Rotten at the Heart

by Bartholomew Daniels

  “How with the arm?” I asked.

  He held it before him, now tight wrapped in linens. “The blood washed off of it, it did seem less fearsome. If it does not corrupt, then a scar only. Though a scar I will bear at the cost of some hard remembering. If it does corrupt,” he shrugged, “then you will need write more parts for a one-armed man.”

  “This falls to my account,” I said.

  “To ours,” said Burbage. “By what perverse greed do you seek to own to yourself every sin entire?”

  I nodded, having no energy then for more words.

  Burbage looked toward the stranger’s body. “Do you think Henslowe? A coward’s belated answer to your challenge?”

  “I did first,” I said. “But have late made myself party to evil in so many directions that I feel fogged in it and can see no sure cause.”

  “He did lay in wait, clear,” Burbage said, “and made for you direct. For he could have had me dead easy, me having no arms.”

  “My arms served me little good in this contest, for I would have been dead sure and in moments save for Jenkins.”

  I heard Burbage swallow hard and, looking to him, saw that his tears flowed freely. “My God, Will. He was a fine boy. Sweet in his disposition, sure in his talents, generous in his spirit, and in the end braver than us all. Even in his drinking there was never that dark spirit in most who seek to drown some world they cannot abide, but instead only that full innocent joy of a world he did rush to embrace. What a loss we have suffered to never know that man he would become.”

  At which I could feel burn my own tears, and was glad to hear the ring of hooves on the cobbles. Carey on horse from Somerset. He swung from the saddle, seeming in ill spirit.

  “Have our stations reversed, Shakespeare, that you feel free to summon me to the scene of any actor’s drunken brawling?”

  I stood and walked to him direct, pointing down at Jenkins, and spoke hard in my voice. “That boy, sir, died in my service and yours and as brave in his end as any soldier, rushing headlong onto this assailant’s blade. Even having accepted it full through his person, he did hold it tight for my safety as I sent this stranger to greet his god. I will have you call him hero only. And if you think other, then I call you ungrateful and untrue, and you can have me answer that as you will and leave me, too, here dead. For I am in truth full tired of this world and will have it either changed or be quit of it.”

  Carey looked down at me stern for a long moment, but then his face softened some. “I am, at my age, ill tempered when disturbed from my slumbers, and, to be true, slept not easy after our time with Topcliffe and was already sour of mind. My apologies, to you and to this good servant.”

  I could only nod, having no faith in that moment in my words. As Carey stood at Jenkins’s back, he now walked round to see him full.

  “My God, he is but a boy,” he said.

  “He died full a man,” Burbage said from his seat.

  Carey squatted down, and being more accustomed to those dead at violence and there being no possible injury now to Jenkins, pulled the blade clear from the boy, taking some interest in its hilt. He then walked closer to the torch near and looked close at the blade.

  “This is Toledo steel,” he said. “A Spanish blade. I have taken enough from dead Spanish hands to know.”

  “Does it matter?” I asked. “Jenkins would be equal dead in any case.”

  “It may,” Carey said. “Some think Toledo steel finer, though I have had no complaints of my English iron. Toledo blades cost dear and, as we current have no trade with Spain, they are rare in English hands. They are more common in those of our enemies.”

  Carey clear had no qualms near the dead, as he did now bend over my late assailant and tore open his shirt. At the man’s neck was a fine silver, which Carey snatched quick loose, holding up the object the chain held. A small crucifix of the Catholic fashion.

  “I half expected this,” Carey said, “as Spaniards seem happier in battle having their God near with them. You cannot trip over a dead Spaniard in the field and not find such.”

  “Then you think him Spanish?”

  Carey shrugged. “By the cross, Catholic sure. And by the blade Spanish.”

  I was now true confused. “But would this point toward or away from our Somerset friends?”

  Carey shook his head. “In matters of commerce, money holds its own allegiance and knows no boundary, cross or crown – so toward Somerset mayhaps, meaning only the scheme be broader. But if away, then to what? Some recusant mischief? This matter is a weed that grows denser the more we cut at it. Perhaps Topcliffe’s records will yield some light. As your man had me awake, I saw no reason Topcliffe should slumber, so I sent your man to his quarters in my name to summon him to court to examine his records immediate.”

  Even on this present sorrowed stage, I could not help a small moment of humour in picturing Heminges’s face at Carey’s order that he go and chase Topcliffe from his bed.

  At which the bailiff did final arrive, armed and with a few armed factors in tow. He was much dishevelled and stunk clear of ale. He had taken no care in his appearance as most often such matters as might have him to Bankside at this hour involved only those whose favour toward him counted little, being most likely drunks or whores or actors or keepers of the bear baits, all being held about equal in his esteem. Carey, being in the street and near the gutter opposite the tavern, was behind the bailiff as he near tumbled from the sorry nag that had borne him hence – Burbage, myself, and such others still present being more near and to his front.

  “There being two dead, the Queen’s peace has been plain breeched,” he blustered, “and I’ll have no congress on fault or cause at this hour, but instead you all to custody, and this then better addressed in the light of day.” At which his factors advanced toward us.

  Burbage stood. “This good gentleman,” pointing to me, “for you will note his arms and he does have full licence to carry them, was cowardly attacked with no warning or provocation and saved only by my small intervention and by the fatal sacrifice of that boy, who is our friend. And I will not bear the insult of custody, the matter of this being so plain and witnesses here abundant.”

  To which the small crowd still gathered muttered their assent.

  “Insult?” the bailiff said. “You call my exercise of the Queen’s office insult?”

  “A fool can turn God’s mercy to insult and with little effort,” said Carey from behind.

  The bailiff spun. “And what have we here? Some gentleman come across the bridge to dip his prick in some whore and now thinks this gives him leave to instruct me in my business?”

  “What you have here, sir, is your better. In station, in manner, in thinking and, should it come to it, at arms. And you will not have these men to custody, as what ills they have already suffered they have suffered in my charge.”

  “Oh, well,” the bailiff said, now feigning obeisance, “I must humble beg thy favour, as I do always swerve in my duty easy at only the word of any well-dressed stranger at the place of any murder.” His acting now over, the bailiff made straight to Carey, his chest puffed. “I would have your name, sir, as you will be joining your fellows in custody.”

  Carey pulled off his glove and held up his hand so that the bailiff could see his signet. “I am George Carey, the Baron Hunsdon, son of the late Lord Chamberlain and soon to assume those duties. And on the subject of your office, I would ask how, on word of these events, I could be here from Somerset before you,” Carey looked down on the bailiff in clear disgust, “me having taken time to be properly attired whilst you seem to have rolled first through a puddle of ale and then a sack of filth.”

  The bailiff stood, his jaw slack. “I do true beg your pardon, sir, as I did not know.”

  “I should think your not knowing to be a common enough occurrence that you would have better practice in its management.” Carey brushed past the man, put his foot to the stirrup of his horse, and swung easy into its saddle, n
udging the horse near up to the man. “All present here are at liberty to leave if they will or return to drinking if they must, both the slayer and the victim in this case being clear known. As you seem little able to manage your own dress, much less the matters of your office, I shall handle any further inquiry this matter requires. It would bode you well not to draw yourself to my attentions further, as I will like be sufficient distracted by more vital duties so as to soon forget your sorry performance. But, if reminded of it, I shall bring it immediate to the attention to those in power to remove your office.”

  “I am at your service, sir,” the bailiff said.

  “You are in my way, sir,” Carey answered, spurring his horse and knocking the bailiff to his arse.

  CHAPTER 32

  “Your answer when last I questioned you concerning Mary Norton was all summation,” Carey said, an edge to his voice indicating some knowing past that of our last congress. “I would now have the whole truth plain.”

  I was back in that larger room that had set scene to our first meeting, having been summoned early from my bed back to Somerset. Topcliffe was seated behind a table toward one corner, many papers I could only assume being the accountings of his unholy arts scattered before him.

  “My lord?” I answered.

  “That is a question and not an answer,” Carey said, now more stern.

  “And a first sign of guilt,” added Topcliffe, “for those in my inquiry do often answer question with question, trying to find such news with which they can careful frame their answer next more to my liking.”

  Topcliffe was to me this morning less fearsome. Perhaps on account of his being out from his sordid lair and seeming in the environs of Somerset House, which was now some familiar to me, less an exotic nightmare and instead plain that diseased creature he true was. Or perhaps the real horrors of the night past made any imagined ills grow pale. If he expected my fear, this day he would not have it.

  “If Baron Carey doth chose to question my honourable exercise of such offices with which he has charged me, as I have found him honourable, then I will learn from him how he comes to hold this new opinion,” I said. “But I will have none of it from you, sir.”

  Topcliffe’s face reddened some and he prepared to respond, but I turned from him to Carey and spoke quick. “I will gladly answer about Mary, but ask only why such answer today holds consequence that it yesterday did not, for I do true think her innocent and will not be careless with her.”

  “Tell him,” Carey said to Topcliffe.

  “My lord,” Topcliffe said, “as matters Papist now seem to cloud your father’s passing, I would be most careful of our news, as we know not yet this plot’s scope or true direction. I advise that we share nothing with this scribbler, but instead have from him direct what he was summoned here to provide. The more time I am in his company, the more I suspect him, for it seems his faith – or at least that of his father, sure – can be thought in question. The Papist faith has a stench,” he now turned to me, “and he does make my nose twitch.”

  Clear, Carey had shared much with Topcliffe in recent hours, and only then did I note that Carey was dressed still in such as he wore the night past, and so had been not to bed but to here direct and likely in Topcliffe’s congress for long hours.

  Carey brought both hands to his face and rubbed it slow in the fashion of one much wearied, and not in body alone.

  “I have, I think,” he said, to Topcliffe, “heard sufficient from you on matters of faith. We are called to faith not in God only, but also in one another, at least as we have earned it. And Shakespeare has earned mine. So, tell him.” Carey sank hard into the chair nearest him, his hands again to his face, speaking through them. “And I would warn you both that I am wearied of having my orders questioned.”

  “Very well,” Topcliffe answered, his face flashing shame, and he then turned to me. “What know you of the Rising of the North?”

  “Little,” I said. “A Papist rebellion when I was a but a boy, some few dukes and earls hoping to strike down the Queen and have England return to Rome’s fold.”

  Topcliffe nodded. “The late Baron Carey was general to those forces that quelled this foul business. And he helped collect for our good Queen, whether on the field or after, such heads as made their vile allegiance to Babylon’s Whore instead of our sweet crown – Darce, Percy, Neville, some others,” at which Topcliffe paused to shift through his papers, bringing one to fore. “The rebellion being in the north, where even today the stink of Papist still scents heavy the air, I will note that Stratford is some little north and the name Arden, your mother’s name, carries no small Papist taint. But the rebellion was near to York, and the family Norton was deep involved, having at the time many holdings in those districts.”

  “Mary’s family?” I asked, remembering now the Yorkshire accent.

  “The same,” said Topcliffe. “At the rebellion’s end, I was summoned to York to assist the late Baron in such investigations as needed to ensure we had this weed of treason out by its root. We found that weed was flowered thick with Nortons, some few of whom did pay full with their lives. One man questioned was a Harry Norton, some attached to the family but in that branching way of cousins and latter-borns so that he was a distant twig to the treasonous tree and had shared little in its fortunes. But he did prove stubborn as I exercised my arts. His right hand suffered true terrible to no avail, so I was little surprised to learn he did later lose its service. As his own suffering had not the effects I wished, I had brought forth his son, aged a decade perhaps at the time. And when I applied full to the boy’s nose such instrument as I showed you this night past, the father did finally break and offered what little secrets he had – which were only scare helpful in our mission. It was my thought to have him hanged, but the Baron – being of a merciful bent, and we having found no direct support of the rising, but only that Norton may have kept secret some he should have shared – ordered him freed.”

  “The son being near ten at the time of the rising would be near to forty now,” Carey said. “The age to match our late, foul-nosed assailant.”

  “And so this Harry was Mary’s father, and the son Mary’s brother?” I asked.

  The serpent smile that too oft did decorate Topcliffe’s face new appeared. “To be sure, no,” he said. “For in my ministry to Norton the elder, I employed another instrument of my design that attaches in full circle to the sources of man’s seed and crushes them slow but entire if the subject does not relent. As he did not relent. Any children he might have sired, all would need be seeded before that night. And had he seeded Mary then, she would number near thirty years now at least.”

  “But our nosed friend, being forty at his dying, could easy have a daughter of Mary’s age,” Carey said.

  It was my turn to sink to a chair, being sudden unsure in my legs. “This all, then, revenge? The granddaughter seeking service in Somerset to have your father dead to avenge his role thirty years past?”

  Carey breathed out a long sigh. “If that were all, it would be enough. But sure you cannot think it all, not with some Spaniard at you last night, and with your friend dead. For if my father had been the sole aim of this plot, Mary and her father could have been easy gone these days past. Instead, he died trying for your life and she tarries near still.”

  Topcliffe waved a hand over his papers. “We have been long hours over reports from my varied intelligencers as to these Nortons. Mary seems curious absent in any records prior to her sudden arrival in service at Somerset only this winter past, and her father – famous to you as the ruined nose, but John by name – more absent still. That absence is true puzzling, him being remarkable in appearance and marked in our files early as such Catholic as would bear scrutiny. And yet of either John or Mary, until her Somerset service, nothing. Or almost nothing.” And he drew out a single sheet. “A letter from a man I keep in my employ to report on comings and goings or any curiosities of note in those districts nearest the river where we s
uspect the rot of recusancy still festers deep. It concerns an aging father, lost of a hand, new to the district, supposed from Cornwall. His village having been burned by the Spanish in that raid of this summer just past and his family there lost, he was now dependent on his daughter for care, them having travelled to London, where she might seek better fortune in the city.”

  “I recall the raid, of course,” I said.

  “The Spanish are sometimes curious in their intrigues,” Topcliffe continued, “and, being Papist, they do love to plot foul. Not a few English who still suckle at Rome’s bosom have found refuge in Spain, and we have seen them at times returned to our shores as Spain’s agents. Having looked hard and found no evidence of these Nortons over long years, and finding it now easy and sudden in only these recent months, I do suspect the Nortons were to Spain short after the rising. Mary was likely born there and schooled from birth to this purpose. I believe they were returned to England under cover of this Cornwall mischief but in service to some larger and darker plot.”

  Carey now pushed himself up from his chair, standing purposeful with the stature of his office.

  “And so, Shakespeare, innocent as you might think the girl to be, and full admitting that I, too, held that opinion, I will now have a full accounting – as it seems she may in truth be an arrow aimed to England’s heart.”

  CHAPTER 33

  “We can assume that last night’s Spaniard was dispatched at Mary’s hand to still your tongue, you having traced her to her new lair,” Carey said after hearing my account. He had, at my request, excused Topcliffe that I might have his ear on this in private. For I had now to share with him in full all I had learned, but I wanted still to shield from Topcliffe any that I could. I was honest with Carey in all details save the baker and his wife – having told Carey instead that I had returned to near to the building that I had previous marked as Mary’s father’s home to continue my investigation, only to chance upon Mary’s entry to what I soon learned to be a secret Catholic mass, and that I had marked her from there to that shop where she now served.