‘I should be delighted,’ Johns said, falling into step with her. ‘My own mother was also rather fond of folk remedies. I well remember going to bed in winter with a mouse in a bag round my neck. It was a specific against the quinsy.’
Ursula clutched her throat. ‘Did it work?’ she asked.
Johns bowed, arms outstretched behind him. ‘I stand here, Mistress Steane, without a quinsy to be seen. But if the mouse kept it away, I could not say.’
She laughed and went on ahead, through the wicket gate in the wall. She liked this man. Perhaps dear Benjamin could find a place for him, after his preferment.
The others standing in the knot garden watched them go.
‘Johns is a very sound man,’ Norgate said. ‘Liked by everyone. A good scholar, too, although a little weak on Greek.’
‘Weak on Greek,’ spluttered the imbibing chorister on the other side of the planted square. ‘He just made a pome, did you hear that? A pome.’
Thirling peeled off from the group. ‘I apologize, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid young Kenneally is getting rather excitable. I will get the choir back to Cambridge now, with your leave, Dr Steane.’ Although still-smouldering Cambridge was not the place he would rather be just at that moment.
‘Oh, no, surely not,’ Steane said. ‘There are places for all of you at the table for the wedding breakfast. Please, do stay. Ursula will be so sad if you go.’
Thirling dithered. He liked a good blow-out as much as the next man and if the sweetmeat table was any guide, the dinner later would be a spectacular one. But, a chorister was drunk and had to be taken home. On the other hand . . .
‘Dr Thirling?’ A smooth voice carried over the lavender. ‘If you will permit me, I have a plan.’
‘Ah, Morley,’ Norgate said. ‘You seem to get everywhere.’ He had hoped to avoid this meeting. Gabriel Harvey’s words still rang in his ears – ‘the crime of Sodom’. For an old man, Goad could still think pretty fast on his feet. ‘The singing was exquisite, if I may say so, but I hardly think it appropriate . . .’
‘I was about to say,’ Marlowe said, ‘that the boys could be sent home in the cart that brought us and the men could stay to eat. They have, after all, given up a day for the wedding and they have been accommodated at the table . . .’
‘I can’t send the boys home alone!’ Thirling said, aghast. ‘Anything might happen. There is still a lot of unrest in the town. There’s talk the rioters have hanged the Mayor.’
‘I’ll go with them,’ Marlowe offered.
‘You?’ Norgate was puzzled and aghast in equal measure. This didn’t sound like the roisterer he knew and secretly admired for his cheek. But it did sound like the murderer and pederast of whom Harvey spoke.
‘Yes. I have had rather a sad time lately, if we take one thing with another. I think I may be a ghost at the feast and we don’t want that. It would be my pleasure to make sure the boys got home safely.’
Thirling and Falconer looked at one another. Neither of them wanted to make the journey home on a jolting cart, riding into God-knew-what and yet they, like Norgate, could not quite square their view of Marlowe with the offer he had made. But, a decent dinner is a decent dinner.
‘Thank you, Master Marlowe,’ Falconer said quickly, before the scholar could change his mind. ‘That is very decent of you and I’m sure the boys will be safe in your charge.’ He raised his voice. ‘Boys! Gather round.’ He set about counting heads and making sure he had a full complement before sending them off on the road.
Marlowe marshalled the children into a short column of two and marched them round the corner of the building to the stables beyond where the carts were waiting. ‘Up you jump, boys,’ he said, and walked round to where the carter dozed on his bench.
He was just hopping up into his place when he heard his name being hissed from behind a bush. He looked around vaguely.
‘Yes? Who is it?’
‘Kit. It’s me. Roger Manwood.’
The Corpus scholar leaned sideways and could just see the man sticking out through the foliage. ‘Why are you hiding in that hedge, Sir Roger?’ he asked.
‘Why are you leaving Madingley? We need to talk.’
Marlowe sighed. ‘Of course we do. That’s why I’m leaving.’
The bush trembled and John Dee’s head appeared through the top branches. ‘I tried to tell him, Master Marlowe. He wouldn’t believe me.’
‘Well,’ Marlowe said, nudging the carter into what passed for action. ‘Explain to him, will you? If I’m not away soon and with as little conversing with bushes as possible, this whole subterfuge will be pointless. I’ll meet you back here later, when all these people have gone. Cockshut time.’ He turned to the carter, who was sitting, whip raised, ready for the off. ‘Are we going or not?’ he asked. ‘Only at least two of these boys are as pissed as owls and the sooner we get them off your cart and into the sick room, the better. Unless you like swabbing out your cart.’
The carter needed no second bidding and with a lurch, they were off, rattling along country lanes.
Kit Marlowe sat silently as the carter urged his horses along the dusty road. He only spoke twice and both times it was to demand that the boys were quiet back there and that they should stop vomiting. The carter was impressed that they obeyed both instructions without question, and he had to agree with them that there was something about Marlowe that brooked no argument. The streets were eerily quiet for a Monday and the hoofs and wheels were loud as the cart clattered into the School of King’s, Marlowe yelling for a porter to fetch someone from the dormitory, a bedder, a sizar, anyone who could take the queasy children and put them to bed. That done, he considered his responsibilities covered and strolled around the corner to Hobson’s stables in Trinity Lane.
‘Ho!’ he called. ‘Anyone there? I need to hire a horse for the night.’
A groom, no bigger than one of the trebles, emerged on bowed legs from behind a partition and pointed wordlessly to the horse nearest the door, a spavined-looking creature with a dull coat and a mean eye.
‘No,’ Marlowe said, patiently. ‘I need a horse with some go in him, not this . . .’ he waved a hand, lost, for once, for words.
The groom hoiked and spat into the gutter. ‘This is Hobson’s,’ he said, as if that was explanation enough. ‘You get the one nearest the door and no argument. You want to pick and choose, go somewhere else,’ he continued, and he hefted his pitchfork over his shoulder and turned to go.
‘While this one is next to the door,’ Marlowe said, reasonably, ‘you’ll never hire out another mount. Not that it will be here long, I think. It’ll drop dead soon and how will that look, a dead horse in your doorway?’
‘Look . . .
sir
–’ the groom managed to get a world of derision into that single word – ‘with what’s been going on these past days, you’re lucky we have a horse in the place. It’s this one or nothing.’
Marlowe peered past him and saw, at the back of the stables, in the shadows, a likely looking mount, black as night and with a look of the Devil about him. All in all, a suitable horse for the night’s black doings. ‘What about that one?’ he pointed into the gloom.
‘You wouldn’t want that one, sir,’ the groom said, spitting again. ‘He’s a demon to ride and anyway, he belongs to a visitor to the town, a Francis Hall, staying at the Swan.’
Marlowe looked around. ‘Is he here?’
‘Not at present,’ the groom said. After Marlowe’s question, he had heard, faintly the chink of coin and it was coming from the region of Marlowe’s hand. ‘He hasn’t ridden him in a day or two. I expect he would be grateful if you gave him a bit of a run.’
‘My thoughts exactly,’ Marlowe agreed, opening his purse and foraging for the coins which had been his pay for the wedding. The groom’s hand came up with lightning speed and, quick as a wink, the coins had disappeared into the man’s jerkin-front.
‘Will you take him now, sir?’ he asked, suddenly deferential.
‘What’s the time?’ Marlowe asked the man.
As the groom opened his mouth to speak, a clock chimed overhead, four times, sweet and crisp. ‘Half past three of the clock,’ the man said.
Marlowe looked puzzled.
‘They keep that clock fast,’ the man said. ‘It stops people being late. Everyone knows that.’
‘If everyone knows . . .’
‘Ar?’
‘Never mind. So, it is only half past three. Can I leave this horse here for an hour or so? It’s a trifle early for my needs just yet.’
‘Ar. That’s up to you. You’ve paid for the day. But don’ forget, we close the doors at seven.’
‘Is that seven by this clock, or seven by the other hundred clocks in the town?’
‘Seven by this clock.’
‘So, at half past six, you close the doors.’
‘Ar.’
‘So, I must get back to you by half past six.’
‘No need, really,’ the man said. ‘I shall be here. I live here. I just was saying we close the doors at seven.’ There was a pause. ‘By this clock. And I ain’t taking no chances after cock-shut. There’s people in this town that’s aggrieved. They want to hang the Mayor, you know.’
Marlowe smiled a wintry smile and patted the man condescendingly on the shoulder. ‘I’ll make sure I get back before then,’ he said, and made his way to the Swan.
FOURTEEN
The Swan was always quiet in the middle of the afternoon and especially so in the aftermath of a riot. Almost by definition, the regulars had been affected most severely by the violence, either because their stalls had been destroyed by random looting, or because they were habitual drunkards who had been too slow to move out of harm’s way.
Meg Hawley was leaning on the counter which ran along one side of the room, polishing a pewter mug which was marred by an enormous dent in one side. At a brief glance, Marlowe suspected that the dent would fit, almost perfectly, the side of someone’s head.
‘Hello, Meg,’ Marlowe said. The girl didn’t raise her head, but polished even more furiously. ‘Quite well, I hope,’ he added. ‘Not affected by –’ he waved his arm behind him as if to encompass the whole town – ‘recent events.’
She looked up at him, meeting his gaze full on. ‘I’m well, Master Marlowe, thank you for asking,’ she said. ‘Harry is in the lock-up. My father has a bad sprain to his back, but that’s his fault, silly old fool.’
‘Harry’s in the lock-up?’ Marlowe was surprised to say the least. ‘But, surely, he has a broken arm.’
‘It would take more than a broken arm to stop Harry,’ Meg said, ruefully. ‘But that isn’t really my problem any more.’
Marlowe raised an eyebrow. ‘No?’
‘No. I’m tired of the fighting, Master Marlowe. I don’t want my . . .’ her hand stole, almost involuntarily, to her waist. She gave herself a shake and looked again into his eyes. She saw honesty there, and trustworthiness that perhaps few others could see. ‘I don’t want my child to be brought up by Harry Rushe, and that’s the truth,’ she said. ‘He won’t grow up to be like his father if Harry Rushe puts his name to him.’
Marlowe stepped back a pace and looked again at the girl. He was far from being an expert, but he thought that he could see a thickening there that had not been there before. His next remark would take careful planning; he needed to talk to this girl some more, to ask her things which would be sensitive and personal. He couldn’t afford to annoy her, and yet – the question had to be asked.
‘How can you be so sure this child is not Harry’s? I assume you are saying it is Ralph’s?’
The girl put down the mug. If she polished it much more, she would wear it away. In a low voice, she said, ‘If you were me, Master Marlowe, with a child in your belly and no husband, would you rather that that child would grow up to be like Harry Rushe, or like Ralph Whitingside?’ She put her knuckles on her hips and stepped back a pace as she waited for his answer.
Marlowe’s problem was that he was not in love with Ralph Whitingside. They had been friends for so long he knew him inside out, the bad as well as the good. And, on balance, Ralph just came down on the side of the angels, but just barely, by only a whisker. But for a moment, he looked through the eyes of her love and gave the right answer. ‘Ralph’s,’ he said and risked placing his hand on her stomacher. He looked up at her and smiled. ‘He even looks like Ralph.’ She laughed. ‘Yes,’ he said, removing his hand, ‘he has his father’s nose.’
‘Thank you, Master Marlowe,’ the girl said, resuming her polishing. ‘I knew
you
would understand.’ She lowered her voice. ‘I’ve told Ralph,’ she whispered. ‘He’s very pleased.’
‘That’s . . . wonderful,’ Marlowe breathed. This might well put the cat among the pigeons. He had heard, when he was at home, listening to his mother gossiping over her sewing with the maids, that sometimes being with child made women mad. He would just have to trust that she could make sense of his questions and answer them right. ‘Can we sit down?’ he asked her. Another thing he had picked up was that women sometimes swooned when in Meg’s condition.
She looked from side to side, back and forth. ‘I think we can, Master Marlowe,’ she said. ‘We are having a quiet patch just at the moment.’ She led the way over to a seat in the corner.
‘May I ask you some questions?’ Marlowe said. ‘About the days before Ralph died.’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘But I only saw him once, as I told you.’
‘You started to tell me. I didn’t hear the whole story, though, did I?’
‘You stopped me,’ she said, testily. ‘I was quite willing to tell you. There was nothing in it to be ashamed of.’
‘I’m sure there wasn’t,’ he said, quickly. ‘But . . . will you tell me now?’
She gazed into the middle distance, as if the scene were printed on the air. ‘We went outside,’ she said. Then, she glared at Marlowe. ‘We didn’t always go outside, you must understand that, Master Marlowe. It wasn’t just about that with me and Ralph.’
He smiled encouragement. She had forgotten that he knew Ralph even better than she did, and it was always just about that with Ralph.