This Private Plot

by Alan Beechey

  We have reached the final tableau. The duel between Hamlet and Laertes commences with swordplay of an incompetence that approaches genius, and the histrionic deaths of the main characters follow in sequence—well done, Claudius, for a full minute of convulsions on the banquet table.

  The doomed Hamlet, expiring in Horatio’s arms, hears the approach of Fortinbras (excellent sound effects from above the stage), and as he speaks his last words—“the rest is silence,” as we all well know, or should—snow begins to fall inside the castle, turning to rain, the significance of which I don’t need to explain, I’m sure.

  Ah, but the rest is far from silent. There is a piercing shriek, and a woman is lowered head-first from the top of the stage—a barely-clad wench, dirty, ragged and soaking wet, hanging by her ankle from a long rope. She swings wildly, screeching and cursing and waving her free leg around in such a display of “country matters” that we must conclude she is no angel winging the sweet prince to his rest, but none other than the vexed and tormented spirit of the drowned Ophelia. And one—well, this one—instantly comprehends the excruciating monotony of the production: to lull us into a state of complete habituation, so this shattering coup de theatre has its greatest possible impact.

  Meanwhile, the actors below attempt to go on with the scene in the continuing heavy downpour, on a stage that is now rapidly filling up with soapsuds, an obvious nod to Artaud’s Theatre of Cruelty. When Horatio slips and disappears beneath a cloud of froth, unable to continue, a heavily bearded Scotsman leaps onto the stage from the front row of the audience and picks up the speech “So shall you hear of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts, of accidental judgments, casual slaughters…” but seeming to forget the lines, switches to “It is a tale told by an idiot,” thus confirming what I had instantly intuited, that he is meant to represent that other tragic hero, Macbeth. An enormously tall black man, no doubt portraying Othello, also rises from the front row and attempts to drag Macbeth off the stage again. Oh, the significance!

  In the chaos of a deepening sea of foam—Tzara! Beckett!—Macbeth accidentally collides with another character (I think it was Osric), which mystifyingly strips him of his wig and false beard. The denuded Macbeth falls off the stage into the lap of an older man in the audience. (Lear? I regret that I remember little of this performer’s appearance.) (Editor’s note. See story on page 1 “Anonymous blogger proves scab driver death a hoax. Government resigns. Who is UTooth?” Also pages 2, 3, 4 and 17.)

  At this point, a sudden horde of actors in police uniforms—a clear homage aux Les Keystone Kops—rush in through the auditorium, many of them joining the melee on the stage. It is, naturally, the final key to Mr. Fingerfook’s conception of the play: Hamlet is completely sane; it is the rest of the cast who are mad. Like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, the entire play takes place in a madhouse. Only while Hamlet lived could the lunacy be held in check.

  And we, the theater audiences of today, are now revealed as no better than those middle-class doctor-peepers of yesteryear who sought their entertainment in touring the bedlams of England. As we are herded from the auditorium, our ears and cheeks now aglow with much-deserved shame, as we walk voyeuristically past the young couple kissing passionately in the foyer (I’d seen the same actor at a local comedy club, doing a stunningly Fingerhoodian portrayal of a second-rate stand-up comic), and as we are patted down with delicious intimacy in the evening air by young men dressed as policemen, who pretend to take our names and addresses (call me, Trey), we feel duly and deliciously abased. Positively degraded, in fact.

  Thank you for that, Hymfrey Fingerhook—genius.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Saturday evening (continued)

  “You know, Tobias,” Oliver reflected, “it was the Mikado who wanted the punishment to fit the crime. That’s comedy. Shakespeare lets the punishment fit the criminal. That’s tragedy.”

  Oliver and Toby were back in the fourth row of the otherwise empty auditorium, still damp, but draped in blankets scavenged from the RSC’s props department. They had just watched as Davina Bennet was lowered headfirst to the sudsy stage, freed from the noose around her ankles, and led away in a blanket and handcuffs by several detectives.

  “The odd thing is that she killed Breedlove because he was blackmailing me,” Toby reflected. “She never knew that she had been one of his victims for years.”

  Effie was standing stage right, in earnest conversation with Simon Culpepper, who seemed partly distracted by the fidgety Scotsman hovering beside him. The smaller man had reapplied his wig and beard.

  “I bet that tall chap plays basketball,” said Toby. “Who is he?”

  “That’s Detective Sergeant Culpepper. He’s supposed to be in charge of the Breedlove case. He and Effie started out as bosom buddies, but somewhere along the line he must have blotted his copybook. Never a good move with Eff. Apparently, he was convinced that Breedlove’s murder had something to do with a peculiar outfit called the Priory of Synne.”

  Toby flinched, but said nothing.

  “You’ve lived in Synne since you were a kid, Tobe—don’t make the joke—have you ever heard of such a thing?”

  “Never,” Toby answered quickly. Oliver turned in his seat and looked at his brother closely.

  “You’re lying,” he said. “I’ve always been able to tell when you’re lying, ever since that time you vehemently denied stealing Eve’s first training bra, but I had the videotape of you wearing it as a World War II flying helmet.”

  Toby shuffled uncomfortably. “Okay, but you have to keep this to yourself. I’m actually a member of the Priory of Synne.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since this morning. Do you remember that little man who was sitting in the front row? Wee Jockie McSporran over there landed in his lap during the final fracas.”

  “You mean Mr. Tooth? You see him, too, do you?”

  “What do you mean, ‘see him’?”

  “Nothing. It’s just I was beginning to…No, nothing. Never mind.”

  “I wasn’t in the theater for all that malarkey, but I bumped into Mr. Tooth as he left, and he told me what had happened. He seemed quite charged about it—kept muttering something like ‘Thickpin’ or ‘Pigpen.’ Anyway, he’d turned up earlier today at Holy Trinity, just after you left and just before I got the call about the tunnel. Apparently he’s some kind of recruiting officer for this Priory of Synne. It always has one member who lives in the village, and he thought I’d be a good choice, since I am native here. I was in a bit of a rush, so I said yes.”

  “What are you supposed to do?”

  “Nothing really. Just protect the Secret of Synne.”

  “And that is?”

  Toby looked shocked. “I couldn’t possibly tell you, Ollie.”

  “After all I’ve done for you in the last week?”

  “I was sworn to secrecy!”

  “Come on, Tobe. Let this be our little family secret.”

  He stopped. The phrase echoed in his mind.

  “Oh, very well,” Toby glanced around and brought his voice to a whisper. “Synne is French.”

  “French for what?”

  “No, really French. Mr. Tooth gave me a handout with all the details. You see, Synne started out up in the Middle Ages as a small settlement on a plot of land that a nearby French Benedictine priory had kept to sneer at. This expatriate community of monks was ruled by the Abbots of Brest in Brittany, and at some point, one of these Abbots decided to name the village ‘Sein.’ That’s French for breast.”

  “In the nurturing sense of the Madonna feeding the Christchild?”

  “No, it was in bile-soaked retaliation for all the sniggering double-entendres that the Abbot of a place called Brest had to endure when visiting his English outpost. Anyway, a few decades later, Thomas Cromwell undertook the Visitation of the Monasteries, basically casing the joint for
Henry VIII. But he failed to notice that the Benedictine possessions included a straggle of hovels and their impoverished English occupants. Twenty years later, Bloody Mary was to lament the final loss of Calais, which was England’s last corner of France. Little did she know that, because of a clerical oversight, there was one tiny part of England that was still legally French. And still is to this day. The village of Sein in Warwickshire. Or, as it is now known, Synne.”

  “French!” said Oliver, aghast.

  “When you think about it, it does explain a lot.”

  “French,” Oliver muttered again. He got up to join Effie, who seemed to have finished with Culpepper and the mysterious Scotsman.

  “Toffs nil, workers one,” he said, stepping up onto the low stage and prodding the long, swaying rope, still attached to the gantry far above them. “But did she fall or was she pushed?”

  Effie smiled. “The silly girl did seem determined to rock the boat up there, so I tied a bowline around her ankle, in case there were any unfortunate accidents. She fell only a couple of feet before the rope stopped her. But it turned out to be a good way to keep her out of mischief until the cavalry arrived. Simon should be able to match her fingerprints to the ones found on the skipping rope. That reminds me, Simon’s on his way to Eric’s flat with some bolt-cutters. I ought to warn him what to expect when he gets there.”

  “Why?” Oliver asked. “Eric’s handcuffed to the bed frame. He’s not going anywhere.”

  “True. And that could be the problem. I left a chocolate on Eric’s pillow.”

  “A kind touch.”

  She screwed up her face. “Yeah. But the thing is, Ollie, I found it in one of Eric’s desk drawers. It was a free sample of the Bennet family’s laxative.”

  She skipped away, trying to avoid the shallow, iridescent puddles of soapy water. Mallard emerged from the wings, still wearing his multicolored Osric costume. To Oliver’s surprise, after the disastrous finale, his uncle seemed blissfully happy.

  “Er, great performance, Uncle Tim. At least what I saw of it.”

  Mallard laughed, threw back his shoulders, and stared around the empty auditorium. “This is the place to be, isn’t it? The greasepaint. The bright lights. The codpieces.” He bounced lightly, as if testing the springiness of the boards beneath his feet.

  “Ollie,” he continued, his voiced hushed. “Something happened to me tonight. I’ve made a decision, and I’m telling you, even before I tell Phoebe and the others. I’m sixty years old—half my life is over already. So I’m going to take my long-overdue retirement from the Yard and become a full-time actor.”

  “What brought this on?”

  “I’ve always been a little stagestruck, as you may have noticed. But earlier this evening, I had one of those transcendent moments.”

  “It was certainly an Osric to remember, Uncle. Distinctly foamy, but a palpable hit.”

  “It wasn’t Osric. It wasn’t even Polonius. It was when I was the Gravedigger. You remember I’d been complaining about the Styrofoam skull I had to use for Yorick? Well, the props manager came up with a much better skull, right at the last minute—brown with age, jawbone missing, decayed, a bit whiffy—but it looked as if it had just been taken out of the ground. I found it on the props table, tied up in an old pair of tights for protection.”

  His eyes looked up dreamily to the distant dress circle.

  “It may sound crazy, but just holding this skull seemed to transform my performance to a level I’ve never reached before. I felt the words coming from my mouth as if they had just formed within my brain. It was almost as if Shakespeare himself were out there on the stage with me.”

  Oliver listened in silence, trying to resist a certain growing suspicion. It would explain why Davina hadn’t tried to escape the building, but hid on the high gantry instead, waiting for the theater to empty to recover the spoils she’d dropped.

  “What, uh…what happened to the skull?” he asked.

  Mallard gestured vaguely around the stage as he strode away. “Oh, it’s here somewhere.”

  ***

  It was half past eleven. Oliver was tucked in his teenage bed in his teenage bedroom, the beneficiary of a long, hot shower. He lay still, thinking, waiting for Effie to finish in the bathroom, toying with the events of the last few days, trying to ignore the aches and the flecks of soreness. Little family secrets…

  Effie swept into the room, wearing a short blue-silk dressing gown, tied loosely at the waist.

  “It’s very quiet,” she said, sitting on the end of the bed and rubbing her hair with a towel.

  “Well, Toby got Ben to drop him off in Oxford on the way back to London. And the entire older generation is out to dinner in Stratford.”

  Effie pointed at the ceiling. “I meant our upstairs neighbors,” she said. “Have they run out of energy at last?”

  “Ah, that’s interesting. I was chatting to Geoff and Susie at the theater about the wonders of making love by moonlight in the middle of the Shakespeare Race. They seemed very keen to try it, so they’re on their way up Synne Common as we speak, stripped and ready for action.”

  Effie laughed. “Let’s hope they don’t find any dead bodies hanging from trees.”

  Oliver looked thoughtful. “No, not bodies. Not dead bodies.”

  “What have you done, Oliver?”

  “Do you remember that very pleasant group of Japanese tourists in the row behind us this evening? I merely happened to mention to their guide that a midnight visit to the Shakespeare Race is a splendid diversion for jet-lagged travelers. And that since the road is finally open to motor coaches again, tonight would be an excellent night for such an expedition. I recommended flashlights and video cameras, to capture the wildlife.”

  Effie got up and draped the damp towel over the back of a chair. She turned to face him. “Do you want to know what it is?”

  “What what is?”

  “What it is I see in you. You asked me last week, in the Race.”

  He propped himself up on his elbows. “Yes, I think I would like to know.”

  “Most of the time, you get it right.”

  “And by ‘it,’ you mean…?”

  “Whatever it is. You usually get it right, Ollie. And even when you don’t, you try to.”

  “Ah. Doesn’t that apply to most of us?”

  Effie shook her head. “You’d be surprised how rare it is. That’s what makes you a keeper.” She looked down. “This is our last night here, and we seem to have the place to ourselves. Do you want to make love?”

  Oliver considered. “Well, in recent days, I’ve been kicked in the cobblers, set upon three times in the village, stung by nettles, scraped up, bruised, nearly buried alive, virtually drowned, and shot out of a drain like a pea from a peashooter.”

  “Is that a yes, then?”

  “Of course it is.” He swallowed. “Is that robe all you’re wearing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you going to take it off, then?”

  “No.” She lifted her head and let her pale, bright eyes meet his.

  “No?” he echoed.

  “No. You are.”

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Sunday

  “I always loved Prussian blue,” said Oliver, peering into his mother’s box of watercolors.

  “As a child, you used to eat it.” Chloe washed the raw sienna out of her brush, turning the clear tumbler to the color of cider.

  With the Sunday morning church service over and with most of her guests departed for London, Chloe Swithin had put on her wide-brimmed straw hat and taken her easel and paint box up to the heights of Synne Common. Oliver had volunteered to carry the rest of her equipment while Effie was packing.

  “You can’t see the village from here.” He looked out over the countryside. The sun was still high in the cloudless sky.


  “Not your usual tagline about that being a good thing, dear?”

  “My wit’s deceased. So’s my hay fever, incidentally. And I’ll admit that Synne is very beautiful.” He sat down in the long grass beside her, watching a buzzard wheel around the top of the Synne Oak. They were only a few yards from the Shakespeare Race.

  “Even when the church organist attacks you at night?” Chloe remarked.

  “How did you find out it was Sidney?”

  She dabbed some red poppies onto the foreground. “He apologized to me privately this morning. That was quite a bashing you gave him.”

  She noticed that her tumbler of water was speckled with drowned midges and tipped it out onto the grass. Oliver refilled it for her from one of the jugs of fresh water that she’d stationed beside her campstool. So Kim finally emerged from isolation, he reflected. And will now have to stay as Sidney until the swelling goes down. Unless, by some peculiar coincidence, Lesbia sustains an identical injury.

  “The odd thing is,” Chloe continued, “that attack happened on Thursday night. I could have sworn I saw Sidney on Friday, and there wasn’t a mark on him.” She sat back and scrutinized the painting.

  “Do you want to know why?”

  “Not really.”

  “Let’s just say that ‘Tweedledum and Tweedledee’ fits them very well. So it’s a shame, in a way, that they weren’t Dennis’s Tweedle victims.”

  Chloe lowered her brush and peered around the easel, surprised to find he had been looking steadily at her. “But you were convinced—”

  “Yes. But I’ve been missing something obvious. Something you told me first, incidentally.”

  “You should always listen to your mother. What was it?”

  “The Weguelins moved to Synne about two years ago. Dennis Breedlove started blackmailing his Tweedles four years ago. So if we really want to complete our set of victims—just for neatness, you understand—we need to find somebody else who fits the rhyme. Somebody who was living in the village four years ago.”