Shakespeare’s blood ran cold. He tried to get up, but was instantly tripped and his captors set to work binding his feet.
‘Indeed, I am led to believe she gave herself up. Walked all alone to Richard Young’s house and turned herself over to his mercy. But that will not save her; no soft womanly entreaties or feigned remorse will save her neck.’
‘And if she is innocent?’
‘Innocent? She is as guilty as you, and you will both die. You are an accessory to murder and a traitor. The company you keep is all the evidence needed. Indeed, the judge may have to invent a new form of execution to reflect the depravity of your crimes.’ Topcliffe had his silver-tipped blackthorn stick strapped to the horse’s flank. He pulled it out and jabbed at the silent figure of Goodfellow Savage. ‘Your friend is very quiet, Shakespeare. He won’t be so quiet when I burn him with irons.’
Anthony Babington scraped his knife across the trencher, pushing his food to the side. He had eaten almost nothing. John Scudamore, meanwhile was eating with great relish. He cut an enormous chunk of pork, wrapped it in a hunk of buttered bread, then dunked it into the middle of a fried duck’s egg, so that the yolk burst forth like a golden sun and covered the bread. He forced the whole into his mouth and chewed with enthusiasm.
‘This is fine fare,’ he tried to say, then took a sup of ale to wash the mouthful down. ‘I say this is fine fare, Mr Babington.’
‘I have no appetite.’
‘So I see. Perhaps you would allow me to finish your food for you.’ He was sitting opposite Babington in a small booth and pulled the trencher towards him and piled the food on top of his own. ‘It would be a crime to waste such fare, for it will only go as fodder for pigs or dogs if I do not eat it.’
The tavern was almost empty. This was a working day. Scudamore tucked into Babington’s meal, looking at him occasionally with what he clearly intended as a reassuring smile, but saying little.
The reassuring smiles did nothing for Babington, who was as tense as a line with a trout on the hook. He was horribly aware that he was the catch. He leant back. His sword-belt and cape were slung casually over the back of his chair.
The terror was worse here, in this mundane place in the company of this pleasant, ravenous man. The visions of blood were more real now; he saw his own blood washing into the earth but also that of his friends – Tom Salisbury, Chidiock Tichbourne and the rest.
What had he done? Oh dear God, what had he done to them? Neither man had been a willing accomplice when first he mooted Ballard’s deadly schemes. Tom would never have become involved in such things without his insistent urgings. And now poor Tom was to die, as were they all.
And yet, surely there must still be hope of escape.
The tavern door opened and Scudamore looked up and nodded. Babington turned. He thought he recognised the newcomer from court, but he was not sure. He was tall and bent and dressed in the sober attire of one of Walsingham’s men. Without a word or other acknowledgement of Babington’s presence he walked up to Scudamore and handed him a sealed note.
‘Thank you, Mr Mills.’
‘My pleasure, Mr Scudamore.’
‘Will you have some ale with us?’
‘Indeed not, I must be away. Good day to you.’ He departed without another word.
Babington watched as Scudamore took his dagger and sliced open the seal on the note. Trying not to make himself obvious, he strained to read the words upside down. He had to stifle a gasp. There was his own name. And another word: arrest. Scudamore had been ordered to arrest him.
Babington stood up. ‘This was my idea, Mr Scudamore, so I shall pay the shot.’
Scudamore merely grunted. He was reading the note.
Without touching either his sword or cape, which he left slung across the back of his chair, Babington strolled towards the counter to pay the reckoning. He asked the sum, then handed over a half-crown. He noted that his hands were shaking. ‘Keep the small coins, Master landlord.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
Babington glanced back at Scudamore. He was still engrossed in the note. As silently as possible he opened the door, stepped outside, and began to run, harder and faster than he had ever run before.
The journey to the Tower was long and exhausting. Strapped face down over the barrel of his horse, the pressure of the constant movement of the animal along the bumpy highway continually knocked the breath from Shakespeare’s lungs.
He was desperately fearful for Kat. If she was now in custody, he knew there would be little delay before her trial and execution. Somehow he needed to find the proof of her innocence at great speed. And he could not do that incarcerated in a cell. Even a day’s delay could prove fatal to her.
As he was being unstrapped from the horse, he looked up at the bleak, impregnable walls of the Tower and its mass of turrets. This notorious and doleful place, the young Princess Elizabeth had called it when she was brought here one wet and miserable day thirty-three years earlier on the orders of her sister Queen Mary.
Notorious and doleful. Though the day was warm, Shakespeare shivered with foreboding.
He and Savage stood side by side at the gate as they prepared to be received into the custody of the Tower warders. Shakespeare tried to protest, but the chief warder merely said, ‘Save it for your examination.’ He turned to Topcliffe, who was still mounted. ‘I am uncertain how to proceed, Mr Topcliffe. We have orders that Savage is to be taken to Ely Place for his interrogation. They are being sent to many different gaols and great houses in the first instance.’ He indicated Shakespeare. ‘I have no orders regarding this prisoner.’
‘This is a most notorious conspirator and spy, sent by the Antichrist. You will find accommodation for him here before the Council decides how to proceed with him. As for Savage, you will depute a well-armed squadron to remove him to Ely Place, if that is what is required. I will be back soon enough.’ Wheeling his horse, he pushed the animal into a walk and turned back towards the heart of the city.
The chief warder knew better than to gainsay Topcliffe. He ordered a detachment of men to escort Savage to Ely Place, the home of Sir Christopher Hatton, then he handed Shakespeare into the care of one of his men and he was marched towards the south-east corner of the Tower.
‘This will be your home until the trial, Mr Shakespeare,’ the warder said as they halted outside one of the turrets, topped by battlements. ‘The Salt Tower. You will be brought ale and some supper before dark and in the morning there will be bread. If you require a bed, then that will be for your friends to provide. Otherwise you will have a scattering of straw on which to recline.’
Shakespeare wished he could have said a proper farewell to Goodfellow Savage, his beloved enemy. He would like to have embraced him, or at least promised to say a prayer, but he knew that any such gesture would be used against them both by Topcliffe.
‘Up the stairs, Mr Shakespeare.’
‘Can you get word to Sir Francis Walsingham for me?’
‘No, sir, I cannot. The instructions from Mr Topcliffe are clear and specific, and accord with the Lieutenant’s wishes.’
‘I will give you gold.’
‘And I will report to the chief warder and Mr Topcliffe that you have attempted to bribe me. I know from experience that that will not sit well with either of them.’
‘How then am I to ask my friends for furnishings?’
‘That, sir, is not for me to say. I am merely obeying Mr Topcliffe’s command.’
‘At least talk to the Lieutenant of the Tower. Tell him I am here and that I am an officer in the employment of Walsingham. I am a Queen’s man.’
‘Indeed, Sir Owen Hopton will already know that you are here. He is expecting the arrival of many others and I don’t doubt there will be protests and complaints from all of you.’
Shakespeare’s eyes grew accustomed to the gloom. The only light he had in the small room came through arrow slits. The only thing he had to occupy him was trying to decipher the marks in the stone where former prisoners had carved their names or prayers. Many men and, perhaps, women must have spent their last night on earth in this little cell. Their ghosts were all around him, filling the space.