Ruled Britannia

You learn them when you put your life on the line-or else you don't, as Don Alejandro didn't.'

'What will become of me, senor?' Lope asked.

'Well, I believe your story-or most of it, anyhow,' GuzmA?n answered. 'As far as I'm concerned, you remain on duty. But you must understand, when you kill a nobleman the matter doesn't end with your immediate superior.'

'Yes, sir,' Lope said resignedly.

'It could be worse, you know,' Baltasar GuzmA?n told him. 'You could have killed de Recalde back in Spain. Then you wouldn't have to worry about your superiors alone. You'd have everyone in his clan hot for your blood, and all his friends, too. He doesn't have many kinsmen here in England, and he wasn't here long enough to make a lot of friends.'

'No doubt you're right, sir.' The same thing had occurred to Lope. 'Is there anything more, sir?'

'Not from me, as I told you. But I also tell you something else: if you fall head over heels in love with Catalina IbaA±ez in the next few weeks, tongues will wag. I don't suppose anyone will be able to prove a thing, but tongues will wag.'

'Nothing I can do about that, your Excellency,' Lope replied.

'You could try keeping away from her,' Captain GuzmA?n said. Lope stood mute. GuzmA?n sighed.

'No point to puncturing a man if you can't enjoy yourself afterwards: is that what you're thinking?'

'Your Excellency, do you question my honor?' Lope asked, very softly.

Had GuzmA?n said yes, things would have taken a different turn. But the captain impatiently shook his head. 'No, no, no, by no means. The IbaA±ez is only a mistress, not a wife. How can anyone lose honor over a mistress? But even the touchiest man will see there is a difference between honor and gossip and scandal.'

'Very well, senor. I thank you for the advice.'

GuzmA?n sighed. 'By which you mean you have no intention of taking it. Well, you've already proved you're not shy about carving a man so the undertakers can't pretty him up. That will make some people think twice. Go on, get back to work, but bear in mind you may be summoned by others besides me.'

Sure enough, Lope was in his room working on a report of doings at the Theatre when Enrique knocked on his door. Captain GuzmA?n's servant said, 'Begging your pardon, Senior Lieutenant, but my principal has just received an order from Don Diego Flores de ValdA©s at Westminster. You are to report to him at once for questioning in the matter of Don Alejandro.'

'Thank you, Enrique.' Lope sighed and rose from the stool where he'd perched. 'I'll go, of course.'

What else could he do when summoned by the commandant of Spanish forces in England?

As he was heading out of the barracks, his own servant came up the corridor towards him. ' Senor, there is an English constable outside, a man named Strawberry.' He said it with care. 'He would speak to you. So says a soldier who knows a little English.'

'A constable?' De Vega shook his head. 'I am called before Don Diego Flores de ValdA©s. I have no time for this no-account Englishman now. I would have no time for the Queen and King of England now.

Go back and tell the fellow, whoever he is, that I am very sorry, but I will have to see him some other day.'

'I speak no English!' Diego wailed.

'Well, get that soldier again, then,' Lope said impatiently, hurrying off towards the stables. 'You found out what the constable wanted. He can find out what you want.'

When he rode off towards Westminster, he got a glimpse of his servant and a large, middle-aged Englishman standing nose to nose in the street, each shouting at the other, neither understanding a word the other said. Maybe the English-speaking soldier had gone away. Lope smiled. Diego needed such exercise to keep his blood flowing. As for the other man, that Strawberry. Well, who cared about an English constable, anyhow?

Once Lope got to Westminster, he had to find Don Diego Flores de ValdA©s' office, which he'd visited only once. He knew he was getting close when someone called out to him: a thin, weedy, pockmarked Englishman who wore spectacles. 'Oh, SeA±or Phelippes,' Lope said, glad to see a face he knew. 'The commandant's chamber is along this corridor, is it not?'

'Yes, that's right,' Phelippes answered. Where Lope had spoken English, he used his fluent Spanish, finishing, 'Congratulations on the skill of your right hand.' His own right hand, still clutching a quill, made cut-and-thrust motions.

'For which I thank you.' De Vega did his best to keep laughter off his face. He had a hard time imagining a man less dangerous than Thomas Phelippes. Hurrying up the corridor, he found Don Diego also scribbling away at something. He waited till the Spanish commandant look up from his work, then saluted. 'I report as ordered, your Excellency.'

'So you do. Come in, Senior Lieutenant, come in.' Don Diego drummed his fingers on the desk. He pointed to a stool in front of it. 'Sit, if you care to. So you've had more woman trouble, have you?'

'Well. ' Lope saw no way out of that one. 'Yes, your Excellency,' he said reluctantly.

'You'll get talked about, killing a social superior,' Don Diego remarked.

'No doubt. But I preferred that to letting him kill me.'

'Yes, I can see how you might. Don Alejandro was not the brightest man I ever saw, but he was brave, and we'll miss him. We haven't enough Spaniards here as is; we can't afford to kill each other.'

'Yes, your Excellency,' Lope said. 'Better you tell me that, though, than that you tell him.'

'He wouldn't agree with you-but then, he's not here to ask, is he?' Don Diego drummed his fingers again. 'By your account, by his mistress' account, it was a fair fight.' Those fingers went up and down, up and down. 'The Ibanez woman, I'm sure, is great fun in bed. But damn me, Senior Lieutenant, if she's worth a man in his grave. She'll be as faithless to you as she was to Don Alejandro, and sooner, for he had more money to spend on her than you do.'

No matter how infatuated with her Lope was, that held the unpleasant ring of truth. 'I'll take my chances, your Excellency,' he replied, for want of anything better.

'So you will,' the Spanish commandant agreed. 'So you do.' He scowled. 'Go on, get out of here. You have to keep an eye on the Englishmen at the Theatre. The good Lord only knows what they're planning, but it's something. I need a hound to smell out treachery. For that, you'll do. And a man who knows how to handle a blade is always an asset, too. Through the eye! Madre de Dios! '

'Your Excellency, with a life on the line, one does what one must do,' Lope said.

'Yes. And that is why I am sending you back to your duty at the Theatre,' Don Diego said. His long face was made to show sorrow, and it did now. 'We will need you, we will need the play, before long. Word just here from Spain is that it is doubtful his Most Catholic Majesty shall leave his bed again. His doctors dare not move him, even to change the linen on his mattress. The end approaches.' He crossed himself.

So did Lope de Vega. 'I shall do all I can to ensure that he has his monument here,' Lope said. 'You may rely on me, sir.'

'I do, Senior Lieutenant,' Don Diego Flores de ValdA©s told him. 'That is why you are returning. For I still fear treason from the Theatre. I want you there to stop it.'

'I've seen no sign of it,' Lope said. 'But if it rears its ugly head, I'll tear it out, root and branch.'

In the upper gallery of the Theatre, the tireman's helper who did duty as a lookout started whistling

'A Man's Yard.' At once, the players who had been Romans and Britons hacking away at one another shifted positions and became Spaniards and Englishmen hacking away at one another. 'By God!'

Richard Burbage snarled at Shakespeare. 'Is he here again?' He glared at the poet as if it were his fault.

Shakespeare spread his hands. 'I did not bid him come.'

'Unbidden guests are often welcomest when they are gone,' Burbage said. 'But of late he is never gone.

How can we rehearse Boudicca under the eyes of a don? He bleeds us of time like a leech of blood, save that a leech may heal, whilst he doth only harm.'

'I cannot mend it-and say not the name, never no moe,' Shakespeare added. 'He hath the Latin to know whence it comes and what it portends.' In strode Lope. He wasn't very tall, but swaggered like a giant. Shakespeare smiled and waved to him. 'Welcome!' he lied. 'Give you good day.'