Winter Blockbuster 2012 (68 page)

‘The field is yours, Ennis,’ he said.

As Anna watched in slowly dawning horror Rob raised his rapier, the greyish light from the sky beyond the open roof catching on the dull-coloured blade. She watched him assess his opponent with a strange half smile on his face. The two men circled each other warily, and then Henry let out a shout and lunged forward, with his blade arcing towards Rob’s chest. Even from where she stood Anna could see the palpable, panicked fury in Henry’s face and his movements. Why did he hate Robert so very much? This seemed no ordinary jealousy between players, but she could not fathom it.

Rob parried Henry’s blade, his own sword arcing down to block the advance. The two blades clashed, scraping against each other in a harsh clatter as they tangled, parted, attacked again.

Henry’s anger made him ruthless in his drive forward, and as an actor he was a practised swordsman. Rob managed to stay ahead of him, but Henry’s fury only seemed to grow rather than burn out. The sharp side-tip of his blade caught Rob on the upper arm, drawing blood.

Anna pressed her hand to her mouth to hold back a scream. Even the gathered actors, who had at first shouted encouragement, grew terribly silent. No one intervened in the fight.

As she watched, Henry gave a strangled shout and raised his sword, as if to thrust at Rob’s neck. Rob ducked nimbly
under the attack and dropped down to deliver a counter-thrust. His blade cut Henry’s thigh—a shallow wound that sent Henry crashing to the stage.

Henry tried to stab at him again, but Rob kicked him back down and pressed the tip of his blade to his opponent’s chest.

‘Enough of this,’ Rob said roughly. ‘What are you even fighting me for?’

‘You care nothing for her,’ Henry shouted. ‘You are a hedge-pig, a heartless swine.’

‘Mayhap I am,’ Rob answered. ‘But I won’t fight a man so out of his wits.’ He tossed down his blade and turned away, stumbling suddenly as he pressed his hand to his wounded side.

His fingers came away stained crimson.

Some of the other men fell on Henry to restrain him as Rob’s friends caught him before he could fall. Anna ran down the narrow wooden stairwell and emerged into the pit as the scene broke into noise and confusion. ‘Follow me,’ she ordered them, and led the way backstage.

‘Bring him in here,’ Anna said, clearing piles of costumes from the crates and chests. ‘I will see to him while you take Henry to the physick.’

Once they were all gone, and everything was quiet in the little room, Anna felt the tense fear of those few, flashing moments of violence drain away and found she was shaking. Even Rob was quiet. He had said nothing since his fall to the stage, with his head bleeding and Henry Ennis left to shout from the wound to his leg.

Anna took a deep breath to steady herself, and leaned over to study the trickle of blood on Rob’s forehead. He watched her closely in that heavy silence.

‘This seems to be becoming a terrible habit of yours,’ she said. She carefully dabbed with a handkerchief at the gash,
only to find it was luckily more blood than wound. ‘You were fortunate again. I don’t think this will need any stitches.’

‘I’m better off than Ennis, then.’

‘I should think so. That leg wound was beyond my meagre nursing skills.’

‘The fool shouldn’t have challenged me.’

‘True. Though I don’t think my father will see the distinction. He will only know you have robbed him for the time being of one of his chief players.’ She wiped away the last of the blood. ‘Why does Henry hate you so? I have never seen him like that.’ Except for that one flash of fury when she had turned down his offer. But that had been quickly gone.

Rob gave a humourless laugh. ‘Do you truly not know, fairest Anna?’

‘I know you have enemies, but why another actor? You provide their livelihood with your plays.’

‘I think Ennis prizes something more than a fine part in one of my plays. Ouch!’ he growled. ‘I think Ennis has seen how I look at you and he is jealous.’

Anna gave one last prod at the wound before she bound a strip of clean linen around his head as a bandage. She feared she
did
know what he meant—Henry had conceived some foolish passion for her, or rather for some imaginary lady he thought her to be. But she didn’t want to think of Henry and where his feelings had led him. She had other things to worry about.

Such as her own feelings for the man who sat before her now. She felt even more foolish than Henry. If he had noticed, surely others would, as well. She had to be careful.

‘Just keep your quarrels out of the playhouse,’ she said sternly.

‘I will do my best—for you, Anna. But I don’t control what some other hothead might do.’

‘Henry will have to learn to behave himself, as well.’ She sat down beside Robert on the chest and kissed him quickly. His lips parted in surprise beneath hers and he reached out for her, catching her around the waist to pull her closer to him.

‘I won’t always be there to mend your wounds, Robert,’ she said. ‘Promise me you will take care from now on. Try not to dash headlong into trouble.’ She tried to keep her voice brisk and impersonal, concealing her concern even as she knew it was too late.

Rob gently kissed her temple, the wave of hair over her brow, and smoothed it back from her face. ‘I fear trouble has a tendency to seek me out wherever I go.’

‘And you never seek it out, I suppose?’ she asked wryly.

‘Perhaps when I was younger trouble had a certain appeal. But I find I grow older and wiser with each day that passes.’

If only that was true, Anna thought, for both of them. But wisdom felt so far, far away.

‘You should leave London for a time,’ she said. ‘Go away to somewhere quiet where you can write.’

‘I have recently been invited to a country house by Lord Edward Hartley.’

‘Hartley?’ Anna knew him—or at least knew
of
him. He was one of Queen Elizabeth’s favourite courtiers, a man of good-looks and fashion, as well as a man of culture and sport. He sponsored poets and musicians, and often took the most expensive box at the White Heron for a play, bringing a party of friends with him. Surely at his house Rob could work and be safe from harm—at least for a time.

But while he was gone she would not see him. How grey would the days be then? How would she go back to her old ways once he was gone?

‘You should go there,’ she said, pushing away that sad
pang she did not want to feel. ‘The country air will be good for you.’

‘And mayhap for you, Anna?’

‘Me?’

Rob tightened his caressing hold on her waist and gave her a cajoling smile. ‘Come with me to the country. We’ll stroll the green sylvan lanes, lie by the river, dance under the stars, be as the shepherd and his shepherdess …’

Anna laughed and tried to push him away, even as she was tempted. To be somewhere quiet and peaceful, with Robert, away from the troubles and stink of London—it sounded like a dream.

An impossible dream. A wild player like Robert was not for the grey likes of her. She had always known that.

‘I have work to do,’ she said carefully.

‘It can wait for a few days. Please, Anna, come with me to the country. You will give me inspiration for my work there, and meet my friends.’

‘I have nothing to wear at a grand house,’ she said, her protests growing weaker. ‘I only have grey, remember?’

Rob reached for one of the costumes and held it up—a handful of purple velvet and glossy satin ribbons. ‘We can borrow these. Stage costumes are as fine as anything seen in a palace.’

‘Aye, and as expensive, too!’ Costumes were the greatest expense of any company of players—the audience didn’t want to see kings and queens on stage clad in trumpery rags. She knew their price because she mended and laundered them herself.

But if she was careful, and took only what was not needed for the current productions, it should be well enough. She gently touched the velvet skirt and imagined wearing it as she strolled by a bright country stream on Rob’s arm. London,
her father, Walsingham—all of it far away. Surely she could be someone else for just a few days? See what centre stage felt like, just once? If she could summon enough courage.

‘Well,’ she said. ‘I suppose someone should keep a watch on you, Robert Alden, and make certain you do finish this play and stay away from fights.’

‘Then you will come with me?’

‘I will. But only for a few days.’

Rob laughed and kissed her again—a hard, hot kiss full of promise. ‘You will not be sorry, Anna. I swear that to you.’

Anna wrapped her arms around his neck and held him close. Nay, she would
not
be sorry. Not this time.

Not yet.

CHAPTER TEN

R
OBERT
stared across the small garden at the country cottage, his gaze narrowed. It all looked so peaceful—half-closed shutters blocking out the bright day, flowers tangling over the gate. Calm and quiet and ordinary. Far from the bustle of London.

Why, then, couldn’t he bring himself to go inside? Why did the sight of it fill him with the hollowness of guilt?

Because he
was
guilty, of course. He knew that all too well. It lived with him day and night, drove him onward.

As he stared at the whitewashed walls he felt almost as he had in those days when his brawling had landed him briefly in gaol. The sky lowering over him, dark and oppressive. The terrible, sick knowledge he had failed those he loved.

That was when Walsingham had found him, dragged him from the cell and offered him a task. Given him a purpose again—a way to atone at last. But the walls still pressed in on him. They were built around his own soul.

Rob pushed open the gate and stepped into the garden. It gave a low, rusty squeak and sent a flock of birds soaring from the tree by the door. They flew into the sky, but he was still bound to the earth.

He knocked on the door and it swung open, to reveal a small, plump older woman in a stained apron. The sight of her round, reddened face calmed him. She was always the same, never changing since she had been his nurse when he was an unruly child, and she could control him with a quick swat and a kiss on the cheek.

‘Hello, Nelly,’ he said.

A smile lit her weathered face and she clapped her hands together. ‘Master Robert! We weren’t expecting you until later this month. London is a fair journey.’

‘Not so long when
you
are at the end of it.’ And when he had something he had to do. Rob stepped into the dim coolness of the hall and swept off his cap before he leaned down to kiss Nelly’s brow. ‘How are you, Nelly?’

‘Oh, I’m well enough, as always.’ Nelly shut the door and glanced over his shoulder at the silent depths of the house. ‘Is aught amiss with you?’

Everything was amiss, he thought wryly. Anna Barrett had thrown everything into tumult. That was why he was here today—because everything was changing. He had to protect everyone.

‘Why do you ask?’ he said.

‘Because we usually don’t see you here when the theatres are still open.’ She reached up to pat his cheek with a plump, roughened hand. ‘You work much too hard, Master Robert.’

‘Only to keep you in luxury, Nelly dearest,’ he teased.

‘Such a rogue,’ she said with a laugh. ‘You always were, even as a small lad.’

‘So I haven’t changed?’ He felt like an entirely different person now, no longer the careless youth who had rambled across the countryside.

‘Oh, you’ve changed.’ Nelly shook her head sadly. ‘When you were a boy you were always so light-hearted, laughing
and running off on a lark with Lord Edward. Now you’re so …’

‘So what?’

She gently patted his cheek again. ‘There’s such a hardness in your eyes now. You never laugh much any more.’

Rob crossed his arms over his chest. ‘There is little enough to laugh about—am I not right, Nelly?’ That was why he had come here today, why he did what he did every day. The careless boy who had worn his heart on his sleeve was long gone. He had to be cold now.

‘How go things today?’ he asked, gesturing towards the rooms at the back of the house.

A frown creased Nelly’s ruddy cheeks. ‘Quiet enough. But there’ve been some sleepless nights of late.’

‘Nightmares?’ He had so hoped those would vanish in the quiet of the country.

Nelly nodded. ‘They went away for the longest time. Now they seem to have returned.’

What new fear could have brought them back, when there had been peace for so long? Rob’s jaw tightened. ‘Is it safe to go back there, then?’

‘It might do some good. She almost seemed to know you last time.’

Almost
.

Nelly turned and led him down a narrow corridor to a small sitting room at the back of the house that overlooked the last bit of garden and the lane beyond. A fire crackled in the grate and the windows were half-open, making the space cosy but open.

At first Rob didn’t see her. A half-finished tapestry was stretched on a frame by the window, where she usually worked, and there was the usual clutter of workboxes and threads. But she wasn’t sitting there.

He found her standing by the fire, staring down into the flames with a pensive half smile on her face. A bright wool shawl was wrapped around her shoulders and her dark hair fell down her back in loose waves. She looked so much like his sister of vanished years—the shy, sweet Mary who had followed along behind him, eager for the attention of her older brother.

The brother who was meant to be her protector and who had failed her.

Then she turned, and the smile vanished. Her blue eyes went blank as ice, and he saw the scars on her left cheek. The stark reminder of her ruined life, of how he had to help her now.

‘Now, see, Mary love, your brother has come to see you,’ Nelly said in her hearty, cheerful voice. She put her arm around Mary’s thin shoulders and led her to the chair by the window. ‘Isn’t that lovely?’

Mary watched Rob carefully, warily, with no hint of recognition. She hadn’t really known him in years. To her, he was only a man, and thus an enemy to be feared.

But the manners Nelly had instilled in them both as children were still strong. She gave him a little nod and said, ‘How do you do?’