The Opening Night Murder (9 page)

After three weeks had passed, each day before venturing onto Bank Side to sell herself she checked in with Maddie to learn if there was a reply to her letter north. Piers began to speak hopefully of rejection when they’d had two weeks of disappointment.

But finally one afternoon Maddie handed her a letter enclosed in a real envelope sealed with green wax. The thing
was terribly fancy, and it made her nostalgic for her father’s house and the niceties of her childhood. Quickly she shook her head clear of the memory, broke the seal, and pulled out the pages. She read:

My friend, Suzanne;

She couldn’t imagine how Stephen could still consider her his friend, particularly since he never had before, but took the salutation as promising.

Suzanne watched Daniel’s face when she spoke of his son’s childhood, but there was no flicker of guilt, or even of acknowledgment. He only looked at her as he listened, with a slight smile on his lips and a distant look in his eye. She couldn’t be entirely certain he even heard what she was saying. Her chest tightened, but she continued. “I was terribly lucky to succeed in obtaining an apprenticeship for him.”

That finally brought a glimmer from Daniel, but of surprise. “But you obtained one. Certainly if Farthingworth hadn’t come through, you might have wheedled it out of a patron.”

Suzanne’s eyes narrowed at the intended slight, but pretended to ignore it. “I wasn’t yet so experienced in such things, had not yet had what might be termed a ‘patron,’ and wouldn’t have known how to convince such a man to put himself out for my son by another man. At the time I believed I had no choice but to make the arrangement as if I were Piers’s father myself, and the only man I had ever known who was in a
position to give Piers what I wanted him to have was Stephen Farthingworth. He was my first and only thought.”

Deeper surprise showed on Daniel’s face. “Rather bold of you. What made you think he would be of help?”

“He was the only man I knew who might be charitable enough to help. When he was my suitor, he’d seemed a reasonable sort, and though I didn’t care to marry him, I nevertheless saw him as kind. Extraordinarily kind, enough to seem weak, and that was why I disliked the idea of marrying him. Besides, desperation makes one do odd, otherwise unthinkable things. I wrote to him in Newcastle and asked if he might be agreeable to taking on my intelligent, obedient, hardworking son. The worst that could happen was that he might say no, and I was used to that by then.”

“Did you explain that said son had been raised in a whorehouse and was currently living on the street?”

She straightened in her chair and raised her chin. “I couldn’t have him thinking Piers might have been raised to be a thief or thug. I told him we were in extreme need. I said we were temporarily reduced to taking a room at Maddie’s, which was true on the day I wrote the letter. I’m certain Mr. Farthingworth must have known enough of my circumstances, given he was there the night I left home.”

Daniel only grunted and drew on his drink. “You’ve changed since I last saw you. The Suzanne I once knew would have announced the situation loud and clear, and devil take the hindmost.”

“I had to change, otherwise I would die. And certainly so would my son.” There was a long pause, then she said, “Your son.”

He looked over at her, then away. The lines in his face seemed to deepen, but he said nothing.

Finally she asked, “Why did you invite me here today?”

“I wanted to see you again.” He said it with a warm smile, as if she should be pleased he’d favored her with his attention.

“Why?” Attention was well and good, but money would be better, if some were in the offing.

“Why did I want to see you again? I’ve always wanted it. Since I left for York with Charles, and especially during the time we were on the Continent. I’ve missed you.”

The sentiment touched her, and she felt the old feeling rise, but she tamped it down as useless to her. “I’ve certainly missed you, as well. I could hardly breathe for eighteen years of having no support and no father for Piers.”

“I couldn’t help that.”

“Your helplessness didn’t change our need.” She took a deep draught of her ale and said, “Is your wife still living?”

He nodded.

Suzanne’s heart sank, and only then did she realize she’d harbored a tiny hope he would be a widower ready to marry her. She tucked that dead wish away, never to entertain it again. “Children?”

He shook his head. “None came before I left London, and I haven’t been back since. So…no children.” Then he said, “You ask to know whether I would support you and Piers.”

“You owe us. You owe him.”

“I’ve no money. Since the death of her father, my wife has lived comfortably these years with her brother, and it’s only by force of law she’s returned to me.” Suzanne mentally cursed the law that chained Daniel to that woman. “While following the elder Charles during the war, then his son in exile, I’ve had no income other than what could be begged from those on the Continent who hate Puritans. The very clothes we wore on our entrance to London were provided by Parliament so we wouldn’t appear to the commons as beggars unfit to rule.”
Suzanne then noticed the outfit he wore today was the same as he’d worn yesterday, but with the gold braid removed from the green cloak. He seemed to be telling the truth, and had more than likely sold the braid for cash.

“So you say no, you cannot support us.”

“That is so. As I said, there is no money even to support myself.”

“I cannot go back to the brothel. Even if it were still there, my days of selling myself are over. Certainly I would starve on what I could get for my aging body. Anymore, I can no longer attract even a Puritan rotted with lust and hypocrisy, one too ashamed of himself to be seen with me in public.”

Daniel grinned, and suddenly reminded her of the youth he had once been. “Nonsense. You’re still quite attractive.”

Suzanne surprised herself by blushing, though she noted the word “still” had the same mitigating power as “handsome.”

“What of Piers? He should be old enough to provide an adequate living.”

“Adequate is different things to different people. And besides, Piers hasn’t yet found employment, so there’s no question that the living he currently provides is inadequate by any standard.”

Daniel considered for a moment, then said, “I’ll make some enquiries, though there will be a great number of more worthy men seeking positions, and finding a place for a young man with no connections and little experience will be difficult.”

“He’s you for a connection.”

“Not so much as one might think. Nobody knows I have a son.”

Were she still able to blush with shame, she would have. “They don’t? Nobody?” His wife might have been kept in the
dark, but it shocked Suzanne that Daniel had never told anyone at all.

“I would prefer it didn’t get out, and therefore possibly back to my wife. My position with Anne, and her brother who is now duke, is precarious enough, I’m afraid. He spent the past decade garnering power in Parliament, and that hasn’t changed since the restoration of the monarchy. And he hates me in the bargain, even without knowing about Piers.”

“You won’t be dependent on the brother for long. Surely the king will restore your lands to you.”

“If he can.”

“He’s the king.”

“And he has just slightly less power than Parliament and astonishingly less money. There are hundreds of loyal royalists climbing all over each other, seeking restoration of their lands taken from them by Cromwell. And equal hundreds of Parliamentarians who have been in possession of those lands for nearly two decades. I’m just one of many petitioners, most of whom are of better rank than myself, and it remains to be seen whether I will have my own income soon or whether I will remain dependent on my brother-in-law.”

“But you sacrificed everything for loyalty to Charles and his father.”

“It’s true. Charles is a kind and reasonable king, and he appreciates those who are loyal to him. I may come out well. As I said, it remains to be seen.”

Suzanne sighed and sipped on her ale. A gloomy frown darkened her face.

“Don’t look so defeated, Suzanne. You’ve always appeared so sad all the time, even when you were young, and you’re so much prettier when you smile.”

“Those who complain about my sadness would do well to give me something to smile about.” She offered her tankard with the comment as a toast, then drank and tried not to feel disappointed that Daniel’s only interest in her anymore was curiosity.

W
hen they parted, Suzanne watched Daniel walk away from the Goat and Boar until he disappeared into the traffic on Bank Side, then she stood alone for a moment and looked around, trying to decide what to do next. She wasn’t in the mood to return home right away and didn’t care to go back inside the public house for another ale, so she went for a walk. Her vizard was gone, having been tossed irretrievably into the Thames, and she felt exposed in public without it but not so much that she wanted to return home for another. There was nothing for it but to press on without the mask. She strolled off down the alley toward Maid Lane, took some random turns that weren’t really so random, and accidentally- on-purpose found herself once again in front of the Globe Theatre, the very venue the great bard Shakespeare had built decades before.

She loved this place. It had stood empty since Cromwell had outlawed theatre performances, but she’d attended several
plays here as a young girl. Now it was boarded up, poorly, with only two boards crossed over the door frame. She shoved the tall, heavy door, which swung inward, heedless of the boards on the outside. Then she stepped over the lower one and ducked under the higher.

Loose dirt gritted under her pattens, which tottered on the littered floor, and she held her skirts up to keep from dragging them through the dust and cobwebs. The building had not worn well during recent years, for most of it was open to the weather above even without the gaps in the roof over the galleries. Birds nesting in the rafters sang and flitted from perch to perch, annoyed at her intrusion, and a small animal made a shuffling noise under some debris nearby in an attempt to flee the invading human. Probably a mouse, perhaps a cat chasing a mouse.

The chairs that had once filled the upper levels were all gone except for some broken ones that lay scattered across the lower level. The pit had a mud puddle, left from a rainstorm the week before. Some birds bathed in it, aflutter with feathers and water drops and chirping away at each other in the spring sunshine. The stage, which protruded into the pit from the far side of the circled galleries, appeared intact, though Suzanne thought the rotted wood must be a danger to any actor treading it. The entire place smelled of rot. Twenty years of neglect had taken its toll.

She loved this place. Ever since her two years with Horatio’s acting troupe she’d been fascinated with it, drawn to it as if it knew her and knew she belonged to it. She’d imagined what it might be like to act on a real stage, to play to the galleries, to an audience of thousands. She imagined how magnificent it would be to have the proper amount of room to really perform what Shakespeare had intended, in the theatre he’d built.