An Honourable Murderer (10 page)

“An unfortunate outcome would not reflect well on the Company,” said Shakespeare.

‘An unfortunate outcome'. The phrase sounded roundabout, almost diplomatic. So I asked WS whether he had any reason to expect trouble.

“This situation is like a cauldron into which all sorts of odds and ends are being thrown,” said WS. “Ben's patrons now, Sir Philip and Lady Blake. There is coldness between them. And Jonson has connections with the man Giles Cass, who is a weathervane. He once veered towards Raleigh. Now he veers towards Cecil.”

“I know. I don't trust him.”

“Then there are the Spaniards at Somerset House. I would be interested to have your account of them.”

“I'll keep my eyes open – though I hardly know what it is I'm looking for,” I said.

“Thank you,” said WS, making to move off. I sensed that he was a little uncomfortable with the request he'd just made. Then he suddenly stopped and looked down, as if deep in thought.

“Have you cut yourself?”

“What? No, I don't think so.”

Shakespeare was gazing at the bare boards. A spatter of blood-red drops had appeared on the floor between us. Instinctively we stepped back. Even as I watched, another drop fell to leave its mark on the stage. I looked up. So did the playwright.

“Hey. You there!” WS called. “Take care with your brush.”

After a moment a gargoyle of a face thrust itself over the side of the aerial platform and leered in our direction.

“Whassat, mate?”

“Be careful, man. You're covering us with red paint.”

“Red paint?”

The big-nosed visage vanished from view. When it reappeared it was accompanied by a hand clutching a brush.

“No red paint 'ere.”

Even from our position on the ground, we were able to see that his brush was tipped with a dark blue colour. Not surprising really if you're painting the sky.

“Only blue up 'ere, see.”

As if to confirm this, a couple of blue drops now flew down to join the scatter of red ones on the floor.

“You're right,” said WS. “Sorry to have interrupted you.”

“'sallright, mate.”

The head vanished again.

“And it cannot be that other fellow now,” I said, pointing to the second painter who was still sitting astride his plank at some yards' distance and who was carefully running his brush along one of the ribs or frets which divided the ceiling into segments. “He is using gold paint.”

“It's a mystery. You like mysteries, Nick,” said Shakespeare, gazing down once more at the cluster of red drops. Already the wooden flooring seemed to have drunk them up, and they had lost some of their brightness. WS spoke lightly and turned away. A man used to dealing with the higher mysteries, perhaps he was not over-concerned with little ones.

Nor was I, much.

But the blood-red drops on the playhouse stage, if they were no great mystery, were certainly an omen.

That night I woke up with a start in the widow Buckle's house. I sat up in bed. What had woken me? Some sound? No. The house was quiet apart from the tiny creaks and groans which you never notice during the daytime. A bad dream? Maybe. I couldn't recall what, if anything, had been going through my head beforehand.

Nor could I get back to sleep. Instead I lay down and returned to the conversation with John Ratchett in the Pure Waterman. I'd attended another practice for the
Masque of Peace
and, in a somewhat half-hearted fashion, had begun to write down my observations on the event. I felt uncomfortable, spying. I was doing this for money, wasn't I? But I was also doing the state some service, wasn't I? Duty and profit. Where was the harm?

And then Master Ratchett's expression came back to me.
Can I put money in your purse, Nicholas?
(Why yes, you can, John Ratchett. Feel free to load it with as many sovereigns as it will hold. I will be able to carry them, however many.)

Put money in thy purse.

These are the words of the villainous Iago in WS's
Othello
, the play which Shakespeare had mentioned to me on the Globe stage. Although I'd had only a couple of small parts in the previous performance, I was familiar with the story of
Othello
.

Ordinary players don't normally get an overview of the works they're acting in unless they have meaty parts like the ones that go to Dick Burbage. But back in the spring of this year Geoffrey Allison, the Globe book-keeper, had asked me to pick up the fair copies of Shakespeare's latest from our scrivener, a gent in Paul's Yard who spends his life bent over other men's scrawlings and who looks up at you with the wide-eyed surprise of an owl. WS must be comparatively easy to copy out, however, since I'm told he doesn't blotch or cross through his lines. Anyway, before I returned to the Globe with my precious cargo of fair copies, I ducked into a quiet corner of St Paul's and had a quick read-through of the play. Naturally, I imagined myself in one or two of the principal roles.

But I knew I'd never get them.
Othello
is a duel of wits between the Moor and his wicked lieutenant Iago, who tempts and seduces his commander into the belief that Othello's new wife Desdemona is unfaithful. Only three people – Othello, Iago and Desdemona – are of much importance in this vicious triangle. Dick Burbage was bound to play the part of the Moor, while the voluble villain would be taken by one of our other seniors (as it turned out, Iago was played by Henry Condell), and Desdemona could only be the property of one of our boy-players. The rest of the characters hardly mattered since they were so much clay in the hands of Iago. I wouldn't have minded playing the dashing Cassio, the honourable ladies' man. I could have dealt with the dupe Roderigo. In the event I wound up with the white-bearded senator and the drunken soldier.

Lying sleepless in my chamber in the house of Mrs Buckle, I wondered about purses and the putting of money into them. Wondered whether John Ratchett, who was paying me to give intelligence on Jonson's
Masque of Peace
, had seen
Othello
when we'd first staged the play at the Globe in the spring. Had he picked up Iago's phrase and, forgetting its origin, used a version of it when he was trying to tempt me?
Put money in thy purse
.

Perhaps I should return the three sovereigns and refuse to write any spy-reports, should have nothing more to do with John Ratchett. That would be risking the displeasure of the Privy Council. But what could the Council do to a free and guiltless Englishman? The answer was, they could do a great deal. A great deal to make life uncomfortable, and worse than uncomfortable.

These were my night thoughts. Now I wished that I'd never listened to Master Ratchett. True, he had saved me halfway through being beaten up on the river bank. I could feel the bruising down my sides, worse at night. The arrival of the man in the red doublet had been opportune. Very opportune. What if –?

But I got no further in my speculations because the night silence was suddenly disturbed by a noise somewhere between a cry and a groan. It came from outside my room.

Without striking a light, I got out of bed, crossed the floor and opened the chamber door. My room was on the top storey. Mrs Buckle and her daughter Elizabeth had their bedrooms below. The runny-nosed girl slept somewhere off the kitchen. I saw my landlady where she stood in the open area at the top of the stairs leading to the ground floor. She was in her night-clothes, holding a candle and staring fixedly at the uppermost corner of the stairs. Her eyes were wide open, but I am not sure whether she was really seeing anything.

In a tavern near the Bristol docks I once witnessed a young woman being put into a trance by a man who came off a ship. The woman had gazed about with the same blank vision as Mrs Buckle's, until the sailor had restored her to herself by snapping his fingers and whispering some words in her ear. Uncertain what to do next, I had half a mind to leave Mrs Buckle alone. There was no sign of Elizabeth. Then a low moan emerged from the widow's lips and the hand holding the candle became agitated. The light fluttered and I suddenly grew afraid that the flame would set fire to her nightdress. Almost before I was aware of it, I was down the narrow stairs connecting the first and second floors.

Mrs Buckle gave no sign that she'd heard or seen me but the candle stopped weaving about. Now she was standing like a statue once more, and her gaze had returned to the vacant corner by the top of the stairs. The candle illuminated a curiously placid expression on her face, still as a mask. We were only a few feet apart.

Gingerly, I stretched out an open hand. Light spilled on to my palm from her candle, and the shadows shifted around us. At once, Mrs Buckle seemed to come to herself. I can't think of any other way to describe it than to say that her eyes, which had been empty, became full. It was like pouring wine into a glass.

“Nicholas, it's you. What are you doing?”

“Are you all right, Mrs Buckle?”

“My husband was telling me . . . telling me . . .”

“Your husband . . .”

“He was telling me . . . something.”

“When?”

“Just now.”

“He is dead, Mrs Buckle.”

“Why, so he is.”

She looked down, as if conscious for the first time that she was dressed in her night things, and then looked at the space between us. After a time she said, “I shall return to my room now.”

And she turned about and entered her chamber, her candle lighting the way to bed. She shut the door. I clambered up the ladder-like stairs to the second floor and shut my own chamber door. I lay down on my bed.

I don't know whether Mrs Buckle found it easy to get back to sleep but I was thoroughly awake by now. Dawn was a good few hours off.

I struck a light and examined the notes which I'd made on that day's practice for the
Masque of Peace
in the great room in the Blakes' mansion overlooking the river.

The notes were scrappy – and not very revealing. I wasn't sure how I could work them up into a ‘manuscript' which would be worth three pounds to Master Ratchett and the Privy Council. All I had were a handful of gobbets picked up in overheard conversations or jibes thrown about the room during gaps in the rehearsal. There were other individuals in the practice room, like the Scaridges and the Fortunes. (It's odd how easily one gets used to throwing off these noble names, as if one was mingling with them every day.) But I will concentrate here on those who are relevant to this story.

For example, I had picked up an anti-Spanish comment from William Inman, secretary to Sir Philip Blake. Yes, an anti-Spanish comment, such as you may hear a dozen times over standing on any street corner in London for half an hour. In his bluff, hearty manner, Bill Inman had said something about preferring a Spanish
piece
to peace with Spain, although both were likely to prove poxy and rotten. He accompanied the remark with a rude gesture. Then he'd caught Mistress Maria More looking reprovingly at him. This was important information, and certainly worth reporting in a despatch to Robert Cecil.

Martin Barton, the red-headed satirical playwright, was talking about art. He had been boasting to Abel Glaze and Maria about the gratifying reception given to his recent tragedy
The Melancholy Man
. But I think he was doing this to needle Ben Jonson, who was in earshot and whose own late attempt at a court-tragedy had flopped so lamentably in a play called
Sejanus
. Barton was not a player – there was something about his combination of red hair and spindly little legs which would have made him suitable only for clown's parts – but Jonson had given him a part as Poesy and Drama in the masque. Maybe mischievously, Jonson had written almost no words to go with this role. Barton seemed content, however, drinking up his surroundings. I reckoned he was storing up material for his next satire and thinking how much better he could have managed the whole business. He was one of those people who are happiest feeling superior.

Giles Cass, the dapper go-between, was also talking about art. He was praising Queen Anne, assuring us that we professional players would find in her a woman of taste who – had destiny not called her to the supreme role in public life as a king's consort – might have excelled in any of the arts. He dabbed at his mouth while he mentioned the Queen, as if he could only do so with clean lips.

I enjoyed a chat with Sir Philip Blake which, after he'd cleared his throat, went in its entirety as follows:

Sir Philip Blake
: Oh, er, Ignorance!

Nicholas Revill
: Ah, Sir Philip.

Sir Philip Blake
: Very good.

In fact I saw and heard nothing of any significance during our time with the Blakes. Nothing except for a couple of exchanges. One was harmless, I think, or at least predictable. And I hardly knew what to make of the other.

Martin Barton accosted me at one point. He waved his hand about the room and said, “What do you think of all this?”

“Think of it?”

“Is there honesty here?”

“As much as anywhere,” I said.

“I tell you there is more honour and honesty in the thumb of a single craftsman than there is in all these finely swathed corpses.”

“If you say so.”

But Barton wasn't interested in agreement or disagreement. He'd approached me only in order to unburden himself. Perhaps he'd had enough of being struck virtually dumb as Poesy. I was treated to a rant about the corruption of the court and the age which might have come from one of his plays. Everything was foul and decayed. It might look fine on the surface but poke your finger through, and it was all seething rottenness underneath, food for worms. I nodded politely, not wanting to spoil the satirist's enjoyment, but eventually I just had to excuse myself. A call of nature, you know.

I was out of the room for a few moments answering nature's call. In less grand surroundings I might have pissed in a randomly chosen fireplace, as one would in an inn, but somehow I didn't think they'd approve of that sort of behaviour in this sort of place. So I dropped in on the servants' privy in the back quarters of the establishment. Even here the buckets seemed to have an extra sheen, no doubt on account of the reflected nobility of the retainers' gilded waste. In the main bedrooms upstairs the chamber pots were most likely silver.