The Mercutio Problem

by Carol Anne Douglas

  “Am I a what?” Kevin came up behind them. His voice was far from pleased.

  “Sort it out among yourselves. I have to go to the women’s room,” Beth said, dodging into that room. There wasn’t a line, so she went into a stall. Doubtless Richard was seeding their path with red herrings, if you could seed a herring, she thought. She imagined a field with red herring tails sticking out of the earth.

  “Herrings fresh and dried!” someone shouted.

  Beth stood on a street in old London. She was Ben again. Oh no, not a time travel while she was in the women’s room. She willed herself back to the theater, but she was on the fishmongers’ street, and the smells were much worse than those in the clean theater bathroom. Fish, fish, fish stank enough to make her puke.

  “Herring, cod, pike!” cried one vendor with a tub of swimming fish. “See how fresh!”

  “Oysters! Mussels!” called another. “Ready for your table!”

  Beth put her hand in her pocket and found that she was supplied with a handkerchief. She put it to her nose and hurried to get off the street as soon as she could. She wished she had a pomander to cover the odors.

  Someone behind her grabbed the ends of her handkerchief, pulled it tight over her mouth, and tied it. She struggled and kicked behind her, stepping on her attacker’s foot, but one person grabbed her arms, another grabbed her legs, and someone else pulled a hood over her head.

  They carried her away, still struggling. She hoped that one of the fishmongers or their customers might help her, but no one did.

  Did her talk with Arnie about kidnapping cause the attack?

  Someone threw her in a cart and covered her with a blanket. The cart moved along, and she felt every bump on the London street. The ride took forever.

  She tried to will herself back in the movie theater, but the endless ride continued.

  She silently called to Merlin, but nothing happened.

  Did Richard have the power to bring her to London and have her kidnapped? Beth wondered. Or did she just happen to wind up on a London street when kidnappers were abroad? The bumping bruised her, and bruises from old London would show up on her in real life. She wished she didn’t know that she could even be killed in London. Really killed, not like dying as Mercutio. She wished herself to be Mercutio in the world of one of Shakespeare’s plays, any of them, but nothing happened.

  The cart finally stopped. People picked her up and carried her, none too gently. They threw her down on a floor.

  Someone pulled the hood off. She had landed in a gray stone room. Two men stood by her, one large and silent, but the other, a man with a salt-and-pepper beard, laughed at her.

  “Ben, aren’t you? I saw you in a tavern once. You wanted to act at the Globe, but Master Shakespeare would have none of you. You’ve got your wish, Ben. This is Blackfriars, and all our actors are boys. Aren’t you grateful to us?”

  He tore the handkerchief off her mouth.

  “No!” She tried to shout, but her voice sounded more like a squeak. “You kidnapped me.”

  “ ‘You kidnapped me.’ ” The man, who was ruddy and rangy, mocked her words. “All of our boys are kidnapped. Queen Elizabeth signed a decree letting us kidnap boys to act in our company. She’s dead, but the decree still stands.”

  Beth gasped. “That can’t be true!”

  “Tell him, Henry,” the other man said.

  “It’s true,” said a pale boy of about thirteen who stood in the corner. “They kidnapped me, too. I’ve heard that my father has been suing to try to get me released, but the courts haven’t heard his plea yet.”

  The thin, bearded man laughed nastily. “They’ll never hear it. Forget about your father.”

  Uh-oh. Beth remembered reading something about the practice of kidnapping boy actors, and how angry Shakespeare was that audiences preferred seeing boys act instead of his trained, and mostly adult, actors. Hamlet complained about it in his scene with the players. And Blackfriars, where she was being held, was a former monastery, now a theater.

  The thin man thrust a script at her. “You have to perform tonight, Ben. You’ll play the part of Lady Mary. Now’s your chance. If you do well, you’ll get good rations. If not, there’s a beating in store for you. Learn your lines.”

  She took the script. The men left the room and shut the door behind them.

  She saw that the script, like most actors’ scripts of the time, had only her lines and her cues.

  She stared at Henry. “How long have they held you?” she asked.

  “Five months.” He choked on the words. “I’m longing to go home.” His voice hadn’t matured yet. “You look old to be able to play girls’ parts.”

  “I’m just lucky, I guess,” Beth said.

  Please, let me go back to the movie theater, she thought. Merlin, can you see me? I haven’t asked for your help in a while, but can you help me now?

  Nothing happened.

  Bottom might have been willing to play a kidnap victim, but she was not willing to be one, Beth thought.

  She read the script. It was hard to tell from just one person’s lines, but she thought it was much inferior to Shakespeare’s work. No surprise there.

  “Do you have a father who could sue to try to get you back?” Henry asked. “Because my father is trying, they don’t sell me the way they sell some of the other boy actors.”

  “Sell them?” Beth’s stomach turned.

  “Like whores,” the boy said. “I hope they never do that to me. Or to you. You’re handsome, so they might.”

  Beth gagged. Get me out of here! She called silently.

  “Better learn your lines, though. We’ll be on stage together tonight,” Henry said. “I could help you, if you aren’t used to acting.”

  “Thank you.” Beth said. She tried to keep back tears at the thought of Henry’s longing for his father and his father trying to get him back. Renaissance English law was worse than she had imagined.

  “Please, let’s practice now,” Henry said. There was a tremor in his voice.

  He read.

  CUE: from PATIENCE, LADY MARY’S DAUGHTER: Will they kill us, as they have slaughtered so many others?

  Beth’s line was:

  LADY MARY: Yes, my child, the evil, witch-guided priests will murder us as they have so many others.

  “I can’t read that line,” Beth exclaimed. “This is anti-Catholic propaganda.”

  “You’re a papist!” Henry cried, pulling away from her.

  “I’m not a Catholic, but I believe in religious freedom. Both sides are guilty of persecution.”

  “You’re a freethinker!” The boy backed into a corner. “Never speak that way again, please!”

  Beth groaned. She desperately had to go to the bathroom. She eyed the smelly chamber pot in the corner. She concentrated hard on the bathroom at the theater.

  She was in the clean stall. She did what she needed to do.

  When she left the stall, tears were streaming down her eyes.

  “Beth, are you all right?” Kevin yelled from the other side of the bathroom door.

  “Yes,” she called back while she washed her hands. Evidently she had been in the bathroom a long time. She used a paper towel on her eyes, but it didn’t do much good. She fled into the hall and almost ran into Kevin and Arnie. She didn’t see anyone else near them.

  Her words came choking out. “I was in London. I was kidnapped. Did you know that the Blackfriars company kidnapped boys to be their actors and held them against their will? It’s terrible.”

  “Bastards!” Kevin clenched his fists.

  Arnie put his hand on her arm. “That is awful. You can’t keep going to London alone. It’s too dangerous. Let’s go get milkshakes and calm down.”

  “Okay.” Ordinarily she would have protested at the idea that she shouldn’t go to Lond
on alone, but that advice sounded better to her now.

  “Take care of yourself, please.” Arnie put his whole arm around her. Fortunately, Beth had to put on her coat, so she could squirm away from his arm without offending him.

  Arnie held back for a minute while Kevin strode on ahead of them. “Keep drinking lots of orange juice,” he whispered. “I’ve kept it up, and I think it’s changing me. Maybe someday I’ll have magical powers, too.”

  Beth shuddered. “Don’t wish for them,” she said.

  When Beth returned home that night, she said good-night to her mother, then went to her room and sat on the bed. She wished for Merlin to come.

  The wizard appeared through the window, though it was closed because the weather was so cold. He wore a late eighteenth century gentleman’s garb with a powdered wig.

  “It has been a while since you have called me,” he said. “I suppose you have found yourself in a situation that you can’t handle alone.”

  “Didn’t you hear me calling you from London?” Beth asked. Her voice was shrill.

  “No. I am not always listening. Do you think I am always tuned to you like a radio?” He frowned. “I can do that only when you time travel with my assistance and I know what you are doing.”

  “I didn’t time travel willingly.” Beth shook. “I was pulled into it somehow.”

  “That is serious.” Merlin’s voice sank. “I am not sure what force pulled you to London. I must advise you to stay away from there now if you can.”

  “I thought you might be able to reach Adam and ensure that he meets me when I go there,” Beth said.

  “Perhaps, if you let me know when you are going.”

  Beth’s heart sank at the word “perhaps.” “Just perhaps? Not definitely?”

  “I think you should confine yourself to being Mercutio in the world of the plays for the time being,” Merlin told her.

  “If I can do that, I will.” Beth longed for sleep. She wanted to be in a world where she couldn’t be killed. At least not as her real self. She shut her eyes.

  “You’re closing your eyes and slumping over. No doubt that is supposed to indicate that all you want now is mortal sleep. Have you no stamina?” Merlin said accusingly.

  “This mortal flesh is weary,” Beth said.

  “Go knit up your raveled sleeves of care.” After this sarcasm, Merlin vanished.

  Beth pulled the covers around her and hoped to dream no more, at least that night.

  But instead of falling asleep, she fell into a wind that blew her into a fog. She hoped this wasn’t the land of the dead. She landed in a bunch of gorse and scratched her knee. The heath. She hadn’t seen the witches in a while. Perhaps they could help her.

  “Hail, Mercutio!” intoned three familiar voices.

  Beth had almost become used to their appearance. Almost. Maybe it was normal to be eerie. The smell of their cauldron was another matter. Holding her nose would do no good because the stench was so bad that it invaded her mouth too. Even her ears felt as if they had been bathed in the noisome potion.

  “I was kidnapped in London. Strange things keep happening in my high school. I’m afraid,” she said.

  “Afraid!” A chorus of laughter followed.

  “Afraid! Now she’s afraid!” They laughed again.

  “She has agreed to be killed as Mercutio, and now she is afraid!” the first witch muttered.

  “How can I fight Richard?” Beth asked. “It seems impossible.”

  “Women bring peace,” the first witch said.

  “Some women.” The second witch laughed.

  Not Lady Macbeth, Beth thought. Though the Lady seemed helpful now, peaceful wasn’t a word Beth would use to describe her.

  “Ghosts to ghosts,” the third witches screeched.

  “Who knows the answers?” the first witch chanted.

  “Who knows the questions?” the second witch chanted.

  “Everyone must die someday,” the third witch said.

  That seemed obvious. “Can’t you explain?” Beth asked, though she knew they wouldn’t.

  “Two minus one is one,” the first witch sang.

  “Which two are you talking about?” Beth asked.

  “Double the boar, or uncouple it?” the second witch sang.

  Then the witches laughed and disappeared.

  Beth stood alone on the heath. An owl hooted. Two minus one is one. Were they saying that Richard minus Mordred would be less formidable? Could they be separated? If only. Beth went home and to bed.

  Chapter 24

  WHEN BETH WOKE IN the morning, the sun shone into her bedroom but she could barely prod her eyes open. She staggered out of bed and down the stairs.

  She called up Sita. “Hi.” Beth’s voice was unsteady. “Would you like to come over tonight for a sleepover? I’m sorry for the last-minute invitation.”

  “No problem. I’ll ask my mother, but I’m sure I can come.”

  Beth was only a little nervous. At least Amelia didn’t monopolize Sita’s weekend time.

  Beth fumbled her way into the kitchen, where her mother was drinking coffee.

  “I’ve asked Sita for a sleepover tonight. I hope that’s all right.”

  Beth’s mother beamed. “I’m so glad that you’re seeing your friends. Sita is such a nice girl,” she said.

  The phone rang.

  Beth hurried to the living room. She was so tired of not being able to use her smartphone. She didn’t want her mother to hear what she was saying. She hoped this call wasn’t from Sita, saying she couldn’t come over after all.

  “Hello.” Beth knew her voice sounded feeble.

  “Hello, Beth,” a man’s voice said. “This is Adam. Our mutual friend talked to me. I need to tell you that I can’t come to London with you anymore.”

  Beth gasped. “Why not? Where are you now?”

  “New York. I was turned down for a part. I want to live in Old London, at least part of the time. If I have to choose, that’s where I always want to live. I’m allowed to act in Shakespeare’s company. What more could I want? So I can’t risk getting in trouble with the people who live there by doing things like getting you out of that last place where you were. I’m sorry, but that’s how it is. I hope you understand.”

  “I understand,” Beth said, because she had to. She set down the phone. She knew that Adam cared more about his acting than anything else. But she felt abandoned anyway. Old London was far from perfect, but she didn’t like being banished from there. And if Adam was going to spend his time there, she might not see him again. She sighed. Now she understood was why Shakespeare thought exile was such a painful punishment.

  SITA CAME OVER THAT evening and acted the same as ever. They ordered pizza and chatted with Beth’s mother a little while. The pizza tasted better when Sita was there. Then the girls went up to Beth’s room.

  “Thanks for asking me over,” Sita said, plopping down onto a cushion on the floor.

  “I’m glad you still have some Saturday nights free.” Beth sat on a cushion next to her. “And doing things you normally do will help keep your parents from guessing before you’re ready to tell them.”

  “That’s thoughtful. Thanks.” Sita smiled.

  “I also wanted to ask again whether you can tell me more about why you’re time traveling. Is anyone helping you, or talking to you?”

  “Talking.” Sita kept up her guard.

  “Renaissance London has become too dangerous for me. I think you’d better stay away, too.” Beth shivered. “I was kidnapped last night by the Blackfriars players. Their young actors were coerced to play. I almost became one of them.”

  Sita whistled. “That is scary. Yes, you’d better stay away. I haven’t been there in a while either.”

  “Do we have to have secrets from each other? I can’t tell yo
u other people’s secrets, but I’m trying to tell you mine.” Beth gave Sita an imploring look. “Who’s the person who knows what you’re doing? Not Merlin?”

  Sita shook her head. “Ms. Capulet.”

  “She has the power to send you time traveling?” Beth almost fell off her cushion.

  “No way. It’s my own power. If it’s coming from someone else, I don’t know who. But I tell her what I’m doing.” Sita grinned. “So don’t worry. I’m reporting to a responsible adult.”

  “One who can’t help you if you get in trouble,” Beth pointed out.

  “Says the girl who was kidnapped last night.”

  “Says the girl who knows it’s dangerous,” Beth said. “Have you told Amelia any of this?”

  Sita choked with laughter. “Are you kidding? That would be a great way to start a romance. ‘Honey, my friend Beth spends a lot of time in Renaissance London and in a world where Shakespeare’s characters live. I’m trying my best to join her.’ Would you tell that to a boy you wanted to date?”

  Beth joined in Sita’s laughter. “No. But you might tell her when you get closer.”

  “I might.” Sita rubbed her chin. “After about three years, if I was certain that she could handle it and would never tell. Then again, I might not. We can’t keep spreading the secret.”

  “Thanks.” Beth smiled. She could trust Sita. And they shared a secret that Amelia didn’t know. That reassured Beth.

  They talked long into the night and slept a little, like most sleepovers. Beth thought Sita was just as glad as she was that things were back to normal, at least in this part of their lives.

  “Would you like to try time traveling together?” Beth asked in the morning.

  Sita grinned. “Would birds like to fly? I thought you’d never ask.”

  “We have to try to find Bottom.”

  “I knew you wanted me for my skill-set. Who else can sound like Titania?”

  “Not fair. I’ve always wanted you to come. But Merlin forbade it.”

  “Where shall we go? What do you think is the best place to look for Bottom?”

  “I’ve been thinking.” Beth opened her computer to a full text of Dream. “He wants to be a dramatic actor. So I think he’s hidden in one of the best dramas. Are you sure you’ve searched Hamlet completely?”