The Pale Companion (16 page)

I marvelled at the skill and diplomacy with which Thomas Pope and Richard Sincklo marshalled their small charges, combining firmness with kindness and patience. At the same time I realized that performing in a great man’s house was never going to be straightforward. You do not have that freedom of decision and action which comes from treading your own boards.

As Pope was instructing these little eyases in their movements and gestures at the close of the action, the rest of our company took their ease on the fringes of the playing area. Earlier on in the evening I’d spotted Adam Fielding and Kate observing us from the side. Their presence, hers in particular, gave a spring to Lysander’s (and my) step. Now, however, they were nowhere to be seen. Instead, Cuthbert Ascre came to join me and resumed a conversation, or rather a question-and-answer session, we’d been having earlier.

“You were telling me about your early days with the Admiral’s, Nicholas.”

“I served a kind of apprenticeship with them. I played little things, attendant lords, third murderers. But they are a good Company.”

“Not as fine as the Chamberlain’s though?”

“No, it is the general opinion that we carry it away.”

“So you are at the pinnacle.”

“For myself, I am at the bottom of a hill or at best on its lower reaches, Cuthbert [
you may see by this that we were already on good terms
]. But it is the highest hill in the region and, though the way up is steep and winding, I am resolved to reach the top.”

“That is highly poetical, Nicholas. You should write it down. And your ambition as a player speaks well for you.”

“Your father,” I said, encouraged, “he is a friend to the playhouse also?”

“He is, but not through a liking for the art for its own sake, I think, or not so much. He took his cue from Her Majesty. Queen Elizabeth stayed here several times when I was small. I can scarce remember her, though she did give me a silver pin.”

“I know that the Queen is a votary at the altar of the drama,” I said – without adding that I’d met her and that we’d discussed plays, among various matters.

“Votary at the altar, hmm . . . Anyway, my father realized that players enjoyed the highest possible patronage and that it might advantage him to befriend them too. This is what my mother says.”

I was a little embarrassed by the openness of Cuthbert in describing his father’s motives. Almost disappointed too. True, where the Queen led others were bound to follow, but it is agreeable to be liked for one’s own sake. Since Cuthbert was evidently in a mood to be confidential I thought I’d press him on another question.

“Your mother also is a supporter of the drama,” I said. “I understand that those wandering players on the estate-farm are here by her allowance.”

“You mean the Paradises? Oh they have connections here, yes. By your tone I can see you don’t approve of the ‘wandering players’.”

“I saw them first in Salisbury and was surprised when they fetched up here.”

“They’re not really brothers. They just call each other that.”

“And their audiences as well,” I commented. “Brothering and sistering away like mad.”

“They’ve visited us with their Bible stuff before. My mother believes that everything should be for our instruction and edification. Accordingly, she hopes to improve the conduct of our workers by allowing them to watch plays in which punishment is always meted out to wrong-doers and despair overtakes the sinner.”

“But that’s what happens in any play,” I said. I kept quiet about the little speeches and sermons with which Peter Paradise prefaced or rounded off their performances.

“My lady mother would say that not all drama is blessed with the tinct of scripture. It is not specifically designed to elevate or frighten.”

“I’m not sure if that’s what was happening when your labourers were watching Judas hang himself the other day in the barn. I think they were simply enjoying a spectacle. It was elevation in a strictly limited sense.”

Cuthbert grinned gratifyingly at my little word-play on elevation, then said, “But spectacle is the business of players, isn’t it, whether they’re wandering or fixed?”

“May I ask you a question?”

Cuthbert looked at me. Underneath the friendly, easy-going exterior, there was a shrewdness about him, an inwardness. Before us, Thomas Pope continued to put the little sons and daughters of the great noblemen through their paces, as they danced in circles on the green or held up imaginary tapers to the declining sun. I noticed two or three of our company, in particular Laurence Savage, casting frequent glances in Cuthbert’s and my direction. I supposed that there was a certain resentment when the son of our patron fastened on to so junior a member of the Company.

“Would you act, if you were free to do so?”

“I
am
acting in the
Dream,
Nicholas – although of course I would never claim to be the equal of any of you.”

“For a living, I mean.”

“Very well. Perhaps I would. If I was free. But I am not free. To be born to all this, even if it will never be yours, is to be born in a cage.”

“A cage with golden bars and a marble floor.”

“Oh yes, and fine views and so on. But a cage nonetheless. I tell you, Nicholas, I would give much to be as free as you are.”

To be envied (and especially by the scion of a wealthy house) for something you’ve hardly ever considered, is a disconcerting experience. Free! Yes, free to worry about where your next month’s rent will come from, if your fortunes turn Turk. Free to find your lodgings in a ditch should you fall out of favour with the audience or the shareholders!

I said none of this, but instead asked another question which had been nagging at my brain.

“Your brother Harry, is he not free either?’

The changed expression on Cuthbert’s face made me realize I’d overstepped the mark. At once, there was a chill between us.

“I am not sure what you mean.”

His voice had something of the aloofness of his father’s.

“It was nothing,” I said lamely. “A foolish remark.”

He seemed to accept this as a species of apology, but the closeness which had been between us moments before was dissipated in the cooling evening. Perhaps it was fortunate that the practice drew to a close at this point, with Thomas Pope himself rounding off the action by delivering Puck’s valedictory lines. Before we dispersed Pope spoke to us all, consulting the notes he’d made during the rehearsal. As I’ve said, he had the gift of offering criticism in the guise of encouragement. He had some comments, of a shrewd but generous sort, to make to Cuthbert Ascre and I noticed that my new friend (if that’s what he still was) accepted the guider’s advice like a meek boy.

I was trying to fathom Cuthbert’s remarks about “freedom” and wondering whether I’d really offended him by the query about his brother when I was suddenly assailed by Laurence Savage. For once, my co-player lived up to his name. An angry redness suffused his broad, equable face. The livelihood of the Chamberlain’s was threatened on two fronts, he said furiously. Over there was a bunch of vagabonds living in a barn and presenting crude Bible tales which brought the refined art of playing into disrepute. And on the other hand – and a much worse hand it was too – here was the disgrace of a jumped-up sprig of the nobility’s using his father’s money to procure himself a place in a professional troupe of players, so that he might strut, mince and mumble his way to the sycophants’ applause. And what made it worse, a great deal worse, was that members of the same troupe – supposed professionals – bowed and scraped in front of the said sprig, and told him that he could do no wrong but was a very fine actor indeed, yes sir, no sir.

I tried to interject that, in reality, Cuthbert Ascre – “if that’s who you’re referring to,” I said disingenuously – was a capable player who deserved his place in our
Dream
on merit, that he didn’t present any threat to us Chamberlain’s, that as far as I knew no money had changed hands, &c. But Laurence only grew angrier at me. So it’s Cuthbert now, is it Nicholas, Cuthbert Ascre, well, I noticed you on the grass grinning like an ape and exchanging compliments. What would you have me do with him? I said. Turn my back and never speak to him again? Yes, said Laurence, that’s what you should do, Nicholas. We may have no choice about whether he’s in our play or not, considering his father used his stinking money to secure him a stinking place, but we do have a choice about whether to talk to him or not, about whether to kiss his arse or not. Have no truck with fellows of that sort, I say.

Only afterwards did I understand that Laurence Savage was not attacking Cuthbert Ascre, or at least not primarily. He was furious to see me, and no doubt Thomas Pope and others, consorting with and complimenting the son of a man whom, for some reason, he loathed: Lord Elcombe.

Adam Fielding remained at Instede during these wedding preparations while he continued his investigation into the death of Robin the wood-man. Kate remained too, and I was always on the alert to catch a glimpse of her or to exchange a few words. Each time I sighted her, my heart beat faster and my palms turned slippery. If she was similarly affected by my presence she didn’t show it. She maintained the same light, slightly mocking look and manner; she was always quick in converse; she did not ask to hear more poems by Richard Milford or anyone else. Yet, despite this apparent distance, I found myself thinking of her – or rather, her image wandered unannounced into my mind – at odd moments during the day and as I lay wakefully on my crib in the players’ dormitory at the top of the house. Though, if I’m to be honest, it wasn’t at
odd
moments that she occurred to me, but
frequently.
I caught myself mooning and moping about. I sighed often and, if I noticed myself doing it, sighed more emphatically. It seemed to me that my appetite grew less hearty and that I slept little during those short summer nights. These are some of the indisputable signs of the lover, ones which I was pleased enough to cultivate. Yet my thoughts were pure enough, and my mind shied away from imagining the two of us engaged in anything more reprehensible than chaste kissing. Well, relatively chaste.

Of my friend Nell back in London I did not think much at this time – except to consider that she was still there.

My most reckless imagining in respect of Kate was to picture the two of us together, Nicholas Revill and Kate Fielding, united and living happily ever after. Hymen must have been hovering in the Instede air (even if the white-faced Harry didn’t look eager to pluck down his share of that god’s train). So quick do love and unreason rush ahead together that I went so far as to approach Kate’s father in the way of marriage – albeit in my mind only. How would a Justice of the Peace look upon having a poor player as a son-in-law? Not very favourably. It would be different, of course, if I was further advanced in the craft which I practised, higher up that steep hill which I’d mentioned to Cuthbert Ascre. If I was a Globe shareholder, say. But I was not long out of my ’prentice period. No, I would have to do something very pleasing – or very clever – to influence Adam Fielding. To make him consider me as a suitable match for his daughter.

As you’ll have observed, this calculation left entirely out of account Kate’s feelings for me. Perhaps this was because I feared that she didn’t really have any, or nothing that extended beyond courtesy and womanly concern. Maybe I thought of winning over her father because that seemed a less difficult task than winning
her
over.

With this in mind, when Adam Fielding asked if I’d be present at a formal conversation with Lord and Lady Elcombe, I was pleased enough to agree but baffled as to why he needed me.

“Because, Nicholas, I’d value your eyes and ears in this matter.”

This was gratifying, naturally, but I worried about what cover he would offer for my presence.

“None is necessary,” said Fielding. “As a Justice, I may press you into service if I wish. Anyway, it was you who first saw that there was something untoward in the manner of Robin’s death. You have won the right to share in my discoveries, if there are any.”

“But Robin was – somebody of little account,” I said, somehow surprised that this matter should be taken as high as the Elcombes.

“And so his death may go unexamined?”

“Of course it shouldn’t, but . . . sir . . . Adam . . . is this timely?”

“No, and nor is death,” said Fielding, “if we wish to get profound now.”

“The house is all in a stir with this wedding. I hardly think that Lord and Lady Elcombe will be happy to answer your questions at this time.”

“Again, my title and position carry some weight. And I am long familiar with this couple. They will not grudge half an hour, believe me.”

So it proved. We were summoned to attend on Lord and Lady Elcombe in their lodgings, a large assemblage of rooms on the second floor commanding fine views over their property. I was still not accustomed to the size of these Instede apartments, into the smallest of which you might have fitted my bedchamber in Dead Man’s Place several times over. Nor had I recovered from my surprise at the sheer quantity of light which flooded through the great windows. Coming from a city where, at least in less prosperous quarters, sunlight seemed to be doled out in miserly parcels and to fight its way through the smoky air before penetrating one’s squinty windows, I was dazzled by the splendour and openness of the Instede interiors.

Before we had our interview with the Elcombes, Fielding instructed me that I should say nothing unless asked but should watch and listen carefully. My youth and my training as a player would come in handy, he claimed, since I would doubtless be able to recollect what was said more accurately than someone of his advanced years. I was to write down what had passed as soon as possible after the encounter was done. I did as instructed (still hoping to win the Justice’s favour) and what follows is my record of this dialogue.

We were ushered in by one of the manservants. The Elcombes sat stiffly side by side, as if they were to be painted. The long face of the master of Instede was unrelieved by any softening mark. For all her drawn beauty, his wife shared his stony features. After we were bidden to sit, the questions began.