Shakespeare's Blood - Chapter 1

1596 A.D.-Scotland

Kirkfort Willie Reid followed his henchman down the stone stairs, watching his step carefully lest he slip on the slimy surface or tread on something disgusting. Circling the moss-encrusted well, they turned down a passage barely high enough to navigate at a crouch, where he was wary of his head as well as his step.

Finally they came to a rough wall constructed across the passage end, forming a tiny cell. A horizontal slit somewhere above let in a narrow ray of light, and in it sat a man, hunched and still. As footsteps sounded outside his prison, he looked up briefly, his ruined face catching the light. Willie’s man took a key from a hook ten feet back, tantalizingly visible but out of the prisoner’s reach. He moved to unlock the door, but Reid gestured a curt negative. The stench was bad enough from outside the cell.

The prisoner had a high forehead and a pale face that formed a perfect oval. The nose, once long and slender, was misshapen now, and breath wheezed through it laboriously. His bones stood out sharply, the cheeks hollow, the once muscular frame shrunken. Eyes that had sparked with fire at first were now dim, like lamps about to sputter and go dark. He did not rise to meet his visitors, apparently having no hope of mercy.

"Have ye considered, Johnny?" Reid called through the grated door. "Ye dinna look well. A bit o’ venison or an apple’d serve better than bread and water, would it nae?"

There was no answer from the prisoner, who studied something much more important to him than the outlaw Scot who held his life in his hands. Willie had seen the focus of his prisoner’s interest, had in fact inspected it carefully. It was a small wooden box, about six by eight by three inches, containing a sheaf of papers which John studied intently whenever the light permitted. After he had scanned them himself, Willie had ordered a minute examination by his clerk, but neither he nor the learned fool could explain why they were so important to John.

The outlaw, dressed warmly in breeks and wrapped in a heavy woolen cloak, shivered in the dank that the prisoner seemed not to notice. "Come nae, Johnny. A bit o’ help from ye and I am a happy man. I will set ye free and gie ye food, real food. Cook’s roastin’ one o’ th’ new turkeybirds for dinner, a fine meal. T’would be sae easy t’ hae yer freedom." The mere mention of the meal made Willie’s mouth water, and he rubbed his ample stomach.

The man answered without looking up. It took some effort, loosened and missing teeth making it difficult to enunciate clearly. "You do not intend me to leave this place, Reid, as we both know well. It makes not a whit of difference if I tell you what you want to know or I do not."

It was true. They had beaten and starved him. He was skeletally gaunt and his left shoulder was broken, the arm held painfully against his side. But they had met with no success. Reid noted that the captive no longer denied that he knew what they wanted him to tell. He simply had decided to die rather than do it.

"I know ye spoke wi’ Robert Maxwell," Willie tried. "Th’ auld rogue went missing right after. Ye got what ye wanted fro’ him, and I’ll get it fro’ you as well!"

"I doubt that." John spoke mildly, but his tone was certain.

The burly outlaw’s jaw clenched, and for a moment he considered ordering another beating to force what he sought from the prisoner. Further torture was not wise, however, for the prisoner was fragile, and when he died his secret would die with him. Best to let him think on it a day more. Reid turned to go, throwing casually over his shoulder, "Well, then, Johnny, no bread. See how ye fare on water alone."

"Might I have pen and ink?" The voice conveyed no dismay at the further reduction.

Reid glared at him through the opening, finally giving the door an angry thump with a beefy fist. "Have it and be damned," he replied. "Mayhap with your last words, ye’ll write the location I seek." The stomp of his frustrated departure echoed off the stone walls and died away.

The prisoner looked at the papers in his lap, considering. He smiled, although he was very, very tired. "Mayhap I will."