The ride here had been hectic and perilous along the dark paths east of London. They had driven their horses hard. Now they strode to the door of the fortress-like house, where the guards took one look at Shakespeare’s two companions – Boltfoot and a small, weaselly man named Wicklow – and stood back, fear in their eyes. It was Wicklow that engendered the terror. Shakespeare guessed that he was a senior lieutenant of Cutting Ball and was a great deal more deadly than he looked. He had been sent not merely to smooth Shakespeare’s passage but to protect Ball’s interests and to report back to his master.
‘Mr Shakespeare and Mr Cooper are to be admitted and have free range of the house, save only the strongroom.’ Wicklow’s orders from Cutting Ball had been concise and now he delivered them with equal sureness.
The guards bowed low and stood aside.
‘And you, Mr Wicklow?’
‘I will accompany you so that the indoor guards do not bar your way. You have an hour, no more. Those are my instructions.’
He nodded. An hour would be more than enough. If they had found nothing in that time, then Kat and Sorbus were certain to die.
Their boots rang out on the ancient stone floors. Otherwise, the house was silent. At every corner, guards slid from the shadows, weapons at the ready, only to salute and shrink back at the sight of Wicklow.
They went to the old woman’s chamber. She was of venerable age, but Shakespeare would waken her nonetheless. He pushed open the door. The room was in darkness so he took a lantern from the wall outside and walked into the familiar room. He held the lantern over the bed.
She seemed so small and insignificant in her sleep. Was this the woman whose wealth had once been almost as great as the Queen of England’s, the woman whose beauty had stirred Great Henry? Neither the lantern light nor their footsteps woke her. Shakespeare touched her shoulder. It was cold to the touch. He put the back of his hand to her face: the coldness of death. He felt for a pulse in her neck and found none.
‘She’s gone, Boltfoot.’
Shakespeare saw two vials on the pillow beside her. They were empty. Beside the bed, her small silver goblet was upended. Perhaps she had finally decided she could no longer bear to outlive those who mattered to her. She had been killed by the very spirit of opium that she believed preserved her; he cursed beneath his breath. There would be no information or evidence from Mistress Joan Giltspur, the grandame of the family and its great corporation of fishing fleets.
How long had she been gone, he wondered? Hours? Days? With her son Nicholas murdered, there was no one left in this house to care whether she was alive or dead.
Shakespeare and Boltfoot searched the room. They delved in coffers, beneath the bed, on shelves and in drawers. It was Boltfoot who spotted the small distinguishing line of the floorboards in the corner furthest from the window. It was a trapdoor set in the floor, but without any handle or grip to raise it. He thrust his dagger blade between the edge of the trap and the rest of the boards. The two-foot-square hatch sprang open. Shakespeare held the lantern above the hole, which was lined in scarlet satin. Two heavy books bound in black leather lay there.
‘So she had control of the books.’ But they would, of course, have been easily accessible to another when she was in her opium stupors.
Shakespeare pulled them out and flicked through the pages. The books were dense with small script. Masses of figures and words, much of it abbreviated and, possibly, coded. His heart sank. It would take an expert many days to sort out the truth secreted between the covers of these volumes.
They moved on, with Wicklow in close attendance. In the darkness and quietness of the early hours, the house seemed like an anteroom for the shades of death, inhabited by the ghosts of a once-great family, now fallen. From the top of a long wooden staircase, they heard sounds behind a closed door. Shakespeare stopped and looked at Boltfoot. ‘That must be Arthur Giltspur’s bedchamber. It seems he is both here and awake.’ He spoke in a low voice.
‘And judging by the voices, master, he is not alone.’
‘Mr Wicklow?’
‘I will wait down here. This is yours to deal with.’
Shakespeare and Boltfoot began to climb, on their toes, trying to remain silent. They were halfway up when the door burst open. Arthur Giltspur stood at the top of the stairs, lit from behind by the flickering glow of two dozen candles.
He was naked, brandishing two wheel-lock pistols, one clasped in each hand.
Boltfoot already had his caliver in his arms, primed. Without a second thought, he raised it and levelled it at Giltspur.
The peace of the night was broken by an explosion, then a second. Smoke engulfed the stairway. As it cleared, they saw that Giltspur was no longer there. He had retreated back into his room. Below them, at the bottom of the stairs, Wicklow was sitting on the floor clutching his chest. Blood was pouring through his fingers.
Shakespeare stepped down to go to the man but Boltfoot took his shoulder. ‘Leave him, master. The guards will help him.’
He nodded. ‘Did you get off a shot?’
‘No. They were both his. He’ll be reloading.’
‘Take him alive. He is worthless dead.’
‘I’ve seen that man before, Mr Shakespeare. He staked a thousand pounds on the throw of a dice that might have killed me.’
Shakespeare had his sword out, the blade honed and lethal. He was moving up the staircase, not knowing what he would meet. Did Giltspur have other pistols loaded? Boltfoot had his own gun square into his shoulder.
Giltspur’s chamber door was closed. The air was thick with the stench of burnt blackpowder.
Shakespeare’s eyes met Boltfoot’s. The first man through the door would be an easy target. He signalled with his hand and Boltfoot backed off, taking a kneeling position, his weapon trained towards the door. Heart beating like the sails of a mill in a gale, Shakespeare lifted the latch and pushed. The door was unlocked and swung open inwards. He flung himself flat back against the jamb, scanning the chamber. He could not see Giltspur. But there were two others there, women, unclothed
– and he recognised them instantly.
The Smith sisters were lying nonchalantly across the great tester bed, gazing at Shakespeare as though he were some curiosity that had made an entrance at the Circus Maximus for the delight of a Caesar. One was on her front, resting her chin on her elbows, gazing at him with interest but no fear. The other sprawled on her back across the pillows, her breasts pointing to the ceiling like ripe plums.
‘It seems you alarmed our friend,’ Beth said in her light, tinkling voice. ‘He left clutching his hose and shirt.’
Shakespeare glanced at them, then removed his gaze. He wanted Giltspur. Something caught his eye: a hole in the wainscotting. Two panels had been removed, revealing the opening to a hide or tunnel.
‘Stay here, Boltfoot. I’ll follow him.’
‘He’s gone, Mr Shakespeare. Forget him,’ the elder of the Smith sisters said, the one lounging back against the pillows. ‘Come join us on the bed, for we delight in making men’s pistols go bang. Do we not, Beth?’
‘Where, oh where, is our little pink pigling?’
Shakespeare strode across to the hole in the wall, his sword in one hand, lantern in the other. He held it into the darkness. A tunnel ran downwards like a chute; he could not tell how far it went. Was it a self-contained priesthole or an escape route? There was nothing for it but to go onwards.
‘If you must go, take the caliver, Mr Shakespeare,’ Boltfoot said.