Edward Marston - The Nine Giants

‘But ownership will transfer to you.’

‘In return for a handsome price.’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Marwood quickly. ‘That is very much at the forefront of our minds. You have been most kind and generous in that respect.’

‘So what detains you? Sentiment?’

‘It has its place, surely.’

‘What else?’

‘Fear of signing away my birthright.’

‘The contract keeps you here until you die.’ Rowland Ashway used podgy hands to pull himself up from the table to confront the landlord. ‘Do not see me as a threat here. We are equal partners in this enterprise and both of us can profit from the venture.’

‘My wife might need more persuasion.’

‘Do it in the watches of the night.’

‘That is when I am least in command.’

‘What will content the lady, then?’

Marwood shrugged and started to flutter once more. At one stroke, the brewer cut through the threatened delay to their negotiations.

‘I increase my bid by two hundred pounds.’

‘You overwhelm me, sir!’

‘It is my final offer, mark you.’

‘I understand that.’

‘Will it please Mistress Marwood?’

‘It may do more than that,’ said the other as a ray of hope found its way into his desperation. ‘I’ll raise the matter when we retire tonight.’

‘It is settled, then.’

Alderman Rowland Ashway sealed the bargain with a flabby handshake then allowed himself to be conducted down to the yard. Even with the additional payment, he would be getting the inn at a very attractive price and he had already made plans for its improvement. Before new features could be added, however, one old one had to be removed without compunction.

‘What of Westfield’s Men?’ said Ashway. ‘Have you acquainted them with their fate?’

‘I have mentioned it to their book holder.’

‘That will rattle their noble patron.’

‘It is Master Firethorn who will roar the loudest.’

‘Let him. Rowland Ashway is a match for any man.’

‘Rowland Ashway! That barrel of rancid lard! Ashway!’

‘This is what I have been told.’

‘That fat turd of aldermanic pomposity!’

‘The same man, sir.’

‘That leech, that vile toad, that bloated threat to every chair he sits upon! I could spit at the wretch as soon as look at him. He should be weighted down with blocks of lead then drowned in a tub of his own beer! Rowland Ashway is a monster in half-human form. Does the creature possess a wife?’

‘I believe that he does, master.’

‘Then must we pray for her soul. How can the woman endure to be mounted by that elephant, to be pounded to a pulp by that bed-breaker, to be flattened into a wafer by that scvurvy, lousy, red-faced bladder of bilge!’

Lawrence Firethorn had not taken the news well. When Nicholas Bracewell called on him that afternoon, the actor had been pleased to see his colleague and took him into the drawing room in the interests of privacy. That privacy had been rescinded now as Firethorn’s voice explored octaves of fury that could be heard half a mile away. Nicholas made a vain attempt to pacify him.

‘No contract has as yet been signed, sir.’

‘Nor shall it be,’ vowed the other. ‘My God, I’ll grab that walking nightmare of a landlord and hang him up by his undeserving feet. The traitor, the lily-livered hound, the one-eyed, two-faced, three-toed back-stabber!’

‘I think it might be better if you steered well clear of Master Marwood,’ suggested Nicholas. ‘To lay rough hands upon him will not advance our cause.’

‘I demand revenge!’ howled Firethorn.

‘The crime has not yet been committed.’

‘But it is planned, is it not?’

‘We may yet be able to avert disaster.’

‘Only by a show of force, Nick. Let me at him.’

‘I counsel the use of diplomacy.’

‘Diplomacy! With a twitching publican and a bloated brewer? I’d sooner play the diplomat with a pair of sabre-toothed tigers. Let them hatch their plot and they’ll have us turned out of the Queen’s Head without a word of thanks. Is it not perfidious?’

‘That is why I felt you should be warned.’

‘Indeed, indeed.’

‘So that we may take the appropriate action.’

‘Aye, Nick. Tie those two villains together back to back and drop them in the Thames to curdle the water.’ He prowled around the room as he considered more gruesome deaths for the miscreants then he stopped in his tracks. ‘We’ll attack them from above.’

‘How so?’

‘Lord Westfield will be told.’

‘Only as a last resort,’ urged Nicholas. ‘It would be wrong to alarm his lordship with a problem that we may be able to solve ourselves. He would not thank us for dragging him into a wrangle of this nature.’

‘You may be right,’ admitted Firethorn. ‘We must keep that last card up our sleeve then. Meanwhile, I will vent my spleen upon that lizard of a landlord.’

‘Then might our case be ruined altogether.’

‘Heavens, Nick, this is an insult I will not bear! Our plays have helped to fill his coffers generously these last few years. Our art has put his foul establishment on the map of London. We have made the Queen’s Head. Instead of selling it to Alderman Rowland Ashway, he should be giving it to us in appreciation.’

‘Master Marwood is a businessman.’

Firethorn glowered. ‘So am I, sir.’

There was a long pause as the actor-manager fought to subdue his temper and take a more objective view of the crisis into which he was now plunged. Behind all the bombast about the primacy of Westfield’s Men there lurked a simple truth. The company’s survival depended on the income that it could generate and that would shrink alarmingly if they lost their regular home. Lawrence Firethorn stared blankly ahead as cruel practicalities were borne in upon him. His immediate impulse was to launch an attack but it could bring only short-term benefits. In the long run, they relied on one man.

‘What must we do, Nick?’ he muttered.

‘Move with great stealth.’

‘Has anyone else been told of this?’

‘No, sir,’ said Nicholas. ‘Nor should they, except for Edmund and Master Gill. If we spread panic now, it will show in our work and damage our reputation.’

‘You give sound advice as usual.’

‘Leave me to work on Master Marwood.’

‘I’d do so with the sharpest sword in Christendom!’

‘Then would we lose all. We must deal softly with the man or he will take fright and run. It is only by talking to him that we can keep abreast of any moves that are made by Alderman Ashway.’

Firethorn snorted. ‘The whole city is aware of any moves made by that spherical gentleman. Whenever he stirs abroad, the very earth does shake. If he stood by the river and broke wind, he could launch a whole armada.’ He gave a crumpled smile. ‘Help us, Nick.’

‘I will do everything in my power.’

‘That comforts me greatly.’ His eyes moistened. ‘I would not lose the Queen’s Head for a queen’s ransom. That stage has seen the full panoply of my genius. Those boards are sacrosanct. Tarquin has walked there. So have Pompey and Black Antonio. King Richard the Lionheart and Justice Wildboare have strutted their hour. A few days past, it was the turn of Count Orlando and I have burnt dozens of other fine parts into the imagination of my audience.’ He looked up. ‘I would not have it end like this, dear heart.’

‘There has to be a means of escape.’

Lawrence Firethorn’s voice faded into a whisper.

‘Find it, Nick. Save us from extinction …’

Anne Hendrik’s anxiety over her apprentice did not ease. The boy was no better on the following day than he had been during a torrid night. Nor could he provide any clue as to what had upset him so dramatically while he slept. Sunday was no day of rest for Hans Kippel. Watched over carefully by Anne and visited by Preben van Loew, he was unable to do more than hold desultory conversation with either. A depression had settled on his young mind. His face was one large puckered frown and his eyes were dull. All the spirit which had made him so boisterous had been knocked out of him by the experience he had undergone. It would clearly take some time yet before the details of that experience began to emerge.