Love's Will

by Meredith Whitford

  “No. Odd, isn’t it. Five of us, and I’m the only one to write. What’s the time? So late? Harry, I must go. We’re rehearsing early tomorrow, for the wedding play.” He pushed his chair back and stood up. “Sorry not to have given you a better game.”

  “Don’t be. I like winning.”

  “And with a more worthy opponent you should play more carefully.” William slid his hand round Harry’s head, kissed him. “We’ll meet again soon?”

  “As ever. And we will meet at the wedding festivities.”

  “See each other. You’re an honoured guest and I’m merely an entertainer. Adieu.”

  The wedding was celebrated with all due pomp of masques, dancing, feasting. And, of course, William’s play. It was a wild success. Perfect for the occasion, everyone said, charming, funny, touching. The echoes of applause ringing in his ears, William accepted his author’s due of praise and Lord Derby’s gift of an extra twenty pounds above the agreed fee. And, out of kindness for the players who had once worn his brother’s livery, Lord Derby begged them stay and take drinks, mingle for a few moments with the guests. “Keep your costumes on,” he said, twinkling, “so that as at that other wedding, we may have the Fairy King and Queen and their court among us – not to mention Bottom; a splendid part, Will. Come, join us at our feast.”

  Free food and drink of wedding guest quality wasn’t to be sneezed at. Amused and hungry, the players obediently mingled.

  And, mingling, William came face to face with her.

  Mara-Marian. His dark and damnéd beauty.

  Clad in shell pink and gold lace, colours that became her, with her hair tidily curled, rings on her fingers and gold at her ears and throat, her bosom no more displayed than was proper. Dignified as any great lady there. Only the heady, heavy scent was the same.

  “You,” he said. “You, here?”

  She gave him a heavy-lidded, bland look then her eyes slid sideways to a man standing nearby, watching her. “It’s Master Shakspere, is it not? I think we met some time since. Two years, was it, or three? Are you acquainted with my husband, Master Leigh?”

  The stage lost a great player in her. “I think not,” said William, bowing, as she introduced him to the watching man.

  “Master Shakspere? Ah yes, you wrote that excellent play we have just seen. A fine work.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “And how do you come to be acquainted with my wife?” Yes, there was jealousy there, and suspicion. Perhaps he knew what sort of woman he had married. He was at least twenty years her senior.

  “We met at one of Lord Southampton’s musicales.”

  “Ah.”

  Lord Derby came to speak to William then, and for a time he lost sight of the woman and her hornéd husband.

  Later, however, she found him alone in a quiet corner of the garden. “William.” She leaned in to him, her breasts pressing against his arm.

  “My lady.”

  “Oh, none of that nonsense, not between us.”

  “There is nothing between us, Madam. As in my play, the enchantment has worn off.”

  The moonlight showed the flicker in her black eyes as she hit back swiftly. “What did Titania say? 'Such dreams as I have had? I dreamt I was enamour’d of an ass'?”

  “Ass I may be, but you were never enamour’d.”

  “Say you so? I told you I should miss you, and I did.”

  Some hopeless, half-wit, gullible fool said wistfully, “Did you truly?” William actually looked around to see who had spoken before he realised it was himself.

  “Yes I did. Well, the playhouses opened before Christmas, so you’ve been back in London some time, I suppose.”

  “Yes, since after the summer tour.”

  “And you managed not to come to me.”

  “Yes. So that’s your husband. Poor man. Though I daresay he’s a rich man.”

  “Why, William, what a pretty compliment. A rich man for having me?” Mockingly girlish, she flirted her fan. Against his will, he laughed. She wasn’t what you would call a witty woman, but there was a core of self-mocking honesty under all her guises. “Well, we women must make our way as best we can. I thought I’d never see you again.” She moved in front of him and slid her arms around his waist. He started to say, “No,” but she put her lips on his.

  And it was all there again, and his body remembered what his mind was determined to forget. All his good resolutions fled. There was a low wall beside them, and he lifted her onto it and flung her skirts up. She laced her legs around him, panting as he touched her. He was desperately, ragingly eager for her, but he was in costume as Philostrate, and the unfamiliar clothes cost him a moment’s fumbling. Then he thrust into her, and her tongue was halfway down his throat, and she used his mouth to stifle her cry at the end.

  She leaned her head on his shoulder, almost as a child does. “Ah, William, my Will. I’ve missed you.”

  “And I had vowed never to do that again.”

  “Would you order love?”

  “It is not love.”

  “Well, you know best.” She disengaged herself, hopped off the wall and shook out her skirts. With trembling hands he fastened up his clothes. “If you want to come to me again, I no longer have that house, I live now with my husband. Is there somewhere?”

  “I keep my old lodgings, I go there to write. Two rooms.”

  “One would be enough for this kind of love. Tell me the direction.”

  In bitter self-hatred he did so.

  “Then perhaps we will meet again.”

  She began to stroll back up the garden towards the house. William fell into step beside her. And, strolling thus, two mere acquaintances, they ran into Harry Southampton. He was slightly drunk.

  “Well-met by moonlight, my Will. Will, Will, Will, my sweet William, my pet poet, my tame songbird, what a play you gave us tonight.” He had a wine jug in his hand, and he waved it in punctuation of his words. “What – a – play! What wit, what charm, what gaiety. What a triumph of love. I liked the lion. Thyramus and Pisbe. Pyramus. Good old Ovid. And who are you, Madam? You look familiar.”

  “Mistress Leigh,” said William.

  “Your humble servant. But do I not know you?”

  “We have met, my lord. I sang for you once.”

  “Oh yes, the lady with the eyebrows. I remember. Sang Will’s song. You’re here to make music for the wedding feasting?”

  “No, my lord.”

  “A pity. You could have sung about the potted snakes; from the play, you know. Sssssspotted.”

  “Yes, my lord. Charming. May I beg your lordship to excuse me? My husband will be seeking me.”

  “Of course.” Harry bowed, nearly falling over. William righted him. “That’s a damned lovely woman, Will.”

  “Oh, do you think so?”

  “’Course I do. Not being blind. Damned lovely. Taking.” He peered owlishly at his friend. “Aha. You are taken with her!” Then he made one of those leaps of intuition William had thought the preserve of women. “And you’ve taken her. Last year... she was the one. When you had no time for me. Always busy, always dreaming.”

  “I always have time for you, Harry.”

  “Not last year. Different. And you are in love with her.”

  “No, Harry. Do guard your tongue!”

  “Sick of guarding my tongue. People here, half the Court, old Burghley, Derby caught up with the Papists, Essex out of favour with the Queen, the queen’s little maid of honour, Bess Vernon, making eyes at me, not that I mind that, she’s very fetching, Raleigh always underfoot, Anthony Bacon and his little arse-licking brother, Francis, and I must guard my tongue. Always guard my tongue. And my back, from the daggers of my enemies. No friends. No real friends. Except you, Will.”

  William smothered a sigh. “I am your friend, forever. Come, Harry, I have to give my costume back to the ’tire-master, then let us have a drink together.”

  Harry had a poor head for drink. Another glass or two and he’d be
asleep. As for William, he longed for nothing more than to be in bed, alone. The other players were staying on, to grace the wedding festivities with another play tomorrow. But out of friendship and love, he would have to keep Harry apart from anyone who could hear his ramblings and pass them on. He set a brisk pace back to the players’ quarters, Harry trotting docilely after him, and handed in his costume, noting as he did so that it reeked of his mistress’s perfume. The ’tire-master, in charge of the players’ wardrobe, looked at him oddly, and winked. Then he sat out in the garden with Harry, drinking, until Harry’s eyes drooped and William could hand him over to his valet. When at last he tumbled into bed beside his brother, he thought he would toss and turn through a sleepless night of guilt, but despite Edmund’s snoring he fell asleep at once.

  2.

  In the days before they could afford to send their laundry out, Anne might have noticed sooner. As it was, when all she had to do was to sort and bundle the clothes sent for washing, it took her some weeks to recognise that William’s shirts had not acquired some of their marks in the theatre. The players taking women’s roles used lip-rouge and face powder, they wore long wigs. But usually the wigs were blond, not black. And not the most ardent actor could week after week press his lips to the same place on William’s shirts. And that faint scent, which now she knew she had smelt before? But of course he met many people out of her ken. He went often to Harry’s house and no doubt there were women guests. Suspicions were ignoble and she put them away with the clothes to be washed.

  But the following week there was lip-rouge on the hem of a shirt, and long black hairs, too dark to be her own, caught in the lacings. The week after that, his under-linen was torn. And that scent seemed to cling to every garment. Anne stored clean clothes with rosemary, lavender and pepper to keep the fleas and lice at bay. This scent was of chypre and roses and ambergris.

  After that she began to watch her husband. He came and went at the usual times. Or if he did not, always there was a reason, freely discussed. A company meeting, rehearsals, business with Lord Hunsdon their patron. Always a good reason. But he was different. Different in the way he’d been at Stratford last year after the fire. Gentle, loving, entirely himself. Yet different. Alert. Given to odd silences.

  Sometimes she would catch him looking at her with sadness or even pity, but if she asked, he would say he was thinking of a new play and read her a scene as proof. In bed he turned to her less often, he would complain of being tired and fall asleep or think he heard Edmund or one of the children still awake. He brought her gifts more often, coming home with earrings, a box of sweetmeats or the fruit he knew she loved, a book, a pair of shoe buckles. Not that he’d ever been ungenerous, and certainly they now had the money for these fairings, but these presents came so often, for no reason. Presents for the children too, she noted. Hair ribbons or dolls for the girls, books and toys for Hamnet. He acted differently with the children too, more indulgent and at the same time more demanding, less tolerant of noise or squabbles, then overcome with remorse when he snapped at them.

  Anne watched him. He watched her. Often she had the feeling he was on the verge of some confession, but always held back.

  And then he suggested they move house. A man called Francis Langley was building a new playhouse, to be called the Swan, on the other side of the river, near the Rose in Bankside. Why, said William, should they not move house to Southwark? So much easier, to be near the new theatre (the word was coming to be used, now, after The Theatre). The company would be based there. Surely it made sense to move.

  “But Southwark is all brothels and bath-houses,” Anne objected.

  “Not all. There’s – ”

  “What’s a brothel?” Hamnet piped up. They had forgotten he was in the room, so silently had he been working at his school books.

  “Nothing for you to know of. A bad place.”

  “It’s a house where the whores and punks do business,” Susanna told her brother with chilling authority.

  “Susanna!” shouted both her parents. William added, “Where do you learn such words? You shouldn’t know of such things.”

  “But everyone does. I’m not a little girl any more, I’m twelve.”

  “All the more reason,” he shouted, “not to talk of such things!”

  Susanna burst into tears and ran out of the room. Listening to her thudding furiously up the stairs, William and Anne exchanged a long, rueful glance.

  “Twelve, aye. It’s time I talked to her. She’ll be a woman soon. We shouldn’t have been angry with her. Children hear things, they pick up words and the knowledge to go with them.”

  “Knowing but innocent. The worst combination. Twelve. Where have the years gone, Anne?”

  “I often wonder. Where have many things gone?” Their eyes met again, for a long, taut moment. William was the first to look away.

  “Are you angry with me?” Hamnet asked tremulously.

  “Not at all. Get back to your work, dear.” With a worried glance he did so. “Well, revenons à nos moutons. What do you think of a move across the river?”

  “I don’t want to. I like this house, Will, we’re settled here. And surely it will be a long time before this new playhouse is built. I dined with Mrs Burbage yesterday and she said nothing of the company moving to a new theatre.”

  “It will come. But perhaps you’re right. It was just a thought. Very well.”

  Perhaps it was the unacknowledged workings of the back of her mind that took Anne to William’s old lodgings. Perhaps it was an odd glance or two from the other players, conversations cut off abruptly when they knew she was near. Whatever the reason, she set out one day, six weeks after William had talked of moving across the river, to do her regular shopping, and had found her steps taking her in the other direction.

  She hadn’t been here for nearly a year. There was no reason to visit. William used the rooms only when he was working at white-heat and could tolerate no interruptions. But today she went, walking briskly and without a second thought up the stairs and into the familiar quarters.

  The outer room was very untidy, William at his worst. Dust coated the few books on the shelves. His writing table and the floor around it were awash with papers, blank, written over, scored through, flung down in crumpled balls. Seven broken pens lay surrounded by ink splatters. A stale piece of cheese and the heel of a loaf sulked on a flyblown platter. Wine glasses showed a sticky residue. No one had been here, you would say, for days; weeks, perhaps. Certainly not the house-proud landlady.

  Feeling foolish, Anne almost turned to leave. But there was the inner room, the bedchamber.

  The blankets and coverlet were shoved to the foot of the bed. Stained, rumpled sheets trailed to the floor. Two pillows atop one another lay halfway down the bed. The other showed fine russet hairs and some long, coarse, curly black ones. Two wine-glasses – two – stood together on the bedside chest. And the air smelt of that heavy, musky perfume.

  Quite blankly Anne walked back to the outer room. She felt very cold, but to her surprise she wasn’t shaking, she felt no desire to cry, not even any anger. Just cold, a chill that frosted her soul.

  Then she went home, took a hairpin and picked the lock of the box where William kept his private papers.

  She found the poems.

  3.

  “Mistress Shakspere, you asked to see me?” Harry Southampton came into the room with something of a rush. Anne rose and curtsied and, as usual, he brushed the courtesy aside. It had been some time since Anne had seen him, and he had grown up remarkably. He was twenty-one now and the girlish delicacy of his looks was hardening into something very attractively masculine. It was said he was in love with Elizabeth Vernon, but perhaps that was only gossip.

  “Yes, my lord.” With a glance toward the serving man, she lowered her voice to say, “This is going to be a very improper conversation.”

  “Oh? Then perhaps we should take a glass of wine.” He was doing his best to seem dégagé, but his fa
ir skin showed the nervous colour of embarrassment. No doubt he thought she had come to accuse him of seducing her husband.

  “Thank you, yes.” As soon as the wine was served, Harry dismissed the servant. Anne took a fortifying swig of her drink. “Do you know who Will’s mistress is?”

  Harry was sitting in the light. Anne saw his face clench as if in pain, and also with some surprise. “Why do you ask me?”

  “Oh, come, boy,” she snapped, “did you think I didn’t know about you and William?”

  “Ah. He told you?”

  “I saw it in him, right from the start. He told me no details, but he never denied he loved you.” His mouth opened and shut like an unperfect actor forgetting his lines. This time when he blushed it was no defensive colouring but a full, fiery reddening from collar to hairline. Anne’s son blushed like that when caught out. “You’re very young still, aren’t you, Harry. And do not ask if I minded or say you’re sorry.”

  “I was not going to.” He stared at her, almost squinting in his intensity. “You are an extraordinary woman, Anne.”

  “No, only an ordinary woman whose husband is mad for another woman. You were never the rival this woman is. So tell me, do you know about it? Who she is?”

  “I knew there was someone. He has told me nothing. But some things become obvious.”

  “Ah.”

  “Yes. It hurts me. We share that, Anne.” Abruptly he shoved back his chair and stood to pace about the room. His slender, long-fingered hands twisted together. “Yes, an improper conversation indeed.” He stopped pacing and leaned on the back of his chair, facing her. Impatiently he pushed back the long hair that fell forward over his shoulders. “I love your husband. And he has fallen… no, not fallen in love. Fallen. Into lust, infatuation. Against his will, I think. He’s unhappy.”

  “I think so too. But so am I.”

  “Yes. Poor Anne.” Harry sat down again, and took her hands. “He loves you very dearly. I have always known that. Loved you more than he knows, I truly believe.”