The Quality of Mercy

by Faye Kellerman

  Rebecca took a deep breath, tried to calm her galloping heart. She shook her head no, her eyes affixed to his. There it was—that twinkle.

  Lowering her lashes, she said, “Good morrow.”

  “And a good morrow to you, my most beautiful fellow,” he said.

  “I thank you for your kind words, honorable man.”

  “Kind words that you repay in kind. And so this most honorable man does offer this gentlewoman his honor.”

  She said, “And gentlewoman does honor his offer.”

  He said,

  “A woman once offered her honor

  to a man who honored her offer

  So passed a night

  of heavenly delight

  Sporting much on-er and off-er.”

  Rebecca burst into laughter. “You’re playing the piper Pan this morning.”

  “A beguiling woman dressed as a man makes me daft.”

  “I thank you for accompanying me to Paul’s.”

  “The pleasure is mine, mistress.”

  Rebecca smiled, then gazed at her feet. She felt light-headed and warm. After that horrible event called her betrothal feast, she longed for something airy and impulsive, something that would bring out the child rather than the matron in her. Ugh, the thought of marriage and pregnancy. Her eyes climbed upward to his face, then back to the ground. In her brother’s boots her feet looked enormous.

  They walked down Holborn past four estate homes—three-and four-story houses layered with brick and ornamented with embrasured parapets, turrets emblazoned with balustrades, multiple-peaked roofs, and mullion windows where once were simple holes covered with wood lattice. Great structures of many rooms and landscaped demesne.

  The sun shone brightly in the midday sky; no fog, no damp air that seeped into the marrow, only sweet vapors that warmed the lungs. A mild spring day, summer still three weeks away. They stepped in silence, exchanging sidelong looks and occasional shy smiles. A half hour later, as they approached Grey’s Inn, the estates suddenly disappeared, replaced by modest wooden houses resting on dirt patches and fronted by beds of flowers. Shakespeare led Rebecca first to Fetter Lane, then twenty minutes later onto Fleet Street—the eastern road leading to the entrance of Londontown. The private homes were gone. Instead stood crumbling, abutted buildings, overcrowded with people and overtaken by rats.

  Shakespeare asked, “Have you word from your cousin about the dagger I’d given you?”

  Rebecca stopped, pulled out the dagger from her belt and handed it to him. “The metal is old, and the bladesmith was not a man of much skill.”

  “And?”

  “Sir Thomas is of the opinion that the blade was crafted in the northern region. He remembered many Scottish daggers having a similar edge angulation in relationship to the shaft of the blade itself. Sir Thomas thinks that whoever fashioned this dagger found an old discarded Scottish weapon in a scrap pile and personalized it for his use.”

  “His use being murder.”

  “It would seem thus.”

  They resumed walking.

  “Who would desire you murdered, Shakespeare?”

  “The one who murdered Harry.”

  “And if I may be so bold to ask, who would want Harry murdered?”

  “Mackering holds the key to that lock.”

  “Why would Mackering want to murder Harry?”

  Shakespeare shrugged. “I don’t know for certain. Harry was found dicing with this ruffian. I think my friend had gambled his soul into heavy debt.”

  “So why would Mackering murder Harry? Surely the rogue would never recover the money owed to him if his dupe—no offense meant to your mentor—were…not among the living.”

  “You may say dead.”

  “Dead, then.”

  Shakespeare said nothing.

  Rebecca asked, “Was your friend a man of much means?”

  “Modest means,” Shakespeare answered. “But he had enough money to pay off an occasional gambling debt.”

  “And many resources from which to borrow?”

  “Yes. There was not a player in our fellowship who would not have sold the shirt off his back for Harry. Gods, how many times we’ve picked up the tab for his drink.”

  “Had you ever seen Harry dice in London?” Rebecca asked.

  “No.”

  “Gamble at the baiting arenas?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Bet on a duel?”

  “Never.”

  “So it appears that Harry gambled only when he traveled to the North.”

  “If he gambled at all.”

  “And Mackering?” Rebecca said. “It is known that the uprightman spends most of his time in London.”

  “Yes.”

  “So what was the ruffian doing up North?” Rebecca asked.

  “I know not.”

  “I would think the riddle would best be solved by another trip to the North, the home of the dagger.”

  “Perhaps,” Shakespeare said. “But first I set my sights on Mackering. He was the last known person to see Harry alive. As long as Mackering is in London—and I believe he is—I should like to speak with him first. Then, if his information necessitates another trip up North, so be it.”

  “You don’t seem the least bit worried about dealing with Mackering.”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  “He holds a ruthless reputation.”

  “I’ll be most careful.”

  Rebecca rolled her eyes. Shakespeare definitely wasn’t stupid. Which meant he had to be either fearless or naive. It was obvious that he’d never met Mackering. Rebecca had. Once. Once had been enough. Thomas had arranged a contest of swords in the middle of the common property with Mackering and had allowed her to tag along. Mackering had been flawlessly polite to her, but the eyes had been deadly. Mucoid green. Evil. Thomas had noticed Mackering’s unhealthy gaze. Her cousin had reddened with anger, bested the ruffian in only a half hour. Afterward Thomas had told her to stay away from Mackering.

  Exactly what I had in mind, Tommy.

  Rebecca sighed, allowed her fingers to rest on his arm. “Pray, do be cautious. Please.”

  Shakespeare nodded, touched by her concern. Though she was costumed like a lad, her beauty was still evident. Nothing could hide it. As a woman, she excited him. But dressed in manly garb, she evoked in him a feeling of warmth, feelings of friendship.

  The people on the street began to thicken into crowds, and along with the throng came the sounds of the city—the cries of the mongers, the banging of the builders, and the ever-present bells.

  They passed the Fleet, trodding over the Thames, then entered the walled city through Ludgate.

  The stench was immediate.

  Piles of bodies lay on the open streets, some of them putrefied, nothing more than skeletal frames under black taut skin. The eyes had been hollowed out by rats and maggots, the mouths open cavities in which nested hordes of vermin, beetles, and flies; skin textured by blotches and buboes of the plague; intact brown tongues hung over blue, mottled lips. A blond girl of no more than ten lay atop the mound of corpses, her muscles still twitching, eyelids fluttering. A beggar was yanking off her skirt, another pulling off her sleeves. Around the bodies burned pyres of fragrant wood. The aromatic scent did little to mask the stink.

  Adjacent to the human heaps were shallow pits, some half filled with bodies, some still being dug deeper by laborers sweating in the noon-hour sun. One of the workers, a dwarf, rested on the handle of his spade, the top of the blade buried in the stomach of a corpse. He spat, bit off a piece of dried meat, and chewed as the innards of the dead man coated his tool with blood.

  Rebecca had witnessed death countless times at her father’s side as he attended the wretches stuffed into the wards at St. Bartholomew’s, aiding him again while he ministered to the most famous lords in London. She had seen her own parents bury her four brothers and sisters, her kinsmen stricken with each new outbreak of disease and pestilence. But never had she seen
such quantity of dead concentrated in one small area. She averted her eyes and covered her mouth.

  “Are you ill?” Shakespeare asked.

  She shook her head no.

  “Are you certain?”

  “Quite certain.”

  “Come,” said Shakespeare. “We’ll run by Paul’s and go down Thames Street. The air smells not so rotten there.”

  Rebecca followed. She said, “I had no idea that London had become so foul.”

  “You father is quite the man to brave this daily,” Shakespeare said.

  “He calls Bartholomew’s the cemetery of the living,” Rebecca said. “Yet I’ve seen him dispense his medical duties diverse times. He greets the sick with a smile on his face and much cheer in his heart. He treats the stricken as if they were his kinsmen.”

  “Your father has a strong stomach,” Shakespeare said. “This way, mis—sir.”

  They hadn’t walked more than a minute when they were espied by a group of beggars. The poor rushed to their side, grabbing ankles and thighs, stretching bony hands upward in desperate supplication. Rebecca knew that few were officially licensed for begging; they had no authority to request alms and should be arrested immediately and placed in the stocks. She also knew that among the helpless were sturdy beggars—able-bodied men who could work a day of honest labor if they were so inclined. She tried to ignore the wretches, but her eyes refused to harden her heart. A pockmarked hand grabbed her arm, a solitary eye beseeched her face; the eye’s mate was nothing more than an empty socket.

  “A groat, good sir, for a wretched soldier tossed overseas by the accursed Spanish—”

  Shakespeare pushed her forward. “If you show pity to one, the rest shall become as leeches.”

  Rebecca said, “I—”

  “A farthing, good sir,” interrupted a legless man. He moved his truncated body forward by swinging it between his arms. “I was once a whole-bodied man as yourself, sir, but the evil Spanish blew off my legs in battle in eighty-nine. Under Sir Francis Drake I did serve, amongst his fleet I did sail, but alas the conditions of the sea were treacherous, and the poxed men of Philip, may they rot in Gehenna, took advantage of the good and honest English.”

  Rebecca pulled out a farthing. The man pushed on his palms and jumped upward on his stumps, snatching the coin between his teeth. Within seconds a score of beggars began to shove open palms into Rebecca’s face. Shakespeare took her hand, jerked her away from the black cloud of the destitution, and ran. They slowed their pace a minute later.

  “Such misery they endure,” Rebecca said, breathing hard. “They are nothing more than today’s gladiators, marking their days before they’re devoured by lions called Black Death and starvation.”

  “Death would be sweet sleep for them, so pathetic is their lot.” Shakespeare gently nudged her shoulder and said, “Come, sir, erase from the canvas of your mind so pitiable a painting.”

  Rebecca raised her eyes to his, finding comfort in them. It was strange to find warmth in such light eyes, yet they were welcoming. Her body suddenly became aware of him, how close they were to one another, her right shoulder grazing his left upper arm. She lowered her head and walked in silence, thinking it immoral to feel such sudden physical excitement amid such ugly squalor.

  A body, dropped from above, landed in front of their path—a dehydrated boy covered with boils.

  Rebecca muttered a dear God.

  “This way,” Shakespeare said, trying to push her away from the corpse. “The tavern’s not far.”

  “I’ve no appetite for dinner,” she said.

  “You must harden your stomach,” Shakespeare said tightly. “Contemptible is a man who is able not to quaff ale freely while looking death in the eye.”

  Rebecca sighed. “Then tis good that the beard is removable. Much as I try, I’m a slave of my emotions.”

  “God created women different from men, sir. You would not be true to your sex if you walked through these streets unaffected.”

  “Aye.”

  They hurried through Paul’s. Shakespeare gave her a gentle pat. “How long has it been since you’ve seen the city?”

  “Since our duel. It has become a muck heap.”

  “And the muck increases by the hour.”

  “Gardy loo,” shouted a voice from an upper window. Shakespeare yanked Rebecca to his right as the contents from a chamberpot splattered on the cobblestones just a yard to their left.

  “As if to prove the prophecy of my words,” Shakespeare muttered. He swept his arm across the fouled streets and boomed in a theatrical voice, “Cousin and foreigner alike, a goodly welcome from the jeweled scepter of the sea called England!”

  A Puritan pointed an angry finger at him and growled, “Until the Devil has been purged, sin shall clog the bowels of this land.”

  “Then we’d better give the land a purging,” Shakespeare said.

  “Sinners!” the Puritan shouted. “I know ye all, know ye evil ways.”

  Rebecca interrupted the fanatic’s speech by laughing in his stern face—not a laugh of derision but one of released tension from Shakespeare’s awful joke. The Puritan’s black eyes became hot with outrage, and Rebecca would have offered her apologies to the black-garbed mountebank, but Shakespeare pulled her along.

  A moment later Rebecca said, “The abbeys on the continent situate themselves on mountains. One reason is an earnest desire to be in isolation, that one may become closer to the Almighty when few distractions present themselves. The other stems from the ability to strategically place their jakes on downhill streams and runoffs. The cities below receive such gifts from the men of God.”

  “And from where did you learn that juicy bit of knowledge?” Shakespeare asked.

  “My kinsmen have their fingers in many men’s pies.”

  Shakespeare said, “Among your diverse relations are monks?”

  “Not at all.” Rebecca smiled cryptically. “As false an assumption as saying I’ve had relations with diverse monks.”

  It was Shakespeare’s turn to laugh.

  A man crusted with sores blocked their path. He was naked from the waist up, a filthy sheet tied around his middle. His hose were torn and blackened with mud, his toes sticking out of holes in his shoes, and his arm inked with the initials F. R. His wrists were red and raw, as if recently manacled, and his hands flapped at his sides. He shouted,

  “Now, good sir, what will you give this poor Tom this morrow, wisely and well?” He let go with a high-pitched squeal. “Please, sir, a pound of sheet feathers to make poor Tom a blanket, or a cross of silver to buy poor Tom a shirt and breeches, wisely and well.”

  “We’ll be giving you a leaky heart if you’ll not leave our sight,” Shakespeare said.

  Poor Tom rolled his head, hiccuped, then spat. To Shakespeare he said, “Good sir. A farthing for a drink, wisely and well.” He attempted to dance a jig but tripped instead. He shouted, “God save the Queen and her council.”

  “The man is besotted or daft,” Rebecca said to Shakespeare.

  “Or desires us to think him so.”

  “A groat for a pair of shoes to cover poor Tom’s aching feet, wisely and well,” Poor Tom screamed out.

  “Away,” Shakespeare commanded. Poor Tom laughed and started to speak, but immediately silenced his wisely and wells when Shakespeare’s hand held the hilt of his sword.

  “Away,” Shakespeare repeated, drawing his sword.

  Poor Tom fled.

  They resumed their walk, turning onto Bread Street, elbowing their way through the crowds. After they’d walked a mile, Rebecca asked,

  “How far is your alehouse?”

  “Another ten minutes from here.”

  A lord bumped into Rebecca, looked at her clothes, said nothing and walked away.

  “Unmannered churl,” she muttered.

  “He’s whittled,” said Shakespeare.

  “But through drunken eyes he was still able to determine I was of lower rank.”

  “Ti
s your clothes. Next time, don the dress of a lord. As long as you playact, you may as well receive honor and title.” Shakespeare paused, then said, “But enough blather about rank. All stomachs empty. Come, good sir, let us dine.”

  “I’ve yet a stomach,” she said.

  “Still come with me hence,” Shakespeare persisted. “If for no other reason than to remove ourselves from the streets.”

  The Mermaid was a small tavern between Watling and Cheapside, a comfortable place where many bookwriters came to quench their thirst as well as joust in bouts of wordplay. It seemed to Shakespeare that as soon as they stepped upon its threshold, a black shadow momentarily blocked the sun. Rebecca said nothing, so he remained silent. But his reflexes were immediately on their guard, his muscles taut and ready for action.

  They took a table at the far side of the room. Shakespeare rubbed his stomach and ordered mutton and cabbage without a glance at the fareboard. Rebecca requested the same dinner, although her belly was still tightly knotted.

  Two overflowing tankards of ale were placed before them. Rebecca took a sip, then healthy gulps, allowing the liquid to coat her parched throat.

  “Don’t drink so fast,” Shakespeare said. “You’ll become light-headed.”

  “So much the better after the London I’ve seen.”

  Shakespeare smiled. Rebecca looked across the table and felt herself growing timid, aware that she was with a man whom she found desirable. She quickly lowered her head. Picking up the tankard, she brought it to her lips and sipped the ale, her eyes peeking over the rim, observing his well-formed face deep in thought. On the streets conversation with him had been so natural, but now, seeing him like this, she was tongue-tied.

  Not like her to be the shy maiden. She started to speak at the moment he uttered a word.

  “After you, sir,” Shakespeare said.

  “Pray, continue in your thought,” she said.

  “After you have completed yours.”

  “Upon the completion of yours.”

  “Better to be unmannerly than to delay you further,” Shakespeare said. “I will begin.”

  Rebecca nodded. Shakespeare paused, then laughed nervously.

  “And what does strike Shakespeare with humor?” Rebecca asked.