Dark Lady

by Charlene Ball

  “She slandered my kin.” She hoped he would not ask to know more.

  “I see.” Hunsdon looked away. “Like my royal cousin, I would not put windows in men’s souls. This woman is harmless. Her mind may be troubled.” After a moment, he added, “She has kin at Plymouth that are sailing to Virginia. Would you I send her to them?”

  Emilia breathed deeply. “Thank you, Master Carey.”

  A few days later, as Marie was leaving, she said, “Please God, I go to a place where true Christians may worship free from Papists, infidels, and Jews.”

  “I hear Spanish Papists be there already,” Emilia answered, “and also red Indians that are not Christians, so far as I know.”

  Marie shot her a look of hate and exited.

  That evening at Lucretia’s, Alfi could hardly contain himself with excitement. “I may get to join the Consort. Will Damon is ill, and father put in a word for me to replace him.”

  Emilia felt a flash of envy, which she quickly suppressed. “Congratulations.”

  CHAPTER 8

  Robin Goes Adventuring

  May–June 1591

  Emilia had not seen the player in the last three years except onstage. One day in May, she happened to visit the bookstalls around Paul’s, and stopped at Vautrollier’s. He was there. They talked as though no time at all had passed and lingered in the warm early summer air, watching the sun glint on the pages of new books spread out to tempt passersby. Talk wandered to the Armada of three years ago, and Emilia told the player how confined she had felt when Marco left.

  “It was like being back in my mother’s house when I was afraid to go out for fear of a constable arresting me for being a masterless maid,” she said. “Girls and women have been thrown into Bridewell for no more than walking out alone.”

  “Men can be arrested too,” said the player, “for dressing above their station. They don’t quite know what to do with us players, since we dress as everything from kings and nobles to beggars and thieves. Some players have taken a fancy cloak or hat from the tiring-house and worn it in the street, and been punished for it. There’s even a law to fine us for wearing cloth of gold, silk, or velvet in public.”

  “You’re breaking the sumptuary laws,” said Emilia. “But do you break them when you dress like that onstage?”

  “A question for a lawyer—a tribe that has its uses.” He looked at her, and his eyes widened. “I have an idea! I’ll bring some boys’ things from the tiring-house for you. Then you could go about the streets more freely.”

  “What? I couldn’t pass as a boy.” She looked down at her chest.

  “Sure you could. I can see you as a likely lad of thirteen or so.”

  “What if I’m discovered?”

  “You won’t be. Think of all the places you can go as a boy. Taverns, alehouses, ordinaries where you can get a decent meal for next to nothing.”

  “I have a cook who prepares my dinner every day. Why should I go to a tavern?”

  “You could go to plays and bear-baiting houses.” His voice took on a wheedling tone. “No need for a manservant to carry your money and light the way.”

  “I detest bear-baiting. And when I go to the theater I like having someone carry my money and light my way. I can sit in a box and not be jostled by the crowd.”

  He gave her a teasing smile, head tilted. “You could go with me to see the sun rise on Hampstead Heath. The robins and larks will be clamoring and shouting and having song contests, and pied daisies and blue violets and forget-me-nots will carpet the ground, and the clouds will ride overhead and run roseate before the sun. And we can lie on our backs and see him rise all gold and feel his warmth drying up the dew. We’ll whistle to the robins and walk quietly along the hedges, and, if we’re very quiet, we may surprise Mistress Thrush herself stuffing worms into the beaks of her young ones, or see Madame Snail taking the air, her whorled manor settled on her back, her shiny trail glistening behind her.”

  She looked at him in wonder. “You are a poet, sir.”

  He bowed. “Your own poet, m’lady, in poor booksellers’ tatters.”

  “Hardly tattered, sir, but when costumed.”

  “I’m always costumed.”

  “And always playing a part?”

  “Of course. Isn’t everyone?”

  Emilia felt the moment, vivid and sharp: Morning coolness on her hands, sunlight in her eyes, wind lifting a strand of hair across her mouth, her hand brushing it away. Pages of books fluttering on the table, clatter of horses’ hooves and voices passing in the street. A gull swooping over the line of stalls next to them with a catlike mew, its white wings gleaming against the enamel blue of the sky.

  “I dare you.” His eyes gleamed.

  Emilia met his challenging gaze. “Bring the outfit.”

  Emilia took the clothes from the bundle: doublet and hose, shoes, short cloak, a hat with a feather. She picked up the shirt. Thin white cotton lawn, worn cuffs with a narrow row of bobbin lace around their edges. Trunk hose of dark woolen-linen; doublet the same; both shiny with wear on elbows and knees. Knitted stockings, fraying a little; would they be long enough? She slipped off her night rail and pulled on the shirt, shivering a little at its touch. She stepped into the trunk hose: neither too tight nor too baggy. Then on with the stockings, tying them to the trunk hose. She slipped on the doublet, puffed out with stuffing. The boots looked narrow, but her feet slid into them with ease. How quickly she could get dressed, and with no help. She wound up her thick braid and pinned it, set the hat on her head, and looked in her steel mirror. A shadowy boy’s face looked back: smooth chin and cheeks, oddly bare without her hair curling around it or a hood framing it.

  She put down the mirror and paced around the room, taking long steps. She sat wide-legged on the trunk, knees apart, feet pointing out. She smoothed her hands over the padded doublet. She would have to bind her breasts.

  She opened her chamber door and stepped carefully down the stairs, feeling almost naked without skirts swinging around her. Hearing voices and laughter from the kitchen, she tiptoed to the door and threw it open.

  “What cheer, good folk?” she bellowed in her deepest voice.

  Jenny stared, mouth open, then shrieked, “Mercy on us!”

  Marco’s hand flew to his dagger.

  “Who—?” Min exclaimed. Her eyes narrowed. “Mistress?”

  Emilia laughed and strode into the kitchen. “I hoped to fool you all.”

  “Oh, Mistress!” Jenny cried. “I thought you was Robin Goodfellow.”

  “I thought you was a thief!” Marco said.

  “What say you, friends? Shall I pass for a lad?” She stood, legs apart, hands on hips.

  Min walked around her. “You’ll need to bind your bosom. Reminds me o’ me niece, God bless her. Used to go to plays in her brother’s clothes. A regular tomrig, that girl.” She shook her head, a smile creasing the corners of her mouth.

  “Ye could go on the stage, Mistress,” Jenny said. “Like that Master Shakeshafte.”

  “Shakespeare,” Emilia said.

  Emilia stood still while Min put final touches on her outfit. She had already helped her bind her breasts with long strips torn from an old sheet.

  “Some boy may grab your hat for a prank,” Min said. “You’ll have to cut yer hair.”

  Emilia’s hands flew to her head.

  “To the shoulders only,” said the cook. “Young men and boys wear it so, and many ladies too. You can still fix it up fancy-like.”

  “What will I say to Lord Hunsdon?”

  “Tell him it’s the fashion.”

  Black swirls lay on the kitchen floor, and curls billowed around her shoulders. “My head feels lighter!” Emilia rumpled up her hair with her hands.

  “Put the hat on, Mistress,” Min said, laying down her scissors. She scrutinized Emilia again. “You still look woman-like. Let me tie back your hair.”

  With her hair tied back and the hat on, Emilia strutted about the kitchen. “Will I d
o now?”

  Marco tilted his head. “Stand more easy, Mistress. Don’t swagger, walk natural-like.” He demonstrated.

  I thought I always walked “natural-like,” Emilia thought. Are skirts also a disguise?

  She hastened to St. Paul’s, heart pounding. The warm sun and unaccustomed exertion made trails of sweat run down her neck and forehead. When was the last time I ran like that? she wondered.

  At the bookstall, she saw no sign of the player. She lounged against the table in what she hoped was a boyish slouch.

  “Hey, you! What are you doing there?” yelled a familiar voice.

  Emilia suppressed a smile and turned, glowering from under her hat brim. “D’ye address me, sir?”

  “I do, you—you—you?” His eyebrows shot up and his jaw dropped.

  Emilia burst out laughing. “If you could see your face!”

  He walked up. “I don’t believe it. You’re perfect!” His face went from open-mouthed astonishment to delight, and he lightly touched her cheek. “It becomes you, the lovely garnish of a boy.”

  She felt a blush spread over her face. “So when shall we go to Hampstead Heath?”

  “I know someone who’s going in a wagon tomorrow. Can you go then?”

  “I can.”

  “Let’s wander about the city a bit. I’ll leave Ned, the printer’s devil, in charge.”

  They strolled together around the courtyard of St. Paul’s, browsing the bookstalls, stopping to listen to a preacher holding forth in the pulpit, leaning against a column to watch the passersby. Emilia felt self-conscious at first but grew bolder as no one seemed to pay her any mind. She strutted, matching her strides to her companion’s, and even spat in the dust.

  The sun was growing low. “Are you hungry?” Shakespeare asked.

  She nodded, realizing she was—and thirsty, too.

  “Let’s go find an ordinary.”

  They walked north on Aldersgate Street, following it to the City wall. They passed through Aldersgate and walked the dirt path along the fields. They saw a laundress gathering up washing that she had spread on the grass to dry. A small dog trotted beside her. A couple of youths were practicing archery in the next field. A man and woman walked arm in arm; Will raised his hat, and after a second, Emilia did too.

  The sun gilded the outlines of houses, walls, gates, and churches as they walked. They looped around and turned down an even narrower path that took them back toward Paul’s. In the shadow of the cathedral, they found an ordinary where they stopped for a bite of supper. Emilia looked around with curiosity at the rough-timbered interior with long tables and benches; it was like a tavern, but plainer.

  Will ordered the meal of the day, a bowl of mutton stew with carrots and skerrits, and two mugs of small ale.

  Emilia took off her hat and ran her hand over her pressed-down hair.

  “You’ve cut your hair!” exclaimed the player.

  “It’s the fashion.” She tossed her head.

  After eating, they walked to the river in the late dusk and caught a wherry to Westminster. As they rode in silence, they watched the last glimmer of the day reflected on the water and heard the calls of the boatmen as from far away. They parted at the stairs.

  Emilia said, hesitating, “Farewell, Master Player.”

  “My friends call me Will.”

  “Shall I?”

  “Of course. And what shall I call you, my young friend?”

  “Robin. Robin—Warbeck.”

  “Another pretender?” He raised an eyebrow.

  She shrugged.

  “Farewell, then, friend Robin. Tomorrow at eight at the Exchange.”

  She nodded and turned away. At the top of the stairs, she stopped and watched until the boat disappeared. Then she ran home in the warm spring dusk.

  Next morning early, she dressed as Robin. “I will be gone all day,” she told Min.

  The cook gave her a sideways glance. “Are you goin’ alone?”

  Emilia started to say it was none of the cook’s business but instead chose honesty. “I’ll be with the player,” she said.

  Min nodded, narrowing her eyes.

  Marco drove Emilia to the Exchange, where she met Will and a middle-aged man he introduced as Master Brayne, a grocer with ties to the players. The wagon rattled along Aldersgate Street as the sun came up on their right. They rode past the Charterhouse, turned onto Clerkenwell Road, then headed north on Faringdon Road to the Heath, where the grocer dropped them off.

  Emilia looked around in wonder at the broad expanse of the heath. “It’s vast! I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  They struck out on a footpath across an expanse of wild grass alive with humming and buzzing. The sun rose higher, and she squinted and pulled her hat down. Tall, yellow blooms on stalks brushed their legs as they passed. She exclaimed over small white and blue flowers and looked in wonder at the expanse of purple-flowering grass the player called heather.

  “Those are mary-golds, and these lady-smocks. See the violets, still blooming. And here’s yellow crowfoot.”

  “It’s lovely,” Emilia exclaimed, reaching to break off a bloom.

  “Watch out for the leaves,” said Will. “They cause blisters.”

  “Oh.” She drew away and reached for the mary-golds instead. “I wish I could take them back and plant them.”

  “They would wither before you got home. They don’t travel well.”

  “Look!” she cried as a long-legged creature popped out of a clump of grass and bounded away.

  “Hare,” said Will. “Old Wat’s a’feard we might be hunters. If I had a slingshot, I’d get him. He’d make a nice supper.”

  Emilia remembered that Lucretia never served hare or rabbit. “Would he travel well?”

  “Ha!” the player laughed.

  They sat on a bank, watching the rabbits leaping out of the tall clumps of grass. Birds called high overhead. Will imitated them, cupping his hands around his mouth. “There’s a lark,” he said, pointing.

  Emilia gazed, open-mouthed, as the bird rose, its song twirling out as though spun like thread. She looked with delight at a robin that hopped along, cocking its head at them, then bobbing to stab at a worm. “He’s not afraid.”

  “No more than his namesake,” said Will.

  It took her a moment to realize that he meant her.

  They stopped when the sun stood overhead and ate some bread and cheese that Will had brought. As they finished their meal, a light rain started to fall. At first it was only a few gentle drops, but as they walked, the rain fell faster. Suddenly it was lashing them, and wind was tossing the trees about. They could hear nothing but rain and wind and could hardly see as they pushed through sheets of water. They half ran, half stumbled across the heath and found shelter under some trees.

  “Oh, I am soaked!” Water streamed from Emilia’s wilted hat brim and over her face in rivulets. Her hair had lost its cord, and it fell over her shoulders in wet strands. The white shirt Will wore under his doublet was so wet it looked transparent.

  “We are a pair. Two beggars could not be soggier.” He looked delighted. “Blow, winds! Blow hard and crack your cheeks! Blow, I say!” He shook his fist at the sky.

  “You look like a madman.”

  “I might be a madman as far as you know.” He threw back his head and howled, “BLO-O-OW!”

  “You might have fallen overboard from a ship.”

  “You look like a water nymph with your hair in wet snakes.”

  “No, I don’t! I look like the other madman.”

  “You’re the madman’s little fool who goes about with him.”

  They laughed at one another, rain running over their faces, wet hair streaming, their clothes soaked. Emilia sneezed.

  Will said, “I think I saw an inn on the edge of the heath.”

  They set out, clinging to one another, pushing against the wind.

  The inn was on a corner where open country—now open mud puddle—pushed against one side
and a row of dilapidated houses and shops leaned against the other. They staggered through the door.

  “Innkeeper!” Will called. “My son and I need a room with a fire, and clean sheets, and some mulled ale. Some food would also be welcome.”

  “We’ve naught but the common room,” grunted the innkeeper.

  “Any port in a storm.”

  Emilia found herself in front of a roaring fire in the common room, really a bedchamber with a huge bed. She and Will were the only people there. He pulled a blanket off the bed, sniffed it, and handed it to her. “Full of fleas, no doubt, but it’s warm. I’ll look the other way while you get out of your clothes and wrap yourself up.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll take the other blanket. Go ahead, quick! You don’t want to catch a chill.”

  She quickly shed her dripping clothes, peeling off trunk hose and stockings, squelching out of shoes, wringing out her thin lawn shirt. She tried not to look as Will stripped off his doublet and shirt, wrapped a blanket about his shoulders, and poked up the fire. Snuggled in the other blanket, she huddled on the floor before the fireplace. Will threw a towel over her head and began to rub her hair.

  The innkeeper came in with two bowls of stew and two tankards of steaming ale.

  “Drink that,” ordered Will. “Sir Host, could we trouble you for spoons?”

  They sat wrapped up on the floor by the fire, eating and drinking in silence. She could not believe how much better she felt wrapped in the blanket, hair almost dry. The stew was surprisingly good, mutton and vegetables with bread to thicken it, and the ale was hearty and fizzing.

  At length, she sighed and leaned back, sipping the last of her ale. “I hate to leave.”

  “We’re not leaving tonight,” said Will.

  “But—my servants! They won’t know where I am.”

  Will glanced at the window, where rain was pounding the shutters. Thunder rolled overhead. “Do you want to brave that?”

  She shook her head, then had a sudden, alarming thought. “What if others come?”