‘Mr Maude, you are indeed a wonder. I do dare believe you could charm the bees from their hives and the eels from the reeds.’
He took another little bow. ‘At your service, Captain.’ And what is more, I shall charm you to the scaffold. Harry Slide drank the last of his beer. It was time for bed. The sooner they were done with this northern excursion and back in London, the better.
Chapter 17
Shakespeare’s head told him that Kat probably was her husband’s killer; only his foolish heart and the evidence of the Searcher of the Dead suggested that she might be innocent – evidence that might yet prove irrelevant.
As for his examination of Oswald Redd, that had achieved nothing. Threats proved as worthless as entreaties. He had cursed the man for the sheep’s-head that he was and gripped his hand about his miserable throat. ‘You will not help me – which means you will not help Kat. And so I leave you to survive as you may, Redd. I care not a dog’s fart for your neck, but if you do not heed my warnings, you will be the cause of Kat’s death too.’ Releasing his grip on the man’s throat, he had pushed him in the chest so that he fell back against the huge puncheon cask, then turned away and stalked out into the night. There was no more to be done.
Now, in the pre-dawn gloom, he went downstairs to take his breakfast at the long table. At least there was good food to be had in this house since the arrival of Jane. She was already up, so he asked for bread and eggs, then demanded after Boltfoot.
‘He is already up, master.’
‘Fetch him to me if you would, Jane.’
Shakespeare took his place at the head of the table and nodded in greeting to Boltfoot as he hobbled into the room. It seemed to Shakespeare that his limp was more pronounced than usual, and he was certainly slower. His face was bruised and one eye was blacking over.
‘Good day to you, Boltfoot. How are your wounds?’
‘Healing, master. They are as nothing.’
He looked closely at Boltfoot’s injured face. ‘You look close to death, Boltfoot. Rest up for the day. Jane will care for you with hot broth. I will send her to the apothecary for lotions and herbs.’
‘Please, master, no. I have unfinished business.’
‘It will wait; remember, this felon Ball has threatened your life if you go east of the city. From all that we know of him, his threat must be taken seriously.’
Boltfoot’s face was set hard. ‘I cannot let this pass.’
‘What do you think you can do? Are you hoping to find Cutting Ball again? You were blindfolded, Boltfoot.’
‘I can find the whore Em. I am certain of that. If she is his sister, as I suspect, then she will surely lead me to him.’
‘And then what would you do?’
‘I will extract the truth from him.’
‘Boltfoot, there is a line where courage becomes foolhardiness. You will not be helping our cause if you cross it.’
‘But this is not about you and me, is it, master? It is about Kat . . . Mistress Whetstone. Who will save her if we do not?’
Ah yes, that was it. Boltfoot had been almost as distraught as Shakespeare when she left. He had always held a candle for her while knowing she was beyond his reach. Shakespeare managed a smile which he hoped evoked his sympathy, a shared anxiety. ‘At least wait until you are whole again. Then we will discuss our next step, calmly, when the heat has gone from your temper.’
Boltfoot said nothing, merely cast the same look at his master as he had done when defying him over the matter of hiring a new maidservant. Shakespeare saw it and knew the battle was lost. The only way Boltfoot would stay in this house today was if he were fixed to the wall by fetters. Shakespeare shook his head with a light laugh. ‘Take care, Boltfoot. You are worth nothing dead.’
Shakespeare sighed with relief as he arrived at the Holborn house at nine o’clock and ascertained that Gilbert Gifford was indeed still there. He and the Smith sisters were eating heartily, so Shakespeare joined them, for his breakfast had not assuaged his appetite.
‘Thank you, ladies,’ he said as he rose to go.
‘It was our pleasure, sir.’ Eliza gazed at Gifford. Her little pink pigling.
‘Mr Gifford, if you would accompany me, we have an appointment with Mr Secretary.’
‘I want them again tonight. Will you bring them here?’
‘First let us talk to Mr Secretary. He may have other plans. Come, sir.’
On their way to Walsingham’s Seething Lane mansion, Shakespeare called in at home briefly. Boltfoot immediately approached him. ‘A messenger came, master, not ten minutes since.’ He held out a sealed letter. ‘It is from Mr Tort.’
With his poniard, Shakespeare sliced open the red wax seal, unfolded the paper and read the short missive. Go to Aldermanbury at noon. Mr Arthur Giltspur has agreed to see you. Well, that was something, but it might be no more than the last turn of a card in a hand that was already doomed.
Taken alone, a conversation with the dead man’s nephew was unlikely to help. Shakespeare had to talk further with Kat. Now that it was clear her husband’s killer might have had a way to implicate her, he needed to hear from her own lips the names of all those who might have stood to benefit from his death and her downfall.
To one unversed in the labyrinthine twists and turns of his humours, Walsingham’s mood might have seemed unremarkable, for he did not shout or curse or hammer his fist. But Shakespeare knew him better than that; Mr Secretary was in an unholy rage, like the churning current beneath a placid sea.
‘This is falling apart, John. This infernal trinity – Babington, Ballard and Savage – where are they? Why are they not bringing the strands of their demonic plot together? If they were captains-general, their army would have turned tail or been slaughtered by now. Can none of them hold to the sticking-place? I am told Savage has become a model scholar at Barnard’s Inn and is devoted to his studies. Is he to be assassin or lawyer?’
Shakespeare soaked up the onslaught. Only when Walsingham had stopped talking and was silent for a few seconds did he reply. ‘They lack leadership.’
‘Then you provide it!’
‘I am not trusted enough.’
‘What of Babington? Has he not been placed in the lead role by Ballard? I had thought the others of these Pope’s White Sons followed him like sheep.’
‘Yes, but Babington is idle and with Ballard gone north, he drifts. As for Ballard himself, he wastes his energies in the futile cause of raising a Pope’s army. His head is full of bees. He promises the Spanish he can raise a force of sixty thousand English, when we know he is unlikely to rouse one Englishman from his slumbers.’
‘And Goodfellow Savage?’
‘Like an obedient, well-disciplined soldier, he is waiting for others to give him the order to strike. All I can say is this: he may procrastinate, but he will never betray his vow. He still means to do it; he merely awaits the time and the method.’ He paused. ‘But you have the letter from Mary to Babington now, Sir Francis. That surely will spur these men to action.’
‘You have Gilbert Gifford with you?’
‘He is in the anteroom. Would you have him take it to Babington this day?’
Walsingham gave a brisk shake of the head. ‘I will wait until Ballard is back. I want him to boast to Babington about legions of Englishmen rising in the north and foreign armies sweeping in to support them. Only then will he have the confidence to write back to Mary with a detailed plan. A plan she will seize on. A plan that will provoke her into writing to him yet again – and this time giving her backing to treason. That will be the letter that will give us her wicked head.’