Shakespeare's Rebel (36 page)

At that, he walked away. John wanted to follow, grab, persuade, somehow. But he did not move. Men stared. If they did not hear the whispered words, they sensed the feeling, as good players will.

He took a moment to master himself. There were so many cuts, he did not know which to staunch first. The deepest he discovered when he probed was that Burbage was Ned’s new father. Yet his son was right in this. Choices had been made. Consequences must now be lived with.

When he was ready, he shook himself, straightened. As he made for the stairs, what he forced himself to dwell upon was not his sentence of banishment, but the first thing that Ned had shown him, albeit in a flash: his relief. Buried deep within his justified resentment, he was glad his father lived. That would have to be enough for him, for now.

During
Henry the Fifth
, John had explored the new theatre top to bottom, and had discovered a viewing hole in the uppermost level of the playhouse. He made for it now. The winch that was up there to lower characters from heaven was obviously not required for this piece. No workers awaited their cue in the cramped space. So he was able to tread carefully to the front wall to peer, to seek. Yet how, in that vast horde, would he ever be able to pick out Tess?

He sought. Faces blurred as he scanned them. He knew she’d be dressed simply, demurely – but so was most of the audience that sat in the galleries. She would have her natural hair, not a tower that testified to the tirer’s art. Again, that only ruled out a few. He looked where he had sat with her before, and did not find her.

He lowered his eyes, rubbed them – and then admitted another sense. He began to listen. To Burbage. At first he tried to pick fault, as if the player’s rendition could make him unworthy to be Ned’s tutor; yet soon admitted that there was scarce a fault to be found. The deep voice rolled like smoothest moleskin over the house, enfolding all in warmth, heating John where he sat, directly above. And then he was taken beyond the sound, to the words themselves. John had known his friend’s words from the beginning, had spoken not a few himself. The playwright had always had a way with him. But these? There was something different to them, to the way the verse moved. It was . . . simpler, swifter somehow, direct and all the deeper for it. The way the character talked . . . Burbage was Brutus, the noblest Roman, that John knew. But Brutus was not telling others who he was, as was usually the way. He was telling the audience, of course – but he was also telling himself. More – and this made John’s heart beat a little faster – he was using the audience to decide his course of action.

Words floated up.

Between the acting of a dreadful thing
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasm or a hideous dream.

It was thrilling. Uncanny. Will had written soliloquies before. None like this. And because he was lost in it, staring out into the playhouse, transported, no longer seeking, he found – and looked straight into Tess’s face.

XXVII

The Battle of the Bridge

She was sitting right in the centre of the second gallery. She was as enraptured as he had just been. As they all were, either side of her and all around. Even the fidgety groundlings, silenced and still, held in the alchemy of playwright and his player.

John had to break free of them, could not lose himself to rapture. Especially when, in seeing her and studying a path to her, he also saw possibly the only two men in the playhouse who were not caught in Burbage’s spell. They were not looking at him upon the stage. They were looking all around the house. One was the man who’d lately stood sentinel at the players’ entrance. The other was the officer who had arrested John and taken him to Lollards’ Tower – Waller, was it? Who’d been kind enough to give him some ale. Cecil’s man.

It did not matter. He had to be gone. But first he had to see Tess.

He moved to the stair, as soft as any mouse. If he had escaped Burbage’s entrapment, he would not distract any other from it.

As he descended the ladder, he wondered how he could approach her. He assumed that Cecil’s officers were wise enough to have followed Tess from the tavern. They would know where she sat, and another man, one he had not spotted, might be watching her. No answer came as he passed quietly through the tiring house, and no player noted him, all their attention forward to the platform. He descended again to the players’ entrance. A keeper he did not know eyed him as he bent to the grille. There was no one watching there. Cecil’s men had obviously decided he was in the house.

He gestured to the bolts, was let out. He merged swiftly into the crowd that still moved towards other Bankside entertainments, inns, cockpits, brothels. Left them at the Globe’s main door. Hesitated there. It was foolish to go in. He had a purse to see him out of London. He could send Tess a note, explaining all.

It was foolish – and he did it. I have my reputation to consider after all, he thought. Fool. The one title I truly own. May as well own it, and let Tess make up the triumvirate of those who so justly condemn me this day.

Latecomers were always admitted, if they had their penny. John opened the purse, saw his friend had treated him well – there was gold, five angels’ worth in various coins, some shillings and sixpences, some brass . . . and just two pennies, which were what he needed now. He handed the first to the doorkeeper for entrance, the second to the gallery man, who admitted him though muttered there was little room to spare. At the top of the stair he peered down, marked Tess in the front row. A servant was beside her, her chaperone.

John gnawed at his bottom lip. He glanced at the stage, where conspirators had given way to Brutus and his lady. They began to speak . . . and John was jostled by a boy trying to pass him into the gallery, a tray of oranges held before him. John moved aside . . . then reached, grabbing the boy by the arm, pulling him close. ‘Listen, lad, do you want to earn a tuppence?’

He whispered instructions. The boy nodded, disappeared the coin under his rags, then went about his business, whispering his wares. When he reached the row behind Tess, he bent and said something softly into the serving man’s ear. He jerked his head around . . . and John ducked from view down the stairwell.

People rose and moved around the galleries all the time – to piss, to buy nuts or oranges or beer, to liaise and flirt. They could be cursed, especially during an intimate scene like this one. John heard some angry mutters; and then the serving man appeared. He halted at the top of the stairs on seeing John, who reached up, caught him by the sleeve and pulled him down a couple of steps and out of sight. ‘Do you know me?’ he said, low and urgent.

The man, one of Tess’s brewers with a gut his trade had given him, nodded, his eyes wide.

‘Then I ask a favour of you: I wish to hire your seat for a time.’

‘My seat?’ The man scratched his beard. ‘I don’t think the mistress would like . . .’

‘I assure you, the mistress is expecting me. Besides’ – he raised a silver shilling – ‘you look thirsty.’

The brewer licked his lips. ‘I was enjoying the play, though. That Burbage . . .’

‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said John testily, ‘the prince of players. Well, you will return to him soon enough.’ He shoved the coin into the man’s hand. ‘Oh,’ he added, ‘and I will need to borrow your bonnet and cloak.’

The exchange was swiftly made. Fortunately the brewer had a head to match his stomach, and John was able to pull the brim well over his eyes. As the man descended for refreshment, John climbed and, to more curses, made his way to the vacant place. It had been expanded into, but with a forceful insertion, he was down.

‘Really, Matthew, can your bladder not hold till a noisier time?’ whispered Tess.

John peered under his brim at the two of Cecil’s men he’d spotted before. The officer who’d brought him beer in Lollards’ Tower was staring at them. John froze until the man’s stare went elsewhere. ‘Gently, love,’ he said softly, ‘do not startle.’

He was watching her from the side of his eyes. Hers narrowed, moved towards him, for an instant showing that same relief that had briefly lit Ned’s. As swiftly it passed, and if their son’s anger did not come into them, what did perhaps hurt John even more – a sad resignation.

‘So. You live.’

‘I do. No thanks to the Irish, nor my lord of Essex.’

‘But some, surely, to the whisky and the lady with blonde tresses?’

She’d heard. What could he say? ‘Tess . . .’

Her head shook, short, sharp. ‘No. No excuses, John. Remember, I have heard them all before.’

John sighed. ‘I see now whence our son derives his lack of charity.’

‘You’ve seen him?’

‘Aye. Though he has made it clear it is for the last time.’

Behind them, someone hissed, ‘For shame, sir. Burbage speaks!’ Tess leaned a little closer. John inhaled her, some potion of lavender and comfrey about her. He closed his eyes for a moment, enjoying a far sweeter scent than cloves.

‘Can you blame him?’ Tess whispered, even lower. ‘He has not the experience of your broken promises that I have. This time he had hopes . . .’

‘Stop,’ he whispered back. ‘You cannot whip me more for it than I have whipped myself.’ He could not think what next to say. So instead of trying, he reached within his doublet and drew out the letter that he had kept there in all the miles from Dublin. Wordlessly, he handed it to her.

She took it, stared at the familiar seal, broke it, began to read the words of Samuel D’Esparr. John turned again to the stage, where a thunder roll ended one scene and heralded another – one that brought Ned back on, following Gus Phillips. They took their positions, began to speak. And somehow John was able to mostly forget what the woman beside him was reading, and listen. Ned was clear . . . yet he seemed to John a little stiff. Perhaps our recent encounter has unsettled him, he thought, to his regret. Yet when Ned said:

When beggars die, there are no comets seen;
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes

a sigh ran through the Globe. There had been many signs and portents in the summer skies over London. And England had an aged queen.

His attention was drawn back by the folding of paper. He glanced sideways. Tess was staring forward, but not at the stage. At something beyond.

‘My . . . Samuel says that you fought together. More – that during an ambuscade, you saved his life.’

‘I did.’

‘Why?’

‘Why what?’

‘Why did you save him? Would it not have suited you better to see him dead?’

John frowned. ‘Undoubtedly it would,’ he said, ‘and I admit there are still times when I hope the Irish succeed where last they failed, and pierce his fat guts through.’ He shook his head. ‘But even if you condemn me in so much, Tess, you must allow me this: I am not a dastard. I would never seek to win you through Despair’s death if I had the power to prevent it.’

He had whispered with some heat, provoking more hisses from behind them. Tess reached over and laid a hand on one of his, squeezed briefly, withdrew it. ‘I know you are not, John. You are, despite it all, a noble man.’ Before he could venture that he was, in more ways than she could yet know, she continued. ‘Though I wonder much at this,’ she said, lifting the letter. ‘My fiancé speaks more . . . feelingly than he was wont.’

Or I’ll not trust whisky, thought John. He’d made sure that Sir Samuel had taken a skinful, was suitably maudlin and still full grateful when he wrote. A sober morning and Despair might have produced a very different letter, glossing over John’s rescue, emphasising his own courage. Still, his missive had achieved this much at least: his love was no longer looking at him with that terrible mixture of pity and disdain. A small victory that perhaps could be followed up. ‘Tess, hear me. I have to g—’

‘Will you cease your prattling, varlet?’ The bellow came from right behind him, accompanied by a hard shove, and continued, ‘We are trying to listen to the play.’

The noise would perhaps not have drawn so much attention. It was the custom in the playhouse for people to converse, to comment, to voice their displeasure. Not even Burbage could hold them silent for ever. Unfortunately, the matronly shover had a bass bellow that would not have disgraced the platform, produced from a chest that would have disgraced no mastiff. Beside her, a terrier of a man equally glared, and when John said, ‘Lady, I seek only to . . .’ he got no further, for the terrier snarled, reached up and threw John’s hat from his head.

The stage was shaken by more thunder. Most people were drawn back to it. But John, as he bent to retrieve his hat, noticed that a few weren’t – most especially Cecil’s officer, who was staring straight at him.

He turned to Tess. ‘I have to leave now. But know this first: I will return and I will try to make amends. For ever this time.’

He was half up when her hand delayed him. ‘John, what is wrong?’

He glanced around. More than one man was converging. ‘I have made a powerful enemy. Adieu.’

With that, he headed for the stairs to accompanying snarls from the mastiff and her terrier. He gained the stairwell – and met a man hastening up who straightway betrayed his allegiance by reaching both hands to grab John by the throat. Sweeping his forearm round in a pugilist’s block, the clash hard enough to draw forth a yelp, he silenced the man with a straight left palm to the mouth, knocking him down the stairs. He followed fast, but though the man tumbled, he still managed to grab John’s legs as he tried to jump him. He fell, hard, caught himself on his hands, got a leg free and kicked back, encountering he knew not what; but the result was a cry, and a slackening of grip. John was free of it and through the door.

He headed straight down Maiden Lane, aware of shapes following him fast from each side of the playhouse. These did not hue-and-cry him. They had their own reasons for taking him silently and without the interference of citizens or the watch – which thought added speed to his legs. He wove, ducked, threading through the people. Yet the crowd was not thick, for so many were within the places of entertainment.