Holy Spy

Chapter 15

Shakespeare left Gifford to the exquisite ministrations of the Smith sisters, certain that the pink pigling would be grunting and squealing with pleasure for many hours to come. Vitally, he would not be taking his leave of them before the new day. It was a prospect that made Shakespeare’s own bedchamber seem a desolate place.

The sisters were under instructions to stay with Gifford in the chamber until nine o’clock in the morning. The housekeeper would provide breakfast for them and, while they were eating, Shakespeare would return. The Smith sisters would say a tender farewell and tell their satisfied client how boldly he had performed, and travel in their carriage back home to Westminster.

The plan then was for Shakespeare to take Gilbert Gifford to the Walsingham mansion in Seething Lane. If all had gone as hoped, the letter from the Scottish Queen to Babington would have been deciphered and resealed and would now be there, waiting. If it was as damning as Walsingham hoped, then the way ahead should at last become clear, the months of scheming brought to fruition. The question for Mr Secretary to answer was when and how to deliver the letter onward to Anthony Babington. Timing and method of delivery were all-important.

For the moment, Shakespeare had an evening stretching ahead of him and he planned to make use of it. First, however, he rode home, intending to take supper.

He tried the door, but it would not open. He pushed again. It must be bolted on the inside, for it would not budge an inch. Exasperated, he rapped his knuckles against the solid wood. From inside, he heard scurrying feet, then a small voice.

‘Who is it?’

‘God’s blood, Jane, it is John Shakespeare. Let me in!’

He heard the bolt sliding back, then the door opened. Jane stood before him, shaking and distressed.

‘Mr Shakespeare, sir . . .’

‘Jane, what is it? Why was the door bolted?’

‘Oh, master, I was afraid. A terrible thing has happened to poor Mr Cooper. He has been attacked.’

‘Where is he?’

‘He is in the parlour, sir. He has suffered sorely. I have just begun tending to his injuries as best I can.’

‘Come, let us go to him.’

‘Should I put the bolt back on the door, sir?’

‘No.’

Boltfoot was sitting on the settle, leaning forward, head in hands. He was naked from the waist up and his wiry mariner’s body was streaked with blood. His hair hung lank and sticky about his face. At his feet there was a basin of bloody water and blood-soaked linen towels.

‘Boltfoot?’

He looked up. ‘I’m sorry, master.’ His cheek was bruised and his left eye was puffed up. The blood was seeping from a gash above his left eyebrow.

Shakespeare sat on the settle beside his assistant and combed the hair from his face with his fingers. ‘What happened?’

‘I found Cutting Ball. He ordered me beaten and threatened worse.’

‘You found Cutting Ball? So he is real. I had almost thought him a mythical being.’

‘He’s real enough. A dangerous man.’

‘So I see. Are any bones broken?’

Boltfoot shook his head, then groaned. ‘No.’

‘I can send Jane for a physician.’

‘No thank you, master. She has been doing well enough cleaning me up. I have suffered worse in my life and I will survive this with an aching head.’

‘Where did you find Cutting Ball?’

Boltfoot groaned and put a hand to his shoulder. Shakespeare saw that it was bruised almost black. Boltfoot tried to laugh. ‘They beat me with sticks, like a dog.’

‘Take whatever time you need.’

‘Forgive me, master, but I cannot be sure where he was, save that it was north-east of London. I was led there, blindfold. All I can say is that Ball was in an old barn, well away from the highway, on farmland surrounded by woods. From the outside no man would have given the barn a second glance but inside it was like the hall of a manor. It seemed to me that he ran his empire of felony from there.’

‘A palatial barn?’

‘In the countryside north of Whitechapel. He was playing cards with some men and a couple of women. After my beating, I was blindfolded again and brought on a cart to Aldgate, where I was dumped and told not to go east of the city walls on pain of death.’

‘Are you certain you would not be able to find this barn?’

Boltfoot thought for a few moments. ‘It is not impossible. I tried to count my steps and note the changes of direction, but I was without sight for at least twenty minutes, so it is far from certain.’

‘Well, I won’t ask you to go back there for the moment. What did you learn?’

‘I learnt that he is a tyrant feared and respected in equal measure. I learnt, too, that he considered the assassin Will Cane his friend. One thing that is certain is that he is interested in the matter of the murder, for that was why he had me brought to him.’

‘Do you believe he was involved in the killing?’

‘He gave nothing away. But there was something that worried me . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘When I mentioned Kat, he called her a fine-favoured wench, from which I inferred that he knew her – or at least that he had seen her. I put this to him, and that was when his mood darkened. No man is allowed to put questions to Mr Ball, nor are they to refer to him by the name Cutting.’

Kat had mentioned nothing about knowing Cutting Ball, but then perhaps she had no knowledge of his link to Will Cane. Or perhaps she did. It was not inconceivable that they had met, and if they had, Shakespeare needed to know the circumstances.

‘There was one other thing, master. The whore’s bawd named Em was there among the band of felons surrounding Ball in his great hall.’

‘Tell me about her.’

‘She did not seem afeared by him and risked his ire by warning him to be wary of crossing you or Mr Secretary. He was displeased by the way she spoke and told her to get out, but still she was not scared. It seemed to me there was something between them.’

‘Man and wife?’

‘It is possible. Or brother and sister.’ He groaned again and slumped forward, breathing heavily.

‘That is enough for now, Boltfoot. We will speak more later.’

Shakespeare glanced over towards the door where Jane was hanging back. ‘Continue your nursing, please, Jane. Then give him broth and put him to bed.’

‘Yes, master.’

‘And Jane . . .’

‘Yes, master?’

‘I know this has been a trial for you. You have done well. Thank you.’

Boltfoot put up his hand. ‘There was one other thing, master.’

‘Yes?’

‘I was made to throw a dice for my life. I lost, but Ball spared me anyway.’

‘So he has the quality of mercy . . .’

‘I think not. He saved me because I am connected to you – and you are connected to Mr Secretary.’

Ninety minutes later, Shakespeare was at Severin Tort’s house in Fetter Lane, just west of the city wall. Tort was as neat and well kempt as ever, his silver hair parted and combed to perfection; but the tension in his eyes was evident.

‘Is something amiss, Mr Tort?’

‘No, nothing, sir.’

‘You look out of sorts.’

‘It is my boy. It is nothing. He finds fault with the world and speaks his mind too freely. He is not yet sixteen, but I fear for him. These are harsh days, as you must know as well as any man. But he is not your problem.’ Tort shook his head, too quickly. The movement betrayed his strung nerves. ‘Why are you here, Mr Shakespeare? Do you bring news?’

There was a brittle edge to the voice. Was Tort displeased by his arrival here unannounced? Shakespeare put the question to the back of his mind, to be revisited later. ‘Indeed, I do bring news,’ he said. ‘Much has happened but I fear I have no resolution.’ He took in his surroundings. Never had he seen a more well-ordered room. At the desk where Tort studied and wrote, his quills were neatly cut and laid out and his ink-bottle was placed precisely with no black drops staining the wood around it. Each item of furniture – his coffer and chair and settle – seemed to have been lined up like a disciplined army, likewise his books, of which there were many.

‘I do not have a great deal of time to talk, Mr Shakespeare.’

‘Mr Tort, I have no time at all, and yet you have brought this matter to my attention and so at your instigation I am making inquiries.’

Tort hung his head, chastened. ‘Forgive me. It is just . . .’

‘Yes? Speak, man.’

Tort looked up and emitted a heavy sigh. ‘I had another visitor less than an hour since. The magistrate Richard Young, who is leading the search for Katherine. He came here with a band of pursuivants.’

‘Why?’

‘He believes I know where she is. He interrogated me and made dire threats against me. He said my faith would be held against me, that I would be accused of harbouring priests and face the scaffold for treason. No London jury would believe me for I was a papist and therefore untrustworthy, he said. He threatened my stepson, too.’

‘Why do you think he came to you? He must know something. Have you been speaking to anyone?’

‘Only you, sir.’

The unspoken accusation was not lost on Shakespeare, but he let it pass without rebuttal. ‘Could someone at the Curtain know something, someone other than Oswald Redd?’

‘Only if Redd has told them. But I cannot see why he would do such a thing.’

‘No, Mr Tort, that will not do. Kat lived with Redd. Everyone at the playhouse must have known that they were living together. It would not be beyond the wit of the most doltish player to consider that his house would be an obvious place for her to hide. This tale of murder must be as much a sensation in Shoreditch as it is in London. Perhaps a player went to Young with his suspicions, hoping for a coin in his hand.’

Tort tapped his fingertips together so that his hands formed a half-globe. It was a habit Shakespeare had noted among other lawyers during his days at Gray’s Inn; they seemed to do it while thinking through a complex matter. ‘I don’t think so,’ Tort said, his face a blank. ‘If a player had told Justice Young about Oswald Redd, then his house would surely have been raided.’

He was right, of course. But it could only be a matter of time before Young discovered this part of Kat’s past for himself. Which meant that Redd had done the right thing to hide her elsewhere. But where was she?

‘I went to her again,’ he told Tort. ‘But she was gone. Do you know where she is now hidden, for I would very much like to talk with her again? There are matters to which I must have clear answers if I am to investigate further.’

The lawyer’s eyes widened and he shook his head as though surprised by the revelation that she was not at Redd’s abode. Was his surprise feigned, Shakespeare wondered, or was he somehow in league with Oswald Redd, keeping vital information from Shakespeare?

‘How did you know that she would be at Redd’s house when you took me there? What is your connection to Redd and how did Kat first ask you for assistance? Be straight with me.’

‘Why, it is simple enough. Redd approached me and I went with him to her; then again with you. Those are the only times I have seen Katherine and he is the only line of contact I have had with her.’

‘And did you know Redd before this tragical sequence of events?’

‘No, I had neither met him nor heard of him. Kat sent him to me.’

Shakespeare was thinking hard. If Young’s men suspected Severin Tort, then they would undoubtedly be watching him and his house – and they would have followed him to Shoreditch, in which case Kat would by now be under arrest. But that hadn’t happened, so Young’s interest in the lawyer must be more recent. Why?

‘Mr Tort, I have two more pieces of information that I would like to bring to your attention. Let us sit down.’ He was irritated to see the lawyer shifting uneasily as though desperate for him to leave. ‘God’s death, Mr Tort, hear me out. Whatever matters of importance you have to deal with, they will wait.’

Shakespeare slumped down on the settle and stretched out his booted legs; he felt an urge to sprawl himself as an antidote to Tort’s impatience and the cloying tidiness of this room.

Reluctantly, Tort took the chair at his desk, his knees clenched primly, as though he wore skirts. He listened in silence as Shakespeare regaled him with the revelation that the assassin, Will Cane, had been close to death when he murdered Nicholas Giltspur. If he was shocked or surprised, it did not show on his impassive lawyerly face. Nor did he speak as he heard of Boltfoot Cooper’s experiences to the east of the city. The only visible reaction was a slight tensing of the shoulder and neck at the name of Cutting Ball.

‘And so you see, nothing is as it seems. The reason I am here this evening, Mr Tort, is to ask you to help me make the acquaintance of Arthur Giltspur, the dead man’s nephew. For if Kat did not do it, then we must find someone else who would have benefited from Nick Giltspur’s death and the execution of his widow. So far the only name I have is Arthur’s, which I heard from Oswald Redd.’

‘I cannot believe Arthur would do such a thing. He is a fine young man.’

‘Then you know him?’

‘Well, yes, for he was often at Aldermanbury when I had dealings with his uncle.’

‘Then arrange a meeting for me as soon as possible. The steward of the house has been most obstructive.’

‘Sorbus? Yes, he can be a little too protective of his domain. I will do what I can. And Mr Shakespeare, there is one other thing I should tell you.’

‘Yes?’

‘When Justice Young was questioning me, he mentioned your name.’

Somehow Shakespeare was not surprised, and yet he was angry. ‘Indeed? You think to tell me this now? Why did you not say aught when I arrived?’

‘I was unsure how you would react.’

‘What did he say?’

‘He asked me if I knew you. I could not think what to reply, so I confessed that I did.’

‘Confessed ? As yet, it is not a crime to know me. What more did Young say? Did he mention why he was interested in me?’

‘He said that you and Katherine had . . . lived together. He did not express it in quite such decorous terms. He said that you must know where the murderous trug – his words – was hiding.’

Shakespeare snorted. Of course, it had been common knowledge among his neighbours and those he worked with in Walsingham’s employment that he had lived with Kat as man and wife for two years or more. But how had that information come to Richard Young’s attention? Shakespeare went through all those with whom he worked and wondered whether any of them might have informed Young. Mills? Gregory? Scudamore? Would any of them have gone out of their way to proffer such information? And if so, why?

What was certain was that he must now assume he was being followed wherever he went. He had probably been trailed here to Fetter Lane. In which case, if he could arrange a further meeting with Kat he would have to go to great lengths to ensure he lost his pursuers.

He stood up and strode towards the door. ‘As soon as possible, Mr Tort. I rather think Mr Arthur Giltspur might offer some insights to this wretched tale.’

‘I doubt it, but I will do what I can.’

He pushed open the front door and was about to step out into the night but stopped. He was face to face with Dominic de Warre . . .