The Pale Companion Read Free Page B

anxious that you’re late?” he said.
    “Company?”
    “Your fellow players.”
    “Not them,” I said. “As long as I’m there for the setoff tomorrow morning they’ll not trouble themselves about where I am tonight. They’ll think I’ve found me a – ”
    Some sense of delicacy made me break off, and the grey-beard said, “In that case you’d better come inside and take some refreshment. Can you walk unaided?”
    “Thank you, yes.”
    “Follow me then.”
    He led the way into the house, the figure with the candle having by this time disappeared. He ushered me into a parlour, delaying in the passage for a moment to call out “Martin!” Candles were already burning on a table where a pile of papers and a clutch of pens were neatly arranged. I guessed I had interrupted my host in the middle of some business. He motioned me to a nearby chair. As I sat down I groaned involuntarily.
    “My dear sir, you are hurt.”
    “Not at all,” I said “or only slightly. A loudmouth’s penalty.”
    “There’s blood upon your face. A little blood.”
    “Only mine.”
    A stocky man appeared in the doorway.
    “I can offer you cider,” said my host, “or perhaps purging beer would be better for your case.”
    “Cider,” I said rapidly. I wasn’t at all sure what purging beer was and didn’t like the sound of it.
    The grey-bearded gentleman gave the order to the servant and then sat down at the table. He pushed a couple of candles nearer to me, apparently for my convenience but really, I think, to make a more careful assessment of what he saw.
    “You were about to ask who you had the honour of addressing,” he said.
    I was, but even so his quickness took me by surprise and I simply nodded.
    “My name is Adam Fielding, citizen of Salisbury.”
    This time I nodded more slowly.
    “Nicholas Revill,” I said formally. “I’m –”
    I stopped because he’d raised his hand.
    “Wait.”
    He leaned forward and squinted through the candle-smoke. As he cast his grey eyes up and down my front I became a little uneasy at his scrutiny. I wanted to wipe away the blood from wherever it was staining my face but didn’t move.
    Then he sat back and smiled.
    “Don’t worry, Master Revill. It’s only a little occupation of mine.”
    “What is?”
    “To, ah, see what someone is before he speaks what he is.”
    “And what do you see, sir?” I said, prepared to humour this kindly gent.
    At that point Martin returned with tankards of cider for his master and me. Fielding waited until the servant had gone and I’d had my first sip. Until I tasted the cider I hadn’t realized how tired and thirsty I was.
    “This is made from my own apples. Pomewater. But you were asking what I could see.”
    I nodded, then abruptly remembered that he’d mentioned my “company” on the doorstep. How had he found out about them?
    “Well, Master Revill, you are a player, one of a travelling group newly arrived from London and currently lodging at the Angel Inn on Greencross Street.”
    I almost spilled my cider.
    “Don’t be alarmed,” said my host. “This I knew already. I am a Justice of the Peace for this town. One of our duties, as you surely know, is to license and superintend the visits which players make.”
    “We are not playing here, your worship,” I said, to show that I knew the proper form of address for such a dignified gentleman. “We’re only travelling through.”
    “No, the only company licensed to play these many weeks is the Paradise Brothers. They put on Bible stories and old morality pieces.”
    “I know. I saw them in the market-place.”
    “And you belong to the Chamberlain’s Company, so I imagine you’d have little time for the kind of thing which the Paradise Brothers present.”
    “They are – professional enough,” I said. “How do you know I belong to the Chamberlain’s?”
    “No magic,” said Fielding, although I sensed that he was enjoying taking me a little by surprise. “In a town like