Edward Marston - The Mad Courtesan

In this case, she doubted whether his arousal would last even that long and so it proved. Pulling down the top of her dress to expose small but shapely breasts, she lay back on the mattress and lifted her skirt invitingly. She gave him an open-mouthed grin that allowed her tongue to stick out provocatively between her teeth. A gorgeous serpent was enticing with her fangs. He needed no more encouragement Gathering his strength, he stared at her through blurred eyes then made a beery lunge. As he hit the mattress beside her, she turned him over and gave him a kiss that drained every last ounce of energy out of him and left him snoring noisily. Frances wasted scant time on him. She emptied his purse, grabbed him by the feet and dragged him out into the passageway. Leaving him in his stupor, she adjusted her dress and tidied her hair before going back downstairs in search of the next client. It was a profitable night in Turnmill Street.

Alone in his lodging, shut away from the world, Edmund Hoode sat at his table and worked by the light of a tallow candle. He was a nocturnal creature, a gifted poet whose Muse visited in the silence of the night and kept him from his slumbers. All of his best plays and most of his best sonnets had been written in the hours of darkness when his creative juices were in full flow and he could apply himself without distraction. It was at once gruelling and inspiring. Quill pen, inkhorn and parchment became closely acquainted and formed a willing partnership right up until dawn. It was only when the first rays of light tapped softly at his window that Hoode paused to read and reflect.

As the resident playwright with Westfield’s Men, he was required to provide a number of new plays each year. Love’s Sacrifice was his latest composition, a moving tragedy that was shot through with irony and pathos. It was the tale of a mighty king who bravely extended his empire into unconquered and hitherto unconquerable territory. Though he won a famous battle, however, he lost his heart to the queen of the subject nation and remained in thrall to her. The fiery passion which drew them together burned its remorseless way through all that he held most dear. Crackling flames consumed his wife, his children, his friends, his honour, his reputation, his sanity and his imperial crown. Love then exacted the final sacrifice from him by taking his life.

Though set in Ancient Britain, the play owed much to the story of Antony and Cleopatra but even more to the doomed romance in the author’s own life. He reached the end of Act Five with the mangled bodies of King Gondar and Queen Elsin entwined together in their tomb before the warring parties from their respective countries. Death ennobles them both. As Edmund Hoode stood among the soldiers and gazed down sadly at the tragic scene, he was reminded of the most recent calamity in his severely charred private life. Queen Elsin was his own lost love, forbidden yet irresistible, for ever out of his reach, one more corpse for the overstocked mausoleum of his despair. He used the quill to brush away a tear.

It was in this mood of suffering, with his sensibilities tingling and his faculties heightened, with his pain and his poetry fusing in perfect harmony, that he penned a long valedictory speech to king, queen and every woman he had ever worshipped. Words came easily but beautifully and the result was a minor miracle. Reading the verse quietly to himself, he knew that he had brought Love’s Sacrifice to a most poignant and affecting conclusion. What he did not realise was that a speech of twenty lines would have a significance that went far beyond the boundaries of his play to put the whole company in mortal danger.

‘And has Master Firethorn been informed of this horror?’

‘I will speak to him within the hour.’

‘It is a grievous blow to Westfield’s Men.’

‘Sebastian was well respected and well liked, Anne. We will all feel his loss keenly.’

She gave a shudder. ‘To die in such a fashion!’

‘His murder will be revenged,’ vowed Nicholas.

‘You must first find the murderer.’

‘It will be done.’

‘How?’

‘By patience and persistence.’

She smiled. ‘You have both in large supply.’

‘Sebastian Carrick was a friend of mine.’

‘And of everyone he met,’ she said wistfully. ‘I never encountered a more engaging young man. He was joyful company indeed. Who could have hated him enough to kill him?’

It was early morning and Anne Hendrik was seated in the living room of her house in Southwark. She was a tall, well-groomed woman with easy charm and a natural grace. The English widow of a Dutch hatmaker, she had spurned the many offers of marriage that came her way in order to retain her independence and run her husband’s business in the adjoining premises. Under her shrewd eye, it flourished. Since she had no children with whom to share the house, she elected to take in a lodger. Nicholas Bracewell had lived at the Southwark abode for some time now and his landlady had become a good friend and — when need arose and occasion served — a lover. A secretive man found someone in whom he could confide.

Anne Hendrik saw the practical consequences.

‘This will affect the new play at The Rose,’ she said.

‘Sebastian was to have taken an important role.’

‘To whom will it now fall?’

‘My choice would be Owen Elias.’

‘What of Master Firethorn?’

‘He will resist the idea strongly at first.’

‘Can you win him around?’

‘Edmund Hoode and Barnaby Gill are of my persuasion. And there is no other actor in the company who could carry the part as well as Owen.’ Nicholas grew serious. ‘We need the best man we have, Anne. Love’s Sacrifice brings us here to Southwark. Much rides upon the event. We must give off our true fragrance at The Rose.’

‘I will be there to inhale it,’ she promised.

Over a light breakfast of bread and meat, he had told her the full details of Sebastian Carrick’s death. She was frankly appalled. Anne Hendrik was well aware of the multiple burdens under which Westfield’s Men laboured to make their precarious living. This new crisis would only make matters worse. Though she had great sympathy for the company itself, her main object of concern was Nicholas Bracewell. She became fearful.

‘Take care, sir,’ she said anxiously.

‘The murderer must be brought to justice, Anne.’

‘But you will need to search the stews of Turnmill Street to find him. There are many perils there. I would not have you meet the same end as Sebastian himself.’

‘I will show all due caution.’

‘Go armed, Nick. Take friends.’

‘More may be achieved alone.’

‘Add discretion to your valour.’

He grinned fondly. ‘That is why I live in your house.’

‘I’d have you continue here,’ she said softly. ‘For my sake, therefore, tread warily in Clerkenwell.’

‘My search begins elsewhere.’

‘With whom?’

‘A father has the right to know of his son’s death.’

‘Master Andrew Carrick?’

‘I must find a way to reach him.’

The Tower of London was the oldest and most secure building in the city. Founded by William the Conqueror on the site of a Roman fortification, it still dominated with its awesome combination of elegance and strength. It was set between neat gabled houses and lawns sloping down to the glittering havoc of the Thames. The Norman citadel had been constructed of white stone from Caen and its enormously thick walls rose to a height of ninety feet. Successive kings enlarged and reinforced the edifice until it became a huge complex of towers, baileys, domestic buildings and outworks. By the time Elizabeth came to the throne, the Tower had fulfilled its usefulness as a royal residence but her family left vivid mementoes in the crypt of the Chapel Royal of St Peter’s ad Vincula where the vast majority of decayed bodies lacked heads. The obvious headquarters for the Mint, the building also housed the Crown jewels, the royal armoury and the national archives. In addition, it was the most feared prison in England. Above all else, however, the Tower remained what it had always been — the focal point of a burgeoning city that was planned around a main river and encircled by fields, forests, marshes and hills.