The Alchemist of Souls (Night's Masque, #1)(15)
"It had better not be all crimson velvet and goldwork," Mal muttered as the tailor fussed around him with lengths of measuring paper and a mouthful of pins. "I shall look like a popinjay. And do not pad it overmuch. I must be able to move freely."
The tailor said nothing, only wrinkled his nose at the squalid surroundings. Ned was not the most fastidious of bedfellows, and Mistress Faulkner was too stiff with age to run about after her grown son. Reaching out with one foot Mal slid the chamber pot under the bed. The tailor muttered imprecations under his breath and left as soon as he could, saying that next time Mal would have to come to his workshop, for he would not set foot in the place again, no, not if the Queen herself commanded it.
A few days later, Mal was walking back towards London Bridge after a fitting when two figures stepped out of a doorway into his path. By their elaborately slashed sleeves, Venetian lace ruffs and pearl earrings, he took them to be courtiers, or perhaps the sons of wealthy merchants.
"Forgive me, gentlemen," Mal said with a slight bow.
They did not give way. The slighter built of the two, a youth of sixteen or so, raised a silver pomander to his nose; the scent of cloves and orris root wafted from it, competing with the stink of the river.
"What have we here?" the other drawled, looking Mal up and down. "A sewer rat bearing the weapons of a gentleman. From whom did you steal them, sirrah?"
"They're mine, given to me by my father."
"Really? Is that how you northerners acknowledge your bastards?"
Mal's jaw tightened and he drew his blade a hand's breadth from its scabbard in warning. Passers-by hurried away, their eyes averted.
"Go on," the man said with a mocking smile. "Show us why you deserve the Queen's favour, when so many of your betters have been passed over."
Was that what this was all about, jealousy that he had been chosen to guard the ambassador? What irony, that they so coveted something he would give up in a heartbeat.
He glanced from one to the other. Taking them both would be easy enough, but what good would it do? This could end in one of only two ways: his own death, or an arrest warrant for murder. He slammed the rapier back into its scabbard.
"A coward as well as a bastard," the pomander bearer said with a sniff.
Mal snatched the bauble from the youth's hand and threw it across the street. It flashed in the sunlight, bounced off a shop front with a high sharp note like a hand-bell and plopped into a slimy puddle. A scabby dog trotted over to investigate, but backed off whining when the overpowering scent hit its nostrils.
The older man caught Mal by the front of his doublet and slammed him against the nearest wall.
"Don't think Grey will protect you, cur," he growled, craning his neck to look Mal in the eye. "His standing at Court is not so high as he likes to think."
"And yours is, I suppose?"
"I am a close friend of Prince Arthur. One word to him, and–"
"And what? Think you he will go against his mother's wishes?"
The man flushed. His was an empty threat and they both knew it. If he had so much influence with the prince, why bother to seek Mal out and threaten him?
He released Mal with a sneer of contempt.
"I shall enjoy watching your fall from grace," he said. "If not I, then someone will bring you down. 'Pride goeth before destruction, and a high mind before the fall'."
He gestured to his companion, who was fishing his pomander out of the puddle.
"Leave it, Jos. A gentleman," he glared at Mal, "does not grovel in the muck."
Mal watched them leave. Was the pomander bearer Josceline Percy, one of Northumberland's tribe of younger siblings? If so, who was his companion? Mal had paid too little heed to Court gossip in the past, knowing that what reached the ears of the common folk was for the most part a confection of lies and exaggeration. Perhaps it was time to start listening. And where better to begin than with those on the very fringes of Court: actors.
? ? ? ?
Coby saw no more of Faulkner in the next few days, for which she was heartily thankful. She had enough to do helping Master Naismith ensure there were no delays in the new theatre's construction. He entrusted her with a great many more errands than usual, and she had been back and forth across London Bridge so many times, her shoes were more holes than leather.
On Friday morning she was sent to Bankside with a message for the foreman in charge of the builders. The new theatre, which was to be named the Mirror, was being built on the western edge of Southwark, in a field next to Paris Gardens. Workmen swarmed over the ladders and scaffolding that covered its sides, putting the finishing touches to the lattices of split branches that filled the gaps between the main timbers. Soon the wattle panels would be plastered over and it would start to look like its rival the Rose, barely a hundred yards to the east.
She found the foreman deep in conversation with a man she had never seen before. He was of middling years, with lank mousy hair parted in the centre above a round, clean-shaven face. Plainly dressed in a dark brown worsted doublet and hose, there was not a bit of lace or other frippery about him except for a heavy gold neck chain from which hung a unicorn badge. Another servant of their patron, and an important one at that.
At last the foreman made his courtesies and returned to his work. Coby ran after him and delivered her message, but as she turned to leave she found herself being addressed by the stranger.