Roger Zelazny - If at Faust You Don't Succeed

"Gentlemen!" the publican said. "I did not see you arrive!"

"That is because you were fooling with the serving wench," Mephistopheles said.

"Not so, sir! I was behind the bar all this time, polishing the brass and chatting with Mistress Henley, who provides our daily repast."

"Well, so what if you didn't see us arrive?" Mephistopheles demanded. "Do you believe that my friend and I conjured ourselves into your low abode?"

"Not at all, my lord!" the publican declared. "It takes no witchcraft to come into this place! The door is always open and I am always ready for business! What may I bring Your Worships?"

"A bottle of your best Malmsey should do nicely," Mephistopheles said. "What do you think, Doctor?"

Mack had been gathering his wits about him, for the transition from Florence to London had been swift enough, and his clothing, which Mephistopheles had changed for him in midflight, was still unsettled. But with Mephistopheles elbowing him into the booth and the publican looking at him openmouthed, he soon recovered his native alacrity.

"Malmsey will be fine," Mack said. "And was that orlotan pie I noticed on the shelf?"

"Indeed it is, sir," the publican said.

"Then bring us a couple of slices of that," Mack said, glancing to Mephistopheles, because he wasn't entirely sure that food was included in his traveling allowance.

"Yes, and half a loaf of your best wheaten bread," Mephistopheles said. He smiled ingratiatingly. "Has Dr. John Dee been in this morning, perchance?"

"Perhaps Dame Rumor will also tell you that my friend and I are quick to chastise if we do not receive our provender promptly."

"I will see to it that the provender is brought forthwith!" the publican declared. "Polly! Get the lead out of it and serve these gentlemen their fare!" And so saying, he hurried off, the bar rag flapping from the back pocket of his broad-backed pantaloons.

"What is this placer Mack asked, as soon as they were alone. "And what did you do with Marguerite?"

"I've left her in my waiting room in Limbo," Mephistopheles said. "You need no woman along for the task that lies before you this day. As for the where of it, this is London, my dear Faust, and the year is 1588, an eventful year for England, and for you."

"For me?" Mack said. "Wherefore sayest thou?"

"It is the year and day of the premiere of the first showing of that famous play based upon your life. I refer, of course, to the Tragical History of Doctor Faustus as enacted by the players of the Earl of Nottingham and with the nonpareil Edward Alleyn in the title role. But you must have known of this in Cracow through your necromantic musings."

"Oh, yes, of course," said Mack, ever eager to take upon his shoulders the mantle of learning. "The famous play about me! And you've brought me here to see it! It is good of you, my dear Mephistopheles."

Mephistopheles frowned. "I haven't brought you all this way to sit in an audience and suck an orange and applaud the lies a poet tells. There's work for you to do here."

"Well, of course," Mack said. "I thought not otherwise. What would you have me do?"

"Hearken," Mephistopheles said, and then desisted, for Polly, the serving girl, had arrived with the orlotan pies, which were actually made of sparrows, the wheaten bread, which turned out to be oaten, and the Malmsey, which was no more than vin ordinaire from Bordeaux. Still, it was as good as you could expect from a riverside pub in the momentous year of the Spanish Armada, with plague raging in the city and the duke of Guise with his thirty thousand Spanish veterans penned up in Scheveningen and snarling across the Channel. Mephistopheles and Mack fell to with good appetite. Presently Mephistopheles pushed his plate aside and said, "Now hearken to me, Faust, for you have work to do upon this day."

"I am all ears," Mack said, "and eager to do your bidding."

"Christopher Marlowe is the author of this play," Mephistopheles said, "and he will be in the audience tonight. After the performance—which will have notable success—he will meet with a certain man, and have a conversation with him."

"Aha!" said Mack, though he wasn't sure where this was leading.

"That man," Mephistopheles said, "is Thomas Walsingham, an old friend of Marlowe's. Thomas' father, Sir Francis, is secretary of state to Elizabeth, queen of England, and he also commands her secret service, by means of which the intentions of the various factions in this war-torn year of Europe's woe will be known."

"No, no," Mephistopheles said, "you are not to touch Walsingham. Just listen."

"All right, I'm listening," Mack said.

"Walsingham will ask Marlowe to serve once again in his father's Secret Service, as he did in bygone years. Marlowe will agree. That's the fact of it. It leads to Marlowe's premature death. But in this case, immediately after Marlowe and Walsingham talk, you will seek out Marlowe and convince him to do no such thing."

"I'll convince him, all right," Mack said. "Is this Marlowe skilled at arms? I guess I'd better have some weapons for this. Do you know where I can pick up a good cudgel?"

"Forget the cudgel," Mephistopheles said. "No man ever convinced Christopher Marlowe by force, and not much by persuasion, either. No, you will demonstrate to him what the consequences of his spying for Walsingham will be."

"And what will those consequences be?"

"Five years from now, on May 30, 1593, Marlowe will go to an inn with Ingram Frizer, Robert Poley, and Nicholas Skeres. He will remonstrate with them concerning evidence he has as to their traitorous actions on behalf of Henry the Third of France, asking them to turn King's evidence and throw themselves on the mercy of the Privy Council. Scorning such a course of action, these men will seize Marlowe and stab him to death, and then bruit it about that Marlowe irrationally attacked one of them, Frizer, who, hard-pressed, killed him accidentally and in self-defense. Thus England and the world will lose its foremost poet, dead at the age of twenty-nine, whereas, had he lived, he might have been expected to write many more fine plays exposing the pretensions of standard piety."

"I get it," Mack said. "You want this Marlowe to live, is that it?"

"Oh, I wouldn't go so far as to say I want it," Mephistopheles said. "It is but a suggestion, a choice for you."

"But you have laid out the course I am to follow."

"Certainly. But only if you want to. You could also steal the magic mirror of Dr. Dee. You have heard of the famous Dr. Dee, no doubt?"

"Of course," Mack said. "But just at this moment the name 'scapes my ken."

"Dr. Dee is the foremost necromancer and magician in England, a name to be spoken in hushed tones along with those of Albertus Magnus and Cornelius Agrippa. He has been asked by no less a personage than Elizabeth of England to cast her horoscope, and the queen is noted for her hardheadedness. Dee leaves presently to take up residence at the court of Rudolph the Second of Bohemia. And he will take his magic mirror with him. You must somehow get that mirror."

"What do I need this magic mirror for?"

"Oh, you might use it to convince Marlowe to avoid working as a spy for Walsingham. When he gazes into it, the mirror will show the bloody result if he should persist in that course. Seeing his death before his very eyes should change his mind. Do you understand all that I have told you?"

"My dear fellow," Mephistopheles said, "I can't be expected to do all your work for you. Ask him.

Should he prove obdurate, give him this." Mephistopheles took a small object out of an inside pocket in his cloak, wrapped it in a scarlet silk handkerchief, and handed it to Mack. Then he arose and gathered his long black cloak closely about him. "Farewell, then, Faust, I'll await your results."