The Opening Night Murder

by Anne Rutherford

  “But my brother’s new theatre would offer the serious plays. The common people could see them there.”

  “Yes, your majesty, in another part of the city, and in a much fresher setting. Which will be very good indeed. I hear the new theatre will have many innovations such as backdrops and set pieces, and an arch to frame the scenes like a painting. But the common folk don’t share a taste for innovation. They rather prefer the traditional. The familiar. They find comfort in it, and the Lord knows that there is little enough comfort in the lives of commoners. Our venue would not be like the new theatre, but would present plays as they’ve been staged for the past century, in the traditional manner.”

  “And where would this theatre be?”

  “Southwark, your majesty. It’s the Globe Theatre my son wishes to restore.”

  Surprise put a curl to Charles’s lips. “That old place? You can’t be serious.”

  “I’m afraid I am, your majesty.” Suzanne lowered her gaze and bent her knee as if about to curtsey in apology for contradicting the king. “’Tis a poor building and in bad repair, but ’tis good enough for the audience my son would serve.” She nodded toward Daniel. “Throckmorton here has pledged money to make repairs enough for the theatre to be presentable to the commons. Again, not suitable for fashionable company as yours will be, but pleasing to the low folk.”

  The king addressed Daniel with a twinkle of humor in his eye. “You wish to make yourself a patron of the theatre like myself?”

  Daniel bowed quickly. “Never like yourself, your majesty. I only wish to bring the renegade entertainments of street performers under the purview of the crown, as should be any public amusement.”

  Charles chuckled. “And gather in some cash in the bargain.”

  “Perhaps, your grace, but even were it a losing venture there would still be the benefit to the crown and to the overall culture of London. To elevate the sensibilities of the commons is to elevate us all in the greater scheme of things.”

  Charles gazed at them both for a long moment, thinking. He said to one of the bewigged nobles near the door, “What think you, Richard?”

  The one who liked cows considered his answer for a moment, then spoke from where he stood. “This theoretical troupe wants to perform Shakespeare and Marlowe? Are we certain they will do justice to serious plays?”

  The man with the vaguely familiar face said in reply, though he hadn’t been addressed, “Well, one can hardly damage Shakespeare. So long as the words are spoken clearly, the play is excellent drama.”

  The first said, “I’ve heard of people changing the words of plays. In fact I’ve seen enough damage done to Shakespeare that I could hardly recognize the play and it was so much gibberish.” To the king he said, “That is a consideration, your majesty. What will this new troupe do to these well-loved plays, many of which are about your ancestors, I would remind your grace.”

  Charles said, “Indeed.”

  Desperation leapt on Suzanne. She hurried to say, “I agree, your majesty. The things some actors do to the words should be deemed criminal. And they do it without sanction, every day. Somewhere in this city each day a play is performed in an alley or close, without permission from the crown. Actors do what they please, say what they like, take the audience’s money, then pack up and move to another street to do it again the next day. How good would it be to have a venue meant especially for those who live on the south side of the river and perhaps cannot travel to stand in the pits of your excellent new theatres? What advantage would there be to have a sanctioned theatre troupe answerable to my lord Throckmorton and therefore to your majesty, serving the poorer folk and giving them what they like and what you need them to have? Traditional theatre, whether serious or comedy, as it was before the Commonwealth?”

  Charles nodded, warming to the idea.

  The first noble said, “But your grace…serious theatre for the commons? Can they possibly appreciate it?”

  “They’ve always enjoyed standing in the pit in the presence of Shakespeare or Marlowe,” said Charles. “By my estimation they appreciate the old plays as much as anyone.”

  Suzanne saw an avenue and went down it to press her case. “Yes, the old plays. They prefer the old ones, and their sensibilities cannot compass the newer, bolder plays. They won’t understand the ideas of backdrops and set pieces. They like what they’re accustomed to. Too much change and they’ll be happier to attend plays presented in alleys than to travel across the river.”

  “You may be right,” said Charles, still nodding slowly. “However, I balk at the idea of letting the Globe Theatre and an untried troupe have their way with serious plays that carry weight in the mind. Too much leash could lead to…satire.”

  Suzanne wondered why the king didn’t feel that way about the commedia dell’arte, which was easily made political satire by extempore performance, but let her question go and asked another. “Perhaps a patent that will specify only the plays of Shakespeare?” Suzanne watched Charles’s face, and when the king’s expression didn’t change, she added, “And perhaps additionally specify that nothing be changed from the original scripts?”

  Charles raised his eyebrows, apparently liking the idea. “Yes, that might be to the advantage of the crown. A theatre for the commons, sanctioned and controlled so that it might be another voice of the monarchy. The more subtle for not bearing the name of myself or my brother, but under the patronage of a loyal courtier.” He gestured to Daniel. “One who has been loyal for a great long time.”

  “An excellent idea, your majesty,” Daniel said.

  “Yes,” said the king. “I like the idea. There will be a patent allowing the theatre in Southwark to use Shakespeare and the lower forms only, under the patronage and responsibility of the Earl of Throckmorton.”

  Suzanne couldn’t keep a grin from her face. Her dream was going to happen.

  Chapter Eight

  Now that financing and performance permission had been secured, the next step was to secure actors to perform those plays. Though her life with William hadn’t kept her entirely sequestered from the world, she had been fairly sheltered by him. And her life in the care of her father certainly hadn’t prepared her for the task of convincing people to work for her. It had been over seven years since she’d seen any of the old troupe. In fact, the last time she’d seen Horatio was that ugly day when he’d been arrested. In seven years a man could become very lost or even more dead, and she’d never had any knowledge of what had become of him. London was a large place, dotted with backwater neighborhoods where one could disappear accidentally or on purpose and never be found by the authorities.

  But a few enquiries among the musicians along the Bank Side gave her to know Horatio was still alive and plying various trades here and there, none of them involving theatre. Rumor had it he was currently residing somewhere in the vicinity of Newgate, a section of town even Suzanne found menacing for its locals prone to violence. But in spite of the risk, she wasted no time in hiring the chair of Thomas and Samuel to venture across the river in search of him.

  Newgate was an area of London into which spilled former occupants of the notorious prison, some of whom were still under sentence and had bought their way out. Much like the Bank Side, which had its own prison and sinful amusements, the streets were filled with vendors of all kinds: food, magic potions, astrology readings, gambling, stolen goods, and sex. Lots and lots of sex, of all kinds, willing and unwilling, human or beast, adult, child, or deformed, paid by the hour, by the day, or by the month. These streets made Bank Side appear positively God-fearing.

  Suzanne rode through the streets in the chair of Thomas and Samuel, who also served as bodyguards if for no other reason than that they wished her to survive to pay them for their work in carrying her. In her search she bade them pause whenever she saw someone who appeared likely to have information of the neighborhood in general or Horatio in particular.

  Of course none of them knew where he was, because they didn’t
know who she was. Some said they had never heard of Horatio, and one or two may have told the truth. As the day wore on, the search took on the patina of a wild-goose chase. Those who had information sent her hither, where someone else would turn her around and direct her yon. None of it ever panned out, and she entertained the thought they were stationing themselves in her path as a game, to make her dizzy.

  Late in the day she enquired of a street musician playing a squeeze box, who turned out to be a little more forthcoming than the vendors and beggars she’d accosted earlier. When she spotted him and ordered Thomas and Samuel to stop, she leaned out of the chair and greeted the musician with a pleasant smile as she asked for the whereabouts of her old friend Horatio. She’d heard through a current acquaintance that he occupied a vacant building in the vicinity, but “vacant” didn’t exactly narrow the search. She hoped for more specific information.

  The squeeze box player kept playing, a sort of vamp that laid a cover of sound over his words. He glanced around to be sure nobody could hear, though everyone in sight was eavesdropping as best they could. Suzanne slipped a silver penny into the tin cup he wore around his neck on a length of twine, and he told her an address in a close several streets over where Horatio might be found. It might have been a lie, but she politely thanked the man and directed her carriers to take her there in case it wasn’t.

  The place was of Tudor construction, so old and neglected it appeared as deserted as the Globe and in far greater need of repair. Against the protests of Thomas, Suzanne left the chair and asked her carriers to wait. She assured them if she needed them she would scream. Then she crossed the close and stepped through a ragged hole in the wall that had once been a window. Inside the dank, rotting place she found debris everywhere on the ground floor and a ceiling beam with one end lodged in the floor above and the other resting on the floor. She looked up at the hole in the ceiling, through to the room above, and somewhere on the first floor was a flicker of hearth or candlelight reflected from the brick walls. This appeared promising. She peered into the darkness around her and found a spiral stairs that might be sturdy enough to take her upward. She lifted her skirts and picked her way across the treacherous floor to it.

  Quietly as she could manage, she went up the steps, each one so worn at the center, the stone appeared to sag. The light from above flickered and danced, and her eyes adjusted to the dimness. At the top she paused to get her bearings and determine the source of the light.

  A hearth and chimney stood in what was now the center of the room but may once have been a division between rooms where the wall had been knocked down, leaving crumbling brick blackened by centuries of cooking and heating. The hole in the floor she’d seen from below was just beyond it, and the wooden flooring on this side seemed sturdy enough. The stone fireplace slumped like a hunchback, and some of the smoke from its coals threaded its way into the room and up, following a slight draft out through a gap near an outer wall. The coals weren’t bright enough to have made the flickering light, but a candle set on a rickety table to the side made the room jump with shadows. It all smelled of decay, scantily laced with the odor of burnt meat and stale beer.

  A bed stood to the side, aslant to everything else, its curtains thick with dust though the bedclothes were relatively clean and recently used. Hung from hooks about the bed and from the beams above were a confusion of clothing and other odds and ends, which Suzanne recognized as costumes and properties for the stage. Frayed brocade and velvet in faded colors that had once been rich and bright hung aside yellows and grays meant to represent cloth of silver and gold. Everywhere hung wooden practice swords and daggers adorned with chunks of stained glass to represent jewels. Old feathers and decrepit furs shed bits here and there that floated in the air each time they were disturbed. A fairly new reed mat lay between the bed and the hearth, and on it stood a table and chair. On the table were a platter containing the remains of a roast poultry of some sort, a half-empty bottle of wine, a plate of food and wooden spoon, and a large pewter tankard.

  Horatio sat in the chair next to the table, his dagger in his fist, peering across the room at the shadows where she stood. “Who goeth there?” He squinted as if he couldn’t see very well.

  “Horatio, ’tis I, Suzanne Thornton.”

  He squinted harder. “Suzanne? Gay Suzanne?” He laid his dagger on the table. “Little Suzanne? My lovely Suzanne?”

  “Yes, my friend. How have you been these years past?”

  Horatio rose from the chair. He was a few years older now, but without a wig he’d always had a smooth head free of hair, and to her he looked the same as he ever had. His large frame, broad at shoulder and thick about the middle but narrow at the waist and dwindling to spindly legs, towered over the table, and he hunched over to peer at Suzanne. “How now, my niece? How farest thee these past many years?” His voice was hesitant, as if he weren’t entirely certain he wasn’t hallucinating her.

  “I’ve done well, Horatio.”

  “And thy son? Has Piers grown well?”

  That he remembered Piers at all touched her. “He has, truly. He’s a fine young man and about to launch into a venture I’m certain would interest you.”

  “Come!” Horatio fairly shouted, his actor’s voice booming and echoing in the large and mostly empty space. He threw his arms wide and stepped aside to indicate she should sit in his only chair. “Come! Sit! Tell me of thine adventures out in the world!” Horatio had an odd habit of dropping in and out of archaic Elizabethan language, depending on his mood. Sometimes he quoted his favorite plays, other times he just peppered his speech with “thee” and “thou” because it amused him to mock the stuffy Puritans. He was a staunch Catholic and wore a crucifix under his shirt at all times, and didn’t think highly of Protestantism in general.

  He waited for Suzanne to step over some debris on the floor and take the offered chair, then he picked up his half-eaten plate, and after a couple of turns to see where to put it, he set it on the hearth. “Would you care for some meat? As you see, I’ve still half a hen untouched. And some wine. Would you care for some wine?”

  She sat with her hands folded demurely on her lap. Horatio, in spite of his vocation and circumstance, and in spite of having known her as a prostitute, was something of a prude and appreciated a woman who was not overly casual in her demeanor. The insistence that all women function as either Madonna or whore seemed bred into all men, and she knew when and which to evoke. “Yes, Horatio. I’d love some.”

  The big man took another pewter tankard from a box containing several of them along with a number of wooden cups and wooden candlesticks that had been painted gray to appear pewter. All stage properties. Horatio blew into the tankard to clean it of dust, wiped it with his shirt, then poured some wine from the bottle on the table.

  “So, Horatio, I’m curious how you escaped the Roundheads when last I saw you.”

  He laughed and handed her the tankard. She took a sip, but though the wine was palatable, she didn’t care to throw it back too quickly. She liked to keep a clear head when out in the town, even with someone she trusted as she trusted Horatio. He said, a laugh in his voice as he recalled that day, “I was caught, dear Suzanne. The soldiers caught me and bound me in chains, but I never was incarcerated.”

  “No prison for you?”

  He shook his head. “’Twas simple enough. I merely paid a fine on the spot, and was released on the promise that I would never, ever break the law again.”

  “Which, of course, you’d broken the law by paying the bribe.”

  Horatio shrugged. “One does what is necessary to get by. I had the means, and they had the key to my shackles. It was an equitable exchange, much as it went against the ideals of the Lord Protector, who was a usurper in any case and his ideals should never have carried the weight of law.” He took a deep drink of his own tankard, and added, “I daresay Cromwell never knew of the bribe and was therefore never distressed by it.”

  She nodded. In general, th
ose who made the laws never seemed to be the least aware of those expected to abide by them, and neither did the lawmakers ever seem to abide by those laws themselves. One might think Parliament was nothing more than a recreational pastime for rich men with nothing more interesting to do than argue with each other. “And what have you done with yourself since then? Did you reassemble your troupe?”

  “I’m afraid I could not. I tried to find the scattered actors, and found a very few. Some had been arrested, some left town or, as thou didst, simply disappeared. Our stage was confiscated, and so was every costume and property, along with the wagon and horses. I hadn’t the money to keep myself walking the streets every day, and even less to replace all we’d lost. I was forced to find other means of support.”

  “Honest work?”

  “Some of it.”

  “Bravo, Horatio. That, at least, is something.”

  “I’m telling you, it was not easy. I carried a sedan chair for a time, but had little luck being paid at the end of the day by the owner of the chair. So I began keeping back a portion of my fares, until my employer noticed the shortage and sent me on my way. He shouldn’t have taken exception. I only held back what was due me, making up for what I knew from experience would not be paid to me.”

  “And what then after the sedan chairs?”

  “I sold meat pies. Of a morning I bought a boxful of them from the vendor just down there on the corner.” He gestured with his tankard in the general direction of a shop Suzanne had seen on her way there. “But at the end of the day I always had at least half my pies left over. I ate them, of course, but that brought me little cash. I finally deduced that people prefer to buy their food from children and old women, and that a large, loud man such as myself is not considered a suitable source of meat pies.” He shrugged. “So I needed to find something else for cash. Odd jobs, errands, digging holes or filling them in…I worked at whatever I could find that would pay me.”