Free The Hooded Hawke by Karen Harper Page A

someone else—someone local. Can you not answer a direct question?”
    “Yes, I suppose I, like most others of some means, have Spanish-made bolts or arrows,” Robin admitted, looking most annoyed.
    “Your Grace,” Cecil cut in, “granted the Spanish are a danger, but we have no evidence to tie them to—”
    “Just find where that imported Spanish bowman is and see that he is somehow detained, with or without de Spes’s knowledge, Cecil.”
    “Yes, Your Grace. It is being seen to.”
    “I’d say,” Robin cut in, his voice almost petulant, “you’d best look to someone closer, one not usually part of your entourage. Your fine Captain Drake didn’t come alone to attend Your Majesty, you know. He brought two ship’s crewmen with him, one, I hear, a fine marksman with the bow, good at hanging about in swaying rigging and yet striking true.”
    Trying to cover her surprise, Elizabeth swung around to gape up at him. She almost accused Robin of jealousy. More than once she had suspected that he might stoop to something low to get her trust and affection, so how dare he implicate Francis Drake! Still, she did not know Drake that well, and here she’d included him in her Privy Plot Council—she’d let him interrogate Sheriff Barnstable, for all the good that had done. And, though she’d instinctively trusted Drake from the first, Cecil evidently thought he was a climber and rather rash.
    No,’s blood, she told herself, she was a good judge of character. Even if Drake had let down his cousin and master, John Hawkins, even if he needed her goodwill to build his influence with her, she trusted Drake, at least as much as she did Robin.
    But then, hell’s gates, hadn’t her father long ago taught her to trust no man?

    D espite her worries, the queen’s bright and boisterous welcome to the market town of Farnham raised her spirits. Robert Horne, the Protestant bishop of Winchester, tall, solemn, and thin as a rail, met her at the town boundary and made a lovely speech of welcome before they all set out again. Yet Drake’s armor, chafing and heating her, was a constant reminder of what had happened and possible future danger.
    The castle where they would stay two nights had been built in 1138 by the grandson of William the Conqueror, and she felt today like one indeed. Despite the unsettling events of late, the Queen of England smiled and waved and nodded at her subjects. All along the way, carpets and tablecloths hung from windows; flowers pelted into her path from upper stories of tall buildings that shaded the streets. Cheers and huzzahs oft roared as loud as the sea.
    The twisting River Wey glinted in the sun as the royal progress turned from East Street onto Castle Street. From here they could see the gray-stone castle and its ramparts on the northwest hill overlooking the black-and-white-timbered and thatch-roofed town. Emerging from the tight streets, they were thrust into sunlight again and then into the massive shadow of the walls and castle towering over all.
    The horses strained as they pulled the coach and wagons up toward the massive gatehouse set in thick, stalwart stone walls. Within the main building and its towers lay a grassy inner bailey. It would do well, Elizabeth thought, to tether tents there for the fringe folk and to be a place of refreshment and sporting—including an archery match she meant to stage.
    As the entourage halted and the queen was assisted down from her coach, servants immediately proffered cool goblets of wine to her and her main party. Elizabeth couldn’t wait to get out of her armor and dusty garb; she had a good notion to dump the cool liquid between her breasts, but she sipped it as she scanned the lofty castle battlements. She breathed a sigh of relief. No one could hide behind trees or build a stile on hedges here to shoot a bolt or arrow. Nor would danger lurk in the upper parapets or crenellations where bowmen once stood, for she would order those well guarded and