Sea Change (40 page)

'Didn't you care about Zuyler?'

'If you're asking me whether I'd have done the same for him, the answer's no. You're a different kind of man, William, I'm glad to say. You should be glad too. But don't let the difference go to your head. I think I was looking for an excuse to leave Walpole anyway. It was a beholden life. And I prefer to be beholden to no-one. Besides, ease and pleasure cloy after a while, don't you find?'

Spandrel laughed at the absurdity of the notion that he would have any way of knowing and shook his head at her sheer incorrigibility. 'What in Heaven's name will you do in Java?'

'I can't imagine. Fortunately, I don't have to. I'm not going to Java.'

'You're not?'

'Certainly I'm not. You've met my stepson. If he's an example of the effects of the East Indian climate, not to mention East Indian society — and I'm assured he is — I'd be mad to go. Gerrit has me marked down as good marrying material for the wife-hungry merchants of Batavia. He — and they — are to be disappointed, however.'

'But Dekker and Captain Malssen have orders to take you there.'

'Indeed.' Estelle lowered her voice to a whisper. 'I intend to come to a private arrangement with one or both of those gentlemen. I have it from the boatswain that we're to call at Madeira on the way. I shall disembark there.'

'They won't allow you to.'

'Do you doubt my powers of persuasion?'

'No. But—'

'Then leave me to employ them. On which subject…'

'Yes?'

'Don't look round. Dekker has just commenced observing us from the shelter of the companion-way. It would be helpful to my managing of him on this voyage if you and I appeared to be at odds. You'll forgive the pretence, I know, disagreeable as it will be for both of us. All will be well for you from now on, William. You have nothing to fear from Walpole. He knows certain bargains must be honoured, especially those struck by his brother in his name. He will leave you completely alone. And you will prosper. Of that I feel strangely certain. Finish your map. Maps are the coming thing, you know. People have need of them. At any rate, they think they do, which is even better.'

'Not you, though?'

'No. I prefer an unmapped future. Now, I hope we will be able to contrive a more fitting leavetaking closer to the time, but for the moment—' Suddenly, she tossed her head and raised her voice. 'It is all very well for you, Mr Spandrel. What do I have to show for it?'

'Enough, I think, madam,' he snapped back, rising to the occasion so well that there was the sparkle of a smile in her eyes that she did not allow to reach her lips. 'Go to the Devil.'

'I very likely shall.' She turned on her heel and strode towards the companion-way, where Spandrel glimpsed Dekker's black-clad form shrinking back out of sight. There was no way to tell Estelle's simulated anger and frustration from the real thing. That was the wonder of her. And for Spandrel it always would be.

Early the following evening, the Tovenaer hove to off Hastings and set down a launch, with Spandrel aboard. He could see Estelle watching from the quarter-deck, her pink dress turned blood-red by the wash of golden sunlight. She did not raise a hand and nor did he. The rules of the game she was playing had still to be observed. Each knew what the other's gaze conveyed and that was enough.

Spandrel wondered if he would ever see her again. If not, this last, fading sight of her was the end. He did not want to believe that, likely though it was. She was still alive and so was he. There was no telling what the future might hold. Except that, throughout as much of it as lay before him, he would think better and more fondly of her than he would once have supposed to be possible.

'Fare you well, Estelle,' he murmured under his breath as the launch drew further and further from the ship. 'Fare you ever well.'

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

Looking to the Future

After a night at the Smack and Mackerel Inn in Hastings — named, he decided, because a stomach-turning tang of stale fish pervaded everything, including the bedding — Spandrel was eager to be on his way. But it was Sunday and no coaches were running. The skipper of a coaster sailing for London that afternoon was willing to take on passengers, however, so Spandrel left Hastings as he had arrived, by sea.

The coaster had many calls to make on its way, the number and duration of which far exceeded Spandrel's expectations. Tuesday morning found the vessel no further on than Deal. There Spandrel lost patience. After a salty exchange with the skipper, who declined to refund any portion of his fare, he went ashore and continued his journey by road.

He spent that night at Faversham, whence the mail-coach bore him on to London the following day. He could have reached Leicester Fields by early evening, but a whimsical notion had occurred to his mind. He put up for the night at the Talbot Inn in Borough High Street.

After a meal and several reviving mugs of ale in the taproom, he walked up to London Bridge and stood by the railings in a gap between the houses, watching the light fade over the city he had never thought he would see again. It was good to be back. And better still to know that, this time, he could stay.

The following morning, Margaret Spandrel breakfasted in low spirits. Her attempts to shake off the sadness William had caused her by his second abrupt and unexplained departure had been undermined by the realization that today was his twenty-seventh birthday. Sighing heavily and deciding to set off for Covent Garden in the hope that haggling over vegetables might improve her state of mind, she rose from the table and walked across to the window to judge the weather.

But what the weather was like she suddenly did not care. For there, standing at the edge of the lawn in the square below, was a familiar figure. And he was waving at her.

She flung up the sash and leaned out. 'William?' she called. 'Is that really you?'

'Yes, Ma,' he called back, smiling broadly. 'It really is.'

Later that day, another traveller returned to London from the Low Countries. Horatio Walpole, devoutly hoping he would not be sent straight back again this time, reported promptly to his brother at the Treasury.

Resilience was one of Robert Walpole's abiding traits. He had long since rid himself of the despondency that had gripped him on the occasion of their last meeting. It seemed to Horatio, indeed, that he had already forgotten the charms of Estelle de Vries, alias Davenant, thanks either to the alternative charms of some newly discovered mistress or to a happy turn in his pursuit of Atterbury. As it transpired, both emollients to Robert's mood had been applied.

'You've done well, Horace,' the great man and grateful brother announced over a bumper of champagne. 'The East Indies is as far from harm's way as anyone could ask for. As for Spandrel, I suppose the fellow's never really meant any harm. And now he can do none. We have Atterbury by the tail.' 'Has he been arrested?'

'Not yet. But Plunket is beginning to see the attractions of turning King's Evidence. When he does… we'll have them all.'

'I can rest my weary limbs at home for a while, then?' 'Indeed you can. Take a well-deserved rest.' 'And what will you do with Phoenix House?' 'Oh, I have someone in mind for that.' Robert winked at his brother. 'When a mare throws you, mount a sweeter-tempered one, I say.' At which they both laughed immoderately and recharged their glasses.

Two days later, at the Goat Tavern in Bloomsbury, Sam Burrows' customary Saturday evening soak was enlivened by the not entirely unexpected arrival of William Spandrel.

'You've heard, then, Mr Spandrel?'

'Heard what?'

'Come on. It's why you're here.'

'I've been away, Sam. Apparently, Dick Surtees came looking for me. But, when I called at his lodgings, his landlady told me he'd moved — without leaving a forwarding address.'

'Shouldn't wonder at that.'

'What's it all about?'

'Bigamy, Mr Spandrel. Well, it would've been bigamy, if the marriage had gone off. Seems old Mr Chesney reckoned your friend was too good to be true, so made some inquiries. And what pops up but a wife, in Paris, legally churched and well and truly living. Didn't see Mr Surtees for dust, did we? Handsome of him to try and let you know the coast was clear, though.'

'How's Maria taken it?'

'Oh, much as you'd expect. Whey-faced and weeping at first. A little better lately. But she still keeps to her room a lot. In need of consoling, I'd say.'

"Would you?'

'I would, now I've met the man to do it. Not got a wife tucked away somewhere, have you, Mr Spandrel?'

'Definitely not.'

'Nor any skeletons in the closet likely to rattle their bones?'

'Not a one.'

'There you are, then. You're just the man she needs. And an altogether finer one than Mr Surtees, if you don't mind me venturing the opinion.'

'No, Sam. I don't mind at all.'

Spandrel took his place early for matins at the Church of St George the Martyr in Queen's Square the following morning, then settled back to watch as the pews filled around him with the pious pick of local society. About ten minutes before the service was due to begin, Mr and Mrs Chesney, accompanied by their daughter, Maria, entered the church and moved to their private pew near the front. They did not notice Spandrel. But Spandrel noticed them, Maria in particular. She was looking pale, as Sam had led him to expect, and thinner than he remembered.

A tender feeling of pity for Maria stole over Spandrel, a feeling he knew, in favourable circumstances — beginning with a brief but telling encounter at the conclusion of the service — might lead to a revival of the affection they had once proclaimed for each other. It would be a delicate business, at least at first. But he was confident that he could manage it. He could not in fact recall feeling so confident about anything before in his life.

Many of the congregation were kneeling in prayer. So as not to appear out of place, Spandrel dropped to his knees, folded his hands and closed his eyes. As he did so, a strange and exhilarating thought came to him. Queen's Square stood at the very limit of London. Beyond the gardens at its northern end lay open fields to north and east and west. This was the edge of the map. It would not always be so. The city would grow, around and beyond it. The map Spandrel had not yet even finished — the map he had helped his father draw — would be redundant. What then? Why then, of course, as the future unfolded, he would draw another. And quite possibly another after that, helped, perhaps, by his son. In its way, the thought was a kind of prayer. And Spandrel uttered it solemnly.

POSTLUDE

July 1722–March 2000

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Tragedy, Comedy and History

History is the geology of human experience, a study, as it were, of tragedy and comedy laid down in the strata of past lives. In death there are no winners or losers, merely people who once lived but can never live again. What they thought, what they believed, what they hoped, is largely lost. That which remains is history.

The Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie vessel Tovenaer called at Madeira early in July 1722. It is not known if any passenger disembarked. Certain it is, however, that none of its passengers can have reached Java. The Tovenaer was lost with all aboard in a storm off the coast of New Holland (later to be renamed Australia) in the middle of October 1722. She has lately become the object of the eager attentions of aqualunged treasure-seekers, by virtue of her cargo of gold and silver bullion, intended to be traded for tea, textiles and porcelain, but which has served instead as a waterlogged memorial to Dutch commercial enterprise.

This disaster is unlikely to have been reported at the time in England. It almost certainly therefore did not intrude upon the early married life of William and Maria Spandrel, whose wedding had been solemnized at St George the Martyr's Church, Queen's Square, Bloomsbury, on Michaelmas Day of that year.

By the time of the Spandrels' wedding, the evidence given by John Plunket had led to the arrest on charges of treasonable conspiracy of Christopher Layer, George Kelly, Lord Grey and North, the Earl of Orrery and, of course, Bishop Francis Atterbury. As soon as Parliament met in October, the Duke of Norfolk joined them in the Tower. Walpole then pushed through the suspension of Habeas Corpus for a year and the imposition of a special tax of five shillings in the pound on Roman Catholics and non-jurors to meet the alleged cost of putting down the conspiracy.

Layer was tried and convicted of high treason and sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered. In the hope of extracting information from him to use against the others, his execution was many times delayed, but in vain. Eventually, Walpole had to acknowledge a lack of clinching evidence. He therefore proceeded against Atterbury and Kelly by a Bill of Pains and Penalties, calling only for presumptive evidence. The delinquent peers were released on indefinite bail. Kelly was sentenced to life imprisonment (as was the wretched Plunket), Atterbury to permanent exile. Layer was at last put out of his misery in May 1723. A month afterwards, Atterbury was loaded aboard a man-of-war and despatched to France, whence he was never to return. Of the multitude of Jacobites Walpole feared and/or hoped might come to see the Bishop off, only the Duke of Wharton put in an appearance.

Layer's head was duly displayed at Temple Bar, only to be blown down in a gale some years later, almost literally into the hands of Dr Richard Rawlinson, the Oxford theologian and non-juring bishop, who was so taken with this relic of Jacobite fervour that he asked to be buried with it in his right hand. It is not clear whether the request was carried out. Kelly languished in the Tower for fourteen years, then staged a dramatic escape and re-entered the Pretender's service. He was one of the 'Seven Men of Moidart' who sailed with Prince Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, from Nantes for Eriskay in June 1745. He later served as the Prince's private secretary. He died in Rome in 1762. Plunket, meanwhile, had died in the Tower two years after Kelly's escape.