Ruled Britannia

'He told you that, did he?' Vincent turned his head a little to one side and brought a hand up to his ear, as if imagining he were listening to a conversation at which he hadn't been present. 'Quotha, a€?I shall make myself known to him in good time.' ' He sounded preposterously pompous. 'And then you would have nodded and said, a €?Let it be so, Master Phelippes.' ' Suddenly he stabbed a forefinger at Shakespeare. 'But if he fail to make himself known to me?'

'Then we are betrayed, and God have mercy on our souls,' Shakespeare said. Thomas Vincent asked him no more questions.

He wished the same would have been true of the players. He'd had to sound them out, one by one, knowing a wrong word in the wrong ear would bring catastrophe down upon them all. He felt as if he were defusing the Hellburner of Antwerp each time he spoke to one of them. At his nod, Richard Burbage had eased a couple of devout Papists from the company-both of them hired men, fortunately, and not sharers whom the other sharers would have had to buy out. Some of those who remained, and who knew what was toward, seemed to think it certain no one not of their persuasion was left in the Theatre. They were careless enough with what they said to make Shakespeare flinch several times a day-or, when things were bad, several times an hour.

It would have been even worse had they seen their parts for Boudicca and begun throwing around lines from the play. That would come soon enough-all too soon, Shakespeare feared. Even now, a robustious periwig-pated fellow named Matthew Quinn got a laugh and a cheer by shouting out that all Jesuits should be flung into the sea.

'Only chance, only luck, Lieutenant de Vega came not this morning, else he had been here to catch that,'

Shakespeare said to Burbage in the tiring room after the company gave the day's play.

'I have spoke to Master Quinn,' Burbage answered grimly. 'The rascally sheep-biter avouches he shall not be so spendthrift of tongue henceforward.'

Will Kemp came up to the two of them puffing on a pipe of tobacco. Still nervous and irritable, Shakespeare spoke more petulantly than he might have: 'How can you bear that stinking thing?'

'How?' Kemp, for a wonder, took no offense. 'Why, naught simpler-it holds from my nostrils the reek of yon affectioned ass.' He pointed with his chin towards Matt Quinn. 'And they style me fool and clown.' He rolled his eyes.

'They call you by the names you have earned,' Burbage said. 'The names Master Quinn hath earned for this day's business needs must be named by Satan himself, none other having the tongue to withstand the flames therefrom engendered.'

'Better Quinn were dis gendered,' Shakespeare said. 'The fright he gave me, I'd not sorrow to see him lose both tongue and yard.'

'You're a bloody kern today,' Kemp said.

'Nay.' Shakespeare shook his head. 'I thirst for no blood, nor want none spilled-most especially not mine own.'

'Master Quinn will attend henceforth,' Burbage promised. 'He stakes his life upon't.'

'The game hath higher stakes than that,' Shakespeare said, 'for his I reckon worthless, but I crave mine own to keep.'

'And they style me fool and clown,' Will Kemp repeated. Shakespeare left-all but fled-the tiring room a moment later. He knew this plot was all too likely to miscarry, but wished Kemp hadn't reminded him of it quite like that.

'Ah, my love, I must go,' Lope de Vega murmured regretfully.

Lucy Watkins clung to him. 'Stay with me,' she said. 'Stay with me forever. Till I met thee, I knew not what love was.'

'Thy lips are sweet,' he said, and kissed her. But then he got out of the narrow bed and began to dress.

'Still, I must away. Duty calls.' Duty would consist of more rehearsals for El mejor mozo de Espana.

Lope knew he would go back to his games with Catalina IbaA±ez. The more he saw of Don Alejandro de Recalde's mistress, the more games he wanted to play with her. That didn't mean he despised Lucy, but the thrill of the chase was gone.

Softly, Lucy began to weep. 'Would thou gavest me all thy duty.'

'I may not. What I may give thee, I do.' What I don't give to Catalina, Lope thought. Lucy knew nothing of the other woman. Lope dabbed at her face with the coverlet. 'Here, dry thine eyes. We'll meet again, and soon. And when we do meet, let it be with gladness.'

'I always come to thee with gladness,' the Englishwoman said. 'But when thou goest. ' She shook her head and snuffled. At last, though, she too sat up and reached for the clothes she'd so carelessly let fall to the floor a little while earlier.

By then, Lope was pulling on his boots. He'd had plenty of practice dressing in a hurry. He didn't urge Lucy to move faster. Better-more discreet-if they weren't seen coming down the stairs together from the rooms above this alehouse. He kissed her again. 'Think of me whilst we are parted, that the time until we meet again might seem the shorter.'

Even as he tasted her tears on his lips, she shook her head. 'Always it is an age, an eternity. Never knew I time crawled so slow.'

He had no answer for that, or none that would make her happy. That being so, he slipped out of the cramped little room without another word. Before long, Lucy would come forth, too. What else could she do, after all? The stairs were uneven and rickety. He stepped carefully on them, and used care of a different sort going out through the throng of Englishmen drinking below. He walked very erect, hand on the hilt of his rapier, as if eager for one of them to challenge him. Because he looked so ready, none did.

Behind him, one of them asked, 'What doth the don here?'

'What doth he? Why, his doxy,' a drawer answered, and masculine laughter rose from the crowd. De Vega ignored it. The server wasn't even wrong, or not very wrong, though Lucy Watkins was no whore.

She'd fallen in love with Lope as he'd fallen in love with her. If she hadn't, he would have lost interest in her right away. Getting to a woman's secret place was easy. Getting to her heart was harder, and mattered more.

His own heart leaped when he began directing Catalina IbaA±ez, explaining to her just exactly how she as Isabella was falling in love with the soldier playing Ferdinand of Aragon. And if you as yourself happen to fall in love with me as I think I'm falling in love with you. Lope thought. He intended to give Catalina all the help he could along those lines.

No matter what he intended, though, he had to restrain himself for the time being. 'Don Alejandro, darling!' Catalina Ibanez squealed when a handsome, tawny-bearded fellow strutted into the courtyard where Lope was putting his mostly ragtag company through its paces. 'You did come to see me rehearse!'

'I told you I would,' Don Alejandro de Recalde replied, bowing to her. 'I keep my word.' He nodded to Lope. 'You are the playwright, senor?'

'At your service, your Excellency,' Lope said, with a bow of his own. At your mistress' service.

Especially at your mistress' service.

If the nobleman knew what was in de Vega's mind, he gave no sign of it. With another friendly nod, he said, 'I've been listening to Catalina practicing her lines these past few days, and I have to tell you I'm impressed. I heard a good many dreary comedies in Madrid that couldn't come close to what you're doing here in this godforsaken wilderness.'

Slightly dazed, Lope murmured, 'You're far too kind, your Excellency.' He scratched his head. He wasn't impervious to guilt. Here was this fellow praising his work, and he wanted to sleep with the man's mistress? He took another look at Catalina IbaA±ez, at her sparking eyes, the delicate arch of her nose, her red lips and white teeth, the sweetly curved figure her brocaded dress displayed. Well, as a matter of fact, yes, Lope thought. The game is worth the candle.

'Do I hear you write plays in English as well as Spanish?' Don Alejandro asked.