‘Everyone knew that.’
‘So I think they decided to offer it to someone within the anti-reformist faction as something they could take to the king and use to advance themselves. Again, everyone knows the king’s interest in ships and weaponry. The Gristwoods probably thought it was safer to be in with the coming faction.’
‘Then who?’ Barak asked, excited himself now. ‘Marchamount? He’s a protégé of Norfolk’s, the earl’s biggest enemy.’
‘Possibly. Though, being at Augmentations, Michael had a channel to Rich and Cromwell says Rich is plotting. This puts him and Bealknap back on the list.’
‘Then we have to include Lady Honor too. She’s no reformist.’
‘All right, for the sake of argument. At all events, the Gristwoods went to someone. Call them Cromwell’s enemy for now. They took the barrel and the formula, and promised to make more Greek Fire for them. Toky and Wright were set to work to help them and probably to keep an eye on them too.’
‘Yes, that fits.’
‘So for six months they try to make more Greek Fire. But the stuff is like nothing they’ve ever seen and the formula, perhaps, referred to the use of an element they didn’t have. I wondered earlier why the Romans, who knew of something like Greek Fire, didn’t develop it as a weapon. There were sources, pools of strange flammable liquid in the ground, which the Byzantines had access to but the Romans didn’t. Far beyond Jerusalem. And we don’t have access, either, to whatever it was.’
His eyes were wide with interest now. ‘Something essential to make Greek Fire?’
I nodded. ‘I see Michael and Sepultus following all sorts of trails, like the Polish drink, trying different experiments, increasingly desperate.’
‘Because they couldn’t make Greek Fire despite having the formula.’
‘Exactly. And how frustrating that must have been for them, and their masters, to have this opportunity for such power and wealth just beyond their grasp. Remember that they had reconstructed the apparatus that was used to project Greek Fire with the aid of Leighton the founder, and practised in his yard using the stuff in the barrel. They knew it worked. How frustrated, and how angry, they must have become as the winter passed and Cromwell found himself in ever greater trouble over the Cleves marriage.’
‘So the demonstrations, the one I saw and the other one, used up all the stuff from the barrel?’
‘They must have. All, or nearly all.’
‘Ay. There must have been nearly half a barrelful in that tank, even if it was only partly filled.’
‘By March I think Cromwell’s enemy was losing patience with the Gristwoods. Perhaps with a better alchemist they could have divined some alternative, perhaps not. But they dared not spread the word beyond a very small circle. So they devised another plan - they decided to try and turn the fact they only had a limited amount of Greek Fire to their advantage. Oh, they have been very clever.’
‘So—’ Barak raised a hand, frowning - ‘they went to the earl and said they had got Greek Fire, said they had made some, and he told the king.’
‘Exactly. And they used a chain of contacts to reach him - Bealknap, Marchamount, Lady Honor - that would make the story sound more plausible.’
‘Then none of those three need have been involved.’
‘None, or some, or all.’
Barak whistled. ‘And then they staged the demonstrations, using what was in the barrel. To trick the earl into making a promise to the king that he could never keep.’
‘Yes. Perhaps the Gristwoods were told they’d be paid off and could flee England before Cromwell found out that there was no more Greek Fire. They weren’t told about the final part of the plan - to kill them and make it appear as though the formula had been stolen and might be given to a foreign power. After Cromwell had got the king excited, and promised him a demonstration.’
‘On Thursday.’
‘Yes. The unfortunate founder was killed because he knew too much, I’d guess. Also the throwing device was probably in his yard and Cromwell’s enemy needed to take it away.’
Barak nodded. ‘You were right to go back to the beginning after all.’ He frowned. ‘If you’re right.’
‘It’s the only reconstruction of events that makes everything fit.’
He stood a few moments, nibbling thoughtfully at his knuckles. I watched him anxiously, frightened he might see some hole in my theory that I had missed. But he only nodded. ‘And poor Bathsheba was killed lest Michael Gristwood might have told her something between the sheets. As he had.’