A Dead Man in Deptford Page 3

  - So you would have Oedipus tear out his eyes in full view?

  - So I would. They pay to see horrors not hear of them. I see you go shudder shudder. The fine Cambridge man pedantical about his classical authors.

  - We will save up money to send you to Cambridge, Tom, Watson said. Or to the other shop if you would wish it.

  - My Latin is as good as any's, Kyd cried. I had Mulcaster at Merchant Taylor's. I acted Seneca on the school stage, and they came from far and wide to hear. Then I saw that they must also see. So behold me, Cambridge or not.

  - This will not do, Alleyn said, his head swinging in a slow shake. This business of Jupiter and Ganymede. It is sodomitical.

  - Ah, both Kyd and Henslowe went. And Kyd: You cannot bugger on the stage. Though in his eyes it seemed he cherished the notion though not as an act of twofold pleasure: he relished the fancied scream as the punitive rod of flesh struck home.

  - Oh, it is only in prospect, Alleyn said. It is all words. There are good words here, he added, but alas they are not for me. I am not Aeneas. 't'hough Jack here (meaning myself) would be a fetching Dido. Ah well, you must try again. And he handed back the bundle to Kit, who took it, somewhat abashed. Kyd squinted and said:

  - A very foul copy.

  - He has not been trained as a noverint, Watson said.

  - Noverint? Kit said in puzzlement.

  - Noverint universi per praesentes. Let all men know by these presents. Tom Kyd was a scrivener. He scrivens very handsomely.

  - So, Kyd growled. Is this to be accounted a curse to me?

  There were sounds of soothing about the table. Henslowe drained his pot and said he must go. A little trouble with one of his newly indentured harlots, it was supposed. A girl named Deborah, a good Bible name, who drank illicitly and flailed with her fists. This would not please all customers, though, if made more formal with whip and nailed club, it might pleasure a few. I take it, Henslowe said, that my proposition goes down as well as my ale treat. We will talk further. He went to the door, opened, peered out, returned, frowning. The bravoes are in there, he said. They have cleared all out with their brawling. Your brother Jack looks to be paying out protection money, as they call it.

  - Who?

  - Bradley, Orwell and Simkin.

  - I've told Jack, Alleyn said, that he must not. Give a groat and it will expand to a noble. They tried this at the Theatre. We were too many for them and they were surprised to find muscle under our gaudy onstage raiment. Armed?

  - Their usual short daggers. You have nothing save niefs.

  - Niefs not knifes, I said. Must we be prisoners in here till they be gone?

  - Oh, we will go, Alleyn said. We will take supper at the Triple Tun. So we drained, rose, and followed Henslowe out to the main room, which was indeed empty save for the three ruffians at a table in the corner bv_ the door that led streetwards. Jack Alleyn was saying:

  - You have drunk enough. This penny should take you safely to the spewing stage. His brother said, as we neared the scene:

  - Keep up with these disbursements, Jack, and you do no more than feed their greed.

  - You may be right, and Jack Alleyn picked up the brown coin and pocketed it. Will Bradley was an unwashed rogue, burly enough, with tangled wires of black all over his lousy scalp. On his finger-ends were black demilunes. He said:

  - We know well enough what you and your fellow sellers of the well-watered are at. You send bullies with clubs around to my poor old father to have him hold his son out of the tattery taverns where the filthy players do booze. Well, here you see a free man with his companions as free who will go where they choose and slice any that say not.

  - You had best choose to booze at your dear dad's foul den, Jack Alleyn said. He meant the Bishop's Head at the corner of Holborn and Gray's Inn Road. So go.

  Bradley's companions sat behind the table and, much at their ease, tilted their chairs on two legs and leaned back to make dirty the roughcast wall with their greasy jerkins. Orwell, a deformed braggart, humped and with a skew-mended broken left arm, leered at me, twittering:

  - Untruss, sweetheart, that I may embrown my piggot. And how doth filthy Neddy?

  - Why then I'll firk you, Simkin mocked. It was Kit who said:

  - These players seem clean enough. I would say that you three gallows-fodder have the monopoly of dirt here. Ah no, went Watson under his breath, his hand on Kit's arm. Orwell said:

  - Big words. A Latin and Greek boy. Monopoliology. Thou also piggesnie might do well in a back-butting. And he smiled foolishly and smacked kisses at the air in Kit's direction. Kit then. He should not have but he did.

  Kit then with two swift hands rammed the table edge so that the whole sizeable hunk of elmwood was down on Orwell and Simkin so that they were on the floor heavily. Then he seized Bradley by the back hair and wound it tight what time he thrust two fingers ugh and ugh up his filthy nostrils as he would reach his very pia mater, and Bradley's blind fingers sought his dagger. But Kit by his distasteful nose hole-boring, the distaste in his face much evident, had borne Bradley over and now had him on the splintery floor planks where he danced briefly upon him, on the watch for recovering Orwell and Simkin. Bradley's dagger had escaped from his belt and Kit now joyously seized it, making for Orwell and Simkin who were staggering to their feet though firmly drawing. As Bradley was rising cursing, Kit dealt him a kick on the chin which thrust him temporarily out of combat. He then slashed Orwell's daggering wrist, making Orwell howl and seek to drink the blood to stem its flow. Simkin crying no no he then ripped in the trunks so that his shame would be exposed to the world. This was enough for those two, though Bradley on his feet with panting oaths and arms flailing made to encircle Kit's neck, which, as Kit wore a newly clean ruff to be prized, Kit would by no means have. So he buffeted Bradley to the wall by the serving hatch, took a quart pewter mug that rested there, and battered his lousy head till it lolled. All this time we others watched and gaped. Kit then panted that he would have water to wash his hands that were so defiled that he was like to vomit, and Simkin, hearing that word, began to take it as an injunction to do so, which he did in green and yellow copiosity. Jack Alleyn's two potboys pumped up water from the well in the yard that backed the inn and brought it in three buckets. Kit washed and washed and washed as he would never cease washing, then all three loads were flooded on to Simkin and his puke. He left howling and soaked and tottering and the others followed with breathy threats. Kit bestowed a kick in valediction on Bradley and thus the Unicorn was restored to a kind of cleanliness proper to that emblem of virginity. But Jack Alleyn shook his head, saying:

  - They will have you. They will slit your throat. His brother said:

  - Where did you learn?

  Kit, who panted less and drank thirstily of a nearquart, sat and said:

  - It was in Canterbury. Fighting the Huguenots. The Huguenots can be very filthy fighters.

  - God's big body, Henslowe said piously. Are they not our religious brothers?

  - I have no love for the Huguenots.

  - Come, Ned Alleyn said, to supper. You, Jack?

  - I stay. There is a barrel to be broached. He nodded direly at Kit. So we left. Henslowe made for the Bankside but Tom Kyd, penniless but hungry, kept close to us, though Watson, who said he would pay, had not meant that he be included in the supping company.

  - Vomit, Kit said to him. I said the word and that ruffian did it. It is somewhat like Seneca and Thomas Kyd Esquire, would you not say?

  - I am no esquire, Kyd muttered. Your meaning?

  - For the one the word suffices, the other is lost without the action.

  - I do not follow you.

  - No matter, Kit said as we walked, oft slithering, the cobbles were slimy and rats peered from the kennel as the sun westered and would break the heart of the man who yearned above our filthy lot with its vision of heaven in trumpet colours. Masterless dogs scavenged and cats with staring coats darted or limped. And so we came to the Triple Tun,
with its trinity of barrels on the sign that creaked in the sunset wind. Within, the lamps were already swinging from the rafters, the flames of candles danced, and fat was in the fire of the kitchen open to the view at the far end. So we sat and were greeted by Shilliber himself who, with his wife, bade the ordinary thrive with its coffined meats, browned fowls, flummeries, tarts and syllabubs. Good red wine, he announced, had come the long journey from Bergerac. Jolly eaters waved or nodded at Ned Alleyn, and some gave him the fanfare of What outcries. So we asked for the great veal pie with its minced dates and a mingling of cream in the peppery gravy, also wine in a crock drawn bubbling from the cask. And Kit, in exhilaration of his dousing the bravoes, grew talkative. He spoke of Machiavelli and his Prince and of Simon Patricke's Englishing of Gentillet's Contre-Machiavel which had been his bed-book at Corpus Christi. He said:

  - I have lines for him. The man himself, old Nick, on the stage in black, croaking:

  I forget the rest, but it is all writ down.

  - You spoke that too loud about the childish toy, Kyd said. See, there is one looking and one taking it down on his tablets. There are spies all over.

  - Not my thought though my words, Kit said. But I see the danger. A man can be identified with his creation. Create a villain and you become a villain.

  - Those devilish verses would be in the manner of a prologue, Alleyn mused. But the prologue of what piece?

  - Machiavel is no Satan, Kit said. It is his honesty that astounds. We have seen in our time men sent to the flames or the hangman's hands on the grounds of their rejecting the holy word of God as our prelates interpret it. These prelates have lifted up their eyes as they were swooning with joy at the salvation of the sinner through deeply regretted agony inflicted. But they were and are hypocritical. They love the pain of others for in it their own power is made manifest. It is the one thing men want. Not knowledge, not virtue, but power. This Machiavel knew, this he has taught us. And so the show of holiness is in the service of the love of power. But our prelates would be shocked to be told it is but a show. They do not gaze deep into themselves. Machiavel counsels this and sees virtue in dissimulation if it be exercised in the pursuit of power. You yourselves look shocked so I will say no more.

  By this time the coffined veal had been placed steaming on the board by Shilliber's younger daughter Kate, whose hoisted bosom was well on show. Ned Alleyn took the great ladle and dug in and the spiced aroma rose. We proffered our dishes and he unladled with a clash of metal on metal. Kyd's watering was visible to the depth of his chin: saliva played in his reddish beard. He ate greedily and Tom Watson gently disengaged his hand from his horn spoon that grace might be said. I, at Henslowe's nod, said it:

  - May the good Lord bless our victuals. As our bellies fill with thankfulness may our souls fill with grace. Amen.

  - Well, Kit said, but toying with his sauced veal, it is a good grace. Meaning that there is no harm in it. But God's grace is no special condiment. And it is more of a bestowal for the abstinent than for the gorger.

  Kyd gorged. Tom Watson ate with delicacy. Kit drank deep and praised the Bergerac red. Watson said, delicately munching:

  - I see some great giant striding the stage in the pursuit of power. There are such giants out there in Europe but topicality is dangerous. Machiavel, they say, is the Bible of the French queen mother. Put her on the stage and that would put you in jail.

  - The topical, Kyd said indistinctly, veal sauce colouring his beard, must ever be inserted as it were on the side. My tragedy is of Spain and Portugal but on the side. To bring in King Philip would be indiscreet, however we know him to be the enemy. Young sir, you must learn of discretion. London will teach it if Cambridge not. And he fell to again.

  Kit smacked his lips over a fresh potation, saying: By God this wine is good, call for more. And then: Discretion is a great killer of God's truth or the devil's. We must not wound, we must not discharge a nauseous stink in the nostrils of the hypocritical.

  - Talk not of stinks, Ned Alleyn said, when we are eating.

  - Yes, I see that and say pardon. Discretion is a matter of good table manners. But it is not more.

  - You must learn, Kyd said, dish held out like an alms bowl for a second serving. Discretion at the last will save your neck. You will regret indiscretion when your dying eyes see in an instant the cutting out of your beating heart and the tumbling into the air of your bloody bowels.

  - I beg you, Ned Alleyn cried in pain.

  - Well, he must learn, Kyd said. But I cry you regret. He impelled me to it.

  - To turn your belly to a wineskin, Watson warned, is the royal way to a quelling of discretion. And tomorrow early you must be of clear eye and brain. I will not call for more.

  - More, more, cried Kit. In youth is pleasure. Then, grinning like a fool, he stroked my unfeeding hand, which was to his right. Is it not so, you luscious Bel-Imperia that was, nay, you are better as you are, women are but machines for breeding, boys are perfection. To be young and of lucent skin and luminous eye, the flesh not yet disfigured with the gross hairiness of what is termed maturity, to be of youth's sweet breath and unpustular and unblemished by fatty comedones -

  - What is that word? I asked, reaching for a bread manchet with my left hand.

  - It is Greek. It means sebaceous eruptions.

  - Please, said Ned Alleyn in agony.

  - You are wrong, Kyd said. It is Latin.

  - I will wager you it is Greek.

  - It is Latin. A comedo is a glutton.

  - Then you, sir, are a comedo. But I still say it is Greek.

  - You try to be too much the Greek, said Kyd. This is not Plato's Symposium. Learn discretion. Take your hand away.

  - Discretion discretion, Kit cried to the whole ordinary, so that many, chewing, looked. And he opened out the four syllables with a verberant gong stroke on the on. Then he sang to a tune of his own devising words of his own devising:

  Shilliber came up to us, chewing his nether lip, and made eye-gestures of plain meaning though not to Kit. Tom Watson sighing said:

  -Well, I had a mind to eat your hayberry flawn, but I have a duty to my guest.

  - That is another fine word, cried Kit, and he sang duty duty duty like some loud bird. Then he became suffused with a kind of green sickness. Ah well, he murmured in some sobriety, we are but the guests of life, we begin aghast and end a ghost. And he raised himself abruptly so that his chair fell and suffered himself to be led away by Tom Watson. But outside in the street on their way to Hog Lane corner he could be heard singing with force but tunelessly:

  Tom Kyd shook sadly his head as his horn spoon dug into a dish of flummery and, in a mood of prophecy, said he gave him but few years.

  I M U ST suppose, I suppose, that Kit was giddy with his crapula when he stood before Mr Secretary of State at eight the following summer morning, the enfeebling sun in his eyes. Mr but a knight, this being Sir Francis Walsingham, lord of the Service as it was called. He was a frail dark man that the Queen, who liked him little, called the Moor. This was royal ingratitude, since on her behoof, and partly from his own pockets that were not bottomless, he maintained fifty-three sniffing agents between Calais and Constantinople. These he called his eyes. He said, and it was a strange echo, as if he himself had eyes that could pierce a man's breast:

  - Duty with discretion. Sign your name here. And he pushed forward abruptly on his paperloaded table a particular paper, neatly scrivened, which, so Kit with his painful crapulous sight descried painfully, said something of an oath of secrecy and lifelong fealty and much more of a binding nature. Kit felt as if two men, each holding an end of rope that was coiled about his neck, pulled and pulled opposedly. He said:

  - Wait. I cannot be so committed. I am still a student with years of study to go. Mr Watson here has doubtless told you of my situation.

  - One that is committed to the taking of holy orders but is also a poet of sorts and is wavering in his allegiances. This signing is by way of fixing
the ultimate allegiance which is above both. We will have no wavering in this respect. (And he fixed on Kit stern eyes black as hell's hobs.) The Queen, the Queen, and her holy Church. A man who will not put his name to such a testimony of allegiance may well call himself a traitor.

  - I am no traitor but I am dubious about signing.

  - Dubiety is in itself a sort of treachery. Sign.

  So Kit dubiously signed with a swan feather and ink black as the gaze of him who was to be his master. Sir Francis frowned at the scrawl arsiversy, saying: I see the first name is Christopher and a good name, one who bears Christ on his back, but what is this other?

  - The beginning is sure, being Marl or Merl or sometimes Morl, but we are not clear in the family whether it be Marley or Morley or Marlowe. I have in my time been called Merlin, the magician's name. This I write is, I think, Marlowe. May I now sit?

  - You would do better to brace yourself to attention in soldier fashion, for you are now a soldier of the cause.

  At this, Tom Watson, who lolled in a fine Spanish chair all knobs and curlicues which should have been wooden heresy to Walsingham but displayed his ironic temper, smiled and smiled and Walsingham sourly released a smile as if he must dearly pay for it, saying: Eh, eh, Thomas?

  This study in Walsingham's mansion was small and stuffy and, as it were, penitential, the window shut tight to the summer air of noisy London as though the very motes were charged with enemy poison. There were bulky papers bound in tapes, some near-tumbling from their shelves, and there was a drawn map of Europe with red-headed pins to mark the loci of spies for England, not all of them English. Walsingham said:

  - You will have to meet Poley, for Poley will be your help and guide and master under myself, but at the present Poley is in the Fleet prison, only for a supposed and fictitious crime, for he is there to nose out priests. He will be out soon. You will meet him at Dover, for he must be your cicerone into a Europe black as hell.

  - So. I am to go into Europe. Kit could not hold back a shiver of pride, that he was to go into Europe.

  - Yes, and soon. You are to visit the city of Rheims. Tell me something of Rheims.

  - It is in France. I know little more.

  - Our Catholic traitors pondered their coming onslaught on our realm and its lawful monarch in the town of Douai. They had been sluiced out of the Lowlands by William of Orange and rightly. Philip of Spain, the inferno is being stoked for him, founded the university of Douai because he feared the protestantism of his Dutch subjects, and what they call the English College was set up there. Set up for the training of filthy priests to come to our land disguised as dancing masters to mutter the mass in priest-holes and dare the risk of capture and drawing and quartering. It is a kind of courage but as much may be said of the kitticat cast in the tub for drowning that swims and swims. The Pope in Rome, the devilish pincers are waiting to drag out his nails everlastingly, puts a hundred gold crowns each month into this venture. It has left Douai and is now established at Rheims, a nobler town where kings are crowned. So Rheims goes with Rome and Spain and hell itself as loci of diabolism that menace our Queen and must be prayed against. And, here you come in, acted against.