Swords From the Sea by Harold Lamb Read Free Book Online Page B

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Chapter I
    The Man-at-Arms
    Upon a fair day in May, in token of the honor due them for long and valorous service in Flanders, a small group of men were chosen to mount guard at the pavilion of His Majesty King Edward the Sixth of England. They were armigers or esquires-at-arms, and the youngest of their company was placed at the entrance of the pavilion nearest the person of the king.
    The name of this armiger was Ralph Thorne. He was selected for this post because, of these survivors of a gallant company, he had done the most in battle.
    "Because, sire," explained the politic Dudley, Duke of Stratford, "he has never failed in the execution of a command. Because, being distant from the court and the eye of his sovereign, he has yet performed deeds of hardihood, suffering thereby sore scathe and wounds."
    This tribute, lightly rendered by my lord duke, was remembered by him in latter years. Verily he had good reason to regret his words and his selection of a sentinel.
    For there befell in that hour and in that day of the year 1553 a strange event. And here is the tale of it, justly set down, giving every man his due, and no man more; for it is not the task of the chronicler to praise and dispraise, but to make manifest the truth.
    Master Thorne walked his post, after receiving signs and orders from my lord, the aforesaid Duke of Stratford. The armiger was not by much the elder of the boy king who lay within the pavilion on a couch covered with a deerskin. He wore the armor of the guards-cuirass and morion-and carried a harquebus on one shoulder.
    A slow match in his other hand was kept alight by swinging gently back and forth. Walking slowly from one pole of the entrance to the other, he did not look within. And the grievously sick Edward took no more notice of the sentinel than of the ancient hag who crouched at the head of his divan, shredding herbs in her bony fingers.
    Thorne's first hour of duty had not passed before a cannon roared from the river below the marquee. He had seen the flash before he heard it, and glanced keenly at four ships that were abreast the royal standard.
    The court had removed that day from London town to the meadows of Greenwich on the lower Thames. Edward's pavilion was pitched nearest the shore. Across the stream was anchored a galleon that flew from its poop an ensign bearing the triangular cross of Spain.
    This ship had entered the river some time since, and the nobles in attendance on Edward remarked that it fired no salute when the king's standard was raised. This omission was set down to the absence of the captain or neglect or more probably to the intolerant pride of the Spaniards.
    But the cannon had been fired from one of three vessels coming down the Thames. Ignorant as he was at that time of ships, Thorne saw only that they were merchant craft, stoutly built, no more than half the tonnage of the Spaniard. As they passed between him and the galleon he noticed that the mainmast of the leader came no higher than the Spaniard's mizzen.
    The ship that had fired the salute bore an admiral's colors and devices painted on the after-castle, also on the wooden shields that lined the rail. From the green and white coloring, and the Cross of St. George on the banner, he knew that they were English.
    "Are they come at last?" cried Edward from within. Raising himself on an elbow, he added eagerly, "I pray you of your courtesy Sir Squire, tell me what ships go out with the tide."
    Turning about, Thorne lowered the muzzle of his harquebus to the earth and knelt.
    "Three tall and goodly vessels, may it please your majesty, having the Tudor colors."
    "'Tis Sir Hugh's admiral ship," amended the duke, who had come to the entrance to look out, "and the two consorts."
    The boy on the couch tried in vain to catch a glimpse of the river, and sank back with a sigh. Under his transparent skin blue veins showed. Then a sudden attack of coughing sent a flush even to his forehead. The duke, who was the