P. Chisholm - A Plague of Angels

‘Like many other poets, he has turned to spying to make money. He has a great desire for money, you know, Sergeant, great ambition, great passion. Even in bed he over-reaches himself, exhausts himself. And he is very jealous, consumed by it, I’m afraid. He hates my Lord Hunsdon, who is, of course, my lover, and he hates your master too. You should be very careful of him.’

Dodd felt his jaw drop. ‘Ah thocht…’ he gargled. ‘I hadnae thought he was that kind of man.’

Mistress Bassano only smiled again and glided off into the garden. Dodd discovered he was one of the last remaining guests still out in the dusk and hurried back to the house. On the way he thought he glimpsed Mistress Bassano, locked in an embrace with somebody whose balding forehead gleamed in the last light of the west.

Carey was playing primero with the Earl and the other overdressed men of his affinity, cold and bright as a polished silver plate, calling his usual point-score of ‘eighty-four’ amid sarcastic groans. Dodd stood just inside the door and watched for a little while, trying not to think about what Shakespeare was getting up to in the shrubbery, nor what Mistress Bassano had said about him, nor the likelihood of Carey losing hundreds of pounds in this kind of company and in the mood he was in.

Christ, what do I care? Dodd demanded of himself; I’m not his mam.

‘Are you joining us, Sergeant?’ Carey called over to him, to Dodd’s surprise, pulling in quite a respectable pot of gold coin.

‘Och God, no,’ Dodd said. ‘Ye’re all too good for me. Ye’d have the shirt off ma back, for what guid it would dae ye.’

‘You disappoint me, Sergeant Dodd,’ said the Earl, as hectic-eyed as Carey and even more drunk. ‘I’d heard the men of Cumberland never turn down a challenge.’

‘Nor we dinna,’ said Dodd, thoroughly tired of being needled. ‘Name yer place and yer weapons and I’m yer man.’

There was a moment of silence in the overcrowded, candle-heated room and Carey leaned sideways to whisper in the Earl’s ear. The overdressed southern catamite smiled widely.

‘Why, Sergeant, I think you misunderstood me. I only meant to challenge you to a card game.’

‘Ay,’ said Dodd, privately quite amused at this climbdown. ‘Well, my lord, in that case there’s nae shame in admitting ye’d have the mastery over me in any card game ye care tae mention. I’ve no’ the experience nor the resources to meet ye on that field, eh, my lord?’ He swallowed down a yawn. ‘Ah’m nobbut a country farmer, me. An’ wi’ yer permission, my lord, Ah’ll gang tae ma rest.’

After translation from Carey, the Earl waved negligently at one of the servants. ‘Of course, Sergeant. Goodnight, pleasant dreams.’

‘Ay, the same to ye, my lord.’

Dodd followed the servant through the carved and marbled rooms, feeling that if Carey didn’t see some sense soon, he’d head north by himself.

***

Obviously, the Southampton household thought he must be Carey’s henchman because the servant led him to a truckle bed in a very magnificent bedroom, painted with pictures that made you think you were looking at the sky filled with angels and fat cherubs and the bed hung around with tapestry curtains. Dodd took one look at it and decided he preferred the truckle bed anyway: how could you sleep with no air at all reaching you? He left the watchlight burning and slowly and carefully negotiated his way through the multiplicity of buttons and laces involved in dressing as befitted his station in London.

He woke already on his feet and his dagger in his hand because somebody was moving around in the room.

‘It’s only me, Henry,’ came Carey’s voice. ‘Don’t kill me.’

‘Och,’ moaned Dodd. ‘What the hell are ye doing?’ He scrubbed the heel of his palm in his eyes as Carey, with infinite care, transferred the watchcandle to a nest of candles in a corner next to a mirror and lit the room.

‘I was…er…trying to find the pot,’ said Carey in the slow painstaking way of the magnificently drunk. ‘But it eluded me.’

Dodd blinked his eyes hard. ‘It’s in the fireplace. Dinna drop it,’ he growled, not trying to hide the fact that he was staring at Carey’s face where the clear print of a woman’s hand was glowing red like the brand of Cain.

Carey swayed over to the fireplace and obeyed what was evidently a very peremptory call of nature, judging by the time it took him. Dodd sat down on the truckle bed again and rubbed his face with his hands, lay down to try and get some more sleep.

No, the bloody Courtier could not let him rest. Carey was next to the bed, reeking of aqua vitae and tobacco smoke.

‘Very sorry, Henry,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid I’m…er…stuck.’

‘What?’

‘Can’t get out of this suit without help. Irritating, but there you are. Fashion.’

‘Och, Christ.’

‘No Barnabus. No helpful woman. You…you’re…you’re it.’

Murder in his heart, but not sufficiently annoyed with Carey to make him sleep in his uncomfortable fancy clothes, Dodd got up again and followed his instructions as to which laces to untie. All the back ones were inextricably knotted.

‘What happened tae the woman?’ Dodd asked as he picked away at them, the curiously neutral intimacy of helping another man undress giving him unwonted freedom to ask.

‘Gone back to Father. In a litter. Very cross.’

‘Is that so? What happened to your face?’

Carey took off his elegant kid gloves and fingered the weal with a nailless finger. ‘All my fault,’ he said. ‘Tactless. Very.’

‘Och, ay?’

‘Advice for you, Henry. When you’re…er…when you’re making love to a woman, try and…er…remember who she is.’

With magnificent self-control, Dodd did not laugh. ‘Och?’

‘Yes. At a…sensitive moment. Called her Elizabeth.’

Dodd sucked air through his teeth, contemplating Janet’s likely reaction to such a mistake.

‘Pity really. Wonderful body.’

‘Ay.’

‘My…er…my child, I think. Not sure. Could be Father’s.’

‘Could be Will Shakespeare’s?’ Dodd asked, some small devil in him wanting to make trouble for Mistress Bassano.

Carey contemplated this in silence as the last laces finally gave way, releasing the back of his gorgeous doublet from the waistband of his lily-encrusted trunk-hose. He had been fumbling with buttons while Dodd worked on the laces and the doublet finally came off, revealing the padded waistcoat that held up his hose. He moved away, shaking his head.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Manage now.’

Dodd lay down again, properly awake by now but determined to go back to sleep, turned his shoulder on Carey’s continued troubles with his clothes. Serve him right for wearing such daft duds.

‘Int’resting, what you say.’ Carey was still talking, though by the smell he should have sloshed with every step. God, did the man never stop? ‘The poet, eh? Thought so, wasn’t sure. Said so. She denied it. Couldn’t deny calling her Elizabeth. Rude of me. But…er…she’d no call to sneer at her for being provincial. Isn’t. Anyway, what’s wrong with provincial?’

‘If ye’re askin’ me,’ said Dodd wearily, ‘Lady Widdrington is worth a thousand of Mistress Bassano, for all her pretty paps and all her conniving ways.’

‘Father likes her. So does Will, it seems.’

‘Then they can have her.’

‘Yes, but…Elizabeth won’t let me have her,’ said Carey sadly. ‘Won’t. Tried everything. Won’t let me bed her. ’S terrible. Never happened before. Can’t think. Can’t sleep. Can’t bloody fuck another woman without…mistaking her. Terrible.’

Och God, thought Dodd in despair, any minute now the bastard’ll be weeping on my shoulder. I want to go to sleep. I’m tired. I don’t like London. I don’t like all these fine houses and fine beds and fine courtiers. I want to go home.