‘Yes,’ said Nick.
‘You’ll find Master Bruton in The Ram, sir. That’s where he is when he isn’t here.’
Hans spun round so fast his glasses almost fell off his nose. He looked annoyed as though some family secret had been revealed. In this way Nick knew the information was reliable. He thanked the apprentice and left.
Nick was acquainted with The Ram although he had not stepped across its threshold for several years. He wondered why George Bruton habitually drank in a tavern that was quite a way from his work and his home, before it occurred to him that the distance was probably the reason.
He trudged through the slushy streets. The snow that had fallen the previous evening was lying in dirty, half-frozen pools in the road, and the white rooftops were now smudged all over with soot. Pulling his cloak about him and avoiding the other passers-by as they negotiated slippery corners, Nick thought about his ‘mission’. He wasn’t sure whether William Shakespeare was more worried because of the potentially treasonable lines in the play called The English Brothers or more outraged because someone – Henry Ashe? – was attempting to pass the piece off as his (WS’s) work. Nick decided it was outrage rather than worry.
By now he had reached The Ram. The place showed no improvement in the years since his last visit. Still very dingy and disreputable. Despite the dim light, he observed a man sitting by himself in the corner. He recognised Bruton from Shakespeare’s description: a man with a large belly pressed against the table before him and with the reddened nose of a drinker. Bruton looked up. When he saw that Nick was heading directly for him, he tapped with his fingers against his tankard. The gesture was clear. Since Nick needed him to co-operate he ordered two pints before sitting down opposite the printer.
And he waited until the drinks arrived before announcing that he’d come from the Admiral’s Men.
‘Oh, yes?’ said Bruton, taking a big swig from his mug.
‘We are interested in staging a play that you have recently published.’
‘Are you?’
‘It is called The English Brothers.’
Nick was gratified to see a change come over Bruton’s hitherto impassive face. Not a positive change, since he now looked both wary and irritated.
‘You are sure you are from the Admiral’s Men? You’re not from… the Council.’ Bruton lowered his voice as he said the last two words, and in such an artificial way that it would scarcely have been believed on stage. There was nobody nearby, although a knot of men was sitting and drinking in another corner. Bruton’s manner told Nick that WS’s fears about the Privy Council were justified. He assured Bruton that he really was a player and not a government agent.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Richard Newman,’ said Nick promptly. He was pleased not to have been caught out by the abrupt question. ‘You may call me Dick, if you prefer.’
‘I have no preference over what to call you. I’ve never even heard of you. You are sure the Admiral’s want the play?’
‘Absolutely sure,’ said Nick, then went on quickly before he could be asked any more questions. ‘But there is no author to go to, no one named on the title page.’
‘The author is Henry Ashe.’
‘I’ve never heard of him,’ said Nick. ‘Did he deliver the play to you himself?’
Bruton paused before replying. ‘No. Mr Ashe gave it to a friend – or an agent – I don’t know which.’
It took another two drinks before Nick was able to prise the name of this supposed agent out of the printer. He was called Christopher Dole. This was a name that was familiar, or half familiar, to Revill. Wasn’t Dole a bookseller?
‘That’s his brother, Alan,’ said Bruton. ‘Keeps a bookshop by St Paul’s.’
Nick knew the bookshop. He tried again. Was Dole an actor? Or a playwright?
Yes, said George Bruton, he’d been both. Dole was an actor with Lord Faulkes’s company for a time and he’d penned a few plays for them. Not very successfully. The last piece he wrote more or less finished him off. It was about the Roman emperor Nero and it was called The Matricide.
‘A tragedy?’ asked Nick.
‘Meant to be,’ said Bruton, ‘but it was received as a comedy. Dole was humiliated. He blamed everyone but himself. Turned his back on the drama, which is why I was surprised when he presented me with this new piece, The English Brothers, even if it is by someone else.’
Nick thought that the play was probably by Christopher Dole, and not the elusive Henry Ashe. It was Dole he should be calling on. But if the printer knew where he lived, he was not going to reveal it. This might have been connected to the fact that Nick refused to buy him another drink. However, he did add, as Nick was leaving The Ram, ‘And, if you catch up with him, tell that bastard – Christopher Dole, I mean – tell him that he owes me money.’
Nick thought that next he ought to visit Alan Dole. He would surely be familiar with his brother’s whereabouts. Reflecting that he was having to go a long way round the town to carry out this task on behalf of Shakespeare, and warmed only a little by the thought of WS’s friendship, Nick duly called at Dole’s bookshop. At first the bookseller was reluctant to talk about his brother, but then he suddenly grew angry and made mention of Christopher’s ‘foolish crimes’. When Alan Dole calmed down, he was able to identify the street and house where Christopher lodged.
‘The landlady is Mrs Atkins. Christopher occupies a meagre top-floor chamber and that is all he is entitled to,’ said Alan. ‘If you see him, ask him why he didn’t return yesterday with the… the thing he promised to bring. He’ll know what I’m talking about. And when he does return, I want a word with him, more than a word.’
So now, in the early afternoon and with the feel of snow in the air once again, Nick stood outside the house he’d been directed to. A young man opened the door to his knock. His close-set eyes scanned Nick without approval.
‘I am looking for Christopher Dole, I believe he lodges here.’
‘The world is beating a path to his door,’ said the young man. ‘You are the third visitor since this time yesterday.’
He stood aside to let the caller in, although in a grudging sort of way so that Nick had to squeeze past him. He pointed a finger upwards and said, ‘Go as far as you can go.’
Nick groped his way up a dark staircase, which narrowed and grew more rickety as he reached the top of the house. Once there, he paused and listened. The house was silent and any street sounds were muffled by the snow outside. Suddenly Nick was reluctant to proceed with this. Yet he had his mission. He tapped on what, since it was the only door on this floor, must be the entrance to Dole’s room.
No response. He rapped more loudly. Nothing. He reached out and twisted the handle, not expecting to get anywhere. But the room was not locked. His sense of unease grew stronger. Nick would have turned and gone back down the stairs but for the thought that he might find some evidence inside that Christopher Dole was the author of The English Brothers.
He pushed the door right open. It was a small room, even smaller than Revill’s own lodgings. In the gloom he could make out the shape of a bed, a desk beneath the small window, a stool against the wall and a chest in the corner immediately to his left. Perhaps Nick looked at these things to avoid looking at what was in front of his nose.
Directly before him, so close that it was almost touching the door, was a body. Swaying very slightly in the draught from the open door, it hung from a belt or girdle looped round a beam in the low ceiling. The head was almost crammed up against the beam, and the feet pointed downwards so that they dangled a few inches above the floor. Not much of a distance perhaps, but even those few inches had been enough to ensure Christopher Dole choked to death.