Secret World Read online

  ‘Get on with the play!’ somebody in the gallery shouted, rigid with boredom. Nothing had happened since they burnt La Pucelle and that was done offstage, Philip Henslowe fearing for his tinder-dry theatre.

  Roland misheard the direction of the shout and poured his scorn on to the groundlings who were milling below him like mutinous sheep. ‘So worthless peasants,’ he jabbed a finger at them, ‘bargain for their wives …’

  ‘’Ere,’ came the predictable cry. ‘Who’re you calling worthless?’

  ‘As market-men for oxen, sheep or horse …’

  ‘Animals!’ somebody else shouted. ‘He’s calling us animals, now.’

  There were boos and groans filling the theatre, almost drowning out Roland’s words. He stood taller. He was the Earl of Suffolk today, by God, and people would listen. ‘Marriage is a matter of more worth …’

  ‘Tell me about it!’ a henpecked husband had the nerve to shout back. His wife wasn’t there.

  ‘… Than to be dealt in by attorneyship …’

  In the gallery, one bored lawyer turned to another. ‘That’s actionable, I would have thought.’

  ‘Could be,’ his companion yawned. ‘I’ll have my people look into it.’

  ‘Not whom we will …’ Roland was still struggling against the noise when a clash of steel silenced everybody. Enter two men, stage right. They fight. Tom Sledd blinked, looking at Alleyn who half-turned to him and shrugged. The prompter, already numb with the boredom of Will Shaxsper’s lines, suddenly sat up and started riffling through his pages. Where was this bit? Why had no one told him about this bit?

  In his hiding place in the gods, Philip Henslowe blinked too. He didn’t have a script but he knew this wasn’t part of the play. They’d tinkered with it, tried it this way and that, but a duel? What the Hell was going on? And that … he peered closer … surely, yes, that was Kit Marlowe.

  Poley was older than the Muses’ darling, but not by much. He also had two good arms to Marlowe’s one and the edge was telling. Neither man saw the others on stage, trying to get out of their way. All they saw was the face and the blade of the man bent on killing each of them. Roland gave up. He threw his chain of office to the ground, spun on his heel and left. Ned Alleyn, the famous rescuer of situations, worked desperately to make the audience think the whole thing was planned.

  ‘What now?’ He suddenly became far more imperious than he had been as the boy-king so far. ‘A duel for us, an interlude to celebrate our forthcoming nuptials?’ He was counting furiously in his head. No trace of iambic pentameter now, but he hoped no one would notice.

  ‘Watch yourself, Ned,’ Marlowe hissed as he circled Poley. ‘This one knows his way around.’

  That was too loud for Alleyn’s liking. ‘Fie, Sirrah.’ He stayed in character. ‘You forget yourself. I am “your grace” to sworders like yourself.’

  The crowd had fallen silent now, the groundlings pressing forward to the stage. This was more like it. A bit of action at last.

  ‘That’s Kit Marlowe,’ somebody shouted. ‘I didn’t know he could act.’

  ‘Ah, but you can, can’t you, Kit?’ Poley darted forward, his blade clashing on Marlowe’s. ‘Something else we have in common.’

  ‘I’ve nothing in common with you, murderer,’ the playwright said. Poley was retreating slowly, checking right and left to make good his escape. He didn’t know this theatre, but he knew that Marlowe did.

  Henslowe looked along the raked seats up in the gallery. Everybody was craning forward, rapt in the cut and thrust on stage. Now, if only he could turn this into a permanent feature. The word would spread after today. Good old Kit. If anybody could save Shaxsper’s bacon, Marlowe was the man.

  ‘Good sirs …’ Alleyn was still trying to make it all work.

  ‘Give it up, Ned, and get off the stage,’ Marlowe muttered.

  Alleyn had stopped being Henry the Sixth now and was himself, the greatest actor of his … of any … age. ‘How dare you?’ he shouted, ‘Talk to me like that?’

  ‘You tell him, Your Majesty!’ a groundling shouted. After all, the man was king of England; it wasn’t right.

  An arm appeared behind the Arras at the back of the stage and yanked at Alleyn’s sleeve. He struggled and in doing so the lad who had appeared as La Pucelle appeared centre stage. He still wore his petticoats, but because of the heat in the wings and the tiring room, he was naked from the waist up.

  ‘’Ere, you’re dead!’ a groundling shouted.

  ‘Master Alleyn,’ the lad hissed, ignoring the things now flying from the pit. ‘You must come away. It isn’t safe. The Rose can’t do without you.’

  Alleyn dithered. Marlowe and Poley were prowling the wooden O, kicking furniture out of the way. He looked at the hero-worshipping lad and decided he was right. Kit Marlowe could look after himself.

  ‘You’re not only dead,’ another groundling wit shouted at the retreating pair, ‘but your tits have fallen off.’ There were howls and hoots of merriment and Philip Henslowe in his high perch above the multitude, cringed. Was this what the theatre had come to? Daggers and tits? He shook his head. But now that the bit players had left the scene, the leading men held centre stage. No one was going to call the constable this time and there would be no Tom Watson to put his life on the line. Tom Sledd might have interceded, for old times’ sake, but Ned Alleyn was blocking his view from the wings. The stage manager might take on whoever it was duelling with Marlowe, but Sledd wasn’t up to tackling Alleyn too. He just watched from his vantage point behind everybody’s favourite leading man, both of them dodging, ducking and diving with everybody’s favourite playwright’s every move.

  A wild sweep from Poley’s blade knocked Marlowe off balance and he fell off the stage into the welcoming arms of the crowd. A woman took his face in both hands and kissed him. She was the size of a kitchen press and grinned gappily at him. ‘Ooh, wait ’til I tell ’em at the Mermaid who I’ve just kissed!’ The crowd extricated Marlowe from the woman’s clutches but there was no way for him back on to the stage with Poley patrolling the apron. In the event, La Pucelle did what Tom Sledd had wanted to do – should have done – and hurtled across the stage, hitting Poley in the back with a broom and knocking him into the crowd.

  ‘That’s how we shovel shit at the Rose!’ he squawked at the man he had just upended. The crowd erupted. Poley was on his feet in seconds, slashing the air with his blade. Once, twice, it caught on Marlowe’s quillons and the playwright swung his man to the ground, driving his knee into Poley’s face. He stumbled backwards, his nose pouring blood and his eyes a blur of tears. He hacked at the crowd who leapt out of his way and he scrabbled back on to the stage. Marlowe was after him, driving him back towards the wings, steel ringing on steel.

  From his perch in the gods, Henslowe saw a movement in the flies, at his own level and above the open space of the groundlings. The sun was sharp here and the flies in shadow, but he could make him out nevertheless. Dick the Painter was edging his way forward, inching his body out on to the planks. He had a knife in his hand and was sawing away at a rope that held the counter weights that raised and lowered Tom Sledd’s scenery masterpieces. Henslowe could see at once what he was trying to do. But it was risky. If Dick mistimed, even by a second, he’d hit Marlowe and no one was going to walk away from that.

  ‘It’s over, Poley.’ Marlowe was panting. His arm wound threatened to burst its stitches and he had knocked the wind from his lungs when he had fallen from the stage. The enormous woman had just completed what the fall had begun. Both men were tiring visibly now, their swings wilder, more erratic and the clashes as steel rang on steel were getting less. The crowd was still roaring them on and briefly Henslowe could have kicked himself. Money was changing hands among the groundlings. Why wasn’t he down there, cashing in? After all, it was his theatre. The law would be on his side he felt sure – he’d ask the lawyers before they left. Then he checked himself, feeling something surge through his brain. It took him a
moment to identify the sensation as guilt; not something Philip Henslowe had encountered that often.

  ‘Look out, Kit!’ Henslowe shouted. ‘The flies!’ All in all, it was an ill-considered warning, because it saved Robert Poley’s life too. Both men looked up simultaneously as the huge weight came crashing down. They sprang apart as it hit the stage, shattering planks and sending splinters flying. It was followed by a scream and a thud as Dick the Painter followed it. He had lost his balance as he made the final cut and he hurtled through the dust-mote-swimming afternoon air to break his neck on the wooden O.

  When Marlowe looked up, Poley had gone. He was about to give chase when the crowd roared, whistled and clapped. Henslowe was astonished. Even the languid lawyers were on their feet, shouting, ‘Author! Author!’ with all the others.

  ‘Audience interaction,’ he called to them, waving. ‘It’s the coming thing.’

  Ned Alleyn knew how to work the crowd. He pushed La Pucelle on to the stage and Jack Roland and all the others. They passed around Kit Marlowe, still panting and reeling from the exertion of the fight and swept him centre stage, all of them stepping over the body of Dick the Painter. It’s a harsh world, treading the boards.

  ‘I thought I heard the name Shakespeare earlier.’ Philip Henslowe was trying to make sense of the afternoon’s performance while simultaneously counting his money. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘You did,’ Marlowe told him. ‘But it’s not our Will.’

  ‘He may be your Will, Marlowe,’ Henslowe bridled, ‘but he most assuredly isn’t mine. Listen, I don’t pretend to know what’s going on here, but the crowd loved every minute. Can you write it up, do you think; you know, the mighty line?’

  ‘The play isn’t always the thing, Henslowe,’ Marlowe told him. ‘And it most assuredly isn’t today.’ He stopped the man from counting, putting aside a pile of silver. ‘There’s a dead man in the tiring room,’ he said. ‘You knew him as Dick the Painter, but his real name was Harry Bellot, sometime soldier, sailor. And, by his lights, a good man. See that he has a decent burial, will you?’ He toppled the pile of coins that spilled out in a silver ribbon across the table. ‘You can afford it, after all.’

  ‘Of course, Kit, of course.’ Philip Henslowe knew that look on Marlowe’s face. Best not to cross him when he looked like that. ‘Where will you be?’ The theatre owner still had a play in tatters and these days the Rose was only as good as its last performance.

  ‘Me?’ Marlowe looked at him oddly. ‘I’ve got to find Master Robyn Poley. There’s a score to settle.’

  Marlowe visited the dead man before leaving the Rose. Henslowe would give him a good send off and there was nothing actors liked better than a good funeral. It gave them the opportunity to hone their crying skills. Ned Alleyn was an expert at it and had graced many a committal, to the astonishment and usually delight of the bereaved. So he knew that Harry Bellot would not go to his grave alone. But there was one last thing that needed to be done and only Kit Marlowe, now, could do it.

  The wardrobe department had done what they could in the way of tidying up Harry Bellot, but there was a limit to their skills and the man had after all fallen the whole height of the Rose, which was substantial. He had landed on his back, so his face was not too bad and if the cushion behind his head hid a multitude of sins, it wasn’t obvious. They had left him in his own simple clothes, paint daubed and worn. Marlowe was grateful for that. He knew what happened to discarded things in the Rose – if they didn’t go home with the understudy’s understudy, they would be part of the costume for the next production before you could say knife. Carefully, he edged his hand inside the man’s jerkin and fumbled for what he knew would be concealed there. He flinched as he felt the ribs give under his fingers but soon found what he was looking for. He drew out a little chamois leather bag and tipped it up so the contents fell into his hand. There were the missing globes. The emerald from Starkey Hall, Walter Mildmay’s diamond and a lapis, which must have come from the London merchant’s house. He turned them once, twice in his fingers then put them back in the bag and the bag in his breast. He put his hand lightly on one of Bellot’s own and pressed it.

  ‘I’ll do what’s right, Harry,’ he said. ‘You meant well. You just chose the wrong man for the job.’ He smiled. Harry had become a man of the theatre, he would understand what he was going to say. ‘Just like Henslowe when he let Master Shaxsper write a play. You should always pick your men with care. You didn’t, and you died for it, as well as other people who deserved to live. Henslowe is just killing the art of theatre, but that’s perhaps something for later. Don’t worry. Your soul will be singing soon.’

  And Marlowe turned and left the man alone, waiting for his God and his judgement.

  Outside the theatre, a figure detached itself from the shade of Master Sackerson’s wall. Marlowe tensed and reached for his dagger, back in its sheath as it was. The man held out his arms, hands empty and open.

  ‘Kit!’ It was Tom Sledd, a welcome sight at any time, but especially now. ‘Where are you off to? Don’t answer – I’m coming along, wherever you are going. I didn’t do enough back there. Everything went by so fast and I didn’t know what was going to happen next. Forgive me, but the theatre and the audience had to be my first concern.’

  Marlowe quickened his pace to stand alongside the stage manager. ‘Tom, it wasn’t your fight. And you certainly are not coming along with me.’

  ‘Unless you intend to stand here for the rest of your life,’ Sledd said, ‘I don’t think you can stop me, because every step you take, I will take one too. And I don’t think you want to wait; I know you well enough by now to know when you have something on your mind. On your heart, even.’

  Marlowe gave Tom Sledd a long look and gave in. Tom had been by his side in many tight spots over the years and he had never let him down. He knew he wouldn’t now. He was having to keep his right arm pressed to his side. The wound had bled again and the blood had dried, sticking the lawn sleeve to the skin. Every move pulled it free and it oozed some more. He just wanted to lie down and let kind hands soothe him, but that was for later. For now, he had a job to do and a murderer to watch out for. He knew that Poley would not give up this easily. Like all men with the glint of gold in his eye, the man had not taken in or believed Bellot’s motive for wanting the globes. Poley could only see things from his point of view. He would still be chasing the globes and would not rest until he had them. Another pair of eyes to watch his back and another pair of hands to wield a blade would not come amiss. He nodded. ‘Well, Tom, since you insist,’ he said. ‘But don’t ask questions. The less you know the better; this may not be over, even now that Harry Bellot is dead.’

  ‘Harry Bellot? I thought his name was Dick.’

  ‘It’s a long story. He had laid his plans for so long, including false names, that only a few people knew who he was any more. I wouldn’t be surprised if most people thought he was dead. A drunken sailor down in Deptford told me about him, but I took no notice. In amongst stories of men with ears they could wear as cloaks and women eating precious stones, a name was easy to miss.’

  ‘I don’t want to know if you don’t want to tell me.’ Tom Sledd knew that in Kit Marlowe’s world, the least said was probably the soonest mended. ‘I’ll just be your eyes and hands and then get back to the theatre. Where, by the way, we could do with you, if you don’t mind.’

  Marlowe allowed himself a chuckle. ‘That play is very bad, isn’t it?’

  ‘No,’ Sledd said, solemnly. ‘It is very, very, very bad indeed.’

  ‘How has Henslowe allowed Shaxsper to get away with such stuff? I’m surprised he hasn’t had him rewriting it over and over.’

  ‘That’s the thing,’ Sledd said. ‘I was in the theatre the day that Shaxsper delivered the play. It was late – by about a month, I should say – and Henslowe was already getting testy. He had been filling in meanwhile with some bits and bobs that he had had in hand for years. He even ended up putting on Rafe R
oister Doister. Remember that?’

  Marlowe laughed. ‘How could I ever forget?’ he said. Ned Sledd, actor manager par excellence had claimed the work as his own on many an occasion, although why anyone would want to do that Marlowe couldn’t imagine. He might have known Henslowe would have a copy somewhere in his eyrie. ‘How did that go?’

  ‘Surprisingly well. He also trotted out The Devil and Mistress Maguire but the trapdoor didn’t always work, so we only ran that a couple of times.’

  ‘You are lucky that all your troupe are quick studies,’ Marlowe said. He found writing words easy; learning someone else’s had always given him rather more trouble.

  ‘If only they were.’ Sledd shook his head. ‘It was a mercy on us all that all the pieces we put on were as old as the hills. In one or two scenes, the whole of the groundling pit were speaking in chorus. Quite an improvement, in fact.’

  They had digressed as they walked and Marlowe brought the conversation to heel. ‘So … Shakespeare delivered his play.’

  ‘He did. He walked in, put it in my hands and walked out with hardly a word. And no one in London has seen him since.’

  ‘Have you tried …?’

  Sledd was ahead of the poet. ‘Every woman who has ever so much as brushed past him in the street. He is with none of them.’

  Marlowe didn’t want to alarm the stage manager and erstwhile La Pucelle but he had worried ever since hearing that Poley had used the name Shakespeare with such freedom. Although not quite a byword where theatre-lovers gathered, Shakespeare had a tiny coterie of followers, those who had seen him on the stage and found him amusing. He had a way with him, Marlowe admitted. His domed forehead and neat little beard appealed to a certain type of woman and he had enjoyed a certain success in that direction. So, unless Poley was very provincial, and Marlowe doubted that very much, he had likely heard of the man. And Poley was not one to leave any thread dangling from any plan he wove. If Shakespeare was alive and well, Marlowe feared, it would be a minor miracle.