Edward Marston - The Fair Maid of Bohemia

Before he could go back into the inn, Nicholas experienced the sensation he had felt on the drive from Rammekins. He was being watched. He sensed that it was a hostile gaze. Instead of swinging around sharply to catch a glimpse of the man, he pretended to have noticed nothing untoward. He sauntered across to the pump in the middle of the yard and worked its arm to fill a bucket with water. Then he casually removed his jerkin to hang it on the corner of a wagon. With his back to the wagon, he dipped both hands into the cold water to sluice his face and beard. He made sure that he took longer than usual over his ablutions. After drying himself on a piece of sacking, he retrieved his jerkin and ambled into the building.

***

The stocky figure dodged the market traders in the street outside and hurried across to the Cardinal’s Hat, a commodious inn chosen for its proximity to the White Cross. As he went upstairs, he congratulated himself on his opportunism. It had taken only a second to remove the document from the pocket which had been sewn inside the jerkin. His objective had been achieved without the need for more bloodshed.

Once inside his chamber, he locked the door and crossed to the window to get the best of the light. He tore the ribbon from the parchment and unfolded it eagerly. As he read the words on the paper, he reached into his pocket for the little notebook which he always carried with him. It listed a wide range of codes and ciphers. He was confident that he could soon unveil the secret message that lay behind the scrawled words. Then he read the document again and blenched.

THE FAIR MAID OF BOHEMIA

a comedy in five acts

by Edmund Hoode

Newly amended, corrected and enlarged from the tale of Nell Drayton, a chaste maid from Wrapping, stolen from her cradle at birth and forced into a life of drudgery until reunited with her noble family, thus showing the triumph of true love over setback and adversity .

Beneath the title of the play was a failed attempt to write a Prologue for it. The author was so dismayed with the poverty of his verse that he had slashed through every line with a vengeful quill. No secret message could be unlocked because it did not exist. What the man was holding was the sheet of paper which Edmund Hoode had discarded in a fit of self-disgust at the White Cross.

The fair maid now took even fouler punishment. Tearing the parchment to pieces, the man flung them to the floor and ground them beneath his heel as if killing some loathsome insects. His rage was short-lived. Realisation froze him to the spot. He had been duped. Nicholas Bracewell had deliberately allowed him to steal the document in order to draw him out of cover. The man was left empty-handed while the book-holder had gained two valuable pieces of information. He now knew for certain that he was being followed and that his shadow was after one thing.

The man smiled, then chuckled, then laughed at his own folly. He had been completely taken in by the ruse. Nicholas won a new respect from him. In the resourceful book-holder, the man had a worthy adversary. It would add more spice to his assignment. Westfield’s Men would need to be trailed in a very different way from now on. Nicholas would be more wary than ever and the rest of the company would be alerted.

As he thought about the sturdy figure who had washed himself in the stableyard, the man’s laughter took on a darker note. Instead of jeering at his own folly, he was savouring the pleasure of a duel with an able opponent. There would be no swift dagger-work in an empty stable this time. He wanted the utmost enjoyment from the death of Nicholas Bracewell.

***

The play which was set before the citizens of Cologne that afternoon was Love and Fortune . It was a compromise. Lawrence Firethorn was desperate to portray one of his gallery of tragic heroes and Barnaby Gill argued vehemently for Cupid’s Folly because he took the leading role of Rigormortis in that pastoral comedy. Nicholas imposed a truce on the warring actors and guided them towards common ground. Love and Fortune gave Firethorn a part in which he could unleash both his thunder and his comic brilliance while Gill was appeased by his generous haul of songs and dances. As it was another staple drama of Westfield’s Men, it needed no exhaustive rehearsal. They donned it like familiar apparel.

A stage was erected against the building which stood at right angles to the town hall. Curtains hung from horizontal poles along the other two sides to screen off the rectangle. Chairs and benches were laid out in rows at the front, with standing room behind them for the bulk of the audience. Seats were also placed in the upper windows of the town hall so that the Burgomaster, his Council and their wives could view the entertainment from a privileged position.

As in Flushing, curtains at the rear of the stage hid the tiring-house from view. It was in the hallway of the building. A stout wooden box below the stage enabled actors to mount it with ease before bursting between the curtains to make an entrance. When not doubling as characters in the play, the musicians could make use of an upper room as their minstrels’ gallery. Nicholas had been diligent in his preparations. Since Nathan Curtis, their master carpenter, had been left behind in London, it was the book-holder who devised and built the cunning trapdoor through which a number of surprise appearances would be made.

The beaming Burgomaster had been as good as his word. He had provided Nicholas with four able-bodied servants, who took some of the massive load from the inadequate shoulders of George Dart, and he persuaded every citizen of distinction to attend the performance. Market-day had swelled the numbers in the city, and many from the surrounding areas decided to avail themselves of the rare treat to see a performance by an English theatrical troupe.

Nicholas converted his German assistants to gatherers and placed them at strategic points to collect money for admission. Four albus was an attractively low price to pay. Westfield’s Men had an audience three times the size of that in Flushing. It flattered their vanity and stimulated their desire to give of their best.

Owen Elias could not resist peering through the curtains.

‘The whole city is out there!’ he said.

‘Let them see you during the play,’ advised Nicholas at his shoulder, ‘and not before. The time to appraise the spectators is when you stand before them.’

‘I know, Nick. But my curiosity was whetted.’

‘About what?’

‘I had to see if they were in the audience.’

‘They?’

‘Some of those eleven thousand virgins.’ Nicholas’s smile threw the Welshman on the defensive. ‘They do exist,’ he claimed. ‘We drank with a German watchmaker last night. His English sounded more like double Dutch, but one thing he did make clear was that there are eleven thousand virgins in Cologne. The city is famous for them.’ He grinned with frank lechery. ‘There’ll be a few less in number by the time I quit this place.’

‘You are centuries too late,’ said Nicholas, taking the curtain from his hand to close it again. ‘Your watchmaker forgot to tell you that the eleven thousand virgins existed in Cologne a long time ago. They accompanied Princess Ursula on a pilgrimage to Rome. When Ursula was martyred by Attila the Hun, she was made into the patron saint of Cologne.’

Elias was deflated. ‘How do you know all this?’

‘The Burgomaster gave me a history of the city.’

‘There are no virgins here?’

‘Not in the numbers you hope for, Owen.’

‘I have been cruelly misled.’

‘Only by the heat of your desire.’

‘You speak true, Nick,’ admitted the other with a wry grin. ‘We Celts are too goatish. When I first heard about those virgins, I thought my cod-piece would burst asunder.’