Marlowe stepped back a pace and looked again at the girl. He was far from being an expert, but he thought that he could see a thickening there that had not been there before. His next remark would take careful planning; he needed to talk to this girl some more, to ask her things which would be sensitive and personal. He couldn’t afford to annoy her, and yet – the question had to be asked.
‘How can you be so sure this child is not Harry’s? I assume you are saying it is Ralph’s?’
The girl put down the mug. If she polished it much more, she would wear it away. In a low voice, she said, ‘If you were me, Master Marlowe, with a child in your belly and no husband, would you rather that that child would grow up to be like Harry Rushe, or like Ralph Whitingside?’ She put her knuckles on her hips and stepped back a pace as she waited for his answer.
Marlowe’s problem was that he was not in love with Ralph Whitingside. They had been friends for so long he knew him inside out, the bad as well as the good. And, on balance, Ralph just came down on the side of the angels, but just barely, by only a whisker. But for a moment, he looked through the eyes of her love and gave the right answer. ‘Ralph’s,’ he said and risked placing his hand on her stomacher. He looked up at her and smiled. ‘He even looks like Ralph.’ She laughed. ‘Yes,’ he said, removing his hand, ‘he has his father’s nose.’
‘Thank you, Master Marlowe,’ the girl said, resuming her polishing. ‘I knew you would understand.’ She lowered her voice. ‘I’ve told Ralph,’ she whispered. ‘He’s very pleased.’
‘That’s . . . wonderful,’ Marlowe breathed. This might well put the cat among the pigeons. He had heard, when he was at home, listening to his mother gossiping over her sewing with the maids, that sometimes being with child made women mad. He would just have to trust that she could make sense of his questions and answer them right. ‘Can we sit down?’ he asked her. Another thing he had picked up was that women sometimes swooned when in Meg’s condition.
She looked from side to side, back and forth. ‘I think we can, Master Marlowe,’ she said. ‘We are having a quiet patch just at the moment.’ She led the way over to a seat in the corner.
‘May I ask you some questions?’ Marlowe said. ‘About the days before Ralph died.’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘But I only saw him once, as I told you.’
‘You started to tell me. I didn’t hear the whole story, though, did I?’
‘You stopped me,’ she said, testily. ‘I was quite willing to tell you. There was nothing in it to be ashamed of.’
‘I’m sure there wasn’t,’ he said, quickly. ‘But . . . will you tell me now?’
She gazed into the middle distance, as if the scene were printed on the air. ‘We went outside,’ she said. Then, she glared at Marlowe. ‘We didn’t always go outside, you must understand that, Master Marlowe. It wasn’t just about that with me and Ralph.’
He smiled encouragement. She had forgotten that he knew Ralph even better than she did, and it was always just about that with Ralph.
‘Well, we found a quiet spot and I lifted up my skirts. I . . . well, I wanted it to be like that, that night. I hadn’t seen him for a while and I admit I was in need of him . . .’ She looked down and blushed. Marlowe could almost hear the ‘but’ hanging in the air.
‘But . . . when I unlaced him, he . . . was not in need of me.’ She lifted her chin defiantly. ‘I was angry, Master Marlowe. I thought he had already been with someone else. I dropped my skirts and came back inside. And . . . I . . .’ She buried her head in her hands and cried, almost howling the words. ‘I never saw him again. I never said I was sorry.’
Marlowe put his arms around the girl and she burrowed in to his chest. He stroked her hair and murmured, as he did to his sisters when they were sad. Soon, she struggled up for air. He looked down at her and tucked a curl back up under her cap. ‘Better now?’ he smiled.
‘I never saw him again, Master Marlowe,’ she whispered, her eyes big and dark with tears.
Again, Marlowe was on a cusp. If he told her that Ralph Whitingside had been less than lusty that night because he was already dying, and not because he had come to her fresh from another bed, she would feel even worse than she did already. He couldn’t swear to that, but Dee had suggested that this would be a symptom of poisoning by foxglove. He took refuge in his own words. ‘Love is childish which consists in words.’
She sat up. ‘I beg your pardon, Master Marlowe?’ she said. She narrowed her eyes. ‘Ralph told me you were a poet. Are you quoting from your poems at me?’
‘A play,’ he muttered. ‘Currently in the hands of Lord Strange’s Men.’
She flicked him with her wash-cloth. ‘Don’t talk of players to me,’ she said. ‘We have been cleaning and scrubbing for nearly two days because of what those wastrels brought here – rioting and looting.’ She jumped to her feet, every inch the busy cellar maid. ‘Let me get on with my work.’ She rubbed the last of the tears from her eyes and bustled away.
Marlowe smiled to see her go. He didn’t need Dee’s showstone to see that any child of Meg Hawley’s would grow up big and strong, whoever his father was, and that she would survive. He turned towards the door.
‘Master Marlowe?’ she called.
‘Yes?’ He didn’t turn to her, but paused in the doorway.
‘I didn’t speak to Ralph before he died,’ she said. ‘But I speak to him now.’
His shoulders slumped. Poor deluded girl. But he decided to let kindness prevail. ‘That’s good, Meg. That must comfort you.’ And he stepped out into the afternoon light.
‘Oh, it does, Master Marlowe,’ she said, polishing her mug. ‘It does.’
It was still early to be going back to Madingley – it was no good wearing dark clothes and riding a black horse if arriving in broad daylight – so Marlowe took a walk along the Backs. It had always soothed him and had the added attraction that he wasn’t overlooking, and being overlooked by, his own college. The sunlight was golden, almost thick with motes of dust and ash still settling out of the air after the uproar of the days before. College servants were working in most of the grounds as they swept down to the river; the crowds had not been concentrated here, but stragglers had managed to get across the river and had either hidden there overnight, lighting small fires and making shelters, or had abandoned looted goods, to be collected later. Some of the meadows had been gouged by running pattens, others had been more unlucky, and windows were being covered up temporarily by planks of wood.
King’s had been quite badly hit, although the Chapel was untouched. Marlowe assumed it had been used, as other churches had, as a meeting place for the injured and disoriented. This would probably explain the piles of clothing he could just see in the entryway leading to the side door from the gate in the fence. Then, suddenly, his heart gave a lurch, as the pile of clothing moved and he realized that what he had been watching was a college servant taking a rest in the shade. The man looked at him, straight into his eyes and leaned forward with his finger to his nose. Across the grass and echoing through the arches, Marlowe heard his stage whisper: ‘Don’t tell on me, Master.’
Marlowe waved to him and walked away, back round to Trinity Lane and Hobson’s Stable. He had a lot going on in his head, and wanted to put it all in order before his meeting after dark with Manwood and Dee. A ride in the countryside would perhaps put it all in perspective.
Soon, he was clattering down the road out of town, glancing through the windows of the Swan as he passed. Although he had no feelings other than friendship for Meg, it would have been nice to see her before he left town, but she was nowhere to be seen.
In the ale-soaked shadows of the Swan, Francis Hall turned to Meg. ‘I do believe I’ve just seen my horse ridden down the street,’ he remarked, calmly.
‘Sir?’ Meg was startled. He didn’t sound half upset enough. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Certain,’ the man said. ‘Young man, dark eyes, small beard, long hair, about so tall.’ He sketched a size about equal to his own in the air.