License to Quill (4 page)

“William,” called the barkeep.

The bard stopped and turned.

“Before you sit with this man, make sure you count the coins in your purse. I don't want to see you robbed by him.”

“Oh?” Shakespeare replied with piqued interest. “What is he, a crossbiter? A drigger?”

“Something like that,” the barkeep grumbled. “He'll probably say a lot of sweet things to you with that smart mouth of his, but I'll tell you right now that John Johnson is not his real name. I keep a record on everyone who comes in, and that red angler upstairs owes me money under
two
different names.”

“Really?”
The bard kicked out a barstool and sat. “And what names would they be?”

*   *   *

The gentleman the two Williams were discussing downstairs was indeed a tall, muscular man with a full head and thick beard of rust-colored hair. He sat alone in a corner beside a large glass window from which he had studied William Shakespeare since he stepped onto Bread Street. With the bard in the tavern, this quiet customer waited with a loaf of bread on his table, a plate of peasecods, a bowl of hazelnuts, oysters, two kippered fishes, and two tall beers he planned to share with England's most famous playwright.

“Master Johnson?” the bard greeted as he approached the table.

“Master Shakespeare!” The patron rose from his seat and the two shared a strong handshake. “I appreciate you meeting me this afternoon.”

“As do I.” The bard smirked slyly.

“If I may ask: Do you prefer Will, or William?”

“Oh, what's in a name?” the playwright mused to the man he knew was not John Johnson, but Guido Fawkes. And long before that, before he had disappeared from the rolls at the Mermaid, Guy Fawkes.

“May I sit?”

“Please!” Guy Fawkes replied with a bow. “And help yourself to some eating.”

“Thank you. I think I may.”

As the two lunched and talked amicably about a wide range of subjects, the bard was impressed by his companion's composure. Fawkes seemed more at ease in this false face he wore than he did as that more serious fellow Shakespeare had caught spying on him from the window. Although William's smile was as sincere as when he stepped into the Mermaid, he assumed that intense glare boring down on him was Guy Fawkes's true self. With that in mind, Shakespeare could not help but admire the man laughing with him over drinks. Fawkes may have been a man of many faces, but he was also a uniquely gifted actor.

But alas, such a masquerade could not last forever. After dancing around the subject for two pints, Shakespeare asked: “So, what is this meeting about, Master Johnson?”

Guy Fawkes smiled and ever so slightly narrowed his eyes. “I am glad you asked, Master Shakespeare. I was sent here as a representative for my employer, Thomas Percy. He is a wealthy man of good standing who wishes to commission a play from you.”

“Is he the gentleman who will be paying for this meal?”

“He paid in advance.”

“How nice of him!” Shakespeare smiled as he leaned back in his chair. At the very least, this solved the mystery of why William Johnson had let the man through the door. “What type of play does your master want?”

“A tragedy. One set in Scotland.”

The bard dropped the fish bone he was picking his teeth with.

“Master Shakespeare?”

“Scotland?” the playwright asked.

“Yes. Is that a problem?”

Shakespeare sat upright. “Not a problem. Just a challenge.” The bard had never set a play in Scotland before. “Is this a historical piece?”

“It doesn't have to be. We want you to be creative with this. We want it to be something that shakes the very core of this country. Something revolutionary!”

The playwright was intrigued. “What are your specifics?”

Fawkes glanced around the room and then leaned forward. “My employer wishes to commission a tragedy about the abuse of power. About the misfortune visited upon those who pursue ill aims for ill needs.”

“So, this is a political play,” the bard clarified.

“Yes. But for the sake of security, you are welcome to take whatever creative liberties you wish.”

Shakespeare scratched his short beard and squinted in thought. It sounded as if Fawkes's employer expected their play to attract the ire of government censors. But why? “If this is a political piece, then why set it in Scotland? Why not someplace safer, like a country far away and … less close to home?” The playwright shook his head with this last line, knowing that he could do better. He was William Shakespeare, after all. “Master Johnson, why Scotland?”

“Scotland is a mysterious place. It makes an appropriate setting for the darker subjects we hope you will explore in this drama.”

The bard smirked incredulously. “Are you sure this has nothing to do with King James or his patronage?” The king's mother was the same Queen Mary who lost her head for plotting against Queen Elizabeth. But of course, “John Johnson” knew that. Everyone knew that.

“Master Shakespeare…” Guy Fawkes folded his hands. “My employer is a member of the Honourable Band of Gentlemen Pensioners. He is a dutiful man sworn to protect the king's life and honor, so, perhaps you are mistaken about whatever you insinuated just now. Such misapprehensions could get a man even as respected as you in trouble someday.”

A threat?

Yes, a threat!

It was a veiled threat, but one as pointed as a dagger pressed against naked skin. Shakespeare
loved
these types of threats because they allowed him to test whether they carried any weight, or whether they were just bad acting. Since no man alive could spot a bad actor better than William Shakespeare, his mind went to work on Fawkes using the cards the man unconsciously dealt him throughout their talk.

The bard sensed something out of character in Fawkes's delivery. He wore a false name and face, but his confidence appeared to be genuine. Shakespeare understood that much: Guy Fawkes was a good actor, and he knew it. However, he exuded a different poise when he issued his threat. It was not bravado; it had to be confidence in his connections. The bard considered Fawkes's business partner: Thomas Percy, gentleman pensioner to His Majesty. Shakespeare knew it would be difficult for anyone to falsify such credentials and dangerous to attempt to, even if it was over drinks in a tavern. Thomas Percy had to be real, but why would such a person hire a man like Guy Fawkes? And why would Fawkes choose to meet in an establishment where he already owed an outstanding debt? Was it carelessness, or was Fawkes truly so confident in his employer that he no longer feared bartenders … or anyone else for that matter?

Since Shakespeare did not wish to find this out the hard way, he surrendered his cards even though he suspected Fawkes had won this round on a bluff. “I apologize, Master Johnson. I'm just curious why it has to be Scotland. The London crowd prefers exotic locations: Venice, Rome, Florence.… What makes Scotland so special? And what makes your employer so confident that his investment will be returned, if at all?”

Fawkes shifted his eyes and then produced a folded piece of paper. He slid it across the table with his finger pinning it down. “
This
will be your main draw. It is our only specific request for the play.”

“Scotland is pretty specific,” the bard parried.

“Not this specific.”

The playwright furrowed his brow and looked down to the parchment. As he reached for it, Guy Fawkes seized Shakespeare's wrist. “Be careful who you share that with,” the man cautioned with a tightening grip.

William Shakespeare stared straight into Guy Fawkes's eyes.

Beneath the table, both men had their hands on their swords.

Without breaking eye contact, the bard freed himself and took the paper. He unfolded it with one hand and examined it against his chest like a card player.

Double, double, toile and trouble;

Fire burne, and Cauldron bubble.

Shakespeare raised his eyebrows. “Your employer requires a play on the occult?”

“Not necessarily. All he requests is a tragedy set in Scotland covering the subjects we discussed. However you treat the stranger side of pagan history is entirely up to you. All we ask is that a group of witches say these lines at some point in the drama.”

“Witches?” Shakespeare repeated.

“Yes. Three of them.”

The bard froze. There was only one time in his career that he had accommodated such a strange request, and it nearly cost everyone at the Globe Theatre their lives. Although Shakespeare and his actors managed to escape with their heads, never before had the Crown more closely monitored the bard's every move. Informants combed his audiences, unfriendly faces began to haunt him throughout London, and his license to work free from censors had been revoked. It was a dangerous time to be a playwright in authoritarian England, and the last thing this one needed was to find himself in the same boat as Christopher Marlowe. If Fawkes had been sent to trap Shakespeare, the playwright knew he was already as good as guilty in the government's eyes.

The bard took a deep breath.

“Why does your employer wish to cover such a sensitive subject?” he asked. “Has the king's campaign against witchcraft gone unnoticed?” Such persecutions reached their greatest fervor in Scotland during the prior decade, and the Witchcraft Act of 1604 had been passed by the House of Lords only months ago.
*

Still wearing his cheeky grin, Guy Fawkes brought the conversation deeper into dangerous territory. “Master Percy has many backers. It is necessary that he satisfies all their demands on this project.”

“And which one of them wants me to write about witches?”

“I am afraid I am not at liberty to speak on their behalf. I only speak for Master Percy.”

“And if I were to ask Master Percy in person?” Shakespeare thought it was time to play a bold hand. If he was to get any sleep this evening, he needed to know whether Fawkes's connections to the Crown were genuine or a farce.

Fawkes appeared hesitant for a moment but then nodded. “That could be arranged. But only if you commit to penning our play.”

A mixed response. Shakespeare gained nothing from it.

Fawkes was
good
, he realized.

As the playwright mulled over this, “John Johnson” plucked the parchment from his hand and slipped it into a pocket. He then removed a leather purse from his belt and set it on Shakespeare's side of the table. The brown bag clinked of coins.

The bard studied the pouch and then looked back to its owner. “I never said I accepted your commission.”

His opponent smiled with a wide grin. “You will. Consider it a mission from God.” With those words, Guy Fawkes had completely removed his mask. Shakespeare could now clearly see the man before him, and this one was not bluffing. Fawkes had been holding all the cards all along. The deck was stacked in his favor, and he had just one card left to play.

Fawkes rose from the table while the stunned playwright remained seated. “My master works from a building owned by John Whynniard, the Keeper of the King's Wardrobe. It can be found adjacent to the House of Lords in Westminster. You have one day to comply with our request.” He then put his hand on Shakespeare's shoulder, leaned close to his ear, and under the wide brim of his hat, whispered: “Go in peace, brother.”

There it was. Guy Fawkes had made his play.

He knew something about William Shakespeare.

And on that note, with that gesture, the mysterious messenger departed.

Shakespeare remained at the table long enough to follow Fawkes from the window as the stranger walked out of the Mermaid and onto Bread Street. His large hat made him easy for Shakespeare to spot, and the tall figure walked with a comfortable gait. Once Fawkes disappeared into the London mob, the bard checked the leather purse left on the table.

The last time Shakespeare had had a conversation like this, he was paid in precisely forty pieces of silver.

 

Chapter IV

W

Shakespeare stood silently outside the Mermaid while his active mind was pulled in four different directions. About half a mile behind him was the Globe, where the playwright could begin work on his strange new play immediately. To his left was St. Paul's Cathedral, where he knew he could dispel every doubt Guy Fawkes raised by presenting the leather pouch in his palm as an offering. Straight ahead was a road that would take him to his apartment on Silver Street, where he could easily pocket the money and pretend his encounter with Fawkes never happened. And lastly, looming like a mountain over a mile of ramshackle rooftops to his right was the white and arresting Tower of London. The path there was filthy: an open sewer of rotting garbage, dead animals, and bad memories of the bard's last visit. The encounter marked the end of Shakespeare's relationship with Thomas Walsingham, who now not only enjoyed a knighthood but also his late-cousin's famous headquarters on Seething Lane. To go back there would be an act of self-mutilation, a reopening of every wound in the bard's body.

The playwright chose the right path and tossed his bag of silver coins to the first beggar he saw: a young girl on Cheapside who had been staring at him the whole time.

*   *   *

There was a knock on the tall doors of Walsingham's mansion, its portal a gateway to power beyond rival in the British Isles. The beautiful woman who served as its custodian was whispered to be Thomas Walsingham's mistress, but the truth was something much more shocking for the seventeenth century: she was his secretary. She, a woman! Her name was Lady Penelope of the great and noble House of Percy, but because of her silvery-blond hair, those who loved her and whom she loved knew her as “Penny.”

She opened the door and just as quickly had the breath sucked out of her. “Will…” she whispered.