him killed.'
'Had you?' asked Jane again.
'I hadn't, of course not,' said Gresham, shrugging his shoulders. 'There was no need, no reason. He was just history as far as I was concerned. I suppose I hoped he'd write things abroad, under another name, set up theatres in Europe… I remember feeling quite shocked when we heard he had actually been killed, after he'd written to me. It was in September, I think. I also found something out later that convinced me Cecil had done it.'
'What was that?' asked an intrigued Jane.
'For a long while I don't think Cecil knew Marlowe was alive. He took over Walsingham's spy service but he never ran it properly. Preferred to work through ambassadors, official people. Well, the letters make it clear someone tried to murder Marlowe in 1602, in Spain. I think it was Cecil. I think that's when Cecil found out Marlowe was alive, and who he was working for. It must have been the biggest shock of his life.'
'Why the biggest?' said Jane. 'We know he had quite a few shocks in his life, even before 1605.' She could not help smiling at the memory of the Gunpowder Plot, and the exact nature of the shock administered by Gresham to Cecil.
'Because in 1602, when it was clear Elizabeth was dying, when everyone thought Robert Cecil had chosen King James I as the new King of England, and when Robert Cecil himself was writing away to James and declaring himself his most loyal servant, all the while the bloody man was plotting with the Spanish to get the Spanish Infanta on the throne in place of James! He was riding both horses, wasn't he?
'Well, Cecil is fearful of the Queen finding out he's been writing to James in Scotland, and fearful of her and James finding out he's been trying to ride two horses and back Spain as well. Then, lo and behold, what does he discover? That Marlowe's been an agent for the Spanish for years! Marlowe, who hates him! Marlowe, who's privy to all the Spanish secrets — might even have seen some of his cursed letters. He must have ordered Marlowe knocked off as soon as he heard. Obviously Marlowe got away, if it was him you saw this afternoon…' Gresham glanced at Mannion, who nodded.
'Are you sure Cecil was riding both horses? Backing the King and the Infanta?' asked Jane. 'It's absolutely explosive if it's true. Elizabeth could have had him killed for it, and James could never have let him run the country for him.'
'Oh, I'm sure, right enough,' said Gresham with the grin of a devil on his face. 'You see, I've got two of his letters to the Spanish! I've held them as a bargaining counter for years. It's one of the main reasons Cecil didn't have me killed long ago.'
Jane's head was reeling. 'Are you telling me you could have proved Cecil a traitor since 1602? And I know you could have done it again in 1605 with the Gunpowder Plot? If you hated the man so much, why didn't you topple him?'
'You know why,' said Gresham. 'Power is a filthy business. It dirties all those who wield it. There's no room for a good man in government. We've had peace for years now, haven't we, over the land of this country at least? No babies killed, no villages razed to the ground, no women raped, no harvesting of all the best young men to die stupidly in battles no one understands. If the price we pay for that peace, that stability, is to have the anti-Christ on the throne, I'll take it. Cecil's evil, the fact he had no morals, the fact he would assassinate without thinking to keep the peace — we need someone like that as our ruler. And if he damned himself in the process, why should I care?'
'So you're saying Marlowe got away some'ow, and buggered off somewhere to lie low? When he knew people was trying to kill him?' said Mannion.
'Must have done. The Americas* perhaps? Or Russia? That's where I'd have gone. Wherever it was, it must have turned his brain. Not that it ever needed much turning. And now, all of a sudden, he turns up in England again,' said Gresham, 'and I bet I could dictate the letter he sends to Cecil. 'I'm going to get my revenge on you at last,' he says, 'and on that arch-villain Gresham who helped you ruin my life.''
'Oh dear God!' said Jane. 'I see it now… it's so simple.'
'Isn't it?' said Gresham.
Mannion, whose face was screwed up like a cow's, was clearly not finding it simple at all. Gresham carried on.
'Cecil sets me, his best agent, on to finding Marlowe, carefully not telling me it is Marlowe, of course, just to add a bit of spice to it. So I'm moving about with the highest possible profile, more or less guaranteeing that Marlowe's going to come screaming out of a side alley and try to kill me. If I kill Marlowe, which is the best option of all, then what a joke for Cecil from his grave. He's got his oldest and bitterest enemy to preserve his reputation, pure and unsullied, for all of history. That would appeal to Cecil's sense of humour. And if Marlowe kills me — the second best option — what a joke as well! Cecil's oldest enemy follows him to the grave with a helping hand from Cecil, 'and the killer is the person whose escape I arranged twenty years ago partly to spite him! Poetic justice and the wheel come full circle, isn't it, if Marlowe kills me?'
'Are you sure Cecil's first aim wasn't to get you killed by Marlowe? We only survived by luck. If you hadn't been prepared… What an evil man,' said Jane. 'What a horrible mind.'
'Brilliant mind,' said Gresham in appreciation. 'Almost as good as mine.'
'Well,' said Jane,' at least we know why everyone's talking about a lost play by Marlowe. He must have written his masterpiece in all those years of exile.'
'And now one of his aims is to get it performed,' said Gresham. 'He's obviously been peddling it in the disguise of this bookseller.'
'But not got it performed yet,' said Jane.
'Any decent company's going to get itself laughed out of court if it claims a play's by Marlowe without concrete evidence. It'd take time and money to get one of the respectable companies to put it on. I doubt Marlowe's got a great deal of either.'
'It's almost pathetic,' said Jane, 'if he is trying to get the students to put it on- It's almost like a homecoming. Or beginning all over again.'
One of the greatest playrights of all time reduced to having students put on his play? There was little sympathy for Marlowe in Gresham's heart. That commodity had been used up long ago.
'So where do the buggers' letters come in?' asked Mannion, direct as ever. too you have an answer?' asked Gresham.
'How about this?' replied Mannion. He got up and put his mug down on the table. It was half full. It was almost unheard of for Mannion to put down a mug with drink still in it. 'You're Marlowe. You've got dirt on Cecil and you want to cause as much 'avoc as possible in as short a time as possible. Who do you go to?'
'The King?' suggested Jane.
'No!' said Mannion scornfully. 'Think on't, mistress! How does Marlowe get to the King? Goes up to 'is man on the door, does 'e? 'Excuse me, Mr Gatekeeper. I'm a sodomite ex-spy and playright who died in 1593 and who's been working for the Spanish ever since. Oh, and by the way, I died in 1602 as well. Anyway, I'm here and I've got the dirt on the King's right-hand man. So let me in, will you, to talk direct to His Majesty?''
'Put like that,' said Jane, 'it doesn't sound that easy.'
'Marlowe's a spy, isn't he?' Mannion was pacing up and down now, his brain engaged. Did he realise how like his master he looked? 'He knows about real power. So who's the real power in England?'
'Carr. Robert Carr. The King's lover,' said Gresham, happy to feed Mannion, fascinated by what he was seeing.
'No, master! Not Carr! Carr's just the beautiful body! Who's the brain? Who's still trawling taverns and going to stews where gentlemen shouldn't be seen? Who's accessible to a runt like Marlowe?'
'Overbury,' breathed Gresham. 'Sir Thomas Overbury.' Someone had just opened a window in the darkness of his knowledge. 'It's about comfort. It's all about comfort.'
'What do you mean?' asked Jane, perplexed now.
'The King's tired, losing himself more and more in hunting and wine and beautiful young men, selling out to comfort.'
'There's men as can't take power,' said Mannion, speaking to Jane. 'We've seen 'em often enough in the wars. Men who get tired of decisions. First it's the wine. Takes the place of thinkin', blocks it all out. Then, if that don't work, beggin' your pardon, there's women.'
'But it's a young man in King James's life!' said Jane, unabashed.
