The Armor of Light

by Melissa Scott

  Bell Road was wider than most, running almost at once into the open land of St. George’s Field, so wide in fact that the jutting second stories barely shadowed the sides of the street, and the ditch in the center of the roadway ran almost clear. The sun had burned away the morning’s fog long before; now, setting, it bathed the open yard in front of the Bell, and the knot of day-laborers drinking on the benches outside the door. The two men standing at the doorway itself cast long shadows back along the street. Marlowe recognized them both, but it was the slighter of the two that made his breath catch in his throat. Ganymede himself, perfect from his tarnished-gold curls to his trim, unpadded call, very neat in a suit of the shade of scarlet known as kiss-me-darling: very appropriate, Marlowe thought, sourly, and did his best to ignore the knife-thrust of longing in his belly.

  The other man saw him then, and touched the blond man’s shoulder. The latter glanced back—he’s grown a beard since he left me, Marlowe thought, startled—then said something to his friend, and vanished into the Bell. Marlowe kept on, uncertain whether he was glad or sorry his Ganymede had chosen to avoid what could only be an unpleasant encounter, and nodded to the man remaining in the doorway.

  “Good evening, Kit.” Edward Alleyn’s knobby, short-bearded face was faintly wary. “Bringing Henslowe the second act?”

  Marlowe nodded. “It’s in my purse.”

  “And when will you be offering us a play of your own?” Alleyn continued. “It’s been almost two years since The Massacre at Paris.”

  He’s had time to get away, Ned, Marlowe thought. He bit back his annoyance, saying, vaguely, “I’ve some things in mind. Wait for me, Ned? I want to talk to you.”

  Alleyn nodded. “Henslowe’s within.”

  “I know.” The poet brushed past the actor into the Bell’s cool dimness, drawing the rolled manuscript from his pouch. He glanced quickly around the main room, but Ganymede had vanished; the long tables held only a scattering of actors from the Admiral’s Men, and the tight knot of writers clustered about Henslowe at one end of the smallest table. Marlowe moved to join them, skirting the murmuring actors.

  “Ah, Master Marlowe.” Henslowe looked up, a polite smile on his face. He was a small, round-faced man, with a streak of white in a beard that was trimmed to be fearsome to his enemies, rather than mild to his friends.

  Marlowe, who had seen that serene look before, held out the manuscript at once. “Master Henslowe. The second act’s complete.”

  Henslowe sighed. “Master Haughton is ill, and asks to bring his share tomorrow.” His tone suggested he’d heard the excuse before. “Will you come back for the reading?”

  Marlowe spread his hands, a calculated gesture of regret. “I’m sorry, Master Henslowe, but I’m going out of town. You have my part; surely one of the others can read it with theirs.”

  “And I suppose you expect to be paid on that basis?” Henslowe asked.

  “I do.”

  One of the playwrights made a choked noise that might have been laughter, which was quickly stifled as Henslowe sighed a second time. He loosened the ribbon that fastened the manuscript, and glanced quickly through the close-written pages. “Oh, very well,” he said at last, and fumbled in his purse.

  Marlowe accepted the proffered coins—the remainder of the two-pound fee—and tucked them into his own pouch. “Good evening, then, Master Henslowe,” he said, and could not resist adding ironically, nodding to the other playwrights sitting silent beside the manager, “Gentlemen.”

  One of them mouthed a curse, but Henslowe chuckled. “And a good evening to you, Master Marlowe.”

  Marlowe turned, fully aware of the other playwrights’ jealousy, and made his way to the door. Alleyn, still leaning in the doorway, shook his head.

  “You are a troublemaker, Kit.” He tucked his arm through Marlowe’s and urged him toward the bench vacated by the knot of day-laborers, gesturing with his free hand for the innkeeper’s boy. “Ale?”

  Marlowe nodded, and settled himself on the bench. Judging by the length of the shadows in the dusty street, it was still some time before he had to start toward St. Paul’s to keep his other appointment. He accepted a pint mug from the boy when he brought them, and made no argument when Alleyn offered to pay.

  “Now, what are these things you have in mind?” Alleyn leaned back against the wall of the tavern, one knee drawn up like a schoolboy’s, and regarded the other over the rim of his mug.

  Marlowe took a long swallow of his ale, buying time. In point of fact, he had no subjects in mind—Hero and Leander, the Ganymede satire, and then the single act he’d worked on for Henslowe, had taken up a good deal of his thought, and he’d read nothing recently that had inspired him. With a fleeting pang, he remembered the excitement of reading the Faustbook, but thrust the thought aside as unprofitable. “It’s very vague yet, Ned, and I don’t want to talk too much about it.” Alleyn’s eyes narrowed—the poet was not noted for his modesty, or his reticence—and Marlowe added quickly, “I’m thinking of a classical subject.”

  Alleyn nodded, but there was a note of disappointment in his voice. “Histories have been doing well. And comedies.”

  “Comedies, Christ.” Marlowe took another drink of ale as though he’d wash the taste from his mouth. The play he had been working on for Henslowe was a comedy of sorts, and he had not cared for it. “Think of it as a classical history.”

  Alleyn made an appraising face. “That’s possible. Who’s—” Marlowe spoke quickly over the question. “I need a favor, Ned.”

  The wariness returned to the actor’s mobile face. “What sort of favor?”

  Marlowe grinned, and said deliberately, “No, it has nothing to do with my sweet Ganymede.” He took a deep breath, the smile fading. “It’s about a boy.”

  “Isn’t it always?” Alleyn growled. “For Christ’s sake, Kit, can’t you manage your own affairs?”

  “It’s not like that,” Marlowe protested. “What I wanted to know was, do you have room for another apprentice—you or any of the others?” Alleyn’s eyes were still wary, but some of the disapproval had faded from his expression. “Not easily,” he said. “What’s he like, this boy of yours?”

  Marlowe answered carefully, feeling his way, “Clever, but biddable. And he has a truly lovely voice.”

  “Does he sing?”

  “He’s not trained,” Marlowe said.

  Alleyn grunted. “And his looks?”

  “Ordinary enough,” the poet answered. “He’d pass quite easily, under paint.”

  Alleyn stared into his ale, then made an undecided gesture. “What is he, a London boy?”

  Marlowe hesitated, and the actor looked up quickly. “Out with it, Kit, what’s the catch?”

  “He was born in Yorkshire,” the poet admitted.

  “Oh, no.” Alleyn shook his head decisively. “And he talks like a Yorkshireman, I’m bound. No, Kit, there’s no room with us for a boy who’ll have to be taught to speak before we can use him.”

  “He’s young,” Marlowe said. “He could learn. And the voice, Ned, is beautiful.”

  Alleyn shook his head again. “I’ll listen to him, Kit, but I’ll tell you now, there’s not much hope.”

  There was a note of finality in his voice that stopped the poet’s insistence. “All right,” he said. “But I will bring him to you, Ned.”

  “Where did you acquire this boy?” Alleyn began, and the poet set his emptied mug aside.

  “I found him,” he said, and grinned.

  “If there’s trouble connected with him,” Alleyn said, “I doubly don’t want him.”

  “There isn’t,” Marlowe said blithely, and pushed himself to his feet. “I’m sorry, Ned, I’ve another appointment tonight.”

  Alleyn nodded. “Don’t forget the play,” he said. “Henslowe’s willing to offer eight pounds--two in advance.”

  Marlowe’s eyebrows rose in spite of himself—he had expected to earn an eight-pound fee, but he had not expected to see any of
it before the manuscript lay in Henslowe’s pudgy paws—and he whistled softly. “I will keep that in mind.”

  The offer remained in his thoughts as he made his way to Bankside and hailed a waterman to carry him back across the river. He lay back against the boat’s greasy cushions, shivering a little in the chill river air, trying to think of some suitable subject. The easy subjects, the ones that sprang first to mind, were stale, unprofitable, holding none of the special magic that had carried him through the first plays. So let the offer sit, he told himself, as the boatman swore cheerfully behind him, cursing the river and the heavy traffic. You are going to Scotland first, whatever happens.

  That thought was enough to drive away the last of his mild contentment; he scowled unseeing at the army of little boats to either side of him, and wondered if there were any way to evade Cecil’s commission. Not likely, he thought. The man who’d ordered his murder once already would hardly be likely to scruple at trying it again—and there was no counting on Sidney’s rescuing him a second time.

  He paid off the waterman at the docks below Baynard’s Castle, automatically adding a generous tip from the money Henslowe had given him, and started through the crooked streets toward St. Paul’s. The sun was setting now: already rushlights were lit in the taverns and behind a few house-windows, and here and there apprentices were busy folding away the day’s stock and preparing to shutter the open storefronts. Marlowe moved through the homing crowd without really seeing it, his mind on the meeting ahead of him. Witchcraft—Scottish witchcraft—and spying on Sidney… His mouth curved upwards into a humorless smile. It had the makings of an unholy mess.

  St. Paul’s was quiet, the bustle of the day’s commerce fading into the twilit peace of evening. The booksellers’ stalls were boarded up for the night, their contents spirited away, back to the printers’ shops. The congregation, gathering slowly in the side chapel, was mostly of the merchant class, men and women in good, sober stuffs, with a sprinkling of those apprentices pious enough to put off their dinner for an hour or so. Marlowe let himself merge with the crowd, following a middle-aged woman whose bottle-green skirts and stiffly boned bodice were trimmed with canary-colored ribbons, scanning the figures around him for any sign of Cecil or Cecil’s agents. He recognized no one, but he had not really expected to see them yet—Cecil, certainly, would not make himself conspicuous by attending such a middleclass service. He found himself a place in the shadows at the side of the chapel where he could put his back against a pillar, and composed himself for the service, pulling off his hat.

  The sound of boys’ voices broke his reverie. He straightened reluctantly, glancing toward the priest’s entrance. A small choir, he thought, three boys and as many men—what most would consider suitable for a weekday service. The priest who accompanied them was also of the sort suitable for a weekday service: a youngish, balding man, whose face bore the indrawn lines of a man greatly concerned with others’ opinions. A typical junior minister of the cathedral, Marlowe thought. And, God help me, that could’ve been me.

  The processional ended, and the priest turned to face the congregation, somehow contriving to look disapprovingly down his nose at them all. “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit,” he intoned, “a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.”

  Marlowe sighed, his intentions of getting easily through the service, of conforming without annoyance if not with belief, vanishing utterly. He withdrew his thoughts from the service then, using the too-familiar words and phrases to build a barricade against the reiteration of certain sin and necessary damnation, of absolute submission, keeping a tight rein on an old resentment. If nothing else, he would need all his wits about him when he met with Cecil—and it would not be unlike Sir Robert to have planned the meeting for this time and place in order to disconcert his agent.

  The words of the first lesson broke through the fragile barrier. “And Joshua said unto the people,” the priest recited, “Ye cannot serve the Lord: for he is an holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins.”

  Marlowe smiled. Yea, even from the walls of Jericho, yea from the height of victory—Joshua knew, he thought.

  This was the God he scorned—the God that had driven Faustus from theology, and then made repentance useless even if it had been possible... The voices of the choir rose abruptly into the psalm that followed the second lesson, a boy’s soaring mean and then, nearly an octave above that, the pure, piercing treble, rising and re-echoing even in the confines of the chapel.

  He forced his thoughts away from the service, made himself concentrate instead on the meeting with Cecil, mouthing the creed and the final prayers by rote. At last the service ended, and the congregation made its way out of the chapel, sharp London voices rising to resume conversations begun before the service. Marlowe hung back, at the side of the crowd, scanning the faces for Cecil or his agents. Despite his care, he recognized no one until a hand caught his elbow. The poet started, cursing, and Poley said softly, “This way, Kit. In the side chapel.”

  Marlowe bit back an automatic protest, heart racing. Poley had him by the right arm, neatly preventing him from drawing his rapier—if there was murder planned, he was already half disarmed. But why should Cecil be planning a death? the poet demanded silently. There was no need for it... Even so, it took all his will not to reach left-handed for the dagger at his right hip.

  “This way,” Poley said again. Marlowe let himself be urged toward the archway of the smallest chapel, his body tensed either to fight or to run.

  Half a dozen candles were burning before the altar, casting a wavering light in the confined space. A papist touch, Marlowe thought, but for once said nothing, his eyes on the man who waited just inside the globe of light. The stooped figure stared back at him for a long moment, then nodded.

  “Well, Marlowe,” he said aloud. “That will be all for now, Robin.”

  “Yes, Sir Robert.” Poley released the poet’s arm, and slipped away into the shadows. He had not gone far, Marlowe guessed, just out of earshot of a quiet conversation, but within range of a shout. The poet’s mouth twisted wryly. He wasn’t likely to try anything—if he had been, he would not have waited until two years after the attempt at Deptford—but it was typical of Cecil to take precautions. That was one thing to be said for Walsingham, Marlowe thought, as he stepped forward into the light. The old man had never been afraid, either of his agents or of the information they brought him.

  “Well, Marlowe,” Cecil said again. “Poley told you why I’ve sent for you.”

  It was not entirely a question, but Marlowe answered anyway. “He told me some things, not much.”

  When Cecil did not answer immediately, the poet tilted his head slightly, studying the other man. Robert Cecil was not an old man by any reckoning—a year older than Marlowe himself—but his neatly trimmed hair and beard were already sprinkled with grey, and his clothes, the long-skirted, fur-lined gown worn over a suit of soberest black and white, were the wear of a man twenty years his elder. Some of that sobriety was to help disguise the stooped back—Thomas Walsingham had whispered once, not without considerable malice, that the younger Cecil was actually crook-backed—but much of it was policy, the policy of the ambitious son of a renowned father.

  The silence stretched between them. Marlowe recognized the tactic and set his teeth, refusing to speak until the other did. Cecil smiled austerely.

  “You’ll go to Scotland, then,” he said, as though they had been discussing the topic for some time already. Marlowe nodded, grudgingly. “Yes.”

  “And you’ll keep me informed of Sir Philip’s actions,” Cecil continued.

  “And how am I to do that?” Marlowe asked, and kept his tone coldly academic. “It’d be hard enough, and expensive enough, to arrange for couriers—not to mention that Sir Philip might grow suspicious.”

  Cecil made a face as though he’d bitten into something unexpectedly bitter. “You will use cipher,” he said a
t last. “Walsingham’s cipher. Once you reach Scotland, you may give your messages to the ambassador, he will see that I receive them. You will have a letter to that effect. Before then, I—trust your ingenuity, Marlowe.”

  ‘Very well,” Marlowe said. So far, the secretary had told him nothing new, nothing that could not have been relayed through Poley; the poet shivered suddenly, wishing Cecil would come to his real business.

  “There is a further commission,” Cecil said at last, and gave the younger man a sudden fierce look. “And if you betray this by so much as a breath or a glance, you will wish you had died in Deptford. Inquire of your friend Kyd as to the least I can have done to you...

  Kyd had been arrested two years earlier on suspicion of publishing a seditious libel, and the Privy Council had used the rack to aid their inquiries. Marlowe pushed away the memory of his last, unpleasant meeting with his fellow playwright—Kyd had been limping still, a year and a half later, and not without some reason blamed the younger man for his arrest—and managed a curt nod.

  Cecil lowered his voice still further, until he was speaking at a pitch just above a whisper. “Your task is officially to aid King James. Insofar as this means preserving his life and his throne from this threat of witchcraft Dr. Dee has seen, you will do it. However—” The fierce eyes flashed again. “You will not do anything more than what you must to keep him alive and king.”

  Marlowe frowned, and said in spite of himself, “Not do more than—”

  “He must not be made strong or secure,” Cecil hissed. “If he were to become either, he would not need England—English money, English help in other ways—and if he no longer needed England—” The secretary of state broke off abruptly. “But that does not concern you, Marlowe.”