Rejection had wrought deep changes in Master Roger Bartholomew. He felt defiled. When he saw his play about Richard the Lionheart performed at The Queen's Head, he thought that he had finished with the theatre for ever but his Muse had other ideas. Directed back to the playhouse, he had now suffered such comprehensive rejection that it turned his brain. He discovered a vengeful streak in himself that he had never even suspected before. They had hurt him: he wanted to strike back.
Lord Westfield's Men became the target for his obsessive hatred. Other companies had turned him down but Lawrence Firethorn had done far worse than that. He had ruined one play by the young poet then reviled another. To make matters worse, he was playing the leading role in a new drama on exactly the same subject as An Enemy Routed. In his feverish state, Bartholomew wondered if his play had been plundered to fill out the other. It would not be the first time that an author's work had been pillaged.
As he stood outside The Curtain, he could hear the voices booming away inside during the rehearsal. He could not make out the words or identify the speakers, but he knew one thing. Gloriana Triumphant had dispossessed him. He reached out to snatch another playbill from its post. If talent and justice meant anything in the theatre, it was his play that should be advertised all over London, and his words that should now be ringing out behind the high walls of the playhouse.
Bartholomew stood above all things for the primacy of the word, for the natural ascendancy of the poet. Firethorn and his company worked to other rules. They promoted the actor as the central figure in the theatre. A play to them was just a fine garment that they could wear once or twice for effect before discarding. An Enemy Routed had been discarded before it was even worn. No consideration at all had been shown for its author's feelings.
Lord Westfield's Men deserved to be punished for their arrogance. He elected himself to administer that punishment. All that he had to decide was its exact nature.
*
Adversity was a rope that bound them more tightly together. In the face of their setbacks, Westfield's Men responded with speedy resolution. The injured apprentice was taken home and his deputy, Martin Yeo, started to rehearse at once. Even as he was working out on stage, the tiremen were altering Gloriana's costume to fit him and redressing the red wig that he was to wear. Yeo had already learned the role in readiness and so the eleventh hour substitution was less of a problem than it might have been, but there were still movements to master, entrances and exits to memorize, due note to be taken of the performances of those around the Queen so that he could play off them.
Nicholas Bracewell, meanwhile, had taken steps to stabilize the mast and sail. When it was set up now, a series of ropes led down from its top to different parts of the stage and tied off on hooks or cleats. The mast was so solid that it was possible for someone to climb it. Ever the opportunist, Firethorn cast the smallest of the journeymen as a ship boy and told him to shin up the mast. It would be a good effect in performance.
A bewildering variety of chores kept George Dart on the move throughout the play. At Nicholas's suggestion, he was given another job as well. Because they could not guarantee that a wind would blow the next afternoon, Dart was handed a long piece of rope that was attached to the heart of the sail. Concealed on the balcony above the stage, he was to tug violently on cue to give the impression that the ship was being blown along by a gale. It was the first time in his young career that he had ever taken on the role of the west wind.
Even Barnaby Gill pitched in to help with the emergency. He suspended his ultimatum about Samuel Ruff until after the performance, and did what he could to keep up everyone's spirits. Against all the odds, the play began to come together. Frantic rewriting by Edmund Hoode eliminated the part that Martin Yeo had played before and smoothed out one or two other lumps. Morale was high at the end of an interminable rehearsal.
'Well, Nick. What do you think?'
'I think we'll get through.'
'We'll do more than that, dear heart. Dicky may have gone but there are still many other sublime performances. I wager that we'll hold them in the palm of our hands.'
'It never does to tempt fate,' warned Nicholas.
They were standing together on the now almost empty stage at The Curtain, reviewing the day and its vicissitudes. Firethorn suddenly declaimed his first speech, aiming it at the galleries and raking up various positions to do so. Nicholas soon realized what he was doing. The actor was trying to work out precisely where Lady Rosamund Varley would be sitting.
'We'll show ' em, Nick.'
'Who, master?'
'Giles Randolph and his ilk.'
'Ah.'
'You saw the fellow here last. How did he fare?'
'Indifferently. It was a poor play.'
'A poor play with a poor player. I will act him off the stage, sir!'
'You are without compare,' said Nicholas tactfully.
'Tomorrow is an important day for us,' continued the other. 'We must prove ourselves once and for all. Our dear patron will rely on us to increase his lustre. We must use this new play to stake our claim to the highest honour-an invitation to play at court.'
'It's long overdue.'
Firethorn made a deep bow to acknowledge nonexistent applause that reverberated in his ears. He was already at court, performing before the Queen and her entourage, receiving royal favour, achieving yet another success in the auditorium of his mind. Nicholas saw that his ambition had another side to it than mere glory. Performance at court would be in front of a small, exclusive, private audience that would include Lady Rosamund Varley. She ruled on the throne of his heart at the moment.
'I would be in Elysium,' confided Firethorn.
'It will come.'
'Let us ensure it, Nick.'
When everything had been cleared away and locked up ready for the morrow, they all departed. There was sadness for Richard Honeydew that he had been robbed of his first taste of stardom but the performance had to continue and everyone had bent themselves to that end. Company rivalry was paramount. Banbury's Men had done themselves less than credit at The Curtain. Lawrence Firethorn and his fellows could dazzle by comparison.
*
It was a long, lonely walk back to Bishopsgate and Nicholas still had more than a mile to go when he entered the City. But he was too preoccupied to notice the extent of his journey or the stiff breeze that swept through the dark night. Will Fowler still haunted him as did the actor's young widow. Two battered prostitutes, one of whom had been subsequently murdered, also had a strong claim on his sympathy. He feared for Samuel Ruff whose place with the company was now in jeopardy. He worried for Richard Honeydew. There was even a vestigial concern for Roger Bartholomew, who had been ousted from the theatre almost before he had got into it. The book holder puzzled over the ruined playbills that George Dart had reported with such trepidation. They had enemies enough without that.
What kept pushing itself to the forefront of his mind, however, was the surly face of Benjamin Creech. Why had the man denied being at The Curtain and concealed his old association with Banbury's Men? What had been the real cause of his fight with Will Fowler? Had the injury to Richard Honeydew really been an accident? Did Nicholas truly see a glint of relish in Creech's eyes or had he imagined it?
Speculation and recrimination carried him all the way back to Bankside. He was almost home when the trouble came. Turning into a side-street, he suddenly had the feeling that he was being followed. His years at sea had helped him to develop a sixth sense for self-preservation and his hand stole quickly to his dagger. He listened for a footfall behind him but heard none. When he spun around, there was nobody there. He continued on his way, ready to dismiss it as a trick of his imagination, when a tall, hulking figure stepped out of an alley ahead of him to block his way. The man was some fifteen yards away and seen only in hazy outline through the gloom, but Nicholas knew at once who he was. They had met before at the Hope and Anchor when a friend had been murdered. There had been more evidence of his handiwork at The Cardinal's Hat.
Pulling out his dagger, Nicholas bunched himself to charge but he did not get far. Before he had moved a yard or so, something hard and solid struck him on the back of the head and sent him down into a black whirlpool of pain. The last thing he remembered was the sound of footsteps running away over the cobblestones. The rest was cold void.
*
Lawrence Firethorn was at his best in a crisis. The threat of resignation by Barnaby Gill and the sudden loss of Richard Honeydew had imposed pressures which he had surmounted with bravery. Pulling the company together in its hour of need, he fired them with the possibilities of the morrow and infected them with his unassailable self-confidence. The play would be another afternoon of glory for him and it would be followed-in time-by a whole night of magic. Gloriana Triumphant and fourteen lines of poetry would win him the favours of Lady Rosamund Varley.
After all the setbacks of the day, therefore, he returned home with a light step to receive a kiss of welcome from his crusting wife. But the kiss did not come and the trust seemed to have gone. Frost had settled on Margery's ample brow.
'What ails you, my love?' he asked blithely.
'I've been talking with Dicky.'