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artery. He thudded to his knees and looked at his dripping red hands with amazement. Then he toppled. Dead.
    Carlos heard the commotion around him—shouting, scuffling, sounds of panic. But he was calm now, no longer disoriented. No man in this room could have killed so swiftly.
    He swung around to locate Sydenham. But other men had moved in around Carlos in a wide circle, and Sydenham was not among them. The men’s eyes were full of fear and aversion, as though they had surrounded a maddened wolf.
    Carlos heard an icy voice inside his head telling him that he had just made the biggest mistake of his life.

3

The Agreement
    C hrist, Honor, don’t you see that we’ve got to leave? You’re not safe in England.”
    Richard Thornleigh angrily slapped down his gloves on the table of his room in London’s Crane Inn. It was the day after the mob’s attack on the Spanish envoys. He and Isabel and Martin, split apart in the chaos, had each found a way to scramble to safety, but his anxiety over the incident had not left him. He and his wife, just returned through the falling snow from a morning at the Blackwell Hall wool market, had been arguing about the affair since passing the gallows on Cheapside where the body of the mob ringleader, executed that morning, was hanging.
    “You don’t know that,” Honor said. “It was all so long ago, no one remembers.” She whirled off her cloak, making snowflakes flurry around her. “In any case, I won’t let them run us off, Richard. They have no right.”
    “They have the power. And, by God, this Queen will use it. She’s dead set on bringing back all the terrors of the old Church. The Protestant priests here know it. That’s why they’re fleeing to the German cities, getting out before she strikes.”
    “Priests are conspicuous. I’m not a priest.”
    “You’re a perfect target nonetheless.”
    “Not if I’m careful. I’ve already given Father Gilbert a generous contribution for the new parish cross and a pyx for Mass. He’s singing my praises. He doesn’t suspect I am, or ever was, anything but one of the faithful flock.”
    “And Anthony Grenville? Do you think you can buy him off with such baubles?”
    “Lord Grenville knows nothing about my past,” she said, loosening her hair to shake off more snow.
    “Not yet. But we’ve only been his neighbors for a few months and he’s already gathered that we’re hardly the ideal Catholic family. That’s grist for his mill. And now the Queen’s restored the Mass by law, so how long do you think you’ll be able to avoid attending? How long until Lord Grenville publicly scorns you for that in the parish and begins investigating?”
    She shrugged. “I won’t be alone. Half the parish won’t attend. You won’t attend.”
    “Good God, woman, it’s not me they’ll come after!” Their eyes locked. Thornleigh saw that she was not backing down.
    There was a knock on the door. It opened, and a boy of about fourteen poked his head in. He held a lit taper. “Light your fire, sir?”
    “No,” Thornleigh said irritably, “go away.”
    “Oh yes, please, Peter,” Honor said to the boy, beckoning him in. “It’s cold in here.” Thornleigh threw up his hands in exasperation.
    The boy clattered with logs at the fireplace. Thornleighwalked to the window and looked out. The falling snow had almost stopped and a pale sun was struggling out from behind the cloud cover, but some stubborn flakes still drifted down. In the street below, children squealed in a snowball war. On the church steps an official had stopped a pauper to inspect his hand for the brand that was his license to beg. Thornleigh turned back to the room. Honor was moving about, folding clothing for their journey home to Colchester tomorrow, and chatting with the boy. Was his mother’s cough better? she asked. And had he enjoyed the city’s Twelfth Night revels? Thornleigh watched her. Why was she willfully blinding herself to the dangers? Had the past