Harry didn’t get it.
“Christ almighty,” said Sir Neville Cribbins. “It’s under your bally seat, you plum.”
Harry stood up. His seat swung up on its hinges. Harry stooped to pick up a length of dark wood. The audience gasped and applauded as if they were at a pantomime.
Harry unwrapped the other piece and joined both together. He pointed it at Jeremy.
Ariel flitted up to a gantry of lanterns.
“This cannot be! Ariel, explain!” Jeremy looked at his staff.
“The rubbish tip, ‘Master’,” the spirit grinned, rather Puckishly. “I went in alone, you will recall. There was ample time for me to fashion a counterfeit piece from all that garden waste. I secreted the true piece away and then, during the interval, snuck it under my friend Harry’s seat. You are equally matched, now. You may as well give up.”
“No!” Jeremy stamped a petulant foot. “It must be done! It shall be done! And no Stratfordian conspirators are going to stop me.”
“Oh, you really are a silly sausage,” said Professor Cheese, climbing onto the stage. He straightened the sleeves of his striped blazer and adjusted his straw boater. “There is no conspiracy. Shakespeare wrote those works and there’s an end to it.”
“No!” Jeremy’s voice quavered. “He was just a poor boy from a poor family.”
“As am I,” said Cheese, patiently. “Education’s a wonderful thing. You should try it sometime.”
“He couldn’t possibly have known about all the things he mentions.”
“Imagination and research, old boy. A writer doesn’t stop learning on the day he finishes school.”
“But -”
“You are the worst kind of snob, de Vere,” Professor Cheese leant on his cane. “An intellectual one. Your ancestor is only one of many alternative candidates that has been proposed as the true author over the years. But what are the facts? He wrote a bit of poetry - most of it egregiously poor and nothing of the quality of even the weakest of the Works.”
“That was part of the cover-up, to hide his true identity”
“That’s balderdash. Face it, Jeremy; your ancestor would struggle today to get a job writing birthday cards.”
“No! I won’t listen. I won’t let you sway me with your words. That’s what they do, these academics. They twist your mind with facts and theories until you don’t know which way is up.”
“Stand down, Jeremy. These good people deserve a refund at the very least. And complimentary tickets to a future performance of their choice.”
This suggestion gave rise to cheers and wild applause. Jeremy snarled. The professor had the people on his side.
He waved the staff menacingly. “Get back, Professor. This is going to happen, will you, nill you. And where will your precious career be then, eh?”
“Oh,” Professor Cheese shrugged, “probably in Oxford, I shouldn’t wonder. After all, the Works to which I have dedicated my life will still exist, albeit with a different name on the cover. You see, dear boy, it’s not who penned the plays that’s important. What matters is that the Works exist, that they are here to enrich the lives of everyone. It’s of no import whether they were written by Bill of Stratford or Ted of Oxford or even the man in the bloody moon.”
“Hoi!”
Heads turned. It was Harry on the balcony who had cried out.
“Just a minute,” he said. “If it doesn’t matter who wrote them, I’ll be out of a job. This entire town will lose its identity, its place in the world. What will become of us then? Do you really think people are going to flock from all over the world to a pretty little market town? I doubt it very much. Without Shakespeare, this place will go the way of other towns in this grim and boarded-up land. Charity shops, betting shops, fried chicken shops - that’s all that will be left. Have you seen High Streets lately? It’s the same up and down the country. You take Shakespeare out of Stratford and the town will die. Remove him from history and the town will have died long ago, and none of us will be here now, because this building won’t exist - there will be no reason for it to exist and no reason for us to have gathered in this place. Who knows where we will end up? You flash that magic wand and do your nifty find-and-replace-all trick and that’s it. We all disappear, including you. I can guarantee you this much: we won’t all magically reappear in a theatre in Oxford for a performance of De Vere’s The Big Storm, or whatever arsehole title he might give it.”
“Zap him, Harry!” Brownlow urged. “Let him have it!”
The American’s suggestion was met by a ripple of applause.
“Fuckin’ A!” added one of Brownlow’s countrymen.
Harry pointed his half-staff at Jeremy’s chest. He was reminded of javelin-throwing lessons at school. He’d been rubbish at that. It did not bode well.
The lights flickered.
“Jeremy... Jeremy...” said an eerie voice from everywhere and nowhere all at once.
Jeremy turned around with a start. He grasped his staff tightly. “Who goes there?”
“Jeremy...” the voice rose up again. “Do not bring dishonour to the family name, I prithee.”
“What? Who is that?”
A ghostly face appeared on the cyclorama, a disembodied head with a high forehead and a well-trimmed moustached and little, pointed beard. A pearl earring hung from one lobe.
“It is I, Edward de Vere, seventeenth Earl of Oxford,” said the disembodied head. “I ask you not to drag my name through the mire. Abandon this scheme, forego this complot. You are a de Vere and this is unworthy of you.”
“But - but -” Jeremy protested. “This is for you! This is all for you! Everyone shall know of you. All over the world. There’ll be tea towels and bookmarks. Snow globes!”
“I care not for trivia and trash,” said the head, rippling a little. “Put down your stick and go home. There’s a good boy.”
“But you wrote the plays! You deserve the acclaim, the recognition!”
The pale lips curled in a smirk. “I rather think it is you who is seeking the acclaim, to be remembered as the man who brought down Shakespeare. Oh, Jeremy! Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy! You must abandon this crusade. It will lead you nowhere.
“I can tell you the world has changed. Back then, I was a patron of the arts. My own well of creativity had dried up but I dipped into my coffers and, with great largesse, I would support troupes of theatrical players. There was one young man, young Will Shakespeare - always with an eye for business - who gratefully accepted my donations and encouragement. We would talk - we would talk of anything and everything. It was I who told him details of Italy, for example. He never went there but you don’t have to have visited a place to write about it. It’s one thing the scholars of your age appear to lack: imagination! Do you think he went to a deserted isle in order to be able to write The Tempest? Of course he didn’t. And neither did I! Do you think he actually murdered someone - a king, perhaps! - in order to write the Scottish play?
“It was flattering to have the attention of such an intelligent and perceptive young man. I told him everything he needed to know. I would translate phrases into languages he knew little of. I advised him on matters of the law and falconry and all those things people doubt a bumpkin from Warwickshire would ever encounter. I was not his only source. He was a great frequenter of the alehouses on the South Bank. He would talk to anyone, would Will. He would just watch and listen. It all went into his head and came out of his quill pen. It was one of the greatest pleasures of my life to see his body of work increase. To see the playgoers - all kinds of people, the great and the low! - enrapt by his words and his manipulation of drama. It was the pride of a teacher, a patron and a - yes - a bedfellow. Oh, Jeremy, don’t you get it? We were lovers!”
The audience gasped. Jeremy approached the cyc. He peered at it, suspicion clouding his feature
s.
“Good try, Olly,” he called into the wings. “Now get out here and take a bow!”
Olly emerged from the wings, looking sheepish. His face was painted white and grey. He pulled off his false goatee and winced.
“Sorry, Jeremy,” he said. “Sorry, Harry!” he called up to the balcony. “I got the idea from his scrying thingamabob.”
“That’s all right, Olly,” Harry called back. “Proud of you, man!”
“How touching! I may vomit,” said Jeremy. “But first, I have a job to do.”
He warned them all back with a swish of his staff and then raised it high over the Folio.
The audience gasped but not at the enormity of what this Prospero-turned-villain was about to do. Everyone gasped because a strange creature was bounding across the stage towards the mad magician. They consulted their programmes. The bloke playing Caliban was standing in front of them, dressed as a ghost. Who then was portraying the monkey-fish-man? Oh, it was all getting too weird, too avant garde for their liking.
Caliban sank his teeth into Jeremy’s leg. He pulled the staff-wielding maniac to the floor and sat on his chest.
“No!” Caliban roared. “You will not do it! You will not eradicate me!”
“My dear fellow,” Jeremy squirmed beneath him, “you’re worrying about nothing. You will not change, only the name of your creator.”
“You baffle me with words,” Caliban snarled. “I cannot believe a single one of them.”
He raised a paw as if to strike Jeremy’s head off but the magician wriggled beneath him. He lifted the staff and ran Caliban through. The creature let out a sound that was neither simian nor piscine but somewhere between the two. Jeremy pushed him aside and, scrambling to his feet, leapt from the stage. He tore up the aisle to one of the exits.
“Stop him!” the professor cried.
Olly jumped down and gave chase. Up in the balcony, Harry and Brownlow headed to the exits, hoping to head Jeremy off in a corridor.
Caliban got to his hind legs and lumbered off in pursuit. Professor Cheese picked up the Folio and dusted it off. He took the stairs slowly before striding up the aisle and out. No one in the audience moved, believing it all to be part of some radical reimagining of the classic. Someone began to clap in a desultory fashion. Others took it up but were less than enthusiastic. Some decided to ask for their money back anyway.
Brownlow reached the ground floor before Harry. He saw Jeremy duck into the gift shop and followed him in there. Jeremy used his staff to throw merchandise into the air. Keyrings, masks and, yes indeed, tea towels flew up in Brownlow’s way. The American brushed them all aside. Jeremy animated some headless mannequins that were displaying ornate costumes from past productions. A Cleopatra and a Toby Belch backed Brownlow into a corner. Jeremy saw Harry was heading towards him and doubled back through the foyer and up the stairs.
“He’s going up the Tower!” cried a helpful programme-seller.
“Thank you!” said Harry. He bashed the mannequins with his staff. Their life force left them and Brownlow was able to get free.
“That thing’s gone up there and all!” said the programme-seller, pointing a helpful finger, and indeed there were splashes of green blood on the stairs to corroborate her assertion.
“That thing’ll kill him!” said Brownlow. “Come on!”
“Be careful, Harry!” Olly appeared behind them. He squeezed Harry’s hand. “Go on; this is your starring role.”
“Well, I hope you’ll be around to give me a review afterwards and not my obituary.”
“Jeez,” said Brownlow, pausing several steps ahead. “Get a room, you two. After we stop the madman!”
Jeremy had reached the observation deck at the top of the tower. He had lost the Folio but up here would do nicely - perhaps even better. From this lofty perch, he’d be able to encompass the whole town in one fell swoop - or one foul sweep - of his staff. The detestable upstart Shakespeare would be eradicated once and for all, before that two-bit tour guide with the other pieces could do a thing to stop it.
Laughing, Jeremy paced the perimeter of the room. Where to start, where to start?
The spire of the Holy Trinity church presented itself in his view. There! He would start and end with there, the final resting place of the bogus bard himself! He raised his staff and aimed the tip.
Behind him a terrible, guttural growling started up, like a gorilla gargling mouthwash. The monkey-fish-man was on its haunches, preparing to pounce. Jeremy turned quickly and gave it a prod with the staff, sending it flying to a corner where it landed in a crumpled heap.
The others will be here soon, he knew. He resumed the position and took aim again at the spire.
Caliban launched himself at the magician, sending the staff across the room. It broke when it hit the floor. Jeremy screamed in anguish but Caliban blocked his way, keeping him from reassembling the pieces.
“Fool!” Jeremy spat. “This is not about you! This is not going to hurt you!”
Caliban drew himself up to his full height. “It is about changing things that perhaps don’t need to be changed; I don’t know. It is about changing things with magic, and that is wrong - I know that!”
Harry and Brownlow rushed in. Brownlow picked up the pieces of wood.
“How do we know which is the fake bit?” He turned them over. Better to focus on the bits of old wood than to consider how high up he was above the ground.
“Beats me,” said Harry.
“I don’t think it’ll come to that,” said Brownlow. “Let’s try putting them all together.”
“No!” Jeremy cried. “Let me!”
“Do you think we came down in the last tempest?” Brownlow arched an eyebrow. Good line; it would go into the shooting script.
“Masters, I beg you,” Caliban turned. “Do not mess with things you wot not of.”
“Someone’s becoming more eloquent,” said Harry. He threw back his head and called for Ariel.
Olly came in. “What have I missed? Bugger to get up the stairs with one monkey leg and one flipper.”
“I managed it!” sniffed Caliban.
“Oh, you’ve got all the pieces. Well done, Harry.”
“Cheers.”
“Let’s save the congratulations until we’ve worked out what we’re going to do with Mister Magic here.” Brownlow jerked his thumb towards Jeremy’s corner. Caliban stepped aside.
Jeremy was not there.
“Say, where is the bastard?” Brownlow rushed over, forcing himself not to look down. “Holy shit; he’s outside.”
And so he was. Jeremy had taken advantage of the distraction to climb through a window. He was scaling the roof of the tower.
“He’s one crazy sonofabitch,” was Brownlow’s assessment.
“One’s more than enough,” said Harry. “Mr De Vere, come down from there. You’ll catch your death.”
The sound of sirens tore through the air. The police were on their way.
“Pitiful fools,” Jeremy roared at them. “Why did you have to interfere? I had a chance to right one of history’s greatest wrongs but you have taken my magic wand away!”
“Ah well, you see,” said Harry, “these days you just can’t get the staff.”
Jeremy stepped to the edge of the roof. A breeze tugged at his Prospero costume. Down at street level, policemen slammed patrol car doors.
Detective Inspector Montmorency Fisk spoke through a loudhailer. “Jeremy de Vere, step away from the edge. The fire brigade is on its way. We’ll get you down from there licketty split.”
Jeremy shook his head vigorously. He extended his arms to steady his balance. He cast one last contemptuous look to the faces of Harry, Olly, the American and the other savage, looking up at him from the window.
“Now my c
harms are all o’erthrown,” he said sadly.
And stepped off the ledge.
Everyone held their breath. Jeremy plummeted like a stone in fancy dress. He landed on a tree at the pavement’s edge. Or rather, the tree caught him - by the arsehole. With a squeal of agony, Jeremy slipped down the uppermost branch until he could slide no more. The tip of the branch emerged from his mouth.
Immediately, the police set to cordoning off the tree. People were emerging from the theatre. Harry and the others pelted down the stairs, forcing their way through the bemused theatregoers.
They ran to Montmorency.
“Is he -?” said Harry, looking at the tree on which Jeremy de Vere was suspended like a Christmas angel.
“Oh, I should say so. Hell of a way to go.”
They all agreed, wincing at the thought of it.
“I say!” Sir Neville Cribbins hailed them as he staggered down the entrance steps. “Should have told a fellow it was a bally promenade performance.”
Harry looked past him. The police were shepherding the audience from the area.
“Olly, where’s Caliban?”
“Um, wasn’t he with you?”
“It’s okay,” said Brownlow, pointing up at the window. “He’s up there.”
“Well, we can’t just leave him,” said Harry. He fought against the tide of exiting spectators and went back up the tower. When he reached the observation floor, Ariel was there with Caliban.
“Where the hell have you been?”
“Busy,” said Ariel. “Look, I’ve put the staff together.”
He presented Harry with the restored staff. Harry snatched it with an angry snarl.
“Give me that!”
“I was doing,” said Ariel. “Moody.”
Harry felt the weight of the fabled stick. It was sending tingles up his arm, reminding him of a time when he was a boy and had been dared to lick a battery. The staff was alive with power and potential. With a staff like this, it seemed to whisper to Harry, you could rule the world.
Where The Bee Sucks Page 21