The Slaying of the Shrew (15 page)

"Let me see it," Worley said.

Smythe handed it over. Worley unstoppered it and took a tentative sniff. He frowned. "Brand," he pronounced at once, identifying it correctly. "But for a surety, 'tis mixed with something else. There is a curious, uncommon, musty sort of odor."

"I thought so, too," said Shakespeare.

Worley sniffed the flask once more, frowned, then shook his head. "I cannot put a name to it. And you say Catherine was drinking from this?"

" 'Twould appear so," Smythe replied, "although we did not see it for ourselves."

"But Will found it lying stoppered at her feet, you said. If she were drinking from it, and 'twere poisoned, then would she not have dropped it while it was still open?"

"Perhaps," said Shakespeare. "But like one who has already had too much to drink and falls insensible in the act of raising the cup once more, if she had already drunk from it earlier and the poison was not very quick, then she may have been preparing to open the flask to take another drink when it finally took effect, causing her to drop the flask unopened."

Worley nodded. "That is certainly possible. And 'twould explain why the flask was still stoppered and unspilt. But though it may smell peculiar and raise a foul suspicion, we must nevertheless find out for certain if 'tis poison and, if possible, what the poison is. 'Twill take a skilled apothecary to make such a determination."

Smythe and Shakespeare exchanged glances and simultaneously replied, "Granny Meg."

"She is the cunning woman who had helped you once before, as I recall," said Worley.

"Aye," said Smythe. "She has an apothecary shop in the city."

"And she is possessed of uncommon skills," added Shakespeare.

"Her name is not unknown to me," said Worley. "But 'tis said she is a witch."

"If so, then she is an honest one," said Smythe. "And witch or no, she knows her herbs and potions. If anyone can tell us what manner of poison has been put into this wine, she is the one."

"So be it," Worley said, nodding. "Middleton has a light carriage in which you can make the journey with dispatch. In the meantime, I shall see to matters here and send word to Her Majesty that I shall not be rejoining her because of pressing matters that require my immediate attention."

"There is more, Sir William," Smythe said.

"What,
more?
Come on, then, out with it."

As quickly as he could, Smythe told him about what he had overheard the previous night in the maze, and how an attempt had been made upon his life to silence him.

"I see," Worley said, when he had finished. He fixed Smythe with a sharp look. "And how did it happen that you were in the maze to overhear this intrigue in the first place?"

Smythe hesitated awkwardly.

"Come on, Tuck, tell him, for God's sake," said Shakespeare. "There is no shame in it."

"I… was following Elizabeth," said Smythe, somewhat sheepishly. "We had quarrelled previously, some days ago, and I suspected that she was seeing someone else."

"And was she?"

"I never learned the truth of it," admitted Smythe. "I lost her in the maze, and then I heard the voices of those men, and you already know the rest. More than anything, I feared that they would stumble upon her and she would come to harm. Hence, I shouted out to warn her and to draw them off."

"Well, if 'twas ever any doubt that foul play was at hand, this certainly dispells it," Worley said. "Whoever those two plotters are, it seems evident from their attack on you that they will not stop at murder to achieve their goal. And now with Catherine's tragic death…" He grimaced and shook his head. "Catherine was, G6d rest her soul, a strong-minded young woman. Godfrey had been trying to get her married off for quite some time, but whether 'twas justified or not, she had a reputation as a shrew. Her sister seems to have a milder disposition, one most men would doubtless find preferable in a wife, but 'twas well known that Godfrey would never have consented to the betrothal of his younger daughter before the older one was married. And now Catherine is dead… 'out of the way,' as that miserable scoundrel put it."

"And with no sons to inherit Middleton's fortune, 'twould all go to Blanche now," Shakespeare said. "Or, more to the point, to whoever should become her husband."

"Indeed," said Worley. "And whoever marries Blanche will likely find her far more manageable than ever her sister would have been."

"I am not so sure of that," said Smythe, "but either way, methinks Master Middleton should know of this." He sighed heavily. "If I had only said something last night…" His voice trailed off.

" ‘Twould have made no difference in the end, Tuck," said Shakespeare, gently. "Last night, as it turns out, Middleton was in London with his daughters. We did not know that then, yet even if we did, word could never have reached him in time to save Catherine. How were you to know that someone meant to kill her? And even if you knew, you could not have known she would be poisoned."

"Your friend speaks sensibly and truly," Worley said. "You are entirely blameless in the matter, Tuck. The guilt rests with the murderers. And we shall find them, have no fear. There cannot be many here who are not known to me. We shall look to Blanche's suitors for our suspects."

"But will they not be forewarned now?" Smythe asked.

"Perhaps," said Worley. "However, we have a number of things working in our favor. For one thing, they may not know who you are. And for another, even if they do, they can have no way of knowing that you have discussed with me the things you overheard last night. They shall have no reason to suspect any relationship between us, and we shall give them no reason to suspect one. For all they know, you are merely someone who may have overheard part of their conversation last night. They cannot know for certain what you may have heard, or whether you shall do anything about it, or even whether you shall make any connection between their plot to impersonate aristocrats and Catherine's death."

"But in either case," said Shakespeare, "would it not be in their interest to eliminate even the least possibility that their plot may be exposed?"

"To be sure," Worley agreed. "And they have already demonstrated their willingness to do so in their attack on Tuck. And if they did not hesitate to do so once, they shall not hesitate to try again. Remember that without Blanche Middleton, they have nothing. The entire success of their plan rests on their remaining here and seeing it through. And that is where they shall give themselves away."

Smythe sighed. "I fear I know where this is headed."

Worley clapped him on the shoulder. "Tuck, no one shall force you to take any risks you do not wish to take," he said. "But consider that one woman has already died and the welfare of another is at stake."

"I had already considered those things, Sir William," Smythe replied. "And there can be no question but that I must do whatever must be done. I am completely at your service."

"Good lad."

"I, too, stand ready to assist," said Shakespeare. "What would you have us do?"

"I knew that I could count on you both," Sir William said. "We shall have to move quickly, however. The more time that elapses, the more it favors the killers." He turned to Shakespeare. "Will, you must make all haste to London with this flask and see your Granny Meg. I shall have a carriage made ready for you at once."

"We shall change our clothes and leave immediately," said Smythe.

"Not you, Tuck," Worley said. "You shall be staying here. You have a different part to play."

"That of the Judas goat," said Smythe, dryly.

"Precisely. We must bait them into coming after you once more. Are you up to it?"

Smythe took a deep breath. "I am."

"Good. Now, the first order of business shall be to get Will on his way to Granny Meg's and then see to Catherine's funeral. I shall speak with Godfrey Middleton and fix him to our purpose. It shall not be difficult. He may appear foppish, but there is iron in his spine. I should not wish to have him as an enemy. Once he finds out that his daughter has been murdered, he shall not rest until he has seen her killers brought to justice. But at the same time, we must see to it that in his anger, he does not give our plan away."

"We have a plan, then?" Shakespeare asked.

"Aye," Smythe replied, "to put me into harm's way and see who tries to harm me."

"Ah. It sounds like a good plan to me."

"Oh, does it, indeed?" asked Smythe, wryly.

"Well, I much prefer it to putting myself into harm's way," the poet said, nonchalantly.

" ‘Twould be an awful thing if the carriage hit a rut and dropped a wheel on its way to London, so that you fell out and broke your neck," said Smythe.

"Aye, and 'twould be terrible if someone stuck a rapier in your gizzard whilst I was not there to watch your back," Shakespeare riposted.

"If you two are finished fencing, there is more to be discussed," said Worley. "Now then, mark me well, here is what we shall do…"

The journey back to London in Godfrey Middleton's light carriage took far less time than the trip out, but it was also far less comfortable. When they had set out for Middleton Manor, the Queen's Men had travelled by horseback and by wagon, but because their wagon was large and rather cumbersome and loaded with all of their gear, they had traveled slowly, those of them on horseback proceeding at an easy walk so as not to lose the wagon. This was Shakespeare's first ride in a gentleman's open carriage, and he was not especially enjoying the experience.

The well-padded, velvet-covered seats were certainly a vast improvement over a simple leather saddle or the hard, unupholstered wooden bench of a wagon, but the rate at which they travelled made the carriage bounce and jounce as they careened along the rutted road to London and each jarring impact was transmitted through the wooden wheels of the carriage to its frame, then through the seats, despite their padding, directly into the poet's bones. Every bump made his teeth click together sharply and at least twice he had almost bitten through his tongue. Sir William had directed the driver to waste no time in getting him to London and back, and the man was complying with disconcerting efficiency.

Shakespeare knew better than to ask the driver to slow down. The liveried servant had stared at him with thinly veiled contempt when he discovered whom he would be driving to the city and back. After all, he was a gentleman's driver. He had certain standards and a reputation to uphold. And Shakespeare knew that he did not even remotely resemble a gentleman.

Someday, he thought, it would be a fine thing to be able to call oneself a gentleman, with good clothes and a grand house and servants who would tug their forelocks at you. He imagined what it must be like to have his own coat-of-arms to display over his doorway and his mantelpiece, and have painted on the sides of a fine, black-lacquered coach. A coach whose driver he could order to drive
slowly.
He swore to himself as yet another jarring impact shot painfully through his tailbone into his spine. If this was how a gentleman was meant to travel, then he could damn well do without it. If I should ever become a gentleman, he thought, then I shall travel everywhere on horseback. At a walking pace.

It struck him suddenly how utterly ludicrous that thought was. That an actor should ever be regarded as a gentleman was simply ridiculous. An actor, he thought, had about as much chance of becoming a gentleman as he did of being knighted. Still, it was a lovely fantasy with which to pass the time.

It was not very long before the rutted road led to the outskirts of the city and then gave way to London's cobbled streets, which were no less gentle to the poet's fragile frame than they were to the stout, wooden frame of the carriage. Shakespeare swore softly to himself as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Carriages and coaches were a fairly recent addition to the traffic on the streets of London, but there were now so many of them vying for space with the wooden-wheeled carts and wagons of the farmers and tradesmen, not to mention the horses and pedestrians, that the streets were more often than not hopelessly clogged. It was becoming insufferable and Shakespeare could not see it getting any better as more and more of the "new men" were infiltrating the ranks of the upper classes and buying carriages and coaches of their own.

The ditches that ran down the middle of each street trickled with a stinking quagmire of every sort of waste, including human and animal, raising a stench that was enough to take the starch out of a pleated ruff. And for those who could not navigate these streets from the relative safety of a carriage or a perch on horseback, it was a constant hazard to be splashed with the awful ooze, or to lose one's footing on the slippery cobbles. Not a few elegant suits of clothes in evidence on the streets were inelegantly bespattered, and those that were not bore testimony to the light-footedness of their owners.

At the same time, however, London was full to brimming with a sense of energy and purpose that Shakespeare found invigorating and even intoxicating. Unlike his sleepy home village of Stratford, this was a place where things were happening all the time. Here in these teeming streets, and behind those doors, fortunes were being made and lost and people struggled to survive, to live and love, sometimes with passion worthy of a poet's muse, and sometimes with a dull, rutting mindlessness that was nothing more than some primitive, instinctual affirmation of existence. It was all here, the base and the sublime, the endless drama of human character and existence that he found so endlessly fascinating and compelling. Just being here made him feel alive.

To him,
this
was the true theatre, whose machinations he wanted his more artificial theatre to reflect. There was an ongoing drama unfolding in these streets that was far more essential, far more basic, far more tragic, comedic, and uplifting than anything that was currently being acted on the stage. Compared to all of this, he thought, as his alert gaze swept the streets around him, how tawdry, how simple-minded and how utterly banal were the highjinks, jokes and caperings indulged in by the players of the day. All that petty posturing, all those silly, ribald songs, all those grandiloquent speeches said nothing at all about the piece of work man truly was. The ancient Greeks had understood something that men like Greene and his academic cronies seemed to have forgotten, and that was that the highest king could have at heart the motives of the basest peasant, and the meanest menial could possess nobility that would surpass that of the highest king.