Ruled Britannia (47 page)

 

J
ACK
H
UNGERFORD SHOWED
Shakespeare a row of cheap, rusty helmets somewhat brightened by splashes of silver paint. “With feather plumes, Master Will, they serve passing well for Roman casques,” the tireman said. “See you how the cheek pieces I've added help give 'em the seeming of antiquity?”

Shakespeare reached out and touched one of those cheek pieces. It was, as he'd expected, nothing but cut tin, hardly thicker than a leaf of paper. That didn't matter. It would look all right to the audience. What the players wore and what the groundlings saw—or imagined they saw—were two very different things. He knew that. No one who'd ever gone on up on stage could help knowing it. Still . . .

“Can we not make it plainer who these Romans are, whom they personate?” he inquired.

Hungerford frowned. “They are Romans, not so?” He scratched his head.

“Ay, certes, they are Romans.” Shakespeare drummed the fingers of his right hand on his hose. The tireman, who dealt in things, cared nothing for symbols. “But bethink you, Master Jack. They are Romans, yes. They are invaders, come to Britain to conquer her, to change for their own her ancient and ancestral usages. In the doing, they have cast down a Queen. . . .” How many examples would he have to string together? How long before Jack Hungerford saw where he aimed? Would the tireman ever see it?

Scratching again, this time at the side of his chin, Hungerford spoke in thoughtful tones: “They fair put you in mind o' the dons, not so?”

“Even so, Master Jack! Even so!” Shakespeare wanted to kiss him. Hungerford had seen where he was going after all. “Can you devise somewhat wherewith they have at once the seeming of Romans and Spaniards both?”

“Well . . . I have me these morions here,” Hungerford said doubtfully, pointing to a row of Spanish-style helmets below the “Roman” ones. “Haply I might make shift to give 'em a crest of feathers or horsehair, here along the comb, so. . . .” He ran his finger from the front of a morion to the back to show what he meant.

“Yes! Most excellent indeed!” Shakespeare exclaimed. “By my troth, Master Jack, the very thing. At times, now, the Roman soldiery will be seen armored. Can this also call to mind the dons' equipage?”

“Oh, yes. Naught simpler there.” Now that the tireman had the bit between his teeth, he could run. “A good English back-and-breast is like unto that which the Spaniards wear. An eagle daubed on the breast thereof should show the armor is purposed to stand for a Roman's, an't please you.”

“Indeed—it pleases me greatly.” Shakespeare nodded. “Now, one thing more. What have we here of queenly regalia?”

“Queenly . . . ?” Even with bit between his teeth, Hungerford didn't change gaits quickly; he needed a moment to shift his thoughts from one path to another. But then he snapped his fingers. “Ah! I follow! For the lad who is to play . . .” He snapped his fingers again, this time in annoyance. “Beshrew me if I recall the name.”

“Boudicca,” Shakespeare said patiently. How many people these days knew of the Queen of the Iceni, defeated and dead more than fifteen hundred years? Only those who'd fought through the
Annals
. Maybe his
tragedy would change that. Then again, maybe it would never take the stage. But he had to go on as if he thought it would.

“Boudicca,” Hungerford echoed. “A heathen appellation, if ever such there be. Well, what would you in aid of the garb purposed for that part, Master Will?”

“That it resemble a certain other deposed Queen's, as close as may be,” Shakespeare answered.

He would not say the name. He didn't know why not. This conversation was already so manifestly treasonous, the name couldn't make it worse. But no one ever said it in today's England without a shiver of fear, without wondering who might be listening. He wondered if any girl child born after the summer of 1588 bore it. He had his doubts. He knew he wouldn't have given it to a little girl, not in an England ruled by Isabella and Albert. Maybe some folk were braver than he. No: certainly some folk were braver than he. But were any that brave, or that reckless?

Again, the tireman needed a heartbeat or two to catch up with him. “A certain other . . . ?” Hungerford said, and then nodded. “Oh. Elizab . . .” He stopped. He would not say all of the name, either. His eyes widened. “I take your drift. Whatsoever we may lack, I can get for barter from other companies. They need not know our veritable intent, only that it is to garb a Queen.”

“You may say Queen Mary, an't please you,” Shakespeare said. “She hath some small part in
King Philip
.”

“As she had some small part in King Philip his life,” said Hungerford, who was old enough to remember when Mary and Philip had briefly shared the English throne. He nodded. “Ay, that will suit well enough, should any presume to make inquiry. Are you fain to have me give him a red wig and powder his face white, as was . . . her custom for some years?”

“However your wit may take you,” Shakespeare answered. “The greater the semblance, though, the more likely the play to seize the auditors.”

“Then I'll do't,” Hungerford said.

“And one thing more, Master Jack,” Shakespeare said earnestly. “Come what may, suffer not Lieutenant de Vega to learn aught of what's afoot, else all's ruined.”

“You need not tell me that,” the tireman replied. “D'you take more for a witling? A soft and dull-eyed fool?”

The poet shook his head. “By no means, sir. But the enterprise hath
such weight and urgency, I'd liefer warn without need than need without giving warning. 'Swounds, I meant no offense, and cry your pardon for any I gave.”

Hungerford smiled. “Rest easy. I am not one to hold anger to his inward self, cherishing the warmth like a man in January new-come to hearth and home. And you speak sooth: 'tis no game we play, unless you'd style thus dicing o'er the fate of kingdoms.”

Shakespeare sighed with relief. He still had no guarantee
Boudicca
would come off well, or that it would do as Sir William Cecil hoped and help rouse England against the Spanish occupiers. He had no guarantee the play would even appear on stage. (That gave rise to a new worry. If
Boudicca
didn't appear, if
King Philip
did, how could he reclaim the written parts? Any of those, should a Spaniard see it, would be plenty to get him dragged to Tower Hill, hanged, cut down, drawn, quartered, and burnt. His danger didn't end if
Boudicca
failed to play. If anything, it got worse.) But if his tragedy of the British Queen did reach the stage, Jack Hungerford would do everything in his power to make it look the way it should. And the tireman took it seriously. He understood the stakes for which they were playing.

Haply I make a better poet than did Kit Marlowe
, Shakespeare thought.
But in all else he were better suited than I, being an intriguer and intelligencer born
. “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.”

He didn't realize he'd said that aloud till Hungerford completed the quotation for him: “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.”

Was this God's will? Shakespeare checked himself. That was the wrong question. Everything, surely, was God's will. But was it God's will that the uprising should go forward and succeed?

How can I know?
Shakespeare sighed again, on a very different note. Almost groaning, he said, “O God! That one might read the book of fate and see the revolution of the times.”

“What fates impose, that men must needs abide,” Hungerford said.

Shakespeare's nod was half glum, half exalted. “We have thrown our gloves to death himself, that there's no maculation in our hearts. If it be otherwise, if the canker of treason dwell in someone's bosom, we are all undone.”

“Hanging and wiving go by destiny,” the tireman said, a homely saw that would have made Shakespeare happier had his own marriage been better.

He left the tiring room and went out on stage, where rehearsal for
Boudicca
went on. Burbage, as Boudicca's brother-in-law Caratach, traded barbs with Will Kemp, who played Marcus, a Roman soldier now captured by the Iceni, and with Peter Baker, the boy playing Caratach's nephew, Hengo.

 

“Fill 'em more wine; give 'em full bowls.—

Which of you all now, in recompense of this good,

Dare but give me a sound knock in the battle?”

 

Burbage boomed the words: Caratach was a fierce, blustering soldier.

 

“Delicate captain,

To do thee a sufficient recompense,

I'll knock thy brains out,”

 

Kemp replied. Marcus' talk was far bolder than his performance. He mimed gobbling down food in front of him.

“By the gods, uncle, If his valour lie in's teeth, he's the most valiant,” the boy playing Hengo jeered. He shook his fist at Will Kemp.

 

“Thou dar'st as well be damn'd: thou knock his brains out,

Thou skin of man!—Uncle, I will not hear this.”

 

“Tie up your whelp,” Kemp told Burbage, exactly as if he were a proud Roman in barbarous hands.

Peter Baker capered about in a well-acted transport of fury.

 

“Thou kill my uncle! Would I

Had but a sword for thy sake, thou dried dog!”

 

“What a mettle this little vermin carries,” Will Kemp muttered.

“Kill mine uncle!” the boy screeched.

“He shall not, child,” said Burbage, as Caratach.

 

“He cannot; he's a rogue,

An only eating rogue: kill my sweet uncle!

Oh, that I were a man!”

 

Peter Baker cried.

Will Kemp smirked.

 

“By this wine, which I

Will drink to Captain Junius, who loves

The Queen's most excellent Majesty's little daughter

Most sweetly and most fearfully, I will do it.”

 

“Uncle, I'll kill him with a great pin,” the youngster playing Hengo squeaked.

“No more, boy,” Richard Burbage began. Before he could go on and drink to Kemp's Marcus in turn, the tireman's helper started whistling the bawdy tune of which he was so fond. Instantly, Peter Baker ran off the stage. Burbage went from fierce Caratach to majestic Philip by leaning forward a little, letting his belly droop down, and dropping his voice half an octave. Will Kemp was as quick to turn, chameleonlike, into a cardinal hounding the Mahometans of southern Spain: the drunken, lecherous Roman he had been was forgotten in the wink of an eye.

By the time Lope de Vega walked into the Theatre, what had been a rehearsal for
Boudicca
had metamorphosed into a rehearsal for
King Philip
. “Good morrow, gentles,” the Spaniard called as he walked towards the stage. He waved to Shakespeare. “Give you good morrow, Master Will. You go on without me, is it not so?”

“A good day to you, Lieutenant,” Shakespeare answered. “All of us must take our parts.”

“That is so.” Lope nodded. “Tell me something, an't please you.”

“If I do know it, you shall know it,” Shakespeare said. It sounded like a promise. But it was one he had no intention of keeping if de Vega wanted to know anything he shouldn't.

All Lope said, though, was, “Whensoever I come hither of late, some fellow in yon topmost gallery whistles the selfsame song. What is't? The music thereof quite likes me. Be there accompanying words?”

Shakespeare coughed. Richard Burbage kicked at the boards of the stage. Will Kemp guffawed. Still, Shakespeare could answer safely, so he did: “An I mind me aright, the ditty's named ‘A Man's Yard.' ”

“Not a tailor's yard, nor a clothier's yard,” Burbage added, perhaps helpfully. “Any man's yard.”

“Ah?” Lope looked unenlightened. “Can you sing somewhat of't for me?”

That made Shakespeare cough again, cough and hesitate. Very little made Will Kemp hesitate. He sang out in a ringing baritone:

 

“ ‘Rede me a riddle—what is this

You hold in your hand when you piss?

It is a kind of pleasing sting,

A pricking and a pleasant thing.

It is a stiff short fleshly pole,

That fits to stop a maiden's hole;

It is Venus' wanton staying wand

That ne'er had feet, and yet can stand.' ”

 

He would have gone on, but Lope, grinning, held up a hand. “
Basta
,” he said. “Enough; that sufficeth me. And now,
por Dios
, I take your jape of a few days past. We have such songs also in Spanish.” He too began to sing. Shakespeare followed a little of it; he knew Italian and French, which were cousins to Spanish, and had picked up some of the conquerors' tongue itself during their ten years in England. From what he got of it, it was indeed of the same sort as “A Man's Yard.”