Rory Clements - The Heretics

Henslowe listened with interest and some amusement.

‘If you cheat the rope, I might ask Mr Alleyn to find you a part in our next play, Mr Cooper, for you have something of the clown about you. The world would love a new Tarleton. He was a short-arsed wreck of a man like you, but he could make princes and paupers weep for mirth. I do believe you would be his equal, for you make me laugh.’

‘Mr Henslowe, there is no amusement here. Only murder and treason. I must find Ovid Sloth! Mr Shakespeare ordered me to fetch him to Newgate. Why did he take those costumes? If you have doubts, come with me-’

‘No, I will not go anywhere with you. As for the costumes, you will have to ask Mr Sloth. He asked for them some few weeks ago, named me a fair price, and so a deal was struck. Such things happen all the time. Great ladies and gentlemen stage entertainments for their great friends. And so I am happy to oblige. No one can afford to keep costumes unused if there is money to be made from them. As for detaining Mr Sloth and taking him to Newgate, I would say that trying to shoot a man is a strange way to arrest him.’

‘I feared he was fleeing again, as he has done before.’

Henslowe laughed out loud. ‘Cardinal Quick is the slowest creature on earth. He could not escape an earthworm, Mr Cooper. How could he possibly flee from anyone, even one as lame as you?’ Henslowe shook his head and turned to the constable. ‘He is yours to question, Mr Godfrey. Do with him as you think fit. I will happily testify against him, as will Mr Fontley.’

The constable had a squint eye and a mouth that turned down. His watery eyes looked at Boltfoot in turn, first the left, then the right. ‘Are you a good man and true?’ he demanded at last.

‘Yes, Constable. I am in service to Mr John Shakespeare, an assistant secretary to Sir Robert Cecil. I work for him on behalf of Her Royal Majesty.’

‘Then if you are a good man and true, why are you held here under guard?’

‘It is an error.’

‘In my experience, thieves, vagabonds and murderers are apprehended because they are guilty of crimes. Therefore a man apprehended must be a thief, vagabond or murderer. Which, then, are you — for you have been apprehended?’

‘I am none of those, I pledge it.’

‘Then you have committed some other felony. The chiefest of these are rape, rustling of cattle and treason. Choose your felony, Mr Cooper. The neck will stretch when the noose is about it, whichever you do decide on.’

‘I have committed no crime!’

The constable rubbed his neck and stretched it this way and that as though he could feel the rope tightening.

‘Why, I do believe there was one went to the Tyburn tree this very morning. Died well, the broadsheet sellers cry. Gave praise to God and the Queen and did beg mercy of the Lord for his manifold sins.’

The constable tied Boltfoot’s hands with a leash of rope and led him out into the streets of Southwark to the Clink prison, fifty yards away.

‘Hold this man, Mr Keeper,’ the constable said, pushing Boltfoot forward at the heavy gate. ‘He says he is a good man and true, but I say he is a most desperate felon and horse-thief, nor is he to be trusted. Have him brought before the justice in the morning.’

‘Have you got sixpence for his keep?’

‘He can pay you himself or starve.’ The constable handed over Boltfoot’s weapons to the keeper. ‘Or you may sell these on his behalf. But I say observe him well, for he is most dangerous and ungodly. I wish you good day, Mr Keeper.’

The turnkey’s long, grey-flecked beard straggled down to his waist. He tugged at it as he watched the constable march off, then looked at Boltfoot with a morose, puzzled expression. His tongue lolled out like a dog’s on a hot day.

‘Mr Cooper?’

‘Aye, it’s me behind these bruises.’

‘Trug’s arse, Mr Cooper, I know that each honest parishioner must do his duty and serve a turn as constable, but that maggoty son of a whore Godfrey is too much. I say he should be strung up for having the wit of a haddock. A dead haddock. He is a night-soil man, to which I think him better suited. Now then, Mr Cooper, what have you done?’

‘Nothing. And I need your help. Free me and you will have gold.’

‘Sadly, I cannot do that, as you must know.’

‘Then get word to Mr Shakespeare for me.’

The first thing Shakespeare saw was a pair of eyes, glowing like fire. Through the cloud of his semi-conscious brain, he tried to look closer and realised that it was nothing but a black mastiff, sitting on its haunches a few yards from him. The dog’s ears were pricked and it was alert, watching him closely. The light in the animal’s eyes was the flickering reflection of a candle-flame.

He tried to step forward, towards the dog, then realised he could not shift at all, not even his arms. He was tied to a chair. His arms were bound down the sides of the high back and his ankles were fastened to the chair legs. Another rope was wound tightly around his chest, holding him back into the chair. There was a fragrant smell of incense in the air as well as some other smoke. A few feet away stood a small table with three dishes and a cup. He shivered, and realised that he was naked from the waist up.

‘The demon awakes.’

He twisted his head at the sound of the voice and a thundering pain made him groan. Now he recalled: he had been clubbed at the stables in Dowgate.

‘Where am I?’

‘Are you in pain, Mr Shakespeare? Perhaps you would like to take a drink. I will bring you water.’

He could not see her, but he recognised that strange, smoky voice. It was Beatrice Eastley, born Sorrow Gray. She moved across his field of vision. Now she was standing in front of him with her pipe in her mouth, belching forth smoke that seemed to him like the fumes of hell. She picked up the cup from the table and held it out to him. He clenched his jaw tight and averted his lips.

‘Drink.’ Roughly, she put it to his mouth. He tasted a sip, then drank greedily, but she took the cup away too soon. ‘Not too much. Food?’

‘No.’

She clutched her arms about her slender body. ‘It is cold in here, is it not? And yet outside, the day is warm.’

Her manner of speaking was spindly and curt, very unlike her sister’s in Wisbech. He studied her closely. At first sight, at the Countess of Kent’s home in Barbican Street, there had been an impression of fresh, faraway innocence in her unblemished skin, yet now he saw a strange, troubling absence in her eyes. She was garbed in a simple dress of dark red, and wore her hair uncovered. She had cut it most unusually short, so that it fell about her face like a helmet. It was the unblinking eyes that unsettled him.

‘Release me, Mistress Eastley. This is a treasonous act for which you will hang. Release me and I will protect you.’

She sucked at her pipe.

‘In the name of God, you have fallen into a conspiracy that can only help England’s enemies!’

‘Do not call on God. Call on the serpent. You are his fellow and your body is a temple to his demons.’

‘I demand of you, where am I? Why have you brought me here?’

He looked around him now, his foggy eyesight clearing, and saw that he was in some church. A thin light of reds and blues streamed through soaring stained-glass windows. At the end of the nave there was a high altar with an enormous crucifix. But this church did not hold the comfort and tranquillity of God’s house.

‘To cleanse your body and free your soul, Mr Shakespeare.’

‘Is that what Regis Roag told you?’

The name had an instant impact. He saw it in her wide eyes and realised it was the reason he was still alive, the reason his throat had not been ripped open at the Dowgate stables. They needed to know what intelligence he had. Whatever it was they were planning, they needed to be sure it had not been detected.