Free Crimson Rose by M. J. Trow

from holding forth and it worked, with one flick of his hand.
    ‘Shakespeare. Sledd. You will come with me.’ And he marched towards the Arras at the back of the stage, the pair trooping behind him. Marlowe joined him. So did Henslowe and Alleyn. ‘Not you,’ Thynne growled. ‘Nor you. Nor you.’
    ‘These men were working under my auspices, Master Thynne,’ Marlowe said in level tones. ‘I owe them my support.’
    ‘Support?’ Thynne chuckled. ‘They’re going to need more than that.’ He paused for a moment, then relented. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘But just you, Marlowe. And the rest of you,’ he yelled to the still sitting cast. ‘My men are at every door, every gate and there are others outside. If anyone attempts to leave … well, don’t attempt to leave.’
    Sledd led the way behind the Arras, making sure Thynne’s flames didn’t catch the sparkling velvet and he led them down a small flight of stairs to the Tiring Room. Props lay everywhere here, wigs, dresses, shackles and all the panoply of ancient Persia, all of it made a few weeks ago by the sweated labour of Spitalfields. What had looked like gold and costly vestments to the groundlings was shown here in its true tawdriness as paint, plaster and a sprinkling of glamour, which was all lost in the harsh light of the Constable’s torch.
    On a table in the centre lay the body of Eleanor Merchant. Her cap and cowl had gone and her bodice had been ripped open in a frantic attempt to save her life. Somebody had closed her eyes, but her mouth was still open with the shock and impact of the musket ball that had hit her in the throat and blown her backwards off her seat.
    ‘Anybody know who she was?’ Thynne asked, peering at the gaping wound, almost black now with congealed blood.
    ‘Eleanor Merchant,’ Marlowe said.
    ‘My landlady.’ Shakespeare’s voice was almost inaudible.
    Thynne’s head came up slowly. ‘Indeed?’ he murmured. ‘So you knew her well?’
    ‘Tolerably.’ Shakespeare shrugged.
    ‘Intimately?’ Thynne was watching the man closely.
    ‘I said “tolerably”,’ Shakespeare repeated, louder this time.
    ‘Yes.’ Thynne smiled coldly. ‘I heard what you said. Where’s the gun, Factotum?’
    Thomas Sledd crossed the room and handed the arquebus to Thynne, who swapped it for his torch. He sniffed the lock, cocked it, reversed it in his hand and looked down the bore. ‘It was supposed to have been empty,’ Sledd said. ‘They all were.’
    ‘Who set the charge?’ Thynne asked.
    ‘I did,’ the stage manager told him.
    ‘When?’
    Sledd was on his best behaviour, so he kept his voice level in the face of the endless questions rapped out by the High Constable. He owed it to Philip Henslowe not to annoy this man who could ruin him in the bat of an eye. ‘Half an hour, perhaps more … Before the play began, I know that. I don’t have time later.’
    ‘And when – in whatever play this was – did Master Shakespeare here kill this woman?’
    Shakespeare raised a hand to protest, to have it knocked down again by Marlowe.
    ‘Act Five, Scene One,’ Marlowe explained.
    ‘In the real world.’ Thynne tried to be patient. ‘How long elapsed between the loading of the gun and the shooting?’
    ‘An hour and a half, perhaps a little more.’
    ‘Thank you. Now, that wasn’t too difficult, was it?’ The High Constable weighted the arquebus and brought the butt to the floor with a thud. ‘And who handled it in that hour and a half or a little more?’
    ‘Anyone could have,’ Marlowe said.
    ‘That’s right!’ Sledd clicked his fingers as he realized, his face oddly pale under the torch’s guttering light.
    ‘And did that “anyone” include you, Master Shakespeare?’ the High Constable asked.
    ‘Yes,’ the actor said.
    ‘Good enough. You will come with me. Consider yourself under arrest.’
    ‘On what charge?’ Marlowe asked.
    Thynne frowned at him before taking his torch back from Sledd. He tucked the