No bones had been broken, however, and the loss of blood was relatively minor. Simon Chaloner had arrived in time to disturb the attackers but they had fled from the premises before he could confront them.
‘How many were there?’ asked Nicholas.
‘Two of the rogues.’
‘It feels as if there were a dozen,’ he said, hauling himself upright and finding new sources of grief in his thighs and shoulder. ‘You saved me from worse punishment. I thank you for that.’
‘You should be blaming me.’
‘Why?’
‘For getting you so soundly beaten.’
‘It was not your doing.’
‘I fear me that it was.’
‘Why?’
‘The warning was not for you.’
‘Then for whom?’
‘Me.’ There was a noise outside the door and Nicholas tensed for a moment. ‘They will not come back, I promise you. Those ruffians will only attack one man by surprise. They would never dare take on two who are ready for them.’
He flicked his cloak back over his shoulder to reveal weapons at his waist. Nicholas took a closer look at him and saw that Simon Chaloner was in much more sober garb than at their previous meeting. Instead of the garish apparel of a roaring boy, he was now wearing a doublet and hose that would not have been out of place on a lawyer. Nobody at the Inns of Court, however, would have been as well-armed as Chaloner. In addition to a sword and dagger, he had a ball-butted pistol in a holster attached to his belt.
The younger man looked at the injured face and sighed.
‘I offer you a thousand apologies, Nicholas, if I may call you that. In trying to protect you from danger, I seem unwittingly to have led you into it.’
‘It was not your fault,’ said Nicholas, attempting to piece together the sequence of events. ‘I was caught off guard. When I entered the tavern, a serving-wench was waiting for me. She brought me up here and led me into the trap.’
‘But only because of me.’
‘How so?’
‘I called here earlier to hire a room. Obviously, I was followed and my business learned from the landlord. The serving-wench was party to the ambush. I will swear that she is not employed at the Eagle and Serpent.’
Nicholas walked a few paces but found his legs heavy and unsure of themselves. Chaloner helped him to a stool before sitting opposite him at the table. Raucous laughter filtered up from far below. Other revellers could be heard in the street. The atmosphere in the room was noisome but at least they had a measure of privacy. Nicholas kept both elbows on the table for support.
‘The case is altered, I think,’ said Chaloner sadly.
‘Case?’
‘You came here this evening to tell me that Westfield’s Men would stage The Roaring Boy. Had you not, you would have brought the manuscript with you to return it. Had you or Edmund Hoode despised the play as a vile concoction, you would not even have bothered to answer my summons.’
‘That is true.’
‘But your offer will now be withdrawn, alas.’
‘Why?’
‘Because of the beating you took. Every scratch and bruise about you was put there by The Roaring Boy. It is, as you see, a perilous enterprise. Now that you know the risks we take here, you will run headlong from the project.’
‘Westfield’s Men are not so easily frightened, sir,’ said Nicholas. ‘You were right to think the play found favour. Lawrence Firethorn and Edmund Hoode judged it a remarkable piece of drama-when it is made fit for the stage by a more practised hand. If they commit themselves to something, they are not easily deflected.’
‘Nor are you, I suspect.’
‘The Eagle and Serpent has given me a personal stake in this business,’ said Nicholas, lowering the wet cloth to examine the bloodstains on it. ‘I have a score to settle with the two men who set upon me here this evening. And with the person who hired them. The only way I can do that is if we perform The Roaring Boy. That will bring them back.’
‘Unhappily, it will.’
Nicholas felt another trickle down his forehead and folded the cloth before applying it to the gash once more. The lump on the back of his head continued to pound away. He appraised his companion for a moment and took especial note of his weaponry.
‘You have served in the army, I think,’ he said.
Chaloner was surprised. ‘Why, yes.’
‘And saw service in Germany?’
‘Holland. I was at Zutphen when our dear commander, Sir Philip Sidney died. How on earth did you guess that?’
‘You have something of the stamp of a military man,’ said Nicholas. ‘And you have a soldier’s bravery, certainly. You would not else have undertaken such a dangerous business. You carry those weapons like a man who knows how to use them.’ Nicholas gave longer attention to the stock of the pistol, which protruded from the other’s holster. ‘I would say that fought in the cavalry.’
‘Even so! By what sorcery did you divine that?’
‘Your pistol. May I see it?’
Chaloner handed it over at once. ‘Here, ’tis yours.’
‘It is of German design,’ said Nicholas, ‘its stock inlaid with engraved staghorn. A wheel-lock. Such weapons are highly expensive and not to be wasted on common foot-soldiers, where the risk of damage would be great. This is a German cavalry pistol.’
‘Indeed, it is,’ agreed Chaloner with a grin. ‘I borrowed it from its owner when he had no more use for it. The villain had the gall to discharge it at me. When our swords clashed, I cut him down and took it as a souvenir. You name him aright, Nicholas. He was a German mercenary.’ He took the pistol back and returned it to his holster. ‘How does a book holder with a theatre company come to know so much about firearms?’
‘It is all part of my trade, sir. We use pistols and muskets in our plays as well as swords and daggers. Nathan Curtis, our stage carpenter, fashioned a caliver out of wood but two weeks ago. Before that, an arquebus. Painted replicas but made with great skill.’
‘And a ball-butted German cavalry wheel-lock?’
‘No,’ said Nicholas, ‘that is beyond his art and our needs. But he works from a book of firearms that I keep and study for pleasure. It contains a drawing of your pistol. It is very distinctive.’ He leaned forward and his voice hardened. ‘So you see, Master Chaloner. I already know more about you than you intended. Do not put me to the trouble of finding out who you really are. Enough of all this mystery and evasion. If you wish to proceed in this affair, we must have more honesty between us.’
‘There is only so much that I may tell you, Nicholas.’
‘Then we might as well part company now.’
‘Do not mistake me,’ said Chaloner, easing the other back on to his stool as he tried to rise. ‘I will answer any question you put to me. Some of those answers, I must insist, are for your ears only and I rely on your discretion to perceive what they might be. But my own knowledge is far from complete. On many things, I am still in the dark.’
‘Let us begin then where light can be shed.’
‘Please do.’
‘How did they know I was coming to this tavern?’ said Nicholas. ‘When you hired the room here, did you tell the landlord my name?’
‘The devil I did! He did not even get my own.’
‘Then why was I expected at the Eagle and Serpent?’
‘I can only guess, Nicholas.’
‘Well?’
‘Someone learned of my business with Westfield’s Men,’ decided Chaloner. ‘Not from me. I am as close as the grave. And only one other person on my side knew of our meeting. Someone at the Queen’s Head must have let slip our plans.’
‘Only three people know them apart from myself.’
‘Word got out somehow. It shows how subtly they work.’
‘They?’
‘The people who ordered the death of Thomas Brinklow. Who sent his wife and her lover-guilty of sin, but innocent of murder-to the gallows. The people whom the play sets out to expose and call to account.’