‘Richard,’ my brother looked at Richard Cowley, not at me, ‘you’ll play Snout, a tinker.’ He waited as Isaiah put Snout’s part in front of Cowley. ‘John?’ he looked at John Sinklo next to me, ‘you’re Robin Starveling, a tailor.’
‘Starveling!’ Simon Willoughby said, and laughed. The name fitted, because John Sinklo was impossibly thin.
‘John Duke?’ my brother looked around the table. ‘There you are. You’re Snug, a joiner.’
Isaiah put a single sheet of paper in front of John Duke. Someone sniggered, and John Duke, one of the hired men, frowned. ‘It’s a very small part,’ he said plaintively.
‘A lot of it is extempore,’ my brother said, ‘you’ll be roaring.’
‘Roaring?’ Duke was puzzled.
‘I can roar!’ Will Kemp put in eagerly, and immediately demonstrated by roaring like a mad beast. Simon Willoughby giggled and tried to roar himself.
‘Enough!’ My brother slapped the table. ‘Snug roars, and only Snug!’ He glared at Will Kemp, who just grinned back. ‘And the last of the mechanicals,’ my brother went on, ‘is Francis Flute, a bellows mender. And that part,’ he smiled at me, he actually smiled, ‘that part is all yours, Richard.’
Isaiah put the last sheaf of papers in front of me. There were four or five sheets, and that meant it was a substantial enough part, and certainly a lot longer than some of the other mechanicals. My brother began to explain the play’s first scene, which was set in Theseus’s palace, but I did not listen. Instead I was eagerly reading Flute’s opening lines, looking for the character with whom I would fall in love. This was my first proper part as a man! I was excited.
Then I came to Francis Flute’s third line, and my heart sank. I just stared. For a moment I could not believe what I was seeing, then I looked back to the top of the page and read the opening cues and lines again. The bastard, I thought, the utter bastard!
‘So let’s begin,’ my brother said, ‘George? You have the first line.’
The bastard!
I wanted to stand up and walk out. Instead I sat seething. The play’s opening droned past me with the usual long speeches. ‘Full of vexation,’ I heard Thomas Pope say, and that was nowhere near strong enough to describe how I felt. I was full of vexation and humiliation, I was angry and scorned. Get up, I told myself, stand up and walk away, but a common loaf was a whole penny these days, and I needed money. I had to endure the scorn or starve.
The play went on. No one seemed particularly excited by what they were hearing. The duke threatened to kill Hermia if she refused to marry Demetrius, but what did I care? I knew my face had reddened, I was staring at the page on the table, not daring to look up and catch my brother’s eye.
‘“Is all our company here?”’ my brother’s voice broke in.
‘“You were best to call them generally, man by man, according to the scrip,”’ Will Kemp, playing Nick Bottom, at last put some energy into the reading. Men perked up, looking forward to Will Kemp’s wit. I guessed my part was coming and so kept my eyes on the first line on my first page.
‘“Here is the scroll,”’ my brother read, ‘“of every man’s name which is thought fit through all Athens to play in our interlude before the Duke and the Duchess, on his wedding night.”’
‘“First, good Peter Quince,”’ Will Kemp interrupted vigorously, ‘“say what the play treats on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow to a point.”’
Men laughed, because Nick Bottom’s interruption and harrying of Peter Quince was so like the way Will Kemp interrupted and harried the other Sharers whenever we rehearsed a play. Kemp understood the joke and grinned, ‘Grow to a point, Will!’ he called.
‘“Marry!”’ My brother was also grinning, taking energy from Will’s enthusiasm, ‘“Our play is The Most Lamentable Comedy, and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe.”’ This time the laughter was louder, the players around the table were enjoying the dialogue.
The Most Lamentable Comedy, and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe was the play that the tradesmen of Athens wanted to perform for the duke’s wedding. It would doubtless prove a mockery of the sort of performance that we had all witnessed from tailors, carpenters, and ploughmen putting on an entertainment of a winter’s night back home.
‘“A very good piece of work, I assure you,”’ Will Kemp said heartily, ‘“and a merry! Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves!”’
‘“Answer as I call you,”’ my brother said. ‘“Nick Bottom, the weaver?”’
I knew my lines must come soon. I stared at the paper. All around me men were laughing as Will Kemp delivered a bombastic speech. Nick Bottom had the part of Pyramus in the play the mechanicals would perform, but was pleading with Peter Quince to be given an even more heroic part. Men grinned, recognising that Nick Bottom was a portrait of Will Kemp, and Kemp himself enjoyed the jest. ‘“This is Ercle’s vein,”’ he finished, ‘“a tyrant’s vein. A lover is more condoling!”’
‘“Francis Flute?”’ my brother said, ‘“the bellows mender?”’
That was the first line on my sheet of paper.
‘“Here, Peter Quince,”’ I read lifelessly. The Sharers were looking at me, grinning in the candlelight. They knew what was coming.
‘“Flute,”’ I could hear the suppressed amusement in my brother’s voice, ‘“you must take Thisbe on you.”’
‘“What is Thisbe?”’ I read, still tonelessly, ‘“a wandering knight?”’
‘“It is the lady Pyramus must love,”’ my brother said, unable to hide his amusement, and with those words the whole room burst into raucous laughter.
‘Oh, that’s good, Will, that’s very good!’ John Heminges said.
‘“It is the lady Pyramus must love!”’ Simon Willoughby squeaked, and I could have throttled the little turd.
‘Speak up, Thisbe,’ Will Kemp said with savage enjoyment, ‘let’s hear you!’
‘“Nay, faith,”’ I read, ‘“let me not play a woman.”’ And at that line they all started laughing again. I waited, but the laughter did not stop, so I raised my voice angrily to finish the line. ‘“I have a beard coming.”’
‘He’s got a beard coming!’ Simon Willoughby crowed.
‘“That’s all one,”’ my brother did not look at me as he spoke his lines, ‘“you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.”’
‘In a mask!’ Richard Burbage said, covering his face with his hands to imitate the masks high-born women wore to prevent the summer sun darkening their skin.
‘And speak small, Richard!’ Simon Willoughby shrieked happily. ‘Speak small!’
‘You’re playing a man,’ Rust said, ‘you always wanted to!’
‘Who plays a woman,’ Simon Willoughby said, just in case anyone around the long table had failed to see the jest.
Will Kemp, or rather Nick Bottom, interrupted to demand that he play Thisbe instead of me, and that started yet more merriment, because Kemp was famous for wanting to play other parts beside his own. The company was beginning to enjoy the play, and there was a growing excitement in the room as it continued, but I just sat simmering with an angry resentment. Alan Rust was right, I was playing a man, but the man I played had to pretend to be a woman. And there was nothing I could do about it.
I had been cozened by my grinning brother.
Then, as the rehearsal broke up, I thought there was something I could do about it.
We never finished reading the play that day, time was too short. As the city churches mangled the air by striking eleven, my brother commanded us to take care of our parts, to learn them, and to assemble at the Theatre next morning to finish the reading. ‘All those who appear in The Seven Deadly Sins should go to the Theatre now,’ he said.
‘Why aren’t we rehearsing here tomorrow?’ George Bryan demanded.
‘Peter Strete will be here tomorrow,’ my brother explained. Strete was a carpenter who
did most of the Theatre’s work. ‘We will rehearse here most days,’ my brother went on, ‘but tomorrow they’re moving all the timber in for the new stage and wall, and we’ll have no peace.’
I had no part in The Seven Deadly Sins, and so was not needed. My brother, deep in conversation with John Heminges and Henry Condell, ignored me as he left. Alan Rust, though, sought me out. ‘You’re being a fool,’ he said.
‘Why?’
‘Because Flute is a good part. The whole notion is that you play a woman badly! The audience will know you’re a man.’
‘They already know that,’ I said sullenly.
‘Christ on his silver-painted cross! What kind of a fool are you? When you play Uashti, the audience doesn’t see a man dressed as a woman, they see a queen! They even hear a queen! We deceive them, Richard! But Flute? The whole conceit is that you don’t deceive them. That you are what the play says you are, a man playing a woman. So you play the woman like a man, and you play her badly. It’s a jest, and it’s a very fine one.’ He had led me out through one of the two doors beneath the minstrels’ gallery, but now hesitated, unsure which way to choose. ‘This must be the scullery passage.’
It was indeed the scullery passage, and led to the stable yard where a pair of carriage horses were being washed and combed. ‘I dare say,’ Rust said, looking at me, ‘that your last scene with Will Kemp will be the funniest in the play. It’s a good part! You should be happy.’
‘I have to fall in love with Will Kemp?’ I said savagely.
‘Not easy, I agree, but you’re a player. You pretend. Really, Richard, you should be happy.’
I was anything but happy. Rust was right, it was a jest, but the jest was on me, and, to make my misery worse, I had seen no glimpse of Silvia.
We left the stable yard, and, once on Water Lane, Rust turned uphill, going towards the Theatre, but I turned left towards the river. I had a handful of coins in my purse, and, much as I resented losing any, I had decided to take a wherry across to the Paris Garden Stairs on the south bank of the Thames. I had nothing else to do that day except, perhaps, learn Francis Flute’s lines, and I had no enthusiasm for that.
There were a half-dozen watermen waiting at the stairs at the lower end of Water Lane, but before I could hail a boat I was hailed myself, or rather I was distracted by a gasp that made me turn, and there, to my sudden surprise and pleasure, was Silvia. She had evidently followed me down Water Lane, going, as I was, to the river stairs. She was dressed in a long grey cloak and hood, and carrying a basket covered with a clean linen cloth. She was smiling, which was gratifying. ‘You’re the player!’ she said.
‘Francis Flute,’ I said impulsively. Why? I had no idea, and, to cover my confusion, I offered her a bow. ‘At your service.’
She giggled at my elaborate bow. ‘You’re crossing the river?’
‘I am.’
‘You can come with me, then!’ she said cheerfully. ‘That end boat.’ She pointed to the far end of the pier where two watermen sat in a wherry.
‘Why that boat?’
‘’Cos the big man at the stroke is my father.’ She grinned.
The waiting watermen all knew her. They called to her in greeting, either by name or by calling her ‘darling’ or ‘sweetheart’. ‘Got yourself a handsome lad, darling?’ one shouted.
‘He’s Mister Flute to you, Billy,’ she called back.
‘Going to blow him, darling?’
I thought she would be embarrassed, but she turned and grinned at the man. ‘No good relying on your strokes, Billy!’
The watermen cheered, while her father, grinning proudly, stood to help her down into his boat. She gave him a respectful nod, then tilted her head so he could kiss her cheek. ‘Usual?’ he asked.
‘The usual,’ she said, then gave me a worried glance. ‘Is the Paris Garden Stairs all right for you?’
‘It’s where I was going,’ I said, stepping into the boat.
‘This is Mister Flute,’ Silvia introduced me to her father. ‘He’s one of Lord Hunsdon’s men, a player!’
‘Honoured to meet you, sir,’ her father said, obviously impressed by my borrowed finery. ‘I’m Joe Lester.’
‘I’m honoured to meet you, sir,’ I replied, then sat beside Silvia in the wide thwart at the stern of the boat. She waved at the other watermen as we pulled away.
‘I’ve known them since I was a child,’ she said to me, explaining her familiarity, then she grinned at her father, a big man hauling on a big oar. ‘Gawd,’ she said, ‘it’s good to get out of there!’
‘You’re lucky to have the position, Silvia,’ he said, ‘you and your brother.’
‘You have a brother?’ I asked.
‘Two of them! Great lunks they are. Yes, Ned works for his lordship. I know I’m lucky, Pa, and they’re good to us, but oh my gawd, there are times we just sit about doing nothing while her ladyship reads. Well, maybe not nothing, but how many unicorns can a girl embroider in a day?’
‘That’s what a lady’s maid does,’ her father said.
‘This one would rather be working,’ she said. I stole a glance at her. How had I forgotten that face? Just looking at her was to be struck by Cupid’s arrow. She stopped the breath in my throat, turned my blood to smoke, struck me senseless. I remembered a line of Titania’s that I had copied, and I muttered it under my breath. ‘“O how I love thee! How I dote on thee!”’
‘What did you say?’ Silvia asked.
‘Nothing, nothing.’
‘So you’re a player,’ her father said to me. ‘Do you play at the Rose?’
‘We’re at the Theatre,’ I said, ‘the Rose is the Lord Admiral’s company.’
‘We go to the Rose sometimes,’ Joe said happily. ‘We saw Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay last. I laughed!’
‘It’s a funny play.’
‘It’ll be nice when the new playhouse opens,’ Silvia said, nodding towards the monstrous pile looming over the small cottages of the southern bank. ‘It’ll be right on your door-step, Pa!’
‘With all the bloody drunks too,’ her father said. ‘No offence, sir.’ He glanced over his shoulder to judge his progress against the current and the tide. ‘It’s bad enough with the Ugly Duck right there.’
‘The Ugly Duck?’
‘It’s a tavern,’ Silvia explained. ‘It’s close to Ma and Pa’s house. I used to work there.’
‘Work there?’ I asked, surprised.
‘Not like that!’ she said, laughing, and I was embarrassed that she had divined my meaning, though neither she nor her father seemed to have taken offence. ‘No,’ she went on, ‘when I was little I used to wash their pots.’
‘She’s a hard worker, our Silvia,’ her father said proudly.
‘Is that why you’re crossing the river?’ she asked me. ‘To see the new playhouse?’
‘I want to see it,’ I said awkwardly.
‘Me too!’
‘You have to see Nurse Dodds,’ her father said strictly.
‘That’s what I’m doing, Pa, that’s what I’m doing,’ Silvia said, then looked at me. ‘Milly Dodds is Sir George’s old nurse,’ she explained.
‘Sir George?’ I asked, puzzled.
‘He’s Lord Hunsdon’s son,’ she said, ‘and father to the bride. Nice man, isn’t he, Pa?’
‘Sir George Carey is a proper gentleman,’ her father said.
‘So at midday on every Monday I take her comfits and sweetmeats,’ Silvia said, indicating the basket. ‘Sir George insists. He sometimes goes himself.’
‘A proper gentleman,’ her father said again, hauling on the loom of his oar.
‘They’ve given her a nice little cottage,’ Silvia went on. ‘Well, they haven’t given it to her, but they let her live there. She’s a lovely old lady. On Thursdays I take her to the bear baiting! She loves that little outing. Do you like marchpane?’
‘I’ve never eaten it.’
‘Never eaten marchpane! Lord above! Here,’ she lifted the l
inen cloth and brought out a yellow-coloured square, soft enough for her to pull into four separate parts. ‘Nurse Dodds don’t like marchpane, but I don’t tell Sir George that on account that I love it, here, one piece for you, one for me, one for Father and one for Tom.’ Tom was evidently the bow oarsman, who had said not a word since I climbed into the wherry. ‘It’s only almonds, rosewater, and sugar,’ she said. ‘And we add egg whites, not everyone does, try it. It’s like nibbling a bit of heaven!’
The boat swung into the current and eased alongside the Paris Garden Stairs. I stepped off first, then held out a hand to help Silvia. The touch of her fingers! ‘I’ll look for you, darling,’ her father said.
‘About one o’clock, Pa,’ she said, ‘and thank you, Tom.’
Tom, a heavyset young man, just nodded.
‘Should I pay?’ I asked her father.
‘Get on with you, lad!’ he said. He had called me ‘sir’ when I first stepped into the boat, but the short crossing of the river had evidently persuaded him of my true status.
I thanked him, then climbed the stone stairs with his daughter. I had so wanted to be with her, but now found I had nothing to say, or rather my mind went blank. I had rehearsed a hundred lines to impress her, but I could remember none of them. That had happened to me at the Theatre once, I had been playing the Queen in my brother’s Richard II, a part I knew so well, yet one afternoon the words just vanished like dew under the sun. John Duke, a hired man, turned to the left of the stage, ‘“Here comes the Duke of York,”’ he’d said, and George Bryan, wearing a gorget, had entered, and I should have spoken immediately.
‘With signs of war about his aged neck:
O, full of careful business are his looks!
Uncle, for God’s sake, speak comfortable words.’
Instead I had stammered incoherently, and Isaiah Humble, who should have called the words to me, had gone out the back for a piss. George Bryan had just gaped at me for a moment, and the groundlings had started to jeer. ‘Learn your words!’ one shouted, and an apple core soared out of the crowd and knocked my gilt-bronze coronet over my ear. George had finally spoken his next line, which began, ‘“Should I do so,”’ after a ghastly pause, and the words made no sense because I had been reduced to a stuttering, helpless fool, and that was how I felt with Silvia as we climbed the Paris Garden Stairs.