Tamburlaine Must Die (11 page)

everything,
perhaps I hoped he would, for when he raised his head and I saw tears
glistering his eyelashes, my fractured world shattered. I whispered,
`Oh you really did it. You killed me. You're talking to a dead man,
dead man.'

It
was hard to believe this was the Thomas Blaize who had held whole
audiences in his sway. He clutched his hand to his broken jaw and his
voice was tired and muffled with pain.

`I
never meant it to end this way.' Frustration made me shake him.
Blaize kept his hand at his chin, but offered no resistance, letting
the back of his head bang against the wall until I stopped for fear
I'd dash his brains from their skull.

`You
owe me names.' I slammed his head again for emphasis. `You haven't
the guile to achieve all this on your own. Tell me who stands behind
you and I'll grant you a few more last breaths.' Blaize looked into
my eyes.

`We
were the best of friends.'

I
hit him again, knocking his hand from his face. A thin stream of
blood flew from his mouth splattering the wall like a devilish
signature. He staggered and I caught him.

`Now
talk.'

Blaize
placed his hand back on his wounded face as if its presence lifted
some of the pain. His voice was broken and at times he faltered. But
there were no more appeals to friendship or times past. He turned
inwards, searching for the truth of the story as he told it.

`It's
hard to light upon beginnings. Months ago, when the theatres first
closed, I found myself in difficulties.'

He
hesitated.

`What
kind of difficulties??

'The
usual kind. Some men came to my assistance.'

`They
lent you money? Blaize nodded. `For love?

He
laughed.

`The
days when my love could bring an income are long past. No, I was to
make their investment grow, though I needed it to live. When the time
came to repay, I found myself without even the principal.'

`And
no plan??

'I
thought perhaps the old man,' he wiped his face. `I thought perhaps
he would help. The sum he advanced was too small.'

`So
you killed him??

'No!
Yes.' He shook his head. `Not straight away. This all happened months
ago, before you departed for Walsingham's.'

`So
even then there were plots against me? His sigh hung in the air.

`I
met them to ask for time. I knew that as soon as the Plague lifted I
would have a means to make money. But they gave me a beating,
threatened my life, then offered me a way out.'

`Your
life for mine.'

`It
wasn't so simple. They represented powerful men. They told me that if
I thought of

a
way to bring you before the Council then these men would free me of
my debt.' Blaize's voice grew querulous. `You'd abandoned me to the
Plague and the city. I did as they asked to save my skin, trusting
you to shake yourself free. You have before.'

I
shook my head in wonder. He had killed Kyd, Grizzle and me, for a bag
of gold.

`I
would have given you money.5 'Money and contempt.'

There
was a loathing in his voice I hadn't heard before. A realisation
dawned.

`It
wasn't just the money,' I whispered. `You wrote those notes. I knew
you jealous but I never guessed the depths of your envy. You hate
me.' Blaize shook his head.

`You
took my love and warped it. Laughed at my literary works. Introduced
me as one of the finest actors in London, never the finest. Played
tricks on me. Made me step through Hell's mouth then gave the
magician's role to another, leaving me to play the servant once
again. You cast me in the role of murderer and so I became one.' He
dropped his head. `But hate has fled now that we're equals.'

I
looked at his blood-spattered form hunched against the wall and
laughed.

`Some
Faustian King you'd make. You're a half-rate actor and a no-rate
poet. A scurvy cove who kills old men for effect. You leave your
little notes to add more theatre to the chase, but also because you
needed me to find you. To be your audience, admire you in the role of
killer, when all the time you're just the hired helper of a hired
hand. I'll kill you with as much regret as I'd kill an insect. You've
never been my equal, never will be. A spasm crossed Blaize's face,
but he managed to grin through it.

`The
dead are equal.'

I
leaned in close, scored another cut across his face and hissed, `The
dead are dead.'

Blaize
shuddered in pain, then forced a laugh. `You always had a way with
words. So you mean to kill me??

'Do
you doubt it?

`No.'
My lost friend shook his head. `You and I have reached our final
act.'

`My
final act will be to kill you.'

He
leered, his grin shining wolfishly in the dark. It was a look I'd
loved and I struck out once more with my sword hoping to slash it
from his face. Blaize screamed and put his hand to the flap of flesh
hanging from his cheek. He whispered, `One last kiss and I'll save
you a task, dead man.'

And
shoved his bloodied self against me, his lips, scraping my brow. I
slammed him into the wall and Blaize's wild laughter rang through the
deserted hallway.

`Now,
or I'll do it for you.'

I
watched as he unfastened the bodice, dropping the dress to the floor,
standing before me in only his britches, exposing the chest I had
lain on, the dark hair that tangled across his breast, then trailed
like an arrow to his navel and below. Desire caught me unawares. My
fingers tingled with the anticipation of touch. But the thought of
Kyd and Grizzle stayed me. I watched as Blaize pulled out his dagger
and turned its cutthroat blade upon himself. Looked on as he winced
at its contact, not in pain but at the iciness of the metal against
skin that would soon feel nothing. He hesitated.

`We
travelled far together. Will you hold my hand at the start of this
journey?

And
I spat on him.

`Even
if we meet in Hell I'll damn you.'

A
tear leaked down his cheek. He wiped it away and pressed the knife
further, wincing. He saw how it must be done and turned to face the
wall, preparing to dash himself against it and fall on his blade,
Roman style. I looked away. Heard Blaize take a deep breath, that
blew into a warrior yell, then felt a rush of air as his body charged
towards me and he turned, knife in hand, lunging at my throat. But I
had known him long times and had my own blade waiting. I ducked his
move, then caught him close, sticking my knife deep into his belly.
His eyes rolled back to meet my gaze.

`You
were never Tamburlaine,' I told him, `just a half-rate actor. No
match for fear or fatal steel.' I held Blaize to me for what seemed
like an

age,
feeling his gasps fade into sighs, twisting the dagger slowly, until
I realised the heat of his breath was gone and let the body crumple
to the ground, softening his descent though I knew he could feel no
more pain. My comrade lay broken at my feet, his face a bloody mess,
but his eyes the same deep brown I'd loved. I turned my back and
walked away, scraping my sword down the wall of the staircase in a
rattle that couldn't drown the silence.

Last
night I received a summons to a house in Deptford. There I will be
held to accounts, which cannot be squared. Life is frail and I may
die today. But Tamburlaine knows no fear. My candles are done, the
sky glows red and it looks as if the day is drenched in blood. I
finish this account and prepare for battle in the sureness that life
is the only prize worth having and the knowledge that there are worse
fates than damnation. If these are the last words I write, let them
be,

A
Curse on Man and God.

Christopher
Marlowe 30`h May 1593

Christopher
Marlowe was knifed to death at a house in Deptford, on the evening of
Wednesday 30th May, 1593.

AUTHOR'S
NOTE T he death of Christopher Marlowe is a mystery which will never
be solved. History has bequeathed us a tantalising framework of facts
- the Elizabethans were as prolific as the Stasi when it came to
official documents. Tet the facts can't tell us the full tale and
historians' theories on Marlowe's death are ultimately well informed,
meticulously researched speculation.

The
debate is not confined to historians. Type Christopher Marlowe Death
into any Internet search engine and you'll raise thousands of
websites and chat rooms devoted to the poet's demise. American
coroners debate the nature of his wounds, conspiracy theorists think
his death a ruse designed to cover escape and believe Marlowe the
author of Shakespeare's better plays. It's cheering that a mystery,
which was a source of conjecture and rumours in the 1590s, still
exercises so many 21st-century minds.

Thomas
Beard in his Theatre of God's judgement (1597), a series of
obituaries relishing God's revenge on wayward individuals, has no
doubt that Marlowe's atheism was the cause of his untimely end. Beard
alleges that Marlowe's hand was grabbed by his opponent in a knife
fight, and the blade forced into the poet's own eye. A scenario that
pleases Beard no end. `...hee compelled his own hand which had
written those blasphemies to be the instrument to punish him, and
that in his brain which had devised the same . . . hee euen cursed
and blasphemed to his last gaspe, and togither with his breath an oth
flew out his mouth ..." Another theory is that a serving man, a
rival of ' Quoted in The Nonesuch Press, Hotson, J. Leslie and G. L.
Kittredge, Death of Christopher Marlowe, p.11 (1925)

Marlowe's
`in his lewde loue', administered the blow 2

According
to the official inquest, Christopher Marlowe, Ingram Frizer, Robert
Poley and Nicholas Skeres were companions in a day-long drinking and
feasting session which was reaching its close by six that evening.
Witness accounts have Marlowe reclining on a bed. The other three
still at table, Frizer sandwiched himself between Poley and Skeres
with his back towards Marlowe. The poet and Frizer began arguing
about who was to pay the bill. Marlowe, suffused by anger at some
statement of Frizer's, leapt from the bed, grabbing a knife from his
opponent's belt, attacking and wounding him in the head. Frizer,
wedged between the two other men and in fear of his' life, struggled
with Marlowe, eventually managing to gain control of the knife, and
struck Marlowe a mortal wound over his right eye, penetrating his
brain and killing him instantly.

The
coroner's jury accepted the killer's 2 Meres, Frances, Palladis Tamia
(1598), ibid.

claims
of self-defence, supported by witnesses Poley and Skeres, the
evidence of his own superficial head wounds, and the fact that he
didn't abscond. So Marlowe's killer was awarded a pardon.

The
flaws in the jury's decision have been well established, notably by
Charles Nicholl.3 Ingram Frizer, Robert Poley and Nicholas Skeres are
variously con men, extortioners, double agents, fences and
international spies. They have connections with the murkier fringes
of Elizabethan politics, are well known to Marlowe's patron, and
factions of the Privy Council and the underworld of more than one
city. The keeper of Marshalsea prison said of Poley: `He will beguile
you of your wife or of your life.'4 The official account rests on the
unreliable testimony of three rogues and is therefore unsafe. We know
that Marlowe died at a house in Deptford. We know the date of his
death and the three men present. ' Quoted in Nicholl, Charles, The
Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe, Vintage, 2002. ' Ibid.

We
k: him. in thi now the nature of the wound that killed Everything
else is educated guesswork, or s author's case, a fiction.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
T he responsibility for any inaccuracies within this text lies
entirely with me. There are,

however,
several sources whose help should be acknowledged. Invaluable
histories included Charles Nicholl's The Reckoning (Vintage, 2002),
Peter Blayney's The Bookshops in Paul's Cross Churchyard
(Bibliographical Society of America, 1990) and Leslie Hotson's Death
of Christopher Marlowe (The Nonesuch Press, 1925). The inspiration
for a novella starring Christopher Marlowe came from a commission by
Jamie Byng of Canongate Books. The National Library of Scotland's
Robert Louis Stevenson Award and the Hotel Chevillon in
Grez-sur-Loing gave me valuable peace and space in which to begin
this narative. My agent David Miller, editor Judy Moir and the
novelists Graeme Williamson and Zoe Strachan were each a source of
support, advice and suggestions, the best of which I probably
ignored, but would have been lost without.