Her Last Assassin (27 page)

Marlowe slipped past him, and the door closed.

The corridor was dark and empty. Goodluck edged nearer the door, listening hard for the sound of voices within. But all he could hear was a muffled exchange between the two men. They were speaking quietly, as though afraid of being overheard. Then the earl suddenly exclaimed, ‘No!’ and Marlowe’s voice dropped to a whisper.

The scraping of a chair indicated that the interview was at an end. Goodluck hurried into a shadowy doorway further along the hall and waited, his cap drawn down.

A moment later, the door opened and Marlowe emerged. Bowing briefly, the young man returned the way he had come, once more wrapped in his cloak, a huddled figure unlikely to excite comment among the hurrying palace servants.

Essex turned and came slowly towards Goodluck’s hiding place, his head bent in thought, a hand resting on the jewelled hilt of his sword.

‘My lord,’ Goodluck muttered, and the earl’s head came up, frowning.

He stared at Goodluck through the gloom, then a wry smile twisted his mouth. ‘I should have known nothing would escape your attention, Master Goodluck.’ He glanced over his shoulder but the corridor was still empty. ‘You recognized my visitor?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘And now you are wondering at our business together?’ Essex shrugged. ‘I keep many irons in the fire. Some are hotter to the touch than others. Not that it concerns you, but to lay your mind at rest, I have spoken with young Marlowe about his presence in the Low Countries at the time of the Spanish Armada’s launch, and his visit to Stanley’s house. I am convinced by what he has told me that he plays the villain for our benefit, and at his late master Walsingham’s express command.’

‘He spies for both sides, then?’

‘But is loyal to England, yes.’ Essex was clearly impatient. ‘I must attend the Queen for Sunday Mass. What of you, Goodluck? Marlowe tells me that our man may be a foreigner, not English as we originally suspected. But nothing is certain, and he fears this could be another false lead, thrown out by our conspirators themselves to send us off the track. So still we search.’

Essex hesitated, looking hard at him. ‘Have you anything new for me? Are you any closer to discovering the identity of the traitor we seek?’

Goodluck had to admit that he was not. The earl swept on, leaving him alone in the corridor.

Contemplating the earl’s disappearing back, his thoughts were bitter. But what use to complain that he was hunting for a thimble in the dark, when he had willingly accepted this task, knowing success to be unlikely?

He made his way back to the kitchens, for further tasks would await him there to be completed before the servants were called to Mass. There were several men he was watching within the Queen’s household, but so far he had been unable to find evidence of any conspiracy or wrongdoing there. It seemed to him that this trail had indeed gone cold, as he had warned Essex before.

Yet Marlowe appeared to have brought the earl credible intelligence that some threat to Her Majesty was still afoot.

How was that possible? What leads had young Marlowe pursued that had been denied to Goodluck?

I am jealous
, he thought ironically, and had to laugh.
Fool that I am.
Jealous of a young man for possessing more information than he had been able to glean. And yet they were both working for the Queen’s safety. Or so Essex would have him believe. Perhaps the ambitious earl was more trusting of Marlowe than he should be, this hunt for a non-existent traitor merely a desperate bid to impress the Queen.

I must tread carefully
, he told himself.
If things run foul, it will be my neck that swings, not his lordship’s.

Voices ahead, muttering together as though in some secret conversation, brought him up short. Suddenly alert, he flattened himself behind a stack of crates and peered round. The corridor was dark here, no torches nor openings to weather that might afford light. But he recognized one of the men’s voices.

It was Marlowe, his back towards him, speaking softly to a hooded and cloaked figure whose face he could not see.

‘Come, I must give them a date.’

The other man replied, his voice low and harried, accented. Possibly Spanish? ‘Forgive me, but to give a date … It must be the work of a seized moment. She is too closely guarded.’

‘The King grows impatient with your delays. He demands a date. This month? Next? He will not wait for ever, and then …’

The man sounded terrified. ‘Yes, yes, I understand. But please … you must give us more time.’

‘Your master has had years to prepare for this.’

‘It is not an easy thing,’ the man muttered. ‘To take such a life …’

A serving man came puffing down the corridor under the weight of a tray of flagons, and both conspirators moved aside to let him pass, their faces hidden. The man glanced at both, his round face frowning, but continued on without comment. Goodluck drew closer into the wall, and was relieved when the serving man turned aside into another corridor leading up to the ground floor. It would not have done to be discovered down here, not when Marlowe knew him by sight.

The two men seemed to have been unsettled by this interruption; nothing more was said as they stood, listening to the man’s receding footsteps.

‘It will be done soon. That is all my master can promise.’ The man turned and hurried away into the darkness.

If Marlowe knew the identity of the traitor, and was speaking to him or his servant here, why would he not have communicated this information to his master, Essex? The only explanation was that Kit Marlowe was not merely aping a double game between England and Spain, but was secretly in the service of King Philip.

Yet how to convince Essex of such treachery, when the young earl clearly favoured Marlowe above him and would hear no suspicion raised against him?

Marlowe pulled his hood down to cover his face and began to move away, then halted, glancing back over his shoulder as though some sixth sense had warned him that he was being observed.

Goodluck stood still, head lowered, hoping he would be hidden behind the stack of crates. A few uncomfortable seconds passed in silence, then he heard Marlowe walk on.

Had he been seen?

Goodluck had only meant to close his eyes for a short while, resting on his straw pallet after the day’s labour, but when he woke, night had fallen and the room was dark.

A quiet knocking at his door had woken him. He rose and listened, frowning.

‘Goodluck? Are you there?’

In a guilty rush he remembered his arrangement with Lucy, and was suddenly alert. He drew back the bolt and opened the door. She stood in the doorway, holding a small lantern, the flame sharply illuminating her face.

‘Lucy, forgive me,’ he managed, barely able to meet her gaze. ‘I … I fell asleep. Come in.’

His blunt admission did not seem to ease the sudden awkwardness between them. Cloaked and hooded for disguise, Lucy looked as uncertain about this secret assignation as he was. Acutely aware of his own dishevelled appearance, Goodluck gestured her inside the room, then combed down his unkempt hair and fastened his loose-hanging shirt.

While he knelt to kindle a fire, Lucy stood in the middle of the candlelit chamber, keeping clear of the narrow window where she might have been seen from the courtyard below.

‘I could not come any sooner. The Queen has not been well.’

‘Yet still you came.’

She swung off her cloak, turning to face him as he straightened, her eyes lowered. Had she registered the surprise in his voice?

‘As you see.’

‘Did you check you were not followed?’

She bit her lip, then shook her head. ‘Forgive me, I … I did not think.’

‘No matter,’ he reassured her, and managed a smile, though in truth he was a little unsettled by her admission. To be discovered here, alone together, would not easily be explained, not even by their old relationship of guardian and child. For those days were long gone. ‘I am sure we will be safe enough here from prying eyes.’

Goodluck knew his own fears about this meeting, but he had not expected Lucy herself to be shy. Not after her affair with Shakespeare. It pleased him, because it suggested feelings which matched his own. Or was that merely his own wish, preventing his ability to read Lucy as he would any other woman?

He saw her shivering, and frowned, cursing his own stupidity at not staying awake and kindling a fire earlier to warm the chamber.

‘This place is too cold,’ he muttered, glancing about the small, grim tower chamber where he slept. ‘There is not even a chair for your comfort. I should not have asked you here at this hour.’

She came to him, rustling in her broad-skirted court gown, seed pearls along her white bodice. Her eyes met his in frankness. ‘Do not say you regret it. I could not bear it if you were to send me away now. You do not know how much courage was required to climb those stairs.’

She smiled wryly, adding, ‘And breath, for they are steep and many, and I am no longer young.’

He saw the fine lines about her eyes and mouth, and recognized the truth in that. He had been her guardian once, and had protected her like his own daughter. But Lucy was no longer a child. She had loved one man, and married another to hide her shame, then miscarried the ill-starred child in her belly. She knew her own mind now, and her appetites, and if she felt no strangeness in this, then why should he?

‘You are younger than I am,’ he pointed out.

Her smile faded. ‘Goodluck, you are not old.’ She put a hand on his chest and stood, head on one side, as though listening to the beat of his heart. ‘Besides, I love you.’

He drew her close, looking into her face. He had waited so long, so long …

And yet, if she was at all uncertain about this desire between them, he could wait a little longer. For ever, if need be. He would take nothing from Lucy that did not come willingly.

Goodluck stroked her cheek.

‘And Shakespeare?’

She had not changed much since leaving her girlhood behind. Her cheek was still soft, her nature one of curiosity and goodness. Still, she was no fool, this woman he had raised. She could not only sing and dance to charm the coldest court, but could handle a knife, decode a secret message, and had even learned to smell out a villain, however cunningly he might conceal himself.

His traitorous old companion John Twist had taught her that lesson himself. Never trust anyone, however close to your heart.

Yet to love was to trust. Could Lucy do either, given her upbringing at the hands of a spy?

Could he?

‘I love Will too,’ she replied simply, rubbing her cheek against his hand. ‘But not like I love you. When I was younger, I thought the world only turned one way. That if a woman loved a man, it was for ever and she could love no other. But I know the truth now.’

She looked stubborn, her chin jutting out, her eyes searching his in the candlelight as she struggled to explain her innermost thoughts. He let her speak, though she might have been describing his own feelings.

‘There are many different kinds of love, and it is entirely possible to love more than one person at once, and even to fall out of love and into hate, then love the same person again with all your heart, and not understand the reason why, but suffer the pain of this torment, and have no release except to tell them – and hope they feel the same.’ Her voice broke suddenly. ‘Which too often they do not.’

It was difficult to keep the anger out of his voice. ‘Has Shakespeare hurt you again?’

‘He no longer has the power to hurt me, Goodluck. But you do.’

‘I would never hurt you.’

She smiled painfully. ‘Not by design, perhaps.’

‘Lucy,’ he muttered.

Her gaze moved to his mouth, and he could not help himself. He took her by the shoulders and kissed her, his touch urgent. His hands stroked to her waist, then suddenly the chill air took flame, burning between them like the logs in the hearth.

She helped him with her gown, all intricate fastenings and frustrating silken layers he had not known with the women he had lain with before. Nor was her body like that of any other woman he had seen naked, being strong and black, her curves bold and womanly, almost statuesque. He wrenched at his own clothes, but she did not seem inclined to wait, so they collapsed together on to the straw pallet with him half clothed, his need for her obvious, her mouth on his. She knew what to do, as eager for this consummation as he was, her hands less shy than her smile as she moved him inside her.

He gasped, looking up at her naked and astride him. Her spirit shone out in the dark of the evening, her body glowing as she rose and fell as though dancing with him, her dark-tipped breasts flickering with firelight.

Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

‘I love you,’ he whispered, and she leaned forward, laughing, kissing his mouth.

‘I love you too, Goodluck.’

He captured her hands in his, drawing them to his bared chest. Her skin was so warm. ‘My Christian name is Faithful.’

‘Faithful,’ she repeated, then kissed him again, more lingeringly. ‘I should have known. It suits you.’

‘I cannot think why I hid it from you.’

Her smile was slow. ‘Because I did not need to know you were Faithful until this moment.’

Her naked limbs rubbed against his, drawing a groan of exquisite pleasure from him. He could bear much more of this torment, he realized, and felt his control begin to slip.

Almost feverish in his haste, Goodluck drew her down to him. He kissed her bare shoulder, her throat, her delicious mouth, then turned her over on the straw pallet so that she lay beneath him.

He dragged off his shirt, suddenly burning hot in the chill of the wintry evening, then pressed her down into the rough mattress, muttering between her breasts, ‘You truly want this, Lucy? You are certain? We must be careful. I do not wish to make a child.’

‘I will not stop you.’

Lucy stroked down his back, her eyes huge and dark, her lips parted with passion, and it was all he could do not to achieve his end there and then.