by Carla Coupe
“Look at my present, grandfather,” cries the little girl, proudly showing her work-box. “Can you guess who made it?”
“You are a good fellow, Julius Caesar!” exclaims Mr Wray, guessing directly. “Good morning; shake hands.”—(Then, in a lower voice to Annie)—“Has he broken anything in particular, since he’s been up?” “No!” “I’m very glad to hear it. Julius Caesar, let me offer you a pinch of snuff,” and here he pulled out his box quite in the Kemble style. He had his natural manner, and his Kemble manner. The first only appeared when anything greatly pleased or affected him—the second was for those ordinary occasions when he had time to remember that he was a teacher of elocution, and a pupil of the English Roscius.
“Thank ye, kindly, sir,” said the gratified carpenter, cautiously advancing his huge finger and thumb towards the offered box.
“Stop!” cried old Wray, suddenly withdrawing it. He always lectured to Julius Caesar on elocution when he had nobody else to teach, just to keep his hand in. “Stop! that won’t do. In the first place, “Thank ye, kindly, sir,” though good-humoured, is grossly inelegant. “Sir, I am obliged to you,” is the proper phrase—mind you sound the i in obliged—never say obleeged, as some people do; and remember, what I am now telling you, Mr Kemble once said to the Prince Regent! The next hint I have to give is this—never take your pinch of snuff with your right hand finger and thumb; it should be always the left. Perhaps you would like to know why?”
“Yes, please, sir,” says the admiring disciple, very humbly.
“ ‘Yes, if you please, sir,’ would have been better; but let that pass as a small error.—And now, I will tell you why, in an anecdote. Matthews was one day mimicking Mr Kemble to his face, in Penruddock—the great scene where he stops to take a pinch of snuff. ‘Very good, Matthews; very like me,’ says Mr Kemble complacently, when Matthews had done; ‘but you have made one great mistake.’ ‘What’s that?’ cries Matthews sharply. ‘My friend, you have not represented me taking snuff like a gentleman: now, I always do. You took your pinch, in imitating my Penruddock, with your right hand: I use my left—a gentleman invariably does, because then he has his right hand always clean from tobacco to give to his friend!’—There! remember that: and now you may take your pinch.”
Mr Wray next turned round to speak to Annie; but his voice was instantly drowned in a perfect explosion of sneezes, absolutely screamed out by the unhappy “Julius Caesar,” whose nasal nerves were convulsed by the snuff. Mentally determining never to offer his box to his faithful follower again, old Reuben gave up making his proposed remark, until they were all quietly seated round the breakfast table: then, he returned to the charge with renewed determination.
“Annie, my dear,” said he, “you and I have read a great deal together of our divine Shakespeare, as Mr Kemble always called him. You are my regular pupil, you know, and ought to be able to quote by this time almost as much as I can. I am going to try you with something quite new—suppose I had offered you the pinch of snuff (Mr Julius Caesar shall never have another, I can promise him); what would you have said from Shakespeare applicable to that? Just think now!”
“But, grandfather, snuff wasn’t invented in Shakespeare’s time—was it?” said Annie.
“That’s of no consequence,” retorted the old man: “Shakespeare was for all time: you can quote him for everything in the world, as long as the world lasts. Can’t you quote him for snuff? I can. Now, listen. You say to me, “I offer you a pinch of snuff?” I answer from Cymbeline (Act iv, scene 2): “Pisanio! I’ll now taste of thy drug.” There! won’t that do? What’s snuff but a drug for the nose? It just fits—everything of the divine Shakespeare’s does, when you know him by heart, as I do—eh, little Annie? And now give me some more sugar; I wish it was lump for your sake, dear; but I’m afraid we can only afford moist. Anybody called about the advertisement? A new pupil this morning—eh?”
No! no pupils at all: not a man, woman, or child in the town, to teach elocution to yet! Mr Wray was not at all despondent about this; he had made up his mind that a pupil must come in the course of the day; and that was enough for him. His little quibbling from Shakespeare about the snuff had put him in the best of good humours. He went on making quotations, talking elocution, and eating bread and butter, as brisk and happy, as if all Tidbury had combined to form one mighty class for him, and resolved to pay ready money for every lesson.
But after breakfast, when the things were taken away, the old man seemed suddenly to recollect something which changed his manner altogether. He grew first embarrassed; then silent; then pulled out his Shakespeare, and began to read with ostentatious assiduity, as if he were especially desirous that nobody should speak to him.
At the same time, a close observer might have detected Mr “Julius Caesar” making various uncouth signs and grimaces to Annie, which the little girl apparently understood, but did not know how to answer. At last, with an effort, as if she were summoning extraordinary resolution, she said:—
“Grandfather—you have not forgotten your promise?”
No answer from Mr Wray. Probably, he was too much absorbed over Shakespeare to hear.
“Grandfather,” repeated Annie, in a louder tone; “you promised to explain a certain mystery to us, on my birthday.”
Mr Wray was obliged to hear this time. He looked up with a very perplexed face.
“Yes, dear,” said he; “I did promise; but I almost wish I had not. It’s rather a dangerous mystery to explain, little Annie, I can tell you! Why should you be so very curious to know about it?”
“I’m sure, grandfather,” pleaded Annie, “you can’t say I am over-curious, or Julius Caesar either, in wanting to know it. Just recollect—we had been only three days at Stratford-upon-Avon, when you came in, looking so dreadfully frightened, and said we must go away directly. And you made us pack up; and we all went off in a hurry, more like prisoners escaping, than honest people.”
“We did!” groaned old Reuben, beginning to look like a culprit already.
“Well,” continued Annie; “and you wouldn’t tell us a word of what it was all for, beg as hard as we might. And then, when we asked why you never let that old cash box (which I used to keep my odds and ends in) out of your own hands, after we left Stratford—you wouldn’t tell us that, either, and ordered us never to mention the thing again. It was only in one of your particular good humours, that I just got you to promise you would tell us all about it on my next birthday—to celebrate the day, you said. I’m sure we are to be trusted with any secrets; and I don’t think it’s being very curious to want to know this.”
“Very well,” said Mr Wray, rising, with a sort of desperate calmness; “I’ve promised, and, come what may, I’ll keep my promise. Wait here; I’ll be back directly.” And he left the room, in a great hurry.
He returned immediately, with the cash box. A very battered, shabby affair, to make such a mystery about! thought Annie, as he put the box on the table, and solemnly laid his hands across it.
“Now, then,” said old Wray, in his deepest tragedy tones, and with very serious looks; “Promise me, on your word of honour—both of you—that you’ll never say a word of what I’m going to tell, to anybody, on any account whatever—I don’t care what happens—on any account whatever!”
Annie and her lover gave their promises directly, and very seriously. They were getting a little agitated by all these elaborate preparations for the coming disclosure.
“Shut the door!” said Mr Wray, in a stage whisper. “Now sit close and listen; I’m ready to explain the mystery.”
IV
“I suppose,” said old Reuben, “you have neither of you forgotten that, on the second day of our visit to Stratford, I went out in the afternoon to dine with an intimate friend of mine, whom I’d known from a boy, and who lived at some little distance from the town—”
“Forget that!” cried Annie! “I do
n’t think we ever shall—I was frightened about you, all the time you were gone.”
“Frightened about what?” asked Mr Wray sharply. “Do you mean to tell me, Annie, you suspected—”
“I don’t know what I suspected, grandfather; but I thought your going away by yourself, to sleep at your friend’s house (as you told us), and not to come back till the next morning, something very extraordinary. It was the first time we had ever slept under different roofs—only think of that!”
“I’m ashamed to say, my dear”—rejoined Mr Wray, suddenly beginning to look and speak very uneasily—“that I turned hypocrite, and something worse, too, on that occasion. I deceived you. I had no friend to go and dine with; and I didn’t pass that night in any house at all.”
“Grandfather!”—cried Annie, jumping up in a fright—“What can you mean!”
“Beg pardon, sir,” added “Julius Caesar,” turning very red, and slowly clenching both his enormous fists as he spoke—“Beg pardon; but if you was put upon, or made fun of by any chaps that night, I wish you’d just please tell me where I could find ’em.”
“Nobody ill-used me,” said the old man, in steady, and even solemn tones. “I passed that night by the grave of William Shakespeare, in Stratford-upon-Avon Church!”
Annie sank back into her seat, and lost all her pretty complexion in a moment. The worthy carpenter gave such a start, that he broke the back rail of his chair. It was a variation on his usual performances of this sort, which were generally confined to cups, saucers, and wine-glasses.
Mr Wray took no notice of the accident. This was of itself enough to show that he was strongly agitated by something. After a momentary silence, he spoke again, completely forgetting the Kemble manner and the Kemble elocution, as he went on.
“I say again, I passed all that night in Stratford Church; and you shall know for what. You went with me, Annie, in the morning—it was Tuesday: yes, Tuesday morning—to see Shakespeare’s bust in the church. You looked at it, like other people, just as a curiosity—I looked at it, as the greatest treasure in the world; the only true likeness of Shakespeare! It’s been done from a mask, taken from his own face, after death—I know it: I don’t care what people say, I know it. Well, when we went home, I felt as if I’d seen Shakespeare himself, risen from the dead! Strangers would laugh if I told them so; but it’s true—I did feel it. And this thought came across me, quick, like the shooting of a sudden pain:— I must make that face of Shakespeare mine; my possession, my companion, my great treasure that no money can pay for! And I’ve got it!—Here!—the only cast in the world from the Stratford bust is locked up in this old cash box!”
He paused a moment. Astonishment kept both his auditors silent.
“You both know,” he continued, “that I was bred apprentice to a statuary. Among other things, he taught me to take casts: it was part of our business—the easiest part. I knew I could take a mould off the Stratford bust, if I had the courage; and the courage came to me: on the Tuesday, it came. I went and bought some plaster, some soft soap, and a quart basin—those were my materials—and tied them up together in an old canvas bag. Water was all I wanted besides; and that I saw in the church vestry, in the morning—a jug of it, left I suppose since Sunday, where it had been put for the clergyman’s use. I could carry my bag under my cloak quite comfortably, you understand. The only thing that troubled me now was how to get into the church again, without being suspected. While I was thinking, I passed the inn door. Some people were on the steps, talking to some other people in the street: they were making an appointment to go all together, and see Shakespeare’s bust and grave that very afternoon. This was enough for me: I determined to go into the church with them.”
“What! and stop there all night, grandfather?”
“And stop there all night, Annie. Taking a mould, you know, is not a very long business; but I wanted to take mine unobserved; and the early morning, before anybody was up, was the only time to do that safely in the church. Besides, I wanted plenty of leisure, because I wasn’t sure I should succeed at first, after being out of practice so long in making casts. But you shall hear how I did it, when the time comes. Well, I made up the story about dining and sleeping at my friend’s, because I didn’t know what might happen, and because—because, in short, I didn’t like to tell you what I was going to do. So I went out secretly, near the church; and waited for the party coming. They were late—late in the afternoon, before they came. We all went in together; I with my bag, you know, hid under my cloak. The man who showed us over the church in the morning, luckily for me, wasn’t there: an old woman took his duty for him in the afternoon. I waited till the visitors were all congregated round Shakespeare’s grave, bothering the poor woman with foolish questions about him. I knew that was my time, and slipped off into the vestry, and opened the cupboard, and hid myself among the surplices, as quiet as a mouse. After a while, I heard one of the strangers in the church (they were very rude, boisterous people) asking the other, what had become of the ‘old fogey with the cloak?’ and the other answered that he must have gone out, like a wise man, and that they had all better go after him, for it was precious cold and dull in the church. They went away: I heard the doors shut, and knew I was locked in for the night.”
“All night in a church! Oh, grandfather, how frightened you must have been!”
“Well, Annie, I was a little frightened; but more at what I was going to do, than at being alone in the church. Let me get on with my story though. Being autumn weather, it grew too dark after the people went, for me to do anything then; so I screwed my courage up to wait for the morning. The first thing I did was to go and look quietly, all by myself, at the bust; and I made up my mind that I could take the mould in about three or four pieces. All I wanted was what they call a mask: that means just a forehead and face, without the head. It’s an easy thing to take a mask off a bust—I knew I could do it; but, somehow, I didn’t feel quite comfortable just then. The bust began to look very awful to me, in the fading light, all alone in the church. It was almost like looking at the ghost of Shakespeare, in that place, and at that time. If the door hadn’t been locked, I think I should have run out of the church; but I couldn’t do that; so I knelt down and kissed the grave-stone—a curious fancy coming over me as I did so, that it was like wishing Shakespeare good night—and then I groped my way back to the vestry. When I got in, and had shut the door between me and the grave, I grew bolder, I can tell you; and thought to myself—I’m doing no harm; I’m not going to hurt the bust; I only want what an Englishman and an old actor may fairly covet, a copy of Shakespeare’s face; why shouldn’t I eat my bit of supper here, and say my prayers as usual, and get my nap into the bargain, if I can? Just as I thought that—bang went the clock, striking the hour! It almost knocked me down, bold as I felt the moment before. I was obliged to wait till it was all still again, before I could pull the bit of bread and cheese I had got with me out of my pocket. And when I did, I couldn’t eat: I was too impatient for the morning; so I sat down in the parson’s armchair; and tried, next, whether I could sleep at all.”
“And could you, grandfather?”
“No—I couldn’t sleep either; at least, not at first. It was quite dark now; and I began to feel cold and awe-struck again. The only thing I could think of to keep up my spirits at all, was first saying my prayers, and then quoting Shakespeare. I went at it, Annie, like a dragon; play after play—except the tragedies; I was afraid of them, in a church at night, all by myself. Well: I think I had got half through the Midsummer Night’s Dream, whispering over bit after bit of it; when I whispered myself into a doze. Then I fell into a queer sleep; and then I had such a dream! I dreamt that the church was full of moonlight—brighter moonlight than ever I saw awake. I walked out of the vestry; and there were the fairies of the Midsummer Night’s Dream—all creatures like sparks of silver light—dancing round the Shakespeare bust! The moment they caught sight of me,
they all called out in their sweet nightingale voices:—‘Come along, Reuben! sly old Reuben! we know what you’re here for, and we don’t mind you a bit! You love Shakespeare, and so do we—dance, Reuben, and be happy! Shakespeare likes an old actor; he was an actor himself—nobody sees us! we’re out for the night! foot it, old Reuben—foot it away!’ And we all danced like mad: now, up in the air; now, down on the pavement; and now, all round the bust five hundred thousand times at least without stopping, till—bang went the clock! and I woke up in the dark, in a cold perspiration.”
“I’m in one too!” gasped “Julius Caesar,” dabbing his brow vehemently with a ragged cotton pocket handkerchief.
“Well, after that dream I fell to reciting again; and got another doze; and had another dream—a terrible one, about ghosts and witches, that I don’t recollect so well as the other. I woke up once more, cold, and in a great fright that I’d slept away all the precious morning daylight. No! all dark still! I went into the church again, and then back to the vestry, not being able to stay there. I suppose I did this a dozen times without knowing why. At last, never going to sleep again, I got somehow through the night—the night that seemed never to be done. Soon after daybreak, I began to walk up and down the church briskly, to get myself warm, keeping at it for a long time. Then, just as I saw through the windows that the sun was rising, I opened my bag at last, and got ready for work. I can tell you my hand trembled and my sight grew dim—I think the tears were in my eyes; but I don’t know why—as I first soaped the bust all over to prevent the plaster I was going to put on it from sticking. Then I mixed up the plaster and water in my quart basin, taking care to leave no lumps, and finding it come as natural to me as if I had only left the statuary’s shop yesterday; then—but it’s no use telling you, little Annie, about what you don’t understand; I’d better say shortly I made the mould, in four pieces, as I thought I should—two for the upper part of the face, and two for the lower. Then, having put on the outer plaster case to hold the mould, I pulled all off clean together, and looked, and knew that I had got a mask of Shakespeare from the Stratford bust!”