Time's Fool (A Mystery of Shakespeare Book 1) by Leonard Tourney

Author:Leonard Tourney [Tourney, Leonard]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Lume Books
Published: 2016-02-29T00:00:00+00:00

Twenty

I’D NOT SEEN my jackdaws since my arraignment before Justice Swallow when one bird lied and the other scattered, the devil knows where. Stanleigh and his master had given me to believe that both were gone — unreproved, unpunished, sought but unfound. And so I had imagined them flitting around Paul’s, pecking for some new employment and finding none because their whoreson avian countenances tell all their predatory natures, pecking for maggoty bread, purse snatching, or off to sea on some rat-infested galleon where if there is a God in heaven let them drown dead the first tempest blasts them.

These imaginings were cold comfort when I remembered the humiliation of my arraignment and imprisonment, the stark, clammy cell, my disreputable cellmates with their foul mouths and fouler breath. And now the causes of my misery were here, my treasonous jackdaws, in this remote wood.

I did not fail to consider that they might have repented of their lies, been forgiven by their lord, and assigned anew as my protectors. Yet, forgive me God, I could not forgive their villainous testimony against me. After that, there could be no trust.

And so I watched while Marbury relieved himself in the hard cold dirt, wiped his filthy arse with a fistful of dried leaves, and trussed up. I watched while he made his way back to where he’d left Spurgeon and the man I did not know, and I watched while my two jackdaws mounted, talked, forded the stream, and then disappeared from my sight.

Me they never saw.

Some time passing, I crawled from my hiding place, untied my most discreet horse, and climbed aboard her. Since there was a possibility of my catching up with Spurgeon and Marbury, I decided to follow with caution. I forded the stream as they had done and proceeded round the same hill. Before me was a long sodden meadow. I strained to see, cocked ear to hear. Nothing. I rode at a steady pace, as watchful as a hawk. The light began to fail. I came to the crown of the rise. Before me I could dimly see in the far distance three men mounted. I was deep, deep in their traces. At least, they weren’t in mine.

Somewhere west, my destination, lay an inn called the Fallen Man: The name did not inspire confidence given where I was and what vile and treasonous company I kept. I knew I would come upon it if I kept to this road, but I’d lost time in the wood, sleeping and spying, and so I had little hope of reaching the inn before dark, of getting supper or bed, although I woefully needed both. The cold had long ago reached deep within my woolen cloak, pressing its icy, deathlike hand on chest, limbs, and loins. Even if I were to push on through the night, my jackdaws might have reached the inn themselves. I would find them waiting.

I had spent my childhood amid stream and field. I hunted and fished there,

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.