The Hooded Hawke Read Online Free PDF

warrant you’ve heard the rest,” he said, his voice now harsher, faster. “Deceit, betrayal. The local governor, Enriquez, had signed a pact he would let us leave peaceably. But he began to fire on us from the shore as their fleet closed in for a kill, like—like huge hawks swooping down on pigeons already caught in a trap and disabled,” he said with broad gestures. “But, even when they sent fire ships against us—”
    “Fire ships? They burned some of their own ships and sent them against ours?”
    “Yes. Even then, Your Majesty, our smaller ships maneuvered better, but we were battered. So many were maimed or killed. I commanded the Judith and, after six hours in battle, saw the opportunity to escape and did—to save those of my crewmen who were still alive, to hope to fight another day, for I thought all else was lost, that my cousin was lost. I had no idea he’d managed to fight his way free and would be looking for me to back him up—or would have a hellish voyage home. Or that,” he said, and heaved a huge sigh that hoisted his shoulders, “he would blame me for deserting him in his direst hour of need.”

    They sat silent for a moment. Somewhere outside in the darkness an owl called, who, whooo .
    “I fear my cousin hates me now,” Drake admitted, turning to look at her again. “Yet he needs me, for I know those distant waters and how treacherous the Spanish can be. And I hate them as he does—it burns deep in my belly and my soul!”
    “In mine as well. Which is why you must, if not put that dreadful past incident aside, learn from it. We must both learn from it. Our smaller, darting ships in the face of their lumbering galleons, the use of fire ships, and the brave tenacity of our men even when treachery strikes are lessons we must hold to. You see, Captain Drake, you and I are much alike.”
    “Indeed, Your Majesty?” he asked, sitting up straight as a board in his padded chair.
    “We both have learned things the hard way, through our losses, and it has made us wiser and stronger,” she declared, rhythmically hitting both fists on the arms of her chair. “And we both must deal with cousins who hate us and might wish to make us suffer—or even die.”
    “Yes,” he whispered, “by my faith, that’s true. But as that owl out the window is asking again, if someone meant that arrow for one of our hearts today, who? Who?”
    W illiam Cecil wished he could look as rested and ready as his favorite messenger, Justin Keenan, who rode abreast of him as they reached the vast grounds of Loseley House near noon. They trailed four guards and four scriveners. Only Keenan seemed to look about with relish, while Cecil felt crazed to get off this horse. He supposed a professional courier who rode so much and so well would have to find the passing scenery of some interest, or he’d go stark mad with all the time he spent in the saddle.
    A good courier covered about fourteen miles per hour, and with post horses every ten miles, the man could almost fly. Then, too, if a courier could claim he was on royal business, he
could commandeer horses along the way as long as they were later returned by a postboy. Keenan, however, often favored pulling one horse and riding the other to make tracks between Cecil and the queen.
    No wonder the man did not seem to have a care in the world. Mere couriers did not have to live day and night with the fear something would happen to England’s monarch, nor did the man have to deal with that carping, complaining Spanish ambassador, Guerau de Spes.
    “Will you convince Her Majesty to return to the safety of one of her own castles or palaces, then, my lord?” Keenan asked as their horses’ hooves spit gravel on the lane to Loseley House.
    Usually, the man never spoke unless spoken to, another admirable trait in servants. Keenan was mature, at least thirty, with years of experience in the livery of one earl or another until last year, when he’d come into Cecil’s employ.