by P. N. Elrod
Members of the court took their places in the audience, and Gertrude and I came in and settled ourselves. Hamlet made a bit of a scene with Ophelia, which caused a general discomfort to those who heard. Gertrude tried to distract him over to herself, but he continued to walk on the brink of provocation with the girl. Though sweet of temper, she wasn’t particularly clever, and he still possessed enough of his wits to sting her with jibes and near-insults. She understood that he was bullying her, but wasn’t quick enough to hold her own against attack, retreating into red-faced silence until the play began. I thought I should have words with him afterward, but Gertrude shot me a glance that said she would deal with him. Clearly he still had some control over himself and harrying an innocent like Ophelia was not gentlemanly behavior. He’d been raised better than that.
The players went through their traditional prologues and miming to which I paid scant attention, focused as I was on Hamlet. If he continued to be a nuisance to Ophelia I would step in and halt things.
Would that he had done so, but he seemed aware of my attention and behaved himself, more or less. He shifted to making comments about the presentation, which was irritating but tolerable. The player king and queen stumbled through their lines as though they’d but learned them in that same hour, and the whole time Hamlet’s old school friend from Wittenberg, Horatio, held his gaze on me like a hawk. I knew some devilry must be afoot, but could not imagine what it might be. The man was too far distant to make a physical attack on my person, which was what I most dreaded. My guards would cut him down quick enough, so I felt safe, but hated the idea of more tales of scandal being heaped upon my court.
There, too, was the possibility that Hamlet might, while others were distracted by the show, attack me. He was armed with sword and dagger as was the fashion and necessity of the time. However, I had instructed my guard to be particularly alert to any threatening move on his part. After that awful business with Ophelia I concluded that he might eventually give in to a violent impulse and direct it at me. They were well aware of Prince Hamlet’s growing madness and prepared, I hoped, to deal briskly with it should he lose control.
But he had no need. I was the one who fell into a fit, maneuvered there by a cunning made vicious by his disease.
Rumor has it I stopped the play out of guilt, for the players enacted a performance of a man’s murder in a garden, his assassin, who was his own nephew, marrying the shallow and betraying widow in order to inherit everything.
At first I could not comprehend what I was seeing. I thought I must be interpreting it the wrong way, but as each ill-memorized line pressed upon my ears the more my disbelief gave way to rage.
The offensive parallels to my brother’s demise were too great to be ignored, nor could I possibly contain my fury at so brazen an insult. I’d loved my brother, and to be accused of killing him by a boy I loved as much as a son was vile beyond imagining, yet Hamlet had imagined it, and it was at his instigation that the show was carried out. Only true madness could have created and birthed such a twisted thought from his innermost mind.
I rose and roared for lights, bringing to an end to the mockery. The players stood rooted in place, horror on their painted faces. They knew they had committed a supreme offense, but were obviously ignorant of what it might be. My gaze next fell upon Hamlet. On his face was a look of such vicious, lunatic exultation that I actually felt sickened at the sight. I’d not had such a reaction since the day I’d fought at his father’s side in my first battle. The fighting itself inspired a perilous euphoria, but afterwards, when one sees the bloody bodies strewn helpless and twitching in their death throes on the field. . .I was not impervious to pity or revulsion and had staggered to one side to spew my guts on the red-stained grass. It took all my self-control now to keep from repeating that youthful weakness in front of all. I gulped back the impulse, breathed deep of the thick, smoky air from the lamps and torches, and inwardly vowed that young Hamlet would pay dear for this indecent cruelty.
This was not the time or place to confront him. It must be done in private—after I’d mastered myself. Until now his tragic disease had been a family matter; by this display he’d made it devastatingly public.
The disaster of the play alone was more than enough woe, but on this terrible night an army of troubles began ravening within Elsinore’s walls.
After leaving the great hall in considerable disorder and disarray I took myself in haste to the chapel. It was one place where I thought I’d be left in peace by the constant press of courtiers, but two of them turned up to disturb my attempt at calming devotions. As there was no ignoring them, I ordered them to prepare for their instant dispatch to England with my wayward nephew. They fled, quickly to be replaced by Polonius who informed me that Gertrude had summoned Hamlet to her closet. My old friend promised to listen in on that exchange and acquaint me of the details soon after, and took himself away.
Alone for the moment, I bent both knees and spent time in sincere prayer in an attempt to soothe myself to coherence, but it availed me not. I was not a man used to being angry, and containing it did not sit well with me, nor was I in a position to express it as before my rise in rank. There were many times when I saw my father and brother bound by the same circumstance. How it rankled them that they could not be forthright, but had to bury their feelings deep for the sake of the state. I had little to no practice at this bitter portion of royalty, and certainly those waiting without quickly backed down when at last I emerged from the chapel, still thunderous of aspect. None offered useless words of kindness or comfort, but maintained a wise silence.
I shortly called a small gathering to my council room to formally deal with the crisis. This very night Hamlet would depart for England, in fetters if need be. The timing was wretched, for it would indeed appear that I’d been stung with guilt inspired by the mummery of the play. In truth, I had put off sending him to sea, for his presence was a dear thing to Gertrude. She seemed to take her very breath from his glance, and I was loath to bring her pain. But I measured the brief sharp hurt of his leaving against the ongoing agony of months of his out-of-control rants and accusations. If he turned his wrath upon her. . .better to cut the festering limb off now before the poison spread to the rest of the body.
While I made more detailed arrangements to carry the wretch to foreign shores where his ravings would be ignored, Gertrude attempted to impart some measure of parental authority to Hamlet in her chambers. At the least she would keep him busy while I set things in motion for his removal. I judged she of all would be safe, especially while Polonius played both watchdog and witness as he’d done so many other times before under a variety of circumstances.
But young Hamlet, deranged and worked into a frenzy, did, in the violence of his madness, discover and murder loyal Polonius right in front of poor Gertrude, running him bloodily through with his sword.
Oh, God, what a foul and fell deed it was, and when I learned of it I was torn between boundless grief and a matching fury at the senseless death of a harmless old man. In my heart I called Polonius my second father; if depth of grief could be measured by depth of love, then never would I struggle free of the darkness that enveloped my heart.
But. . .the demands and duties of office forced me to rouse, put off my feelings, and deal with the calamity. There would be no trial, sparing Gertrude that agony. There could be none, since lunatics are not responsible for their wildness. Hamlet would depart for England that night, and so he did, under the close guard of two watchful courtiers.
Then all that remained was this second anguish to live through, and I felt it even more keenly than the loss of my brother, for I might have prevented this death by arresting Hamlet immediately after the disrupted play. Again and again I berated myself for not sending a guard along with Polonius, or instructing him to have a trusted man within close call.
Alas, Gertrude withdrew from me. The ordeal of seeing gentle Polonius murdered had been too much. She’d witnessed a side of her
son she never knew existed, not only his mindless ferocity, but his staring awe when he conversed with empty air as though his father stood before them. This reminder of her first husband must have plucked a deep chord of guilt in her heart. I wanted to give her comfort, and perhaps in the giving receive some crumb of it for myself, but from that night on, she held herself aloof from my solitary company, even if only to talk as one friend to another. Without her, without Polonius, I was utterly and wretchedly alone.
Time might have eventually closed even these bleeding wounds to our family, but it was not to be. Young Ophelia was unable to accept her father’s death at the hands of the very man she loved to distraction. Ever excessive in her affections, now did she also slip into madness. Hers was not violent though, and her wandering speech soft, if disturbing. I conjectured then if Hamlet had not at some time pressed his attentions to the point of bedding her, and thus passed on his affliction. I consulted several physicians about the progress of such a disease and was again assured its onset toward madness was slow. It was her mind and spirit that were shot through with lunacy, not her body.
But I had other concerns to keep me engaged.
The news of Polonius’s murder ran fast to the general rabble, causing much unrest, for the old man was popular with them. We gave him an obscure burial, which turned out to be a mistake on my part. As a lifelong servant of the court he deserved better, his bier heaped high with honors and ceremonial ostentation, with proclamations about his virtues made to the people, but at the time I thought it might better to keep things quiet and private. Instead, the scandal of his death was only magnified by this seeming suppression of his passing.
Rumors flew about like scattered birds, the worst being that I had killed him or commanded his death be carried out by a man masquerading as the virtuous Hamlet, then spiriting the assassin away to safety. It was folly, of course, but if a lie is repeated often enough it becomes truth, and there were those in the court who would be glad to see me toppled. There would be no surprise in me to learn Hamlet, in the forefront of that gathering, turned out to be the source of the falsehood.
A garbled version of events traveled swiftly to Paris and thus to Laertes. He sped light along the roads with few companions, changing mounts and pausing to sleep only when he actually fell from the saddle. By the time he reached the borders of Denmark there were crowds waiting to greet him and declare him to be the next king. He used them to expedite his safe passage to Elsinore and to break through my own guards, storming into my chambers threatening hot revenge.
However much the mob hailed him, though, he persuaded them to stand down and wait without, and that was how I knew him to be uninterested in the crown itself. He was a hurting son wanting his father, nothing more.
Gertrude’s presence also brought him up short, made him more willing to listen. She was like a second mother to him and bravely seized upon his sword arm lest he raise it to strike me. I had no fear of him, though. After so many batterings from other quarters I could deal with one angry young man, but it did take all my skill of reasoning to turn him around. Once he saw my own ravaged face an understanding came to him that our hearts were as one in our mourning for a lost parent.
Then did Ophelia come wandering barefoot through the chamber, festooned like a bride in blossoms and weeds alike, singing ribald songs a maiden should not know. Gertrude collapsed into tears from this, and Laertes was frozen by such a shock as to be struck dumb. Ophelia recognized him not, but happily insisted on decking us with some of her garlands as if in celebration of a wedding. For each she had a story or saying that herbalists use to memorize the qualities of each plant.
That is when the awful truth came to me, painful as a knife in the vitals. I felt my legs go weak in reaction, as sick at heart as I’d ever been. I had to sit lest I drop into a womanish faint.
Gentle Ophelia—who knew the name and nature of every flower in the land, who distilled their petals into sweet perfumes and their leaves into cures for small ills—could she not just as well concoct a deadly brew of henbane and other poisonous plants and roots? She knew the story of the gentleman’s revenge that I’d brought from Italy as well as any; might she also have learned the ingredients for making juice of hebenon from some forgotten volume in Elsinore’s book room?
She had right of entry to the orchard when the king was not there. If she hid herself within its twisting paths well before my brother’s arrival—then all she had to do was wait until he slept, then steal soft upon him and. . .
And let herself out later. Or, if there was sufficient confusion attending the discovery, add herself to the gathering and thus make her egress. I’d not noticed her presence that day, like all others, my attention was elsewhere.
But why?
For her thwarted love of Hamlet?
It seemed a foolish, petty motive to me, but to an inexperienced girl caught in the excessive throes of first love. . .I recalled the heat and anguish of my own youth. In those hasty days there is no restraint to the extremes of emotions, and one chafes bitterly against the unfair limits set by others.
And—most telling of all—it was less than a week before my brother’s murder that he’d forbade Ophelia’s marriage to his son.
With this in mind it was like a book opened to a telling page that revealed all. No man would benefit by the king’s death, only this otherwise innocent young girl. In the course of time Hamlet would assume the throne and claim her as his bride, sweeping her off to be his queen as in some old tale told in the nursery. How she must have repeated it to herself in the dreaming dark of her virgin’s bed. How must she have resented and despised my brother for trampling upon her perfect musings.
The fates can be kind in their way, for it was just as well that Polonius was dead, never to know this terrible truth. Would that they had granted me a similar ignorance.
Never could I speak to Gertrude about this, for she might well reproach herself for indirectly causing her first husband’s death. If she’d argued just a little harder for the marriage. . .that was where her mind would take her.
Nor could I speak to Laertes. He had enough misery.
Dear God, but I wanted someone to talk to, but a king’s lot must needs be lonely, his burdens heavy beyond bearing, and only death can bring him to lay them aside.
Laertes and I did come to an accord on one matter, and that was our blaming Hamlet for Polonius’s murder. Yes, it is wicked to hold a lunatic responsible for his rash acts, but a man’s nature can only endure so much and no more, and we had reached our limit. When I received notice that Hamlet had somehow slipped his watchers’ leash and was returned to Denmark it was too great for either of us to continue without taking action. Laertes was all for waylaying him on the road or cutting his throat as he prayed in church, but I with a cooler head and more experience had a better plan. Ironically, it was with Ophelia’s unknowing help.
While visiting Polonius’s chambers, ostensibly to sort out state papers, I also made a sortie to the maid’s own room. It was in considerable disorder as might be expected given her deranged state, but there did I find all the evidence needed to confirm that it was she who murdered my brother. Upon a long bench did she store and refine her perfumes and potions, and in certain bottles hidden behind more innocent distillations she kept the deadly results of her shadowy delvings. There was no mistaking them. Though the bottles were sardonically labeled with names like Heart’s Desire and Maiden’s Wish they stank foul of the grave. I took them away with me, confident she would not miss them now and in secret tested each on vermin supplied to me by the castle rat catcher.
It was frightening to see the effect of her dire inventions, more so to realize that she’d gone unsuspected all these months. At any time she might have taken it into her head to deliver a cruel finish to all of us had she chosen.
But I mentioned none of this to Laertes and only produced one of the poisons, along with a design to remove Hamlet’s destructive presence from us altogether. All Laertes
had to do was meet his father’s murderer and make a public reconciliation with him. Then they would conduct an apparently friendly passage of arms as a means to settle a wager. During the course of their demonstration I would see to it Hamlet drank from my own cup of wine. Within the hour he would be dead, seemingly from overexertion, and that would be the end of the matter. It is not unknown for an otherwise fit and hearty man to fall if pressed to his limits. His mother would be sore grieved, but hold none to blame and accept it as God’s will.
Some might think this a cold and malicious action on my part, but along with the burdens of rule it is also a king’s grim lot to order the execution of those who threaten the stability of the state. I would have been entirely within my royal duty and powers to have him arrested and beheaded the same night of the old man’s murder. Only my love for Gertrude held me back from meting out justice.
Laertes then surprised me by also producing a poisonous unction. The smallest scratch would finish Hamlet off, he said. I knew he’d bought it to commit royal murder on my nephew and perhaps even myself, but held back from comment. I, the king, was about to sanction that nephew’s death, changing it from murder to a lawful execution by my word alone. Besides, Hamlet was dying already, we were but speeding the process. Such was my power, and Heaven knows I took no pride in it.
For all that sorrow, the thought came to me of who to declare as my heir once Hamlet was gone. With the troubles that issue from bearing the weight of a heavy crown, it was not a responsibility I would willingly lay upon anyone. I had discussed several possibilities with dear Polonius, one of whom was Laertes himself. He was a good and studious man, perhaps too good of heart to be a ruler, for one is often required to do unpleasant acts for the health of the state. But his fiery resolution to avenge his father, tempered by his willingness to hear my side before taking rash action decided me to name him my heir after the duel.
