Lord Lovell shifted the scroll again, to one side and back again, and this time did not look up as he said, “That had much to do with my interest in taking on your company as my own. I wanted to be able to call on your wits if need be.”
With the slightest twitch of their heads, Joliffe and Basset shared a glance. They were both shifting their thoughts, and by the smallest of nods Basset told Joliffe the game was his for now. Putting a careful edge of interest to his voice’s mildness, Joliffe said, “And now there’s need, my lord?”
Lord Lovell looked up at him. “Now there’s need. As players, you can go unquestioned to places anyone else I might send would be suspect. You can be in the midst of a household, seeing things, without anyone wondering why you’re there.”
“Where would you have us go, my lord?” Joliffe asked, even-voiced, showing reasonable interest and keeping his instant wariness from sight.
“One of my feofees”—holding land from Lord Lovell in return for service if called on for it—“Sir Edmund Deneby, is readying a marriage between his daughter and the nephew of another man I know and am friendly with. It’s a reasonable marriage. I’ve encouraged it. The only thing is that the girl was betrothed before but the man died not long before the wedding.”
“Suspiciously, I take it?” Joliffe asked, the guess not difficult.
“He fell ill of a flux that couldn’t be stopped. Such things happen.” Lord Lovell said it easily but was not at ease about it. He might be unable to say in clear and certain words why he was uneasy but nonetheless he was.
“No one else fell ill?” Joliffe asked. Since they were in this with no way out, he might as well know more. “He was a hale man but it came on suddenly and killed him too quickly?”
“You know about it?” Lord Lovell asked in quick return. “You’ve heard something of it?”
“No, my lord. Those simply seemed the most reasonable things to make you uneasy about what might otherwise seem straight-forward mischance.”
Sitting back in his chair, Lord Lovell smiled and rapped his knuckles against the tabletop. “There! That’s what I want. Sharp wits looking at this thing.” He looked to Basset. “Master Basset, I’m sending your company to Sir Edmund as a sort of betrothal present. He and Master Breche are presently at Deneby Manor, working out final matters before the betrothal, settling the contract for Mariena and Amyas’ marriage. Amyas. A fool name. What did they think he was going to be, some hero out of a French romance? Anyway, I’ve had dealings with Master Breche and I’ve backed this marriage, so no one will wonder if I send my players there for this while before the marriage.”
“How long will we have?” Basset asked.
“As I understand it, they’re in the last of the betrothal talks. Everything should be agreed within a few days, the betrothal will be made, the banns immediately given on the three following days, and the marriage held the day after the last of them.”
That was a quick moving toward the marriage. The usual way was for the banns announcing it to be read at the church door for three Sundays in a row and the marriage to follow sometime soon after. It was possible—though rare—to do it more quickly and, “Why the haste?” Joliffe asked. “Is that part of your suspicion?”
“No. Master Breche has merchant interests abroad. He’s due to be in Calais by Martinmas. Amyas is his heir. He wants him settled before he goes.”
“Is the girl Sir Edmund’s heir?”
“There’s a son. Much younger. So she’s not the heir, but Sir Edmund is giving a good dowry with her and she’ll have considerable lands from her mother when her mother dies.”
And her brother might die. Then she would have everything, if—“Is the estate entailed in the male line only?” Joliffe asked. Because that would mean the property could go only from male to male, never to a daughter, however sidewise that might take it, even to remote cousins.
“No,” Lord Lovell said, with a level look at Joliffe that said he understood what lay behind the question. While a well-dowered knight’s daughter was a very good thing, a daughter who was heir to all that knight’s property was even better, and here was someone with only a younger brother in the way to that. But even without that, it was likely a good marriage just as it was, because by way of it, a merchant’s heir would rise into the gentry and a knight’s daughter acquire a wealthy husband.
Besides, it seemed that Lord Lovell feared for the bridegroom, not the brother.
Even as all that chased through his mind, Joliffe asked, enjoying this chance to question a lord, rather than merely obey. “Is there more you could tell us about what has you uneasy?”
“I would there were. As it is, the best I can offer is that you just go there, make of matters what you can, and let me know.”
“How do we let you know, my lord?” Basset asked.
“My lady wife and I are coming to the wedding. We’ll be there the day before and I’ll make occasion to talk to you. If there’s any reason not to go forward with the marriage, I can deal with it then.”
Unless the bridegroom died sooner, Joliffe thought but did not say; but found Lord Lovell adding, level-voiced and looking straight at him as if reading his mind, “In the meantime, if you see need to keep anyone alive, please do so.” He pulled a scroll toward him, dropping his gaze to it, dismissing them with, “I’ll have Gil sent to you directly.”
Joliffe followed Basset in deeply bowing and retreating from the room. A servant waiting outside went in as they left, probably to receive an order about this Gil with whom they were going to be saddled, but neither Basset nor Joliffe said anything until they were in the middle of the yard, away from anyone to hear Joliffe ask, “What do we tell the others?”
Without slowing or looking at him, Basset said, “What my lord told us. That he has a boy who wants to be a player and we’re to take him on, and we’re being sent as a betrothal gift to this Sir Edmund Deneby.”
“And about the other?”
“Nothing.”
The briefness of Basset’s answer told how he felt about the business set on them.
“We’ve been asked to do worse,” Joliffe pointed out.
“And when we refused, we lost our then-patron and have been living narrowly ever since,” Basset pointed out in return.
“But this time we’ve accepted,” Joliffe said cheerfully. “We’ll do what we can, which probably won’t be much, and there’ll be an end of it. Although,” he went on thoughtfully, “if my lord thinks I’m going to hurl my body in front of an assassin’s dagger or suchlike to protect this Amyas Breche, he can think another thought about it.”
“Watch what you don’t wish for,” Basset muttered. “You might get it. What we need to talk about is this thought Lord Lovell has that we can do his spying for him because of the Penteney business.”
Because that matter had been much Joliffe’s doing, he started somewhat uneasily, “I—”
“Later,” said Basset. “When there’s time.”
The others were waiting for them with all the hampers and baskets packed into the cart and the mare Tisbe hitched between the shafts. While Joliffe went to be sure of her harness’ straps and buckles, Basset explained about this Gil that was to join them.
All in all, the others took it not so badly as they might. Ellis said, “He’ll be the one who was all but falling into the playing area with staring at us, whatever we did here.”
“If it is,” Rose said encouragingly, “at least he’s neither lame nor ugly.”
Over Tisbe’s back, Joliffe said, “A player can do with being ugly. Look at Ellis.”
“I’ll look at you with a stick the next time you’re in reach,” Ellis returned without heat. “That’ll help your looks, anyway.”
“It’s what his voice is like and whether he’s trainable,” Basset said.
“Even Joliffe has been mostly trainable,” Piers said from where he sat on the cart’s tail, legs swinging.
“I get enough of that from Ellis,” Joliffe said. �
��Don’t you start.”
“You give enough of that to Ellis,” Rose said. “All of you stop it.” She was Basset’s daughter and Piers’ mother and Ellis’ love and often sounded as if she would willingly knock all their heads together if she had the chance. “Father, you haven’t noted the cart.”
“The cart? What’s wrong with the cart?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” Rose said. “Look.”
Piers helpfully pointed at the cart’s curved canvas top. The high-sided cart carried all the properties needed for their work and what little else there was in their lives. Sturdily made to begin with and carefully kept these many years, it rarely failed them, but it was the canvas cover over curved wooden struts that kept the weather off everything, and despite the best of mending, it was simply wearing out. Patched, blotched, and gray with use, it told all too well how low the players’ fortunes had sunk these past few years. Except that instead of that cover there was another one now—crisp with newness, without patch, blotch, or mend to be seen, and brightly painted gold and red in the bold, curving, nebully lines of Lord Lovell’s heraldic arms.
Both Basset and Joliffe must have very satisfactorily gaped at it because Rose and Ellis and Piers all burst into laughter together; and while Joliffe stood back to admire it and Basset circled the cart, staring, Ellis said, “The man who brought it said it was Lord Lovell’s gift. He left a cask of paint, too, for us to paint the cart red to match when we’ve a chance.”
Still staring, Basset breathed, “Blessed St. Genesius.” The patron saint of actors.
“You really didn’t see it?” Rose insisted.
Basset shook his head, picked up Piers from where he had fallen off the cart-tail with laughter, and said without taking his eyes from the splendor that had so suddenly overtaken them, “I never did. I was thinking about where we’re going.” He blinked and gathered his thoughts. “Do you know, I don’t know the way to Deneby Manor. We’ll have to ask.”
“I know the way,” said someone from the outer corner of the shed.
They all turned to look at the boy standing there with a long bundle clasped to him with both arms. The same boy—as Ellis had guessed—who had been at everything they had performed at Minster Lovell this week. Until now there had never been reason to note more than that about him, but that had changed and Joliffe made a first, quick assessing of him. Older than Piers by a few years, he was pleasant-featured enough, with straw-brown hair and a well-limbed body, compact enough that it might never take him through a gawking, awkward time. All that, at least, was to the good. More, including his voice and whether he was trainable, would have to wait. Basset was saying, surely while making his own judgment, “You do? To Deneby? That will be a help. You’re Gil, I take it?”
The boy ducked his head in awkward acknowledgment, thought better of that, and tried a slight bow from his waist instead, more awkward because of the bundle clutched to him. As he straightened, his gaze flickered to all of them looking back at him, and Joliffe remembered his own first moment of joining Basset’s company. That had been before the disaster had come on them, so there were more people looking at him—five men and Rose and another woman—but the feeling must be the same for this Gil as it had been for him: the lone outsider being judged by a close-grown group who knew each other, did not know him, and were unsure they wanted to. Basset had done then just as he did now—said with hearty goodwill, “Welcome, young man—” and went on to make them all known to him. “Ellis Halowe, who does our villains and heroes, depending on which we need. Joliffe Ripon, who mostly plays our women’s roles as well as anything else that’s needed. My daughter Rose, who’ll keep you clothed and teach you your share of the cooking. Her son Piers, who’ll make trouble for you, just as he does for the rest of us.”
Gil smiled and nodded at each of them. They smiled and nodded back.
“It’s your last name we don’t know,” Basset said.
“Densell, if you please, sir,” Gil said.
“Well, Gil Densell, it’s time we were on our way. That’s all your gear?” Basset asked. “Put it in the back of the cart. Show him where, Piers.”
“There’s a meat pie on the top,” Gil said. “For all of . . . us.” He offered that “us” uncertainly. “From my mother,” he added, abashed.
“Then doubly welcome,” Basset said heartily.
Young Gil would learn soon enough, thought Joliffe, that food from anyone for any reason was always welcome among them.
But even now, with Piers showing Gil where to stow his bag and no reason left not to be on their way, Rose said, “There’s one more thing.”
Joliffe, going to Tisbe’s head to start her away, turned back to see Piers handing his mother a folded cloth that must have been lying at the cart’s back. He and his mother and Ellis were all smiling as if to burst, and before Joliffe or Basset could ask why, Rose shook out the cloth and held it up, showing it was a tabard of strong red cloth painted with Lord Lovell’s badge of a silver wolf-dog—playing off Latin lupellus and Lovell—stitched on its front. Slipped over the head, the tabard would hang loose in back and front and by the Lovell badge tell to the world whose players they were.
“From Lady Lovell,” Rose said. “There’s one for each of you and Piers and Ellis, too.”
“The Lord and St. Anne and the blessed Virgin love her,” Basset breathed, staring much as the Israelites must have stared at the manna from heaven. “I . . .”
Words failed him. Joliffe did not even try for any. A few months ago they had been near to ruin and now they were a lord’s players, with all the marks of honor that could go with being so.
“We’ll wear them,” Basset said. “As we leave. To let my lady know we honor her gift.”
“And then put them away for later,” Rose said firmly. While Piers tossed folded cloths to Ellis and Joliffe, she went to her father and slipped the tabard over his head, settling and straightening it as she had his surcoat. He struck a pose and she nodded at him, smiling approval. Then she turned to Ellis, waiting for her help though he did not need it; and when she had the tabard on him, her hands lingered on his shoulders, and he put his hands over hers, the both of them smiling at each other with smiles far different from what she had shared with her father.
Joliffe, putting on his own tabard, held in his own smile at sight of them. The affection between them was too often an uneasy thing and it was good to see them being simply glad of each other, brief though it lasted before Rose had to untangle Piers’ head from his tabard, saying to Gil while she did, “I’m afraid there’s none for you yet.”
Lifting his chin, the boy said cheerfully enough, “That’s no matter. After all, I’m not a player yet.”
Joliffe began to have hope of him.
Chapter 2
The day’s rain held off until the players were a mile or more from Minster Lovell. Their tabards were safely stowed in one of the hampers by then and they had their cloaks on and their hoods up against the soft drizzle that would likely last all day but was better than a downpour. Drizzle took longer to soak through thick-woven wool.
According to Gil, who had been there with his father a few times—“When he still thought he might make a bailiff of me,” the boy said simply, with neither triumph that his father had failed nor bitterness that he had tried—the manor of Deneby was north and east from Minster Lovell, a day and a half ’s travel at the cart’s pace. “We’ll be there early tomorrow afternoon,” he said. “All going well.”
The boy might be addled enough to want to be a player, Joliffe thought, but he was at least sensible enough to add that “all going well.” And he made no word of complaint about the rain or the walking either, and that was to the good, since walking and rain were both inevitable in a player’s life. Unless, Joliffe amended, a player prospered to the point of affording a riding horse—which was so rare a thing as to be a laughable thought—or else fell so ill he had to ride in the cart—which God forbid. A player could no more afford to be ill than
he could afford a riding horse.
At least this Gil looked healthy enough, striding steadily beside Basset. With Minster Lovell behind them, they had all taken their usual places around the cart: Basset on one side, Ellis on the other, Joliffe at Tisbe’s head, Rose and Piers behind. Sometimes it went other ways; sometimes they walked together or in various pairs, and in good weather Piers often roamed forward to Ellis’ side or his grandfather’s or Joliffe’s, but today he kept beside his mother, slogging with the rest of them, and Basset had called Gil to his side to talk with him while they walked.
Joliffe remembered his first walk and talk with Basset, when Basset had skillfully drawn him out with questions and at the same time given him to understand what his place in the company would be and, for good measure, gave him his first lesson in playing. “Your voice and your body do your work,” he had said. “Your voice and body. They’re the tools of your trade. However sharp your mind is, boy—and I suspect yours is sharp enough you’ve cut yourself more than once—it’s no good to us if you can’t work your voice and body into whoever you need to be in a play, and you’re going to have to be everyone there ever was if you’re going to be in this company—from sweet maiden to old man, from angel to devil, to everyone and everything between. We’ve no use for someone who can only be himself.”
Remembering, Joliffe smiled to himself. He had learned, and he was good, and he took pleasure in both the work and in being good at it. He smiled, too, because his years of almost always playing the woman or girl in any play they did were maybe done. He was become somewhat old for playing maidens. If Gil proved any good at all, he was more than welcome to become every maiden there was in all their plays.
Their plays. Despite his boots were in mud and rain was dripping off his hood’s edge past his eyes, Joliffe smiled wider at the thought of what he could do with their plays if Gil proved good. When their company had broken up and shrunk, he had reworked what plays of theirs he could to fit the few of them that were left, with him and Basset and Ellis often shifting to play two or more parts apiece in a single play. Too many of their plays, though, could not be altered enough to be playable by so small a company and had languished these years in the bottom of the box where their scripts were kept. With even one more player, possibilities opened up and through the summer, after Lord Lovell had taken the company for his own, Joliffe had begun to work over the plays, seeing what could be done.
A Play of Dux Moraud Page 2