Fool (12 page)

I started to speak, thinking it a perfect opportunity to mention her newfound affection for Edmund of Gloucester, my recent session of bawdy discipline with the duchess, and a half-dozen metaphors for illicit shagging that had come to mind while the duke mused, when Jones said:

“Sex and cuckoldry

You’ve mastered those jokes

For a more challenging jape

A new seal should be broke.”

“What?” said I. Whenever Jones has spoken before it has been in my own voice-smaller and muted sometimes, from the art of throwing it, but my voice alone, unless Drool is mimicking the puppet. And it is I who works the little ring and string that move Jones’s mouth. But this was not my voice, and I had not moved the puppet. It was the voice of the girl ghost from the White Tower.

“Don’t be tedious, Pocket,” said Albany. “I’ve no patience for puppets and rhymes.”

Jones said:

“A thousand rough nights

To call the lady a whore,

Only today may a fool,

Jest the land into war?”

And like a shooting star cutting brilliant across the ignorant night of my mind, I saw the ghost’s meaning.

I said: “I know not what the lady sends to Cornwall, good Albany, but while I was this last month in Gloucester, I heard soldiers talk of Cornwall and Regan gathering forces by the sea.”

“Gathering an army? Whatever for? With gentle Cordelia and Jeff now on the throne in France, it would be folly to cross the channel. We’ve a safe ally there.”

“Oh, they aren’t gathering forces against France, they are gathering forces against you, my lord. Regan would be queen of all of Britain. Or so I heard said.”

“You heard this from soldiers? Under whose flag, these soldiers?”

“Mercenaries, lord. No flag but fortune for them, and the word was there is coin aplenty for a free lance fighter in Cornwall. I have to be off. The king will need someone to whip for your lady’s rude announcements.”

“That doesn’t seem fair,” said Albany. He had a spark of decency in him, really, and somehow Goneril had not yet been able to smother it. Plus, he seemed to have forgotten about accidentally hanging me.

“Don’t worry for me, good duke. You have worries of your own. Someone must take a hit for your lady, let it be this humble fool. Pray, tell her I said that someone must always hit it. Fare thee well, duke.”

And merrily I was off, bottom stinging, to let slip the dogs of war. Hi ho!

Lear sat on his horse outside Castle Albany, howling at the sky like a complete lunatic.

“May Nature’s nymphs bring great lobster-sized vermin to infest the rotted nest of her woman bits, and may serpents fix their fangs in her nipples and wave there until her poisoned dugs go black and drop to the ground like overripe figs!”

I looked at Kent. “Built up a spot of steam, hasn’t he?” said I.

“May Thor hammer at her bowels and produce flaming flatulence that wilts the forest and launches her off the battlements into a reeking dung heap!”

“Not really adhering to any particular pantheon, is he?” said Kent.

“Oh, Poseidon, send your one-eyed son to stare into her bituminous heart and ignite it with flames of most hideous suffering.”

“You know,” said I, “the king seems to be leaning rather heavily on curses, for someone with his unsavory history with witches.”

“Aye,” said Kent. “Seems to have steered his wrath toward the eldest daughter, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Oh, you don’t say?” said I. “Sure, sure, that could be it, I suppose.”

We heard horses galloping and I pulled Kent back from the drawbridge as two riders, leading a train of six horses, thundered across.

“Oswald,” said Kent.

“With extra horses,” said I. “He’s gone to Cornwall.”

Lear broke with his cursing and watched the riders take out across the moor. “What business has that rascal in Cornwall?”

“He carries a message, nuncle,” said I. “I heard Goneril order him to report her mind to her sister, and for Regan and her lord to go to Gloucester and not to be in Cornwall when you arrive.”

“Goneril, thou foul monstress!” said the king, clouting himself on the forehead.

“Indeed,” said I.

“Oh, evil monstress!”

“To be sure,” said Kent.

“Oh, pernicious monstress, perfect in her perfidy!”

Kent and I looked at each other, knowing not what to say.

“I said,” said Lear, “most pernicious monstress, perfect in her perfidy!”

Kent mimed a set of generous bosoms on himself and raised an eyebrow as if to ask, “Boobs?”

I shrugged as if to say, “Aye, boobs sounds right.”

“Aye, most pernicious perfidy indeed, sire,” said I.

“Aye, most bouncy and jiggling perfidy,” said Kent.

Then, as if coming out of a trance, Lear snapped to attention in his saddle. “You, Caius, have Curan saddle a fast horse for you. You must go to Gloucester, tell my friend the earl that we are coming.”

“Aye, my lord,” said Kent.

“And Caius, see that my apprentice Drool comes to no harm,” said I.

Kent nodded and went back across the drawbridge. The old king looked down to me.

“Oh, my pretty Black Fool, where from fatherly duty did I stray that such ingratitude should rise in Goneril like mad fever?”

“I am only a fool, my lord, but making a guess, I’d say the lady may have in her delicate youth required more discipline to shape her character.”

“Speak plain, Pocket, I’ll not hold harm against you.”

“You needed to smack the bitch up when she was tender, my lord. Instead, now you hand your daughters the rod and pull down your own breeches.”

“I’ll have you flogged, fool.”

“His word is like the dew,” said the puppet Jones, “good only until put under light of day.”

I laughed, simple fool that I am, no thought at all that Lear was becoming as inconstant as a butterfly. “I need to speak to Curan and find a horse for the journey, sirrah,” said I. “I’ll bring your cloak.”

Lear sagged in the saddle now, spent now from his ranting. “Go, good Pocket. Have my knights prepare.”

“So I shall,” said I. “So I shall.” I left the old man there alone outside the castle.

TWELVE – A KING’S ROAD

Having set the course of events in motion, I wonder now if my training to be a nun, and my polished skills at telling jokes, juggling, and singing songs fully qualify me to start a war. I have so often been the instrument of the whims of others, not even a pawn at court, merely an accoutrement to the king or his daughters. An amusing ornament. A tiny reminder of conscience and humanity, tempered with enough humor so it can be dismissed, laughed off, ignored. Perhaps there is a reason that there is no fool piece on the chessboard. What action, a fool? What strategy, a fool? What use, a fool? Ah, but a fool resides in a deck of cards, a joker, sometimes two. Of no worth, of course. No real purpose. The appearance of a trump, but none of the power. Simply an instrument of chance. Only a dealer may give value to the joker. Make him wild, make him trump. Is the dealer Fate? God? The king? A ghost? Witches?

The anchoress spoke of the cards in the tarot, forbidden and pagan as they were. We had no cards, but she would describe them for me, and I drew their images on the stones of the antechamber in charcoal. “The fool’s number is zero,” she said, “but that’s because he represents the infinite possibility of all things. He may become anything. See, he carries all of his possessions in a bundle on his back. He is ready for anything, to go anywhere, to become whatever he needs to be. Don’t count out the fool, Pocket, simply because his number is zero.”

Did she know where I was heading, or do her words only have meaning to me now, as I, the zero, the nothing, seek to move nations? War? I couldn’t see the appeal.

Drunk, and dire of mood one night, Lear mused of war when I suggested that what he needed to cast off his dark aspect was a good wenching. “Oh, Pocket, I am too old, and the joy of a fuck withers with my limbs. Only a good killing can still boil lust in my blood. And one will not do, either. Kill me a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand on my command-rivers of blood running through the fields-that’s what pumps fire into a man’s lance.”

“Oh,” said I. “I was going to fetch Shanker Mary for you from the laundry, but ten thousand dead and rivers of blood might be a bit beyond her talents, majesty.”

“No, thank you, good Pocket, I shall sit and slide slowly and sadly into oblivion.”

“Or,” said I, “I could put a bucket on Drool’s head and beat him with a sack of beets until the floor is splattered crimson while Shanker Mary gives you a proper tug to accentuate the gore.”

“No, fool, there is no pretending to war.”

“What’s Wales doing, majesty? We could invade the Welsh, perpetrate enough slaughter to raise your spirits, and have you back for tea and toast.”

“Wales is ours now, lad.”

“Oh bugger. What’s your feeling on attacking North Kensington, then?”

“Kensington’s not a mile away. Practically in our own bailey.”

“Aye, nuncle, that’s the beauty of it, they’d never see it coming. Like a hot blade through butter, we’d be. We could hear the widows and orphans wailing from the castle walls-like a horny lullaby for you.”

“I should think not. I’m not attacking neighborhoods of London to amuse myself, Pocket. What kind of tyrant do you think me?”

“Oh, above average, sire. Well above bloody average.”

“I’ll have you speak no more of war, fool. You’ve too sweet a nature for such dastardly pursuits.”

Too sweet?
Moi?
Methinks the art of war was made for fools, and fools for war. Kensington trembled that night.

On the road to Gloucester I let my anger wane and tried to comfort the old king as best I could by lending him a sympathetic ear and a gentle word when he needed it.

“You simple, sniveling old toss-beast! What did you expect to happen when you put the care of your half-rotted carcass in the talons of that carrion bird of a daughter?” (I may have had some residual anger.)

“But I gave her half my kingdom.”

“And she gave you half the truth in return, when she told you she loved you all.”

The old man hung his head and his white hair fell in his face. We sat on stones by the fire. A tent was set in the wood nearby for the king’s comfort, as there was no manor house in this northern county for him to take refuge. The rest of us would sleep outside in the cold.

“Wait, fool, until we are under the roof of my second daughter,” said Lear. “Regan was always the sweet one, she will not be so shabby in her gratitude.”

I had no heart to chide the old man any more. Expecting kindness from Regan was hope sung in the key of madness. Always the sweet one? Regan? I think not.

My second week in the castle I found young Regan and Goneril in one of the king’s solars, teasing little Cordelia, passing a kitten the little one had taken a fancy to over her head, taunting her.

“Oh, come get the kitty,” said Regan. “Be careful, lest it fly out the window.” Regan pretended she might throw the terrified little cat out the window, and as Cordelia ran, arms stretched out to grab the kitten, Regan reeled and tossed the kitten to Goneril, who swung the kitten toward another window.

“Oh, look, Cordy, she’ll be drowned in the moat, just like your traitor mother,” said Goneril.

“Nooooooo!” wailed Cordelia. She was nearly breathless from running sister to sister after the kitten.

I stood in the doorway, stunned at their cruelty. The chamberlain had told me that Cordelia’s mother, Lear’s third queen, had been accused of treason and banished three years before. No one knew exactly the circumstances of the crime, but there were rumors that she had been practicing the old religion, others that she had committed adultery. All the chamberlain knew for sure was that the queen had been taken from the tower in the dead of night, and from that time until my arrival at the castle, Cordelia had not uttered a coherent syllable.

“Drowned as a witch, she was,” said Regan, snatching the kitten out of the air. But this time the little kitten’s claws found royal flesh. “Ow! You little shit!” Regan tossed the kitten out the window. Cordelia loosed an ear-shattering scream.

Without thinking I dived through the window after the cat and caught the braided cord with my feet as I flew through. I caught the kitten about five feet below the window as the cord burned between my ankles. Not having thought the move completely through, I hadn’t counted on how to catch myself, kitten in hand, when the cord slammed me into the tower wall. The cord tightened around my right ankle. I took the impact on that shoulder and bounced while I watched my coxcomb flutter like a wounded bird to the moat below.

I tucked the kitten into my doublet, then climbed back up the cord and in through the window. “Lovely day for a constitutional, don’t you think, ladies?”

The three of them all stood with their mouths hanging open, the older sisters had backed against the walls of the solar. “You lot look like you could use some air,” said I.

I took the kitten from my doublet and held it out to Cordelia. “Kitty’s had quite an adventure. Perhaps you should take her to her mum for a nap.” Cordelia took the kitten from me and ran out of the room.

“We can have you beheaded, fool,” said Regan, shaking off her shock.

“Anytime we want,” said Goneril, with less conviction than her sister.

“Shall I send in a maid to tie back the tapestry, mum?” I asked, with a grand wave to the tapestry I’d loosed from the wall when I leapt.

“Uh, yes, do that,” commanded Regan. “This instant!”

“This instant,” barked Goneril.

“Right away, mum.” And with a grin and a bow, I was gone from the room.

I made my way down the spiral stairs clinging to the wall, lest my heart give out and send me tumbling. Cordelia stood at the bottom of the stairs, cradling the kitten, looking up at me as if I were Jesus, Zeus, and St. George all back from a smashing day of dragon slaying. Her eyes were unnaturally wide and she appeared to have stopped breathing. Bloody awe, I suppose.

“Stop staring like that, lamb, it’s disturbing. People will think you’ve a chicken bone caught in your throat.”

“Thank you,” she said, with a great, shoulder-shaking sob.

I patted her head. “You’re welcome, love. Now run along, Pocket has to fish his hat from the moat and then go to the kitchen and drink until his hands stop shaking or he drowns in his own sick, whichever comes first.”

She backed away to let me pass, never taking her eyes from mine. It had been thus since the night I arrived at the tower-when her mind first crept out from whatever dark place it had been living before my arrival-those wide, crystal-blue eyes looking at me with unblinking wonder. The child could be right creepy.

“Do not make yourself a maid to surprise, nuncle,” said I. I held the reins of my and the king’s horse as they drank from an ice-laced stream some hundred miles north of Gloucester. “Regan is a treasure to be sure, but she may have the same mind as her sister. Although they will deny it, it’s often been the case.”

“I cannot think it so,” said the king. “Regan will receive us with open arms.” There was a racket behind us and the king turned. “Ah, what is this?”

A gaily painted wagon was coming out of the wood toward us. Several of the knights reached for swords or lances. Captain Curan waved for them to stand at ease.

“Mummers, sire,” said the Captain.

“Aye,” said Lear, “I forgot, the Yule is nearly on us. They’ll be going to Gloucester as well, I’ll wager, to play for the Yule feast. Pocket, go tell them that we grant them safe passage and they may follow our train under our protection.”

The wagon creaked to a stop. Happening upon a train of fifty knights and attendants in the countryside would put any performer on guard. The man driving the wagon stood at the reins and waved. He wore a grand purple hat with a white plume in it.

I leapt the narrow stream, and made my way up the road. When the driver saw my motley he smiled. I, too, smiled, in relief-this was not the cruel master from my own days as a mummer.

“Hail, fool, what finds you so far from court and castle?”

“I carry my court with me and my castle lies ahead, sirrah.”

“Carry your court? Then that white-haired old man is-”

“Aye, King Lear himself.”

“Then you are the famous Black Fool.”

“At your bloody service,” said I, with a bow.

“You’re smaller than in the stories,” said the big-hatted weasel.

“Aye, and your hat is an ocean in which your wit wanders like a lost plague ship.”

The mummer laughed. “You give me more than my due, sirrah. We trade not in wit like you, wily fool. We are thespians!”

With that, three young men and a girl stepped out from behind the wagon and bowed gracefully and with far too much flourish than was called for.

“Thesbians,” said they, in chorus.

I tipped my coxcomb. “Well, I enjoy a lick of the lily from time to time myself,” said I, “but it’s hardly something you want to paint on the side of a wagon.”

“Not
lesbians,
” said the girl, “
thesbians
. We are actors.”

“Oh,” said I. “That’s different.”

“Aye,” said big hat. “We’ve no need of wit-the play’s the thing, you see. Not a word passes our lips that hasn’t been chewed thrice and spat out by a scribe.”

“Unburdened by originality are we,” said an actor in a red waistcoat.

The girl said, “Although we do bear the cross of fabulously shiny hair-”

“Blank slates, we are,” said another of the actors.

“We are mere appendages of the pen, so to speak,” said big hat.

“Yeah, you’re a bloody appendage, all right,” I said under my breath. “Well, actors then. Smashing. The king has bade me tell you that he grants you safe passage to Gloucester and offers his protection.”

“Oh my,” said big hat. “We are only going as far as Birmingham, but I suppose we could double back from Gloucester if his majesty wishes us to perform.”

“No,” said I. “Please, do pass through and on to Birmingham. The king would never impede the progress of artists.”

“You’re certain?” said big hat. “We’ve been rehearsing a classic from antiquity,
Green Eggs and Hamlet,
the story of a young prince of Denmark who goes mad, drowns his girlfriend, and in his remorse, forces spoiled breakfast on all whom he meets. It was pieced together from fragments of an ancient Merican manuscript.”