The three friends sat side by side on a bench in the Swan in Bridge Street that night and, despite the ale in front of each one, no one felt too much like celebrating. Henry Bromerick in particular had difficulty swallowing, his lips purple and swollen, his teeth scraping on each other as he tried to sip his ale. The corner of one eye was red where the cat-tip had caught it and the bruise spread down his cheek in one direction and in the other disappeared into his hair. The others’ wounds were not so easy to spot, but anyone could see from the way that they sat, stiff and unmoving, that they were in great pain, hurting under the grey fustian.
‘Come along now, gents.’ The innkeeper was clearing away the debris of earlier revellers. ‘Shouldn’t you lads be on top of the world tonight?’ He glanced at Bromerick and considered qualifying his remark, but thought better of it. ‘Masters of Rhetoric, or whatever it is you do?’
Jack Wheeler had been keeper of the Swan since before these boys were born. He had seen generations of scholars come and go since the Queen was newly-crowned. In fact, as he never tired of telling everybody, he’d had the honour to present Her Majesty with a cup of his finest local brew on the occasion of her one and only visit to the town. He’d noted the Queen smiling at him but was too busy bowing low to be aware of her passing the cup to the Earl of Leicester who sniffed it and poured away its contents. Wheeler was still waiting for the letter with the lion and dragon seal which would allow him to write ‘By Appointment’ on his shingle. ‘By disappointment’ would have been more apt.
‘We got caught last night, Jack,’ Tom Colwell told him, in an admission of defeat. ‘Felt a taste of the cat.’
‘Not unlike your very own brew, Master Wheeler.’ Kit Marlowe swept in from nowhere, back in the roisterer’s doublet, remembering not to pat anybody on the back. ‘I’ll have a brandy. The same for my friends and . . .’ he looked around him, frowning. ‘Still no Ralph? Where is the toad’s harslet?’
‘Who?’ Matt Parker surfaced from under the smothering golden curls of the girl who he was, very carefully, balancing on his lap.
‘Whingside.’ Bromerick gave it his best shot, but his lips felt like blanc mange – very painful blanc mange – and he gave up.
Marlowe smiled and ruffled his hair before hauling up a footstool to sit on. ‘What Dominus Bromerick is trying to say is Whitingside; Ralph by Christian name. He’s not here.’
‘He wasn’t here last night either,’ Parker remembered, smiling at the girl.
The rest of the company looked at him. Had this man just received a degree from the finest university in the world, or had he not?
‘That’s King’s men for you,’ Colwell grunted. ‘He’ll have been carousing at the Cardinal’s Cap last night. Meg -’ he half-turned as best he could to the girl perched on Parker’s lap – ‘doesn’t your sister work there?’
‘She does,’ Meg told him. ‘Who’re you looking for?’
‘Ralph Whitingside,’ Marlowe said.
‘That tall bloke?’ Meg asked, unconcerned. ‘The one with the six pairs of hands?’
Marlowe smiled. ‘If you say so.’
‘He was in here last night. He . . .’ She looked up and caught the eye of Jack Wheeler. He was all for extras on the bill, but he doubted Parker could afford them. She jumped up and gave the table an ineffectual wipe with her apron. ‘I must go,’ she said, pecking Parker on the cheek. ‘His master’s voice.’
‘Last night?’ Marlowe reached out and pulled her back by the arm. ‘When?’
‘I don’t know for sure. One night’s very much like another in this business, Master Marlowe. Latish. All I know about time is that it passes.’
‘It surely does,’ Marlowe agreed, letting the girl go.
‘What’s the matter, Kit?’ Colwell asked. ‘You’ve got a faraway look on your face.’
Marlowe snapped out of it. ‘Probably nothing,’ he said. ‘But as far as Ralph Whitingside knew we were all going to graduate today. I just thought he’d be here. It’s . . . ah, that’s my girl!’ Meg had brought their drinks. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said and raised his brandy. ‘Here’s to Doctor Gabriel Harvey.’ Nobody drank. ‘May he roast in Hell!’
‘Gabriel Harvey!’ they roared and downed their drinks in one. Except Henry Bromerick, who slopped most of his over his cheek.
Meg Hawley made her way along Jesus Lane as another dawn crept over the graves of the Grey Friars. Her step was a little unsteady and her cloak dragged through the Cambridge dust as she turned the corner. She half-expected to see her sister crossing the low fields by the river, but she wasn’t there. She had probably got off early and was already snoring in her truckle bed at the farm, grateful to be off her feet after a long night.
There was someone there, though, leaning against the red brick of Jesus Gate. He wore his doublet open and his collar was pale against the darker skin. This wasn’t unusual. A client. Meg opened her cloak a little. All right, it was early morning and she was tired, but a groat was a groat at any time of the day or night and while she still had her looks and her youth she wasn’t about to pass up an opportunity. She had lived on the edge of this town all her life. She knew all its alleyways and dark entries like the back of her hand. Lots of places to accommodate a gentleman . . . She stopped short.
‘Oh, it’s you, Master Marlowe,’ she said, wondering again why she always called him that. The others were Matt, Tom and Henry. The poor sizars who couldn’t afford her often, or the gentlemen who’d toss her a shilling; she called them all by their first name. But Marlowe was always different. There was something dangerous, something cold, something indefinable about Marlowe, and she’d no sooner call him Christopher than fly to the moon and back, still less Kit as his friends called him.
Her heart was pounding. The first time she had seen Marlowe, three years ago now, when he came to the town, she was drawn to him and repelled at once. He was handsome, but not in an approachable way, like the boys he was with at Corpus Christi. She and he were of an age, she thought, give or take. She always felt much older than the boys in the Swan and those in the dark alleys, who fumbled and sweated and called her pet names. But Marlowe made her feel like a child; there was something timeless about him, something old looked out of his eyes. He was always friendly, always polite and she was, if not willing, then ready to take his money. Yet . . . nothing. Perhaps this was it. Perhaps this morning with the golden glow of mist was the time, and this the place.
He reached out his hand and, after only a momentary pause, she slid into the crook of his arm, ignoring the fluttering in her stomach. He held her cheek and pulled her lips close to his. She opened them, waiting, staring into those smouldering dark eyes.
‘Tell me,’ he whispered, ‘about Ralph Whitingside.’
She blinked. Frowned. The moment had gone, as they stood there in the red-brick shadow of Jesus College and the morning climbed in the east. Meg pulled away.
‘I’ve got to get home,’ she muttered. ‘My dad’ll take his belt to me.’
But he reached out again and held her tight with a powerful right hand. ‘You saw him the night before last,’ he said, taking account of the morning which was now here.
‘What of it?’ She was frightened now, staring again into those hypnotic eyes. ‘Let me go. You’re hurting me.’ She tried to wriggle free, but he held on tighter, squeezing her arm just above the elbow.
‘Ralph,’ he said softly. ‘Tell me about Ralph.’
She met his gaze for a few seconds more, before squeezing her eyelids shut. A single tear showed fat and wet along her lashes before rolling down her cheek. She spoke so low he had to lean in to hear what she said. ‘I love Ralph,’ she sighed.