‘Young Tom! Take a pew.’
I went over and sat on the bench opposite him, with a small oak table between us. Two men further along the table were studiously engaged in a game of draughts.
‘Hello, Mr Shakespeare.’
A barmaid nearby was clearing up abandoned jars, and Shakespeare called over.
‘An ale for my friend here.’
She nodded, then Shakespeare reconsidered. ‘But you are from France, aren’t you? You probably like beer.’
‘No, sir. I prefer ale.’
‘Your wisdom calms me, Tom. They serve the greatest and sweetest ale in all of London in here.’
He sipped on his, closing his eyes. ‘Ale doesn’t live well,’ he said. ‘A week from today this will taste as sour as a knight’s breeches. Beer lasts for ever. All the hops, they say, causes its immortality. Ale is a more worthy lesson on life. You wait too long, and you will be saying farewell before you say good day. My father was once an ale taster. I have an education in it.’
The ale came. It was indeed sweet. Shakespeare filled and lit a pipe. Like most theatre types with access to money he was a fan of tobacco. (‘The indian herb works wonders for my ailments.’) He told me it also helped with his writing.
‘Are you writing a new play?’ I wondered aloud. ‘Am I keeping you from your writing?’
He nodded. ‘I am, and, no, you are not.’
‘Ah,’ I said. (There was no one like Will Shakespeare to make you feel tongue-tied.) ‘Good. And good.’
‘It shall be called Julius Caesar.’
‘So it is about the life of Julius Caesar?’
‘No.’
‘Oh.’
He sucked long on his pipe. ‘I hate writing,’ he said, through the spiralling smoke. ‘That is the truth of it.’
‘But you are very good at it.’
‘So? My talent is not worth a pot of ale. It signifies nothing. Nought. To be good at writing is to be good at pulling out your own hair. What use is a talent that pains you? It is a gift that smells to heaven and it smells of fox shit. You should rather be a whore in the Cardinal’s Hat than be a writer. My quill is my curse.’
I had, I sensed, caught him on a bad day.
‘I write because then I can make a play happen and then I and my shareholders can make money. And money is no bad thing. Money stops a man from going mad.’ He stared sadly a while. ‘I saw my father suffer when I was a boy, not so younger in years than you are now. He was a good man. He could never read but knew many a trade. Ale taster, a glover, then traded wool. And other things. He did well. We dined happily. Fowl every supper. He lost all his money. Loaned it with not a shilling in return once too often. And with a wife and seven children to keep it sent him into an antic disposition for a long time. He would shake and rock and fear the shadow of a mouse. That is why I write. I am just for ever running from madness.’ He sighed, glancing over at the draughts board a moment, as one of the men laid their piece down. ‘Now, you. What about you? Was your father mad too?’
‘I don’t know, sir. He died when I was young. He was killed at war. In France.’
‘The Catholics?’
‘The Catholics.’
‘So you came to England?’
I obviously didn’t want to be talking about myself, but Shakespeare seemed to want to do exactly that, and if I was going to ask him for a favour, then I had no choice but to oblige.
‘We did, yes. Myself and my mother. To Suffolk.’
‘And did you not like the country air, Tom?’
‘It was not the air that was the problem.’
‘The people?’
‘There were all manner of things.’
He sipped, he smoked, he studied. ‘You possess a young face and a wise tongue. People hate that. They know it could fool them.’
I was worried, felt for a moment like he was testing me. Remembered the conversation with Christopher and Hal.
‘Do you know of the Queen’s Men?’ he asked.
‘The troupe of players?’
‘That is them. Yes. Well, this man joined them. Henry Hemmings. He had been in some other player companies before, and when people turned suspicious that he was not at time’s mercy, he moved to a new company. It gives reason, I would suppose. But by the time he reached the Queen’s Men the whispers were flying like sparrows. One of the actors recognised him, from north of ten years before, and a fight broke out. The most vicious fight anyone watching had ever witnessed. At the town of Thame, in the county of Oxfordshire. By the end, two more of the troupe were at him, like dogs at a rabbit.’ He rested his pipe carefully on the table, the smoke twisting a thin line directly to the ceiling.
‘Were you there?’ I asked.
He shook his head. ‘I never knew him. Yet I have to thank him.’
‘For?’
He smiled, a life-weary smile. ‘His death. He died and the Queen’s Men had lost one of their key players. So when they came to Stratford I saw their predicament and my opportunity. I asked to join them. I drank with them. We spoke a little on general matters. We spoke of Plutarch and Robin Hood. And then chance blessed me. I became a Queen’s Man. And that led me to London.’
‘I see.’
He sighed. ‘Yet it was in truth an ominous beginning. Though I had no part in his death, the shadow of Hemmings passes over me quite often. And I often feel as though I am, even now, in a place that is not mine. That it happened unjustly. They were a violent and amoral rag-tag band of brothers. Killers. Twelve Wolstan the Trees. And Henry Hemmings had committed no crime, except being different. He had a face that didn’t age. That was my beginning – the rotten acorn of it all.’
He looked quite fragile for a moment, then scratched at his beard, and picked up his pipe again. Inhaled and closed his eyes. Blew the smoke over his left shoulder as I sipped my ale.
‘The acorn wasn’t rotten,’ I said.
‘Ah, yet the tree is twisted. But there is no moral to this tale, except with mirth and laughter let wrinkles come.’ I didn’t know for sure if he thought of me as another Henry Hemmings. Nor did I know for sure if Henry Hemmings actually had been like me, or if he was someone who was blessed and cursed with a more youthful disposition than average. I didn’t know if Shakespeare knew the story of what had happened in Edwardstone, and whether, possibly, my Suffolk connection had made a link in his mind. Yet I sensed a kind of warning, a friendly one, in his words. ‘So, why did you want to see me?’
I took a breath.
‘I know two sisters, Grace and Rose, and they need work. They need it urgently . . . They could sell apples.’
‘I have no say over the pippin-hawks.’
He shook his head. Seemed irritated that I would burden his great mind with such an irksome triviality.
‘Please, talk to me of something else, or leave me.’
I thought of Rose’s worried face. ‘I am sorry, sir. I owe these girls a great debt. They took me into their home at a time when I had no one. Please, sir.’
Shakespeare sighed. I felt like I was baiting a bear, and feared what he was going to say next. ‘And who is Rose? You spoke her name soft when you said it.’
‘She is my love.’