Nicholas Bracewell was a considerate host. Once he had dispatched his various tasks, he gave Marion and Anne Hendrik a brief tour behind the scenes and explained the technical effects he had devised for the play. Marion was then able to shower Edmund Hoode with her naive praise and redeem what had been a testing afternoon for the playwright. While congratulating him on his own performance, Marion was anxious to hear how her brother might have acquitted himself in the same role and she was touched by the esteem in which Hoode obviously held his departed colleague.
Nicholas took the opportunity of a few words alone with Anne Hendrik. Her identification of a hatmaker was a most unexpected bonus and he was duly grateful.
‘You have done Westfield’s Men a great service today.’
‘By looking at a hat instead of watching a play?’ she said mischievously. ‘If all spectators did the same, you and your fellows would quickly go out of business.’
‘The threat to our livelihood comes from elsewhere,’ he said, ‘and you have helped us to measure its power. That hat will lead me to the house of Mistress Beatrice Capaldi where I may begin to unravel her mystery a little.’
Anne Hendrik felt the slightest twinge of jealousy.
‘What do you think of the lady, Nick?’
‘Me?’
‘You have twice been close to her person.’
‘Only on embassy from Master Firethorn.’
‘You have eyes, you have feelings.’
Nicholas was tactful. ‘They are engaged elsewhere.’
‘A pretty answer but it evades my question.’
‘I thought as any man would think, Anne,’ he said honestly. ‘Beatrice Capaldi is a woman of great beauty.’
‘Did her charms not enslave you?’
‘No.’
‘Would you not like to be in Master Firethorn’s shoes?’
‘My own fit far more comfortably.’
‘Will you admit nothing about this enchantress?’
He was serious. ‘She is no friend of mine.’
Anne Hendrik relaxed and talked at length about the conduct of Beatrice Capaldi during the play itself. The latter seemed to be giving a performance that was as well rehearsed and carefully judged as any on the stage. The idea which had earlier flashed through Anne’s mind now made a second momentary appearance.
‘Nick …’
‘Yes?’
‘Did you observe anything else about the lady?’
‘I was there but as a messenger.’
‘It is only a feeling of mine …’
‘I trust to your instincts, Anne.’
She hesitated then backed off quickly. ‘No!’ she said. ‘It was an unkind thought brought on by merest envy. The lady is truly beautiful and she wore a hat that I would give anything to have sold her.’
Nicholas brushed a kiss against her forehead. Marion Carrick rejoined them to offer her thanks once more. As they left the playhouse, reality began to crowd in upon her again and she became the distressed sister of a murdered actor.
‘We owe much to your kindness, Master Bracewell.’
‘Sebastian was my friend.’
‘We may never be able to repay you.’
‘I do not seek reward.’
‘It irks my father greatly,’ she said. ‘To be locked away at such a time and in such a condition. He feels the weight of our obligation to you. Father would love to be able to offer you recompense of some kind. He is searching desperately for a way to express our gratitude.’
Enforced idleness was a cumulative misery to a man such as Andrew Carrick. A conscientious lawyer with a substantial clientele, he was at his happiest when in the throes of some litigation. Because he found the cut and thrust of argument so bracing, the unforgiving gloom of the Tower of London was especially lowering. He brooded on. Harry Fellowes came to assume more importance in his life by the day. Not only did Carrick savour their brief conversations, he was given a subject for endless speculation. The Clerk of Ordnance was much more than a holder of Crown office. Eminent visitors came to call on him at the Office and Carrick noted their arrival with interest. It was conceivable that the Earl of Chichester came to the Tower to discharge official business with his junior and that the loan arranged between them — witnessed by the lawyer — was related in some way to the operation of the Ordnance Department, but that explanation could not cover the others who came in earnest search of Harry Fellowes.
An astute observer like Carrick soon developed a theory and he waited patiently for a moment to put it to the test. His friend was too guileful to respond to direct questioning and so the lawyer chose a more subtle line of examination.
‘I have a favour to ask of you, good sir,’ he said.
‘Ask away,’ encouraged the other. ‘I will do all I can except secure your release, and I would do that, too, if it were within my power.’
‘You have been a sound friend.’
‘I hate to see you suffer for such a trivial offence.’
‘In future, I will attend no more marriages.’
They shared a laugh, then strolled across the courtyard. Bright sunshine streamed down to imprison them in a neat rectangle of light. Carrick grew confidential.
‘Evidently, you are well acquainted with the nobility.’
‘And they with me,’ said Fellowes.
‘Then haply you may advise me.’
‘On what matter?’
‘I have this client, a gentleman of high rank …’
‘How do you serve him?’
‘Very ill while I am penned up here and his business is very pressing.’ He lowered his voice. ‘It is also a subject of some delicacy and one with which I am not altogether qualified to deal. My noble lord’s problem …’
Fellowes guessed it. ‘He requires money.’
‘You are very perceptive, sir.’
‘It needs no great insight to divine that,’ he said. ‘Poverty is the natural condition of our nobility. They build houses they cannot afford, keep retinues of servants whom they cannot pay, then give lavish hospitality that sends them even deeper into debt.’
‘That is certainly the case with my client.’
‘It is the case with most of them, Master Carrick. We have nineteen earls and marquesses in England and there are not half a dozen who can pay their own way.’ He became more expansive. ‘Such men are born to borrow. Look but upon the late Earl of Leicester. When he died in Armada year, he left behind debts of £85,000. Were they honoured by his heirs?’
‘Tell me, sir.’
‘They were not. Those debts were promptly increased. The great man’s funeral alone cost £8,000. Even for such a royal favourite, it was an expensive hole in the ground.’
‘These sums do much to reassure me.’
‘Then your client’s problem is of smaller degree.’
‘He staged an entertainment at his country estate.’
‘How much does he owe his creditors?’
‘Some £650.’
‘A mere trifle,’ said Fellowes airily. ‘I could lend him that amount myself.’
Carrick affected mild surprise. ‘You, sir?’
‘At a moderate rate of interest.’
‘My client would be very willing to pay that.’
‘May I know his name?’
‘Let me first sound him out,’ said Carrick. ‘They lock me up but they allow me pen and ink. I will write to him forthwith and tell him I have found a trustworthy banker.’
‘You may also mention that my credit is good among his peers.’ Fellowes could not resist a boast. ‘I have been of assistance to three earls and a duke.’
Andrew Carrick thanked him and moved gently away from the topic of his fictional client. Having confirmed one part of his theory, he now addressed another. The guard was being changed at the Tower and the soldiers went through their established drill. Carrick watched approvingly.