Read The Irish Princess Online
Authors: Karen Harper
Tags: #Ireland, #Clinton, #Historical, #Henry, #Edward Fiennes De, #General, #Literary, #Great Britain - History - Henry VIII, #Great Britain, #Elizabeth Fiennes De, #Historical Fiction, #Princesses, #Fiction, #1509-1547, #Princesses - Ireland, #Elizabeth
The Irish Princess (44 page)
I pushed the past away and ran to the leeward rail. Our ship had cut the
Gerfalcon
off, taken its crew by surprise as they tried to slink into the harbor with their booty—yes, towing the bare-masted prize of a French merchantman behind them. That, I wanted too. If I took Frobisher, his booty was mine by queen’s command and Lord High Admiral’s prerogative.
Gerfalcon
off, taken its crew by surprise as they tried to slink into the harbor with their booty—yes, towing the bare-masted prize of a French merchantman behind them. That, I wanted too. If I took Frobisher, his booty was mine by queen’s command and Lord High Admiral’s prerogative.
I had told Haverhill to use no deceptions, no promises of pardons or counterfeit invitations to a parley. Use the truth, lay it on the line, then fight if one must—that had always been my privy motto, for I’d seen the horror and havoc that deceits and lies could breed. So he used his voice trumpet, his tinny words echoing over the human hubbub from both vessels.
“Halt and be boarded! In the name of the queen of England and Lord Admiral, stow sail and be boarded or be damned by firepower!”
They began to slow; unless tricks or treachery were in store, they were ours now. Frobisher’s crew no doubt carried small firearms, but why should he order them to fight? He’d been to prison twice for privateering and had been merely fined and soon released. No Execution Dock at Wapping for him, for the queen knew raw talent and courage when she saw it, lowborn or highbred. It was what had saved me more than once.
The
Defiance
thudded into the privateer’s hull; our men grappled it to us with hooks and ropes. The Lord High Admiral’s armed sailors clung to the shrouds and lined the deck for boarding the captured vessel. I was suddenly reminded of the river festival Edward had presented on the Thames for the young king, and I told myself to be careful I did not fall in.
Defiance
thudded into the privateer’s hull; our men grappled it to us with hooks and ropes. The Lord High Admiral’s armed sailors clung to the shrouds and lined the deck for boarding the captured vessel. I was suddenly reminded of the river festival Edward had presented on the Thames for the young king, and I told myself to be careful I did not fall in.
On both English ships, canvas flapped like cannon shots as men shortened sail. The mainsail directly over my head rattled and thundered as it sheeted home. Only then did Master Haverhill say to me, with a little bow, “If you’ll wait right here, milady, I’ll have Frobisher disarmed, bound, and brought to you.”
“I will give him a chance to surrender first,” I told him. “I’ve seen too many fine fighting men bound and shamed. I came not only to capture the privateer, but to board it.” Holding to a rope with my free hand, I climbed lithely over both rails to the
Gerfalcon
’s main deck. It was easier than mounting an Irish palfrey.
Gerfalcon
’s main deck. It was easier than mounting an Irish palfrey.
Frobisher looked exactly as he’d been described to me, brawny and a bit wild. With size, swagger, and stance, he dominated the men around him. At least he’d had the sense to sheathe his sword, and I saw he and his crew had put their pistols on the deck.
“You! You, here?” He gasped and pointed rudely as I faced him down, hands on my hips. He glared at me. When I did not so much as blink—such disarming stares from the queen oft made someone blurt out his guilt—he plunged on: “Oh, for a moment, I thought it was the queen herself, but I know who you are. Had it not been an admiralty ship, I would have fought to the last man,” he boasted, crossing his arms over his chest and rocking back cockily on his heels.
“You are an unlicensed privateer and freebooter, Master Martin Frobisher,” I accused in my strongest voice, intentionally not addressing him as captain. “After being twice warned by the crown to cease and desist, you are yet causing discord with the sovereign nation of France, which endangers English royal policy. I arrest you in the name of the Lord High Admiral, the council, and the queen.”
“I have papers—a license—a commission to capture French prizes,” he protested. “The Frenchies are the ones up to no good, not me.”
“I expected you to cobble up an excuse. A license signed by whom?” I demanded, my dander up now at his thinking he could hoodwink a woman—although one who had forged a paper of her own but yesterday. “Your blackguard first mate? A tosspot in a tavern? Some poor doxy from the Plymouth stews?” I shouted.
“In faith, you’re wide of the mark. ’Tis a pass signed by a Huguenot leader,” he blustered, knowing full well, I warrant, that he had not one sea leg to stand on.
“Didn’t you learn your lesson from being captured and imprisoned twice before?” I goaded. I could tell he wanted to insult me in return. At least now that Elizabeth ruled England, no one dared say—to my face, at least—that I was but a feeble female, a fallen Fitzgerald, or an untamed shrew. I was full thirty-six years of age and had swallowed a bellyful of such taunts, though I reckon my fair face and fair sex had saved me once or twice.
“Martin Frobisher, you are my prisoner, and your ship and the captured merchantman are forfeit,” I declared as my ship’s crew cheered and whistled as if I’d doubled their wages.
“You’re all privateers too!” Frobisher railed as our men seized him. His face went red as a Kildare pippin; veins stood out on his temple, and spittle flecked his lips. I’d been warned he had a temper by someone who had never seen an Irish temper. “Poxy legal privateers you are, too, that’s all!” he ranted. “You and the queen, peas in a pod, two clever, flame-haired freebooters; I don’t give a fig if you wear masculine garb and sport a pistol today! Unwomanly, brash, and brazen, both of you—and you an Irish wench at that, and they’re pirates to the core and—”
“I shall be certain,” I outshouted him, “to tell Her Majesty that she has been wrong—wrong to not send you to Execution Dock instead of England’s jails, which you all too soon buy or bribe your way out of, you flap-mouth, base-court cur!”
I slapped his face and boxed his ears. He tried to kick at me, but two of our men pulled him back. When I nodded, they dragged him toward our vessel to be kept secured. A moment of shocked silence followed from both crews. I stood stunned too. I had actually arrested and struck a man who had defied Tudor might, for doing the very thing that had been my passion for years.
“Now, won’t that be something to tell the Lord High Admiral when he returns from Scotland!” Haverhill broke the silence. With a gap-toothed grin, he displayed a bottle of wine and a bolt of cloth. As his men hustled back to work, securing our captured vessel and its crew, he made a little bow. He flapped open and draped a length of robin’s-egg blue velvet over my shoulders like a royal robe.
“I take it your men have already surveyed Frobisher’s booty in the hold of my formerly French ship?” I asked. With a flourish, I flung the end of the velvet up and around my shoulders. At the very least, it was a heady feeling to win for once, to be the one giving instead of taking orders.
“Silks too,” he assured me, “and ginger and nutmeg, by the smell of the hold, milady. Crates of wine, not even in barrels, all of it in glass bottles, can you believe? And it’s all yours, since you stand today in the stead of the Lord High Admiral for his rightful perquisites and in high favor with the queen—so’s I hear, that is.”
“You heard true, Captain, but one never knows which way the wind blows with Her Majesty. That bottle and more are yours, for your fine service, but not until we have all three ships safely in the Thames. The queen, of course, must have Frobisher’s privateer ship for her navy. His crew you may release later, if they are willing to sign onto legally licensed vessels, but the captured French one is mine.”
I didn’t say so, but much of the wine and the sumptuous French fabrics was not destined for London but for Ireland, or at least the profits from their sales were. And my ship, the captured French prize, I would rename the
Pride of Kildare
, and sail her home with Edward someday soon.
Pride of Kildare
, and sail her home with Edward someday soon.
May 6, 1559
When I had sailed away from Ireland twenty-four years ago, I had met Edward Clinton on the ship. And today, going home, I stood shoulder-to-shoulder with him, steering my own ship, the
Pride of Kildare.
We were laden with money and goods to help rebuild Maynooth and help the Irish recover from years of persecution. I was laden, as Surrey had once put it,
In ship, freight with remembrance. Of thoughts and pleasures past . . .
And of so much grief and pain. But not today. Today was just for joy.
Pride of Kildare.
We were laden with money and goods to help rebuild Maynooth and help the Irish recover from years of persecution. I was laden, as Surrey had once put it,
In ship, freight with remembrance. Of thoughts and pleasures past . . .
And of so much grief and pain. But not today. Today was just for joy.
Our puppy, Erin, was full-grown now, pacing on deck as if she were excited to be back too. Alice and Margaret had come along, but they were still belowdecks. Dawn was barely breaking, and we’d made better time than we’d expected. Though I’d gone to bed for a few hours, I had hardly slept at all. Now Edward moved to stand behind me, his hands over mine on the spokes of the great wheel as we guided the ship together into the crowded harbor.
“Do not think,” he whispered in my ear, “that your punishment for forging my name on that admiralty document is over.”
“Punishment, my lord? You call my being at your beck and call in our bed punishment? In that case, I shall board and capture many more ships.”
“Hell’s gates, Irish, that’s exactly what worries me. At least Her Majesty was happy enough to have Frobisher locked up again and to be given his privateer for our fledgling navy. Thank heavens she’s a Tudor who prefers peace to war.”
“Her Grace is so besotted with Robert Dudley’s deceitful, seductive courting of her, she would be happy with anything. But she’s in for a fall, Edward; I know she is, and I’ve told her so.”
“You said she mentioned to you more than once she would never wed, but she needs the adoration from him.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Then since she hearkens yet to you, best you not get in arguments with her—or me. Master Haverhill, come and cozy us up to the wharf!” he called out. “I’d best arm myself lest more wild Irish come on board and take me prisoner as this one has.”
“Aye, Admiral,” he said with a grin so wide it nearly split his face in half. “And aye-aye, Cap’n Lady Clinton.”
I ignored their chuckles and leaned on the rail to take in the view. Erin leaned against my legs, but I only patted her head, for she was too big for me to pick up anymore. Amidst the larger ships like ours, I watched the darting cockle boats and even fisherfolk in a little
namhóag.
I saw where the River Liffey poured in, fed by Kildare’s own River Lyreen that had been Magheen’s and my road to freedom the day we fled. Right up that stream was Uncle James’s Leixlip Castle. Amidst the rooftops of Dublin town, I spotted the hulking Kilmainham Castle, where Uncle Leonard had betrayed the Geraldines and I had first met Alice.
namhóag.
I saw where the River Liffey poured in, fed by Kildare’s own River Lyreen that had been Magheen’s and my road to freedom the day we fled. Right up that stream was Uncle James’s Leixlip Castle. Amidst the rooftops of Dublin town, I spotted the hulking Kilmainham Castle, where Uncle Leonard had betrayed the Geraldines and I had first met Alice.
That very morn we oversaw the packing of the carts we’d hired, piled high with furnishings and foodstuffs for Maynooth Castle and the village. We took guards with us, since we carried a goodly amount of coin for rebuilding the castle and Fitzgerald power. At last, ahorse with the carts rumbling behind us until they fell farther and farther back, we set out for Kildare.
I was drunk with all I saw. Glimpses of golden dandelions and marsh marigold in the wet spring meadows so green—a thousand shades of Irish green. The familiar frogs I’d never heard the like of since I’d left croaked from ditches. Little leprechauns, Magheen used to call them. I could not wait to see her again, and Collum too.
Late that afternoon, as we neared the old Fitzgerald town of Maynooth, rebuilt from its burning, people came out upon the roads to greet us. A young colleen, about my age when I left, curtsied and extended to me a makeshift bouquet of shamrocks and bluebells, no doubt fresh-picked from the woodland floor. She was nervous in her little speech of welcome, but it was so good to hear the Irish brogue about me everywhere again. I dismounted and hugged her, walking my horse the last half mile—Edward did the like—smiling and waving at the greetings and cheers of those who lined our way as if I were the queen of England herself. Or better yet, an Irish princess.
Then someone began the chant, the very one I’d called out for my family on their way to execution, the very one I’d shouted on the day Gerald came back from Europe, the cry of my heart. For those few moments, as much as I loved and treasured my husband, I was not a Clinton but a Fitzgerald again.
“A Geraldine! A Geraldine! A Geraldine!” the people cried, as Erin barked in unison as if she knew the chant.
Through my smiles, I burst into tears, and Edward put his arm around me.
But where was the tall tower of Maynooth? As we walked arm in arm, I tried to catch a glimpse of it through the spring beech forest.
There it was! Tall and proud despite its wounds from cannonballs, sturdy and solid with Fitzgerald banners flapping from its parapets.
I handed Edward my bouquet, dropped my reins, and began to run. Erin loped along easily beside me, just as Wynne used to do. Margaret appeared from back in our entourage, laughing, barefooted like we once ran in the springs and summers of our youth before everything went so wrong. I kicked off both shoes and started up the lawn with her beside me.
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