“Retreat,” Fortinbras orders, and edges the tip of his broadsword towards the man’s throat. “Take your pride and your warriors back to Elsinore. Cross the Øresund no more. The land you’ve stolen shall be mine. Be satisfied with what you have. Do this and live. Do this and we’ll be friends, not foes.”
The sharp blade withdraws. Silence between the two of them.
“If I wished your life I’d take it, Hamlet. I’ve no designs on Denmark. No hunger for a bloody and unnecessary war. No…’
A high-pitched feverish wail breaks his concentration. The warrior looks up at the walls of Elsinore.
“Go home. Be with your wife. She’s more use to you than my barren fields or the herring beneath us.”
The long and armoured figure on the ice glances towards the castle’s grey walls. Listens to the faint and agonised moans of a woman in the throes of labour.
Inside close by the bed Claudius hesitates, sheathes his blade. The midwife grabs his sleeve.
“Either the babe comes out or both will die.” She glares at the doctor. “He knows it too. Why fetch a damned Swede for the Queen of Denmark?”
“It was the King’s wish,” Polonius interrupts.
Claudius casts him a sharp glance.
“And whatever my brother wants…”
The woman walks to the doctor’s bags, rifles through bottles and envelopes of powder, hears Gertrude’s shrieks grow louder, finally finds a pair of French forceps, long hooked arms, shiny silver.
“They keep these things secret. But a midwife sees.” She holds up the instrument. It’s the colour of a warrior’s breastplate, of the weapons beyond the window. “I can use them too. The baby may perish. The Queen for all I know.” A hard, wry smile. “Then me I guess…”
Claudius looks at the stricken woman on the sheets. His brother’s bride, her brisk rude vitality fading with each racing minute. The loveliest woman in Elsinore. Had he been three years older and monarch in Hamlet’s place…
“Do nothing and you’ll be burying both before the morning,” the midwife repeats. “Give me leave and I’ll let her husband judge me. Or Fortinbras. Whichever.”
A silence broken only by Gertrude’s shallow, unsteady breathing. Her eyes are closed. The scarlet scalp within seems no larger. There’s a rattle in her throat, not the sweet, calm loving voice he cherishes.
“Do it,” Claudius orders and she’s there in an instant, opening the jaws of the silver weapon, forcing them into place around the half-hidden gory head, starting to tug.
Gertrude wakes. Her mouth opens. This scream is the worst and he won’t forget it.
The brother strides to the window, looks down at the small circle on the frozen sea. The battleground. His King lies lost on the ice, Norway above him, blade in hand. Talking. But not for much longer.
“We can negotiate,” Claudius whispers. “I’ll beg and plead and give Fortinbras everything he asks for.”
So long as she may live, he thinks. So long as…
Shouts and arguments. The Swedish doctor has intervened, snatched the forceps from the midwife, elbowed her away. As Claudius watches the man in black thrusts the implement so far inside Gertrude she screeches like a prisoner caught on the rack.
“This creature refuses to be born,” he mutters then heaves at the silver handles with all his force, pulls and roars as much as the woman on the stained and sweaty sheets.
For a moment Claudius feels faint. It’s as if the room itself is made of nothing but flesh and blood and pain. Then, steadying himself against the wall, he dares to look. To hear.
Two screams that will never leave him. One a voice he loves, the second a shrill wail, bawling at the world beyond the warm dark womb.
The physic’s knife flies down, severs the red, writhing cord that joins the baby to the mother.
“Give it to me,” Claudius says.
He seizes the hot damp form in his arms. Walks to the window, steps out onto the balcony, into the icy gale blowing from the Øresund.
“See this! See…”
A cunning, articulate man. Words rarely desert him. He reaches for them as protection, comfort, the way Hamlet his brother seizes at weapons. But now this is all he possesses. A bloody infant boy.
A new life. That small, eternal miracle.
The Norwegian looks up from the ice, caught by the cries of the man on the castle balcony. Swift as a wolf on the frozen Øresund Hamlet moves, dashes for the axe, hurls it upwards. Finds Fortinbras in the groin, doesn’t wait to see more as he climbs to his knees, retrieves the broadsword, swings it round, one certain movement.
A warrior always. There’s no need to look. The blade hits home between helmet and neck, cleaves the head of Norway’s king straight off his shoulders, sends bloody beard and helmet skittering across the ice.
Hamlet rises. He raises his gory blade, voice booming, turns to the cheers and greetings of his men.
On the balcony, shivering and miserable, Claudius grips the king’s child.
Hamlet it will be called too, after the father. As Fortinbras named his own boy, now orphaned, revenge brewing in his infant breast, a circle ever-turning.
A scarlet stain spreads across the icy Øresund. A roaring man swings his broadsword round him.
New-born, in the arms of Claudius, eyes blinking at the too-bright day Hamlet’s son sees the world he’s entered and shrieks at its bright and bloody form.
Yorick finished his tale. Thirsty, a little downcast, he clambered to his feet and poured himself a cup of wine.
“Is it true?” Hamlet asked. “That my uncle was there when I came into the world? That he loved me from the start? And Gertrude?”
“Don’t you remember?”
“Only gods recall their own births. I’m no god.”
The jester frowned.
“It’s a story my father told to me. That’s all. Perhaps they change across the years.”
A sound at the door. The dwarf scuttled into the corner, not wishing to be seen.
Horatio stood outside, his face pale.
‘Soon the thing moves on the ramparts.’ He grasped his sword, a wariness in his eyes. ‘You need to see it.’
Hamlet rose to his feet, placed his hand on the hilt of the man’s blade.
‘We’ve no use for that, if it’s what you say. Perhaps we should brandish a bible instead.’
From the curtains in the corner the softest sound. Laughter.
Ophelia was twenty one. Polonius, her father, was in the employ – the ownership – of whoever held the throne. A dedicated man, loyal to the crown. Given ample quarters on the floor below the royal family themselves. He deserved sympathy, support. Demanded it too. Ophelia’s mother died giving birth to her, just fourteen months after she’d delivered her first child, Laertes. Her daughter should have been married long before like most of the Elsinore girls. Instead Ophelia became her father’s proxy wife, administering the servants, seeing his washing was done, the food was right, their warm and spacious apartment kept in order. It was at the back, overlooking the meadows and the winding, sluggish river that ran down to the icy waters of the Øresund as if wishing it would never get there.
She understood that feeling. Remembered when she’d escaped into that grassy paradise with Hamlet, dreaming they might both be free. That was a long time ago. When she was one more castle maid. A title never to be recovered.
Her father’s food could only be served at her hands too, as it had been, he told her, by her dead mother.
The man provided. The woman obeyed.
Cloth in hand, holding the warm pots from the kitchen, she came through with the meal. Winter fare. Salt herring, carrots, broth. He could it eat for weeks on end and never complain. Perhaps he didn’t even notice. The mind of her father was on affairs of state always, even when she entered with the dishes.
Polonius came to the table, still thinking about business. She could tell that from the pleasant, interested look on his face. Then he saw her and let the mask dro
p. He checked his pocket watch, an affectation he had picked up on a visit to Germany years ago. He was never without it. In the silence she could hear it ticking.
The big chair was his. He took it, tasted the food without a word of thanks. Let her begin and chose his moment.
“I saw the way you looked at the Prince this morning, child. Don’t do that.”
Ophelia bridled at the remark.
“Your tone’s hard, father. I deserve better.”
He pushed the plate to one side.
“I’ll decide what you deserve. Hamlet’s a dangerous man to be near.” He tugged on his white beard, a gesture that always annoyed her. “Unstable, perhaps. Though maybe it’s an act. Hard to say. All the same I tell you...”
“I’m not a child!”
He had cold grey eyes and they fixed on her now.
“Child. Girl. Adult. What does it matter? You’re a woman under my roof. My flesh and blood. You go where I tell you. Do what I say. You belong to me...”
‘I do not...”
The look on his face silenced her. Only twice had Polonius struck his daughter. But those two times were of such severity they haunted her still.
“You’re goods and chattel in this place. Remember that. Stay away from the Prince...”
‘We live within the same bleak walls, father! How...?”
“If I say you go nowhere near him... don’t dally with him in the meadow... sneak into his quarters like a harbour whore...”
She knew she was blushing. Feared the words to come. This had never been spoken between them. In her heart she still hoped he didn’t know.
“I don’t warrant such vile accusations.”
“You don’t allow him between your legs again. If that child of yours had lived...”
Ophelia stared at him, aghast.
She refused to cry in his presence. Had for years. Even now that was possible. But only by silencing the screaming voice inside.
Then he laughed.
“Yes. I know. For the love of God, girl. I have spies in every place in the known world. Do you think I wouldn’t have them in Elsinore? Do you truly believe none would see you naked with him by the river banks in summer? Flowers in your hair? Playing that bloody lute and singing your stupid songs?”
The old man speared a piece of herring on his knife. Took a bite.
“You’re too naive to understand discretion. And he’s too much his father’s son to know the need for it. Well?”
Her hands clutched the wooden table. No words. No way to leave him either.
He put down his knife and glowered at her.
“The one thing I don’t know is this. Did you lose the bastard child deliberately? Or by accident?”
That she would answer, but it took an effort.
“I lost the baby when the old king died. I think perhaps the shock...”
Polonius pushed his chair from the table, rolled back his head and howled with laughter.
Wiped his eyes after a while. Looked at her and shook his head.
“Two good deaths in a single night, then. If only day could be so profitable.”
“Father...”
“Don’t weep! I despise that.” He jabbed a finger at her. “You’ve heard him bawling for that savage he called father. Have you heard a word of grief for your bastard brat?”
“He doesn’t know. The Prince had no idea I carried his child.”
Her father didn’t seem to hear.
“Stay away from Hamlet or I’ll cite you as a lunatic and send you to the madhouse without a second thought. I don’t want more bastards in this castle than we have already...”
“I will not be ordered...”
His arm swept the table. Plates, glasses, knives, cutlery, broth and fish scattered across the rich carpet.
She stared at the food, the shattered glass and crockery.
“I’ll call the servants...”
“No servants, Ophelia. You’ll deal with it, not them. I’m offended a child of mine could be so selfish.”
The finger again, the cold and icy look.
“And you shall do my bidding or pay the price.”
There was a knock on the door. She went to answer it, glad to get out from under his stare. A courtier was there, one she’d seen visiting him in his quarters of late. Voltemand, a civil servant from Copenhagen. A good-looking man and he knew it. He always looked at her in a way she didn’t like, a knowing smile on his smug face.
“You have a visitor, father.”
“Perhaps I came to see you,” he told her with a wink and a smile.
She glared at him.
“Why would you do that, sir? I heard you had a wife and children back in the south. Don’t they miss you?”
“Copenhagen’s a long way, lady.”
He reached out and felt the fabric of her dress between his fingers.
Her father was watching and didn’t say a word.
“I’ll leave you to your business, whatever that may be.”
She retired to her bedroom. There she had the servants fetch hot water to fill the copper bath before the fire. Then she locked the door, found the rose essence Hamlet had given her the previous summer, one of several gifts from Paris.
The perfume came with such memories. She took off her clothes, climbed into the water and tried not to weep.
Hours they waited, long into the next morning, freezing on the icy, dark battlements, cloaks around them, marching from the chapel tower to the vaulted roof of the Great Hall, peered round each corner, seeing nothing.
“If this is some prank…” Hamlet grumbled late into the long night.
“We know what we saw,” Horatio replied and the other two with them nodded.
The prince paced the ramparts, looking everywhere.
“You all saw it? The same thing?”
“Yes, my lord,” said Barnardo.
“And it looked like...?”
“Your father, said the other sentry. “A shadow of how he was in life.”
Hamlet had first raced to the battlement with a quickening pulse. quicken. With fear, certainly. Dread too. But also something like a cold excitement. His father was found dead in the royal garden from a strange seizure brought on by a bite from a stray adder. Ever since Hamlet had wandered round like a half-drowned man. The clean and icy wind blowing in from the Øresund had felt like fresh air in failing lungs. And then… tedium and disenchantment.
“It always comes this way?”
“Not always,” said Barnardo. “Last night it went into the tower there...”
He pointed, and then his face changed, his eyes fell and the old soldier’s hand made the sudden sign of a cross.
Hamlet spun around and saw the apparition, standing in the doorway they had just passed.
His father, in armour, staring at him alone.
Time stopped. The world and all that was in it fell away till there was only the prince and the dead king alone in the night, their eyes locked upon each other.
For a long and awful moment nothing happened. The apparition stood frozen in the shadowy doorway, grey hair waving around its deathly face, unblinking eyes burning like embers. Then it raised one slow, gauntleted hand, and crooked a beckoning finger.
Without a second thought, Hamlet took a step towards it.
An arm on his shoulder. Horatio held him back.
“Don’t, sir! We’ve no idea what it is. You don’t know what it wants.”
“Then I’ll ask it,” Hamlet said and shook him off.
Another stronger arm tried to keep hold him back.
“My lord!” muttered Barnardo. “It might be a devil. Come to seize you.”
“And it might be my father, come to speak to his son. I wish none of you harm. But I swear I won’t vouch for the good health of the next man to lay a finger on me.”
The guard’s hand withdrew. The cold night air seemed to gather around Hamlet’s heart. Yet he felt calm and his mind was certain.
“I’ll speak to i
t. Stay here.”
It was as if the apparition heard. It stepped back into the tower and began to climb the stairs, great sword trailing noiselessly behind it. For all the warnings someone snatched at Hamlet’s cloak as he left. He shrugged them off and followed after the phantom, to the winding spiral staircase.
Together they climbed in silence, the only light in the passageway the eerie glow of the spectre itself. Step by step they ascended to the topmost turret. Only when they were outside, with the whole castle laid out below them and the black sea on three sides, did the ghost turn to face him.
At that moment the thing seemed to inhale the bitter wind and changed from unearthly spirit to what might once have passed for a man. The pearly light which seemed to emanate from him faded. Beneath the silver moon the face was older and more real than before, so that for Hamlet it was almost like seeing his father in the flesh.
With that some of his composure failed and he felt the grief and horror mount inside him.
“I am a creature of the night with only moments in this place,” the spirit said. “Do not fail me now.”
It was his father’s voice, commanding, cruel almost. Nothing spectral about it.
“Listen and prepare yourself to revenge what was done to me.”
The mailed hand pointed at him then, a frank accusation.
“You know already, don’t you?”
“Know?”
“I was bitten by no snake. Except the viper who now wears my crown. And occupies my bed.”
“My uncle…?”
“My brother. Claudius. A clever, jealous traitor. His poison poured into my ear as I slept so that the body showed no mark of violence. My brother whose crime has given him all I once possessed: my life, my throne, my queen. You cannot know the horror of my condition, unnaturally cut off by my own flesh and blood, sent to my eternal judgment before I could prepare, weighed down by ancient sins which must now be burned away through endless years of torment.”
“What must I do, sir?”
The spectre seemed to smile. It was a familiar look, knowing, testing, almost mocking, and a part of Hamlet recoiled from it.
“No one knows this secret. No one suspects. Except you, my son. You loved me once. You know what you must do.”
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark Page 4