The Nine Giants by Edward Marston Page B

with them in Shoreditch and whom she had packed into the attic room to keep them out of the way of the other inhabitants. She ran a tight ship and nobody was allowed to flout her captaincy. When one of the actors dared to ogle a servant girl, Margery gave him a fierce sermon on self-restraint and warned him that his voice would rise by two octaves if ever she caught him fraternising again. Since she was carryingthe kitchen knife at the time, he understood her meaning all too well and withdrew hastily to the attic to acquaint his fellows with what had passed. All females in the house were treated with excessive respect from that time on and even the she-cats earned more consideration.
    Caught up as she was in feeding and caring for her extended family, Margery yet found time to keep an alert eye on her husband. Lawrence Firethorn had swept her off her feet with one of the most sublime performances of his career then borne her off down the aisle before she could even begin to resist. It had been a magical experience that could still flicker in the memory on rare occasions but it was dulled beneath the accumulated debris that a marriage inevitably builds up. One thing she had learnt at an early stage: her husband had the defects of his virtues. His overwhelming talent as an actor had indeed seduced her but she was realistic enough to see that it had a powerful effect on other women as well. Temptation was ever-present and Firethorn was not always able to resist it. Without her vigilance, he would be led astray by every red lip and arched eyebrow. She sensed that he was beginning to look elsewhere and decided to fire a warning shot across his bows.
    ‘Good morning to you, sir!’
    ‘Good morning, my dove,’ he said expansively. ‘The sun is streaming down from the heavens to gild the marital couch.’
    ‘You may well say that from where you lie,’ she observed tartly, ‘but I have been up these two hours to make all readydownstairs. Besides,’ she added, ‘if our marital couch is so special to you, why did you return to it so late last night?’
    ‘Work and worry kept me away.’
    ‘Does she have a name?’
    ‘Margery! How can you even suggest such a thing?’
    He sat up in the four-poster with rumpled dignity and scratched at his beard. His wife stood over him with folded arms and snarled her next question.
    ‘Do you love me, sir?’
    ‘I dote on you, my treasure.’
    ‘But do you dote on me
enough
?’
    ‘My devotion is without human limit.’
    ‘That is my complaint, Lawrence,’ she said. ‘I would that your devotion was limited to
me
but it flies away like a bird on the wing.’
    ‘Only to return with joy. I am your homing pigeon.’
    ‘You are an eagle, sir, who searches out new prey.’
    ‘These suspicions are unfair and unfounded.’
    ‘Prove it!’
    He struck a pose. ‘My conscience is clear.’
    ‘You do not possess such a thing.’
    ‘Sweetness,’ he said. ‘What means this discord so early in the day? What crime have I committed?’
    ‘It still lies festering in your brain.’
    ‘That brain is occupied with fond thoughts of you.’
    ‘Only when I stand before you.’
    ‘And lie beneath me, my little pomegranate.’
    He spoke with such tender lechery that even her resolve weakened. A big, buxom, bustling woman in a simpleworking dress, she let herself be flattered by his words and by the admiring glances he now directed at her. With all its faults, the marriage had never lacked excitement or pleasure. Another episode now beckoned.
    ‘You left my side too soon,’ he cooed.
    ‘There was much to be done below.’
    ‘Come back to me for a moment of wild madness.’
    ‘It would be madness indeed at this hour.’
    ‘Let me
show
you how much I love you, Margery.’
    Her doubts were temporarily wiped away and she moved in close to be gathered into whirling embrace. She was lifted bodily into the bed and let out a girlish laugh as he rolled on top of her but their joy was short-lived. Before