Ophelia

by Jackie French

  Gerda looked at me. She was no fool. ‘Madam, you know I would give my life for you.’

  ‘But I want you to keep it.’ I kissed her cheek. ‘Leave me now.’

  I thought she might argue, but after another serious look at me, she bobbed a curtsey, and shut the door behind her as she left the room.

  I bent and stripped off the stockings she had put on me. I stuffed one with Laertes’s old shirt, the other with the breeches I sometimes wore at night. I added men’s shoes. They were bulky, but with a lot of shoving I got them in. I tied the stockings about my waist, under the wide skirt, then jumped up and down to see if they fell off. They didn’t.

  Now for the flowers, my final weapon. Faded flowers, from the vases. I pulled my hair loose from Gerda’s careful plait and poked the flowers in hither and thither, knotting my hair in places to hold them. Dead flowers for a poor mad girl.

  Sauce for the gander can be sauce for the goose. If Hamlet could play mad, then I could too.

  Chapter 19

  I couldn’t leave by the front door. Not like this. Some kind soul in the marketplace would bring me back. A palace guard might be watching the doors to make sure I did not leave the house.

  I climbed up to the second floor and looked at the door to the palace. Would it be bolted? Or would there be a guard waiting on the other side?

  I took a deep breath. If there was no guard, I would leave aside these dreams of persecution and take up my books again. If there was no guard, I was safe.

  I reached forward with one hand and swung the door open.

  ‘My lady?’ The guard stared at me, startled. His sword stayed at his side, but it was there, as was he, standing where no guard or sword had been before. ‘My Lady Ophelia, I am afraid I have orders not to let you pass.’

  I smiled. I picked a dead flower from my hair. I offered it to him.

  The guard stared at it. He could have coped with a sword, even a kitchen knife, but he had no idea what to do with a flower.

  ‘Pray take it.’ I made my voice light, a child’s voice, sweet and almost singing. ‘There must be flowers for his grave, you see. Flowers for my head.’

  The guard took the faded flower helplessly, but he did not move aside.

  I needed to get into the palace now. My plan must be carried out in daylight. I could not risk the night. I slid down the wall till I rested on the stone floor, sitting in a froth of black silk skirts. Using the only other weapon in my quiver, I raised my voice and sang.

  ‘And will he not come again?’ My voice wavered. ‘No, no, he is dead. Go to thy deathbed. He will never come again.’

  Footsteps. I forced myself to look at the blank wall, not at whoever came.

  ‘Lady Ophelia?’

  It was Horatio, Hamlet’s friend. I almost trusted him. But if Hamlet had trusted him, why wasn’t Horatio sailing to England with him? Every face at court might be an enemy now.

  I lifted my head, but did not meet his eyes. ‘He is dead and gone, lady,’ I sang. ‘He is dead and gone …’

  ‘Lady Ophelia! My lady, look at me!’

  I shook my head. ‘I must tell the queen,’ I said in my child’s voice. ‘Tell her he is dead, flowers for his grave there be, flowers for my head.’ I looked at Horatio, my eyes wide. ‘My father is dead. I must tell the queen my father is dead. For he is dead and gone,’ I sang again.

  ‘For the sake of all that is pitiful. Here, let me help you up, my lady.’

  Horatio’s hands were gentle on mine. I hated to trick a man who seemed so kind, but what honesty was there here at court?

  ‘I will try to persuade the queen to see you,’ Horatio said gently. ‘Lady Ophelia, I will call the maids to tend you.’

  ‘Let in the maids,’ I sang. ‘Then out a maid, never departed more …’

  ‘Ahoy!’ Horatio called. ‘Tend us here!’

  A footman peered at us, replaced quickly by some of the serving maids. Horatio beckoned them to take my arms as I flopped against his side. He left, and I began to sing again, softly, hoping he would come back soon. I had too little experience of madness to play this part for long.

  At last more footsteps, then Horatio’s gentle voice again. ‘My lady, I have persuaded the queen to see you. Come, my lady.’

  He took my arm, and one of the maids took the other. Between them they led me down the corridor, up the stairs and along another passage. I leaned my head this way and that, muttering and singing.

  The doors to the throne room were already open. I glanced sideways. The queen sat on her throne, but the king’s throne was empty. Lady Hilda, Lady Anna and Lady Annika sat on their stools. Lady Annika seemed to be asleep as usual. The other two were busy with their needles.

  Horatio let go of my hand, and bowed.

  I ran forward before he could speak. ‘Where is the beauteous Majesty of Denmark?’

  The queen stared at me uncomfortably. ‘How now, Ophelia?’

  I twirled as if I danced in the snow, holding out my skirts. ‘How should I your true love know, From another one?’ I sang. ‘By his cockle hat and staff, And his sandal shoon.’

  Lady Annika’s eyes opened, but she said nothing. The other ladies lifted their eyes from their sewing, then carefully looked back down.

  ‘Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song?’ There was true concern in the queen’s voice.

  She believes I am mad, I thought. It’s working!

  ‘Say you?’ I said, keeping my voice childlike. ‘Nay, pray you, listen.’ I began to sing again. ‘He is dead and gone, lady, He is dead and gone; At his head a grass-green turf, At his heels a stone.’

  The queen rose to her feet. ‘Nay, but Ophelia —’

  ‘White his shroud as the mountain snow …’

  I stopped as King Claudius strode into the room. The queen waited for him to step up onto the dais next to her.

  ‘Alas, look here, my lord!’ she said.

  It took all the art I had to meet the king’s eyes, to smile at him with the sweetness and innocence of a rice pudding.

  ‘Larded with sweet flowers,’ I sang to him. ‘Which bewept to the grave did go, With true-love showers.’

  Claudius looked at me warily. ‘How are you, pretty lady?’

  ‘Well, God give you what you deserve!’ I told him earnestly. I leaned closer, and whispered as if it were a secret: ‘They say the owl was a baker’s daughter.’ I stood straight again and picked a flower from my hair. I held it out to him. ‘Lord, we know what we are, but know not what we may be. God be at your table!’

  I could see the relief run across the king’s face; it could almost have made a puddle at his feet. He took my poor dead flower automatically, rubbing it between his fingers.

  ‘She is talking about her father,’ he said.

  I nodded stupidly. ‘Pray you, let’s have no words of this; but when they ask you what it means, say you this.’ I began a song I had heard our laundress sing, careful to make it sound as if I did not know what the words meant:

  ‘Tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s day, All in the morning betime,

  And I a maid at your window,

  To be your Valentine.

  Then up he rose and donned his clothes

  And opened the chamber door,

  Let in the maid …’

  I lowered my eyes, let anguish slip like a breeze across my face and then be gone.

  ‘… that out a maid,

  Never departed more.’

  ‘Pretty Ophelia!’ The king almost sounded sorry for me. A girl abandoned by her lover, with no thought in her mind but how she had been despoiled. Perhaps he did feel pity. If a man might smile and be a villain, could a villain feel pity too?

  ‘Indeed, I’ll get to the end soon!’ I said, and sang the second verse.

  ‘By Jesus and by Saint Charity,

  Alack, and fie for shame!

  Young men will do it if they get a chance;

  By Cock, they are to blame.

  Said she, “Before you got me into
bed, You promised me to wed.”

  He answers,

  “So would I have done, by yonder sun,

  If you hadn’t come to bed.”’

  It was as open a proclamation as if I had yelled it in the marketplace. Prince Hamlet has taken my virtue. He has killed my father, and then abandoned me. Not even the king could think I was a dangerous ally of his nephew now, nor fit to be a rebel with my brother.

  Lady Anna and Lady Hilda looked carefully at their sewing. Gentlewomen did not speak of such things. Not unless they were mad indeed. I saw that Lady Annika’s eyes were closed again.

  ‘How long has she been like this?’ demanded the king.

  ‘I hope all will be well,’ I said in my little girl voice. ‘We must be patient; but I cannot help weeping when I think of him lying in the cold ground. My brother shall hear of this; and so I thank you for your good advice. Come, my coach! Good night, ladies. Good night, sweet ladies. Good night, good night.’

  I twirled, my black skirt spinning out, once, twice, three times, then danced out of the throne room. I danced along the corridor, my hand out as if held by an invisible lover. I did not dare to look back to see if I was being watched.

  I heard Horatio say something. Was he going to try to catch me? The queen’s voice called him back. No, she would not want a mad girl kicking and screaming in the palace, shrieking out how Prince Hamlet had taken advantage of her, then killed her father. Best to let me leave the palace, go back to the seclusion of my house. Where else would she think I might go?

  No other hand stopped me. It is bad luck to touch the mad. Servants hung back. The porter crossed himself and murmured a prayer, then hurried to open the palace door for me. I smiled at him as I danced down the palace stairs, and offered him a flower, dead and faded from my hair.

  The palace was behind me now. I could hear muttering. Do not look back, I thought. Do not look back.

  Through the palace courtyard, out into the marketplace. I turned to take the path towards the king’s forest.

  ‘Laertes for king! King Laertes! To death with Claudius the traitor! Laertes for king!’ The cries still came from the far side of the marketplace.

  I dared not hesitate. I did not want those who followed me to think I’d heard them. I twirled, still singing. People backed away from me and stared. Some muttered. Others laughed. I tried to look as if I heard nothing but my song.

  ‘But he is gone, lady, but he is gone …’

  Vaguely I was aware of eyes watching from the palace windows, voices shouting. But the rabble made too much noise to hear what they were saying.

  ‘They bore him barefaced on the bier,’ I sang. ‘Hey, non nonny, nonny, hey nonny. And in his grave rained many a tear.’

  I ran up to a lavender-seller. She shrank away. ‘Fare you well, my dove!’ I called to her.

  I skipped over to the firewood-seller. ‘You must sing, A-down a-down, and you, Call him a-down-a. Oh, how the wheel becomes it!’ I whispered at him. I sang again: ‘It is the false steward that stole his master’s daughter.’

  The man laughed nervously.

  I twirled, feeling my skirts rush around me. The crowd drew back. I took a daisy from my hair and held it out. No one took it.

  ‘There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember.’ I took another flower, looked at it sadly, then tossed it to a stout lady carrying a piglet. ‘And there is pansies, that’s for thoughts. There’s fennel for you, and columbines.’

  The piglet wriggled; it, at least, wanted the flowers. The woman held it firmly.

  The marketplace was quiet now, all eyes on me. This is how you hide when all can see you, I thought. This is how a girl escapes her prison.

  ‘There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me. We may call it herb of grace on Sundays. Oh, you must wear your rue with a difference! There’s a daisy.’

  I looked around the silent crowd. No obscene songs now. I wanted them to remember my words. If my brother did come to claim the throne, I wanted these people to remember how they had prospered with the guidance of my father.

  ‘I would give you violets,’ I said clearly, ‘but they withered all when my father died. They say he made a good end.’

  Men shuffled uncomfortably, remembering just what that end had been. Women whispered, pity in their eyes.

  ‘Bonny sweet Robin is all my joy,’ I whispered, almost to myself. I sang again:

  ‘And will he not come again?

  And will he not come again?

  No, no, he is dead.

  Go to thy deathbed.

  He never will come again.

  His beard was as white as snow

  All flaxen was his poll.

  He is gone, he is gone,

  And we cast away moan.’

  I slowly turned in circles, the last of my flowers gone. ‘God have mercy on his soul. And on all Christian souls, I pray God. God be with you.’

  I danced again, my hands holding up my skirts. I danced out through the marketplace and down the road. I danced and whirled past farmhouses. I danced into the forest, not twirling now as it made me giddy. I danced under the trees, danced like the leaf shadows, like the sunbeams, danced towards the glade.

  And there, at the far end of the glade, gleamed the stream.

  Chapter 20

  I climbed the willow tree next to the stream, to wait till the watchers caught up with me. I knew they would come; sent by the king out of wariness, from Horatio or the queen out of pity. It mattered not except that they came.

  I heard their voices, calling me. Two maids. Good. I had been afraid they might send a footman, who could swim.

  I waited till I saw them run under the pine tree that I had stood beneath in the snow with Hamlet.

  Then I fell.

  The water grasped me, like a friend, eager to embrace me. I expected to sink at once, but the air trapped beneath my skirts held me up. I felt myself float along the stream. It was almost pleasant, giving myself up to the water. Was this what Hamlet had felt when he dreamed of ending his existence? That he might just float, and watch the sky?

  ‘Lady all a’dillo,’ I sang. ‘Lay me down and cry …’

  ‘Lady Ophelia!’

  One of the maids stretched out her hand to save me. I could have grabbed it if I tried. Instead, I let the current carry me away, around the bend of the stream, where its banks were hidden by willow trees.

  The water was cold. The women wailed upon the bank.

  I was sinking now. The clothes that had borne me up dragged me down. Down, down … my shoulders under the water, then my neck. I held my face up to the air, breathed one last deep sweet sigh.

  The water closed above me.

  I forced my eyes open. Light shone above me: a green world, faintly bubbled. A brown world below. But not too far below.

  I knew this stream, knew how deep it was. I felt my feet touch the bottom.

  I needed to get out of my skirts. My lungs screamed as I struggled to free my legs. The skirts floated up, into that world of light and air.

  Now for the sleeves, the shift. They wouldn’t float. Let them be found on the river bed, muddy, sodden.

  Let me be free.

  I did not know how to swim. Who would teach a girl? But I had thought that if a person could walk along the land, she must be able to walk the same land underwater, as long as she could hold her breath. I hadn’t realised it would be so hard, pushing against the stream that wanted to keep me down. The green above began to blacken. My lungs had no more air. I must go up. Go up or die!

  I pushed my feet against the mud of the river bottom. My body speared up, towards the light. Air! I gulped it, like a child guzzling new milk. Sweet air, that smelled of trees and flowers and light.

  I gulped three times more before I could look around.

  The glade was gone. The women too. I heard them still wailing in the distance. Blessed willow trees that shielded me from their sight.

  I was wet and friendless. But I was fre
e.

  Chapter 21

  Free and cold. It took almost all my strength to wade to the bank, to clamber up. I lay there gasping, then forced myself to stand. The women had gone. I heard their wailing grow fainter and fainter still. But they would be back, with others to search the stream for my body. I must vanish before they came.

  For the first time I was glad to be a girl. What else would a girl who had lost her virtue do but drown herself? It would not occur to anyone that she might survive a ducking in the stream. Especially not a mad girl. ‘Pretty lady’ King Claudius had called me, as if I were nothing but a flower.

  An almost frozen flower now. My teeth chattered. My limbs were so numb I could hardly feel the grass, nor the nettles that stung my legs. I wanted to sink to the ground. But there was no time.

  My body had never been bare to the air before. Sunlight prickled my skin. Doubt that the sun doth move, I thought. Dear friend, the sun.

  I fumbled at the stockings tied around my waist. I managed to get the knots loose. The shirt was cold as well as wet. It clung to me. So did the breeches. Even with the stockings pulled up and gartered, the shoes on, my hair gathered up under the hat, I still looked … wet. Conspicuous.

  I could pass for a young man at night. But in daylight? With the wet shirt clinging to my bosom? Summer’s darkness is too brief to hide for long. I must get away; let my clothes dry.

  I ran into the forest as new voices yelled from the road. They would be here soon, with poles to find my body in the water and a door to bear me back on. They would not know how far the stream had carried me. I would have at least a week before anyone wondered why they couldn’t find my body to settle in its grave.

  Would they be generous and bury me in the churchyard? Or outside it, like the blacksmith’s poor ruined daughter who had killed herself. Did a death caused by madness count as suicide?

  But there wouldn’t be a grave, I realised, as I found a tree the right shape and size, and grabbed its lowest branch to haul myself up. There was no body to put in it.

  It was curiously peaceful up my tree. I tried to keep my mind off the cold and nettle stings, and listened to the yells of the searchers: a cry of triumph as someone found my clothes; mutters of disappointment when they found nothing else.