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Benjamin Lovett arched his back and squealed like a pig, dropping his knife. Emboldened by the encouragement from the now near hysterical laughter and yelling from the crowd, John made a deft lunge at Lovett’s hat, meaning to skewer it and throw it into the audience. If anything, he was more successful than he’d intended, because the enraged man’s wig came off too, revealing a shiny pink balding head beneath. Lovett let go of Isabella and swivelled round to make a grab at John, but he only succeeded in getting his feet in a tangle and stumbling to the floor in an undignified heap once again. Beth grasped Isabella’s hand and pulled her away from her captor, and they embraced to the delight of the audience.

  “That’s it, John!” she whispered over Isabella’s shoulder. “Take a bow!”

  She and Isabella held hands and bowed low as applause and cheers thundered around the theatre.

  As the curtain began to fall and he hurried off after Beth, John heard the bewildered actress who had played Isabella talking to a stage hand:

  “What on earth just happened?”

  Chapter Ten - A Dilemma

  Beth and John sat catching their breath in Beth’s dressing room. They could hear Benjamin Lovett storming up and down outside, complaining to anyone who would listen about “that girl’s” outrageous conduct and of being made a laughing stock, and, eventually, William Huntingdon’s soothing tones as he tried to explain that the surprise ending of the play had gone down even better than the planned version.

  Beth took one look at John peering at her from under the oversized hat he seemed to have forgotten he was still wearing, then suddenly threw her head back and laughed at the absurdity of it all.

  “That was utterly ridiculous!”

  John joined in her laughter, clearly seeing the funny side of it too, despite having been shaken up by the whole encounter. But he was also staring at her as if there was something else.

  “Oh, I hope you don’t think I was making fun of you,” she said quickly.

  “No, no, it’s not that. I was just thinking you ... you have a lovely laugh.” He looked away, his face reddening.

  She smiled, suddenly feeling a little shy herself, unusually. “Thank you, John.”

  “But I do hope I haven’t ruined your career,” he said.

  “Ruined it? You’ve made both me and the play more popular than ever! The only problem is, if word of the new ending spreads, then the next audience will be expecting us to do it every time. Still, I expect Mister Huntingdon, our manager, can employ another actor to take your part. Not that anyone but you could make such an amazing Captain Jack of the Revenge!” she said with a grin. “However did you think that one up so quickly?”

  “Oh, ’tis something that I...” John stopped himself and fidgeted uncomfortably in his chair. “’Tis just something that popped into my head out of nowhere.”

  “Well then, you have a fine imagination. Perhaps acting should be your calling rather than being a clerk at the Navy Board!” She sobered, remembering her mission for Strange. Could the man following John have had something to do with it? “For now, you can remove that silly hat and provide me with an explanation. I spotted that someone was after you, but who was it? And why?”

  John removed the hat and threw it onto an empty chair. It was only now that Beth remembered how handsome she had thought him when they had first met at the Navy Board. The hat had ruffled his light brown wavy hair, yet in a funny way it made him look more attractive. She blinked a little, trying to refocus in case what he told her might have some significance to the mysterious drifting ship she’d been sent to investigate.

  “I hardly know where to begin,” John said. “It all started this morning, when I was ordered to investigate a strange vessel adrift on the Thames with my colleague, Will Brown—”

  He was interrupted by an urgent knock at the door, and Beth picked up his hat and handed it back to him. “Put it back on – at least for now,” she whispered.

  She called out for the visitor to enter, and was relieved to see Maisie’s shining blue eyes and brown ringlets spiralling tightly from beneath her bonnet as she peered round the door.

  “There be a visitor for you, Mistress Beth.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Don’t know. A man...” She leaned closer and added in a conspiratorial whisper, “And he doesn’t look very nice, if you ask me.”

  “I see. Well, please inform him that I’m tired after my performance and can’t see anyone just yet, Maisie.”

  Maisie went outside with her message, but soon they heard raised voices and footsteps approaching.

  “You don’t understand, girl. I must see her.”

  “But she said—”

  “Step aside, wench!”

  Beth heard some scuffling and a rough, rasping voice, then saw that beneath his hat John had suddenly turned pale. He sprang from his chair and dived beneath a long clothes rail at the end of the dressing room where Beth’s costumes hung. He just managed to pull his feet out of sight as the visitor entered, with Maisie pulling determinedly on his coat tail to try to keep him out.

  “I told him ‘no’, Mistress Beth,” she grunted, “but he wouldn’t listen!”

  Beth stood up indignantly. “It’s all right, Maisie. Let us discover from this man how it is he thinks fit to enter my private room without consent.”

  She watched the intruder’s face to see how he reacted to her words. He was short and stocky, with dark, greasy hair hanging limply beneath his hat. The faintest of sneers had played across his lips when he first heard Beth comment on his intrusion – but he managed to quickly twist it into the nearest thing to a smile he was probably capable of.

  “A thousand apologies, madam,” he said, removing his hat and bowing. “It brings great shame upon me to invade the privacy of so talented and famous a member of the fair sex, and I humbly beseech your forgiveness.” He bowed again, even lower this time – but he could disguise neither the cruel undertone to his voice nor the faint glimmer of contempt behind his eyes.

  “Say your piece, then leave, if you please, sir.”

  The man gestured towards Maisie, who stood scowling at him, tensed as if ready to launch herself if he so much as laid a finger on her friend, and Beth noticed that the middle finger of his left hand was just a short, scarred stump. “T’would be better if we might converse in private, mistress...”

  “Maisie is as a sister to me, sir. There is nothing I may hear that she may not.”

  “Very well. My name is Edmund Groby, and I am here to warn you that a young man by the name of John Turner of the Navy Board may have a design to take your life.”

  Pride almost prevented Beth from admitting it, but now she knew this was something she didn’t want Maisie to be involved in. “Uh, Maisie, perhaps this gentleman was right. I’m going to get someone to take you home.”

  “But I can’t leave you, Mistress Beth – not now!”

  “I shall be perfectly safe. Please trust me, and go home to Moll.”

  “But he said someone may have a design to take your life? What if this murderer should succeed! You are the only friend I have in the world—!”

  “Hush, hush,” Beth said quickly, glancing crossly at Groby. “We do not know for certain what he says is true,” she said quietly to Maisie. “Remember our sword fight? You know I am very capable of taking care of myself. Do not worry.”

  Despite Maisie’s further protestations, Beth went to her dressing-room door and swiftly summoned old Matthew the prompter to escort her friend back to the Peacock and Pie.

  This mysterious visitor and his news about John had put her mind into a whirl. It seemed very unlikely indeed, but spies lurked anywhere, as she well knew. She returned to Groby, determined to appear outwardly composed.

  “Who has sent you, sir?”

  His eyes, sunk deep inside his sullen face, twitched from side to side shiftily. “That I am not at liberty to reveal, mistress. But may I ask you to take a look at this? It comes from the young man I am trying to trace. You w
ill see he has written a very short message on it.”

  He withdrew from his pocket what Beth could instantly see was a playbill for tonight’s performance. Looking closer at it, she saw that next to the engraving of her in her “Henrietta” costume was a single word written in a spidery hand:

  DOODGAAN

  “What is that word?” she asked Groby. “An anagram?”

  “Nay, Mistress. ’Tis from the Dutch tongue.”

  “And what, pray, does it mean?”

  “It means to die, to perish. It means death. He could well be a traitor for the enemy.”

  Beth stared at the piece of paper with the ominous word scrawled right next to her image, which this stranger claimed was written by John, trying not to betray her confusion. This man might be coarse and unpleasant, but that did not mean he was not telling the truth. She had given John just such a playbill. If Mr Groby’s story were false, then was it mere coincidence that John had scribbled “Die” by her picture? Might he really be a spy for the Dutch, with whom England might soon be at war? Sir Alan Strange had always taught her that there was no such thing in this business as a coincidence, and he had, after all, sent her to the Navy Board to investigate the drifting ship. Perhaps it had all been a ploy of some sort – a dangerous one at that – to draw an enemy out? She wouldn’t put it past the spymaster.

  She glanced in the direction of the costume rail. Clearing her throat, she looked the unpleasant man in the eye.

  “Mister Groby, there is something you ought to know...”

  Chapter Eleven - The Golden Earring

  The sneering smile returned to Edmund Groby’s face.

  “What is it you have to say, my dear?”

  “’Tis about John Turner ... I do believe your story, Mister Groby – and a man I believe was John Turner has visited me.” At the edge of her vision Beth noticed some of the costumes on the rail move slightly. Was John going to make a run for it?

  “Very good, Mistress Johnson. I knew you would see sense! Whither can he be found?”

  “Much closer than you think,” she said slowly. There was a distinct ripple of cotton and silk on the clothes rail this time, but Groby was focusing so intently on Beth in his eagerness for the information that he failed to notice.

  “Pray go on, mistress!”

  “Well, I last saw the man I believe was John Turner under a pile of clothes ... in an alley off Drury Lane. He did try to kill me – he jumped out of the alley and drew a dagger when I was on my way to rehearsal. Fortunately, my stage training allowed me to evade him, and a swift blow with a nearby brick sent him flying, though it was indeed a close-run thing. But I am something of a skilled fighter myself, sir. He was unconscious when I left him, prostrate under a mound of abandoned garments.” She smiled proudly and, she hoped, convincingly, to drive her story home.

  Groby’s eyes bore into Beth’s own, and she couldn’t tell whether he believed her or not. She certainly didn’t believe him. His story about John and the playbill had thrown her into confusion for a moment, but she simply couldn’t see John as a spy – and certainly not a murderer. If he intended to kill her, why would he not have done so when they were alone?

  Groby frowned. “Hmm ... When did this incident happen?” He took a step closer to her.

  Beth shrugged. “I can’t remember exactly. As I say, it was just before I reached the theatre.”

  Groby came closer still. She could hear his breath rasping in his throat and smell its foulness as his face loomed nearer to hers.

  “I should have thought that such an event would be permanently engraved in one’s memory – that the time of it would be impossible to forget. Yet you seem unusually vague, Mistress Johnson...” He put a hand on her shoulder in an outwardly friendly way, but his grip was powerful and pressed muscle against bone painfully.

  Beth refused to flinch and eyed him boldly. “Sir, I have told you all I know. Now I must ask you to leave my dressing room.”

  He kept a firm grip on her, his fingertips digging into her flesh like a vice. It felt as if he were strong enough to pick her up with that one hand and throw her across the room like a rag doll. “Pray delve a little deeper into your memory, mistress, and see if you can come up with the true facts.”

  “I have told you the true facts. Remove your hand, you—”

  “John Turner was seen not an hour ago. You are lying!”

  He yanked her towards him and raised his other hand – the one with the missing finger – towards her throat. But just at that moment, her dressing-room door burst open and Groby hastily let go of her and backed off.

  They both turned to see a strange, shabby figure amble into the room, and Beth saw that it was the boy with the golden earring who had been following her earlier. His face had an unwashed, weatherworn look and it was hard to judge just how old he was, but he was at least a year or two older than her. Beth’s heart sank – was he Groby’s accomplice?

  But instead the young man began shouting: “Come and see! Soldiers from the Tower all over the place! People say they’re looking for a traitor to the King!”

  Edmund Groby’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth as if to speak – but then he suddenly rushed for the door. The newcomer quickly tried to get out of the way, but clumsily stumbled into Groby as he passed. The older man pushed him roughly away and disappeared.

  The look of innocent excitement on the boy’s face quickly transformed into a knowing grin. “Blimey, he scarpered a bit sharpish didn’t he? Almost as if he’d got something to fear from soldiers after a traitor. There ain’t any soldiers, by the way – just in case you were wondering. Thought it would give us time to get away.”

  There was a distinctly shifty look to his worldly blue eyes, and Beth rounded on him. “What I’m wondering is why people keep invading my dressing room – not to mention why you were following me on my way here!”

  “Temper, temper! If I’d known you was going to be so ungrateful I might have left you to manage on your own against that ugly feller.”

  “But how did you know I was in danger from him?”

  The boy with the gold earring was still smiling, enjoying her puzzlement. “I’m your guardian angel, me!”

  “How can I trust you any more than I could that Edmund Groby? And if you don’t give me a straight answer this time I’ll shove my boot so far up your—”

  “All right, all right! Perhaps I’m not an angel.” He held out a slightly grubby hand. “I’m Ralph Chandler at your service, that’s who I am. And although few would describe me as angelic – especially the judges and juries in most of the boroughs of London – perhaps you will trust me better if I mention one word: Alan Strange.”

  Beth stared at his hand and back up to him, her heart suddenly beating faster.

  “Er ... I hate to interrupt, but that’s two words,” came a muffled voice from beneath the rail of theatrical costumes.

  Beth turned quickly towards the clothes rail. “Oh! In all the excitement I quite forgot you were there!” She rushed to help John out from his hiding place.

  “He does look easily forgettable, to be fair,” Ralph commented as he saw the bedraggled figure emerge with a feather from one of the costumes stuck in his hair. “And I never learned me numbers: two words, one word – it’s all the same to me. But when the words are Alan Strange it ain’t the number of ’em that matter, if you get me drift.”

  Beth studied him with suspicion. “You were sent by Alan Strange?”

  “Taught me everything I know.” He lowered his voice a little. “About spying, leastways. Picked up a few tricks on the streets meself, you might say.”

  Beth folded her arms and scoffed. “Well, I spotted you following me, so perhaps you need to brush up on your skills—”

  “Spying?” John interjected. “Who is Alan Strange?”

  Beth hesitated before replying, glancing at Ralph before she spoke. “The King has many enemies, John. You know as well as I do about the Dutch, but there are also enemies within. I
t is not so very long since Cromwell’s Republic was overthrown and the King was returned to his rightful place at the head of our nation. It was a turbulent time that divided the people, and there are still some who would have the old ways brought back and rid themselves of the King yet again. His Majesty is well aware of this possibility, and needed someone he could trust to keep an eye on those lurking in the shadows...”

  “So Alan Strange is a spymaster?”

  “Yes.”

  John looked from Beth to Ralph and back again. “So you two are...?”

  “That’s enough for one day,” Ralph chipped in. “Edmund Groby will soon realize he’s been fooled, and he won’t be best pleased.”

  Beth nodded. “Quickly. Follow me. We’ll leave by the back door and we can go to my lodgings until we’re sure it’s safe – it’s not far.”

  “Nay,” said Ralph. “They will expect you to go there. It’s likely they know where you live, as a famous stage actress and all,” he said with a pointed look. “They don’t know me, though, me being a true spy. We ought to go to my place.”

  Beth pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. “Alan Strange never mentioned you. I still only have your word that you are who you say you are.”

  Ralph shrugged. “Our enemies seem to know all about both of you – where you live, where you work. My hideout is safe. Your choice...”

  Chapter Twelve - Culpeper’s

  “What is this place?” asked John, holding his kerchief against his nose as they made their way through the shop on Black Swan Alley where Ralph had taken them. It was a crowded, dingy place illuminated by flickering candlelight. Strange-smelling plants and herbs in pots, jars and boxes filled the shelves that lined the walls. Bottles of odorous, mud-coloured liquids bubbled on the counter beside a precarious pile of mysterious-looking, dusty, leather-bound books.

  “I know,” Ralph chimed. “I thought I’d come across a witch’s coven the first time I set foot in here!”

  A bizarre figure that had been rummaging unseen beneath the counter suddenly rose and added another book to the pile. “But now you know that it’s an apothecary’s shop, young Ralph,” said the man in a gruff but not unfriendly voice. “Herbs and healing, that’s what I do.”