‘And the same goes for any man,’ he boomed so all could hear. ‘I’ll break any man touches my Ursula Dancer!’
Chapter 24
BOLTFOOT COOPER CLIMBED the ladder up to the hayloft. Ivory was sitting on a bale, playing with a pack of cards.
‘That’s what brought you to this state in the first place, Ivory. I should burn them if I were you.’
Ivory ignored him. His face was still blue and yellow from the beating, but his hands were unharmed. His fingers skipped like mayflies as he shuffled the pack, fanned them out, took a middle card and held it up. Knave of Hearts. He shuffled the cards again, pulled the top card from the deck and, yet again, it was the Knave of Hearts. Six times in a row he did it, taking the card from top, bottom or middle at will. Boltfoot squinted to see the secret, but could not work out how he did it.
‘I can’t say I blame them in the Black Moth for tanning your miserable hide,’ he muttered.
‘That’s because you’re a lame, good-for-nothing speck of flotsam, Cooper, and know nothing of art.’
Boltfoot felt himself bristling. He didn’t, in general, mind when folks laughed at his club-foot. It had not been easy as a child, but he had grown a skin as tough as oxhide since then and usually managed to pay no heed to such comments. But coming from this dog Ivory, it was another matter. One day, he’d teach him a lesson in respect, but not now. They had to be on their way.
‘Come on, Ivory. I’ve got horses. We’re going. West of here. Warwickshire. I know a place there. It’ll be safer. Mr Shakespeare will know where to find me.’
‘And there will be dice there? And a game of primero?’
‘Certain to be.’
‘You always were a lying, worthless cripple, but I suppose I’ve got no choice.’
‘No. You got no choice.’
Ivory rose from the haybale and nonchalantly stowed his card-pack in his jerkin pocket. Boltfoot climbed awkwardly back down the ladder and watched Ivory follow him.
He heard a sound. Instinct kicked in and he turned, going down on one knee. In a swift movement, he unslung his caliver, which was loaded and ready to shoot.
He relaxed. It was only Jane, standing in the doorway.
He dropped the muzzle of his gun. ‘We’re on our way.’
‘I’m not alone, Boltfoot. There’s a man here for you.’
Boltfoot raised the caliver again and trained it on the entranceway behind Jane.
A man in black doublet and hose appeared from the daylight and stepped past Jane. His damascened pistol glinted in his belt. What little was left of his hair was white and he had an open, generous face. He bowed almost imperceptibly. After so many years in service to Lord Burghley and now Sir Robert Cecil, it was his way to show due deference to all men.
‘Mr Cooper …’
Boltfoot breathed a sigh of relief and stowed his caliver. ‘It is a great delight to see you, Mr Clarkson. I was beginning to wonder whether we had been forgot.’
‘Indeed not.’ Clarkson turned to the other man and bowed again. ‘Mr Ivory, I have come here with orders to take you elsewhere.’
‘About time, too. Where we going – London?’
‘I’m afraid not. All I can tell you is that you are to be given an assignment. Your especial talent is required, Mr Ivory. And you, Mr Cooper, are to accompany us and continue your watch.’
‘Boltfoot,’ Jane said, tears pricking her eyes, ‘I don’t think I can bear much more of this.’
He went over to her and held her clumsily. ‘It’ll be over soon. You’ll see.’
Ivory shook his head and strode out from the barn. ‘I can’t stand this henhouse a moment longer. Let us go, Clarkson. Cooper can follow when he’s done with the wailing.’
Boltfoot’s hand went to his cutlass, but Jane stayed it.
Ivory laughed. ‘Look at that – she’s even telling you when to draw your sword. Who’s the cock and who’s the hen in your house, Cooper?’
Boltfoot ground his teeth. He was beginning to wonder whether he might kill William Ivory before the Spanish had the chance.
Shakespeare was glad to have Oxx and Godwit with him. The road south was hazardous at the best of times, but with a man such as Dr Dee in tow, the going was slow and they were vulnerable. As they travelled close to towns and villages, they were assailed by the clawed hands of beggar children, the unmistakable evidence of famine. Everywhere they went, they kept watchful eyes open for outlaw bands.
Drawing close to Oxfordshire, they stopped at an inn and noted that men shied away from them. Shakespeare ordered ale from the landlord and asked him what made the people so fearful.
‘They think you’re soldiers, pressing men for Brittany. There’s already been one company through here, like locusts they were, sweeping up our men.’
‘Did you see them? Did they come here?’
‘Aye, they did. Took my son-in-law, poor fellow. Their captain was a man named Pinkney. Had a face so ravaged it seemed the devil himself had torn at him with his claws.’
Pinkney, thought Shakespeare. It was as if the man was dogging his every step.
Andrew felt Ursula’s eyes boring into him. He very much wished to be away from this place. Everyone here looked as if they would kill him without blinking.
‘If you want to stay alive, you’ll have to learn quick,’ she said, reading his thoughts. ‘Staffy’s put me in charge of you, so you’ll do as I say. Have you got more coin?’
‘No, the groat was all I had.’
‘You’re pigging useless. Luckily, I got a penny of my own, so I can hire me a fine gown. Let’s go a-sharking.’
With Staffy’s permission, Andrew and Ursula had eaten their fill of the roasted pork. Now they walked out from the squalor of the Dogghole. It was early afternoon. Two ponies, thin and uncombed, stood gnawing at a poor patch of grass between the drinking den and the woods. Ursula kicked the beggar once more and demanded to know where Maud was.
‘I’d tell you if you didn’t kick me.’
‘I’ll kick you the more if you don’t.’
The beggar looked at her sullenly through his one, watery eye. He knew better than to cross her. ‘She’s round the back.’
Ursula pulled back her foot as though she would kick him again. He shied away, but she just laughed and stepped past him.
‘Pigging blind cripple,’ she said. Then, to Andrew, ‘Come on.’
They found Maud on the other side of the old cowhouse. She had a hastily erected table built of staves and an old door. Various items were laid out: jewellery, knives, pans, crockery, a pair of old shoes, a torn calico jerkin, caps, white kid gloves, songbird eggs, horsebread, unidentified flesh.
‘Best market stall in the shire, this, Andrew. You name it, Maud’s got it or can get it.’
Andrew looked at the array of goods with wonder. He suddenly had a horrible thought. ‘Is it stolen?’ he said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
She rapped her knuckles on the side of his head. ‘Stolen? What a pigging, dirty little boy you are to think such a thing.’
Andrew was not convinced. ‘If it was stolen, you – we – could all hang just for knowing about it. It’s a felony.’
‘Well, it’s not. And, anyway, so pigging what? From what you say, you’ll already hang for whatever it is you’ve done. We could all hang or die of the pest or leprosy or a thousand other causes. Not worth worrying about.’
She approached the stallholder, who had leathery skin, wild black hair and a clay pipe hanging from the side of her mouth.
‘Maud, I need a fine gown, just for today. I got a penny piece.’
Maud looked her up and down, assessing her size. ‘Got just the thing, Ursula,’ she said, without removing the pipe. ‘Come with me.’
Ursula followed Maud into the woods. Andrew was about to go after them, but Ursula stopped him.
‘You stay here and keep your dirty pigging eyes to yourself.’
Andrew stood alone. Men and women with cups of ale and liqu
or milled around. An old woman came and prodded his costly black gown.
‘What you wearing? You look like a justice.’
He towered over her, yet he was rigid with fear.
Suddenly, a few yards away, he noticed the man who had been attacking Ursula in the woods, the man in the blue velvet doublet: Reaphook. He could see him clearly now. He was strong and menacing. His brown hair was cut short and combed forward straight down his forehead, so that its ragged fringe covered his eyebrows. His beard was no more than a tuft in the cleft of his chin and his lips were slightly parted, revealing teeth that protruded like a mule’s. A sickle was thrust into his belt.
Reaphook looked at him and their eyes met. Andrew immediately looked away, but the contact was made. Reaphook strode over and stood before him. A thin youth was at his side.
‘What are you?’ Reaphook demanded of Andrew.
He did not know what to say. Reaphook moved his face closer so that their noses almost touched.
‘Well, boy?’
He stepped back. ‘My name is Andrew Woode.’
Once again, he was conscious of his soft-bred London voice and the desperate inadequacy of his reply.
‘I didn’t ask your bloody name, I asked what you are.’
‘I’m a fugitive. I’ve run away. From the law.’
Reaphook raised his hand in a fist. Andrew flinched but, instead of being hit, the dirty, broken-nailed fingers unfurled and Reaphook flicked them twice, indicating that he wanted more information.
‘I’m a scholar. At St John the Baptist College in Oxford. I am accused of a felony. They will hang me if I’m caught.’
‘Oh, we’re a scholar, are we?’ Reaphook imitated Andrew’s educated voice, then returned to his habitual rasp. ‘What you doing here?’
‘Seeking refuge, sir.’
‘We might hang you for spying on us. Who sent you? Who told you of the Dogghole?’
Andrew didn’t know what to say. He looked desperately towards the wood where Ursula had gone with the stallwoman.
‘You’ll find no answers there. Who was it told you of us? You sent by the headborough or the justice? I’ll cut off your bollocks and send them to town cooked in a pie.’
The thin boy at his side laughed.
Suddenly Ursula was there. ‘I brought him.’
She was wearing a gown of embroidered yellow and crimson worsted. Andrew could not believe the transformation. Her hair had been disentangled and she looked a lady of breeding, but for the scowl on her face.
‘And he’s got Staffy’s let to stay. So you nor no man can pigging say otherwise, Reaphook. Anyway, Staffy’s been looking for you. He wants his due. You owe him more than a mark, last I heard.’
‘I’ve had my fill of giving him coin. His days are numbered.’ Reaphook scowled.
‘Got a plan, have you? Going to do something dirty? Never stand up to him man to man, would you?’
‘You mind your tongue, Ursula Dancer – or one day I’ll cut it from your mouth.’ He looked her up and down scornfully. ‘Don’t you look the fine lady. You off to nip a bung?’
‘That’s my business. Just leave the boy alone.’
He raised his fist again, but Ursula glared back defiantly and spat into the dust at his feet.
The fist hovered, undecided.
‘Touch me and I promise you, you’ll die, Reaphook. Staffy’s in the Dogghole.’
The thin boy stepped forward now, reached out and clasped Ursula’s breasts. She pushed him away.
‘And you, Spindle.’
‘Take on the both of us, will you?’ the thin boy said.
‘Staffy could kill the both of you with one hand, and you know it.’
Andrew hadn’t paid much heed to the boy, but now he noticed that he was astonishingly thin and wiry. His mouth was set in a smile that carried more than a hint of sneer and threat. He reached out again towards Ursula’s breasts. This time Andrew stepped forward and pushed the other boy’s hands away.
‘He’s hit me, Mr Reaphook!’
‘So he has, Spindle. So he has. What you going to do about it, boy?’
‘I’m going to kill him. No one assails me!’
‘Pig off, Reaphook. He hasn’t hit no one. Just protecting me.’
‘We’ll see about that.’
The thin boy was squaring up to Andrew. Ursula pulled him away.
‘Come on, let’s get out of here.’
A group of tattered children had gathered around them, all craning to see and hear, hoping for violence.
‘Oh, your boy has done it now, Ursula Dancer,’ Reaphook said. He turned to Andrew, raised his hands, fingers apart like bearclaws, and growled.
‘Come away, Andrew Woode. Don’t listen to him. He’s all talk and no prick.’
Reaphook’s rotted mouth creased into something akin to a smile, then he spat at the dust where Ursula had spat, and strode away, laughing, the thin boy at his side.
Andrew was shaking. The children looked at him, pointing and laughing.
‘Who was that?’ he asked.
‘The thin one? That’s Spindle. So thin he don’t get wet in the rain. But just because he’s skinny as a stick, don’t go picking a fight with him. He’s as strong as a badger.’
‘I’m not going to fight him.’
‘No? He might have other ideas.’
Suddenly she began laying into the children who still clustered around. She beat them with her fists and kicked them with her new-shod feet. They backed away, grumbling and laughing in equal measure.
‘Pig off, the lot of you.’ She turned to Andrew. ‘Come on. We haven’t got much time.’
Chapter 25
THE LAST OF the livestock was being removed from the pens, spring lambs to the slaughter, laying-hens to new owners. It was the end of market day.
In the main square of the small town, well-to-do yeoman farmers talked prices with wool factors, chapmen drank with common herders, all crowding the taprooms around the market place. Much strong liquor had been taken during the day and some of the men wouldn’t get home tonight.
Andrew and Ursula stood on the north edge of the square. She put her small, callused hand to his lips.
‘Just keep your mouth shut. Watch and learn.’
Three men emerged from a tavern on the east side of the market. The early evening sun lit them. They stopped and gulped in the fresh air. They were well dressed in the staid garb of merchants or town burgesses, but that was the only sober thing about them. They were drunken and loud.
They shook hands with each other. Two tottered off southwards, the third ambled north. Ursula squeezed Andrew’s hand.
‘Sharking time. Stay here. Don’t run. Do nothing but watch.’
She stepped forward and began walking down the street. Andrew was amazed by the way she moved, decorous and elegant, as though she had been born into the gentry. She walked past the drunken yeoman, then stopped, turned back and tapped him on the shoulder. He stumbled back a little and tried to focus on her. She threw her arms around his neck.
‘Uncle Jack!’ she exclaimed, then kissed him on both cheeks and pressed herself to him.
The man looked bemused but happy to be embraced so. Ursula stood back from him and smiled, pushing out her small breasts provocatively. Then her eyes widened in seeming horror and she put a hand to her mouth.
‘Oh, in the Lord’s name, I am sorry, sir,’ she said, aghast. ‘A thousand apologies. I thought you were my uncle. Can you forgive me?’
‘There is no injury, young lady. No injury at all, so nothing to forgive.’ He grinned inanely and proffered his bearded face. ‘You may kiss me again if you so wish.’
He tried to take her back into his arms, but she stepped away, like a demure young woman, mortified by her error. She lowered her head in shame and walked on. The drunk watched her go, shrugged his shoulders, then resumed his stumbling walk until he disappeared into one of the side streets.
A minute after he had gone Ursula was back at Andre
w’s side.
‘That’s lesson one. Now, let’s leave town directly but slowly. If you run or walk fast you will arouse men’s notice, and their suspicions. That’s lesson two. A fair day’s work. A pigging fair day, I do say.’
Bewildered, Andrew went where she went, walking at her side at a steady pace back out of town into the countryside. Only when they were deep in woods, on a well-trodden path, did she stop. She fished a goatskin purse from inside her skirts and held it up.
‘How much do you reckon?’ she said, weighing it with her hand.
‘Where did that come from?’
‘That came from Uncle Jack – he gave it to me. And all for a kiss.’
‘You cut it from him!’
Ursula lifted her eyes to the heavens and shook her head in exasperation. She loosened the ties of the purse and poured the contents into the palm of her left hand.
‘Now what have we here?’ She counted the coins. Eight of them. Then she held up the prize. ‘A gold sovereign. Look at that, Andrew Woode! We’ll eat for two months on that alone. And a noble, an angel, three crowns and two groats. Did you ever see such pigging bounty!’
‘But you’ve stolen it. You can’t just take money from people.’
‘Why not? What’s the world ever done for me? We’ve all got to live.’
‘Well, I want none of it.’
‘Suit yourself. Go hungry. Starve if you want.’ She counted the money again.
Andrew stared at her and wondered how something so beautiful could be so rotten. Still clutching the purse, she put her hands on her hips and glared back at him. Without a word, he turned and set off back the way they had come, towards the town. He had no idea what he was going to do, but there was no future with this girl or her villainous friends. She ran after him and stopped him.
‘Pig’s arse, Andrew, you’re stubborn and stupid,’ she said. ‘What do they teach you at that pigging school you go to?’
‘That theft is a mortal sin.’
‘And if you got no money and no food, what then? Are you supposed to starve?’
‘No. You work.’
‘And if there’s no pigging work to be had because the crops have failed, if your parents are dead, if you’ve got no trade, if the commons are enclosed and the headboroughs drive you away, what then? You supposed to lie under a hedge and die, is that it?’
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