Read Prince - John Shakespeare 03 - for Free Online

John.’
    Shakespeare looked at his wife.
    ‘I mean a man can be too loyal. A man can offer loyalty to a captain-general and receive no loyalty in return. Many have died for their sovereign. How many sovereigns have died for their subjects?’
    Shakespeare laughed and shook his head. ‘Your tongue, mistress. I thank the Lord these walls do not have ears …’
    Catherine rose from the table. ‘Wait, I have something to make you yet more discomfited.’ She went through to the hall while he sat with his wine.
    The Shakespeares lived in a great wood-frame house by the river Thames in Dowgate. They had turned the house into a school for the poor boys of London, but it was still closed as a result of the pestilence that had taken hold last summer. The city’s mort-bills for the year of 1592 recorded that more than ten thousand souls had been claimed by the plague; this year the city fathers feared it would be as bad or worse. Shakespeare took another sip of wine. Perhaps it was just this decline of England that was getting to him: the rising prices, the unrest, the endless war with Spain, the worry that the school would never reopen, his fears for the future of their daughter, Mary, and for their adopted children, Andrew and Grace.
    Catherine returned with a tattered broadsheet for her husband. As she leant over him to place it on the table, he reached out and clasped her breast in his hand. She laughed lightly, let her long dark hair fall about her face and moved her slender body towards him to close her mouth on his.
    ‘Stirring again, Mr Shakespeare?’ she said as their mouths parted and her own hand came to rest in his lap. ‘Time for bed, I think.’
    He tried to smile at her, but it was difficult to shut out the darkness that seemed to envelop him. Her blue eyes held his brown eyes for a moment, then she kissed him quickly once more before pulling away from his clasping hand. ‘Read that, then bed.’
    Shakespeare turned to the paper. It bore the title The London Informer and comprised one sheet, written in poor verse. He went cold as he read it. ‘Where did you get this, Catherine?’ he asked at last.
    ‘Close by the Dutch market, John. I was visiting Berthe. There were two sellers. I thought their proximity to the market deliberate.’
    ‘This is bad. Cecil will not be happy.’
    The broadsheet was a noxious attack on the Dutch and German refugees in London. It accused them of working secretly for Spain, of taking English trade and English work, of seeking to invade and occupy the country by stealth. Worse, it spoke in gloating terms of the explosion outside the Dutch church and said there would be more such attacks – ‘and next time the real dogs will die’. It was signed Tamburlaine’s Apostle .
    ‘This is Glebe’s work,’ Shakespeare muttered. ‘Have I told you of Walstan Glebe? He is a most villainous purveyor of filth. I thought we had broken up his London Informer press – we should have broken him instead.’
    ‘I recall you speaking of him.’
    ‘He has a brand on his forehead – an L for Liar . I had hoped he was dead by now.’ He sighed. ‘But then again, it gives me a start. He knows something. I’ll find him and bring him in.’
    Shakespeare had been thinking hard about how to tackle the investigation. The first thing he had done was call his assistant Boltfoot Cooper to the library on the first floor.
    As usual, Cooper had looked out of place as he shuffled into the fine room, dragging his deformed left foot. He seemed to be growing shorter and more knotted as he approached forty.
    ‘Master?’
    ‘I have a mission for you, Boltfoot. I want you to go to the powdermills.’
    Boltfoot was silent. He and Jane had a child, a boy of eight months. He did not like leaving them.
    ‘I know what you are thinking, Boltfoot. And you are right. This will take you from your family. You will need several days, perhaps a week or more. It is vital work. You know of the powder explosion at the