License to Quill (35 page)

“Wait a minute.” Fawkes squinted above the crowd. “Look there. It's Richard Burbage. And Will Shakespeare!”

The swordsman sized the men up. “Do you want me to kill them quickly?”

“Don't be a blockhead. Ho! William!” Guy Fawkes stepped forward and waved his arms until a raven swooped down and knocked his hat off. “You accursed bird!” he cried, shaking a fist.

Shakespeare threw some seeds he was snacking on into the street, diverting the raven. “Good morrow, sirs,” he bade to the conspirators.

“Good morrow,” Richard Burbage bade as well.

“Will!” Fawkes continued. “Are you all right? I heard what happened. We thought you were dead!”

“Borrow us some money,” Percy interrupted, not the slightest bit interested in Shakespeare's health.

The bard ignored the sweaty man. “All is well, Guido. My health has returned to me.”

“What are you doing here?” Jack Wright asked. “I thought you said all the playhouses were closed.”

“They are, but I had to drop something off at the Globe. In fact…” The bard glanced at Burbage. “Would you gentlemen like to join us there for a moment? Richard, do you mind?”

“Not at all,” replied the player.

“What for?” asked Guy Fawkes.

The bard took a step forward and lowered his voice. “The play is finished!”

*   *   *

Two hours later.

MALCOLM

 … As calling home our exil'd Friends abroad,

That fled the Snares of watchfull Tyranny,

Producing forth the cruell Ministers

Of this dead Butcher, and his Fiend-like Queene;

Who (as 'tis thought) by selfe and violent hands,

Tooke off her life. This, and what need full else

That call's vpon vs, by the Grace of Grace,

We will performe in measure, time, and place:

So thankes to all at once, and to each one,

Whom we inuite, to see vs Crown'd at Scone.

With this farewell, the Globe's star player, Richard Burbage, who had just read for Macbeth, Malcolm, Lady Macduff, Fleance, two of three assassins, one of three Weird Sisters, and the delightful Porter; and the Globe's playwright, William Shakespeare, who read for Lady Macbeth, Banquo, King Duncan, Macduff, Lennox, Ross, the enigmatic Hecate, and all the remaining characters, took a bow for their spellbound audience.

Fawkes hopped up from his bench and applauded while Jack Wright and Thomas Percy were compelled to do so as well.
The Tragedy of Macbeth
was everything the three conspirators had spent the past year hoping it would be, and more.

“How was it?” asked the author.

“Brilliant!” Guy Fawkes sang and cheered. The conspirator hopped the wooden fence around the Pit while the bard and Burbage jumped down from the stage. “Bloody brilliant. Tying the plights of Macbeth to the king today? It was perfect! Precisely what we were looking for!”

Shakespeare smiled. “I made sure to keep King James's villainous ancestors true to history. Banquo conspired against King Duncan, as did Macbeth.
*
They both deservingly died a traitor's death.”

“Bravo!” Fawkes praised, kissing the bard's hands.

“The witches in your play,” Percy entered. “You had them prophesize that Banquo's kin will be kings. Is that true?”

“Yes,” the playwright confirmed. “It is written in the histories.”

Fawkes smacked his hands together. “That's it!” The conspirator spun around to Jack and Percy. “That's what we need to rally the people. King James's line is illegitimate! It is the product of black magic and assassinations!”

“Bloody heathens,” swore Percy.

“Guido, if you don't hold that tongue of yours, I'll have to cut it out.” Jack Wright motioned with his eyes toward Richard Burbage.

“You need not worry,” replied the actor. “Master Shakespeare shared me in on your endeavors. It will be a pleasure to play my part in them.”

Guy Fawkes's jaw dropped. “You are willing to risk your life for this?” he asked. “For us?”

Shakespeare's star player held his head high. “It would not be the first time this wooden O served as a stage for revolution! May God be with you on your efforts. I hope you succeed to the fullest measure.”

The conspirators were speechless.

“Also,” the playwright reentered, “I talked things over with my friend here, and we have an idea that should attract precisely the type of crowd you are looking for.”

“What is it?” scowled Percy, who remained skeptical of any idea that was not his.

Shakespeare smirked. “We are not going to announce the name of the play. Your show will be a surprise performance.”

The sweaty man's eyes bulged in their sunken sockets. “You're going to keep the title secret?”

The dramatists nodded. “And with the curfew lifted, we want to make this a late performance. A nighttime show.”

“What!” Guy Fawkes gasped. “This is not what we paid you for! How could a nighttime show for an unknown play possibly be a draw in London? We need the largest audience possible!”

“My gentle masters,” Richard Burbage entered in his most eloquent diction, “in all my years' experience, I can promise you that this decision will be most beneficial. The theaters have been closed all year. People will be clamoring to see this performance. And if we keep its name a secret, whispers about it will spread throughout the city like wildfire. All will wonder what it is, and all of our most dedicated patrons will attend. They will be rowdy and intoxicated. Their pulses high. Three thousand men whipped into a frenzy and already carrying torches.” The actor smiled like the devil. “You will have an army at your disposal.”

The conspirators were captivated. Their awestruck eyes turned from Richard Burbage to William Shakespeare, who bowed his head with pride. “We are men of action here. We are actors! We know the world's stage better than anyone.”

“Bless you, brother!” Guy Fawkes hugged the playwright while Jack Wright patted him on the shoulder.

“I was wrong to doubt you,” Percy acknowledged. “You clearly know what you are doing.”

“Thank you for your faith, brother,” the bard accepted.

“So, would you mind sparing us some silver so that we can hurry home before it gets dark?”

“Of course.” Shakespeare dropped a sixpence and some silver pennies into Percy's sticky palm while Burbage flipped Jack Wright a groat. “Go in peace, brothers.”

“Hail, and farewell!” Richard Burbage shouted.

The actors waved good-bye to the conspirators as they left the theater. Once they were by themselves, the bard and Burbage exchanged a glance and then retired to the Tiring House.

“You're a better liar than an actor,” the star player complimented as he handed Shakespeare the book of the play
Macbeth
.

“And you, my friend, are a greater liar than every politician in Parliament.” The bard unlocked the Tiring House's cabinet and deposited the leather folio alongside all the other books of his plays. “But I meant what I said, Richard.” The bard locked the cabinet. “Nobody can know that we're performing this. Not even the other actors. You must keep it secret.”

“What?
Macbeth
?” Burbage teased.

The playwright winked.

 

Chapter XXXVIII

The Apology

The Dark Lady returned to London with little to show for her heroism. Although she proved herself as gifted with her bow as with her needles, Walsingham was infuriated that she rode after Shakespeare instead of killing all the witches in the Arden. “Such an opportunity,” he reprimanded, “will
never
present itself again.” He then lectured her at length on how good agents choose death over their missions, “and you know that,” before turning Bianca over to Bacon for further scolding on account of Aston's injuries. Penny remained the only person in the Double-O on the Dark Lady's side, but even she could not repair the damage her friend suffered in Warwickshire. Once more, the Blanca's harpsichord, books, and stately raven were her only companions. Especially since the bard did not muster the courage to come calling at her home until October.

Bianca heard knocking, opened her door, and then slammed it in William Shakespeare's face. “Roses were your favorite flowers, not mine!” she shouted through the door in Italian.

Dejected, the playwright left his bouquet of roses outside her door, along with the bag of silver she was owed for saving his life.

The Dark Lady returned to her harpsichord and raised her fingers in frustration, but then froze once she noticed a second raven at her window. The black bird was cozying against her own.

“TOO əv yə?”
the raven croaked in the bard's voice.

Bianca's fingers curled into fists until her knuckles cracked. After a tearful contemplation, she pounded her keyboard and stomped back to her door.

The Dark Lady threw the door open and walked face-first into Shakespeare's fist just as he was about to knock one more time.

“Oops!” he chirped as the Dark Lady stumbled backward. “I'm sorry.”

Bianca rubbed her reddened forehead while staring into the playwright. She did not say anything, but at the same time she did not have to. The two knew each other well enough to read each other's eyes like poetry.

The two stared at each other for quite a while.

And then, they united.

 

Chapter XXXIX

Heavenly Bodies

“How is this possible?”

It was October 12, 1605, 12:48
P.M.
, and atop the Tower of London, Sir Thomas Walsingham watched in disbelief as the brilliant sun was masked behind the moon. A dark shadow swept across the country like a tide, casting the entire London landscape into panic. Pulses rose, screaming spread from the northwest to southeast, animals barked, chirped, hissed, and hooted, and the watchful ravens surrounding Walsingham blathered in confusion. “We already had an eclipse two weeks ago,” he added. “Why did you fail to see this coming?”

“We can only predict lunar eclipses,” explained Francis Bacon. “We are still working on a method for the solar variety.”

“How long will it be before you come up with one that works?”

Bacon conferred with the disquieted astronomers behind him, among them mathematician and astrologer John Dee. “Years,” the latter concluded. “Perhaps decades.”

“Never in our lifetime is what you're saying.”

The white-bearded astrologer looked to the thirty-four-years-younger Bacon. “I am afraid so,” replied the younger.

Walsingham lowered his spyglass and handed it to the scientist. “Columbus used an eclipse to subjugate an entire island. Our enemies could be doing the same right now to conquer ours.”

“We understand, W.”

“No, you don't, and that's the problem.” The spymaster looked over at the darkened skies haunting London like a storm cloud. “The cunning folk are still a menace.”

*   *   *

Meanwhile, at Seething Lane …

“O me…” Penny gasped from inside Walsingham Mansion. The silver-haired secretary sized up and down the tall, suntanned vagrant outside her doors. His Italian boots were specked with sea salt, his weathered cape was stained with brine, and his freshly shaven face with thin mustache appeared … just dashing. “Who the bloody hell are you supposed to be?” the secretary snapped, remembering her place.

“Christopher Marlowe.”

“I've never heard of him.”

The poet's heart sank. “Really?”

“In sooth,” she sighed sarcastically. “Who sent you?”

“Well, Master Walsing—”

“I'm not interested in that. I want you to tell me the name,
full
name, of whoever told you to mosey over.”

The poet's jaw dropped. Stumped, he rubbed the back of his neck. “Honestly, I don't know his name.”

Lady Percy arched her sharpened eyebrows.

“Drago the … dragoman?” Marlowe tested. “And also, pirate?”

Penny sighed forsooth this time. “I'm sorry, but I have never heard of you or who sent you here, so please shog off.” The secretary shoved her doors until they were stopped by her caller's doeskin boots.

“Please, I came a long way, and not for shogging.” The sailor's sea-tested hands forced the mansion's portal open.

“Oh…” the corseted woman heaved, “you just made a big mistake.” Penny stepped back and pounded her fist against a button carved into the wooden wall. A portcullis dropped on both sides of the doorway, but the vagabond dove under them with catlike agility and tackled her. Penny clawed and kicked Marlowe across the foyer until they rolled atop a bearskin rug.

“This is more than I can bear,” he quipped. “Is this how you treat everybody?”

“You bugger!” the secretary swore. Penny stole the vagrant's dagger and plunged it at his heart.

“Ugh! What is it with you women!” He grabbed Penny's wrist and stabbed the blade through her gown. Lady Percy was unhurt, but she was also stuck to the floor by her own clothes.

“My heart has already taken plenty of abuse, m'lady. Can't we just make peace?”

Penny turned her head away and groaned. Marlowe's breath reeked of a pirate's diet of tobacco, rum, and turtles.

Infuriated, she fumbled for something else beneath Marlowe's belt.

The confused poet looked down. “That is not a sword,” he noted. “At least, not now.”

Penny's eyes widened. She pummeled the man on top of her with her hands and fists until, not able to resist the urge one minute more, she threw her arms around him. The two assaulted each other in a fit of passion.

“Just a moment!” the lady interrupted, kneeing the pirate off her. Marlowe writhed on the floor while Penny ran into her study, inadvertently tearing half her dress off in the process.