One Dagger For Two Page 2

  Pudding Lane branched off Thames Street, a comparatively wide thoroughfare that curved from the Tower wellnigh to Blackfriars, ending at the old Castle of Baynard that rose high against the distant windmills of Hampstead in a series of vertical towers; it was a busy street with many merchant-houses in it, pressed between fishmonger-shops, breweries and, for some peculiar reason, a great many ironmongers.

  Poking his head out of the window and glancing towards the right, Marlowe could see one span of this Thames Street, could see merely the high gables of a merchant’s counting-house, smoky, and leaning forward a little, as if crippled. If he glanced to the left, up Pudding Lane, he saw Little Eastcheap — or rather, a piece of Little Eastcheap — where the basket-makers, turners and butchers made their living.

  It was not a savoury area; it stank of rotten meat and bad fish, but Marlowe had one of those hard stomachs over which smells have no control. He liked the place, not only because it was cheap, but because it was near London Bridge, a few minutes’ walk away, and from there he could easily hire a wherry to take him to the Surrey side where the theatres and bear gardens were, out of reach of the puritanical city aldermen.

  To-day, however, when he reached home after wandering through Southwark and Bankside and lounging with his friends in the fields, he detested the city. He went to bed that night with a real horror of London making him feel ill, and he awoke next day with a feeling, if possible, of even worse horror. It had been snowing, and the flakes lay thick upon his window-sill.

  Terribly cold it was, and he dressed swiftly after washing his face with a wet flannel. Then he sat shivering in front of a miserable fire and brooded on his wasted life. What was there for him to do in this vile city? He couldn’t work, there was nothing to do but to drink. Soon, friends would be coming to drag him out, and he would begin again the daily round of drink and gambling. He was going the same road that Robin Greene had trod; and Greene, poor devil, had died snivelling in his bed with only an unwashed doxy to keep him warm. Would he, too, end like that? With only an unwashed doxy to keep him warm? Cold, hungry, thirsty, whining at God and snarling at man? It was money that caused the trouble; if he had but the smallest of incomes he could settle down and work; he must find a woman with money… Yet could he marry a woman he did not love?

  As he sat brooding over the fire, he heard somebody run up the stairs, sword rattling on the wall. Then the door was flung open and Tommy Nashe entered, dressed in black velvet; very sombre he looked, with fair pointed beard, untidy hair and thin face.

  “Not ready yet, Kit?” he said. “What’s gripped you? Get on your cloak and hat and to St. Paul’s.”

  “I’ve got work to do.”

  “It can wait. What’s work but an effort to put in time between meals? Have you money?”

  “For once I’m wealthy,” said Marlowe. “Dick lent me a few pounds. Take all I’ve left. There’s ten shillings or more in my purse.”

  Nashe took the purse from where it lay on the shelf beside some books, and he counted the money into his hand.

  “This is a good beginning,” he said, smiling. “Let’s to Madame Cotton’s and thrible it!”

  “I want to work,” grumbled Marlowe. He sighed, stood to his feet and went to the little table. “I can’t make this poem come right,” he said.

  “Why bother when you’ve got ten shillings to fling on the cards?” laughed Nashe. “Come on, lazy boy.”

  He stood indecisively, biting his lip and glaring at the manuscript. He knew that if he let Nashe go and himself remained to work, he would regret it and would waste all day regretting it. To stay lonely would be only to pander to his own ill humour.

  “Ay,” said he at last, “I’m with you.”

  *

  Day after day, the same. As he had done a hundred times before, he strolled out into the cold street with his friend, Tom Nashe. Snow was thick on the cobbles and banked against the sides of houses, gradually melting and turning to black mud. They paused, as they inevitably did, for half-a-pint of sack at the Red Rose, then strolled along the footway, past St. Margaret’s, into Thames Street. Here were drays and the dust of commerce; men in leather aprons tugged bales of goods that had sailed here from all quarters of Europe. Marlowe loved the conglomerate smells of Billingsgate: baskets of fish glinting like thin steel blades, oysters, golden crates of oranges, onions, wheat, rye and various grains. The place stank, and was noisy with the rattle of harness and the blowing of horses, with the shouts of workmen, with shrill-voiced accountants running briskly about, pens behind their ears and pewter inkhorns bouncing at their hips.

  Along Thames Street, westward, strolled the two friends, going now and then into taverns for a drink, passing the great merchant-houses, until they reached Paul’s Wharf Hill and wandered up through Knightriders Street and Carter Lane until they reached the south of St. Paul’s Cathedral by the churchyard. They entered through one of three large stone gateways to the west, beside the Lowlarde’s Tower where ecclesiastical prisoners were sometimes locked up. In the yard, within the high stone walls, booksellers had laid out their stalls, and they nodded pleasantly to Marlowe and Nashe as to men who knew the secrets of the trade. They nodded back but did not stop: books did not interest them, nor did they glance at the various posters glued here and there, nor at the serving-men shouting their own attainments in search of a master.

  They made straight for the wide steps, then into the middle aisle of the Cathedral, where under the high arched roof, between the great pillars, all London’s fashion strolled. Here was none of the august silence of a little church, here was no peace to think of God in; it was like a hive, humming and buzzing with the tap of men’s high heels, the padding of soft-soled shoes and the jar of women’s clogs, with the laughter of gallants, the whispering of lovers and thieves and the merry talk of gentlemen about the cut of a cloak and the hang of a sword.

  In an east chancel, service was under way, but none of this jostling throng took note of that; they curled their moustaches, showed the whiteness of their teeth, stuck out their swords arrogantly behind them, uptilting the short Italian cloaks, and playing with the ruffs and gold chains about their necks.

  “Why did we come?” said Marlowe, stopping at the door. “What devil is it that forces us to do the same stupid things every day!”

  “We come to meet friends,” said Nashe, “and to show off our clothes.”

  “My clothes aren’t worth showing, and I want to see no friend but you, Tom. Let’s go.”

  Even as he turned, somebody shouted at him from the crowd, and Frizer pushed his way over.

  “I hoped to meet you here!” he cried. “I’m hungry, and a man can’t eat by himself.”

  “You’ll have to pay for our company,” said Nashe. “We’ve eaten and I’m hanged if I’ll waste money on a second meal.”

  “I’ve money enough,” said Frizer. “Come, let’s to the Mermaid!”

  *

  Eating and drinking, quarrelling and showing tricks with the cards, ogling the pretty doxy who was swamping her gallant with all the wine she could order and fumbling with an air of wonderful simplicity for his purse stuck in his sleeve; a quarrel over the reckoning, a mighty damning of the cook, and a mightier damning of the vintner; then into the street, Bread Street, and around the corner into Watling Street, they went, where the drapers’ shops were like a chain of jewels, bright with silks and satins and velvets. They jested with the girls at the door placed there to entice them in, they argued over the cloths, felt samples, called the shopman a rogue, beat down his price, then left him with a vague assurance of sending their men with the money to-morrow, giving him all the bother of repacking the goods; tiring of this sport, they strolled into Goldsmiths’ Row, between Bread Street and the Cross in Eastcheap, where the beautiful row of shops and houses of a uniform height of four stories shaded the street with a facade of painted lead showing men tumbling on monstrous beasts, now sadly in need of repair, for the paint
was hanging in tatters. Into one of these houses the three friends went, knocking on the door in a secret fashion.

  This was Madame Cotton’s home of gambling, and here it was that Marlowe made his living, for at dice and cards he was the equal of any man in the kingdom. At Madame Cotton’s there was no cogging of dice or pricking of cards, it was a serious gambling house; she supplied all the materials and let no man use his own; and for this she took a shilling an hour from each player.

  “Give me back my money,” said Marlowe to Nashe; “now that you’ve dragged me here I won’t leave until I’ve not a farthing left.”

  In the large room on the first floor tables were laid out, and men and women — mainly men — played the game of their choice. Marlowe and his friends wandered slowly by each group, seeking an empty stool; and at a dicing table they found it. Here, a fat rascal had a pile of winnings in front of him, with a thin youth seated at his side and a masked woman opposite.

  Marlowe took the empty stool, laid down all his money, and said: “Who’ll throw me for that?”

  “We are playing at hazard,” said the stout man pompously, rattling the dice in his hand, “and seven’s the main. Will ye join?”

  Frizer squeezed Marlowe’s arm. “I never play against seven,” he whispered, “ it’s unlucky,” but Marlowe swung him off, smiled, and took the bet.

  Watching Marlowe play, Nashe many a time that afternoon felt the cold sweat break out on his body. Taciturn as Nashe was, a scoffer who pretended to have faith in naught, love of naught and hatred of much, who swore that no woman could pinch his heart or friend drain his purse, Nashe, mocker as he was, sometimes shut his eyes because he could not bear to see such piles of gold balance on the throw of a dice. Frizer, opposite to Nashe in all ways — merry, amiable and seemingly generous — did not attempt to hide his feelings. Often, he called miserably on God and hid his face to hide his feelings, or cried out little hymns of joy while the fat rogue glared at him, and the woman grew paler behind her red mask and the thin youth was greasy with sweat as if he sat beneath a watercock. Others came to watch and held their breath to see the money flash from hand to hand — heaps of gold flung about like brass, white money contemptuously piled aside.

  The woman laid a jewelled pendant on the table, kissed it, and Marlowe weighed it, passed it to Frizer, who blinked closely and rubbed it in his fingers, grimacing to show its value. Marlowe gave her forty guineas and put the pendant in his sleeve. Ay, forty guineas! He who had started with ten shillings had piles of guineas and lesser coins before him; and he was careless with them, showed no joy or excitement; he pushed them aside as if they were trash. Nothing could beat him, it seemed. He kept the Chance to himself — that is, he was the caster — and even when he lost, it almost instantly came back to him.

  The young man rose at last, tried hard to smile to show that he was a good loser, and staggered out and down the stairs. The woman and the fat man remained, both tense, shaking and white-faced. At length, even the woman was beaten, was left with an empty table; but she did not move: she sat perfectly still, poor wretch, as if paralysed with horror. From under her red mask, tears fell and she pouted them from her lips, too exhausted to lift a handkerchief.

  “Give over,” whispered Frizer to Marlowe, “I’ll have apoplexy if this keeps on.”

  Marlowe did not answer, but he glanced inquiringly at the fat man to see if he was ready to give in. The fat man gritted his teeth and kept on. Once, in a fit of rage, he seized the dice and rolled them suspiciously in his fingers to see that no bristle was moulded into them, he held them up against the candle to find if they were not langret dice — that is, longer on one side —, he counted the numbers, for on true dice the opposite numbers always total seven. Then, disgusted to find that they were true, he flung them on to the table and bet his last, his sword. Marlowe valued it at forty crowns, and, his voice squeaking with rage, the man shouted at him that it was a Vienna blade worth fifty. Without argument, Marlowe counted him his fifty crowns, and won that.

  “I’ll get my revenge?” said the man, rising awkwardly to his feet.

  “Decidedly. We will meet again.” Marlowe pulled the pendant from his sleeve, twisted it in his fingers and glanced at the woman who sat calmly beside him, eyes shut behind the glass eyeholes of her mask, hands in lap, and chin glistening with tears.

  “This means much to you, Madam?” said Marlowe gently.

  Slowly she opened her eyes, and Marlowe gazed into them. Very beautiful they were, of a dark blue, lasciviously mysterious behind the glass eyeholes. They were bright as gems with the tears, twinkling with light reflected from the candle-flame.

  “It means nothing to me,” said she tonelessly. “But it means much to somebody else.”

  “To whom, may I ask?”

  “To my husband, sir. It was his marriage gift.”

  “And so, he will miss it,” said Marlowe softly, “and you fear what he will say?”

  “No, sir, not what he will say, what he will do.”

  “And that?”

  She rose slowly to her feet, bending her knees with difficulty, for they were cramped after that long sitting. Leaning on the table, she straightened her back, sighed, and turned away.

  “You have not answered me,” said Marlowe, following her. “What will your husband do, that you fear him so?”

  She kept on walking, and did not look towards him, but he heard her gulp back her tears.

  “Leave me,” she muttered suddenly, gasping; “why do you pester me? He’ll throw me out of doors, that’s what he’ll do. Now, are you satisfied?”

  Smiling, Marlowe caught her arm and swung her round. She was wearing a short veil over her head, through which the coils of brown hair gleamed like gold under water; he flung the chain over her head, and it caught on the mask a moment, then slid, snakelike, slowly down until it fell from her chin to her naked chest, above the lace handkerchief resting carelessly upon her bosom forced upwards by the tight corsage.

  “You mustn’t,” she whispered, yet she caressed the pendant with her fingers. “I have no right to take it.”

  “Some day,” he laughed, “you can redeem it.”

  “Ay,” she said. “I can redeem it, of course. What is your name?”

  Marlowe shrugged. “Does it matter?”

  “It does. I want your name, and your lodging. I won’t leave this debt unpaid. I’ll send the money within a week, or the money’s worth.”

  Smiling at her eagerness, Marlowe gave her his name and address.

  “I will remember,” she said, and her lips moved silently like a child repeating a lesson. “Christopher Marlowe,” she was saying to herself, “ in Rother Lane, above the carpenter, Christopher Marlowe in Rother Lane, above the carpenter, Christopher Marlowe… I must not forget.”

  She turned smiling to him. “You will hear from me,” she whispered. Then suddenly her little hand was at her mask, and had plucked it off for a moment, dazzling him with her white face after the red velvet, dazzling him with the brightness of her eyes, with the warmth of her parted lips and the delicate texture of her skin; for one moment, she smiled at him; then the mask was back again, and she had darted aside, skirts rustling, had turned for one last smile, for a wave of her hand before she disappeared behind the painted screen. He heard her clogs tapping on the stairs as she ran swiftly down.

  “A conquest, Kit,” said Nashe; “I missed her face.”

  “Pretty enough,” said Marlowe. “I gave her back her jewel.”

  “You did what!” cried Nashe. “Oh, Lord! Kit’s turned mawkish! Did you hear that, Ingram?”

  “I heard,” said Frizer. “Kit always was a sweet one with the doxies. What tale did she cozen you with?”

  “She said it was her bridal-gift and that her husband would fling her out if she lost it.”

  “Well, well, what do you think of that!” grinned Frizer. “I just had a yarn with Madame Cotton; she told me, but of course she may be
wrong, that the wench has never seen the inside of a church. She’s in keeping to some lord.”

  Marlowe laughed. “Well, she told a pretty tale,” he said, “ and duped me well enough. I’m glad I gave her back her chain.”

  Chapter III

  FALLEN AMONGST FRIENDS

  Of all Marlowe’s friends, Nashe was the closest. Yet even with Nashe he never knew exactly how he stood, never could understand Nashe’s feelings towards him. They had been at Cambridge together, although but acquaintances then, Nashe being now twenty-seven, three years younger than Marlowe; it was in London that their friendship grew strong. They, Bob Peele ( now in the country) and Robin Greene had been close friends, until Greene became dangerous in his drink, became curiously suspicious, quick with sudden resentments and inexplicable bursts of anger. He had always been a man of strange humours, but towards the end, his reason had begun to go, and Marlowe, Peele and Nashe had kept away until he died and left as legacy his bombastic whine, A Groats worth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance. Whatever sorrow they had felt for his tragic death was wiped away with rage at being thus publicly made the whipping-posts of Greene’s own despair. Nashe, as quick with his pen as with his tongue, had talked of writing an answer to this “scald triviall lying pamphlet,” as he called it, but had not bothered; Marlowe had also done nothing, except to quarrel with its editor, Chettle. He had read it through with anger, certainly, but more with pity for poor Greene.

  “Defer not (with me),” Greene had written, addressing Marlowe, “till this last point of extremitie; for little knowest thou how in the end thou shalt be visited.”

  And “Amen!” Marlowe had jeered with his friends, yet those words hurt, had seemed like a prophetic knell “…how in the end thou shalt be visited!”