My mother nodded, but did not smile.
‘You may not be so thankful soon. You have not seen what else I have written for you.’ She pulled the bill back and slid towards me a second paper, which I took and quickly read. It was a bill of sale: one of those crafty instruments by which usury was conducted without sin, so that the business of the City could go on, while keeping itself free from the Church courts. By this bill, I acknowledged the receipt of a thousand marks, and sold to her in return a twelve hundred mark chunk of my business. At the bottom was the space for me to sign. Twenty per cent interest to my mother, that was the meaning of it: only after that would I make a profit. It was a steep rate. She had made not a single concession to the fact I was her son. She was investing in a venture, that was all: and a venture in which she had very little trust. Anger rose up in me as I set the paper down. I had prepared myself for her refusal, but not this. In a single move she was both helping me and throwing up another barrier in my way.
‘You are right,’ I told her. ‘I am feeling a good deal less thankful already.’
She sat back in her chair, stroking the polished wooden knob of the seal, her face wearing a faint smile.
‘Having second thoughts?’ she said.
I reached for one of the goosefeather pens that stood in the pewter inkpot, and tapped off the excess ink.
‘By God, no.’
‘Wait!’ She put the seal down and leant towards me. ‘Dear Richard. You are taking a very great risk. And you are asking me to share in that risk too. Would it not be far, far better to stay with me? Work for the family business? Go where I advise, with our dear, trusted old Mr William to look after you? Build yourself up little by little: that is the best way in trade. You cannot swallow the whole world in one bite, my Richard. Why do you want to strike out fresh paths of your own, when there is so much for you here?’
Her voice was soft and seductive. Before her on the table lay the two documents: one threatening me with its brutal terms of repayment; the other, I suspected, intended to daunt me with the sheer size of the loan. I saw plainly what she was up to. If I embarked on my venture and succeeded, she made a handsome profit; the thought of those two hundred marks doubtless attracted her. If I failed, I would be in her debt, and entirely in her power. I would have to work for years to pay off what I owed her, travelling where she sent me, and buying what she told me to buy. She would be able to remind me forever after that she had been right and I had been wrong. I would become her creature, a humble minion of the house of Dansey. Even if she never saw her money again, power like that was cheaply bought at a thousand marks. There would be no question of my ever affording another venture on my own.
That was if I failed. But to succeed: to be my own man, to escape the Thameswater stink, the murky family world that had become a prison to me, and rise into a sphere my mother could not guess at, that was worth any risk.
The ink on the pen tip had gone dry. I forced myself not to show my rage. I said, ‘Do you have any other conditions to add before I sign?’
She rapped the seal on the table, suddenly irritated.
‘Only that you take along a family servant, whom I shall pick for you. I would not like to think of you entirely alone on your wild errand. That is acceptable?’
‘Very well.’
I dipped the pen once more in the pot, angrily splashing ink on its pewter rim. ‘You will have your twelve hundred marks,’ I told her. ‘And I shall make my profit, I promise you.’
I signed the document with a quick flourish, R. Dansey. It was done. I had mortgaged myself: there was no going back. My mother pulled the paper towards her and handed me the bill of exchange. She looked at me, thoughtful, and a little surprised, as if she had not expected me to accept her bargain. I stood up.
‘Listen to me, my Richard,’ she said. ‘You have a sharp eye for gems, I will grant you that. But, by God, you have the heart of a child. See that you do not go the way of your father.’
I looked back at her levelly. ‘I am following in no one’s footsteps. Not his, and certainly not yours.’
She looked back up at me with a faint frown. ‘I am very much aware of that.’
I folded the bill of exchange crisply in three, and stooped to kiss her on the cheek. Then I walked quickly out of the room, down the stairs and through the warehouse. I was fuming. That second document seemed to drag at me like a stone about my neck; a bargain with the Devil that one day I would be forced to pay. But as I emerged into the moist air of the riverside, my anger and fears left me, and I felt only exhilaration. That night, as I lay in my bedchamber, unsleeping, I worked out the various conversions and began to conceive all that that money might mean. A mark is a measure of silver, worth two-thirds of a pound, and so a thousand marks are six hundred and sixty-six pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence sterling. At the current rate that made two hundred and ninety-six ounces of gold, or a little over three thousand Venetian ducats. Sufficient, I reckoned, for some fifteen good diamonds, or else maybe twenty diamonds of poorer water, and twenty of the finest opals. Or a hundred Oriental amethysts. Perhaps I might even stretch further, if I bought wisely. How to choose? A dozen different schemes for a collection of jewels of intoxicating wonder presented themselves to me.
In the days that followed I counted out my own modest savings and changed them into bills, while Christian Breakespere and even William Marshe volunteered small loans of their own. I made a last effort to discover the mistress’s name, going round all my trade connections and pressing Uncle Bennet to use his wiles at Court. But to no purpose. It was galling: without that knowledge my whole venture was at risk. I considered putting off my departure. But I had waited far too long already; if I was to have any chance of success I must sail now, even in my ignorance. I was convinced the mistress’s name would not stay secret long. I begged Uncle Bennet to discover it, and write to me as soon as possible. He nodded his bald head in assent.
‘Well, well, I will do all I can. And in return you must promise to send me news of Italy: her politics and the progress of the wars. Send me rumours, send me secrets. I have a particular reason for asking this of you, my Richard. See that you do not fail me, and I shall do my best for you in return.’
On the night before I was due to sail I folded my various bills of exchange inside my casket and nestled it down next to my skin. My great venture was about to begin.
PART 2
Scythian Emerald: a Courtesan among Stones
My enterprise is slow and late in coming,
My hope unsure, while my desire mounts and grows; To abandon or pursue, alike I grudge.
PETRARCH, CANZONIERE
6
A month later I stepped up on to the great wooden bridge that spans the Grand Canal in Venice. I was swelling with pride and excitement. Crowds pressed round me, noblemen with their servants, girls selling nuts and oranges, and merchants of every nation, Venetians and Turks, Jews and Greeks. Beside me trudged my servant, burly Martin Deller. He was the last person I would have chosen to accompany me. Many was the time in my childhood he had caught me in the forbidden depths of the warehouse, and dragged me out by one ear. But, ‘No