The Merry Devils

'Indeed, sir,' agreed Isobel. 'He gave us all a wondrous shock.'

That was our intent,' said Hoode dismissively, anxious to keep off the topic of the uninvited devil. 'Tell me, Mistress Napier, for which of his several good parts did you admire Youngthrust the most?'

Isobel suppressed a giggle but Grace gave a serious answer.

'I was touched by his sighing,' she said.

Were you?' he sighed.

'He suffered so much from the pangs of love.'

'Oh, he did, he did!'

Hoode was thrilled by this new evidence of her sensitivity. With so many other things to choose from, Grace Napier singled out the quality he had tried above all else to project. The sighing and suffering that was provoked by Lucy Hembrow in the play was really aimed at Grace herself and she seemed almost to acknowledge the fact. In every conceivable way, she was a rare creature. Unlike most young ladies, Grace came to the playhouse to see rather than to be seen, and her knowledge of drama was wide. She watched most of the London companies but her favourite--Hoode gave silent thanks for it--was Westfield's Men.

Isobel Drewry might be thought by some to be the more attractive of the two. Her features were prettier, her eye bolder, her lips fuller and her manner less guarded. Again, Isobel's dress was more arresting in its cut and colours. Her combination of worldliness and innocence was very appealing but Hoode did not even notice it. All his attention was devoted to Grace Napier. This was the first time she had come to the Queen's Head without bringing her brother as a chaperone and Hoode saw this as an important sign. She consented to a brier meeting with him after the play and she confessed that she had been touched by the pathos of his performance. That was progress enough for one afternoon.

'We must bid you adieu, sir,' she said.

'A thousand thanks for your indulgence!'

'It was a pleasure, Master Hoode.'

'You do me a great honour.'

I would see you play again,' said Isobel brightly. 'When will Westfield's Men take the stage again?'

'On Friday next at The Curtain.'

'Let's attend, Grace. We'll watch the company in another piece.'

'I am as eager as you, Isobel. We'll visit The Curtain.'

'That might not be altogether wise,' said Hoode quickly. 'If it is comedy that delights your senses, pray avoid us on Friday at all costs. We play Vincentio's Revenge, as dark and bloody a tragedy as any in our repertoire. I fear it may give offence.'

'Darkness and blood will not offend us, sir,' said Isobel easily. 'Tragedy can work potently on the mind. I like the sound of this play, Grace, and I would fain see it.'

'So would I,' returned her friend.

'Consider well, ladies,' he said. 'It may not be to your taste.'

Grace smiled. 'How can we judge until we have seen it?'

'Be ruled by me.'

But they declined. No matter how hard he tried to persuade them against it, they stood by their decision to watch Vincentio's Revenge. Hoode was unsettled. He wanted Grace Napier to see him at his best and the tragedy gave him no opportunity to shine.

He was cast as a lecherous old Duke who was impaled on the hero's sword in the second act. There was no way that he could speak to his beloved through the character of the Black Duke. She would despise him as the degenerate he played.

Grace read his mind and tried to soothe it.

'We do not expect a Youngthrust in every play, sir,' she said.

'I am not well-favoured in Friday's offering,' he admitted.

'We will make allowances for that. Ill not condemn you because you appear as a villain. I hope I've learned to separate the player from the play.' She touched his arm lightly. 'My brother and I saw you as the Archbishop of Canterbury in The History of King John but I did not then imagine Edmund Hoode to be weighed down with holiness. Whatever you play, I take pleasure from your performance.'

'This kindness robs me of all speech,' he murmured.

Grace Napier crossed to the door and Isobel followed her. Hoode moved swiftly to lift the latch for them. Isobel bestowed a broad smile of gratitude on him but he was not even aware of her presence. Grace leaned in closer for a final word.

'I would see Youngthrust on the stage again,' she confided.

'The Merry Devils?'

'Your part in your play. A double triumph.'

'I am overcome.'

'But next time, sir, let him sigh and suffer even more.'

'Youngthrust?'

'He should not have his love requited too soon,' she said. 'The longer an ardent wooer waits, the more he comes to prize his fair maid. It can only increase their happiness in the end.'

She touched his arm again then went out with Isobel, their dresses swishing down the corridor and their heels clacking on the paving slabs. Edmund Hoode was tingling with joy. He had clear direction from her ar last. Grace Napier welcomed his love and urged him to be steadfast. In time, when he had endured the pangs of loneliness and the twinges of despair, she might one day be his. She had transformed his life in a few sentences.

From the depths of Hell, he now ascended to the highest Heaven.

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Chapter Three

St Paul's Cathedral was the true heart of the city. It dominated, the skyline with its sheer hulk and Gothic magnificence. Within its walls could be found the teeming life of London in microcosm. Paul's Walk, the middle aisle with its soaring pillars and vaulted roof, was a major thoroughfare where gallants strutted in their Finery, soldiers escorted their ladies, friends met to exchange gossip, masters hired servants, jobless men searched the advertisements on display, lawyers gave advice, usurers loaned money, country people gaped, and where all the beggars and rogues of the neighbourhood congregated in the hope of rich pickings.

Crime flourished in a place of divine worship and yet the sacred glow was somehow preserved. St Paul's was not simply an imposing structure of stone and high moral purpose, it was a daily experience or everything that was best and worst in the nation's capital.

The cathedral stood at the western end of Cheapside. Its churchyard covered twelve and a hair acres with houses and shops crowding around the precinct walls. At the centre of the churchyard was Paul's Cross, a wooden, lead-covered pulpit from which political orations were made on occasion and from which sermons were regularly preached.

'There indeed a man may behold hideous devils run raging over the stage with squibs in their mouths, while the drummer makes thunder in the tiring house and the hirelings make lightning in the Heavens.'

The sermon which was being delivered there on that sun-dappled morning was fiery enough to draw a large audience and to capture the interest of those who were browsing in the bookshops or loitering by the tobacco stalls. Standing in the pulpit, high above contradiction, was a big, brawny man with a powerful voice and a powerful message. He waved a bunched fist to emphasise his point.

'Look but upon the common plays of London and see the multitude that flocks to them and follows them. View the sumptuous playhouses, a continual monument to the city's prodigality and folly. Do not these vile places maintain bawdry, insinuate knavery and renew the remembrance of heathen idolatry? They are dens of iniquity!'