Will Shakespeare and the Pirate's Fire Page 7

  There was an intensity in Dee’s voice that Will had never heard before. Walter, however, remained sceptical. “What? Do you think she materialised out of thin air?” he scoffed.

  Dee ignored the question. “Will, how did you come to find her?”

  “I was trying out that perspective glass of yours,” Will replied, “and it fixed upon her. She just seemed to jump into view.”

  Dee rubbed his hands together gleefully. “Yes, of course, of course!”

  “Why of course?” Will asked.

  “The lens is designed to capture and expand beams of light,” Dr Dee explained, “and in so doing must naturally be influenced by them. The glow of angelic light, while it might be invisible to mortal eyes, would draw the glass to itself as surely as a lodestone is drawn to the magnetic north.”

  “We can’t navigate by angelic light,” said Walter dismissively.

  “Not yet,” said Dee, “but perhaps we are on the threshold of something new and wonderful.”

  “You don’t suppose it could just be luck?” asked Will dubiously.

  “There is no place for luck in true philosophy,” Dee chided him. “Angels, spirits, celestials powers, whatever you choose to call them, they are all about us, steering a man’s fate and tilting the course of nations. And they have chosen to deliver this lost soul to me.”

  Walter snorted. “I’ll wager she’s one of those wenches that ply their trade by the docks. She gave ill service and an angry client tossed her in the river.”

  Dr Dee looked pityingly on the sleeping woman. “If she had a previous life, she’s dead to that now, washed clean like the world after Noah’s Flood.” He thought for a moment then said, “I’ll name her Magdalena, after the woman brought out of sin by Our Lord.”

  “We could call her Maddie for short,” Will suggested.

  “That suits her better,” laughed Walter, “for I’ll be damned if she’s not mad as a March hare and—”

  Abruptly they all fell silent. The woman was speaking again.

  “Black stone, black stone, black stone” she crooned over and over again, as if they were the most important words in the world. Dee and Walter stared at each other, and this time Walter appeared just as astonished as the doctor.

  “The Black Stone!” he repeated. His fingers clenched the hilt of his sword.

  Dr Dee ordered a bedchamber to be prepared for Maddie, then one of the female servants Will had glimpsed flitting about the house changed her out of her wet robe into a nightgown. She was fed hot soup with sops of fresh bread then left to sleep for most of the day.

  Will went back to work on the play, inventing ways to weave the country sprite Robin Goodfellow into the action. As he toiled, he found his thoughts drifting back to the rock he had seen in the casket the night before. He had no doubt it was the Black Stone by the way the woman’s words had struck Dr Dee and Walter like a thunderbolt. He had not dared question them about it, for their manner had immediately become so secretive he was afraid they would banish him from the house if he appeared too inquisitive.

  But his curiosity could not be denied. He took to drifting from room to room on the pretext of hunting for trifles – paper, ink, a fresh quill pen. In this way he was able to track Walter and the doctor’s movements throughout the day. He saw them consulting maps, whispering in corners and disappearing behind closed doors to argue.

  Once he even risked standing by the door of Dr Dee’s study long enough to overhear a discussion.

  “Walter, she mentioned the Black Stone!” said Dee. “What other proof do you need?”

  “There’s more things learned by simple spying than by talking to angels,” Walter retorted.

  “Is that really what you think?”

  “I don’t know what to think,” said Walter, exasperated, “but I’m ready to let you steer your course for the sake of what might be gained.”

  “Riches and fame, eh, Walter?”

  “Perhaps a whole world,” Walter answered. He did not sound like he was joking.

  At this point one of the maids appeared at the other end of the passage and Will slipped behind a hanging tapestry before she spotted him spying. He waited until he was sure she was gone, but before he could emerge from hiding he heard the door open.

  Walter and Dr Dee were oddly silent as they came out and when Will risked a peek at their receding backs he saw Walter had a casket under his arm – the very one that contained the Black Stone. Will crept after them, padding silently down the passageways.

  The two men made their way to Maddie’s chamber and emerged mere minutes later with the woman, a warm cloak wrapped round her shoulders, a dreamy expression on her face. Dr Dee led her gently while Walter followed, clutching the casket so tightly, you would have thought it was stuffed full of diamonds and rubies.

  Their destination was the library, which pleased Will. Nowhere in all of Mortlake House were there more places to hide. He slid along the walls of books, keeping several discreet paces behind as Dr Dee led Maddie to a seat in the centre of the room. Will deftly removed a thick volume from a convenient shelf so that he could observe them through the gap.

  Opening the casket, Walter lifted out the mysterious Black Stone and placed it on the table directly in front of Maddie.

  Will caught his breath. Could this be the magical philosopher’s stone Caleb had been telling him about? It was certainly like no rock Will had seen before, but it didn’t look like Dee and Walter had come here to conjure up gold.

  “Is this what you wanted, Maddie?” Dee asked kindly.

  Maddie nodded and reached a tentative finger towards the stone. As soon as she touched it she stiffened so dramatically it made Dr Dee gasp. There followed a pause so hushed and still, Will almost fancied that time itself had stopped. Then Dee broke the silence.

  “What’s happening, Maddie? What do you see?”

  “Nothing,” Maddie answered distantly.

  “Nothing?” said Walter. He sounded annoyed.

  “Nothing but light,” Maddie said. Her voice rose in pitch.

  “The light – it’s filled with wings and eyes, moving and watching, guiding and guarding.”

  Dee and Walter traded glances. “Ask her for more,” Walter said. Will had never heard him speak so softly.

  Leaning in over Maddie’s shoulder, Dee asked, “Can you see past the light?”

  “Yes!” Maddie sounded enraptured. “The angels are carrying me now, away across the sky to some far off place. Far, far away. Oh, I see blue water! It’s surely the sea, stretching away and away.”

  “Can you tell me anything else about it?” asked Dee.

  “Yes,” Maddie replied with a shiver. “It’s cold, it’s very cold.”

  Dee gave Walter a satisfied side-glance and said, “Wait a moment, Maddie. I must record this.”

  He disappeared briefly into the maze of shelves and returned with a large green book, locked shut with a brass clasp. He took out a small key that was hanging from a chain about his neck and used it to unlock the book. Then he seated himself next to Maddie with the book open in front of him, a pen and ink ready to hand.

  “Let the angels take you further,” he said, “and tell me what you see.”

  Maddie sucked in a deep breath. “White cliffs,” she half-chanted, “blocking us in on every side. They’re high as castle walls, trying to keep us out.”

  Walter’s eyes were fixed upon her in fascination. His usual air of insolent mirth was quite gone.

  Dee scribbled down her words. “And what now?” he prompted her. “Can you see a way through?”

  “I see open water ahead,” said Maddie. There was a tension in her voice, as if the vision was placing a heavy strain on her. “I see steeples of ice rising out of a misty sea…crystal galleons drifting by on a freezing tide.”

  “It’s Frobisher’s Passage, surely,” breathed Walter.

  “Can you see further?” asked Dee, his pen working swiftly.

  “I’m trying,” Maddie moaned, �
�but it’s very hard. It’s a wilderness of white and the light hurts my eyes. I think I see…I think I see…”

  She lay both hands upon the black stone and craned over it, moaning wordlessly to herself. Walter made a move towards her but Dee waved him back.

  “Tell me,” the doctor urged. “Tell me what you see.”

  Maddie abruptly shot to her feet, the stone gripped between her hands. Her whole body was quivering now. “It’s dangerous to go on!” she gasped.

  Dee stood up. “It’s all right,” he assured her in a calm voice. “You’re quite safe here.”

  “I’m safe nowhere!” Maddie declared shrilly. “The cold is biting into me. It’s freezing me to the heart!”

  She began to sway unsteadily from side to side.

  “This is too much!” said Dee, dropping his pen. He stood up and tried to wrestle the black stone away from Maddie. Her grip tightened convulsively and she bared her teeth like an enraged cat. With a determined heave Dee wrenched it out of her grasp and fell back into his chair.

  Maddie uttered a high pitched shriek and swooned. Before Walter could catch her, she collapsed across the table, striking the empty casket with an outstretched arm and sending it clattering to the floor.

  Mortlake, XIIIth Daye of August, 1579

  My Dear Parents,

  This truly is a House of Madnesse and Wonders. I have encountered Monsters, Faeries, Ogres, and now a Mermaid we have named Maddie. I suppose she is not really a Mermaid (that was Walter’s joke), but she is the most curious woman I ever met. She has no possessions other than the gown she was wearing and no memory of who she is or where she came from.

  I hit upon the notion of clothing her out of the stage garb of Lord Strange’s Men and made haste to the barn where the costumes are stored. As I rummaged through the chests, Tom Craddock complained most sorely that these queenly gowns were meant for him and tried to drive me off with a cannonade of sneezes.

  After I had given her the robes, she paraded around in them with a playful smile on her lips. “I’m fit to be a Queen, don’t you think, Will?” she asks in that curious accent of hers. “Maybe I am a Queen, and if my memory ever comes back I’ll return to my homeland to claim my throne.”

  She is all contradiction, one minute skipping about the garden like a carelesse damsel, the next raging like a half-starved bear over some imagined slight. Just yesterdaye she was passing among the Players as they rehearsed – all smile and lightnesse of step – when Ralph mocked her regal bearing, suggesting that even a boy in woman’s garb had more claim to Queenlinesse than she.

  She shoots him a look as sharp as an arrow, then seizes him by the hand. With a strength prodigious in a wench, she bends his wrist so painfully he’s brought to his knees. She curses him for a milk-livered scut and uses other names you would not wish me to report. Fortunately for the haplesse Ralph, Master Henry Beeston intervened to apologise on his behalf, whereupon Maddie released him and turned all honey-sweet once more.

  And so she piles confusion upon confusion, for if she has no recall of her family or her estate, whence comes this hot-tempered pride?

  Dr Dee believes Maddie is in communication with Spirits and, as I have witnessed, he has been recording the messages she receives from the Spiritual Realm. His friend Walter Raleigh, for all his worldliness, is also not immune to Maddie’s enchantment. However, I suspect it is her physical ornaments that hold him in thrall rather than any communication she might impart from the Realm of Spirits. Young as he is – no more than twenty-four, I reckon – his life is already filled with many Adventures, which he is not slowe to relate, but when Maddie runs a finger down his arm and speakes sweetly in his ear, he appears more confounded than if he were sailing through a tempest into the gaping maw of a sea serpent. Today Dr Dee has dispatched him to London to purchase some charts, but I cannot help suspecting he has sent him away to spare him further discomposure.

  Even Caleb, as surly a fellow as ever walked the earth, has fallen victim to her charms. Many times I have spied them huddled together in hushed conversation, and once I saw Caleb’s mouth contort into something disturbingly close to a smile. This morning I came upon him slouching down a passageway with a vase under his arm. When I ask where he is taking it, he answers curtly, “I was cleaning it. Now I’m putting it back.” He snatches the figurine of a Roman goddess out of a nearby alcove and set the vase in its place. Seeing in this the solution to a mystery that has been puzzling me for days, I asked, “Do you think you should be moving these things from place to place? It might confuse people.”

  “Where’s the harm in it, Master Shakeshaft?” is his reply. “I have my rights in this house after all.” He was about to go when I made reference – perhaps unwisely – to his friendship with Maddie. He fixes me with a glowering eye, and accuses me of spying on him. “I gave you the offer of my friendship, Master Shakeshaft,” sayes he, “and you spurned it. That lady is quicker of wit than you, maybe wiser even than the Doctor. Oh, yes, I’ll have my due,” sayes he. And with that he lurches off out of sight.

  The brighter side of all this is that Dr Dee is so occupied with Maddie and his researches that he has lost all interest in supervising the preparation of Pluto and Proserpina. Thus I am free to effect the many necessary changes without giving him explanation. When I weary of Dr Dee’s verses, I visit the Library and find relief in the tales of Ovid and the comedies of Plautus.

  London is only eight miles distant and I fancy there must be many wonderful sights to behold there. Having come so close (it is one hundred miles from Stratford) it would be a shame to see none of them. But my businesse binds me here like a chain and by the time this work is finished, I hope to return to Stratford to see you all again.

  So London must await my call.

  God guard and bless and keep you all,

  Your most poetical Sonne,

  Will Shakeshaft Shakspere

  12 Curtain Saturday

  Will poised his spear and took a deep breath. Keeping his eye fixed on his prey, he struck. The sharp point pierced the surface and glanced off a marbled pebble. The trout flashed by without a scratch and disappeared into the deeper water where he could not follow.

  “Clodpole!” Will cursed himself.

  For the past half hour he had been stalking barefoot through the shallows of the Thames, home-made spear at the ready. But he’d lost patience and stabbed too soon, forgetting how the water deceived the eye.

  A hard morning wrestling with Duke Theseus’s epilogue, which marked the welcome close of Dr Dee’s play, had left him exhausted. The speech seemed to drone on forever in language so bloated he could hardly judge what to keep and what to cut out. Finally he decided that if he didn’t stop and have some fun he would end up as addled as Maddie.

  Fleeing the library for the orchard, he broke a branch from one of the trees and whittled it to a sharp point, as his father had taught him when he was only five. John Shakespeare had trained him to move cautiously so as not to startle the fish, and taught him where on the Avon he would find the most plentiful hunting grounds.

  The Thames was another matter. Will wondered if the great river were simply barren by nature or whether some baleful influence emanating from Mortlake House was scaring the fish away.

  Disgusted with his failure, he decided to abandon the hunt. Returning to the bank, he was just pulling on his shoes when a splashing from beyond the drooping willow trees alerted his poacher’s instincts. He was trespassing on no one’s property here, but force of habit made him withdraw into the shelter of the bushes.

  Peering from cover, he glimpsed a small rowing boat forging upstream, very close to his side of the river.

  The sole oarsman had his back turned, so his face was hidden from view, but Will noted that he kept casting furtive glances towards land. It looked like he was keeping in the shade of the overhanging foliage so he could not be spotted from the windows of Mortlake House.

  From his vantage point in the undergrowth, Will watched as
the rower pulled ashore and climbed on to land. The stranger cast a wary look around him. He was a short, wiry man with grizzled hair, dressed in sailor’s garb, with baggy breeches tucked into his leather sea boots and a curved sword dangling from a belt that hung crosswise over his shoulder.

  Singling out a nearby beech tree, the stranger pulled a knife from his boot and carved a zigzag notch in the bark. Then he took something from his pocket and concealed it among the roots before returning to his boat and taking to the river once more. With the current now behind him, he quickly disappeared around a bend.

  Will was intrigued by this elaborate performance. Checking that the rowing boat was well out of sight, he went to the beech tree and raked his fingers through the leaf-mould at its base. The mystery object came readily to hand. It was a small scroll of yellow paper.

  Unrolling it, Will saw two words written in a clumsy hand:

  CURTAIN SATURDAY

  He stared at the writing but could make no sense of it. To the best of his knowledge there was nothing special about the coming Saturday. Certainly he had never heard of a feast day or holiday by that outlandish name.

  He decided against taking the scroll to Dr Dee who would most likely attribute the whole incident to angelic spirits communicating information too subtle for human wits to grasp. Walter, on the other hand, would probably just laugh at him. But the message was clearly intended for someone, so wouldn’t they be coming to collect it?

  Will rolled the paper up again and stashed it back among the tree roots. Then he darted back to his own hiding place to wait and see if anyone else came along.

  His initial excitement yielded to boredom as the day dragged on. He risked standing for a few moments to shake the stiffness out of his limbs and it was then he heard the telltale crack of a breaking twig. Someone was coming. Will dropped back into cover. A few moments later a familiar figure appeared out of the trees. It was Maddie.

  She was strolling downhill toward the waterside. Arms swinging casually at her sides, she made for the shade of the beech tree. Gathering her skirts, she sank to her knees and began running her fingers through the grass. Then she suddenly plunged a hand into the midst of the tree roots and pulled out the scroll.