To Tempt the Devil (A Novel of Lord Hawkesbury's Players) Read online

  Rafe could just make out his patron’s silhouette in the darkness. He still sat on the jetty, legs outstretched as if he were lounging in the sunshine without a care in the world. “Do you know where he is?”

  “I traced him here to London.”

  “London? Why? His sister lives in Cambridge.”

  “I think he’s here because of you.”

  Rafe frowned. “Me? But he wants to sell our names to the highest bidder. How will getting revenge on me achieve that?”

  “He could have sold them already if that was indeed his intention.” Hughe got lightly to his feet. “But he hasn’t. I wonder if perhaps he never meant to follow through on his threat. He just wanted me to pay the blackmail money.”

  Then Rafe had killed him for nothing. Or tried to. And failed. “Then why not pay him now and let the matter rest?”

  Hughe shook his head slowly as if it was too heavy for more vigorous movement. “Because the fact that he’s here looking for you and not following me around the country means it’s no longer about money. Rafe, I think he’s going to try to kill you.”

  “Then let him try,” Rafe snarled.

  “I don’t want any of you to be harmed,” Hughe went on. His voice sounded far away, not at all like he was an arm’s length from Rafe. “You’re the brothers I never had. You, Orlando, Cole.”

  “And John Barker?” It was unfair and Rafe wished he could take it back.

  “Barker was never one of us and you know it.”

  True. The other members of their group were the best of friends, brothers like Hughe said. If one was ever caught, he could be relied upon to keep his silence no matter what incentives were heaped on him, or how much torture inflicted.

  Barker was the last to join and had never quite fit in. He set himself apart from the beginning, choosing to eat alone, drink alone, work alone. He’d wanted to kill indiscriminately and grew angry when Hughe turned a job down.

  “It’ll be like a regular contract,” Hughe said. “Only I’ll be the one hiring you, not a stranger.” When Rafe said nothing, he added, “The payment will be substantial. More than enough to pay off your brother’s debts and set him up when he finishes his apprenticeship. There’ll be enough left over for you too.”

  Rafe breathed deeply, drawing the briny scent of the river into his body.

  “You have to do this, Rafe. You know what Barker’s like. He’ll stop at nothing to bring all of us down, one by one, starting with you. And he won’t care who he uses to do it.”

  “James.” He’d be an easy target in the Marshalsea.

  “And his woman you spoke of. Barker will learn of her existence. It’s only a matter of when.”

  Rafe felt sick. Hughe was right. Barker had no morals, which was why he’d been cut loose from the guild. He might go after James and Lizzy to make Rafe suffer.

  “Very well,” he said. His mouth felt dry, his body cold. “I’ll do it. And this time I’ll make sure he’s dead.”

  Hughe removed a leather pouch from his belt. The coin inside clinked. “Take this for now. It’s only enough for a meal or two, I’m afraid.”

  Rafe accepted it. “Do you know where I can find Barker?”

  “No. You’ll need to draw him into the open. Let him find you.”

  “Let him find out who I care about, you mean.”

  “It’s the only way to make him show his face. He’s too good to get caught any other way.” Hughe clasped Rafe’s arm in farewell. “I’m going away for a few days. I’ll check in before I leave. Stay alert.”

  “Just have the rest of my money ready on your return.”

  Lizzy watched James leave from her bedchamber window early the next morning. His steps were slow and he looked woefully unprepared for a long journey in the damp autumn weather. He wore his good coat and his sturdiest boots but the pack he carried was too small to contain more than a single change of clothing. Where was his food, a wineskin? She went to open the window to shout down to him, but then she saw Rafe striding up to join his brother. His gaze locked with hers. He smiled, a curiously tentative half smile as if he were wondering about something—something about her. As usual, her face heated and she silently thanked the lord she was too far away to be seen properly.

  Then Rafe’s smile broadened as if he’d seen anyway. She dropped down on the rushes out of sight. Why did he make her feel like she needed to hide?

  A knock at the door sent her heart leaping, but it was only James. Rafe stood a little behind, glancing up and down the street as if looking for someone.

  “I came to say farewell,” James said.

  “Oh,” she said. “Farewell. Be careful.”

  He shuffled his feet and she thought he might kiss her but he didn’t. Of course not. He’d only ever kissed her on the lips once and that was because she’d surprised him last summer at St. Bartholomew’s Fair behind the puppet show stand. He’d quickly pulled away and admonished her for her forwardness.

  “I’m glad Rafe’s back in time to take care of you in my absence,” he said.

  She hazarded a glance past him to his brother, but Rafe was still standing out of earshot. Nevertheless, she lowered her voice. “I’m not sure having Rafe take care of us was a good idea.”

  “Why not?”

  “In truth, we’re a little fearful of him.”

  He paused. “Oh. I see. But there’s no need. Rafe is very good at protecting people. There’s none better.”

  “But that day. He—”

  “Don’t. Don’t speak of it.” He winced as if in pain and half-turned to leave. “Don’t dredge up the past.”

  Lizzy wasn’t so sure avoiding the discussion was a good idea, but James had always found it a difficult topic and she couldn’t blame him for wanting to bury it.

  He gave her a quick smile. “Let him take care of you. It will ease my conscience.”

  She nodded and watched him rejoin Rafe, then shut the door. She ate a breakfast of cold beef and bread alone in the kitchen then carried in two trenchers to her parents, still abed.

  “What is it, Child?” her mother asked, patting the mattress beside her.

  Lizzy sat. “Rafe Fletcher is back.”

  Her father paused in his task of tearing the bread apart. “Aye, we know. The vicar was here yesterday and gave us the news. We should have told you last night.”

  “I saw him when I visited James. I didn’t mention it then because I didn’t want to worry you, but now…you probably should know.”

  “So how did he look?” her mother asked.

  “The same but…different somehow. Not as…angry.”

  Her father reached across and took her hand. “Do not let that deceive you. Best to stay away from Fletcher. He’s unpredictable.”

  “You think he’s still dangerous?” She’d hoped her parents would reassure her, tell her she had nothing to fear from Rafe seven years after his violent outburst.

  “I don’t know,” her father said, transferring his hand from his daughter to his wife. Lizzy’s parents exchanged grim glances. “In my experience, men don’t change dramatically, and it would require a dramatic change for him to become an accepted member of our community.”

  “Everyone still remembers that day,” her mother said. “Nothing can change that.”

  “Do you know what led to Rafe to do it?” Lizzy shivered. It was still so vivid. She doubted she could ever forget. But she’d not known what caused Rafe to lose control like he did. James had never discussed it with her and he’d always dismissed her questions when she’d posed them.

  “No one knows,” her mother said. “Pritchard was no saint himself, but to warrant such a beating from his own stepson! It’s quite unthinkable.”

  “Rafe was a wastrel,” her father added. “He didn’t work. Just fought and got drunk in alehouses.”

  “He frightened the entire neighborhood. We kept our distance when we saw the type of man he’d become.”

  “We had to.” Her father stroked his long white beard.
“With three daughters to protect, the likes of Rafe Fletcher were not welcome to our door. Stay away from him, Lizzy. He’ll leave again soon enough.”

  She didn’t tell them James had asked Rafe to take care of her in his absence. There was no point troubling her parents with something they couldn’t control. Hopefully James would be back before they ever discovered she’d kept the truth from them.

  “I’d better go to work,” she said.

  “Tell us as soon as the situation with Gripp changes,” her mother said.

  “I will.”

  “That Gripp…” Her father’s beard stroking became faster. “I’d like to wring his neck.”

  “John!”

  “Father, hush.” Lizzy leaned over and pecked his forehead. “He hasn’t shut us down.”

  “Yet.”

  Lizzy left them to their peaceful day and walked down Gracechurch Street and across the bridge, already choked with farmers driving geese and pigs to market in the city. The Bankside thoroughfare running along the south side of the river was quiet by comparison. It wasn’t the sort of area people wandered into unless they sought out the pleasures of the playhouses, bearbaiting pits, or whorehouses, and it was too early for any of those entertainments.

  She entered the Rose’s tiring house through the rear door that led directly out to the street and not through the theatre itself. Edward Style looked up from the prompt book, nodded, and returned to studying his lines. Henry Wells came down the stairs, gave her a bleak smile, and sat on a stool opposite Freddie Putney, slumped in a chair in the corner and apparently fast asleep, although it was difficult to tell since he wasn’t snoring like usual. Indeed, the room was silent.

  “Lizzy!” Antony Carew waved from the stairs. “Watch this and tell me what you think. I’ve been practicing.” He lifted his velvet gown and at least two cotton underskirts and descended the stairs with his head high, flat chest out, and as much grace as any noblewoman. Once on the floor, he dropped the skirts and twirled toward Lizzy, miraculously avoiding props and furniture. The hem of the costume settled around his bare feet with a delicious swish. Antony was short enough that most of his costumes didn’t need lengthening with an extra band of cheaper fabric. It meant his velvet, silk, and satin gowns had a much more satisfyingly rich sound than those she needed to alter.

  “You look very elegant,” she said, accepting his kiss on her cheek. “You would look more elegant if the hair on your legs was a little less…hairy.”

  He flicked his long red-gold curls off his shoulder and finished the flourish with a graceful twist of his hand. It was his signature action, one he’d perfected on stage for the female roles he played. “I’ve been told my legs are the shapeliest in all of England.” He lifted his skirts to study them and pulled a face. “I’ll wear stockings on stage.”

  “I have some in the storeroom which go nicely with that gown. The staircase scene will be a triumph.”

  If they ever got to perform it.

  No one said it, but the air in the room seemed to tighten, stretch, and the four members of Lord Hawkesbury’s Players who were awake exchanged grim glances. They were all thinking the same thing: the play they were practicing might never get approved by the Master of Revels.

  “What shall we do now?” Antony asked. “How dire is our situation?” He had joined the company only a few months earlier after the previous actor’s voice deepened too much to play women. While Antony was a man and not a boy, he sounded, looked, and often dressed like a woman on and off stage. Style liked him for that reason—less training for new boy-actors meant more profit in his pocket.

  “Dire enough,” Edward said. As the manager’s brother, he was well placed to know how desperate the situation was. “Roger is trying to reason with him now.”

  “He’s gone to the Revels office this early?” Lizzy asked.

  “Aye.”

  “Is that wise?” said Henry Wells, the big handsome actor who played most of the lead roles. He’d proved to be very popular with the females in the audience over the years to the point where Roger Style had capitulated and given him the roles he used to keep for himself.

  Edward shrugged. “Is anything Roger does wise?”

  The four of them thought about that for a moment. “He commissions Lady Blakewell to write most of the plays,” Lizzy finally offered.

  “Aye, but only because he still thinks her husband really writes them. He refuses to accept that she is the playwright.”

  With a sigh, Lizzy picked up the pair of wings she’d left on the table overnight and sat at the high stool. She threaded a needle and carefully pierced the delicate holland fabric near a tear. It was an activity that required her concentration so as not to ruin the wing altogether—a blessing since it meant she thought less about Walter Gripp bringing the company to an end.

  As the morning wore on, more players and stagehands arrived. Usually a crowded tiring house meant laughter and chatter in between preparing sets and learning lines. But not this time. They brought nothing but more gloom with them and a silence that crept into every corner and festered like an open wound.

  It was almost a relief when Roger Style finally burst in and shouted, “We’re doomed!” He had a flair for making dramatic entries. As manager and actor for Lord Hawkesbury’s Players, he’d perfected the art of attention seeking in a trade full of attention seekers. But his explosive statement, complete with door slamming and a well-timed pause, was excessive even for him.

  Ordinarily such histrionics would produce eye rolls from the others or a snigger, but this time Roger had everyone’s attention. Everyone except Freddie. He let out a loud, nasally snore. Roger cut a swath through the tiring house and kicked Freddie’s feet off the stool. The actor snorted and snuffled awake.

  “Bloody hell! Who fu—?” He swallowed the rest of the sentence when he saw Roger standing over him, hands on hips. “Oh, it’s you.” Once upon a time Freddie would not have curtailed his language for anyone, including his employer. Especially him. Freddie had grown up with the company, first acting in the female roles then moving on to the male ones when his voice deepened.

  He’d changed in the nine years since Lizzy had joined Lord Hawkesbury’s Players. So had she, but in an entirely different way. Freddie may have learned to temper his more outlandish behavior, whereas she had shed her inhibitions and stepped out from behind her father’s shadow. In the tiring house at least. These days she and Freddie alike valued their positions within the company and neither could afford to leave.

  “We are doomed,” said Freddie to no one in particular.

  “Well?” Edward asked Roger. “What happened?”

  “What do you think happened?” said Freddie. “He’s not going to come in here and announce ‘we’re doomed’ if everything has been smoothed over.”

  Edward shot him a glare. “Shut it, Putney.”

  “He’s right for once,” Roger said.

  “Gripp’s rejected the next play too?” Henry asked.

  Roger had supplied the Revels office with another play the day before. Gripp had promised to have an answer for them that morning. “He said nothing about the play. All he did was tell me he thinks I’m a scourge.” He snatched the prompt book off Henry and held it up as if it were a bible blessed by the archbishop himself. The pages flipped back and forth as he waved it about above his head. “If the Master of Revels gets his way, this is the last new play we’ll be performing in London. Ever.”

  The Master of Revels would get his way, of course. There was no one to stop him.

  “How long before our audiences grow bored with our current stock?” Henry asked. “Another season?”

  “A week or two is my guess,” Edward said.

  “I wonder if Burbage is hiring,” Freddie muttered.

  “I’ll not go to that pompous ass if he begs me,” Roger said.

  “He doesn’t have any work,” Henry said. He shrugged. “I already asked.”

  “We could travel,” Edward said. “Unt
il Gripp forgets and becomes reasonable again.” But he didn’t sound convincing and no one agreed. Gripp’s feud with Style had gone on for nearly a decade, it was likely to last as long or longer and none of them wished to traipse across the country forever. Besides, though he might not have any authority outside of London, a man in his position would have powerful friends who did.

  “Perhaps he’ll die,” Freddie said.

  “Freddie!” Lizzy chided. “That’s a terrible thing to say.”

  “Not unreasonable though,” he said with a shrug. “He’s aged. Aged people die.”

  “He’s not aged,” Roger said. “He’s younger than me.”

  Freddie snorted. Roger stalked over to him and dropped the collection of bound pages that acted as the prompt book into his lap. Freddie yelped but picked up the only complete version of the play and began reading.

  The tiring house settled once more into uneasy silence. “Lizzy?” Antony whispered, leaning closer. He flicked his curls over his shoulder, but not with the self-conscious flourish of earlier. He rarely bothered with the artifice around Lizzy. “Did you speak to your betrothed? Did he agree to an earlier wedding when you explained your predicament?”

  She winced as the sharp reminder of her conversation with James came back to her. “No. He hasn’t agreed. Not to bring it forward and not to marry me.”

  “But…you said…”

  She shook her head and looked down at the wings. They were so fine, so pretty, but terribly damaged. They were a central part of the play, worn by the fairy king, and she had to fix them or the performance would be ruined. “I know what I said.” She fingered the wings. “James and I were never actually betrothed. There was a general sort of agreement between us, a long-standing acknowledgment that we would one day wed. There still is,” she hastened to add. “He had to leave London for a few days, but we’ll discuss it upon his return.”

  Antony kissed the top of her head. “Good. I’m glad you’ll be secure.”

  Lizzy finished mending the wings and left them on the table. They were too big to take upstairs then bring down again when the performance was only a few hours away. “I’ll be in the storage room if anyone needs me,” she said, rising.