Barnabus thought carefully about this. ‘Nuffing,’ he said decisively at last. ‘Don’t want to worry him and I’ll have trouble finding a new master if they think I’ve got plague.’
But you could have it, yammered the scared wean inside Dodd’s head, you could and not know it, the death marks could be growing on you out of sight right now, they could…He shook his head and swallowed the rest of his aqua vitae.
None of them felt like hefting a clumsy heavy cage full of outraged fowl all the way back to the western suburbs, so they took a boat. Simon sat in the back on the cushions and trailed his fingers in the water and wouldn’t look at either of them. Barnabus stared at him the whole way, until Dodd was unnerved just watching.
‘Take us past Mermaid Steps, boatman,’ Barnabus said. ‘I want Whitefriars.’
The boatman nodded, and when they landed Dodd paid him, including a tip after Barnabus elbowed him. He thought he had never ever spent so much money in one day in his life before. He couldn’t even bring himself to count it up, it came to so much, and some of it was false and the plague on top of it all.
‘We’ll take Tamburlain the Great back to the room so he can rest and keep his strength up. Now you’ve looked after him before, haven’t you, Simon?’
Simon nodded and perked up a little with enthusiasm. ‘Me dad was teaching me to handle ’im, how to feed him up before a match and make sure he wasn’t got at and how to put the spurs on. Dad says…’ His voice trailed off. Then he shrugged and went back to staring at the water.
‘Well, you look tired,’ Barnabus said. ‘How do you feel? Peaky? Got a headache?’
Simon shook his head.
‘Well, you can go to bed so you can keep an eye on Tamburlain. If I know Sir Robert he’s playing primero by now and we’re in for a late night.’ Gloomily Dodd thought he was probably right. London was a den of iniquity and no mistake, full of evil greedy folks just plotting to take your money by any way they could, and no wonder it was being visited by the Sword of God’s Wrath.
But would God’s vengeance hit Dodd as well, even though he hadn’t done anything bad? Well, nothing iniquitous, anyway, just the routine normal sins that everybody committed. But the Reverend Gilpin had said that there wasn’t any such thing as a normal sin, a venial sin like the Papists said, they were all sins and that was bad enough to draw down God’s wrath. God had good reason to be angry with every man or woman. Dodd shook his head and tried to stop thinking about it. If he let his mind go down that road he’d be a gibbering wreck by the next morning (or dead of plague, if God was angry enough with him). What could you do? If you got the plague, you got it, there wasn’t anything you could do to stop it except stay out of plague houses and away from sick people and repent of your sins. And even that wouldn’t necessarily help you. Barnabus had said his sister was a good woman, she’d done nothing to deserve such a visitation. Deep in the recesses of his soul, Dodd found it terrifying that God was so much less reasonable than Richie Graham of Brackenhill. At least if you paid your blackrent on time and didn’t kill any Grahams, Richie Graham wouldn’t burn you out.
On the way to the river they had bought grain to feed the fighting cock. It seemed tame enough when they cautiously let it out of its cage in the attic room, fed it grain on the bare floorboards which magnified every footstep and peck, every creak. It glared at Dodd and Barnabus suspiciously, but it seemed to know Simon and even let him smooth down some long feathers that had been disarranged by being in the cage. At last they left the cock roosting on the head of the bed and Simon curled up in his blankets on the pallet by the wall. Barnabus called him to get up and bolt the door from the inside, which he did.
They clattered down the stairs and hurried to Fleet Street to get back into the City before the gates shut. By the time they arrived at the Mermaid, the sun was drowning in a brilliant red blaze that set light to the water and gilded the little boats scurrying across it. All Dodd wanted was to go to bed and sleep.
Barnabus caught his arm just as they went in. ‘Keep quiet for me, Sergeant.’
Dodd sighed. ‘He willnae like it when he finds out.’
‘He won’t find out.’
‘All right, if ye want.’
‘You’re a prince, Sergeant. I owe you one. Not many would have stuck around like that for people that weren’t even related.’
Dodd ducked his head in embarrassment, not able to explain that he had stuck around because he was afraid of getting lost in London again.
Carey was happily calling his point score as they came in, putting down more money on a terrifyingly large pile. Beside him was bundled the still unconscious mound of Robert Greene. When he saw Dodd and Barnabus, Carey closed up his cards and smiled.
‘Oh, there you are. Greene’s no better, as you can see, though I think it’s now the booze not the blow that’s made him so sleepy. Pull up a stool, Sergeant, I’ll introduce you.’
Dodd nodded politely as Carey went round the circle of cardplayers, firing off names like a bowman in a battle. Unfortunately not one of them hit the mark and all were instantly lost from his overtaxed brain. Dodd recognised one man. Shakespeare, his fuzzy dome glinting in the candlelight above him. He had already folded. From the look of concentration on his face and the sideways manner he sat on his stool it was clear he was magnificently drunk. Next to him sat a short rotund man in a grey wool suit with a confiding way to him; Dodd couldn’t remember his name. Another one, directly opposite the Courtier had a handsome slightly smug face, the kind of face that believes itself to be cleverer than any company, and very annoyingly often is, and a fine doublet of black velvet slashed in peach taffeta, almost as good as the Courtier’s. Next to him was a pale man with a nose that had been broken once who Dodd vaguely thought was called Poley or Pool or something, and that took you to Robert Greene and the Courtier again. Dodd narrowed his eyes and sat down on a stool deferentially brought for him by Barnabus and decided that he could throw any one of them a lot further than he was prepared to trust them, and would on the whole prefer to throw them anyway.
‘Will you join us, Sergeant?’
‘Ah’d prefer to watch for a while, Sir Robert. I’m no’ so well in practice with gleek.’
As Dodd knew perfectly well, they were playing primero and in fact he was in razor-sharp form for primero, for him.
The self-satisfied man in the pretty doublet raised his eyebrows at Dodd. ‘Sergeant?’ he asked. ‘Are you a lawyer, sir?’
Was the man deliberately trying to insult him? ‘Nay, sir, I’m a Land Sergeant.’
‘Very important man, in Carlisle,’ said the Courtier helpfully. ‘Keeps an eye on some of the most important reivers’ trails from Scotland into England. He has land and a tower in Gilsland.’
The reaction to this was glazed-over politeness.
‘Fancy,’ said pretty doublet, distantly.
‘And ye, sir?’ Dodd asked pretty doublet. ‘What are ye yerself?’
Pretty doublet laughed. ‘Oh, I’m a poet, a playwright, a scholar, a striver for the incomprehensible crystal reaches of the heavens.’
Dodd gave him a glazed look right back. ‘Och, fancy.’
To his surprise pretty doublet grinned at him. ‘Well, it’s a more interesting trade than hammering shoes for a living.’
Carey coughed. ‘Marlowe’s being modest, which is extremely unusual for him. Also he hasn’t declared his points and I’m waiting to find out by how much I’ve beaten him.’
Marlowe leaned back, drank with an unnecessary flourish and said, ‘Eighty-four, of course, like you.’
‘I’m out,’ said Poley or whatever his name was.
Shakespeare snapped his fingers at the potboy for more drink, which was there with a speed that surprised Dodd. The would-be poet and player looked as if he had a gigantic cloud of black melancholy hanging over his head, so black it was almost visible, and which was deepening by the minute as he drank. Dodd shook his head. Good God, he must be tired, he was coming over all f
anciful.
There was a sudden snortle and an earthquake from the huddle on the bench, and Robert Greene lunged upright, his orange beard jutting like a preternatural carrot.
‘Beer,’ he roared. ‘Where’s the beer?’ Somebody gave him a mug and he lifted it to the company. ‘Holla, ye pampered jades of Arsia,’ he bellowed and drank it down. Marlowe rolled his eyes and stretched his lips briefly in a smile that said ‘oh how witty, and only the hundredth time this week’. Greene had sunk most of his quart before he seemed to notice the taste of what he was drinking which he then spat out again onto the floor in a stream.
‘For Christ’s sake, Greene,’ drawled Carey. ‘It’s only mild ale.’
‘It’s horsepiss,’ roared Greene. ‘You, boy, get me some proper booze. What the hell are you doing in London, Sir Robert? I thought you’d gone to wap the cows in Newcastle.’
‘Carlisle,’ said Carey. ‘I’ll see you, Marlowe.’
‘York, Carlisle. Who cares? Somewhere ooop north.’ Greene waved an arm expansively. ‘I repeat. Why are you here?’
Marlowe put down four fives and Carey shook his head, sighed and threw in his cards. Marlowe smiled in his self-satisfied way and pulled what looked like a very tasty pot towards him.
Dodd tutted sympathetically. ‘Your luck out today, sir?’
‘I must be on the point of getting married, it’s been so bad.’ The man called Poley was dealing again and Greene waved a hand to be included.
‘Don’t waste your sympathy,’ Greene slurred at Dodd. ‘It’s only justice because he won’t tell me why he’s in London and not up in your part of the world having fun hanging sheep-stealers.’
Carey picked up his cards, raised his eyebrows at Greene. ‘You’d have heard about it by now if you hadn’t been so stinking drunk when I found you.’
‘A slight indisposition,’ said Greene, wiggling his fingers generally at Carey. ‘Nothing to be concerned about. I’ve been off colour since I overdid the eels and Rhenish wine last month.’
‘No doubt,’ said Carey. ‘Shocking bad wine the Germans sell, isn’t it?’
‘On the contrary,’ said Greene with dignity. ‘I’m certain it was the eels that were off. Very dangerous to the health, bad eels.’
‘So why are you back in London so soon, Sir Robert?’ asked Marlowe, putting his new cards into a neat pile and laying them face down on the table. ‘I thought Mr Bullard was after your blood.’
Greene sucked air in a whistle through his teeth and tutted with bogus sympathy.
‘No, no,’ said Carey nonchalantly. ‘He’s being paid off, he’s perfectly reasonable.’
Poley laughed quietly at this and so did Greene, only more loudly. Marlowe nodded, grave as a parson.
‘You’ll be moving home to London then?’
‘No, I like Carlisle. I’ll be back there as soon as I can.’
‘The Queen’s in Oxford,’ pursued Marlowe. ‘Are you going to see her?’
Carey looked at him levelly and Dodd had the sudden feeling that this was a river with hidden whirlpools in it.
‘Come on man, out with it,’ roared Greene, who seemed unable to talk except in a bellow. ‘We never thought we’d see you again, what with the creditors and King James and Lady Wi…er, the northern ladies and all.’
‘Oh, don’t be such an idiot, Greene,’ said Carey, in the drawl he used when he was getting annoyed. ‘You know perfectly well what I’m doing here, since my father’s paying you to do the same.’
Greene opened his eyes wide in a parody of innocence. ‘And that is, dear boy?’
‘Look for my brother Edmund, who has somehow lost himself in London.’
‘Ah yes,’ said Greene. ‘To be sure. Edmund. Fine chap.’ There was a glugging noise as a mug of sherry-sack went down his throat. Dodd called for some himself, on the grounds that if the Courtier had decided to spend the night drinking and losing yet more money, who was he to differ? ‘Drawn a blank, though. Nobody’s seen him for weeks.’
‘Maybe he’s caught the plague and died of it,’ said Dodd, surprising himself. ‘There’s plague in London, is there no’?’
‘Nothing more than usual, is there?’ asked Carey, looking concerned.
‘No, no,’ soothed Marlowe. ‘Just the normal amount. Isn’t that so, Will? You’d know if there was plague about?’
Shakespeare had said nothing so far, being more interested in drinking. He blinked owlishly at Marlowe, who was smiling at him. ‘Plague?’ he asked. ‘Er…no, I don’t…No.’
Good God, thought Dodd in disgust, it’s true what Barnabus was saying, they’re keeping it quiet for fear of losing business. He felt Barnabus staring at him desperately and wasn’t sure what he could say next.
Greene had stopped in mid-drink and was scowling pop-eyed across the table at Shakespeare.
‘You!’ he hissed. ‘What are you doing here?’
Shakespeare blinked at him. ‘Drinking,’ he said peaceably. ‘Loshing…losing money at cards. What are you…er…doing?’
With an incoherent roar, Greene slammed both fists down on the table in front of him, causing it to jump. Both Marlowe and Carey immediately picked up their tankards, but before Dodd could do the same, Greene had surged to his feet, bellying the table over so that cards and coins and Dodd’s full cup of sack went spraying in all directions. Like a charging bull, Greene waded past the table, grabbed Shakespeare round the neck. Momentum carried both of them up against the side of the stairs where Greene started banging Shakespeare’s head against the bannisters while he throttled him.
There was a confusion of shouting. Carey tried to grab Greene round the oxlike shoulders and was shrugged off, Marlowe tried a simultaneous blow at the back of Greene’s neck with his dagger pommel and was sent flying by a blow from the back of Greene’s fist. Shakespeare’s face was going purple and he was prodding ineffectually with his fists.
‘Somebody had better stop him killing him.’ The voice seemed to have only an academic interest in the matter, but Dodd had lost an expensive drink he’d been looking forward to and needed desperately, and he didn’t like Greene in any case, while he felt sorry for the player. He picked up the stool he’d been sitting on, prodded the legs into Greene’s meaty back, just where his kidneys should be, and heard the satisfying whoop of pain. He slammed the stool sideways into Greene’s ribs, dropped it, got his left arm in a lock around Greene’s bull neck from behind, leaned back, swivelled his hips and swept Greene’s legs out from under him in a Cumbrian wrestling throw.
Greene’s weight pulled him down, but he was expecting it and he fell on top of the man, bruising his elbow. Half crouching he got a knee up in the small of Greene’s back and then said breathlessly, ‘Will I break yer neck for ye?’
Greene heaved and made horrible noises, the cords on his neck expanding. Christ, he was strong, but Dodd was in much better condition and very angry.
‘I’ll do it, I’ll break it and no’ think twice. Stop still afore I hurt ye.’
Just to make his point, he levered up his elbow to lift Greene’s chin and put more strain on his neck.
‘I’d listen to him if I were you,’ said Carey conversationally. ‘So far Dodd’s been quite gentle with you.’
There was that indefinable change of muscle tone beneath him that told Dodd the man was starting to think. He increased the pressure and felt the man surrender.
‘Will ye behave yerself if I let ye up?’
‘Hhhnnhh.’
After another jerk on his neck to remind him, Dodd let him go and stepped away smartly. Greene lay there whooping and gasping for several minutes before he staggered to his feet. He glowered at Dodd for a while, breathing hard.
‘I want satisfaction from you,’ he croaked at last.
‘Are ye challenging me?’ Dodd asked, almost laughing. ‘Tae a duel?’
‘Name your place and your weapons, sir.’
Behind him Dodd distinctly heard Carey say, ‘Oh dear.’
‘Ye want to f
ight me? With weapons?’
‘Don’t you speak English? Yes, I am, you northern yokel.’
‘Och God, I would ha’ thought ye’d want a rest after a’ that booze and the battering I gave ye. But well enough. Let’s dae it here.’ Dodd drew his sword and dagger, crossed the blades in front of him in the en garde position and waited expectantly.
To his surprise Greene didn’t draw his own blades. His jaw had dropped and he was staring at Dodd as if he didn’t know what to do next.
‘Come on, man, I havenae got all night. Let’s get the mither done wi’ and then I can get back tae ma drinkin’.’
In a voice overflowing with amusement, Carey translated this for Greene. Marlowe was standing next to Greene, whispering in his ear. Greene glared about under his bushy red eyebrows, but his hand made no move to his swordhilt.
‘Do ye want tae fight, or no’?’ Dodd asked, surprised at the delay.
Carey was on the other side of Greene now, whispering in his other ear. Greene was looking at the ground. He coughed.
‘I withdraw the challenge.’
‘Ay?’
‘And the insult about northern yokels?’ prompted Carey.
‘I withdraw it,’ growled Greene.
‘Och, Ah dinna care what a drunken southerner wi’ nae blood tae his liver thinks o’ me,’ said Dodd genially.
Carey translated this as acceptance of Greene’s withdrawal of the insult.
Behind him Poley was setting the table upright again and arranging the stools round it. The innkeeper was standing nearby with arms folded, eyes narrowed and a large cudgel dangling from his wrist on a cord. The plump little man was sitting Shakespeare wheezing on the bench, dusting him down and handing him another cup of booze, which the player took with hands that shook like rivergrass.
‘All right,’ said Carey. ‘Now shake on it, gentlemen.’
Dodd put his sword and dagger away, and held out his hand. After an almost insulting pause, Greene shook.
There was a universal coughing and the staccato laughs of released tension.
‘Damn,’ said Marlowe. ‘I had ten shillings to put on Sergeant Dodd to win.’
4 A Plague of Angels Page 13
