His Dark Lady (18 page)

Will felt uneasy and sat up straight. ‘I am not a spy,’ he replied with some irritation, though speaking carefully in a whisper. He was uncomfortably aware that his mother overhead might be able to hear what they were discussing. Through the cracks in the ceiling, he could see light from her candle as she moved about. ‘I told Richard I would listen to what was being said in the inns and
theatres
, and if there was any news which concerned the Ardens, I would write to tell him of it. Yes, people talked. But it meant nothing. It was just idle chatter. There was never any threat, not once Arden’s head was on a pike on London Bridge and his son-in-law’s alongside.’

‘That poor boy was a fool,’ his father muttered. ‘He should never have been allowed to do what he did.’

‘It was never about Somerville,’ Will pointed out, ‘though his mad rantings against the Queen started the affair. Arden made too many enemies, that was why he had to die. And those who wanted him publicly shamed and executed got their desire. Once the head of the family was dead, and the Arden name disgraced, the rest of us were unimportant. I did not write because I am not a spy and there was nothing to tell. Not because I wished anyone in Warwickshire harm. I was relieved to hear that they released his wife and daughter though.’

John Shakespeare got up and prodded the fire with an iron. ‘Well, I shall not go on about the matter. I just wanted to be sure. But all’s well that ends well. We survived that month, and things seem to have died down for now. Your Arden cousins still live undisturbed, albeit less wealthily than before, and your mother need not fear for our lives as she once did.’

‘I am glad.’ Will loosened his belt, not used to eating so well as he had done that evening at his father’s table. Another reason to be glad he was home, he thought wryly, was the quantity of simple, fresh food served up at dinner. ‘But what of you, father? My cousin Richard told me there had been some trouble in the town.’

‘Did he, now?’

‘Some matter of an unpaid debt.’

His father grunted. ‘I have more unpaid debts than I have gloves for sale in my workshop. Yet at least these are honest debts. The fines are worse. For not attending church when I should. For selling wool when I should not. Next I shall be fined for breathing in the street and for making merry when I am sent to court again.’

Will laughed reluctantly.

His father continued, ‘But yes, it was a bad year, and this one has been little better. Your cousin did not lie. I should wish you home again, but you have your own life now. Do they treat you well, these theatricals?’

‘As well as they treat anyone.’

‘Did you know that Anne talks of travelling down to London to live with you there?’

Will stiffened at the suggestion. He shook his head. ‘London is no place for a decent woman to live. Nor a young child.’

‘I have no doubt of that, Will,’ his father said heavily. ‘I know how it goes when a young man takes himself off to a city. But your wife will not listen to reason.’

‘You think I visit whores and spend my nights drinking?’

‘Do you not?’

‘I may be young, but I am no fool. Listen, Father, London is dangerous. Plague is rife in the summer, and even the beggars will not venture within the walls while it is raging. I cannot allow Anne and Susanna to come to me there. It would be like signing their death warrants.’

His father nodded with satisfaction. ‘I knew you would not. Besides, none of us want that. Your mother would miss Anne terribly if she left Stratford. And the babe, too. When you first made the match, well, we thought Anne too old for you, and too high above herself. But she is a good mother, I will give her that. Though she pines for another child.’

Another child? Will sat a moment in silence, unsure whether to tell his father to mind his own damned business or explain why such a thing was impossible. Then he shook himself and stood up, stretching his back out. ‘Time for bed. Will you damp down the fire or should I?’

‘Leave it to me, you must be tired.’ His father stood, too. He laid a quick hand on Will’s shoulder. ‘Forgive me if I seem to interfere. But Anne is a good wife, and you are away so much. Another child would at least give her some comfort. And your mother, too.’

Will managed a smile and said goodnight. He let himself through next door and up the narrow, creaking stairs to the chamber he shared with Anne and the baby. He had not brought a candle and had to feel his way in darkness. He stood before the chamber door a moment, brooding on what his father had said, then opened the latch and slipped inside.

Fourteen

ONE EVENING, GOODLUCK
opened his eyes and was astonished to find he was still not dead. Nor did the room spin around him as it had done for days. The stale air in the cabin seemed fresher, as though the trapdoor had been left open on to the river, and the hanging lamp glowed rather than glared, swinging softly with the motion of the barge. He was even able to turn his head to look at its steady flame without burning out his eye sockets. Goodluck had been left to lie propped up on his side for more days than he could remember, but now at last could feel his back beginning to mend. He was stiff and still in pain, but he was no longer aware of the agonizing edge of mortality, where the slightest movement had left him close to sickness and fainting.

It was surely a miracle that he was still alive. If the man’s thrust had not done for him, the river would have finished the job. Yet here he was, still breathing.

He struggled to recall exactly what had happened that day on the riverfront. But all he remembered was the agony of steel entering his body, then a long fall into water, the icy shock of it slamming into his body like stone.

When the heavily cloaked boatman came shuffling down into the cabin an hour or so later, Goodluck made an effort to raise his head from the pillow. Outside, he could hear an insistent pattering of rain on the wooden deck, then the softer fall on to water beyond.

‘Who are you?’ he questioned him. The boatman, as usual, made
no
answer. He really was a taciturn fellow, Goodluck thought irritably. He tried again, though in little expectation of a reply. ‘Where are we? Still on the Thames? Come, man, how long have I been here?’

The boatman came over to examine his back. From what Goodluck had guessed by glancing gingerly over his shoulder whenever this was done, his injury had been swathed in cloths that stank of some grisly ointment. The boatman grunted over the wound for a long while, each poke drawing a hiss of exquisite agony from Goodluck’s lips. Then he peeled away a few of the stiff, bloodstained cloths and tossed them aside.

‘Your back’s healing well,’ the boatman muttered in a gruff voice as he worked. ‘I thought you were sure to die at first, but it missed your heart. Go about things carefully, and you could be on your feet in a few days.’

‘I am glad to hear it, and I thank you for saving my life. But wait, answer me this,’ Goodluck insisted, grabbing at the man’s arm as he turned away, ‘are we still in London? And how long have I been in bed? What day is this?’

‘We’re moored on the Thames three miles downstream from Richmond, and the month is June.’ The boatman shook him off with an unexpected vehemence, his voice rising oddly. ‘Now lie still before you burst your wound again and die of a fever!’

The man’s hood had fallen away in his anger, revealing swathes of filthy, matted hair. Goodluck caught a glimpse of a swarthy face beneath the hair, but no beard, nor any sign of one, and no moustache either.

The boatman saw him staring and hurriedly went to cover his face, but it was too late.

She shrugged then, and bent to poke the stinking cloths into the brazier with a long iron. ‘Aye, so I’m no man. What of it? You don’t touch me and I won’t tip you overboard. And don’t think I can’t do it, however big a man you may be,’ she added fiercely, and turned to brandish her hot iron at him. ‘There’s more ways than one to leave a boat, my fine master.’

Goodluck watched his strange companion in silence, disliking the disturbing revelation that he had been under the care of a woman these past few weeks. He could not doubt her skill as a healer, for
the
stab wound in his back – which he had thought surely mortal when he had received it – seemed to be mending well enough. Yet this woman must have stripped him naked while he lay in his delirious fever. How else could she have cleaned and dressed his injury?

‘What is your name, mistress?’

‘I do not go by that title, nor any other. I need no title. I am plain Jensen.’ She sat down opposite him, still wrapped in her thick hooded cloak, and fixed him with the bright eyes he remembered from his first night aboard her barge. ‘Jensen was my father’s name, and his father’s name before him, and it is mine, too, by right of descent.’

‘I do not doubt it,’ Goodluck agreed solemnly.

‘As is this barge, which you shall not take from me.’

He nodded, hearing the fear behind the stubborn will that must have kept this huddled man-woman still working the river long after her father and grandfather had departed this earth.

‘Understood. The barge belongs to you. I have no designs on it.’

‘Spit on it!’ Jensen insisted, nodding at his hand.

Goodluck raised an unsteady hand and worked a small amount of spittle from between dry lips. This he placed on to his palm, then held his hand out to Jensen. She rose, spat heartily into her own palm, and seized his in a firm grip, pumping it up and down as though her life depended on the handshake. Which, he supposed, it did.

‘I’m glad I fished you out and you didn’t die, master. You’ve a good look about you.’ Jensen scratched her nose, sitting down heavily on the bench opposite. ‘Who was it wanted you done for, anywise?’

He had to decipher this question slowly, having lost most of his strength in the handshake, and feeling drowsy again. ‘I have many enemies,’ he managed in the end, not feeling up to a lengthier explanation.

‘So have I,’ she commented sagely, and lay down to sleep on the bunk in her wet boots. ‘They won’t be finding us on this stretch of the river, though. Not for a good while yet.’

Fifteen

‘MY STRIKE!’ ELIZABETH
declared merrily, watching her hawk land with its white dove. She threw her gauntlet to Lucy Morgan amidst applause from her ladies and courtiers. ‘Give that to the falconer.’

Elizabeth walked her horse slowly across the flat green lawns around Richmond Palace, enjoying the sunshine. She must not stay out in such strong light for long, or her complexion would suffer for it. Yet there was a certain pleasure in the touch of the sun’s heat on her face. It made her recall other moments of heat, moments of recklessness.

‘I win again, Sir Christopher,’ she said, glancing at him, then back at Lucy on her neat brown mare. ‘Did you see how my hawk flew, Lucy? How she turned in the air? That is how a dancer should move, with the same economy and grace.’

‘Yes, Your Majesty,’ Lucy agreed.

‘I am on fire today,’ Elizabeth continued, and pulled her riding gloves back on. ‘But Sir Christopher, you look downcast. You do not like to be beaten by a woman, is that it?’

‘You are the finest falconer in England, Your Majesty,’ Sir Christopher Hatton told her as he followed respectfully, his horse two steps behind her. His own hawk had failed to make its kill, and was hooded again now, sulking on his wrist, dragging fretfully at its leather jesses. ‘No man would be such a fool as to deny it. I fear it is hard to compete with your skill.’

Elizabeth clapped her hands in delight, and her ladies followed suit. ‘The finest in England?’

‘And the fairest, Your Majesty.’

She smiled, turning to him. The blue skies were suddenly less bright, though the sun remained undimmed overhead. ‘I had heard you thought another lady held that honour, sir.’

There was a silence among the surrounding courtiers. Even those ladies who had followed the horses on foot stood still under the trees, a light breeze rustling the silks of their skirts.

‘Your Majesty?’

Elizabeth looked back at Sir Christopher Hatton, her eyebrows raised haughtily. ‘Sir?’