Edward Marston - The Roaring Boy

‘Valentine the gardener.’

‘A hideous face like that does not belong in a lovely garden,’ opined Firethorn. ‘It should be set on the side of a cathedral with the other gargoyles.’

‘Do not be misled by appearances,’ said Nicholas. ‘He is our friend. To business. I cannot tell you how it cheers me to have you both here. Three of us may contrive things that no one person could ever attempt alone.’

Elias grinned. ‘Tell us what to do and it is done.’

‘Then first, we must split up. I am known to be here in Greenwich, you are not. That gives us an advantage. One of you must go to the palace to see what may be learned there.’

‘That will I,’ volunteered Firethorn.

‘They may not even admit you,’ said Nicholas, ‘but much may be gleaned if you hang about the quay. Ask what comes in and out by boat. Find out about the workings of the palace. Pick up even the tiniest scrap of news about Sir Godfrey Avenell. His face must be well-known to all. Ask why the Master of the Armoury spends so much time down here in Greenwich when his office is in the Tower.’

‘I’ll find out all that and more, Nick,’ said Firethorn.

‘What of me?’ said Elias.

‘Haunt the taverns here, Owen. You met with good fortune in the stews of Bankside. Try your luck in Greenwich.’

‘What must I seek?’

‘Any rumour, tale or idle gossip about Thomas Brinklow. Secretive about his work he may have been, but someone must have supplied him with materials. Who delivered the coal, for instance? Who built his equipment and machines? Who kept them in a state of repair? Someone must have got in here.’

‘Drink and listen,’ said Elias. ‘Fitting work for me.’

‘About it now.’

They arranged a time and place to meet up later. As they strolled back down the garden together, Firethorn remembered what Nicholas had said a little earlier.

‘You are known, but we are not?’ said the actor.

‘Yes, Lawrence. Word of my presence here will already have been sent to the palace. I am hoping that it will flush out some of the game.’

‘We have been in the house awhile now. Has not the same person reported as much to her spymaster?’

‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘I set my own informer to watch her. Valentine may seem to be about his work out here but he is also keeping his eyes peeled. If a certain maidservant tries to leave the premises, I will be told.’

‘You are a stage manager to your fingertips!’

‘He is too comfortable here in Greenwich,’ said Elias with a wink. ‘How will we ever drag him back to London when he has a beautiful woman to care for him and an ugly gardener to act as his eyes and his ears?’

He and Firethorn went off laughing happily together but Nicholas did not share their mirth. The teasing remark had contained a grain of truth that almost embarrassed him. The book holder was becoming slowly drawn to Greenwich and the kind of life that it might offer him. More particularly, he was drawn to Emilia Brinklow. She was much more than a grieving young woman who needed his help at a difficult time. She had qualities that he found quite entrancing and his admiration for her had soared since her authorship of The Roaring Boy had been revealed. What impressed him was not just the extraordinary skill she had shown for a novice playwright but the way in which her writing had so carefully disguised her gender.

The moment alone together in the middle of the night had a profound effect on him. It was some time since he had shared a bed with a woman and, although they did not sleep in each other’s arms as lovers, there had yet been a bond forged between them. Trust, affection and need had brought Emilia to his bedchamber. It was an open question whether or not they could mature into something more permanent.

As soon as he caught himself even considering such a possibility, he expelled it from his mind. Emilia Brinklow could never be his. She was a rich young woman with a large house and a recognised place in Greenwich society, while he was a humble book holder with a theatre company which did not even have a venue in which to perform. Emilia could offer him so much but he could never bring an equal portion of money or property to the match. On the other hand, there were deficiencies in her life that he could repair. Nicholas could provide the strength which her brother had obviously supplied and the love which hitherto had come from Simon Chaloner. Would he, however, simply be taking the place of others? To be at all worthwhile, he knew, a friendship had to be a merging of true minds.

With a conscious effort, he shook himself free of her for the second time. Emilia Brinklow did not intrude upon his concentration again because someone distracted him. It was Valentine, giving a pre-arranged signal to him that Agnes was about to leave the house for some reason. Nicholas could guess what her errand might be. With her mistress out of the house at church, she had the opportunity to slip out and send some sort of message to the palace. There was no chance of her going there and back on foot so he surmised that she must have an intercessory in the village.

Nicholas moved swiftly. Screened by a line of trees, he worked his way towards the house and was in time to see the maidservant letting herself out by the rear door. She looked furtively around before darting behind the bushes. Nicholas cut around the other side of the house so that he would be at the front when she got there. Agnes knew how to conceal her movements. Only the faintest disturbance in the bushes showed her progress. She emerged near the front gate and tried to scurry through it.

The solid frame of Nicholas Bracewell blocked her way. ‘Where do you go on Fridays?’ he asked.

She let out a gasp of fear, then burst into tears.

***

Sir John Tarker was an arrogant man who had been utterly humiliated. Somebody now had to pay for that humiliation. Sir Godfrey Avenell had administered it but the real cause of it was Nicholas Bracewell. The book holder’s name had cropped up time and again to irritate and confound him. After being soundly beaten at the Eagle and Serpent, he somehow had the resilience to bounce back. Tarker had gone to great lengths to effect the destruction of The Roaring Boy and the damage that had occasioned Westfield’s Men was an incidental bonus to him. An affray, an arrest and an injunction had virtually killed the theatre company.

Yet its members still kept up their pursuit of him. He was certain that two of them had run Maggs to earth in the Isle of Dogs but the organising force behind them was Nicholas Bracewell. And the latter was back in Greenwich.

‘I want him!’ he barked.

‘Leave him to me,’ said a heavy-set man with a guttural accent. ‘I’ll break his back for him.’

‘No, Karl. This man is my quarry.’

‘Will you run him through with a lance?’

‘It would be too kind a death for Nicholas Bracewell.’

‘How, then, will you kill him, Sir John?’

‘Slowly.’

The armourer grunted in approval. They were alone in one of the workshops at the palace and Tarker was venting his spleen. Nicholas Bracewell had helped to lose him his position, his pride, the finest suit of armour he had ever possessed and the invaluable friendship of the man who had bought it for him. Unless he could somehow cut himself a path back into the favour of Sir Godfrey Avenell, Tarker faced bankruptcy, forced retirement from tournaments and certain elimination from Court circles.

‘How soon will you do it?’ asked Karl.

‘Tonight.’

‘Is that not too dangerous?’

‘Why?’

‘We left Master Chaloner’s body there but yesterday. The crime has been reported and law officers are looking for us. Will they not be lurking near the house still?’