Prince

Chapter 21

In the cell known as Little Ease, a man could neither lay his body down fully, nor stand erect. The floor was four foot by four foot and it was no more than four foot in height, like a dice, so that a man of normal height had no room to move, nor rest. He could crouch like a cat or he could kneel or sit against the wall, but he could not stretch his aching limbs or ease the pain in his cruelly bent back by arching it. The very thought of the wretched hole was enough to strike terror and panic into the stoutest heart. The breath came short, the gasping wails of despair rose within the back of the throat. It was a place of madness, a place that would have you pleading for a quick death. After a few days in Little Ease, a man with the strongest of spirits would be fit for nothing but a Bedlam cell or the scaffold.

In his time, Walstan Glebe had suffered the sting of the branding iron and the smell of his own roasting flesh. He had been shackled to the stinking floor of Newgate with scarce enough food to live. He had been whipped for the public’s entertainment at Bridewell and had been threatened with the noose on several occasions. Yet none of those memories matched his fear of Little Ease.

‘Mr Shakespeare, I beg you, not that,’ he whimpered. ‘I have done nothing to warrant such punishment.’

It was not long since Shakespeare had dragged Christopher Morley through the streets towards the Counter prison in Wood Street on a leash linked to his stirrup. It had not been the safest method of taking in a felon, for who could tell when a confederate might dash forward with a razor to slash the cord and free the prisoner. He could take no such chances with Glebe. Instead, he strapped him over the back of his grey mare, his wrists and ankles tied tight by a length of rope stretched under the animal’s belly.

Shakespeare turned to Beth Evans. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Take care in returning to the…’ He stopped, not sure what to say.

Beth laughed as she used to. ‘Don’t worry about my sensitivities, John. I know what I am — and I am not ashamed.’

‘No, of course not.’

Suddenly her smile dissolved. ‘I can only imagine your grief. I am desperately sorry for what has happened. I know you loved her.’

He nodded stiffly and turned away, then shook the reins.

The horse walked with the swaggering gait of the fine mare she was. Her powerful hind quarters swayed with every step along the difficult city roads, sometimes cobbled, sometimes mere dirt and potholes. Each step jolted Glebe, crushing his lungs and turning his belly to mush.

‘Stop a while for pity’s sake. You will shake me to death or make me shit my breeches. I need drink!’

‘Do you think anyone cares about your thirst or even your life, Glebe? Do you think Her Majesty is amused by your pernicious little story about the succession and your involvement in the gunpowder conspiracy? Death awaits you.’

‘None of it was me! I beg you to listen.’

Glebe was having trouble talking. The taut straps and jogging of the beast continually winded him and loosened his bowels.

Shakespeare stopped the horse. ‘So who was it?’

Glebe said nothing for a few moments. Shakespeare shook the rein and the mare walked on.

‘Stop. Stop!’

Shakespeare halted again. He looked at the miserable bundle across the back of his horse. Glebe was dressed in good clothes. A well-made brown doublet and breeches, a cambric falling band around his neck. But he was a villainous, untrustworthy creature who scratched a living out of other men’s misfortunes. He had crossed Shakespeare’s path before and he had not liked him then. He could not bring himself even to read what the worm had written about the blast that killed Catherine. He knew it would dredge up her Papist past and his own failings.

‘I will give you a name.’

Shakespeare said nothing.

‘Mr Shakespeare, you must let me down from here. I beg you, not the Tower. Not Little Ease. I will tell you everything you wish to know. God’s death, I could kill that whore-bitch Beth Evans.’ He began coughing uncontrollably.

Shakespeare looked at him in silence.

‘Give me at least a chance,’ Glebe said when the coughing fit subsided.

‘Why?’

‘Because I can give you what you want.’

‘You will give me what I want in Little Ease, and I will trust your answers more when you are there.’

‘I pledge it, by all that is holy. I swear on my life and my mother’s soul.’

‘Holy? I have heard such words from you before, Glebe. They were as ash and aloes in your mouth.’

They were near Leadenhall, a few minutes’ walk from the Tower. Around them, the world passed in a noisy clattering of hooves, creaking of wagons and calling of wares. No one paid them heed. Another felon taken in to face justice — who should care about that?

‘Very well. His name is Laveroke. Luke Laveroke.’

‘The name means nothing. I have not heard of him. Tell me more.’

‘Do you pledge to free me? I have already told you enough to cost my life.’

‘Free you? You still fancy yourself the jester, I see.’

‘Anywhere but the Tower and I will talk.’

Shakespeare hesitated a few moments, then slapped the mare into a slow walk once more. He leant over to Glebe and whispered in his ear. ‘Very well. I have just the hole for you. But if for one moment I do not feel you are cooperating — if I feel you are holding anything back from me — think on this: it will be but a short hurdle ride to Little Ease…’

Boltfoot did not fear for his own life, yet he was aware enough to know that he was in a perilous place. Every so often another man, or a pair of men, came into the workshop to converse with Warboys. Their voices and language were guarded and Boltfoot found it difficult to follow what they said. They spoke of deliveries, trainbands and, most confusingly of all, a sieve. But they spoke in low voices and their conversations seemed deliberately to be couched in terms that made their meaning indecipherable. Boltfoot affected to pay them no heed and carried on with his work, chiselling and planing with precision. Warboys, meanwhile, drank pint after pint of strong ale.

On several occasions, men came from other parts of the house and simply nodded in acknowledgement on their way through, or stood awhile, watching, before retreating into the depths of the tenement.

At last Boltfoot was finished and stood back from the workbench. Warboys put down his jar of strong ale and held up the old arquebus in the slanting light from the window. His hands were surprisingly steady, given the amount he had drunk. ‘A fair piece of work that, Mr Cooper. A serviceable stock you have crafted there. We do, indeed, need a man like you.’

‘Good. That is what I desire. I will help in any wise I can.’

‘ Any wise, Mr Cooper? Do you have no reservations?’

‘None.’

‘That is good. Faint-hearts do not fare well with us. What do you believe?’

Boltfoot frowned, not comprehending the nature of the question.

‘Do you believe in one God? Do you believe in the devil? Do you believe the dead will rise when called on?’

‘No, not necromancy, though I had thought I saw things — spirits — in storms at sea. And yes, of course I believe in God.’

‘Of course. What man would not…’ Warboys’s nostrils dilated and he spoke with such scorn that Boltfoot gained a clear impression that this man did not believe in God. ‘And yet, Mr Cooper, though I know that there are many dark things man does not know or understand, I also know that he needs solid things in the here and now — weapons of war. Hagbuts and halberds.’

‘What would you have me do?’

‘You will find out soon enough, Mr Cooper. Barrels, certainly, but there are other requirements, too… Have patience.’

‘First, I must attend to certain matters. I will leave you now and be back here soon after dawn.’

Warboys’s laugh came from the depths of his throat and would have intimidated a lesser man. There was humour in it, but only the humour of a cat that has a rat with which to amuse itself.

Boltfoot’s whole body stiffened. He looked at his cutlass and caliver in the corner of the workroom, on the floor against the wall; they were useless to him in these circumstances. ‘I have things to organise, a horse to see fed and stabled.’ More than anything, he had to get word to Master Shakespeare.

‘You are not going anywhere. You are one of us now, an apostle of the Free English Trainband. We must stay together. You may be a volunteer, Mr Cooper, but I must advise you to consider yourself one of us. Once a man is with us, there is only one way for him to leave.’

There was no point in arguing. He could not appear reluctant. ‘I have fought for England before, Mr Warboys, and I will happily venture my life again. But what of my horse? I think he deserves his feed and a stable for the night.’

‘Where is he?’

‘By St Botolph. If I see to him now, I could be back within an hour or two.’

Warboys clapped him on the back. ‘Don’t worry, Mr Cooper. We’ll see to the nag on our way.’

‘Where are we going?’

‘You will find out all you need. Now pick up your fine weapons, and let us be gone. Men are waiting for us, each and every one of them with a common complaint — their livelihoods have been stolen from them and they and their families have been left to starve.’

‘God’s blood, John, this is a terrible pass,’ Henbird said.

Shakespeare pushed Glebe down roughly on to a settle. ‘I wish you to keep this miserable churl safe, Nicholas. Question him with me, then lock him away. You have a cellar?’

‘Beneath a concealed trapdoor. It’ll hold this fellow safe enough. And I have information for you.’

‘Hold it until we have dispensed with Glebe.’

They were in Nicholas Henbird’s pleasant solar room. The sky was dull, but even on such a day, light flooded in through large windows. Glebe, his arms bound behind his back, sat on a settle by a window. He looked as disconsolate as the sky.

Shakespeare glared at Glebe with contempt, then turned back to Henbird. ‘He has mentioned a name. Laveroke. Have you heard of him, Nick?’

Henbird shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Perhaps he is an invention of Glebe’s gong-house mind.’

‘I swear it, Mr Shakespeare. He is all too real, though I wish I had never met him.’

‘Tell us all you know. Who is this man, where did you meet, why is he using your broadsheet?’

‘I was approached by him,’ Glebe said in a quavering voice. ‘In a tavern.’

‘Which tavern?’

‘The Swan in Gray’s Inn Road. I go there often, to listen to the lawyers talk, to garner what news I may. This man, this Laveroke, approached me and asked if I would publish a goodly tale. He said he knew of me from friends. He told me he could give me stories that would sell the Informer by the wagonload. Not only that, he said, but he would pay me two pounds in gold for each story I published. How could I refuse such an offer, Mr Shakespeare?’

‘So you became Tamburlaine’s Apostle?’

‘No, that was Laveroke. He was the author of the stories: he put that name at the end. And they were good stories, Mr Shakespeare, the news the people wished to read.’

Henbird stood still by his great desk. ‘You must have realised you were delving into treacherous waters, Mr Glebe.’

Glebe nodded. ‘I was concerned, Mr Henbird, indeed I was. But which publisher would not want such tales? And to be paid gold as well

…’

‘You should have gone straightway to the Privy Council or, at the very least, to Stationers’ Hall, and you know it, Glebe,’ Shakespeare said. ‘Tell me of this Laveroke. What manner of man is he?’

Glebe sat in sullen resignation. ‘What are you going to do with me, Mr Shakespeare?’

‘That very much depends on you, Glebe. You have saved yourself from Little Ease thus far. But Sir Robert Cecil wishes you consigned to Newgate, and from there to Tyburn. You would do well to convince me otherwise.’

Glebe sighed heavily. ‘In truth, Mr Shakespeare, I thought Laveroke gentry, perhaps even nobility. He had an air about him, sir, an air…’

‘Explain.’

‘I thought him used to command. He was well attired in fine doublet. He had a jewelled dagger at his waist and, though not fat, he looked prosperous.’

‘After this first meeting at The Swan, where did you talk? Did he bring the stories to you at the house near Aldersgate?’

‘No. There is a tavern where I usually take my evening repast, The Mitre. He would come to me there. I had no idea when he would come. He would arrive with the story written in what I took to be his hand and with two pounds in gold.’

‘What was his voice?’

‘I cannot say. I could not identify it.’

‘Spanish? French? Dutch? English?’

‘He spoke perfect English, sir, but beyond that I cannot tell you true what he was, whether of Bristol or Norwich or any other place in this land.’

‘Was he bearded?’

‘Indeed. A spade beard, I would say, neat and well trimmed, as if he had been attended by a good East Cheap barber. His face was unmarked. He was a fetching man with hair that fell to his shoulder. I noted a heavy gold band on his forefinger and pearls studding the front of his doublet.’

‘Where can I find him?’

Glebe lowered his eyes, hunching down into his shoulders. He did not look up. His voice was a mumble, but Shakespeare’s hearing was acute. ‘I do not know. I never knew. I have never seen him before and wish never to see him again, for it is meeting him that has brought me to this ugly pass.’

‘Oh no, Glebe. There is more than that. You have wit enough to know the power of the words you have published. You know well what the Council thinks of such talk. And when it is written, it is a thousand times worse, for it infects others. You know this. Whatever else you are, you are no simpleton.’

Glebe stayed silent.

‘Have you heard of one Christopher Morley?’

Glebe shook his head.

‘He stayed silent. He is now dead, with a cord wound tight about his neck. That is the price of silence. And Marlowe? Did you know Kit Marlowe or Frizer or Poley or Skeres?’

Glebe hesitated.

‘Answer me or be damned to the comfort of Little Ease, Glebe.’

‘I have met Poley and Frizer, sir. Not Skeres, I never met him, but Poley and Frizer. They are coney hunters, Mr Shakespeare. They are the sort of men I know. I could not avoid meeting them from time to time…’

‘Were they involved in the Tamburlaine’s Apostle story?’

‘Not that I know of, sir. That was all Laveroke.’

‘You said he handed you the papers written in his own hand. Where are these papers now?’

‘Destroyed, Mr Shakespeare. Burnt in the hearth.’

‘As you are like to be, Glebe.’ Shakespeare had no time to waste. He had to discover this Laveroke.

‘Let us consign him to your cellar, Nick. I trust it is dank and dark.’

‘Indeed it is, John.’

‘Say nothing of this, Nick,’ Shakespeare said when they returned to the solar without Glebe. ‘I fear there are those that would come after him, for I am not certain Morley took his own life. Keep him alive and keep questioning him. He may know more.’

‘About the gunpowder blasts?’

‘That and the supposed prince of Scots. There is no difference. Can it be mere coincidence that one man feeds such stories to Glebe?’

‘No, it cannot be mere coincidence.’ Henbird poured two cups of brandy and handed one to Shakespeare. ‘I have some news for you, John.’

‘The servant I asked you about, Oliver Kettle? I know he has left the Sluyterman house.’

Henbird settled his corpulent, well-attired frame back into his thronelike chair. ‘I had him followed. And where do you think he went? All the way to the Guildhall for the Lord Mayor’s banquet, where he served as a waiter.’

‘Tell me more, Nick.’

‘They take on day staff for the big banquets. Many of those employed on such nights have positions elsewhere in the homes of the city merchants. Your Oliver Kettle was one of those.’

‘But now he is missing.’

‘Wait, there is more to the story. On the night of the banquet, my man watched Kettle as closely as he could. As you can well imagine, this was not easy, for the watcher was neither a guest, nor a serving man. He is, though, a close acquaintance of the Common Sergeant at the Guildhall and so he enlisted his aid.’

‘In return for a turkey cock or two?’

‘Or three or four, John. The sergeant is a stout fellow. He and my man were able to observe the evening’s proceedings and keep a discreet watch on Kettle. And they discovered something of great interest. Kettle was making a collection. Somewhere between the suckling pig and the swan hearts with syrup of pears, they saw him huddled with a merchant on his way to the house of easement. And then, over the course of an hour, he spoke to others, six in all. And in each case money was passed to him.’

‘Which merchants?’

‘John, be careful. I cannot abide these merchants in all their ermine-clad satisfaction. They are too pleased with themselves. Yet they are not without power for all their softness of belly; these are some of the richest and mightiest men in the city. They have fortunes that could buy the war chest. In their own way, they wield as much force as a Cecil or a Devereux.’

‘Name them.’

‘I have been to speak with two of them — Sir Gerald Bookman and Tolly Weaver. They gave me the same story. They laughed it off. They said Kettle told them he was collecting alms for distressed mariners and they gave him a little money. It was a simple story but unbreakable — unless you wish them arrested and tortured for what would appear to be little or no reason. I have not been to the others yet and I do not intend to.’

Shakespeare was silent for a moment. He had come up against the power of wealth before. No, he could not have the men brought in on such evidence; nor would he, anyway. It was no crime to be charitable. The key to this was the man Kettle. Who — or what — was he collecting for?

‘My man and the sergeant watched to see more of Kettle’s movements — who he approached, where he went…’

‘But they lost him.’

Henbird nodded gravely. ‘He went to the kitchens and was not seen again. None of the cooks or the other serving men could say where he had gone. They knew him as an occasional worker there, but nothing more about him.’

‘What do you think, Nick? What’s happening here?’

‘There is considerable unrest about the strangers. The placards outside the Dutch church and now the powder outrages… There is a fever in the air. I have spoken to some of the poultry traders here. They are wary what they say to me. I think them reluctant to be involved in any way, which is understandable, but one or two have confided that they hear things in the taverns and ordinaries about rabble-rousing. Some speak of a new Wat Tyler or Jack Cade, feeding off the fears of the merchants and the resentment of employed men whose wages have been cut, or whose jobs have been lost. My instinct is that there is something in this, some organisation bubbling up into insurrection. If you asked me to guess, I would say Kettle was collecting for them and that the merchants who gave their gold knew very well what it was for. Distressed mariners be damned. The money is buying gunpowder to blow up Dutchmen.’

‘Then this is even bigger than we feared. This is not merely the usual mob of apprentices spoiling for a fight.’

‘A great deal bigger, John. That is my honest worry.’ He paused. ‘Drink your brandy. You have suffered most grievously, and I am sorry

…’

Shakespeare nodded stiffly, then downed the spirit in one shot. There was, for a moment, silence in the room. At last he spoke. ‘Do you think it worth going back to the two merchants, Bookman and Weaver?’

‘Possibly.’

‘I think you should go. Appeal to their God-fearing natures. Explain that if they don’t help you, they could end up in something so deep it will unsettle their comfortable lives. And find Oliver Kettle for me.’

Henbird enjoyed the smooth heat of the brandy slipping down his throat. ‘I shall also ask about if anyone has heard of a Laveroke…’

‘Do that, Nick, do that.’ Henbird was right, Shakespeare thought as he refilled his brandy. There was a fever in the air. ‘Does this all come from the Escorial?’ he said, expressing his reflections aloud. ‘I know what Mr Secretary would be thinking…’

‘He would be thinking that we are under attack.’

‘And I would have to agree with him.’

It was early evening, a fine evening now that the grey cloud had moved away. The sun was high and the land was warm. No more than a few white clouds drifted on the light breeze.

Boltfoot left his horse at a livery stable, all the time closely watched by Warboys, so that he had no hope of slipping away or getting a groom to take a message for him. Then they doubled back to Brick Lane, where they were joined by eleven other men, all of whom he had seen in the workshop and none of whom were introduced to him. They seemed a strange group, men of different ages and sizes. The only things that united them were the old hagbuts and pikes they brought, their common working men’s clothing of leather and wool jerkins, and their obvious deference to Warboys.

Together, they marched north and east, skirting the fields that fringed the urban areas outside the city wall. Now they were in the countryside to the north of Houndsditch.

Boltfoot heard the distant boom of a cannon. As they drew nearer, the intermittent crack of musket-fire grew louder. They were approaching the long brick wall surrounding Artillery Yard, to the west of Spital Field.

‘Now we’ll try your mettle, Mr Cooper. Now we’ll see whether you have the eye of a hawk or the fumbling eye of a mole.’

Boltfoot mumbled in a non-committal way. He knew his worth in the heat of battle. He had staked his life on many an occasion when ships came broadside and the grappling hooks lashed them together for hand-to-hand fighting. He would fear no man in armed close-quarters combat.

There were other trainbands in the area. Hundreds of men were out this day with the militias of the great livery companies. These were the men who would defend London should Spain ever invade. Slightly apart, keeping themselves to themselves as if looking down on the Londoners, were troops raised by the noble families from the shires, all identifiable by their bright tabards and fluttering pennants. Outside the yard, pikemen and halberdiers rehearsed their deadly craft — parry, thrust and chop. Archers, too, reminded those who thought the longbow had had its day that the whisper of an arrow could be every bit as deadly as the bang of a musket-ball. Within the yard, a few artillery men were working on an array of cannons. Also in the yard, a hundred or so arquebusiers stood idly talking, awaiting their turn to step up to the mark, rest their matchlock muskets on notched props and fire half a dozen balls at a range of targets.

There were others here — food sellers with bushel bags of fruit and bread, whores, alemen — all trying to earn a few pence from this ritual, which had become so much a part of London life since King Philip first threatened to send an invasion armada back in the 1580s. All this army of part-time English warriors required was good leadership and cohesion, for they had fighting spirit in great measure and were rapidly acquiring martial skills.

As they arrived in the yard, Warboys nodded to a group of a dozen men, who came over and mingled with the group he had brought. He turned to Cooper. ‘Do you want to show me your skills with a matchlock hagbut or are you content with your caliver?’

‘What I would most like, Mr Warboys, is a little more information if I am to hazard my life with you. This is a ragged band. I do not mind fighting for England, but I do not wish to have my belly slit open and my trillibub spilled into the Tyburn dust for a group of worthless vagabonds.’

‘All in good time. All will become clear. But I can tell you there is nothing treasonable here. You are risking nothing by training with us. No man who sees us could think us anything but another of the many trainbands honing their aim. What true Englishmen is not out at the targets on such a fine summer’s evening? What man would not defend his country from enemies without and enemies within?’

For the next two hours, Boltfoot took his turn to fire at the targets, along with the other men. They did not talk with him much. Finally, Warboys handed him a tankard of ale. ‘Here you are, Mr Cooper. You have earned that. Not only are you a good craftsman, but you are a fine shot, too. What else do you know? Have you dealt with ordnance, with powder?’

‘Aboard ship, aye, I was proficient enough, but there were plenty of men who knew more than me.’

‘Well, go now and sup, then later, you shall make acquaintance with Mr Curl. I think he will like you well. In the meantime, I have other work I must attend to.’