Free Tamburlaine Must Die by Louise Welsh

was my blood and not his
master's that pooled the table.

    `Marlowe
has had an accident, perhaps you could oblige him with a bandage?

    I
held my hand against my chest, aware of the blood ruining my doublet,
but too seared by pain to let go. The steward returned with hot water
and a dressing, which he applied with battlefield expertise. The old
man smiled.

    `Perhaps
I should have mentioned, this is not the only copy of the document.
They are signed and witnessed and coupled with the charges already
against you ...'

    He
trailed off as if too polite to mention the consequences should my
blasphemies be revealed. The old man's tone betrayed nothing of the
drama between us, but I fancied there was a better colour in his
cheeks. `There is a need for blood. It will either be yours or
Raleigh's. Raleigh's would suit me best, but yours will do should
circumstance insist.'

    I
spoke through gritted teeth. `What is your proposition??

    'if
you sign an affidavit against Raleigh we will destroy this document
and aid you in your current difficulties.'

    `And
if not??

    'No
one can help a man who will not help himself'

    They
gave me two days. I clutched my bandaged hand and stared at the
scores on the table wondering if they had all been gouged by the old
man's knife. His tone was mildness and business now, weighing the
cost of my life as a merchant weighs his stock.

    `You
would be well advised to sign immediately. We would remove Raleigh
and with him any threat he may pose to you.'

    `I'll
take the two days' grace.'

    At
the end of that we will send someone to meet with you. You can sign
and watch the evidence against you burn, or take the consequences.
The choice is yours.'

    `Are
you Tamburlaine? I asked, half dazed. And he laughed.

    `Put
that impostor from your mind. Whoever he might be, his threats are
nothing compared to ours.'

    `Death
is the same whoever brings it.'

    He
gave me a last look and asked, `Do you really think so?' That night
I. followed the Thames out of the city. A full moon lit my progress,
hanging low in the sky as if the weight of its silver was dragging it
from the firmament. The moon man's face gaped, eyes shocked wide,
mouth frozen in a warning scream. Around him stars glowed brilliant
as any theatre backcloth. I looked up at the heavens and felt alone.
Below me the river pressed on, dark and relentless, swirling with
secret currents. I wondered how many deaths it held. Pregnancies and
broken hearts, murders slid beneath its tide, drunkards, debtors,
kittens and cuckolds all lost. I wondered if the day would ever come
when the dead would rise from its embrace and face their persecutors.
I repeated to myself the final line of Baynes's note to the Council,
`I think all men in Christianity ought to endeavour that the mouth of
so dangerous a member may be stopped.' And vowed that if I were
murdered to drag my dead body from whatever grave it were thrown in
and hound my foes beyond mercy.

    Priest
Parsons said Raleigh ran a school for atheists, where men learned to
spell God backwards. But I doubt Raleigh would entertain any
incapable of that poor trick. All of one summer I was a frequent
visitor to Sherborne, the palace the Queen had plucked from a
bishop's living when she was Raleigh's Cynthia. There was no
conjuring done there. But Raleigh was host to amazing men. When he
swapped one Bess for another and so lost influence, things that had
only been whispered against him began to be said out loud.

    Men
like me were poison to Raleigh's reputation. But he thought us worth
the risk. It was at his house that I met Thomas Harriot, who had
ventured to the new world. Harriot told us that these new lands were
awash with antiquities, which preceded Moses's time and that the
natives there had histories of their own which recorded no great
flood. Under Raleigh's roof we questioned the composition of souls,
smoked tobacco and got drunk on dangerous talk.

    Though
it would grieve me, I was willing to betray Raleigh to save