A Tip for the Hangman

by Allison Epstein

  The door opened, and an out-of-breath Robert Poley re-entered the room. A faint sheen of sweat coated his brow. He looked at the conversation unfolding at the table, crestfallen. Kit didn’t spare him so much as a smug look. He ducked his head and filled Morgan’s glass, praying none of his thoughts showed on his face. Retreating from the table, he chanced a glance at Anne. Her hands continued their thoughtless work, expanding the shapeless mass of her knitting. Perhaps she hadn’t noticed anything. Politics bounced off servants’ ears like light from a mirror.

  But Kit had heard. I cannot wait for your convenience to know where I stand.

  No question, then, of if. Only when.

  Nine

  Thomas Morgan belonged in Sheffield’s servants’ quarters as much as the pope belonged in Constantinople. And yet, the next morning, there he was, framed by the door like a medieval saint in a church recess, staring down the fleet of servants as they hastened to their feet. The pale sunrise washed out identical expressions of surprise on each face. In his panic, Kit could conjure only one explanation for Morgan’s presence: one of the servants was on course to be hanged. And if that were the case, he had a good idea who among them it would be.

  Kit could feel Poley watching him from across the room. Small wonder why—Poley had witnessed Morgan’s distaste for Kit with his own eyes last night, and he seemed the type to take pleasure in another man’s pain. Kit looked down at a long, narrow scratch on the floor. If he died today, he would not let his last sight on earth be Robert Poley’s face.

  “I wished to express my appreciation for your service last night,” Morgan said. “The situation was sensitive and required precise handling, and you all performed well.”

  Kit almost laughed. Appreciation? From Morgan? Unlikely. But Morgan had not spoken the words so much as extracted them from his mouth like a crossbow bolt from a wound. And in any case, he wasn’t finished.

  “In light of that,” he went on, “the Lady Mary has granted you a day’s leave, to spend how you wish. She, Master Babington, and I will require nothing.”

  Kit chanced a look at Morgan, then looked down again. Sure enough, Morgan’s glare had fixed on him. This dismissal, like last night’s, was personal. An excuse to shunt Kit from the scene while priceless information still percolated through the manor. But Kit couldn’t protest. None of the servants around him looked likely to argue against a day’s furlough in the village, no matter what was being discussed indoors, and resenting the gift would only attract attention. He inclined his head toward Morgan, acknowledging the glare without commenting on it.

  It was not ideal. It was the furthest thing from ideal. But some of his work could be done outdoors as well as in.

  Outside, the air was cold enough to ache Kit’s chest. Last evening’s rain had turned to snow, burying the last traces of moldering leaves and muddy footprints under a crust of powder and thick ice. Free from the manor, the bulk of Sheffield’s staff turned their steps toward a seedy-looking public house on the far side of the village. Kit could see the attraction: under Beton’s puritanical management and Mary’s moralistic rule, the servants weren’t apt to find that particular kind of pleasure at the manor. But Kit had his eye on a different sort of satisfaction.

  Anne watched them go, her lip edging toward a curl. In the winter light, her reddish hair reminded Kit of brass. “Animals,” she said, to no one in particular.

  Kit, beside her, nodded. “Sinners all.”

  From the elevation of Anne’s eyebrows, she believed Kit would spend every waking moment in a whorehouse if given the chance. On another day, he might have been offended.

  He shrugged. “Not my style,” he said.

  Anne still seemed unconvinced, but a faint smile crossed her face. “Well. What are your plans, then, Master Not-My-Style?”

  You, Kit thought. You, and what you know. He spread his arms wide. “I’m persuadable.”

  Anne turned away, striking off toward the north end of the village. “Come on,” she said without looking at him. “After last night, I need a drink.”

  Kit grinned and started after her. He might make something of the afternoon yet.

  Anne led the way to an outwardly unpromising tavern across from the main square, where she palmed over a few coins for a bottle of sack. Feeling that spending the day indoors would defeat the purpose of liberty, they took the bottle back outside with them. A low stone wall circled the main square, to keep cattle from escaping on market days. Kit brushed the snow from it and sat beside Anne.

  She passed Kit the bottle, and he drank, first apprehensive, then grateful. Excellent. Ages better than the cheap swill he’d been able to afford—or steal—in Cambridge. That made sense, he supposed. In a village where there was nothing to do but raise sheep or slaughter them, a man might as well be able to get comfortably drunk.

  “Can I ask you something?” Kit said, passing the bottle back.

  “May I live to regret it,” she said.

  Go easy, he thought. A simple question to get her talking. And if it satisfied his own curiosity too, well…“Is there a reason you hate me?”

  For someone with such a fierce moral position on lechery, Anne drank like a professional. “I don’t hate you.”

  “Really?”

  “I don’t drink with people I hate.”

  Sure enough, the dislike she’d flaunted in their first interview had faded. At least she could sit beside him now without issuing a barrage of silent threats. When had that happened? Perhaps Kit’s personality was an acquired taste. He wasn’t sure he liked the implications of that.

  “I needed this,” Anne said, taking another drink before passing the bottle. “Another day inside with Master Morgan and by the Virgin, I’ll go mad.”

  Kit laughed. Anne’s professional demeanor was unimpeachable. He’d never considered she might be acting too. But that knowledge made his job easier. In such close proximity to Mary and Morgan, the thousand petty annoyances filling Anne’s days would take their toll. And a sympathetic ear was a powerful weapon, if he wanted her confidence. A spy’s alchemy, turning empathy into gold.

  “He’s a bastard, no mistake,” Kit said.

  “And he hates you. We’re laying bets on how long you’ll last before he throws you out.”

  “What’s your wager?” Kit asked.

  Anne shrugged. “I gave you three months.”

  “Generous.”

  “Make an effort, will you? I’d like to win.”

  “This is me making an effort. If it isn’t enough, only Mary’s kindness will save me,” Kit said, and waited.

  He didn’t dare risk a more direct transition: nudging the conversation, more than redirecting it. But Anne didn’t need much to warm to the subject. She smiled—an actual smile, not her usual mocking one, as if she’d waited for him to say Mary’s name. She leaned back, supporting herself on her palms. When she spoke, it carried the same cadence Kit had heard the Cambridge rector use when reading from the New Testament.

  “You’ve enough to count on,” Anne said. “She’s been through so much, and somehow she’s still as generous as she is. I don’t know how she manages it. Sometimes I think she must be a saint.”

  She put a curious weight on the last word, one Kit didn’t know what to make of. He thought, on a whim, of the Holy Maid of Kent, whose prophecies had haunted the king a generation before. Inspired, divine fervor. Speaking the words of a God you’d seen in person, who sat in the same room, took meals with you. Of course, Elizabeth Barton had ended with her head on a spike. It all came back to that.

  “I wouldn’t call her a saint, if I were you,” Kit said.

  “And why not?”

  “Curious thing about saints when they’re not protected,” Kit said. He feigned interest in a pack of children engaged in an unskilled game of knucklebones in the middle of the square. “You wouldn’t be
lieve the terrible ways they can die.”

  Anne looked sharply at him. “Who was your teacher,” she said, “who gave you faith like that? Not the queen’s church.”

  Kit felt the conversation slipping out of his control. He wouldn’t learn anything by talking about himself. “Not exactly,” he said, following the thread, grasping for a pivot. “And not my parents either. The most orthodox Protestants you’ve ever met. I’m the family disgrace, the way I’ve come out.”

  “Is that so?” Anne’s gaze was now so intense Kit could no longer pretend he didn’t notice. She’d given this more significance than he’d intended, and in the wrong register, one he didn’t know how to follow. If he wanted to shape the conversation, he would have to push it. Take a risk and hope it didn’t cost anything he couldn’t afford to pay.

  “Being a disgrace is my specialty,” he said. “If Morgan could have thrown me from the room last night with his own hands, he’d have—”

  “Do you mind if I join you?” asked Robert Poley.

  If ever Kit had been tempted to kill a man, it was now. Poley strode up behind them, hopped over the low wall, and sat on Anne’s opposite side, legs splayed out to take up twice as much room as a man needed to. Anne inched closer to Kit, widening the distance between them. Clearly Kit’s distaste for Babington’s valet wasn’t an isolated phenomenon. Well, Poley’s interruption might make Anne like Kit better, comparatively. In present company, the competition for “least unlikable” was not fierce.

  Kit gave Poley a smile he’d learned from his mother, one that wished its recipient an agonizing and creative death. “Yes,” he said. “We mind very much, actually.”

  “Forgive me,” Poley said, though he made no move to leave. “I didn’t realize I was interrupting a seduction.”

  Before Kit could voice an objection, Anne took up the task. “By the Virgin, no one asked you, you nosy shit,” she said. She stood up, and the movement made Kit’s heart sink.

  “No?” Poley smirked. “Apologies. If you’re free, then, mistress, maybe I might—”

  “Has that ever worked for you?” Anne asked. “Ever? Once?” She drained the bottle and tossed it with a muted thump into a nearby pile of snow. Poley watched, seemingly more impressed than put out. It was as if the idea that Anne might openly reject his company had never occurred to him. “Kit, I’ll talk to you later,” she said over her shoulder, already crossing the square away from them. “This part of town seems to have a rat problem.”

  As Anne swept back toward the manor, Kit twisted his spine to glare at Poley. “Are you satisfied?” he snapped.

  Poley grinned. “Seduction. I knew it. You want to board her, boy, don’t let her shake you off any time there’s a ripple in the water.”

  Kit stood and turned his back on Poley, walking off in the direction he and Anne had come. It was that or punch the man square in the face, and though Kit could handle himself in a street brawl if he had to, his cover as a respectable servant was already on weak footing.

  He’d speak with Anne again that evening. He’d have to. Start by commiserating over Poley’s interruption, then nudge the conversation back to where they’d left off. He could make it look natural. It wasn’t all lost, he thought, as he crossed in front of the inn again, deeper into town. All right, it was mostly lost. But there was other work he could do this afternoon. Speak with Matthew, perhaps. In staking his hopes on the meeting, Kit had all but forgotten the letters, but for want of a better option—

  “Well, imagine meeting you here.”

  Kit jerked to a stop. The sudden loss of momentum caused him to slip on a patch of ice beneath the snow. He barely stopped himself from falling, wrenching his back in the process. The pain didn’t register against the shock of that voice. And, as he turned in search of it, the sight of the speaker, a square-shouldered man in his middle thirties with short gray-gold hair. He wore a ratty brown cloak and stood in front of the inn’s stable with a wry smile.

  “Gregory?” Kit said.

  “No, it’s Edward the fucking Confessor. Honestly.” Gregory’s face was serious, but Kit could see the amusement beneath it. Clearly he enjoyed Kit’s shock.

  “I thought you were in Rheims,” Kit said.

  Gregory shrugged. “I was. Now I’m here. I was set to meet somebody else, but you might as well join. Come in, unless you want the world to hear.”

  Gregory disappeared into the stable without another word. Kit watched the empty space he’d occupied, equal parts shocked and exasperated, and followed.

  The air hung warmer inside, with the nutty brown smell of straw and stagnant water. Six or seven poor-looking horses stood within, available for rent to any with an equal shortage of money and scruples. The animals watched them with eyes that glistened black like beetle shells. Kit took a step toward Gregory, who didn’t edge back.

  “I don’t suppose you could have warned me you were coming,” Kit said. “I—”

  “Spare me, Arthur, I know I’m late,” said Robert Poley, sauntering through the stable door. “I was trying to—”

  Kit turned. Poley made it halfway to where Gregory stood before he froze. His too-bright eyes locked on Kit’s. Other than the fervent dislike on Kit’s end, Poley’s shock mirrored his exactly.

  Poley regained his composure before Kit did. “Hello again,” he said. He leaned against the low stall door, resting his palms along the top.

  “You’re a spy?” Kit said to Poley.

  Poley grinned. “And to think of the effort I wasted watching you.”

  Gregory laughed, drawing a scowl from Kit and reminding him how much he detested being laughed at. It wasn’t as if he expected Walsingham to hand out the names of every agent in his employ, but the fact that Whitehall had set a spy in Babington’s household as his valet seemed, in Kit’s uneducated opinion, like critical information. He crossed his arms, then, realizing it made him look petulant, uncrossed them again.

  If Gregory noticed the five different emotions Kit had cycled through in the last thirty seconds, he ignored them. “You’ve exceeded my expectations, Marlowe,” he said. “I thought I’d find your corpse on the side of the road.”

  “Did you come all this way to insult me?” Kit asked.

  Gregory smiled. “No, though I might have done. London wants news of your progress. I was to get Poley’s today, and as luck has it I’ve caught you both. If you’ve found anything, let me know, and I’ll keep Walsingham informed.”

  Kit’s fingernails bit into his palms. Six weeks. Six weeks he’d been on the job, proving he could do everything Walsingham asked and more. Was being treated like a competent human so much to ask? See what Gregory made of this.

  “Mary and Babington are in league with King Philip of Spain,” Kit said. “He came with a message too sensitive to be put to paper. But ‘His Most Catholic Majesty is nothing if not faithful,’ or so he says. And her maid heard every word of his plan. I spent the morning with her, until this man”—with an expansive gesture at Poley—“interrupted us.”

  Gregory looked at him, stunned. “They’re in league with Spain,” he repeated.

  “Can’t say I’m surprised, can you?” Poley said. “The only place you’ll find more papists is Rome, and they’re too busy excommunicating the French to bother with us.”

  “What was Babington’s message?” Gregory said.

  Kit and Poley looked at each other.

  “We don’t know,” Poley said.

  “Yet,” Kit cut in.

  Gregory groaned. “A plague on the sacrament, don’t do this. You were there to know there was a message. And you were sent away. You both, specifically?”

  Gregory was sharp. Kit would grant him that. “Yes,” he said. No good denying it. “Us both, specifically.”

  “And you’ve been given leave? In the middle of the day? Right after—”

 
“Arthur, I know,” Poley interrupted, raising a conciliatory hand. “The boy’s new. He made a mistake. But it’s nothing I can’t handle.”

  “I made a mistake?” Kit repeated. “I just need more time—”

  “If I’m hearing you right,” Gregory said, “we don’t have time. Poley, you’re in too deep, but watch yourself, I won’t be responsible for scraping your brains off the floor. Marlowe, you’re out.”

  Kit stared. Out? Just when Anne was on the brink of telling him everything? Yes, the risk had grown, but this was intelligence work, not a tennis match. Risk was part of the game.

  “Mary trusts me,” Kit said. His voice sounded high, pleading, but it was too late to fight that. “It’s not her, it’s her man. It’s Morgan. I—”

  “You’ve done well,” Gregory said, as if Kit were a schoolboy searching for praise. “But I won’t have you kill yourself with your own stupidity. Get back to Cambridge, and we’ll use you from there.”

  “Don’t mother him, Arthur,” Poley said, exasperated. “The boy knew the risk when he signed on.”

  “Walsingham’s orders,” Gregory cut in. “Pull him out if he’s compromised. You think you know intelligence better than Walsingham, Robert, you go to London and tell him as much.”

  All this time feigning servitude, Kit had forgotten that his life was directed by a different master. He couldn’t remember ever having felt this tired before. Anne trusted him. Mary trusted him. And Walsingham would throw all that away, with nothing to show for it. “How do you suggest I leave? I can hardly tell Mary I’m off to Cambridge.”

  Gregory shrugged. “You’re a poet, don’t you spend half your life spinning lies? You’ll work something out. Oh. Another thing.” He unearthed a folded page from his pocket and gestured with it. “Bit of a winding path to get this to you. Walsingham had me bring it on my way. Have a secret lover writing you sonnets?”

  Kit held the letter in both hands. His stomach dropped. He didn’t need this now.

  He knew that clumsy hornbook lettering, the way the s’s in Corpus Christi College were all written backward despite the candlelit lessons he’d given their author years ago. Only one person would write to him this way, without the polish of formal education, addressed not to Ch. Marlowe, but Kit.