A Mystery of Errors (6 page)

They acted as if it were her fault to begin with, and that simply wasn't so. At twelve or thirteen, she could easily have been married off to any of a dozen suitors. There had surely been no shortage. She was young and pretty and the promise of the beauty that would come with more maturity had already been quite evident. Even then, her long, flaxen blonde hair, high cheekbones, deep blue eyes, and soft, creamy, nearly translucent skin had attracted plenty of suitors. But no one had been suitable enough. Each prospective husband was found wanting in some area, and each time it had been something different, but the truth, as Elizabeth now knew, was that none of them had been of the right class.

Henry Darcie had worked hard all his life and had succeeded in becoming a very prosperous merchant. But although he had changed his fortune, the one thing he could not change was that he had been born as common as a dirt clod. Elizabeth knew that he wanted, more than anything, to be a gentleman and gain admittance to the ranks of polite society. The problem was, as things stood, his application to the Heralds' College for a coat of arms would, of necessity, be based upon the thinnest of claims, claims that were mere, transparent fiction. However, an alliance by marriage to a family of rank and long-standing position could go a long way toward ensuring more favorable consideration by the heralds and, more importantly, acceptance by the upper classes. Or at least, so her father felt.

Elizabeth, for her part, had always felt as if she were less cherished as a daughter than as an expedient means to an end and nothing more, a Judas goat staked out as bait to attract the right sort of suitor. And like a huntsman sweeping through the forest with his beaters, her father had relentlessly pursued the cultivation of an ever-widening social circle, the better to increase the odds that the right sort of husband might be flushed and driven to the bait.

From the time that she was twelve, he had regularly attended the entertainments at the Paris Garden, not so much for his enjoyment of the bear baiting itself as to widen his circle of influential acquaintances, especially among the better class of people. Despite her protests, he had brought her along on several occasions, dressed in her finest clothing, to parade her before the gentry and the aristocracy. In her largest and most elaborate linen and lace ruffs, embroidered with gold and silver and sprinkled with a dusting of little moons and stars, and her widest, stiffest farthingales with waist frills and brocade skirts, and her best and most revealing stiff-pointed, padded bodices with slashed leg-of-mutton sleeves sewn liberally with jewels, she had felt awkward and uncomfortable, as if she were some gaudy ornament put on display. Worse still, the grim and brutal sight of the savage, ravening mastiffs tearing at a maddened bear or panic-stricken ape chained down in the arena was more than she could stand. The blood and the noise and the awful smells had made her ill and her father soon stopped taking her, realizing that even the prettiest and best dressed of daughters lost a considerable degree of her appeal while she was retching on her dress.

Still, there were other avenues of social contact that were open to him, many of which did not necessitate her being present, and he had pursued them with a vengeance. He had participated in investment ventures with various projectors, often losing money, but occasionally turning a profit. However, he had measured his gains in such investments not so much in financial terms, but social ones. Shared gains were often not so useful as shared losses, when commiseration could lead, under the right circumstances, to the offer of a loan to help surmount some unexpected and, of course, temporary reverses. There was nothing quite so useful as a social superior who was inconveniently short of funds… and therefore more than willing to grant favors. Especially if such requests were couched in soothing, diplomatic terms.

Among the ventures that her father had invested in through several such contacts was a playhouse called The Theater, constructed by a man named Burbage. Some of the money that had been raised for the construction had come from Henry Darcie, and he had also financed several of the productions. He was not the sole investor who had been involved, and so the risk was spread out somewhat, and in this case, there seemed a better than average chance of making a profit, for the playhouse proved to be quite popular.

There was competition from the Rose Theatre, where the Admiral's Men held court, and some of the other companies who mounted their productions at the inns, and then there was the children's company at Blackfriers, which was proving to be quite a draw and had the advantage of being fashionable because it was an indoor venue. On the other hand, The Theatre could accommodate a larger audience and had, overall, higher standards of production. Here, Henry Darcie could bring his daughter to show her off before whatever members of the gentry were in attendance without fear of having her get sick and ruin the effect of the expensive clothing he had bought for her by vomiting upon them. And it was the one venue for her display to which Elizabeth did not object. Indeed, she looked forward eagerly to going.

From her seat up in the galleries, Elizabeth could look down upon the teeming groundlings in the yard, jostling one another and boisterously calling to the vendors as they waited for the play to start. The early arrivals would have already heard the first fanfare of the trumpets, and as the rest of the audience came streaming into the theatre, Elizabeth would revel in the energetic, cacophonous spectacle, allowing herself to get caught up in it so that she would forget that, as far as her father was concerned, she was on exhibit for everybody else, and not the other way around. She would gape at the ostentatious fashions that were on display up in the galleries around her as the members of the gentry attempted to outdo one another in their finery.

Men in elaborate saffron ruffs and scarlet doublets, puffed at the shoulders, slashed at the sleeves, and padded at the chest, with matching breeches and contrasting hose in hues of periwinkle, marigold, and popinjay vied for attention with gold pomander-sniffing ladies attired in elegant gowns of Venetian satin or taffeta, festooned with precious stones and shot through with gold and silver thread, or else sewn from rich, three-piled-piece Genoan velvets, with dainty leather or satin shoes that were pinked, raced, and rosetted, their hair dyed in fantastic colors and braided with pearls or tucked beneath elaborate caps with large gold and silver brooches holding flowing plumes and feathers to set off the carcanet collars of small, linked enameled plates adorned with jewels and tiny pendants, wrists languidly displayed bracelets of gold or enameled silver with beads of amber, coral, or agate, rings everywhere, on every finger of both men and women… it was a visual feast, a writhing tableau of endless fascination.

And then the play would begin.

From the moment that the first player stepped out onto the stage, Elizabeth became transported to another world, one that seemed even more real than the romances that she read, for these were living, breathing people bringing to life real characters upon the stage. And if, much of the time, these characters seemed less real than stagy, she did not mind and nevertheless allowed herself to be carried away by the illusion. For as long as the play would last, her gaze would remain riveted upon the stage, and if there were other gazes riveted upon her from some other vantage point, she was unaware of them and could thus forget them.

But now, there was a new drama unfolding that she wished she could avert her gaze from, for it was
her
drama and the ending she foresaw was not a happy one. Somewhere along the way, someone had gazed at her particularly long and hard, and favorably, and unbeknownst to her, her father had been approached, discussions had been initiated, and a marriage had been arranged.

She had no idea who Anthony Gresham was. Apparently, it was not really her concern, so she hadn't been consulted. What little knowledge she had was painfully sketchy. The mysterious Anthony Gresham was young, supposedly well set up, and handsome, although she had long since realized that, to her father, any eligible young man from a socially prominent family was certain to be "well set up and handsome." His father was a privateer, one of Drake's celebrated Sea Hawks, who was in line, so it was said, to receive a knighthood. She knew next to nothing of such things, but she knew that the idea of marrying his daughter to the son of a knight would send her father off into transports of ecstasy. There was little else that he would need to know or care about.

Chances were, she thought, that she was just as much a mystery to this young Anthony Gresham as he was to her, although it was certainly possible, even probable, that he had at least seen her, perhaps during one of her visits to The Theatre with her father. Yes, she thought, that had to be how it must have happened. The socially prominent son of a knight, or knight-to-be, could certainly not be expected to marry a young woman sight unseen, regardless of her father's wealth. She, on the other hand, was expected to do her filial duty to her parents and marry someone whom she not only did not love, but had never even seen.

And if, as her mother claimed, most girls "her age" would gladly trade places with her in an instant, Elizabeth felt equally certain that she would trade places with them just as readily, even if they were of the poorest and most common stock. As she sat alone in her room, feeling miserable and lost, she entertained the notion of what it would be like to run away somewhere and find a job in some distant town or village, working in a tavern or an inn, or as a seamstress with threadworn fingers or a laundress with waterlogged skirts and wrinkled hands. Perhaps that was precisely what she should do, she thought, dramatically. Pack up a few belongings and then run away in the middle of the night. That would certainly teach them a lesson. And it would serve them right.

The only trouble was, she had no idea where to go or how to get there. And so she sat, and wept in anger and frustration.

Chapter 4

LONDON WAS EVERYTHING HE HAD expected and much more. A recent census had reported the city's population as over 120,000 and it seemed to Smythe as if they were all out on the streets at once. Cobblers, drapers, merchant tailors, younkers, ironmongers, weavers, goldsmiths and ropemakers, skinners, saddlers, tanners, vintners and apothecaries, discharged soldiers, dyers, pewterers and cutlers, hosiers, stationers, haberdashers, whores and grocers, barbers, balladeers and barristers, scriveners, booksellers, pickpockets and portrait painters and cozeners of every stripe, everywhere he looked, a different walk of life was represented, often loudly, sometimes repellantly, but always interestingly.

Dominating the city was the massive, gothic Cathedral of St. Paul's, where people gathered in Paul's Walk among the open stalls and bookshops to post bills or hire servants or be regaled by lurid tales of far-off lands from seamen—some of whom might even have been sober as they passed their hats—or else receive forecasts from robed and long-bearded astrologers, who were listened to with wary fascination and respect because they were believed by many to consort with demons. Here also was Paul's Cross, where Sunday sermons could be heard preached from the outdoor pulpit on those mornings when it didn't rain and turn the cobbled streets even more dangerously slippery with muck and slime than they usually were.

With so many carriers' carts and carriages and horse litters and coaches clogging up the narrow streets and alleyways, making passage hazardous for those who rode and walked alike, the Thames was the main thoroughfare for many, with the watermen plying their way up and down the river and across in their small rowboats, ferrying those who chose not to use the crowded London Bridge, which was the only bridge across the undulating river to Bankside.

Downstream, to the east, stood the famous Tower of London, built as a palace citadel to guard the city from invasion from the sea. The Tower was an armory, as well as a prison for the most dangerous offenders, and the only place of coinage for the realm, in addition to being a treasury for the Crown Jewels and home of a menagerie that included several lions. To the west, roughly two miles from the city of London and connected to it by the Strand, was the Royal City of Westminster, which contained the Palace of Whitehall, the main residence of the queen, and the Abbey of St. Peter, where the monarchs of the realm were crowned and often buried.

In the city streets, Smythe noticed that many if not most men went armed, although a recent proclamation had reduced the allowable length of swords to no more than three feet and daggers to twelve inches. The fast, slim rapiers were more and more coming into vogue and fashionable ladies carried little bodkins tucked away somewhere discreetly. Those less concerned with fashion wore their poignards or stilettos openly, the better to defend themselves in the event of one of the frequent brawls or riots that broke out from time to time, often the result of young apprentices swaggering about in raucous gangs, needing little more excuse than youth and drunkenness, always an incendiary combination, to start a sudden, bloody street fight.

And drunkenness was less the exception than the rule. Smythe had long since learned that his habit of making an infusion of boiling water with dried clover flowers, mint, and raspberry leaves with honey, a healthful and revitalizing recipe meant to clarify the mind, taught him in his boyhood by old Mary, the village cunning woman, would be considered quite the eccentricity. Water, as everybody knew, was merely for washing up and cooking, certainly not for drinking. Ale was the universal beverage, imbibed at breakfast, dinner, supper, and all throughout the day, save by the more affluent citizens of London, who drank wine, all of which created a constant state of ferment where violence could brew and street fights could erupt at any time.

Shakespeare and Smythe stumbled into just such a street fight shortly after they had entered the city, passing through one of the large, arched gates in the encircling stone wall. For Smythe, it had felt like passing through a gate from one world into another. They were assailed by a dizzying cacophony of smells, from the market stalls selling fish, meats, produce, breads, and cheeses, to the heady, pungent odor of the horse droppings and the still fouler stench of human waste and garbage that was simply dumped into the streets, to be picked at by the crows and ravens who nested in the trees and made their meals out of whatever refuse they could find, in addition to the fleshy morsels that they tore from the severed heads stuck up on the spikes outside the law courts.