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  Chapter One ~ 1739

  Lord Lynke was in a vile temper as he stepped ashore at San Sebastian.

  Irritably, he waved aside the suggestion of the Captain that he should hire a coach until his own was disembarked and strode off alone in search of the inn, which he was already convinced in his mind would be quite insupportable.

  The ground seemed to be heaving and rocking beneath his feet, which was not surprising after the tempest that they had encountered in the Bay of Biscay. Lord Lynke himself had not been unduly perturbed by the storm. He was an excellent sailor and believed firmly that the most queasy stomach could be settled by a glass of the best cognac.

  This belief was, however, of little comfort to his staff, who either were not able to obtain the best cognac or found the remedy singularly inefficacious.

  They had been prostrated one by one, while Lord Lynke cursed them for their weakness and even found a certain exciting exhilaration in the fact that the Captain prophesied that another twenty-four hours of such weather would result in the ship being split in two.

  Three days late, but they had reached San Sebastian safely. Safely, that was, as far as the ship and Lord Lynke were concerned. But there were several casualties. Two men had been lost overboard in the storm, one of them his personal servant. His secretary, whom he also counted as a friend, had broken his leg.

  To complete the catastrophes the very day before they sighted the coast of Spain, Lord Lynke’s page had had an accident. He had been an incredible nuisance during the whole voyage and he had fallen from the rigging, which he had been forbidden to climb, and fractured his skull. He was lying now in a darkened cabin and arrangements were being made to carry him, with his Lordship’s secretary, back on the return journey.

  “The Devil take the lot of them!” Lord Lynke muttered as he strode down the roughly cobbled street, ignoring the glances of admiration and astonishment he was being watched with by the native population.

  There was no doubt that he was an exceedingly fine figure of a man in his full-skirted velvet coat and long gold-threaded brocade waistcoat. His lace cravat and powdered hair caught back with a black ribbon were in pleasing contrast to his handsome sunburnt face. His sword hilt, appearing through the side pleats of his coat, glittered golden in the sunshine.

  A woman leaning from a window shouted a word of greeting and, when he did not answer her, cried aloud that her heart was broken. There was a little ripple of laughter from the passers-by.

  Hugo Lynke hardly heard them.

  He was deep in his own thoughts and blinded by rage at the circumstances that had made things so difficult for him.

  It was bad enough, he thought, to be in this accursed country, let alone without the comforts and companionship he believed he was entitled to.

  He strode away from the quay up a long narrow street that led towards the town. The spring sun, warm and golden, seemed to bring out the colour of the old bricks, the mellowed roofs, the gay glimpses of colour that could be seen through the barred windows.

  The sky above was blue and even the puddles in the street seemed to take on something of the hue of the Madonna’s robe.

  The road was still heaving a little beneath Lord Lynke’s feet. The sea had been worse than he had ever remembered it in the whole of his life and yet there was some satisfaction in knowing that he had experienced it and survived unscathed.

  He remembered the accident that had deprived him of Anthony Clayton, his secretary, and cursed. The journey was going to be a dead bore without anyone he could confide in.

  What was more, he was going to cut a pretty poor figure at the Court of Madrid, arriving unattended save for his coachmen, grooms and only a partially trained valet. He had thought to cut a dash with his coach, his horses, his secretary acting the part of an aide-de-camp and his titled page.

  He cursed again at the thought of it. Little Roderick Lane was a Baronet besides being an extremely intelligent boy. It had been, Lord Lynke thought, a stroke of genius to bring him on this trip.

  It had been difficult to persuade his mother to permit Roderick to leave Eton, where he had already gained a name for himself as being exceptionally clever. Lord Lynke had had several talks with him and decided that he was just the type of lad he wanted for a page, but there was more to it than that.

  Roderick could speak Spanish.

  Lord Lynke had confided his ideas only to Anthony Clayton.

  “You and I can speak the lingo passably well, Tony,” he had said. “That is to be expected. And anyhow everyone will be very careful in front of us. But a page is someone they will take at face value, an unintelligent English boy, chosen for his parentage. They will never for a moment suspect that he understands their language. At any rate the servants will talk freely in front of him.”

  “You are taking this whole project quite seriously,” Anthony Clayton had said with a smile.

  Lord Lynke had shrugged his shoulders petulantly.

  “What else can I do?” he asked.

  No, indeed, he thought now as he walked scowling in the sunlight. There was nothing else for him to do but accept the unavoidable.

  An old donkey, heavily laden, came unexpectedly round a corner. Its burden was so large that Lord Lynke was forced to step from the roadway onto the narrow stone pavement. As he did so, from the other corner of the street a small figure collided with him with all the force of a cannonball. Though the culprit was small the impact was violent and quite painful.

  “Socorro, señor! Socorro!” a shrill frightened voice cried.

  For a moment two dirty hands clung to his blue velvet coat, and then, with incredible speed, the boy, for Lord Lynke could see now that it was a small dirty boy, stepped behind him as if for protection, as round the corner there appeared an angry man brandishing a stick.

  “Come here, you spawn of the Devil,” the man cried in Spanish. “Don’t think you can escape me this time. I swear I’ll give you a beating that will break every bone in your demon-infested body!”

  The man spoke with a vehemence that seemed to make every word infinitely menacing. He was an ugly customer and there was no doubt from the way he brandished his stick that he meant every word he said.

  Lord Lynke felt two hands tugging at his coat-tails.

  “Socorro, señor! Socorro!”

  He was about to shake himself free, thinking that this was none of his business and he did not in the least wish to be implicated in a local brawl, when the man brandishing the stick said impatiently,

  “Out of my way, señor!”

  This was an insult that Lord Lynke was not prepared to tolerate.

  “Are you speaking to me, my good man?” he said in somewhat scholarly Spanish.

  “Who else, señor?” the man replied insolently. “That there accursed urchin sheltering behind you deserves a thrashing and, Mother of God, he’s going to have it.”

  He advanced a step nearer while Lord Lynke stood gazing at him. They were of the same height and their eyes met, one pair dark and smouldering with anger, the other cool, grey and unexpectedly steel-like.

  The silence was broken by the Spaniard.

  “The boy is a thief and a liar,” he roared. “I pay him money to clean the back of my shop. He wastes his time and steals from me.”

  “It’s not true,” a little voice came from behind Lord Lynke. “I stole nothing. I only ate an apple that he had thrown away. It was too rotten to sell.”

  “Pah! He spews up lies,” the Spaniard said disgustedly. “He would twist the Gospels themselves. My stick will teach him the truth.”

  He made a movement as if to dive behind Lord Lynke and snatch the boy sheltering there, but a quick twist of his lordship’s body prevented him.

  Hugo Lynke did n
ot know why he had become the champion of the dirty child clinging to his coat.

  He only knew that he disliked the attitude of the blustering man facing him. He had always detested bullies and the Spaniard was undoubtedly nothing more or less than a bully of the first water.

  He put his hand in his pocket.

  “Aguarde un momento,” he said. “This has gone far enough. I will pay for what the boy has stolen. How much is it?”

  The man’s eyes glinted greedily at the sight of coins.

  “At least five pesetas’ worth of goods, señor. But the time he has wasted will come to far more.”

  “I will pay you merely for the goods that he has stolen,” Lord Lynke said slowly. “And you are not to beat him, not today at any rate.”

  He selected a coin carefully from those that lay on his palm as the Spaniard watched him curiously.

  “And why should you do this, señor? What should it matter to you if the boy is beaten today or tomorrow?”

  “It does not matter, I suppose,” Lord Lynke answered. “Say that I am English and I do not care for cruelty either to children or animals.”

  He flicked a five peseta piece into the air as he spoke. It spun for a moment in the sunshine and fell into the gutter. The man bent down to grovel for it.

  Lord Lynke walked on. He had gone quite a number of steps before he heard a voice behind him say,

  “Thank you, sir! Thank you very much!”

  He spun round in astonishment. The words had been spoken in English.

  He found himself looking at the small, incredibly dirty boy. His feet were bare, his clothes were nothing but rags and his hands and face appeared to be black with soot.

  “I am exceedingly grateful, sir,” the boy said in a quiet cultured voice.

  His face was thin almost to emaciation, the bones standing out sharp and clear as if the skin was stretched taut across them. It was difficult to see his features for dirt. But one thing at any rate was astonishing. The eyes looking up at Lord Lynke were blue, deep blue, as blue as the sea he had just left behind.

  “Who are you?”

  “My name, sir, is – Venturo.”

  “Then how do you speak English?”

  “My father was a Scotsman.”

  “Was?” Lord Lynke queried. “He is dead?”

  “Yes, sir, he is dead.”

  “And your mother, I suppose, was Spanish?”

  That is right, sir.”

  “A nice combination. It is understandable now why you should speak two languages.”

  Lord Lynke felt in his pocket again and produced a slightly larger coin than the one that he had given to the bullying Spaniard.

  “Here, boy. Buy yourself something to eat. And next time you steal don’t get caught.”

  He held out the coin and a thin, incredibly slender hand came out to take it.

  Lord Lynke, who was just about to turn away, then put yet another question.

  “Your father, he was a seafaring man I suppose?”

  He had visions as he spoke of the smiles on the sailors’ faces as the ship had finally reached the Port. He knew that they were thinking of what they would find ashore. Wine and women – and after a long voyage the women were inevitably the most necessary.

  He wondered if this wretched boy was the result of some gay evening ashore. Then he heard the boy’s answer.

  “No, sir, my father was a gentleman.”

  It was such a surprising reply that Hugo Lynke found himself staring at the boy not only in. astonishment but with curiosity.

  The child, for he was nothing more, put up his hand, wiped his face and brushed back the hair that was flopping over his forehead, still damp from the urgency of his dash for safety.

  ‘Yes,’ Lord Lynke thought, ‘the boy was probably telling the truth. There was, indeed, evidence of breeding in that well-shaped brow as well as in his long thin fingers and the proud carriage of his head.’

  “Who was your father?” he asked.

  The boy’s eyes flickered and looked away from him.

  “He was a follower of England’s rightful king, sir.”

  “A Jacobite!” Lord Lynke ejaculated.

  This, of course, accounted for it. The man would have been one of the followers of the Old Pretender, one of the many Scots who were exiled eighteen years ago after the attempted rebellion of 1719, when the Spanish ships landed three hundred soldiers near Kintail in Ross-shire. He remembered hearing about it when he was a boy and people still talked of how the Spaniards had brought arms for two thousand and captured Doran Castle.

  This child’s father would have been just about the right age to have taken part in that ill-fated attempt to put James Stuart on the Throne of Britain.

  “You say your father is dead?” he said aloud.

  “Yes, sir. He died three years ago.”

  “Your mother?”

  “She is also dead. Six months ago she was knocked down by a coach and died from the injuries she received.”

  The deep blue eyes clouded and just for a moment there was a suspicion of tears in them. Then with an effort, as if the boy told himself that he must be a man and not show his emotion, his chin went up and he added,

  “Now they are together in Heaven.”

  “Let us hope so,” Lord Lynke said solemnly. “And what are you doing?”

  “I am looking after myself,” the boy replied.

  “Not very successfully it seems,” Lord Lynke remarked. He glanced down the road where the Spaniard had disappeared from sight. “If you take my advice, you will look for another job.”

  “I shall do that, sir,” the boy replied.

  “Well, the best of luck to you,” Lord Lynke smiled.

  He felt in his waistcoat pocket for a gold piece. It was the least he could do, he thought, for the son of a countryman. And even as he took it from his pocket a sudden thought came to him.

  It was such an outrageous idea that for a moment he could hardly bring himself to put it into words. Yet the more he thought about it, the more it made sense.

  Here was a boy who could speak both Spanish and English. His Spanish was certainly better than that of poor Roderick Lane, lying aboard The Sea Hawk, while his English, and doubtless his manners, would be inferior. Yet the result was about equal and the most important thing was that he was in need of a page.

  He put the gold piece back in his pocket.

  “Listen,” he said. “I believe I could offer you a job. Would you come with me to Madrid?”

  “What as?”

  The question was asked coolly and contemplatively with none of the excitement or enthusiasm that Lord Lynke had expected from such a suggestion.

  Deliberately he pretended to be in doubt and made a little gesture with his hand.

  “I have no idea,” he said. “Perhaps as scullion to my chef, when I engage one, perhaps as a stable boy. Would either of those situations appeal to you?”

  There was irony in his voice, thinking, as he spoke, that there was something amusing in the fact that he should be offering a position to this ragged urchin and that the boy apparently wished it clearly defined before he accepted.

  There was a little bow from the dark head, then Venturo’s chin went up even higher than before.

  “I thank you, sir, for your kind suggestion, but I do not wait on servants.”

  It was said with so much pride and so much dignity that instinctively, but with difficulty, Lord Lynke repressed the laughter that rose to his lips.

  “I understand,” he said courteously. “And I regret I made such a mistake. The position I am offering you is that of my page.”

  Even as he said it he thought that he must be mad. And yet quickly came the thought to his mind that if the boy was hopeless he could sack him long before he reached Madrid.

  “Your personal page?”

  The small insistent voice intruded on his thoughts.

  “My personal page,” he repeated.

  “In which case, sir, I am
delighted to accept your kind offer.”

  Lord Lynke stared down at the child and then he said abruptly,

  “Your duties commence immediately. Show me the way to the best inn. There is one I suppose?”

  “El Gallo de Oro is the best, sir, and you will find it just at the end of the street. Before I come to you, will you permit me to make my farewells to my friends and to – tidy myself?”

  “‘Clean’ is the right word,” Lord Lynke corrected him.

  “I know, sir. The man I worked for insisted that I should scrape out his furnaces every morning. It was dirty work, but, although you may not believe it, I did what he told me.”

  “You certainly look as if you tried,” Lord Lynke said. “Very well. Go along and make your farewells. You can meet me at the inn in an hour’s time.”

  He turned to go, but again he was delayed.

  “I regret to trouble you, sir. But there are two things I must say. First, as your page I shall need suitable clothes. Secondly, may I know your name?”

  Lord Lynke smiled.

  “Intensely practical I see. We should deal well together. With regard to clothes, you can instruct the best tailor in the town to attend me at the inn at the same time as you yourself meet me there. But so that you shall not be ashamed, buy yourself something to wear until he can fit you up.”

  Two gold coins passed from hand to hand.

  “And now, as regards my name,” he went on. “It is Lynke – Lord Lynke of Hatharton Castle in Sussex.”

  The boy bowed.

  “I thank you, my Lord. I will attend you in an hour’s time.”

  There was a flash as if a piece of quicksilver sped across the street and then Lord Lynke found himself alone except for the curious eyes of passers-by and those who were eternally watching from behind their windowpanes.

  He stood for a moment irresolute and then shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Either I have lost a couple of the best,’ he said to himself, ‘or I have found myself a new page.’

  The boy was obviously of gentle birth. He would undoubtedly be in need of training, but what an opportunity to find out skills which otherwise would remain secret!

  If he was clever enough to act the part of an English boy and to conceal from everyone the fact that he could speak Spanish, there was so much that might be learned and so much that might be discovered.