Tamburlaine Must Die (2 page)

Walsingham
sat at the head of the table, I on his right hand like some old-world
vassal. Dish followed dish, but I noticed Walsingham ate little and
drank more than was his habit. I followed suit, matching him cup for
cup so by the time the servants removed the plates and were
dismissed, we were both drunk, and pleased with each other's company.
The night grew darker, the candles burned low and our pipe smoke
wreathed the room like old ghosts come forth to join the merriment.

There
are moments when an evening shifts from one thing into another. All
were abed except we two when the mood turned. Walsingham grasped my
shoulder in response to some jest I had made, squeezing it as if in
gentle affection but resting his hand against my back, a breath or
two beyond propriety. I hesitated, suddenly reduced to my senses,
catching the sharp scent of him, hearing the shallowness of his
breath. But those who know how to mark the signs, know how to
respond. Intoxication tempered surprise. I fathomed him and brushed
my hand against his arm, the briefest of touches, to indicate my
assent. When Walsingham leaned close and whispered my own lines:

Some
swore he was a maid in man's attire, For in his looks were all that
men desire, I knew how it would go. The time had come to grant my
patron his literary droit du seigneur.

When
Walsingham straddled my torso, broad-chested, veiny groin
prick-stout, I was reminded of a back-arching centaur. The image
persisted through the face-fucking interlude that followed. The smell
of sea and sweat and the conquest of my poetry took place in my head
to the image of a white horse running across hard wet sands. The
rough stabbing of the patronofpoetry's cock which jarred this poet's
head against the bed's head took on the rhythm of a gallop, until the
Lord released with a groan, holding his pulsing prick firm between my
lips because somehow satisfaction would not be complete until the
mouth which reads him such fine verse consumed all Walsingham can
give.

Afterwards
I stared up at the canopy that tented the bed, hoping fellow feeling
hadn't fled. My Lord leaned over and ruffled my hair then, as he
dismounted, concluded the verse, making me its hero. And such as knew
he was a man would say, Marlowe, thou art made for amorous play. The
memory made me smile, though it twisted something like a fist in my
belly.

I
asked the messenger if he knew the cause of my arrest but he gave
only a shrug of the shoulders in reply. Twilight shifted into night.
The last bird finished its song, leaving the forest to night prowlers
and highwaymen. I kept my sword-hand ready. Meanwhile my mind, busy
as a late night gaming-board, shuffled through combinations of
treason, and my horse carried me ever closer to whatever waited in
London. *

The
city rose up before us long before we reached her, a confusion of red
roofs slanting this way and that amongst high, pointed spires and
smoking chimney stacks. Distance and sunshine made the place look
fresh. Farm girls and silly country swains arriving here in search of
golden streets must surely rejoice when they first see that view,
never suspecting the stews that lie beneath. On Highgate Hill the
sails of the windmills turned slowly, but no breeze touched us as we
made our way towards the City.

Church
bells were ringing as we passed through the city gates. London was as
I had left it three long weeks ago when fear of Plague had closed the
theatres and I had repaired to Walsingham's house. We made our way
towards the river, along roads edged either side by high, timbered
buildings which blocked the sun and cast us into shadow. Here rich
and poor live one on top of another. Already market traders were
setting out their stalls. Milkmaids, muscle-armed and never as fair
as the songs suggest, rattled below us, eager to sell their wares
before they soured. A mountebank called the afflicted to his remedies
and an old fishwife, as high as her catch, cried Four for sixpence
mackerel. An ancient cove in tattered jester's robes nursed a
miserable monkey with a face like a Beelzebub and shouted Oh rare
show! A pretty country maid sang Fair lemons and oranges and I wished
we could stop and buy some for their scent, though they were soft and
grey spotted. Somewhere tradesmen began to hammer out their day.
Sedans, carts and coaches vied for space on narrow roadways already
busy with a press of people. London assaulted the senses. The din of
voices, superstitious church chimes, pounding mallets, busy workmen
and street bustle, undercut by the smells of livings and livestock.
My months in the country gave a clarity to my vision and suddenly I
felt sure this place could not survive. There was so much energy, so
little space. One day the City must surely combust.

Eventually
we reached the waterside where the air moved a little freer, though
it carried the stench of stagnant places. Beneath the bridge
waterwheels groaned like tortured men. And the ill-favoured
ferrymen's cries of Next oars? seemed like an invitation to cross the
Styx. We pressed aboard a barge packed tight with travellers and as
we pushed into the swell, the messenger pointed towards a group of
strangers gathered on the bank we'd quit. He spoke for the first
time.

`Soon
there will be no pure English left. Just a mix of Blackamoors and
Dutch and God knows what.'

His
speech annoyed me and I answered, `Perhaps the Spanish will relaunch
the armada and save us from the deluge.'

But
it was an unwise jest; the kind that often escapes my lips when I'm
in my cups or lacking sleep and I worried about it for the rest of
the journey, fearing I had added to whatever troubles awaited me.
`You know why you are here?

The
room I had been called to was plainly wainscoted in dark oak,
relieved only by a tapestry depicting a royal hunt, hung across the
whole of the far wall. I found myself searching it for the telltale
bulge of a hidden listener, but the arras was set out far enough to
comfortably conceal any spy. Eighteen men faced me, each dark-dressed
with an expression to match. I had thought I might wait days before
being granted an audience. But relief at being brought straight into
their presence was tempered by the confirmation that my position was
deadly serious. This was'the Privy Council. Ministers who cared
enough for high office to profit from death. Who had committed men
they knew well and men they had met only once to torture and death.
Dangerous men, each with a ruthless core, who had played chess with
their own lives and still lived, though some had sat in prison cells
and listened to the hollow sound of nails splitting wood as their own
gallows grew in the yard. I bowed and scanned their faces,
recognising the Lords Cecil and Essex; at opposite ends of the long
table, as far apart in their seating as in their sympathies. I knew
this was not the forum in which to solicit allies, but hoped
spymaster Cecil would think me still useful and speak in my support
at one of those discreet meetings that take place in dark rooms where
alliances are struck and promises exchanged.

The
man who had spoken sat at the Council's centre behind a long table of
the same gloomy wood that lined the walls. Old and grey with the
flinty'stare of a survivor, he was an ideal companion to the ancient
oak. Destined to grow ever more ancient in the service of the Crown.
His gown was black, untrimmed by fur or jewels, but his ruff was
intricately pleated, his long beard groomed with a vanity that
suggested he had once dressed with more extravagance and might do so
again should the age allow. He glanced at the papers before him, then
turned his stone stare on me, repeating the question with the
patience of one accustomed to completing difficult tasks.

`Do
you know why you have been brought here?

My
back ached from the long ride. I concentrated on standing upright,
throwing my shoulders back like one of the Queen's livery, though the
effort took all my will.

`I
thought perhaps the Queen requires my service.'

The
old man sighed.

`The
Queen requires your loyalty.'

We
live in desperate times, where loyalty is all. The Queen grows old.
Her allies and her enemies grow restless. Some dread the old religion
while others pray for its return. The State is uneasy. It glimpses
plots at every turn and fear makes it ruthless. I steeled my voice
and met the old man's even stare.

`Loyalty
is the duty of every subject.'

He
lifted a page from a bundle before him, raising his eyebrows as if
something he saw there interested him.

`Loyalty,
like love, does not always answer to duty.' He dropped the page and
stared into my eyes, lowering his voice the better to emphasise his
speech. `Yours is in question.'

My
eyes were drawn to the lace that trimmed the hem of my sleeve. I
seemed to see it more clearly than I ever had before. All its
wonderful simplicity revealed in a moment. I forced my gaze back to
the officials.

`Sir,
if there is a question about my loyalty or my love for the Queen,
might I be permitted to answer it??

'Perhaps.'
The man's voice was close to a whisper now and all the method that
might be employed in the asking was in his smile.

I
too know the actor's art. I forced my fear into anger, forging metal
into my voice and fixed his eye with a passion that was dangerous in
its insolence.

`My
loyalty remains steadfast.'

He
made an amused fanning gesture like someone trying to banish a bad
smell or a small insect. `We may test you on that promise.'

At
the far end of the table a small, squat man took up the questioning.
His round, creased face put me in mind of a loaf of bread which,
failing to rise, had collapsed back on itself.

`Tell
us what you know about the playwright, Thomas Kyd.'

I
turned to face the new speaker, keeping the rest of the Council at
the edge of my vision. `We once shared a patron, Lord Strange, who

issued
us a common set of rooms. We knew each other, though not well.'

`Master
Kyd claims you were once firm friends.'

`Perhaps
Master Kyd has fewer friends than I.' I hesitated, but hearing no
cock-crow went on. `I count him an acquaintance. Since I quit the
service of our mutual patron we've seen each other only when our
paths crossed by chance.'

`Did
you ever have him copy work for you?? 'He is a scrivener, son of a
scrivener, and makes fine copies by dint of practice. It would not be
strange if I had asked him to scribe for me, but I can recollect no
occasion when I did so.' At the far end of the room the tapestry
wavered, but whether it was the movement of some concealed listener,
or merely in response to a draught as somewhere a door closed, I
could not tell.

The
man's voice became dangerously intimate. `So you would deny that a
piece of heresy copied in Kyd's hand was initiated by you??

'I
do deny it. I'm accountable for my own writing and blameless of other
men's heresies.' The questioning was taken up from the other side of
the table.

`But
you are responsible for your own heresies?' My voice wavered with the
effort of freeing contradiction from insult.

`I
make no heresies, your Lordships.'

`But
there are some who accuse you of being an atheist and attempting to
recruit others to the cause.'

`Then
they are liars spreading slander.' `Perhaps,' the new speaker's voice
was smooth with a polite disinterest, which belied the sting in his
words. `But your play Tamburlaine is known as an atheist tract. It
seems strange for a man who is no heretic to write sacrilege.'

`Sir,
you know that there are those who dispute our right to have plays at
all. Tamburlaine was submitted to your Lordships' scrutiny and found
to be in accord. Whoever describes it thus casts a slur not just on
me but on Her Majesty's Privy Council.'

He
ignored my speech and raised a ragged handbill.

`Can
you account for this?

The
bill was tattered and torn, it had been roughly pasted somewhere
before it was ripped down and delivered to the Council. Traces of the
paste used to stick it in place still curled its edges, but the words
were clear enough. Tou strangers that do inhabit in this land, Note
this same writing, do it understand. Conceive it well, for safeguard
your lives, Tour goods; your children, & your dearest wives . . .
Tour Machiavellian Merchant spoils the state, Tour usury doth leave
us all for dead, Tour artifex & craftsman works our fate And like
the 7ews you eat us up as bread. Since words nor threats nor any
other thing Can make you to avoid this certain ill,

We'll
cut your throaty, in your temples praying, No Paris massacre so much
blood did spill. Signed, Tamburlaine `This bill refers to your plays
Tamburlaine and Massacre of Paris, does it not?