The Enterprise of England Read Online Free PDF Page A

Street, where Ruy had bought a fine house amongst the English merchants. My father at sixty was beginning to show his age. The extra burden of work falling on his shoulders since I had gone back to working for Walsingham had started to tell on him, and now he had the first signs of a chest infection.
    ‘Are you sure we should go today?’ I asked. ‘I could send a message to tell Sara that you are not well.’
    ‘I am well enough,’ he said stubbornly. ‘It would be discourteous to cry off now. It is nothing but a slight cough. I have been treating it myself. Besides, it is good for us to mix in company from time to time.’
    This last remark surprised me, for my father had become something of a recluse since we had come to England, unlike the old days when he had been part of a gregarious and sociable group at the university of Coimbra. Usually it was he who demurred at going anywhere. I had only once persuaded him to come with me to the festivities at the Theatre last Christmas. By ‘mixing in company’ I wondered whether he meant that I should strengthen my ties to our own community. Much of my time nowadays was spent amongst the English, both in Seething Lane and, whenever I had any leisure, with Simon’s fellow players in Master Burbage’s company. I had seen little enough of them lately, my time being so occupied between my patients and my intelligence work, though I knew from Simon that they were rehearsing new plays for when the playhouses opened again in the better weather.
    As it was impossible to convince my father that he should stay at home, I persuaded him to wear gloves and wrap a thick scarf around his head and his physician’s cap. We set off into the snow, which was still falling, even in March. Just inside the city gate we found a street vendor selling hot chestnuts.
    ‘How many for a farthing?’ I asked.
    He scooped up a shovelful for me to see. I nodded and he gave them to me a screwed up cone of paper. We were close to the grid where the Newgate prisoners beg passer sby to give them food, so I bought another farthing’s worth and pushed the chestnuts through the grid into the frantically grabbing hands.
    ‘Now,’ I said to my father, ‘we don’t need to eat these, for we’ll be royally fed at the Lopez house.’
    ‘I wondered why you bought them.’
    ‘Here, put them in your pockets and keep your hands warm with them.’
    Although he laughed and protested, I filled his pockets with the hot nuts, allowing myself just one to eat.
    ‘You grow more like your mother every day,’ he said.
    I shook my head. ‘Best not to say that aloud. Best not even to think it.’
    ‘But I do think it, Caterina.’
    I felt myself grow cold and looked about to make sure no one had heard.
    ‘Not Caterina any longer, Father. Christoval. Kit.’
    He sighed. ‘I wish it did not have to be so.’
    ‘It is better this way. How else could I earn my living? Now come, we don’t want to be out in the snow any longer than we need.’
    The Lopez house was well heated with generous fires in every room and heavy curtains as well as shutters over the windows to keep out any vicious serpents of cold air. There were thick carpets on the floors and the well polished furniture glowed in the light of many candles. Sara took me aside before we joined the others and gave me a quick hug. When she had taken us in five years ago, I was a terrified child of twelve. Although I had already assumed my disguise as the boy Christoval, she soon discovered that I was in fact Caterina, though she had kept her word and never revealed the truth to anyone, not even her husband, Ruy.
    ‘So, you are back working for Walsingham again,’ she said.
    ‘Aye. Not willingly, but there is much work to be done and I could not refuse.’ I grimaced. ‘Secrets and plots and foreign intrigue. I’ve no wish to be involved, but it seems my skills are needed.’
    ‘I am afraid Ruy is becoming ever more entangled in just such affairs. You know that