Leon Garfield's Shakespeare Stories

by Leon Garfield

  “Call ’em,” commanded Macbeth; “let me see ’em.”

  The weird sisters obeyed. They poured blood into the cauldron, and presently there arose from it, wreathed in smoke and wearing a warlike helmet, a severed head. It hovered in the air and stared at Macbeth.

  “Tell me, thou unknown power . . .” he began; but one of the sisters bade him only listen, as the apparition already knew what he had come to ask.

  “Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth,” it chanted; “beware Macduff! Beware the Thane of Fife!”

  Then the head dissolved and its place was taken by another, even stranger sight. There floated in the air before him an infant, a little child all streaked with blood.

  “Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth,” it piped. “Be bloody, bold and resolute . . . for none of woman born shall harm Macbeth!”

  He would have asked more, but this second apparition had already vanished, and its place was taken by a third. Another child. But now it was a child wearing a crown and holding out the branch of a tree.

  “Macbeth shall never vanquished be,” this apparition told him, “until great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane hill shall come against him.”

  “That will never be!” cried Macbeth, as the third apparition sank into smoky nothingness. What he had been told lifted up his heart and bewitched his spirits as if with wine! No man born of woman could ever harm him; and he would never fall till Birnam Wood came to Dunsinane. Such things could never happen, so he would never fall!

  Yet there was still one thing he wanted to know. “Shall Banquo’s issue ever reign in this kingdom?” he asked. “Seek to know no more,” he was told. But he insisted, and, at length, he had his answer. Before his peering eyes the cauldron sank away and out of the thick air, silent and gleaming, there stalked a procession of kings. One by one they passed him by, each with a stare and each with a nod: five; six; seven; eight in all. And then came Banquo! Banquo, thick and clotted with blood. He pointed to the last of the kings who held up a glass; and in the glass were kings and more kings, stretching out into future time. Banquo smiled. Those kings to come were his!

  Suddenly Macbeth was alone. Banquo, the kings and the weird sisters had vanished.

  “Where are they?” he cried wildly. “Gone! Let this pernicious hour stand aye accursed in the calendar!”

  Banquo’s children would be kings. Macbeth would be barren. He himself was the beginning and the end of his line. But that was in the future. Present matters needed present action. That very day he sent men to murder Macduff.

  But Macduff had forestalled him. He had fled to England and joined Malcolm, dead King Duncan’s son. But he had left his wife and children behind.

  “Where is your husband?” demanded Macbeth’s murderers as they burst into her home.

  She would not tell them; so they killed her, and all her children, and every living soul in the house.

  In England, in peaceful, sunlit England, Malcolm and Macduff talked together of the sad plight of their own land that lay under the shadow of the tyrant King. Presently a messenger approached, a nobleman from Scotland. His looks were strange, his speech, halting.

  “How does my wife?” asked Macduff.

  “Why, well.”

  “And all my children?”

  “Well too.”

  “The tyrant has not battered at their peace?”

  “No. They were well at peace when I did leave ’em.”

  Then the messenger could keep back his terrible news no longer.

  “Your castle is surprised, your wife and babes savagely slaughtered.”

  The great blow fell. Grief turned Macduff to stone. The world was empty for him now. Nothing remained but revenge.

  Macbeth had gone to Dunsinane, and with him, like a painted shadow, went his Queen. Malcolm and Macduff were marching against him and he must needs prepare for war. He had no fear. No man born of woman could ever harm him, and he would not be vanquished till Birnam Wood should move and come to Dunsinane. Those were the promises of Fate. Yet he must be ready because Fate, he knew of old, needed a helping hand.

  It was night in the castle of Dunsinane, and two figures stood close together in the dark hall. One was a doctor, the other a waiting-woman of the Queen.

  “When was it she last walked?” asked the doctor, quietly.

  “Since His Majesty went into the field.”

  “Besides her walking, and other actual performances, what, at any time, have you heard her say?”

  “That, sir, which I will not report after her.”

  “You may, to me . . .”

  “Neither to you nor anyone,” said the waiting-woman. “Lo you! Here she comes.”

  It was the Queen. She carried a taper and was in her night attire. Her eyes were open; but she was asleep.

  “What is it she does now?” whispered the doctor. “Look how she rubs her hands.”

  “It is an accustomed action with her,” murmured the woman, “to seem thus washing her hands. I have known her continue in this a quarter of an hour.”

  “Hark! She speaks,” said the doctor eagerly; and he and the waiting-woman listened intently to the strange mutterings of the Queen.

  “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!” Her hands seemed to gnaw at each other like feverish mice, and the taper tipped and tilted, making wild shadows behind her. Then she cried out, in a voice that filled the listeners with horror: “Who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?”

  “She has spoke what she should not,” whispered the waiting-woman. “I am sure of that.”

  Then her mistress, the Queen, still rubbing at her hands, complained that the smell of blood would not go; and she who had once told her husband that a little water cleared them of the deed, now cried out in anguish:

  “All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand!” Then she drifted away. “To bed, to bed,” she sighed. “What’s done cannot be undone. To bed, to bed, to bed.”

  Malcolm and his army drew near. Already Birnam Wood was before them. It was thick and leafy.

  “Let every soldier hew him down a bough,” commanded Malcolm, “and bear it before him . . .”

  Quickly it was done, and presently it seemed that Birnam Wood itself was moving towards Dunsinane.

  Macbeth, secure in his prophecies, awaited the oncoming army. Suddenly he heard a cry, a desolate cry of women. Once, such a sound would have alarmed him; but now he was past all feeling, past all fear. Wearily he asked the reason for the cry.

  “The Queen, my Lord, is dead,” he was told.

  He shrugged his shoulders. “She should have died hereafter,” he sighed. “There would have been a time for such a word. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time . . .”

  A messenger broke in upon his life-weariness, a messenger amazed and scarcely able to speak. He had been watching from a hill, and, as he watched, it had seemed to him that Birnam Wood was moving, moving towards Dunsinane.

  “Liar and slave!” shouted Macbeth, rousing himself. Rage filled him, not against Malcolm, nor even against Macduff, but against the weird sisters, the Fates! They had deceived and entrapped him into destroying the great man that once he had been.

  “They have tied me to a stake,” he cried, “I cannot fly, but bear-like I must fight the course. What’s he that was not born of woman? Such a one am I to fear, or none.”

  This last promise sustained him as he rushed from the castle to face his enemies. He fought like a giant, for who could harm him? His life, though he valued it at nothing, was charmed. Then, in the smoke of battle, he came face to face with Macduff.

  “Of all men else I have avoided thee,” he cried. “But get thee back; my soul is too much charged with blood of thine already.”

  “I have no words; my voice is in my sword!” shouted Macduff, and rushed upon him.

  “I bear a charmed life,” warned Macbeth, parrying his enemy’s blows, “which must not yield to on
e of woman born!”

  “Despair thy charm!” panted Macduff, his murdered wife and children ever in his thoughts. “Macduff was from his mother’s womb untimely ripped!”

  The last promise had been broken, and the last prophecy fulfilled. The end had come. Nothing now remained for him but to perish bravely, like the soldier that he had been.

  “Lay on, Macduff!” he cried, his sword and shield grasped firmly. “And damned be him that first cries, ‘Hold, enough!’ ”

  They fought, and Macduff killed Macbeth. Then he cut off his head and carried it, dripping, to Malcolm, the new King. He held it up on high, and its sightless glare bore witness to the double truth of Fate.

  Much Ado About Nothing

  Signior Benedick of Padua was a man’s man, and he cared not who knew it! While his master, Don Pedro, Prince of Arragon, had perfumed and barbered himself like a smirking bridegroom for his visit to old Leonato, the Governor of Messina, and all the Prince’s officers were polished like brass candlesticks, he, Benedick, had scorned to change his soldier’s attire, and he wore a beard as fierce as a bush.

  They were in Leonato’s clipped and trellised garden which seemed, to his soldier’s eye, absolutely infested with all the taffeta ladies of Messina, flouncing and fluttering their fans like monstrous butterflies. Most heartily he wished himself back on the battlefield. However, he was gentleman enough not to say so, and to stifle his yawns as Don Pedro and Leonato exchanged interminable compliments.

  “I think this is your daughter,” said Don Pedro, bowing to a simpering miss by name of Hero, who peeped out from under her cap like a mouse in an attic.

  “Her mother hath many times told me so,” said Leonato with a little laugh, and laid a fond arm about his daughter’s shoulders.

  This was too much! “Were you in doubt, sir, that you asked her?” said Benedick, who could not endure affectation. At once, he was taken to task by Don Pedro. He defended himself vigorously; when a sharp, cold voice interrupted:

  “I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior Benedick, nobody marks you.”

  It was, of course, Beatrice, Leonato’s niece, who’d spoken. He’d seen her from the first, in her daffodil gown, spying him out with her cat’s eyes, and, as usual, biding her time to pounce. He’d hoped that, for once, she’d hold her tongue; but no!

  “What, my dear Lady Disdain,” said he, as if surprised that a person of such insignificance should address him, “are you yet living?”

  She flew at him like a fury, with insults that a fish-wife might have shrunk from. He parried as best he could, and delivered some sharp thrusts of his own, which, he was pleased to see, brought fire into the lady’s cheeks and smiles to the faces of the eager audience. Nonetheless, he was not sorry when Leonato laughingly interposed to invite the company into his mansion.

  Two remained behind: Benedick, who needed time to compose himself after his brisk encounter with that harpy, Beatrice, and his friend young Claudio the Florentine, who had been making-sheep’s eyes at the Governor’s meek daughter.

  “In mine eye, she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on!” sighed Claudio.

  Benedick shrugged his shoulders. “I can see yet without spectacles,” said he, “and I see no such matter. There’s her cousin, and she were not possessed of a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty as the first of May doth the last of December.” This was true. Though he disliked her heartily, he had to admit that Beatrice was indeed beautiful. He looked at Claudio sharply. “But I hope you have no intent to turn husband, have you?”

  Alas! that was Claudio’s intention. Benedick threw up his hands in disgust. “Is’t come to this?” he cried, outraged that any man, in full possession of his senses, should thrust his neck into the yoke of matrimony and lose his glorious freedom. “Shall I never see a bachelor of threescore again?” he mourned, and was about to depart when Don Pedro came out of the Governor’s mansion to see what had detained his two officers.

  Benedick lost no time in telling him. “He is in love,” he said contemptuously, and pointed to Claudio. “With who? Mark how short his answer is. With Hero, Leonato’s short daughter.”

  But Don Pedro did not share Benedick’s scorn. He respected Claudio’s feelings, and, turning to Benedick, prophesied, “I shall see thee, ere I die, look pale with love.”

  Benedick shook his head. “With anger, with sickness, or with hunger, my lord,” he promised, “not with love.”

  “Well, if ever thou dost fall—”

  “If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, and shoot at me!” cried Benedick; and off he went, laughing.

  Don Pedro shook his head. He turned to Claudio. He felt a fatherly concern for the young man. The innocence of young love touched him deeply.

  “My liege, your highness may now do me good,” murmured Claudio, with an anxious look in his eyes. Don Pedro smiled encouragingly; and the lover put the question that was troubling him. “Hath Leonato any son, my lord?”

  Don Pedro was a little taken aback. Young love, it seemed, had a practical turn of mind. “No child but Hero,” he told Claudio, “she is his only heir.”

  Claudio’s brow cleared; till another doubt struck him. Would not his love seem too sudden to be believed? But Don Pedro reassured him. He himself would undertake the campaign to win fair Hero’s heart for his young friend. That night, there was to be music and dancing in Leonato’s house. The gentlemen would be masked, so that he, Don Pedro, would be able to present himself as Claudio, and, with his superior skill, woo the innocent Hero in Claudio’s name. “And the conclusion is,” said he, with an all-conquering smile, “she shall be thine!”

  While young Claudio’s heart overflowed with gratitude to his kindly master, there was one who wished that princely gentleman to the devil: his bastard brother, the grim-faced, black-suited, black-hearted Don John. In the late war, Don John had fought against him; and, in the happy flush of victory, Don Pedro had forgiven him. For this gracious act, Don John hated him the more. “I had rather be a canker in a hedge, than a rose in his grace,” he muttered to his smooth-faced follower, Conrade; then he scowled heavily as sounds of revelry from Leonato’s supper-table drifted faintly into his apartment as the door was opened.

  “What news, Borachio?” he demanded, as another of his followers appeared.

  The news was of a betrothal. Borachio, a slippery lurker behind curtains, hedges and doors, had overheard Don Pedro and Claudio. Don John’s thin lips grew tight as a miser’s purse. “That young start-up,” he remembered, with savage anger, “hath all the glory of my overthrow. If I can cross him any way, I bless myself every way. You are both sure, and will assist me?” His companions nodded. “Let us to the great supper,” said Don John; and, with poison in his thoughts, led the way. “Would the cook were o’ my mind!”

  The supper was over, and the music for dancing about to begin. Leonato, with the ladies of his household, awaited the arrival of the masked gentlemen. “By my troth, niece,” warned Leonato, as Beatrice set about demolishing all mankind with her sharp wit, “thou wilt never get thee a husband, if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue!” But Beatrice was unrepentant, and continued with her abuse until the musicians struck up a lively measure, and the maskers appeared.

  Benedick, perspiring behind his mask, watched the pairing-off of the dancers with high contempt. There went the courtly Don Pedro, invisible behind a fantastical monkey face, leading off the timid Hero, and already murmuring Claudio’s love in her trembling pink ear. And there, with a golden countenance of youth (with all its teeth) hitched over his waggling old head, went Leonato’s brother Antonio, happy in the possession of a pretty young woman.

  Suddenly Benedick became aware that he was alone. All the maskers and all the ladies, save one, had joined the dance. Beatrice awaited him. He cursed his ill-luck, and made a hideous face behind his mask. She smiled. Plainly, she had not recognized him. He offered his arm. She took it, and away they went, warily.

  After a little while, he took
the opportunity, in a skilfully disguised voice, of relating some witty abuse of Beatrice that he said he’d overheard, but declined to reveal who’d uttered it.

  “Well, this was Signior Benedick that said so,” she said contemptuously.

  “What’s he?” inquired Benedick, in as off-hand a manner as he could manage.

  “I am sure you know him well enough,” said Beatrice, staring sharply into the slits that were his eyes. “He is the Prince’s jester, a very dull fool.”

  Benedick burned with indignation; but thereafter thought it wisest to hold his tongue. At last, the dancing was ended, the company dispersed about the room, and the gentlemen unmasked. Benedick found himself addressed by his master, Don Pedro.

  “The Lady Beatrice hath a quarrel to you,” said he, wagging a reproachful finger. “The gentleman that danced with her told her she is much wronged by you.”

  “O, she misused me past the endurance of a block!” cried Benedick, outraged. “She speaks poniards, and every word stabs!”

  “Look, here she comes,” said Don Pedro, warningly.

  “Will your Grace command me any service to the world’s end?” begged Benedick. “I will go on the slightest errand, rather than hold three words’ conference with this harpy!” and off he went.

  Don Pedro laughed to see his valiant officer scuttle from the field before a blow had been struck; then he turned to Claudio, who, together with Hero and her father, accompanied the Lady Beatrice. He had good news for the young man. “Here, Claudio,” said he with an air of modest pride, “I have woo’d in thy name, and fair Hero is won. I have broke with her father, and his good will obtained.”

  Leonato nodded in vigorous confirmation, and Claudio was speechless with delight.

  “Speak, Count, ’tis your cue,” prompted Beatrice.

  “Silence is the perfectest herald of joy,” sighed Claudio, gazing at the blushing Hero. “Lady, as you are mine, I am yours. I give away myself for you.”

  “Good Lord, for alliance!” cried Beatrice. “Thus goes everyone to the world but I. I may sit in a corner and cry ‘Heigh-ho for a husband!’ ” and she laughed.