Virgin Earth by Philippa Gregory Read Free Book Online Page B

advice. Most men thought of buying land and keeping it; nothing was more secure than a smallholding.
    The earl shook his head. “The way to make money, my John, is to move fast, even recklessly. You see an opportunity, you take it quickly; you move before other men have seen it too. Then when they see it, you pass it on to them and they crow at having spotted their chance, when you have already skimmed the cream of the profit. And move fast,” he advised. “When you see an opening, when a place comes open, when you see a chance, when a master dies, take what you’re owed and move on.”
    He glanced up into John’s frowning face. “Practice,” he reminded him. “Not principles. When Walsingham died, who was the best man to take his place? Who had the correspondence at his fingertips, who knew almost as much as Walsingham himself?”
    “You, my lord,” Tradescant stammered.
    “And who had Walsingham’s papers which told everything a man who wanted to be Secretary of State would need to know?”
    John shrugged. “I don’t know, my lord. They were stolen, and the thief never found.”
    “Me,” Cecil admitted cheerfully. “The moment I knew he would not recover, I broke into his cabinet and took everything he had written and received over the previous two years. So when they were casting around for who could do the work there was no one but me. No one could read the papers and learn what needed doing, for the papers were missing. No one could know Walsingham’s mind, nor what he had agreed, because the papers were missing. Only one man in England of the dozen who had worked for Walsingham was ready to take his place. And that was me.”
    “Theft?” John asked.
    “That’s principle,” Cecil said swiftly. “I’m advising you to look to practice. Think what you want, my John, and make sure that you get it, for be very certain that no one will give it to you.”
    John could not help but glance up at the great palace of Theobalds, a place so grand that a king could envy it and insist on owning it, knowing that he could never build better.
    “Aye,” said the earl, following his gaze. “And if a more powerful man can do it, he will take it from you. He will be guided by practice and not principles too. Buy land and take risks is my advice. Steal if you need to and if you will not be detected. When your master dies — even if it is me — have your next place secure. And also — marry your woman with a dowry; she sounds the very one for a rising man like you. And bid her be careful with her housekeeping.”

    John Tradescant rode down the Kentish lanes to his old village of Meopham, where he had been expected every day for the last six years. The hedges were white with hawthorn and May blossoms, the air warm and sweet-scented. The rich green pastureland of Kent glowed lush where cattle were knee-deep in water meadows. These were prosperous times and rich fields. John rode in a daze of pleasure, the lushness of the fields and the greening of the trees and the hedges acting on him as strong wine might turn another man’s head. In the hedgerows were the white floss of gypsy lace and the little white stars of meadowsweet. Through gaps in the hedge where trees had been coppiced was a sea of blue where bluebells had sprung up to carpet the floor of the forest. Ahead of him the road was drifted with the tiny petals of the hawthorn flower like spring snow, and at every verge the lemon-yellow flowers of primroses were stuffed into roots and nooks like nosegays in a belt. When the road wound through meadowlands, John could see the light yellow of cowslips nodding as the breeze ran across the grasses; they put a veil of gold over the green as a woman might toss a shawl of gold net over a green silk gown.
    The oak trees were clench-fisted with flowers, the small delicate catkins which looked like lumpy little buds at the end of the tough contorted branches. The silver birches shivered with new pale leaves amid the