Betrayal (7 page)

“The lady was as stiff and white as paper—perhaps the Captain held her under an enchantment—” he mused.

“Masou!” I said. “This isn’t the time for your romantic nonsense!”

He looked embarrassed. “I heard her asking him about Olwen and whether she was safe,” he remembered.

Aha! I thought. That explains why Sarah didn’t struggle or call out directly for help when Drake was putting her into the boat. He used Olwen’s well-being as ransom. What a cowardly bully.

As quickly as I could I told Masou what I was going to do. “But I shall need to go in disguise—as a boy—if I am not to attract attention,” I explained. “So I shall need a boy’s clothes. Is there anyone’s I could borrow?”

Masou thought a bit, then his eyes lit up and he nodded. “French Louis’s son has a new outfit, and he is a beanplant like you. We should find his old apparel in the tiring chamber.”

We crept off to where the acrobats change before a performance, a little room off the Great Hall. The clothes were old and worn and quite smelly, but I nipped into a closet, took off my kirtle and smock, and put on the shirt and hose. I came out pulling on the doublet and leather jerkin, then I put my eating knife on the belt. I thought I looked very well indeed.

But Masou sighed as he looked at me, and then he
brought out a pair of shears. I flinched and he tutted. “Did you ever see a boy with locks as long as yours?” he asked.

I flushed. He was right, of course, but—cut my hair? I wasn’t sure if I dared. Mrs. Champernowne would have a fit if she found out—several fits!

“Come, it will grow again,” Masou reassured me, and without more ado he cut it all to one short length.

I couldn’t believe it was all gone—just like that! It felt very peculiar indeed, but as my mousy brown hair was hardly my crowning glory, I found I didn’t mind so much. And I could always use a hairpiece to hide the damage later, I thought.

Masou then found me a blue woollen cap, helped me to put it on the right way, and showed me my reflection in the big mirror with the crack in it that the acrobats use.

I gasped. With my short hair and my flat-as-a-pancake chest (
when
will I start growing outwards as well as up?) I made a very believable boy. Not far off handsome, in fact. I did a bow—not very good.

Masou sighed. Then he took down two cloaks from a rail. “I am coming with you,” he announced.

“But Mr. Somers might beat you if he finds out!” I argued. “You don’t have to come.”

“Of course I do,” snorted Masou. “What do you know of being a boy? Nothing. And if
you
are found out, there will be a most dreadful scandal.” He shook his head. “Walk over there.”

I did and he sighed again. “Stride, swagger!” he instructed. “Don’t smile. And stare straight at people.”

I walked up and down trying to swagger. It felt very odd to have so much air around my legs, and yet cloth chafing between.

“Not bad,” Masou admitted. “When you talk to anyone, remember to say ‘sir’ or you’ll be buffeted.”

I heard the clock chime one, and worried that Drake might soon have readied his ship to go to sea. “Come on, Masou,” I urged, “we must hurry!”

We flitted through the back passages of Greenwich, past the bakery and the dairy and the little laundry—where Mrs. Fadget was screaming at some very tired-looking laundrywomen—and down to the kitchen steps.

Masou shouted, “Oars! Oars!”

At last a boat drew up and I looked nervously at it, waiting for the waterman to help me board.

“What are you waiting for?” Masou dug me with his elbow. “Jump in!”

Of course, boys don’t get helped, so I gulped and jumped and managed to keep my balance. In fact, it was easier because I hadn’t any petticoats or stays.

Masou followed me, stepping aboard lightly.

“Tilbury,” I said to the man. “And as fast as you can.”

“Won’t make no difference,” said the waterman. “Tide’s still against us.”

“But it’s an urgent message for Captain Drake from the Queen,” I told him desperately.

“You’d better help row then, lad,” the waterman replied bluntly.

Masou showed me the spare pair of oars and fitted them in the little metal things on either side of the boat. He took one himself and started dipping it into the water. I tried to copy him but the oar kept popping out when I wasn’t expecting it and making me fall backwards. It was very annoying and frustrating, and made the waterman laugh and shake his head.

“Clumsy, ain’t you?” he remarked.

It seemed to take ages to get to Tilbury and I was puffing long before then.

“What’s wrong with your mate?” grunted the waterman to Masou. “He sick, then?”

“No, he’s just outgrown his strength,” replied Masou with a grin. “Look what a beanpole he is.”

“Humph,” was all I could manage.

We rowed and rowed and at last we came to the Tilbury watersteps. They must have tidied up for the Queen for it looked messier than I remembered it, and even more muddy. I paid the waterman, and then Masou made me go behind some barrels and arrange my purse in my crotch! Under my codpiece! He said I had to or it would be stolen the first time I blinked. He turned away while I did it and I heard spattering.

“You’d best go, too,” he said, gesturing.

And that was when I realized what was going to be the biggest problem of all: how on earth could I make water? It’s never a problem usually: either there’s a chamber pot to use or, if we are on progress or out hunting, I just find a quiet grassy spot and my farthingale hides me. But now I wore hose, and a codpiece between my legs that unlaced at the front—only that wouldn’t do
me
any good!

“Um … Masou …,” I said, wondering if Lady Sarah was worth this humiliation, “um … how …?”

“Undo all the laces except the back ones and then squat,” Masou instructed. “And try and do it where nobody sees.” He shook his head and tutted.

So I did just that behind a big barrel—and found it very strange and draughty.

As we hurried along the docks, Masou tried to teach me to whistle. I had never realized there were so many things you had to know to be a boy.

“And by the way,” he asked, “what is your name going to be?”

Another thing I hadn’t thought of. I could hardly go around calling myself Lady Grace in doublet and hose. “Um … Gregory? It’s a bit like Grace,” I suggested.

“Right,
Gregory,
please tell me you have a plan,” said Masou. He was sounding a bit nervous now.

“Of course I have a plan,” I blustered. “We go aboard Captain Drake’s ship, find Lady Sarah, and get her off before it sails. Simple! But we don’t want to meet Captain Drake, because I’m sure he’ll recognize me and then who knows what he’ll do?”

“If he’s rogue enough to kidnap Lady Sarah,” Masou pointed out, “you could end up married to the First Mate or something!”

“Well, we’re not going to see him, and we’re not going to get caught,” I told Masou firmly, feeling a bit annoyed. Now he’d made
me
nervous too!

We passed a ship that was being built in the dry dock. It was swarming with people, full of the sounds of sawing and hammering and shouts. Then we passed the big square pond where we had raced the two model ships. The winches were still there, now being perched upon by seagulls.

We asked everybody we met which was Captain Drake’s ship. One person said it was about to sail. So we rushed to the quayside where he’d pointed. The sailors were in the rigging and there were ropes everywhere, along with the sound of creaking and stamping and a song that sounded like “Oo-ay and up she rises, oo-ay and up she rises …”

I was in a panic to get aboard and rushed up to the pigtailed sailor standing by the gangplank. “We’ve got a message for Captain Drake!” I gasped, forgetting to be nervous. “Let us on the ship!”

“No,” said the sailor. He gave me and Masou a knowing grin.

“Why not? We’ve got to talk to the Captain!” I insisted.

“Well, you won’t find him on this ship,” the sailor said. “This ’ere is the
Silver Arrow
—Hugh Derby, Captain. If you want Captain Drake you need to go to the
Judith
over there.” He pointed at the other two-masted ship in the next quay.

Masou and I hastily stepped back from the gangplank, as the sailors hauled up the anchor. The
Silver Arrow
started moving away from the quay. She was being pulled by ropes attached to smaller rowing boats. There were lots of shouts as one sailor removed the mooring ropes from the big tree trunks at the quayside and then leaped lightly across the gap onto the ship.

“Derby’s in a hurry,” commented a sailor behind us, as he watched the
Silver Arrow
move slowly out into the river. “Where’s he off to? I wonder. He’s too early for the ebb.”

Masou and I shrugged at him, then hurried towards the
Judith
.

We found Drake’s ship still moored to the quay, with sailors swarming round it. Baskets and nets full of loaves of bread were being loaded into the hold, and a boy was handing a package to the sailor guarding the gangplank.

“Package for Captain Drake,” he said.

The sailor took it and nodded. “I’ll see that ’e gets it,” he replied.

The boy left and Masou swaggered up to take his place. I followed, doing my best to swagger as well. “Captain aboard?” Masou asked the sailor.

“Aye, but he’s below.”

Below what? I wondered, but didn’t ask. I just stood there trying to look, well—boyish.

“We got a message for him,” said Masou.

“I’ll give it to ’im,” said the sailor.

“We’ve been told to give it to him personally,” Masou countered.

“Ah, now would you be the boys sent from the steelyard?” the sailor asked.

“Might be,” said Masou, using the opening the sailor had unwittingly given him.

“In that case, you can come aboard and wait in the Great Cabin for him—but mind, no tricks now. Captain’s got a short way with lads what annoy him.” The sailor made a throat-slitting motion and grinned.

Masou salaamed, and I pulled at my cap as I’ve seen the kitchen boys do, then we made our way up the gangplank. I swaggered for all I was worth—and nearly fell off.

“Tell your mate to sober up afore he talks to the Captain!” the sailor shouted at Masou.

Masou looked at me sidelong. I could tell that he was trying not to laugh. “Less sideways, more forwards,” he directed.

“This is so difficult,” I complained, puffing.

“Compared with petticoats?” Masou asked. He did have a point.

We picked our way across the deck between baskets waiting to be stowed and net bags full of cannonballs and barrels. Masou told me that the Great Cabin was located in the sterncastle, at the blunt end of the ship.

I had to duck my head as I passed through a low door into the small room that was called the Great Cabin. I stared around, at the table covered with maps and papers, and the cot in one corner. A sword and a pistol in its case were hung on one wall. The others had half-finished paintings on them; they were quite clumsy, showing what appeared to be a lot of people standing on big round balls and looking out to sea. The solitary window looked out on sailors hammering on the deck. But there was no sign of Lady Sarah. And I had been so sure she would be there!

I crept into the next cabin, which had two cots in it, and the next, which had three cots and three small chests. I couldn’t believe Sarah wasn’t in any of them. Where had he put her?

“Any luck?” Masou whispered to me, from where he was keeping watch at the half-open door.

“No!” I whispered back.

Our hearts beating like mad, we climbed down a ladder to look in the tiny cabins below. But we didn’t find her anywhere. And there was so much more ship to search than I’d expected.

Eventually, Masou shook his head. The sun was starting to go down. “Come on,” he said. “She’s not here—we’ll have to leave.”

“But we haven’t even been into the front half of the ship,” I pointed out. “We at least ought to look.”

We crept like mice along the low space under the main deck, where the crew’s bedrolls were tucked alongside the guns. A little further along we passed a little eating room for the officers, where tables hung from the ceiling. The big sullen-looking boy, who had kept the seagulls away from the feast when we visited the docks with the Queen, was listlessly scrubbing at them. Luckily, he was too busy muttering about the First Mate to notice us.

Then Masou found a ladder that went right down into the belly of the ship. Down here the darkness was full of barrels and hams hanging on beams. It looked like the dirtiest, smokiest kitchen you ever saw—and the smell was awful.

We crept past the barrels and found a fire burning in a brick grate, with a huge copper full of water above it. Benches and stools were set around it as if it were an inn. Masou poked a basket that had loaves of bread in it and I had a sniff at an open barrel where some salt beef seemed to be soaking.

“Oi! You two! What are you doing down here?” A skinny man in a dirty apron jumped down from a ladder. He had a sack over his shoulder. “Get out of it! Stealing food—I’ll ’ave you!” He dropped the sack and started throwing potatoes at us, so Masou and I ran away as fast as we could. Once we had escaped, I gasped indignantly, “Stealing food! That horrible stuff? Why would anyone want to?”

Masou just shook his head and laughed.

We searched on until we reached the pointed front end of the ship, where we found a triangular room filled with folded sails, all marked with chalk symbols. I noticed a bowl on the floor—and then something moved slightly in the shadows. I peered into the darkness and saw a long, curvy shape. My heart leaped with excitement. It had to be Lady Sarah with those famous curves of hers! “She’s here!” I gasped.

Shocked that she’d been tied up there in the dark,
I rushed over to release her. Masou followed, and together we pushed past the huge packages of sails to reach Lady Sarah …

Only it wasn’t. It was just a sail, tied up so it looked like someone rather busty lying down. The movement I’d seen was a little family of cats—a mother and her kittens, nestling in the folds. The mother cat meowed at me and then gave a warning hiss.