‘I remember you,’ the constable of the Watch said, looking at Marlowe. ‘Still looking for that old enemy?’
‘I’ve found a lot more since,’ Marlowe smiled. ‘How goes the Pestilence?’
‘On the wane, they say,’ the other constable said, ‘but if you see a cross on the door, I’d keep wide of it.’
‘I will,’ Marlowe said and strode on between the leaning tenements along Kyroun Lane. There was still no cross on Mrs Isam’s door and he banged on it with his fist.
A girl answered, perhaps sixteen, in the clothes of a maid. Her gaze, however, had nothing of the scullery about it. ‘Yes?’ she pouted.
‘Is your mistress in?’ Marlowe asked.
‘If it’s a mistress you’re looking for …’ the girl sidled closer to him, sliding her hand down his doublet.
‘Leave the gentleman alone!’ a harsh voice snapped. It was followed by a smack around the head and Mrs Isam, responsible for both, stood there fuming. ‘Master Marlowe,’ she scowled at him, ignoring the protestations of the girl, who sauntered away, holding her ringing ear.
‘Mistress Isam,’ he nodded. ‘May I come in?’
‘What do you want? None of my girls, that’s obvious.’ For the briefest of moments, the bawd wondered whether Marlowe’s tastes might run to the older woman, such as herself, perhaps. But there was a look on Marlowe’s face that told her not to entertain the idea.
‘I have come for Dominus Greene’s things,’ he said.
‘What things?’ Mrs Isam asked.
‘His effects. You know – clothes, books, pipe …’ the poet-playwright was already running out of ideas.
‘There’s no money,’ Mrs Isam cut to the chase. ‘You can come in and look if you like.’
Marlowe ducked into the dark of the passageway and followed as the landlady-turned-brothel-keeper led him up a twisting stairway. Almost every riser creaked under their weight. If the late Robert Greene was afraid of his murderer, he would have heard him in plenty of time on this staircase.
Robert Greene’s room was a tiny hovel under the eaves. Through the cobwebbed window, Marlowe could make out the spars of the ships at the Queen’s Wharves from Dowgate to Ebbgate and Oystergate beyond that. Southwark, he knew, stood across the river, with the Rose, locked and barred now, and the bear pits that had once drawn the crowds too. All of it lay hidden by mist, as though time, in a single inked line from Burghley, had wiped out their existence. The bed was small and cramped. It was a bed for sleeping, not loving; a bed in which to die. Marlowe opened the single cupboard door and a couple of shirts hung there.
‘Is this it?’ he asked Mrs Isam without turning to look at her.
‘What did you expect?’ she asked. ‘I haven’t been able to let this room, what with the Pestilence. So I had to make a living somehow.’
‘You sold his clothes?’
‘Of course. Not that they fetched much. His cloak was pretty threadbare and he’d long ago pawned that stupid bloody earring he used to wear. Anything else, that slut Fanny Jackman must have taken.’
‘She was fond of Dominus Greene,’ Marlowe turned to her, checking that the cupboard really was empty.
‘Fond, my arse!’ Eliza Isam toyed with spitting on the floor, but it was her floor and she might be able to let the room again, one day. Also, it never did to let the girls see her show her coarser side; she had to keep a distance.
‘Tell me, Mrs Isam,’ Marlowe said, ‘apart from Gabriel Harvey, who spent time with Dominus Greene? When we spoke before, I wasn’t quite sure of the situation here. Now, I am.’
‘Situation?’ she frowned. ‘What situation?’
‘You keep a bawdy house, Madame,’ he told her. ‘The girl I just met is one of your doxies. So was Fanny Jackman.’
‘How dare you!’ Mrs Isam snarled, climbing onto her dignity and clinging to it for dear life. ‘They’re serving wenches, that’s all.’
‘And I’m the Archbishop of Canterbury. I’m also running out of patience. Somebody killed Robert Greene, Mrs Isam, in your house. Shall I find a magistrate to start some enquiries? Keeping a knocking-shop is one thing, but allowing the murder of a gentleman …’ he closed to her, looking down into her twisted face, ‘perhaps even participating in the murder of a gentleman …’
‘I never!’ she screamed. ‘I never did!’
‘Then tell me who came here. Who visited Greene in the days before he died?’
Mrs Isam shuddered. This strange, dark man with the singular purpose had not touched her, yet she felt as if he had driven red-hot irons into her flesh.’ There was one man,’ she said. ‘Came twice. Both before and after Dominus Greene died. Name of Johnson.’
‘Johnson?’ The name meant nothing to Marlowe. ‘What did he look like?’
‘Er … tall. Older than you. Dressed like a roisterer. We don’t get many like that in Kyroun Lane.’
‘What did he want? One of the girls?’
‘No, just Dominus Greene. Said he was an old friend, from way back.’
‘He talked to Greene here? In this room?’
‘Yes. On the day before he died. He came back the day after.’
‘Did he take anything with him? Of Greene’s, I mean.’
‘Papers.’ She was trying to remember. The passing of her lodger had left her, it had to be said, a little unnerved. ‘I don’t know what they were. Plays and poetry, I suppose.’
‘They didn’t go with Dr Harvey?’
‘No, no. He came later. It’s funny. Nobody came at all in those last days and suddenly there was two of them. Well, three, really, if you count Fanny I-can-speak-Latin Jackman, which I don’t. Oh, and Timmy, of course.’
‘Timmy?’
‘My nephew. He comes round to see me from time to time. He’s home now, as a matter of fact. Do you want a word?’
Marlowe did. Fanny Jackman had told him that Mrs Isam’s nephew often sat with Dominus Greene. Perhaps he could shed some light in the darkness of Dowgate.
Mrs Isam shrieked out the lad’s name and there was a clatter of pattens on the risers. A young man stood there on the landing, a young man that Marlowe had seen before.
‘Master Marlowe!’ the boy stood open-mouthed.
‘Timothy,’ Marlowe nodded. ‘The sorcerer’s apprentice.’
‘That’s right,’ Mrs Isam grinned her gappy grin. All in all, Marlowe was happier when she was scowling. ‘Although I don’t think I care for Dr Forman being described as a sorcerer. He’s—’
Marlowe raised a hand. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I know what Dr Forman is. Would you leave us, Mrs Isam?’
‘Leave?’ The woman was nearly speechless.
‘It’s all right, Aunt El,’ Timothy said, patting the woman’s shoulder and shooing her through the door. ‘Master Marlowe and I are just going to have a little chat.’
‘Ah, you University wits, eh? All right, call me if you want me.’
Timothy closed the door behind her. ‘She was a good woman once, Master Marlowe,’ he said, ‘when her husband was alive.’
‘And now?’ Marlowe eased himself down onto Greene’s bed. It wasn’t the softest he had ever known.
‘The girls.’ Forman’s apprentice was looking out of the window. ‘I’ve tried to talk her out of it, but she says a woman must make a living. Who are we to judge? God will have the last word.’
‘What about Robert Greene’s last word?’ Marlowe asked.
‘What do you mean?’ Timothy turned to face him.
‘Were you with him when he died?’
‘No, I was at the master’s … er … Dr Forman’s house in Philpot Lane. Where we bumped into each other, in fact.’
‘But you spent time with Greene?’
‘Yes, I did. He was quite the philosopher, you know.’
‘Really?’
‘We had long discussions into the night, about all sorts of things. The exact shape of the world. The existence of God.’
‘And what conclusions did you come to?’ Marlowe asked.
Timothy looked at him oddly. ‘I’m rather more concerned with your conclusions, Master Marlowe,’ he said.
‘Mine?’ It was Marlowe’s turn to frown.
‘Yes. Men say you have dared God out of his Heaven. Men say that you believe that Moses was just a conjuror. Men say—’
‘—that I am Machiavel and that there is no God. Yes, I know, Timothy. Men say a lot of things, through spite and envy and malice, those three wise men who ride with us wherever we go, following what star they will.’
‘You are making fun of me, Master Marlowe,’ Timothy said, a rather sad look on his face.
‘Not for all the world,’ Marlowe said. ‘Rather, I am making fun of myself. Tell me, did Dominus Greene talk of any enemies?’
‘Enemies?’
‘I received a letter from him, written in the days before he died. He thought that someone was trying to kill him.’
‘Who?’
Marlowe shrugged. ‘If I knew that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Whoever it was, killed him slowly.’
‘Slowly?’
‘With poison would be my guess.’ Marlowe knew that it would be civil to give John Dee credit where it was due, but the least said, the soonest mended. ‘There was no inquest.’
‘The master … Dr Forman … said there was no need.’
‘Did he now?’
‘He is a great man, Master Marlowe,’ Timothy said, ‘except …’
‘Except?’
‘No, no,’ the boy shook his head, ‘I’ve said too much.’
‘You’ve said nothing,’ Marlowe contradicted him. ‘What were you going to say?’
Timothy hesitated. He wasn’t wearing his silly robes today – he never did in Dowgate on the principle that he probably wouldn’t escape with his life – so, somehow, he felt removed from Forman, at arm’s length at least. ‘He preys on women. Relies too heavily in my opinion on glamour. He wants faerie dust and flashing lights. And money, of course. The rest of us want science. Even Gerard, in his country bumpkin way. Actually, perhaps more than any of us; the man knows his herbs, I’ll give him that.’
‘Does he?’ Marlowe raised an eyebrow. ‘And what is the good of your science, Timothy?’ he asked.
‘To find God, of course. Isn’t that what all of us are about?’
Marlowe smiled. ‘I didn’t have Forman or any of his boys down as Puritans,’ he said.
‘We’re not that,’ Timothy assured him. ‘We just see things differently.’
‘So does John Dee,’ Marlowe reminded him.
Timothy’s mouth hung open. ‘You know Dr Dee?’ he asked.
Marlowe nodded. ‘I am proud to count him a friend,’ he said.
‘Oh, Master Marlowe. Could you introduce us? The master is a genius, of course, but Dr Dee …’
Marlowe laughed, holding up his hand. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘One thing at a time. First, I must find out who killed Robert Greene.’
‘I don’t see how I can help,’ the boy said.
‘How often did Dr Forman come to this house?’ Marlowe asked.
‘Now and then,’ Timothy told him.
‘With you?’
‘Hardly ever,’ Timothy said. ‘He encourages us apprentices to go our own way. Says he doesn’t need to hold our hands. Between you and me,’ he leaned in to Marlowe, lowering his voice and becoming confidential, ‘I think we cramped his style. Ladies-wise, that is.’
‘Did he like Greene?’ Marlowe asked. ‘Spend time with him?’
‘I don’t know,’ Timothy said. ‘He never mentioned it. I know he spent quite a lot of … time … with Fan Jackman.’ He looked thoughtful. ‘Gerard and Matthias did, though.’
‘What?’ Marlowe didn’t follow.
‘Spent time with Greene. I introduced them. Matthias is an Oxford man, so I think he liked teasing Robert with the Cambridge thing, as he does me. Gerard doesn’t know one end of a university from the other, so men like Robert impress him.’
‘So they both came here? And so did Dr Forman?’
‘Yes,’ Timothy said. ‘Yes, of course. What are you saying?’
Marlowe sighed. ‘I wish I knew,’ he said. ‘Tell me, your aunt mentioned a Master Johnson who called on Greene in the days before his death. Do you know him?’
‘No,’ Timothy said. ‘I have seen him, though.’
‘When?’
‘Ooh,’ Timothy had to dig deep into his memory. ‘I suppose it would be the last time I saw Robert, a couple of days before he died.
‘What did he look like?’
‘To be honest, I wasn’t paying much attention. I assumed he was a client, you know, of one of the girls. He was a gentleman, that much is certain. His clothes, his manner of speaking. He had an air of authority about him.’
‘Authority?’
‘Yes, you know; as if he was used to giving orders. And having them followed.’
Marlowe clutched at an impossible straw. ‘He wasn’t unusually short?’ he asked. ‘A dwarf, almost?’
‘No.’ Timothy shook his head, this time without having to think unduly. ‘Six foot, if he was an inch. Why the interest, Master Marlowe?’
Marlowe looked deep into the boy’s eyes. ‘The interest, Timothy,’ he said, ‘is that you might just have seen Robert Greene’s murderer.’
As Marlowe made his way back to Hog Lane late that evening, he was in two minds as to whether he had achieved a lot that day or nothing at all. He had certainly spoken to a lot of people, asked them a lot of questions and, in some cases, requested a boon. But whether any of it would lead anywhere was anyone’s guess. He walked more and more slowly as he got nearer to his own front door, somehow reluctant to go in and be by himself, alone with his thoughts. A new play, rudimentary jottings only, lay on the table in his bedchamber and in normal times he would feel that itching in his head and in his hand to get more words down on paper. Sometimes, he could see them, swirling around his head like moths to a flame, clamouring to be the next one written, to be forever part of one of his mighty lines. But tonight, it was faces he could see; Robert Greene, grey and still petulant, even in death; Richard Williams, bereft and suddenly only half of a whole; Eunice Brown, bruised, battered and baulked of a peaceful meeting with her Maker. They seemed to have no link between them and, try as he might, he could not make them fit. And yet …
‘Kit?’ The word was whispered but it hit Marlowe’s ear like a gunshot, so deep was he in his own thoughts. He had spun round, dagger in hand, almost before he realized it.
‘Who’s there?’ he hissed. ‘Show yourself.’
‘Whoa there, Kit.’ Shaxsper stepped out into the fitful moonlight. ‘It’s only me. Will. Will Shaxsper.’
‘Are you some kind of idiot?’ Marlowe stormed at him. ‘Don’t you know by now not to creep up on me? I could have killed you.’
Shaxsper was a phlegmatic man but even his heart was beating faster. ‘You were very quick on your feet, there, Kit. But I was sure you had seen me – you seemed to be looking straight at me as you came down the lane.’
‘I was thinking.’ Marlowe sheathed his dagger and Shaxsper did fleetingly wonder why he had kept it in his hand so long. ‘I’m sorry, Will. I have a lot on my mind. Did you want me for anything in particular, or were you lounging in my doorway by sheer coincidence?’
Shaxsper laughed. He was clearly forgiven. ‘I wanted to see you, Kit. Without the theatres we’re all a bit shiftless and I am trying to decide whether to go home and be a glover like my father. Move back in with …’
‘Anne.’
‘I do know my wife’s name, Marlowe.’ Shaxsper was on his dignity. ‘I was just pausing for thought.’
Marlowe undid the latch and pushed open his door, gesturing Shaxsper to follow. ‘Ah, I see. A little dramatic break, there. Very effective. Keep it in.’ He groped for a tinderbox and lit a taper with the ease of long practice. ‘Come through into the kitchen. It will be warmer in there and there might be a posset warming on the hob.’
‘Your women keep you well, Kit.’
‘I’m not too sure whose benefit it is for,’ he said with a smile. ‘They don’t have too hard a life. I am hardly here, when all is said and done.’
The kitchen was indeed warm and comforting, lit softly by the embers of the fire. The smell of cinnamon and nutmeg lightly perfumed the air and the posset pot and ladle were where he knew they would be, in the far corner of the hearth, keeping warm.
‘I’ll just get an extra cup for you. Sit down.’ Marlowe gestured to a chair in the chimney corner. ‘Watch out for the cat, she likes to sleep there when it starts to get colder out.’
Shaxsper swept a hand over the shadowed seat but it was unoccupied and he sat down. ‘I would never have guessed this of you, Kit. A house. Staff. A cat.’
Marlowe filled the two cups and handed one over. ‘A man must live somewhere. And it isn’t my cat. As for staff, sometimes I wonder if I work for them, not the other way around. But it is good to have somewhere to sit in the warm and have a drink at the end of the day without having to keep my dagger at my back, it’s true.’
Shaxsper sipped his drink. His landlady tended to the watery when she made posset, which was almost never. This was perfect and he gave it all his attention. His eyelids began to close and he was starting to wonder if Marlowe had such a thing as a second-best bed when his host suddenly spoke.
‘So, Will. As you were saying. Should you move back in with …’
‘Ha ha. Very amusing. But … should I, do you think?’
‘I have never met the woman,’ Marlowe hedged.
‘That doesn’t have anything to do with it,’ Shaxsper said, testily. ‘She’s perfectly pleasant, as far as I recall. It’s just that I know if I go back, I won’t leave again. My dream of fame, of becoming a playwright … that all goes to Hell and I become a glover or end up working on her family’s farm. I’m not sure I can do that, Kit.’
‘Then don’t.’ Marlowe had never worried about what his family would think, but he knew with children, Shaxsper’s outlook had to be different. ‘Look, I perhaps shouldn’t tell you this, but I believe the theatres might be reopening soon.’
Shaxsper held on to his cup with difficulty as he jack-knifed upright in his chair. ‘What have you done?’ he asked, his eyes sparkling. ‘Have you really got Burghley to recant?’
‘Not directly,’ Marlowe said. ‘And this isn’t for public consumption, but hopefully, yes, soon. Probably not immediately – Burghley won’t want to lose face – but soon. So, does that answer your quandary?’
‘Oh, yes!’ Shaxsper leaned his head back in his chair and closed his eyes in bliss. He wouldn’t have to be a glover, to have pricked, sore fingers and unsatisfied customers. He wouldn’t have to move back in with—
‘I know this will surprise you, Will,’ Marlowe said, breaking into the would-be playwright’s thoughts, ‘but I would like some advice from you.’
Shaxsper looked at him wide-eyed. ‘From me?’
‘Yes, I knew it would surprise you,’ Marlowe said. ‘I’ve surprised myself. But with Tom in Bedlam, Nicholas Faunt … who knows where … and Michael Johns and Dr Dee tucked up in their beds too far away to reach, I am left with you, or so it seems. If you’d rather not, I do understand.’
Shaxsper leaned forward eagerly. ‘No, Kit, no, I am truly honoured. I will try to give my very best advice.’
Marlowe smiled grimly. ‘Don’t overdo it, Will. I just need you to be as intelligent as you know how. Can you manage that?’
Shaxsper wasn’t enough of an actor to be able to look intelligent very successfully, but he gave it his very best try, his great brow furrowed, a crooked finger to his chin.
Marlowe sighed. This might well turn out to be a gigantic mistake, but it was too late to renege now. ‘You know I was looking into the circumstance of Greene’s death, of course.’
‘I helped dig him up,’ Shaxsper said proudly.
‘Indeed. Well, when I went to Cambridge in search of Harvey, I met a lad there whose twin brother had drowned in the Cam. It had been put down as a tragic accident but he – and I – suspect murder. Whoever had killed his brother had also tried to kill him. It isn’t often you get to chat with a murder victim, and his story was an odd one. As he remembers it, and Dr Dee says it was his imagination at the point of death, he was dunked under the water repeatedly and a man kept asking him a question.’
Shaxsper had not the same experience of bloody murder as Marlowe, but he thought about it all the time. A play wasn’t a play, in his opinion, without at least a couple of horrible deaths, the more the merrier, so he was always concocting new ways to dispatch a person. ‘What was the question?’
‘“Have you seen him?”’
‘Well, that’s clear. The murderer had obviously mistaken these boys for someone else, someone who knew the whereabouts of … I don’t know … a loved one, perhaps. Someone who had stolen something.’
That sounded remarkably intelligent and Marlowe almost looked around to see who had spoken; surely the words had not come out of Shaxsper’s mouth? ‘The problem there, though, is that they were twins. Absolutely identical, according to the surviving brother. It would be stretching credulity to think that this hypothetical person, who knew where another hypothetical person was, was also an identical twin looking very like …’
Shaxsper flapped a hand. ‘Yes, yes. I do see. But it would explain it, all the same.’
‘Then there was another death, in Hatfield. At Burghley’s house, as a matter of fact. This time, it was an old lady, who had been savagely smothered, her face and neck a mass of fingermarks, scratches and bruises.’
Shaxsper looked blank.
‘I know at first glance it doesn’t seem to have anything in common with Greene and the drowned boy and yet … it niggles at me.’
‘Did anyone see anything? Hear anything?’
Marlowe blew out a frustrated breath. ‘Not a thing. The maid along the landing is deaf, although she won’t admit it. The house is full of all kinds of people, coming and going. The guests are above reproach and their servants have to be assumed to be so, otherwise we would all be with Tom in Bedlam. It will turn out to be something and nothing, I suppose, but … even so …’
Shaxsper was tiring of looking intelligent and the heat of the fire was making him a little drowsy, but he tried his best to stay awake.
‘Do you think that the boy heard his attacker speak? That it wasn’t his imagination?’
‘I hear someone call my name, sometimes,’ Shaxsper said.
Marlowe looked encouraging. He wasn’t quite sure where this was going.
‘At night, you know, between waking and sleeping. Just “Will” like that. Once, when I heard that Hamnet was ill, I heard him call “Papa”. But I have never heard a question like that. Not in my head. It seems a bit …’ Shaxsper sought for the right word – the problem he often had with choosing the correct one frequently drove him to make one up. ‘A bit … complexible.’
‘Complexible? Is that even a word?’ Marlowe was beginning to see through Shaxsper’s rambling but needed another push to get there.
‘Complicated, then. Over-precise. So I think that he did hear it, yes.’
‘But what did it mean?’
‘That I don’t know. Perhaps I’m tired. I suppose I should be getting back home.’ Shaxsper looked wistfully at Marlowe.
The real playwright let him stew for a moment then reached forward and slapped his knee. ‘Don’t worry, Will, you can stay tonight. Will the second-best bed do you?’
Over the years working for the Queen’s secret service, Kit Marlowe had learned a thing or two about waiting on street corners. London was crawling with coney-catchers, shady characters like Frizer and Skeres who could spot an ingénu a mile away and fleece him of his valuables, livelihood and inheritance before he could so much as sneeze. Dressed down as he was, he tried that ploy today. He had already bearded Forman in his lair, badgering Gerard on his way in and he didn’t want to risk it again. He had bumped into Timothy without having to break his stride, but that still left Matthias.
The lad emerged a little after noon, striding down Philpot Lane in the direction of the abbey. Knights of the shire in their formal black robes were crowding into St Stephen’s Hall. There was much jostling and shouting as men prepared to debate one of Her Majesty’s bills of provision. Marlowe had targeted three of them already, posing as a humble petitioner. In every case, he’d been given a flea in his ear, but it had all killed time that morning and had served its purpose.
‘Keep walking,’ he muttered in Matthias’s ear, getting into step behind him.
The big lad turned with a swirl of his flashy cape. ‘Master Marlowe,’ he said, but didn’t have time for more before he was scuttling down some steps into the basement of an alehouse and bounced into a hard, wooden seat.
‘What’ll you have?’ Marlowe asked him.
‘Oh, that’s very good of you. Rhenish, if they have any.’
‘Pickles to go with that?’ The playwright-projectioner clicked his fingers and a serving girl appeared. He was remembering Gabriel Harvey’s explanation of what had killed Robert Greene.
Matthias looked up at the girl and grinned. ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘I am about the doctor’s business today and my breath must be fresh.’ He winked at the girl who smiled coyly, curtseyed and went in search of the wine.
‘Tell me about Dr Forman,’ Marlowe leaned forward.
‘What do you want to know?’ Matthias asked.
So much for the loyalty of apprentices. Marlowe kept it simple. ‘Everything.’
‘Well …’ It hadn’t occurred to Marlowe that this sorcerer’s apprentice could gossip for England, but the man asking the questions had struck pure gold. ‘Not to put too fine a point on it, Master Marlowe, he is a fraud.’
‘Oh?’
‘His sole purpose in life is to find fame and fortune – in either order. To that end, he has his way with ladies of rank. Or money; he doesn’t care which.’
‘And men?’
Matthias looked shocked. ‘I hadn’t heard that!’ he said, almost indignant.
‘No, I mean, how does he manage the men? I assume not all of his clients are female.’
‘Oh, I see. Well, he uses his science, of course. I once heard him discourse with two leading scholars from the Inns of Court for nearly three hours. All very plausible, but I’m not sure how much of it was true.’
The girl arrived with the cups and lingered for long enough for Matthias to squeeze her hand. ‘You have some tension there, my dear,’ he purred. ‘Comes of carrying too many heavy jugs, I’ll wager.’ He beamed at her breasts, threatening as they were to burst out of her bodice. ‘If I had more time today …’
‘You haven’t,’ Marlowe said, shooing the girl away. ‘You’re an Oxford man, aren’t you?’
‘Trinity,’ Matthias said, ‘although I have not attained my Masters degree yet.’
‘Nor will you, away from the college,’ Marlowe pointed out. Both men knew that residence at the university was essential for the higher qualification.
‘Ah, but I am learning at the knee of the great Dr Forman,’ Matthias pointed out.
‘His knee may be great,’ Marlowe said, ‘but you just told me he is a fraud.’
‘In his daily rounds, yes,’ Matthias sipped his wine, ‘a man has to make a living.’
‘Can he cure the Pestilence?’ Marlowe asked.
Matthias shrugged. ‘He says he can. But deep down, in the stillness of the laboratory, we all of us work for one thing.’
‘Which is?’
Matthias became confidential. He glanced from left to right. ‘To find God,’ he said.
Marlowe’s eyes narrowed. ‘Then you have all missed your calling, Master Matthias,’ he said. ‘You should have joined the Church.’
‘No, no,’ the boy shook his head. ‘I’m not talking about religiosity, faith, any of that claptrap. I’m talking about science. About the notion of Heaven. Is it real? Are there gates of pearl? Does St Peter keep them, with the keys in his hand? When you and I see a man laid into his grave, Master Marlowe, is that it? Is that all? We believe there’s more.’
‘We?’ Marlowe repeated. ‘Do you mean the majority of the world?’
‘No,’ Matthias said. ‘They just repeat by rote. The three of us and the magus know there is more. As do you.’
‘Me?’ Marlowe raised an eyebrow.
‘One of the little trifles I’ve read in my time is a copy of a play of yours that I believe will never be staged again – Dr Faustus.’
‘Where did you get that?’ Marlowe asked.
‘Never mind. Faustus sells his soul to the Devil to see things that most mortals can only dream of. Have you seen the Devil, Master Marlowe? Are you really a reincarnation of Machiavel?’
Marlowe looked at the boy. With his golden curls and the smooth curve of his cheek, he had mistaken him for a cherubic oaf, a chaser of girls and a charlatan, posturing, like his master, in a lurid gown for effect. But this jackanapes had neatly turned the tables and it was Marlowe who was stretched out like some hapless thing pinned to a laboratory table.
‘Reincarnation of Machiavel?’ Marlowe smiled. ‘No. Have I seen the Devil? Who’s to say? He wears so many guises, Master Matthias. That drunk over there?’ He nodded to the far end of the room where a loudmouth was complaining about the taste – and the cost – of the beer. ‘The girl who served us, the one you plan to practise the doctor’s special massage on? Philip Henslowe, erstwhile owner of the Rose? Lord Burghley? You?’
‘Me?’ The tables had turned again. ‘No, no. I’m looking for God. If I find the Devil on the way, so be it.’
‘How do you do it?’ Marlowe asked.
‘Aha,’ Matthias tapped the side of his nose. ‘Trade secrets, I’m afraid, Master Marlowe,’ he said. ‘I can tell you how the others do it. My own methods must remain my own.’ Again he became confidential. ‘We all risk damnation as it is.’
‘I’ll settle for that,’ Marlowe said.
‘Take Gerard. Not a duplicitous bone in his body, or a brain in his head. He will not hurt animals so he uses plants, herbal medicines, that kind of thing.’
‘He’s a wise man, then?’
‘Of sorts. White witchcraft, if you will.’ Matthias mouthed the words. An alehouse a mere stone’s throw from St Stephen’s Hall and the Abbey of Westminster was not somewhere men bandied such words about. ‘He has potions, elixirs, all suggested to him by the doctor. Except that he knows far more about them than the doctor does. By mixing certain elements in his phials, he hopes to make it possible for us to see Heaven.’
Marlowe looked dubious. ‘Any luck so far?’
‘That depends on who he tries it on. It did nothing for me or the doctor. Timothy – who knows? I’ll get to him in a minute. Mistress Forman will have no truck with it, but one or two of our clients seem … I’ll have to use the word “enchanted”.’
‘In what way?’
‘Well, take Robert Greene. Weeks before he died, Gerard gave him a potion – mandragora, foxglove, bits and bobs.’
‘And?’
‘Well, if you ask me, Greene was a little touched before Gerard started, but he became even odder later, sitting in a shroud, as if he was already dead.’
‘Preparing to meet his Maker,’ Marlowe nodded.
‘That was Timothy’s belief, certainly, when we talked about it.’
‘And what is Timothy’s method?’
‘Well, he’s far more adventurous. Rats, cats, dogs, the odd crow. He’s working on river trout at the moment.’
‘Go on.’
‘Well, he kills them – says fresh meat is essential – skins them and pegs them out on his table. He works on the heart, the lungs, the liver.’
‘And?’
Matthias shrugged. ‘Damned if I know,’ he said. ‘Don’t even know what he’s looking for. He’s been focussing on the animals’ brains recently. There are people in this great country of ours who say that the brain is behind it all, that it – not the body – is where the soul is.’
‘So you don’t think that Timothy is making very good progress?’
‘No, I don’t, but he’s a dark one, is our Timothy. When and if he finds anything, he’s not likely to share it with anybody else.’
‘Which brings us back to the doctor,’ Marlowe said, leaning back. He wanted to replenish their wine but didn’t want the air-headed girl distracting Matthias again, so he went thirsty.
‘Hmm.’ Matthias leaned back too, steepling his fingers. ‘The doctor is a picker-up of other people’s ideas,’ he said. ‘He’ll help himself to anything he can from me, Gerard, Timothy, the man in the street.’
‘I know a playwright like that,’ Marlowe said.
‘I doubt you’ll get anything particularly original from the doctor. You’ll have to ask him.’
‘That’s a little like handling quicksilver,’ Marlowe smiled.
‘Quicksilver!’ Matthias almost shouted. ‘Now, there’s a thought!’
‘What?’
‘Oh, nothing.’ The apprentice realized he might have said too much.
‘Do you know Cambridge, Master Matthias?’ Marlowe asked. ‘Specifically the stretch of the river called Paradise?’
‘Wouldn’t be seen dead near the place,’ Matthias laughed. ‘Oh, begging your pardon, of course, Dominus Marlowe.’
‘Pardon granted,’ Marlowe smiled. ‘What about Hatfield?’
‘Er … that’s in Sussex, isn’t it?’
‘No,’ Marlowe said, flatly. ‘Tell me, when the three of you went on your travels recently, where did you go?’
‘Can you keep a secret?’ Matthias looked a little concerned.
‘Has the Pope put a price on the Queen’s head?’
‘Very well. I went home. To Chertsey, I don’t know if you have ever been there. My people have the old Abbey House there. Lots of good cooking, comfortable beds, motherly smotherings, that sort of thing. We all told the doctor we’d been out administering to the sick. All a load of hogwash, of course. Gerard camped out somewhere along the river. God knows where Timothy went. Some place called Barn Elms, he said.’
‘Barn Elms?’ Marlowe repeated.
‘Do you know it?’
‘I know of it,’ Marlowe said. ‘Pity it’s nowhere near Hatfield.’
Matthias clicked his fingers and the blonde girl came running. The apprentice was shaking his head. ‘All this obsession with Hatfield, Master Marlowe,’ he said, squeezing the girl through her plackets, ‘you really should try to get out more.’