The sky turned black, and drops of rain began to fall.
“For many miles about there’s scarce a bush!” pleaded Gloucester, forlornly hoping to move Lear’s daughters to pity for the shelterless old man.
They shrugged their shoulders. In a world of reason, there was no room for pity. However harsh the lesson, their father must learn that he was now no more than a beggar with a crown.
“Shut up your doors, my Lord,” advised the Duke of Cornwall, grasping the old Earl by the arm. “Come out o’ the storm.” Helplessly the Earl was drawn back into the castle, and the doors were shut with a dreadful sound. Then the sky exploded with wrath!
It was a night such as no man had ever known before. It was a night of glares and roars, of wild winds and hugely down-rushing torrents of rain, of sudden sights of a world in ruins, stark, bare and broken, thrown up blindingly fierce, then plunged into blackness again.
“Where’s the King?” shouted Kent, streaming, sodden Kent; then saw him, running hither and thither, shrieking and shaking his fists at the storm for joining with his monstrous daughters to batter down his old white head.
“I am a man more sinned against than sinning!” he howled, in frantic protests against the horrible injustice of the elements, that blindly punished guilty and innocent, oppressor and victim alike. The soaked Fool, clinging to his mad master with a mouse-like grip, wailed for him to beg his daughters to let them back inside the dark castle, over which lightnings forked and glared.
Desperately Kent tried to lead them away, for the old King would have died in the storm. At first, Lear resisted; then his wits, which were flickering like a windy candle, grew steady, and he saw the shivering misery of the Fool, his only faithful child. “Come on, my boy,” he urged with great tenderness, and consented to be led. “In, boy, you go first,” he said, as Kent brought them to the best shelter he could find, a poor hovel, as sadly tattered as a beggar’s pocket.
But it was not so empty. Within was another wanderer in the storm, another outcast from the castle. Edgar, the Earl of Gloucester’s falsely accused son, had taken refuge there. But it was no longer the smiling Edgar of courts and fine clothes. Hunted and hounded and in danger of his life, he had hidden himself in a shape of wild and pitiful horror. A madman! A grinning, scowling, shouting, naked madman, such as the many who wandered the land and plagued the countryside with howls and shrieks and glarings in the night!
“Help me! help me!” cried the Fool, flying from the hovel in terror, as, after him, with staring looks and whirling words, came the madman! The wind howled, the rain pelted down, and a huge flash of lightning exposed the naked wretch, all tangled with scratches from the flaying of briars.
“Didst thou give all to thy daughters?” pondered the King, shaking his dazed and battered head. “And art thou come to this?”
“Who gives anything to poor Tom?” wondered the madman; then he and the King discoursed weirdly with one another, sense and madness coming and going, and, like the storm’s flickerings, now illuminating, now plunging them into dreadful darkness.
“Look!” cried out the Fool. “Here comes a walking fire!”
A torch, hissing and smoking, was weaving through the night, and the Earl of Gloucester, fear and pity shining in his flame-lit eyes, came stumbling towards them. Although forbidden to help the King, he had crept secretly from the castle to find his old master and bring him to a farm-building nearby, where food and a fire had been prepared. “What! hath your Grace no better company?” he asked in dismay, when he found the King in deep talk with the mad beggar. He no more knew his son naked than he had really known him in his best attire.
But the King would not be parted from his new companion, so all followed the Earl as he led them, secretly, to shelter. “No words, no words,” he whispered, as they drew near the castle. “Hush!”
“Child Roland to the dark tower came,” mumbled the madman, staring up at the grim bulk. “His word was still: fie, foh, and fum, I smell the blood of a British man.”
The room was humble, but there was food on the table and a fire in the hearth; there were rough country stools and a rough country bed, on which the Earl had laid cushions more fit for a King. “I will not be long from you,” he promised Kent, and returned to the castle to see what else he could bring for the comfort of the broken King.
The storm was weakening; wind and rain dwindled, and the thunder sank to a grumbling. Kent begged the King to lie down; but he would not. He had important business first. His daughters must be brought to trial. Their crimes? Hard hearts and ingratitude. Their judges? The madman, the Fool and Kent. The King himself would give evidence.
“Arraign her first,” he said, pointing accusingly at a stool; “ ’tis Goneril. I here take my oath before this honourable assembly she kicked the poor King, her father.”
Kent turned aside, and even Edgar, the false madman, could scarce hold back his tears for the flickering ruin of King Lear’s mind. Only the Fool, his spirits lifted by warmth and comfort, supported his master in his madness.
“We’ll go to supper i’ the morning,” said the King, with a gracious gesture, as at last he lay down on the bed.
“And I’ll go to bed at noon,” said the Fool, fondly mocking his master’s flourish and tone.
The King was sleeping when Gloucester returned. His face was pale, his voice trembled. Lear’s daughters were planning their father’s death. The King must leave at once. There was a cart waiting that would carry him to Dover. “Come, help to bear thy master,” said Kent to the Fool, as he and Gloucester between them, lifted the still sleeping King. “Thou must not stay behind.”
The King had gone and the naked madman had crept away. The night was quiet and a few faint stars pricked through the tatters of the sky. There was a sudden noise of horses, galloping, then it died away. The castle was dark, and its fanged battlements seemed to strike at the sky. The Earl of Gloucester, his act of mercy done, went back inside.
They were waiting for him, the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall. The Duchess of Albany and Edmund, his son, had left him to face Regan and her terrible husband. They had discovered he had helped the King; and worse, they had found the letter telling of the French landing and Cordelia’s return.
He was seized by the Duke’s servants and bound tightly to a chair.
“You are my guests: do me no foul play, friends!” he pleaded, staring up into the eyes where pity had never shone. For answer, Regan leaned forward and mockingly plucked at his beard. He cried out in shocked amazement.
Then the Duke began to question him . . . about the King, about the letter. Why had he sent the King to Dover? He was a traitor and was conspiring with the enemy. Why else had he sent the King to Dover? Again and again he shook his head.
“Wherefore to Dover?” repeated Regan, with fierce insistence.
“Because I would not see thy cruel nails pluck out his poor old eyes!” cried out the Earl, driven at last to pour out all the pent-up anger in his heart against Lear’s monstrous children; and he prayed that he might live to see vengeance overtake them!
“See it thou never shall!” shouted the Duke and, while servants held the old Earl firmly, he reached out, and, with sharp fingers, tore out one of his eyes!
“The other, too!” urged Regan eagerly, as if the old man’s shrieks and screams of agony had made her hot for more.
“Hold your hand, my Lord!” cried out a servant, scarce able to believe what his master had done. The Duke turned on him. Swords were out. They fought. The servant wounded his master; then paid for his brave humanity by losing it. Regan stabbed him from behind.
“My Lord,” breathed the dying man to Gloucester, “you have one eye left to see some mischief on him . . .” But the Duke, scowling heavily from his wound, shook his head. “Out, vile jelly!” he panted, and, with red nails, clawed out the other eye.
Gloucester was in darkness and unimagined pain. “Where is my son Edmund?” he moaned. Only to be told that it was Edmund who
had betrayed him to the monsters in the castle. Then he knew what eyes had never let him see: that he, like the old King, had cast out the true child and had cherished the worst.
“Go thrust him out at gates,” ordered Regan contemptuously, “and let him smell his way to Dover.”
He was led away; and servants, out of sight of their mistress and master, soothed his bleeding face with whites of eggs, and gently bandaged over his horrible lack of eyes. It was morning when he stumbled out of the castle gates, though night to him. Everywhere, broken trees, weeping hedgerows and ruined fields bore witness to the fury that had been outside; the old Earl, with two red flowers for eyes, bore witness to the savagery that had been within.
An ancient countryman, a tenant of the Earl’s, saw him fumbling the air, and was at once filled with pity. He took him by the hand and led him away from the castle. Gloucester begged him to go away, for he feared that any who helped him would suffer for it, even as he had suffered for helping the King.
“You cannot see your way,” answered the ancient one, as if that was reason enough for setting pity above common sense. So they wandered on, the tenant carefully keeping his blind lord out of the ditches that ran, like silver sores, along the sides of the road.
Edgar was on that road, and he saw the old countryman leading his father. Then he saw his father’s eyeless face, and horror seized him, and wild disbelief!
“ ’Tis poor mad Tom,” said the countryman, recognizing the naked madman who stood, staring and trembling in their way.
“Is that the naked fellow?” asked Gloucester, remembering the King’s strange companion in the storm; and when he heard that it was indeed the same fellow, he asked poor Tom to lead him to Dover. But first he begged the countryman to fetch some clothing for his naked guide.
“I’ll bring the best ’parel that I have!” promised the old fellow, and hastened away to his poor cottage, as if it was a treasure-house, overflowing with plenty. While they waited, Gloucester told his guide of a certain cliff near to Dover, that reared high above the sea. It was to the top of this cliff that he wished to be taken; for it was in his mind to end his miseries by plunging from that place.
“Give me thy arm,” answered Edgar, in poor Tom’s voice, for he dared not trust his own. “Poor Tom shall lead thee.”
Serpents do not sicken from their own venom, but men do. Already Lear’s evil daughters and Gloucester’s evil son were being poisoned by the very instruments that had brought them power: greed, lust, cruelty, envy and ambition. The Duke of Cornwall was dead; he had died of the wound given him by his servant. Regan, his widow, lusted for Edmund, the handsome new Earl of Gloucester; so also did her sister Goneril, Duchess of Albany, who loathed and despised her own husband, whose mild nature shrank from his wife’s merciless strength. The two sisters hated each other; and Edmund, smiling, clever Edmund, who had sworn undying affection to both of them, cared not which murdered the other for love of him, for he loved himself far better.
The Duke of Albany, a weak but honourable man, who had grieved for what had become of the King, rejoiced when he learned that the Duke of Cornwall had perished for his monstrous cruelty to Gloucester; and it was only because of the threat to the kingdom itself that he joined forces with Regan and Edmund, and marched upon Dover.
The land trembled under the tread of bony soldiers and gaunt horses; and the banners of Albany, Cornwall and Gloucester streamed out over the two Duchesses, who rode more murderously against each other, than against the invading French. Edmund rode with Regan, who, being widowed, had the better claim; so Goneril sent Oswald, her steward, with a letter to Edmund, begging him to murder the Duke of Albany: then she would be a widow, too.
But when Oswald arrived, Edmund had gone. He had ridden on ahead to seek out his father and kill him, before his wretched state moved too many to anger against those who had brought him to it.
“What might import my sister’s letter?” asked Regan, staring at the sealed paper and consumed with jealous suspicions.
“I know not, my Lady,” answered the steward.
She did not believe him. “I’ll love thee much,” she offered coaxingly. “Let me unseal the letter.”
But Oswald was faithful; so Regan was forced to content herself with hiding her anger and telling the steward to warn his mistress that Edmund was not for her. Then, as Oswald rode on after Edmund, Regan called out, as a bloody afterthought, that he would be well rewarded if he found the blind Earl of Gloucester and killed him.
The blind old Earl, his wounds congealed to two black clusters, wandered in a field not far from Dover. Edgar, still unknown, led him by the hand.
“When shall I come to the top of that same hill?” he asked, wearily.
“You do climb up it now,” answered Edgar.
“Methinks the ground is even,” said the blind man.
“Horrible steep,” promised Edgar, and, with breaking heart, persuaded his father that he stood at the very summit of a cliff so high that it made the brain sway to look down.
The blind man knelt and, giving all he had of value to his guide, took his last farewell of the world. Then he leaped, and fell, foolishly, face forward on the ground.
Edgar ran towards him, and, in a changed voice but still not his own, exclaimed in wonderment that the blind man had not been dashed to pieces! that he was unharmed! that it was not to be believed that he had fallen so far and dropped as gently as a feather! “Thy life’s a miracle!” he declared; and prayed that the great shock his father had sustained would bring him out of the utter darkness of the spirit. He could not endure for his father to die in despair. Anxiously he watched the blind face turn from side to side, watching its looks change, until at last disbelief and misery softened. . .
“Henceforth,” sighed Gloucester, “I’ll bear affliction . . .”
“Bear free and patient thoughts,” murmured Edgar, gently raising his father. “But who comes here?”
A strange fantastic figure was wandering through the high-grown corn; a mad, wild old man, stuck all over with wild flowers, and crowned with weeds. It was King Lear. He had escaped from his attendants, who, even now, were searching for him to bring him to Cordelia.
“No, they cannot touch me for coining,” he announced weirdly. “I am the King himself.”
“I know that voice!” cried Gloucester.
“Ha! Goneril with a white beard!” said the King, as if Gloucester’s horrible eyes reminded him of his daughter’s. Then he talked reproachfully about the world, which he no longer liked; and the wind and the rain which had made him unhappy and given him pains in his bones, even though people had told him he was the King. Then he recognized Gloucester and jeered at his lost sight. Then he strayed to talking about men and women, all of whom filled him with disgust. He shuddered and shut his eyes. They were all liars, cheats, lechers and thieves, with nothing but lies to choose between them. Then his frantic mind, which had buzzed like a wasp over all the wide universe, came back to his children. His eyes blazed. “Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill!” he screamed; and began to run away, for he had seen his attendants coming for him.
This way and that way he capered, to avoid outstretched arms. “Come and you get it!” he shouted. “You shall get it by running! Sa, sa, sa, sa!” And away he went, weeds and flowers falling from him everywhere, and his attendants running after.
Briefly a gentleman stayed to talk with Edgar of the poor King’s state, and of Cordelia, the daughter who truly loved him. The French army had moved on, to do battle with the advancing British, but she was waiting for her father.
“How near’s the other army?” asked Edgar, anxious for his own father’s safety.
“Near, and on speedy foot,” answered the gentleman. Edgar thanked him, and, when he had gone, began to lead his father away.
There was a horseman galloping along the road, a dainty horseman with plumes in his hat and a letter tucked importantly in his belt. Seeing the blind man, he reined in and dismounted. �
�A proclaimed prize!” he cried, his eyes bright with thoughts of advancement. “Most happy!” It was Oswald, and he drew his sword to kill the blind traitor. But Edgar opposed him. “Out, dunghill!” Oswald shouted, struggling fiercely; but the dunghill proved the better man, and Oswald fell, dying, to the ground. With his last breath he begged Edgar to bury his body and not leave it to rot in the air, and to take the letter he carried to Edmund, Earl of Gloucester. Then he died.
Edgar took the letter, and opened it. As he read it his hand trembled and his face grew pale, for the villainy in Goneril’s letter to his brother showed him a world more monstrous than ever he could have imagined. As he crouched, wondering what he should do, he heard the sound of distant drums.
The running King had been caught. Gentle hands had taken him, and tended him, and washed him, and put him in fine soft clothes.
“How does my royal Lord? How fares Your Majesty?” asked a low, soft voice he thought he knew; and above him, with smiling lips and eyes bright with tears, was a countenance he remembered as from an old dream.
“Sir, do you know me?” asked the lady.
He pondered the matter deeply, then answered as truthfully as he could: “Pray do not mock me: I am a very foolish, fond old man . . . and to deal plainly, I fear I am not in my perfect mind. Methinks I should know you and know this man.”
The Earl of Kent, who was standing beside Cordelia, bowed his head as his heart broke.
“Do not laugh at me,” said the King anxiously, “for as I am a man, I think this lady to be my child Cordelia.”
“And so I am, I am!” wept Cordelia; and King Lear’s darkness lifted, and the world shone, as he embraced the child he had banished from his favour, but never from his heart.
The Duke of Albany, mild and courteous even in steel, had been given a letter. He and his Duchess, together with Regan and Edmund, had been walking among the iron forest of their joined forces, pausing here and there to talk with captains, and to glance along the corpse-faces of their soldiers, when a roughly dressed fellow, his face half hidden under a peasant’s hood, beckoned to him. He stepped aside, leaving his wife and her sister, with Edmund between them, to walk on. Then the fellow had thrust a paper into his hand, begging him to read it before the battle, and alone. The Duke had asked him to wait, but he would not. He had hastened away, saying that he would return when a herald’s trumpet should sound for a champion to come forward and answer for what the letter contained. When the fellow had gone, the Duke read the letter. His hand shook and his face grew pale, even as Edgar’s had done. It was his wife’s letter to Edmund, contriving his own murder. Edgar had given it to him. The Duke put the letter away and rejoined Edmund and the two sisters. He said nothing, for the battle drums had begun to roll and thunder.
Leon Garfield's Shakespeare Stories Page 4
