The True Prince

by J. B. Cheaney

  “What mean you?” he interrupted. “Bloody brooks of treachery?”

  He squeezed my hand so hard my next line came out as a squeal: “Aye— Heaven defend us!”

  Tewkesbury was almost panting with effort when we came off the stage. He flung aside my hand and approached Master Will to ask why some of the lines had been changed.

  “Changed, my lord?” asked Shakespeare, all innocence.

  Tewkesbury found himself in a delicate situation: what right had he to protest alterations in the play, if he was unwilling to admit his authorship? The Company, meanwhile, pretended to have no idea what he meant by “changed lines,” thus creating all sorts of undercurrents (streams or brooks) behind the stage. But those were soon o'erwhelmed by the very obvious currents in the house.

  By the second act four young gallants were sitting together in the first gallery, across from Essex. They were obviously not his friends, nor Tewkesbury's, for by the third act they were causing enough disturbance to destroy any possible interest in the play. Every time I came on, there were fewer people in the galleries and more hazelnut shells and orange peels on the stage. Directly after Silvia's death scene, Essex departed, too.

  After that, Master Burbage strongly suggested cutting large sections of the remaining text, and Tewkesbury agreed. He kept his head high, like Hotspur going to his doom with “Die all, die merrily” on his lips. Lord Philip at least had the sense to die quietly, wrapping himself in the poisoned cloak with the least possible fuss and cutting down his speech to:

  “O happy garb, that ends my vile disgrace!

  Ye fates—bear me up to a happier place!

  O cloak most black, consume me into dust—

  The pale smoke of honor to the gods I trust.”

  When he fell (with a thump), his tormenters in the first gallery rose and flapped their arms, as though helping to bear him up to that happy place. Behind the stage, the players groaned. While Edmund Shakespeare was making a speech over the fallen Adrian, his brother said to Master Burbage, “You deal with Lord Mustard; I will do what I can to calm yonder beast”—by which he meant the remaining audience. On his way to the stage Master Will bowed politely to the body of Philip Tewkesbury as it went by on a litter. Thus the gentleman did not hear Shakespeare's public apology for his play, because Richard Burbage was at the same moment apologizing to him—a noble effort that summoned all the diplomacy Burbage possessed. Tewkesbury left the Swan with a straight posture and flaming cheeks, while Master Burbage clutched the bag of coins paid to him as Judas might have held his thirty pieces of silver. “If Kit Glover ever shows himself hereabouts again,” he said, “I'll cheerfully kill him.”

  That night I complained to Starling, “I wish you hadn't talked me into sending that message to John Clement. If ever a man deserved to be robbed, Tewkesbury does.”

  “Well, one good thing came of today's performance—it silenced Mistress Critic. She came early and stayed for the whole play, but after the first act I heard not a word from her.”

  “All the rest of our critics were loud enough.”

  “Put it behind you. Part Two will save your reputation.”

  She was very likely right. Boys were already posting playbills throughout London, and a full house, at double admission, would boost our fortunes again. When Thursday arrived, eager play-goers began lining up outside the Swan long before the first trumpet.

  The Company had to borrow a boy from St. Paul's Chapel to play Falstaff's page. The part had been written for Davy, and to see young Lawrence Bates strutting around in a short cape reminded me painfully of a child lying at the bottom of a stone staircase with a broken neck. By now, five days had gone by without event, but I was increasingly on edge, and Lawrence's habit of humming monotonous tunes needled my conscience. Nor could I escape it, for the boy perched on the loft just over the place where Richard Burbage was painting me.

  Burbage was an accomplished painter, and “Rumor, painted with tongues” gave him an opportunity to stretch his skills. I had pictured something like cow tongues hanging all over me—not a pretty sight, but Master Burbage thought tongues of fire: flame-tipped points, layered like feathers. The wardrobe master had made a pair of breeches covered with strips of red, yellow, and orange that would spin out when I whirled upon the stage. The effect was far more pleasing than I could have imagined, though art could not disguise the fact that I was stripped to the waist and perched on a stool next to a window, while a man in a smock applied paint to my chest in preparation for me to go out upon a stage and expose myself to three thousand pairs of eyes. This was one of those times when the player's life felt every bit as unnatural and devilish as my sister had said.

  “By my faith,” Master Burbage complained, “it takes twice the quantity of paint to cover thy goose bumps. Hold still.”

  I made an effort to hold still, as my breath streamed out upon the cold October breeze and Master Bates overhead hummed his song without end. Then Gregory appeared, in scarlet taffeta. He was playing a whore named Doll Tearsheet, but at the moment his face under the paint was so pale that he resembled a real doll. “Please, sir,” he said breathlessly, “Master Heminges would speak with you.”

  Burbage frowned. “Can it not wait? I'm almost done.”

  “No, sir. We have a visitor—a constable, sir.”

  “What now?” The painter threw down his brush, leaving a bright red spatter on the floor. When he was gone, Gregory leaned forward and whispered to me. “He's looking for Kit Glover.”

  “Who is?”

  “The constable. He wanted to ask me about that time last June, when Kit tried to kill the Welsh Boy. He asked me every detail.”

  If I was cold before, my veins now turned to ice. “Why?”

  “Because Davy is dead! Murdered, most like! They found his body at the bottom of some stairs. They think Kit did it. But he can't be found.”

  Burbage and Heminges sent the constable packing with their assurance that none of us had any notion of Kit's whereabouts, but all the players were shaken. Bad enough that Ben Jonson should now be in prison for manslaughter, but this was cold- blooded murder, with a former colleague as chief suspect. Robin was so undone he had to be fortified with doses of cider and Esperance before he could even think about Mistress Quickly.

  But I was worse. I alone knew that the suspect was not guilty.

  “This is a blow to all of us,” Master Condell told me kindly (and much more truly than he knew). “But set it aside as best you can. It falls to your charge to begin what is perhaps the greatest opening we have ever had. Pray put your speech forward with every particle of energy that's in you, and … Richard, what is behind those great staring eyes of yours? Is your part less than perfect?” I managed to indicate that there was no fear for my part. “Very good—but there's no harm in going over it again, eh?”

  Some of the other actors were looking at me curiously. “You will be able to speak, will you not?” Augustine Phillips asked. I nodded and took out the paper that contained my lines, hiding behind it as I gathered my wits. There was no longer a choice of standing apart from Kit's trouble. Kit's trouble had broken loose like a team of horses pelting madly downhill— with me tangled in the traces. I was the only one who could speak for him, and I must speak quickly. Immediately. Rumor's first words rolled out before my eyes: “Open your ears …”

  In those words, I saw a chance. A slim chance, but it was all I had to hope for. God grant that the ears I must open would be present in the house today.

  The third trumpet blew, and Master Will's hands rested lightly on my painted shoulders. “Not yet—let them wait a little longer. Anticipation, you know. Breathe deep. Again. Remember the voice—high and disembodied. One moment. One moment. Now—”

  WHEN LOUD RUMOR SPEAKS

  pen your ears! For which of you will stop the vent of hearing when loud Rumor speaks?”

  The greatest compliment to a player is not applause; it is silence. From the moment I spun out upon the stage, �
��tongues” flying, the house fell into my hands, hushed and spellbound. Partly because I had been entrusted with opening one of the most eagerly awaited plays of the Company's history—a well-trained dog might have led this audience by the hand. But the burning in my heart fired Rumor with uncommon energy, as I whirled “from the Orient to the drooping west” and swept both hands to the west door of the theater.

  “Upon my tongues continual slanders ride, The which in every language I pronounce, Filling the beaks of sparrow and finch with false reports …”

  The line Shakespeare wrote was “Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.” My change altered the rhythm, and Master Will would not be pleased. For the rest of the speech I made my hands talk, sketching “present danger” in the air as I flew across the stage in a fluttering of tongues.

  “Now (pointing west) the posts come tiring on,

  And not a man of them brings other news

  Than they have learned of me. Now from Rumor's tongues

  They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true

  wrongs.”

  The audience held perfectly still as I whirled off, then erupted in applause. “Well spoke, Richard,” remarked John Heminges in passing. Master Shakespeare was adjusting his nightcap before his entrance as the ailing Earl of Northumberland; he lifted a finger and an eyebrow to indicate we must have a serious talk later. “Later” suited me—at the moment I would have been hard pressed to explain my rewriting the text. I only hoped it had done its work.

  In a few moments, still wet from a hasty scrubbing, I slipped out the west door of the tiring room. The autumn breeze gilded my cheek like cold silver. Shivering in my cloak, I looked about but saw only a few beggars waiting patiently for the play to be done so they could work the theater crowd. A Yeoman Guard, in his red and yellow livery and steel helmet, paced slowly in my direction while peeling an orange. I glanced toward the river, where watermen had docked their boats on the Paris Stairs. My chest was tightening with despair when Bartholomew Finch spoke behind me. “Well, what is it?”

  I spun around to face the Yeoman, who had removed his helmet and was fanning himself with it, blowing the lock of red hair that had escaped from his leather hood.

  “Thank God you came!” I gasped in relief.

  “Small wonder, that. You were as broad as Cheapside. From the way you pointed I expected a whole flock of sparrows and finches to join me in my exodus.”

  I was thanking God that he'd come to the theater that day; a dozen reasons might have kept him from it, though he was as eager as anyone to learn what Falstaff was up to. “Why are you dressed so?”

  “I've been enlisted to guard the Lord Chamberlain's son.”

  “Henry Brooke is here?”

  “Aye,” he said patiently, “else I could not be guarding him here. I've been excused to relieve myself, but if you don't get on with it, he'll suspect I've fallen in.”

  “It's about Kit Glover. Do you know he's accused of murder?”

  “Aye,” he said, most carefully.

  “Do you know who brought the accusation?”

  He chewed and swallowed about a quarter of the orange.

  “I did not come out to answer questions. Suppose you tell me somewhat.”

  “All right.” I took a breath, knowing that what I was about to say would make me his ally. “You must call off the constable somehow. Kit didn't do it. I know because I was with him when it happened.”

  His only betrayal of surprise was that the waving helmet came to a halt and his eyes shifted, as though to make sure we were alone. “Speak fast and low.”

  In few words, I told him of my walk to Cheapside with Kit, of Davy's appearance, of the chase he led, and how we found him at the bottom of the stairs.

  Bartlemy nodded. “A vagrant found the body two days later. Witnesses swore they saw a boy in motley being chased by a tall pale fellow they recognized from the stage—just one fellow, so far as I've heard, not two.”

  “There was a constable here earlier, asking questions about Kit's attack on the boy last spring. Is it possible he's being set up?”

  “‘Set up'?” he repeated, with a sly inflection. “By whom?”

  “Well … It's a long tale.”

  “It always is.” He popped the last of the orange into his mouth and spoke around it. “I will talk my way free and meet you directly after the play. Where can we be private?”

  My mind raced over possible places to meet. “I know— under the stage. No one will be there for this performance. If you come around to the back right corner, you may slip under it without being seen. But I can't stay long.”

  “Ten minutes, no more,” said he, replacing his helmet. “And be prepared to tell me all.”

  With that, he turned and strolled back toward the public entrance. Though his last words fell with an ominous ring, he left me in a more settled state, now that I had done something. True, it might turn out to be something I would regret, but at least half the weight was off my shoulders, and I could think about my part as Lady Percy. As I slipped back into the tiring room, Thomas Pope hitched up his stuffed belly and marched upon the stage with little Lawrence Bates in tow. The roar that greeted Sir John Falstaff's first appearance felt as solid as a clap on the back.

  I knew the outcome, but as usual with a new play, the first performance was like seeing it for the first time. And see it I could; my main contribution was already over, and Lady Percy appeared only once. At the end I would help swell the cheering crowds of London, but between times lay a rare stretch of leisure for me to sit at the back of the musicians' gallery and watch the play.

  Part Two begins much like the first. Though crippled by Hotspur's death, the rebellion is not yet put down. The king still frets over his son's wild ways, in spite of Hal's courage and loyalty on Shrewsbury Field. Falstaff has received a reward for “slaying” Hotspur and swaggers about London with his new clothes and his little page, chiseling money out of anyone foolish enough to lend to him.

  He soon runs afoul of the Chief Justice of London, who wants to question him about the robbery on Gad's Hill. To make matters worse, Mistress Quickly has brought suit against him for money he owes. True to form, Sir John not only squirms out of the suit, but also cozens another ten pounds out of the lady. The justice likewise finds himself no match for Falstaff in a battle of wits, and so leaves the knight's correction to God. But he adds a judgment of his own: “Thou art a great fool.” (Boos and hisses followed the worthy gentleman off the stage.)

  Prince Hal, meanwhile, is restless and troubled. The old reputation sheds harder than he thought, and the old ways still appeal to him. He resigns himself to the hope that events will prove him true: “Let the end try the man.” But when Poins suggests another trick to play on Falstaff, the prince goes along with it willingly enough.

  He and Poins disguise themselves as ale servers to eavesdrop on a flirtation between Falstaff and Doll Tearsheet, a lady of very common goods. (Gregory played much of this scene on Thomas Pope's lap and complained of having to pretend to kiss him behind a fan: “It wouldn't be so bad if he didn't eat boiled eels for breakfast.”) An old soldier named Pistol appears, whose heroic poses and bombastic speeches sound like a broad, comic echo of the late Hotspur—and since Will Sly was given this part, the comparison may have been intended.

  But by now it was evident that Part Two had taken a different tone than the first. It lacked a hero: Hotspur was slain, King Henry dying, Falstaff moaning to Doll, “I am old, I am old.”

  “Rouse yourself then, you ton of flesh!” came a cry from the groundlings. As if in reply, Sir John was soon up to his old tricks.

  Commissioned to raise a company of soldiers, he travels through the countryside drafting able-bodied farmhands— who promptly pay him off so they won't have to serve. Those who can't pay are the lame, the halt, and the unemployed; scarecrows so thin “they present no mark to the enemy.” While making his rounds, Sir John stops at the home of a friend from his school days, a
country justice named Shallow. True to his name, this gentleman is a doddering old fool who thinks no deeper than his ale glass and whose favorite subject of conversation is his wild youth: “What days we have seen!”

  “We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow,” Falstaff agrees—secretly plotting to milk this useful friend for every penny.

  Meanwhile, King Henry feels death creeping upon him and fears for the kingdom once it falls into Hal's frivolous hands. While meeting with his advisors, the king falls into a swoon and must be carried to bed. Hal arrives to find his father in such a deep sleep that he appears to be dead. The prince carefully lifts the crown from a nearby pillow and sets it on his own head….

  And for the first time I understood what both parts of this play were about: not loyalty to the crown, or glory in battle, or outwitting the law—it is about how a prince becomes a king, or how a boy becomes a man. And the hero of Henry IV is not King Henry IV or the lovable rogue Falstaff or the gallant, reckless Hotspur: it is Hal.

  The king revives, but only long enough to make peace with his son and pronounce his blessing. Wild Prince Hal is now King Henry V.

  But what sort of king? Everyone, from his brothers to his disgraceful companions, expect that the royal court will now be turned into the Boar's Head Tavern, with Mistress Quickly pouring sack at council meetings and Falstaff merrily hanging the Chief Justice. When word of the old king's death speeds to Justice Shallow's country house, Sir John believes his fortune is made. Hurrying back to London, he arrives just after the coronation at Westminster, in time to greet the new king's procession.

  By this time I was out of the gallery and on the stage as a member of the cheering crowd. Augustine Phillips, resplendent in a coronation robe, marched solemnly down one side of the stage and across the front, followed closely by Richard Burbage as the Chief Justice. Phillips was one of the tallest players in the Company, but he seemed a very tower in this scene, as though stretching to reach the height of his crown. The two trumpets in the gallery blew a mighty fanfare worthy of ten, as the groundlings cheered and tossed their caps in the air, becoming players as well as audience. Slowly King Henry V turned at the corner of the stage, then paced up the opposite