License to Quill (12 page)

“The English Crown had more to lose from these assassinations than any other kingdom in Europe. Circumstances lead me to believe that the Vatican orchestrated the murders. They have the most to gain from unrest in the East.”

Marlowe's ears pricked up at ‘Vatican.' “You're not hinting at what I think you are, are you?”

The dragoman locked his brown eyes with Marlowe's and nodded.

The poet rubbed his hands together. “So, you think the Church is using their nuns to harvest men's souls again!”

“No one would know this better than you, my experienced friend.”

“I disagree!” Marlowe grinned. “I may have caught one of their birds in the act, but she slew a friend of mine deader than I'll ever be!”

The dragoman smiled. “What was her name again?”

Marlowe's eyes were awash with happiness. “My old friend and I used to call her the Dark Lady.”

 

Chapter XIII

The Dark Lady

Many years ago, before the storm that shattered the Spanish fleet, a young woman was pulled into a grand conspiracy at a time of gods, wars, and rogues. It was a thrilling tale of intrigue and of global consequence. It was a lesson on survival, true love, and betrayal. It was one of history's greatest mysteries. It was the adventure of a lifetime, her lifetime. And it was all born of a young woman's desire to read.

Her name was Bianca.

White, shining, pure. Perfect.

Bianca.

Like the chiming of church bells in the notes of B, A, and C:
Bi-an-ca, Bi-an-ca, Bi. An. Ca.

Just to be clear, her name was Bianca even though her olive skin was quite dark.

Bianca was born in southern Italy to a family of converted Jews around the time that Shakespeare and Marlowe were speaking their first words. Bianca's parents were poor and suffered prejudice in the Spanish-ruled Kingdom of Naples, but their daughter was rich in resourcefulness and determination. She possessed height, strength, and guile that would serve her well in life, but more than anything, Bianca wanted to learn how to read. Since her parents had no money for books or tutors, she was allowed to leave home with what little they saved for her marriage and joined the first convent she found. To be a nun was a life of prayer and poverty, but it offered Bianca precisely what she was looking for: an education.

The dark lady learned to read and write in many languages, which earned her the esteem of her order. When coupled with her natural beauty and tenacity, she became too valuable for the Spanish to keep locked up during wartime. Her kingdom, just like England, needed spies to fight and die for their faith, and as a converted Jew, she was perfect—i.e. expendable. As expendable as a Catholic schoolboy in Protestant England? Yes, although Thomas Walsingham had never told this to young Kit Marlowe.

Bianca was transferred to Rome and was given an extraordinary assignment. According to the Holy See, it was her duty as a bride of Christ to protect the Church by catching and unmasking English spies throughout the city. She was allowed to use any methods necessary to accomplish this task, including the dark art of seduction. Bianca was tempted by this, but not so she could assume the role of Salome or Delilah. Instead, she took advantage of this opportunity to study alchemy, anatomy, archery, and poisons to become a far more efficient killer. The dark lady was good at what she did. Very good. That is, until a certain Jesuit from Florence turned out to be much, much better.

Young Marlowe proved a challenge for Bianca the moment he showed up in Rome. Although she was supposed to treat all new faces with suspicion, this “Cristoforo” she encountered appeared all too convincing. He looked Italian, spoke Italian, Greek, and Latin with fluency, and he presented himself as devoted to his fraternal order. The young Jesuit gave an impassioned defense when one critic questioned his faith in a display that left listeners and onlookers applauding. The young priest seemed destined for greatness; sainthood, even. And the language he used, the words … Bianca had never seen such declarations in person; she had only read about them. However, she soon realized that something was off about this “Cristoforo”: Jesuits had to forswear ambitions for higher ranks within the Church.
*
This one carried himself like a future cardinal. In reality, the masked Marlowe was unabashedly auditioning to be the next pope.

Bianca's suspicions were eventually confirmed in the Vatican, which she routinely visited disguised as a priest. Within the Cortile del Belvedere courtyard of the Vatican Palace, the tall, bearded Bianca spied her target in conversation with other Jesuits in front of the great Laocoön statue. The young priest said one line in particular that resonated with his eavesdropper: how Helen of Troy possessed “the face that launched a thousand ships” and brought Laocoön, his sons, and all Ilium to their doom. Bianca had heard Marlowe use those same words to a cardinal days earlier while admiring the
Venus Felix
at the Cortile delle Statue. At that moment, the incognito lady realized why this mysterious Jesuit was so well spoken: he was reading lines. Everything he said and did was a performance, an act designed to distract and dazzle. And as far as actors went, this wolf in priest's clothes was greater than any she had ever encountered.

Had he heard these thoughts, the great Christopher Marlowe would have agreed.

Now that Bianca had identified her opponent, the dark lady went to work on him with her deadly art. She started by staring at the Jesuit with looks that would have pierced any man's holy armor. He never noticed. She then crossed paths with Marlowe and dropped a scented handkerchief for him to find. He walked around it. Frustrated, Bianca chose a more aggressive means of disposal than she preferred: she cornered “Cristoforo” alone in the Vatican Library with an illuminated copy of Boccaccio's
Decameron
. She looked her adversary in the eyes and demanded that they read the tale of Masetto da Lamporecchio and his lusty nuns. Amused, Marlowe took the book, glanced this way and that way to make sure they were alone, and agreed—but only if they retreated to his apartment. The dark lady grinned, and was then rudely knocked over the head by the heavy tome. After looking around one final time, Marlowe dragged the dark lady behind a bookshelf and into one of the many passageways hidden throughout the Vatican. After being carried across the Passetto di Borgo—Marlowe killed the guards there without difficulty—Bianca woke up bound by her own rosary in a prison cell at the Castel Sant'Angelo. Her captor, who found a stiletto blade hidden in her habit, pressed the dagger against her breast and threatened to do “what Menelaus could not do to Helen” unless Bianca quit acting and started singing.

Understandably, the dark lady was outraged. She had never been bested by anyone, never mind a man as impudent and patronizing as Marlowe. Furious over her failure, she chose death and spat in the Englishman's face. She then threw herself onto her own dagger, but Marlowe pulled it back in time to deny her suicide. Aside from the incident with Boccaccio, Marlowe had no desire to see the dark lady harmed. “If I wanted you dead,” the unmasked spy explained, “I would have strangled you at the basilica and thrown your body into the tomb of some unimportant pope.” It would have been centuries before someone discovered her body. Instead, Marlowe wanted to barter for Bianca's life. She resisted and shouted for help, but her brash captor explained “everyone in Rome is used to hearing screams from the Castel.” He then opened a leather bag and offered the dark lady some wine. She refused, so Marlowe made himself comfortable on the dungeon floor and began negotiations. He did not care if it took all night; Marlowe was determined to have the dark lady leave with him for England instead of becoming a permanent resident in the Castel. Bianca refused to speak. Fortunately, Christopher Marlowe
loved
to talk. And so, for the dark lady, the torture began.

After spending the next few hours regaling her with his life's story, the rogue got down to business and explained that he had already finished his undercover work in Italy. A boat along the Tiber was waiting to carry him out of Rome and off to sea at any moment. Marlowe was just biding his time for research and for love of art since he figured he would never be coming back to the city. He then emptied his bag and showed Bianca everything he had on him: purloined letters, state documents, cipher keys—both his own and stolen—a list of English double agents, some souvenirs, and even a list of friendly spies in Italy. Several of the names, Marlowe mentioned, that belonged to men the dark lady murdered. It was more information than Bianca could be kept alive with. “You do not know it yet,” he taunted, “but I have already killed you.” If he left the dark lady with just one of these documents in her cell, she would be executed for treason—that is, assuming someone found her before she starved to death.

Marlowe promised Bianca anything she wanted if she would join the English: wealth, land, a new life, anything she desired or believed she deserved. “Even love! Does that interest you?” The dark lady turned away, and the poet smiled. After several more hours of negotiating and … well, lots of wine, an increasingly drunk and desperate Marlowe came back to his personal items, which he presented to his captive as if holy relics. After failing to entice the dark lady with his unwashed linens, Marlowe finally got a word out of her when he offered her a stack of poetry.

“Poetry?” she asked with an equal hint of sarcasm, exhaustion, and—if Marlowe heard correctly—
curiosity
? The spy's eyes brightened. He scooted over and read the poems aloud, first in English and then translated into Italian. Once he was out of pages, Marlowe asked Bianca if she enjoyed the writing. She did not answer. He then asked: “Would you like them more knowing that I had no hand in them? They're from a friend of mine back in England.”

At long last, the dark lady turned her head.

“He's a bright lad!” Marlowe touted. An “upstart crow” in London who had sent Marlowe letters once he learned of his plays. Not unlike Dante and Cavalcanti, whom Marlowe correctly guessed Bianca was familiar with, the two poets enjoyed a friendly exchange, swapping sonnets in exchange for each other's feedback. Quite a few of these poems detailed his friend's wish for a happy marriage. “If you come to England with me, I can offer you this man. You may meet him, you may appraise him, and if you desire, you may have him.” Marlowe asked the dark lady to think this over while it was still dark enough for them to escape. He folded his arms and leaned back to nap.

However, as Marlowe rested, Bianca reread the poems. She then kicked her captor awake. “I choose to live,” she decided. Marlowe lifted the young woman onto her feet, cut her free from her rosary, and led her out of the Castel by torchlight. Once at sea, the former nun and false priest left Rome with the sunrise behind them.

And so the dark lady came to England. She met the legendary Sir Francis Walsingham, to whom she told everything that could be useful to the English spy network. She shared what Vatican ciphers she knew with Thomas Phelippes, Sir Francis's chief cryptographer. She outlined every method used by Spanish spies and assassins, including where they operated and what they earned so that they could be bought or disposed of. And, perhaps most important, Bianca was able to make sense of the conflicting reports Walsingham had on the movement of the Spanish Armada. She looked over the letters Marlowe brought from Walsingham's chief informant in Florence, Pompeo Pellegrini, and filled in their holes with what she knew: that the Spanish were not planning to invade England until 1588. It was the greatest breakthrough in English intelligence throughout the war, and Bianca's insight provided Walsingham with the foreknowledge he needed to adequately prepare England's defenses. The dark lady was rewarded with a pension, her own building in Southwark, and even the identity of a man so that she could legally own her property. It was more than any English spy ever received for their services, including Marlowe, who seemed satisfied with his prize: a license to write and perform his plays free from censorship. “This license,” he bragged to Bianca, “will be what kills me!” He was right.

For the moment, all seemed well. For the moment, Bianca was happy.

But for only a moment.

No matter what her compulsion within the Castel, Bianca became genuinely interested in the poet Marlowe spoke so highly about throughout their two-thousand-mile trip back to England—when he was not talking about himself. The mysterious bard behind those sonnets that ultimately saved her life was already in London when she and Marlowe arrived. With Marlowe as her matchmaker, the dark lady got to meet the young crow in person. She found him seated by himself, writing in the Mermaid Tavern on Cheapside. Once the bard and dark lady locked eyes, what happened next was the stuff of sonnets: poetry that Bianca coauthored.

Within her lover's embrace, Bianca was happier than she ever dreamed possible. That is, until she learned that this “upstart crow” longed for a loving marriage because he was trapped in an unhappy one, and with children. Marlowe had deliberately hidden this from the dark lady with his silver-tongued logic since he was so desperate to bring her to England as a war spoil that would win him artistic freedom. It was a trick made more painful by how Bianca learned this: from the bard. Although he knew nothing about Marlowe's grand schemes, the playwright left out certain details about his life when he and the dark lady met. Once he told her the truth, it was too late for his past actions to amount to anything other than betrayal.

The dark lady was trapped in England, and her new home became her prison. The Walsinghams would never let her leave London after what she had learned of their spy network. Bianca had become a traitor to her homeland and to her Church, and as a Catholic captive in England, could never return to either. She never saw her parents again or learned of their fates. She could never thank them for the life they gave her or apologize for how she squandered it. Instead of the pastoral fields of Italy, she was condemned to the stinking, plague-filled squalor of London.