Shakespeare's Spy Read Online Free

a bit out of square. He seemed to find it necessary to screw up his courage a bit before he called, in a voice that might have been more steady, “Madame La Voisin?”
    There was no reply. Sam glanced at us rather sheepishly, shrugged, and called out more loudly, “Madame La Voisin?”
    A low, hoarse voice from within commanded, “Be silent, fool!”
    Clearly startled, Sam took a step backward, treading on my foot. “Sorry. She—she must be in the midst of a reading already.”
    “Perhaps we should just go,” I suggested, feeling not a little uneasy myself now.
    “No, no!” Sam said heartily, and then, glancing toward the tent, spoke more softly. “It’s all right. It’ll be worth the wait, you’ll see.”

3
    W e stood shivering in the cold for several minutes before the flap of the tent lifted and a woman emerged. She looked utterly out of place here, with her richly embroidered gown, her starched neck ruff, and her elegantly coiffured hair. Lifting her skirts a little, she brushed past us, leaving a sweet scent from her pomander hanging in her wake.
    “I take it,” said Sal Pavy, “that was not Madame La Voisin.”
    “No.” Sam lifted the flap and motioned us inside. The interior of the tent was dim, and so thick with acrid smoke that I could scarcely see, let alone breathe.
    “Be seated,” said the same rasping voice we had heard before. Stifling a cough, I eased myself onto a rickety three-legged stool. Sam sat on the one remaining stool. Sal Pavy stood just inside the tent flap, shifting about restlessly, as though ready to make a run for it if necessary.
    When my eyes adjusted to the lack of light, I could make out a hunched figure whose head was swathed in a number of dirty,moth-eaten scarves. On her hands were a pair of equally soiled kid gloves with the fingertips cut off, allowing the ends of her fingers to protrude. When I wiped my stinging eyes, I could see that her knuckles were clustered with a multitude of small warts.
    On the wooden table before her, cradled between her palms, was a surprisingly clean cloth that concealed something spherical. On the ground next to her sat a black iron kettle—the source of the smoke that threatened to suffocate me. I leaned forward and peered into the cauldron, half expecting to find some eldritch brew of newts’ eyes and adders’ tongues, but saw only glowing chunks of Newcastle coal, with no purpose more sinister than to warm the tent.
    La Voisin’s hoarse voice issued again from the folds of her several scarves. “And what do you young ladies wish of me?”
    Sam gave a feeble laugh. “Ladies? We’re no ladies, madame.”
    “Perhaps not today,” she replied slyly. “But sometimes, yes?”
    Sam glanced my way and lifted his eyebrows slightly. “How did you know?”
    “It is my business to know things.”
    “Could you—could you tell our futures, then?” When La Voisin made no answer, Sam shifted uncomfortably in his seat and seemed about to repeat the question. Then the soothsayer laid one of her hands on the table, palm up. “Oh.” Sam dug in his purse for a penny, which he dropped into her worn glove.
    “I have told your fate before,” La Voisin said. Then she pointed a finger in my direction. “I will tell
his
.” She laid aside the cloth, revealing a globe perhaps six inches across, fashioned from some substance that was black as coal; it had been polished until it gleamed darkly, like the pupil of an enormous eye.
    She stared into the ball for a long while. Finally she spoke, in a tone so bleak and ominous that it made me shudder. “I see,” she said, “that you will come into a fortune.”
    Sam’s face took on a look of surprise and indignation. “That’s the same thing you told
me!
”
    “Not so,” said La Voisin. “What I said was, ‘You will receive more money than you imagine.’”
    “That’s the same thing, isn’t it?” When the cunning woman made no reply, he fished out another coin and clapped it into her