— Would I had no being,
If this salute my blood a jot; it faints me,
to think what follows.
The queen is comfortless, and we forgetful
In our long absence: pray, do not deliver
What here you’ve heard to her.
The old lady replied indignantly: “What do you think me?” And both made their exit.
All was now being prepared for the next scene.
Master Drew glanced around, wondering which of the players was Teazle.
Something drew his eye across the auditorium to the box on the second story in front of the stage. Someone was standing, bending over the small cannon that had been pointed out to the constable earlier. Master Richard Burbage had explained that the cannon would herald the scene with a royal salute, followed by trumpets and cornets, and then the King and his cardinals would lead a procession onto the stage.
The muzzle of the cannon appeared to be pointing rather low.
The constable turned to find Master Cuthbert Burbage at his shoulder.
“That is going to stir things a little.” The business manager of the theater, who had observed Master Drew’s examination, grinned.
“Your brother has already explained it to me,” the constable replied. “The cannon will be fired to herald the entrance of the procession in the next act, but isn’t the muzzle pointing directly at the stage?”
“No harm. It is only a charge of gunpowder which creates the explosion. There is no ball to do damage. Take no alarm; young Toby Teazle has done this oftimes before.”
Master Drew started uneasily. “That is Master Teazle up there with the cannon?”
A cold feeling of apprehension began to grip him as he stared at the muzzle of the cannon. Then he began to move hurriedly toward the stairs on the far side of the auditorium, pushing protesting spectators out of his way in his haste. He was aware of Cuthbert Burbage shouting something to him.
By the time he reached the second floor, he was aware of the actors moving onto the stage in the grand procession. He heard a voice he recognized as the actor playing Wolsey. “Whilst our commission from Rome is read, let silence be commanded.” Then Richard Burbages voice cried: “What’s the need? It hath already publicly been read, and on all sides the authority allow’d; you may then spare that time.” Wolsey replied: “Be’t so. Proceed.”
The cacophony of the trumpet and cornets sounded.
Drew burst into the small box and saw the young man bending with the lighted taper to the touch hole. On stage he was aware that the figures of Burbages King, and the actors playing Cardinal Wolsey and Cardinal Campeius, the urbane figure of Hawkins, had come to the front of the stage and were staring up at the cannoneer, waiting. The constable did not pause to think but leapt across the floor, kicking at the muzzle of the small cannon. It jerked upward just as it exploded. The recoil showed that it had been loaded with ball; its muzzle had been pointed directly at the figure of Cardinal Campeius. The hot metal crashed across the interior of the theater and fell into the thatch above the stage area.
There were cries of shocked surprise and some applause, but then the noise of the crackle of flames where the hot metal landed on the dry thatch became apparent. Cries of “Fire!” rose on all sides.
Master Drew swung round only to find the fist of the young man, Toby Teazle, impacting on his nose. He went staggering backward and almost fell over the wooden balustrade into the crowds below as they streamed for the exits of the theater.
By the time the constable had recovered, the young man was away, leaping down the stairs and was soon lost in the scuffling fray.
Master Drew, recovering his poise, hastened down the steps as best he could. The actors, with Cuthbert Burbage, were pushing people to the exits. The dry thatch and tinder of the Globe were like straw before the angry flames. The theater was becoming a blazing inferno.
Master Drew groaned in anguish as he realized that the young man was lost among the crowds now and there was never a hope of catching him.
It was more than nine months later, in the spring of the following year, 1614, that the new Globe Theatre eventually rose from the ashes. This time it was erected as an octagonal building with a tiled roof replacing the thatch. Fortunately no one had been injured in the fire, and all the costumes and properties had been saved thanks to the quick wit of the actors, and all the manuscripts of the plays had been stored elsewhere, so the loss was negligible.
Apart from Master Oliver Rowe, two other players were not present to see the magnificent new Globe Theatre. Master Tom Hawkins was languishing in Newgate Gaol. However, he was not imprisoned for the fraudulent misuse of another playwrights work. In fact, The Vow Breaker Delivered had been taken off on the third night and had made a loss for the Blackfriars Theatre. No, Master Hawkins was imprisoned for breach of promise to the young lady who lived at the Boar’s Head Tavern in Eastcheap. As Constable Hardy Drew remarked, The Vow Breaker Delivered had been an inspired prophetic title, as apt a title as could have been chosen by Master Bardolph Zenobia.
The other missing player was Master Toby Teazle.
It was the very day after the new Globe Theatre had opened that Constable Drew was able to conclude the case of the murder of Master Oliver Rowe, sometime one of the Kings Men. Master Cuthbert Burbage asked Constable Drew to accompany him to the Hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem.
Drew was mildly surprised at the request. “That is the hospital for the insane,” he pointed out. Most Londoners knew of Bedlam, for as such the name had been contracted.
“Indeed it is, but I think you will want to see this. I have been asked to identify someone.”
An attendant took them into the gray-walled building, which was more of a prison than a hospital. The stench of human excrement and the noise arising from the afflicted sufferers was unbelievable. The attendant took them to a small cell door and opened it.
A young man crouched inside in the darkness was bent industriously over a rough wooden table. There was nothing on it, yet he appeared to be in the act of writing in the blackness. His right hand held an invisible pen, moving it across unseen sheets of paper.
The attendant grinned. “There he is, good sirs. He says he’s a famous actor and playwright. Says he is a King’s player from the Globe Theatre. That’s why you were asked here, good Master Burbage, just in case there might be truth in it.”
The young man heard his voice and raised his matted head, the eyes blazing, the mouth grinning vacuously. He paused in his act of writing.
It was Toby Teazle.
“Ah, sirs,” he said quietly, calmly regarding them. “You come not a moment too soon. I have penn’d a wondrous entertainment, a magnificent play. I call it The Friend’s Betrayal. I will allow you to perform it but only if my name should go upon the handbill. My name and no other.” He stared at them, each in turn, and then began to recite.
’Tis ten to one this play can never please
All that are here; some come to take their ease
And sleep an act or two; hut those, we fear,
We have frightened with our cannon; so, ‘tis clear,
They’ll say, ‘tis naught… naught…
He hesitated and frowned. “Is this all it is? Naught?” He stared suddenly at the empty table before him and started to chuckle hysterically.
As Constable Drew and Master Cuthbert Burbage were walking back toward Bankside, Drew asked: “Were those his own lines which he was quoting with such emotion?”
Master Burbage shook his head sadly. “No, that was the epilogue from Henry VIII. At least, most of it was. The poor fellow is but a poor lunatic.”
Master Drew smiled wryly. “Didn’t Will Shakespeare once say that the lunatic, the lover, and the poet are of imagination all compact?”
METHOUGHT YOU SAW A SERPENT
Methought you saw a serpent.
— All’s Well That Ends Well, Act I, Scene iii
Master Hardy Drew, the newly appointed deputy t
o the Constable of the Bankside Watch, gazed from the first floor latticed window onto the street, watching in unconcealed distaste as a group of drunken carousers lurched across the cobbles below. The sounds of their song came plainly to his ears.
Sweet England’s pride is gone!
Welladay! Welladay!
Brave honor graced him still
Gallantly! Gallantly!
The young man turned abruptly from the window back into the room with an expression of annoyance.
On the far side, seated at a table, the elderly Constable of the Bankside Watch, Master Edwin Topcliff, had glanced up from his papers and was regarding the young man with a cynical smile. “You have no liking for the popular sympathy then, Master Drew?” the old man observed dryly.
Hardy Drew flushed and thrust out his chin. “Sir, I am a loyal servant of Her Majesty, may she live a long life.”
“Bravely said,” replied the constable gravely. “But, God’s will be done, it may be that your wish will be a futile one. Tis said that the Queens Majesty is ailing and that she has not stirred from her room since my lord Essex met his nemesis at the executioners hands.”
It had been scarcely two weeks since the flamboyant young Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, had met his fate in the courtyard of the Tower of London, having been charged and found guilty of high treason. Rumor and disturbances still pervaded the capital, and many of the citizens of London persisted in singing ditties in his praise, for Essex had been a hero to most Londoners, and they might even have followed him in overturning the sour, aging Queen, who now sat in solitary paranoia on the throne in Greenwich Palace.
It was rumored that the auspices were evident for Elizabeths overthrow, and even the usually conservative Master William Shakespeare and his theatrical company had been persuaded to stage a play on the deposing and killing of King Richard II but a couple of weeks before Essex’s treason was uncovered. It was claimed that many of Essex’s supporters had, after dining together, crossed the Thames to the Globe to witness this portentous performance.
In the middle of such alarums and excursions, young Master Hardy Drew had arrived to take up his apprenticeship in maintaining the Queen’s Peace with the aging constable. Drew was an ambitious young man who wanted to create a good impression with his superior. The son of a clerk, he had entered the Inns of Court under the patronage of a kindly barrister, but the man had died, and Hardy Drew had been dismissed because of his lowly birth and lack of social and financial support. So it was, he found himself turning from one aspect of law to another.
Old Master Topcliff rubbed his nose speculatively as he examined his new assistant. The young man’s features were flushed with passionate indignation. “I would not take offense at the songs you hear nor the people’s sympathies, young man. Times are in a flux. It is a time of ebb and flow in affairs. I know this from reading the Almanacs. What is regarded as seditious today may not be so tomorrow.”
Master Drew sniffed disparagingly. He was about to make a rejoinder when there came a banging at the door, and before he or Master Topcliff could respond, it burst open and a young man, with flushed features, his chest heaving from the exertion of running, burst into the room.
“How now? What rude disturbance is this?” demanded Master Topcliff, sitting back in his chair and examining the newcomer with annoyance.
The youth was an angular young man of foppish appearance, the clothes bright but without taste. Topcliff had the impression of one of modest origins trying to imitate the dignity of a gentleman without success.
“I am from the Globe Theatre, masters,” gasped the young man, straining to recover his breath. “I am sent to fetch you thither.”
“By whose authority and for what purpose?”
The young man paused a moment or two for further breaths before continuing. He was genuinely agitated. “I am sent by Richard Burbage, the master of our group of players. The count has been found murdered, sirs. Master Burbage implores you, through me, to come thither to the crime.”
Topcliff rose to his feet at once. “A count, you say?”
“The Count of Rousillon, master.”
Topcliff exchanged an anxious glance with his deputy. “A foreign nobleman murdered at a London theater,” he sighed. “This does not augur well in the present travails. There is anxiety enough in this city without involving the enmity of the embassy of France.”
He reached for his hat and cloak and signaled Master Drew to follow, saying to the youth: “Lead on, boy. Show us where this Count of Rousillon’s body lies.”
The Globe Theatre was a half a mile from the rooms of the Constable of the Bankside Watch, and they made the journey in quick time. There were several people in small groups around the door of the theater. People attracted by the news of disaster like flies to a honey pot.
A middle-aged man stood at the door, awaiting them. His face bore a distracted, anxious gaze, and he was wringing his hands in a helpless, almost theatrical gesture. Hardy Drew tried to hide a smile, for the action was so preposterous that the humor caught him. It was as if the man were playing at the expression of agitated despair.
“Give you good day, sir,” Master Topcliff greeted breezily.
“Lackaday, sir,” replied the other. “For I do fear that any good in the day has long vanished. My name is Burbage, and I am the director of this company of players.”
“I hear from your boy that a foreign nobleman lies dead in your theater. This is serious.”
Burbage’s eyes widened in surprise. “A foreign nobleman?” He sounded bewildered.
“Indeed, sir, what name was it? The Count of Rousillon. Have I been informed incorrectly?”
A grimace crossed Master Burbage’s woebegone face. “He was no foreign nobleman, sir.”
“How now?” demanded Master Topcliff in annoyance. “Is the constable to be made the butt of some mischievous prank? Is there no murder then?”
“Oh, yes. Murder, there is, good Constable. But the body is that of our finest player, Bertrando Emillio. He plays the role of the Count of Rousillon in our current production.”
Master Topcliff snorted with indignation.
“An actor?” Master Topcliff made it sound as though it was beneath his dignity to be called out to the murder of an actor. He gave a sniff. “Well, since we are here, let us view the body.”
Burbage led them to the back of the stage, where several people stood or sat in groups quietly talking amongst themselves. One woman was sitting sobbing, comforted by another. Their whispers ceased as they saw the constable and his deputy. From their appearance, so Drew thought, they were all members of the company of actors. He glanced across their expressions, for they ranged from curiosity to distress to bewilderment, while others seemed to have a tinge of anxiety on their faces.
Burbage led them to what was apparently a small dressing room, in a darkened corridor behind the stage, which was full of hanging clothes and baskets and all manner of clutter. On one basket was a pile of neat clothes, well folded, with leather belt and purse on top.
In the middle of this room lay the body of a young man, who in life and been of saturnine appearance. He was stretched on his back, one arm flung out above his head. The eyes were open, and the face was masked in a curious expression as if of surprise. He wore nothing more than a long linen shirt that probably had once been white. Now it was stained crimson with his blood. It needed no physician to tell them that the young man had died from several stab wounds to his chest and stomach. Indeed, by the body, a long bone-handled knife, of the sort used for carving meat, lay discarded and bloody.
Master Topcliff glanced down dispassionately. Death was no stranger to the environs of London, either north or south of the river. In particular, violent death was a constant companion among the lanes and streets around the river.
“His name is Bertrando Emillio, you say? That sounds foreign to me. Was he Italian?”
Master Burbage shook his head. “He was as English as you or I, sir. No, Be
rtrando Emillio was but the name he used for our company of players.”
Master Topcliffe was clearly irritated. “God’s wounds! I like not confusion. First I am told that he is the Count of Rousillon. Then I am told he is an actor, one Bertrando Emillio. Who now do you claim him to be?”
“Faith, sir, he is Herbert Eldred of Cheapside,” replied Burbage unhappily. “But while he treads the boards, he is known to the public by his stage name-Bertrando Emillio. It is a common practice among us players to assume such names.”
Master Topcliff grunted unappeased by the explanation. “Who found him thus?” he asked curtly.
As he was asking the question, Master Drew had fallen to his knees to inspect the body more closely. There were five stab wounds to the chest and stomach. They had been inflicted as if in a frenzy, for he saw the ripping of the flesh caused by the hurried tearing of the knife, and he realized that any one of the wounds could have been mortal. He was about to rise when he saw some paper protruding under the body. Master Drew rolled the body forward toward its side to extract the papers. In doing so, he noticed that there was a single stab wound in Bertrando’s back, between the shoulder blades. He picked up the papers, let the body roll into its former position on its back, and stood up.
“Who found him thus?” Master Topcliff repeated.
“I did,” confessed Master Burbage. “We were rehearsing for our new play, in which he plays the Count de Rousillon. It was to be our first performance this very Saturday afternoon, and this was to be our last rehearsal in the costumes we shall wear. Truly, the stars were in bad aspect when Master Shakespeare chose this day to put forward his new work.”
“You are presenting a new play by Master Shakespeare?” queried Hardy Drew, speaking for the first time. He had ascertained that the papers under the body were a script of sorts, and presumably the part was meant for Bertrando.
An Ensuing Evil and Others Page 6