’t trust her. They thought of her the way those men who had attacked her did, as a “papist.” Except her family put on smiling faces. False faces.
She took a deep breath to steady herself, and looked away.
Adam said, an apology in his voice, “Isabel, it’s the coming child that matters.” She looked back at him and he said, “I care very much about the child.”
She saw that he did care, deeply, and it touched her. But she had had enough of being shut out of this family. She put all the steel she could into her voice. “If you want me to do this, if you want me to see to the welfare of your wife and child, then tell me everything. If you won’t, I swear I will book passage on the very next ship bound for Spain and then sail home to Peru. Decide, Adam. Now.”
4
The Borderland Threat
“Y ou always were the stubborn one.” Adam’s frustrated smile told Isabel that he was going to tell her what she wanted to know. They set out walking again, and although she still felt tender and bruised from the rough handling of her attackers, she kept up with her brother’s stride, impatient to hear. Turning south on Walbrook, they passed a cluster of livery halls—Chandlers Hall, Cutlers Hall, Skinners Hall—but Adam didn’t speak until they turned onto Thames Street. A warren of narrow streets led down to the river a few hundred feet away. He guided her down one.
“First,” he said, “Father is advising the Queen’s council about buying munitions in the Low Countries. No one knows Antwerp better than he does, and its merchant networks.”
Of that much, Isabel was well aware. As a wool cloth merchant with business on both sides of the Narrow Seas, their father had always kept a house in Antwerp. When she was a child the family had lived there for a time. But what was this business about munitions? She put that question aside for the moment and asked, “And Mother?”
“She helped arrange a visit of the Scottish Earl of Arran, all in secret. She kept him in Sir William Cecil’s house on Canon Row, and the Queen met him in private.” He added with some vigor, “The rumor that the Queen wanted to talk marriage with the Earl is nonsense. It was just a political meeting. She sent him back to Scotland. He can do some
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