by Simon Mayo
‘Bravo!’ said King Dick, walking from the shadows. ‘Best I seen. No need to jump away like that …’ He leaned against the stage, beckoned them closer. They exchanged the briefest of glances. Joe pulled his breeches back on, then they both sat on the edge of the stage, Joe still rebuttoning. The King, freshly shaved, with a full complement of rings and a green shirt which appeared to be clean as well as pressed, rapped his fingers on the stage. ‘But that was … that was too good.’ He fixed Joe, then Habs, with the most solemn of stares, every muscle in his face tight, every scar pronounced. ‘We lost the kiss but, you act like that, might as well put it straight back in. You can fight like you mean it, drink like you mean it and, God knows, you gotta die like you mean it. But you gotta embrace like you don’t. Like you are brothers’ll be fine. Embrace like it’s the only goddamn sign of affection between you, not jus’ the first of many. Am I clear on this?’
‘So it was too good?’ Habs immediately regretted the defiant tone of his voice.
‘Good enough to stop the play, Mr Snow,’ said the King, his anger rising to the surface. He seemed to grow taller still as he pulled the bearskin forward on his head. ‘Good enough to get you in the cachot, and good enough for a lynchin’. This play is what we got. This is it. Our company is good. You two are good. We got one more performance here, and the goddamn Agent is comin’, and Mrs goddamn Shortland is comin’, and comin’ here. To Four. Not to Three, not to Seven, but here, where the Negroes are. To see their English Shakespeare performed by coloured American sailors. ’Fore the Agent leaves tonight, he will know that, he loses us – if he loses the men o’ Four – the whole goddamn prison is lost. But if the men o’ Four are busy bein’ outraged ’bout what you two doin’ on stage, we lost everythin’. Everythin’ is gone.’
Habs couldn’t get his words out quickly enough. ‘Sorry, King Dick,’ he said. ‘I never meant …’
‘I know what you meant. I’m jus’ tellin’ you to be careful.’ The King gave the weariest of sighs.
‘We will,’ said Habs.
‘And John Haywood should see all this,’ said the King, waving at the scenery. ‘Both Shortlands know what’s happenin’ here; would do him good.’
‘We’ll tell him,’ said Joe.
The King nodded. ‘And the dress is a good fit, Mr Snow. You like it, Mr Hill? It’ll do the job, I reckon.’
‘I do, sir, yes. We came up to rehearse Act Five and our dying lines, but then …’ He pulled at the dress fabric.
‘You got distracted.’ He looked at them closely for a moment. ‘It happens. How do you die, Mr Hill?’
Joe looked upstage. ‘You want us to show you?’
‘Jus’ where you are’ll be fine.’
Joe closed his eyes, miming a short knife held between his hands. ‘O happy dagger. This is thy sheath. There rust and let me die.’ He made two short stabbing moves to his stomach, then fell sideways, away from Habs. The King nodded.
‘O’ course. And you, Mr Snow? Remind me.’
Habs held up an imaginary cup, the King raising his arms as if to conduct the moment. ‘Here’s to my love,’ said Habs, then drank and clutched at his stomach. ‘O true apothecary, thy drugs are quick,’ he said, swaying. ‘Thus with a kiss I die.’ Slowly, he lay back on the stage.
‘Good,’ said the King. ‘Very good. And there’s the warnin’ – it’s right there in the play. You kiss, you die.’
5.8
Block Six
12.05 p.m.
THEY NOW HAD three functioning scraping tools. Small enough to be hidden in a palm, strong enough to carve cement, they had been constructed from floorboard wood, threads of hammock rope and discarded, sharpened keys. During the game, they had been passed from hand to hand; now, they were all in Horace Cobb’s jacket pocket, his left fist enclosing them. He eyed the militia on the military walk.
‘Shock of their lives,’ he growled to Lane, who followed his eyes and guessed the rest. His hands, too, were thrust deep in pockets, one closed around the cartridges, the other around the pistol.
‘It’ll be quite a sight,’ he said. ‘Yankee men against English boys. And boys that most probably never seen a battle. Barely even fired a rifle.’
‘The most dangerous kind of soldier,’ said Cobb. ‘They won’t have a clue.’
The courtyard was teeming with men. A gentle westerly had allowed the temperature to rise and, when the sun eased through the clouds, a few corners of the yard enjoyed what, in Dartmoor, passed as warmth. From one of these, by the back of Seven, the Rough Allies observed both the British and their own handiwork.
‘I’m tryin’ not to stare at the hole we’re makin’,’ Lane muttered, looking skywards. Cobb inspected the unlit cigarillo between his fingers – his last – and laughed. ‘The whole place’s crumbling. They’re not stonemasons. Why’d they want to inspect a wall?’
‘But can’t they see?’ whispered Lane, incredulous, his eyes dragged again to the smudge on the brickwork that marked their weakening of the radius wall. Beneath it, the ground was scuffed and, despite the clear-up, peppered with crumbled cement. He shook his head in disbelief. ‘We got to get the game up soon, cover our work.’
‘If it was a hole, even the English would spot it,’ said Cobb. ‘But for now it’s just a scallop, a mere scraping. By the time it’s a hole and the bricks are pushed through, it’ll be too late.’
‘And we can do that anytime,’ said Lane.
‘You’re sure it’s that close?’ said Cobb.
‘Could’ve gone through yesterday. But we held back, like you said.’
‘The play’s at three o’clock,’ said Cobb. ‘We give them twenty minutes to settle, give Shortland time to realize what a godawful mess the blackjacks are making of everything, then we go. You go through first – you got the gun. By the time the alarm bell’s ringing, we should all be armed.’
Lane glanced over the radius wall, the central tower of the barracks clearly visible, and swallowed hard. ‘We shoot our way out?’
‘We take hostages. Just like I tried with Madame Shortland. Grab the nearest redcoat we can find and walk out behind him. And with that bloodsucker Crafus busy and all made up like the fancy woman he is, this time, we might make it.’
The shout of orders, a flash of red at the market square gates and Cobb was on his feet.
‘Get some players out!’ he snapped. ‘Go now. Cover what you can – they’re coming in.’ A company of militia, fully eighty or ninety men, were entering the courtyard.
‘What’s happenin’ here, then?’ said Lane, hesitating. The gates swung open, and around twenty soldiers took up positions around the market square entrance, the rest marching straight ahead in the direction of Four.
‘Maybe they found the tunnel?’ Cobb slipped one of the shanks to Lane. ‘I’ll get the men together. You get to the wall.’
Lane called out to the inmates as he ran past and, by the time they reached their ‘scraping’, as Cobb had labelled it, he had at least forty players, with onlookers providing raucous support. Six men threw themselves against the wall, and the scrummaging began. Twenty yards from the gates, they were close – and noisy – enough for the militia to view them warily. A few swung nervous rifles their way, triggering first panic, then anger. Some of the men edged away from the game, towards the troops. Three Allies, arms outstretched, taunted the British.
‘You wanna shoot Yankees? Jus’ for goin’ ’bout their business? S’that why you’re here?’
More of the troops now swung their guns to cover the advancing Americans.
Cobb, running fast and now flanked with Allies, called the men back. ‘Just the game, m’boys! Just the game!’ The vanguard sloped back to the wall, leaving Cobb to watch the soldiers watching him. Three redcoats standing together were the last to lower their rifles. Their faces partially obscured, the only man he recognized was the sergeant; the three stripes on his arm and the striped scar on his forehead gave him away. He stood with his feet firmly planted, like a
Devon farmer. ‘Ol’ Fat Bastard,’ muttered Cobb. ‘Of course. It’ll be a pleasure.’ He saluted the man until his fellow soldiers lowered their aim. ‘You got to keep your bullets for Napoleon. You don’t want to be losing two wars in a row, now do you?’
Cobb saw the men bridle, the sergeant’s two colleagues raising their guns again.
‘You need to read the treaty!’ shouted the sergeant, pushing their guns down. ‘Though maybe the words are too long for you. You lost Canada and you lost your White House. Burned pretty easy, they say.’
Cobb bit down on an instant retort, in danger of making the same error he had come to prevent. He shoved his hands in his pockets and gripped the shanks again. Reassured, he studied the three men. Ol’ Fat Bastard was making his stand with two of the youngest, skinniest soldiers he had ever seen in uniform. One gripped his rifle like a shovel, eyes squinting with fierce concentration; the other, his face reddening with excitement, hopped from one foot to the other, ready to let loose. ‘Farmhands,’ he said to himself. ‘Know-nothing farmhands.’
Lane appeared at his shoulder. ‘You got to see the wall.’
‘Is it good?’ asked Cobb, turning away from the soldiers.
‘It’s beautiful.’
They joined a rolling maul, hooking arms with a row of other Allies. Pushed through flailing legs and tumbling bodies, Cobb quickly found himself lying against the retaining wall. As the ‘game’ heaved and sprawled around him, a phalanx of players provided a temporary shield behind which Cobb could run his fingers across the masonry. Over an area of around two square feet, the cement which had bound the irregular lumps of granite together since its construction had been worked loose. Some lay in small clumps on the ground; the rest had been roughly pushed back, filling in the deepest cracks in an attempt to camouflage their work. He pushed gently with both hands and felt one of the smaller stones shift under the pressure. He pulled back, fearing imminent collapse and exposure, but the wall held its shape. Cobb crouched, replaced some more broken cement, then patted it flush with the brick. Forcing his way back through the melee, he rejoined Lane. A crowd of many hundred were throwing insults at the British, the troop hunkering down nervously behind their rifles.
‘Well?’ said Lane.
Cobb brushed cement fragments from his beard, his face flushed. ‘Just as you said. The wall will go when we need it to go.’ He stared at the soldiers massed outside the steps of Four. ‘If they’ve discovered the Negro tunnel, we can forget about everything.’ He wiped dust from his face and beard. ‘But if they’re just checking plans before Shortland gets here, well then …’ He looked back to Lane. ‘With their play, your gun and our Yankee hearts, God willing, we’ll be free men by sundown.’
5.9
Block Four
KING DICK PULLED deeply on his pipe and studied the guard commander standing nervously by the steps of Block Four. He looked barely older than the men he led, and his oversized shako cap sat awkwardly over his ears. The officer’s hands rested briefly on his sword grip, before anchoring themselves behind his back.
‘I demand entrance to your cockloft!’ he said, his pale eyes wandering along the lines of inmates that had clustered around the King.
‘You mighty early, the play ain’t for a few hours yet,’ said the King. Laughs from the inmates, more discomfort from the officer. ‘You got tickets?’ continued the King. ‘S’jus’, you got so many men with you, and it’s sixpence each.’
Four lines of redcoats had assembled briskly behind their commander, many of them wide-eyed at the King’s air of authority and command; he was actually making fun of them.
‘We might be able to let you in, Lieutenant …’
‘Lieutenant Aveline,’ said the commander, now even more irritated.
‘But not your friends, Lieutenant A-ve-line.’
Aveline stepped forward, provoking the inmates to close tightly around the King. Foot on the step to Four, Aveline’s face was flushed.
‘Captain Shortland and Mrs Shortland will be in attendance for your … performance this afternoon,’ he said. ‘He has ordered me to ensure his safety, and I am ordering you to step aside.’
The King swung the club from the ground to his shoulder, pushed the bearskin to his forehead. ‘Maybe you’re new here, Lieutenant. Maybe you missed the last few months. Maybe the Agent never told you. But King Dick has guaranteed the safety of the captain. When Mrs Shortland was taken by that savage Cobb, who rescued her, Lieutenant? Was it you? Was it anyone in a fine red jacket? No, it was King Dick. In this block, if the King says the captain will be safe, then you take it that it will be so.’
The lieutenant took a breath. ‘I have my orders.’
‘You have my reassurance.’
The tightness of the lieutenant’s voice betrayed his anxiety. ‘You will step aside and allow my men to enter.’
‘I will not.’ The King blew another cloud of tobacco smoke towards the soldiers. The lieutenant pursed his lips. Behind him, redcoats bristled at the insubordination. ‘But I can offer you coffee.’ The officer looked astonished, but the King continued. ‘It’s made from peas, y’know. Quite a flavour, really – maybe different to what you’re used to – but there’s some in the cockloft right now.’
‘You are really in no position …’ blustered Aveline.
‘Oh, but I am,’ said the King. ‘I really am. O’ course, you could shoot us, I realize that. You have the guns. Though’ – and here he gestured to the large and growing crowd of inmates watching their altercation – ‘you might need quite a few bullets for all of us. But if you wanna report back to Captain Shortland without causin’ a riot, I’m offerin’ the solution. And you get coffee.’
‘I don’t want your bloody coffee!’ snapped Aveline. ‘I am instructed to ensure the safety of the Agent. If I cannot do that, the Agent will not come.’
‘Very well,’ said the King. ‘He can stay away. He ain’t needed. We perform for our own pleasure, not yours. Or the Agent’s. D’you get that? We ain’t sittin’ here waitin’ for your blessin’, or even your attention. If the Shortlands come, there’ll be chairs so their plump and tender asses don’t touch the cold ground. And if they don’t, two lucky American sailors will rest their bony asses there instead. Romeo will still marry Juliet, he’ll still take poison, she’ll still stab herself, life an’ death will go on, like it always do.’
Applause from the men around the King.
‘Now, you sure ’bout that coffee?’
There was a nervous energy to the assembled players of the Dartmoor Amateur Dramatic Company as they stood on the stage and waited for the curtain to be completed. Joe and Habs had kept their costumes on. Lord wore a striped necktie and the pastor was sporting a crown made from parchment; ‘Montague’s,’ he said. ‘Gives him authority.’ The rest were yet to change, prison yellow mingling with old coats and dirty blankets. They could all hear the singing below and knew their shipmates would soon be on their way up. The King had posted some more of his Requin men on the door to keep the cockloft empty, but everyone wanted the curtain in place as soon as possible.
‘It is the start o’ things,’ the King had said. ‘Without it, this is just a room with a stage. But when the curtain is in, the magic begins its work.’ His voice softened, adopting the cadence of a priest uttering holy words. ‘It becomes a theatre.’
Surrounded by large pieces of cloth and rope, Sam, in his pale green Benvolio shirt, called, ‘Final stitches!’
Joe and Habs jumped from the stage and stood poised to help hoist his handiwork.
‘Done.’ Sam jumped to his feet, rolled the finished cloth into a long roll. With Joe at one end and Habs at the other, Sam directed the curtain’s placing between the two stage flats. The King, at full stretch, hooked the curtain’s two roughly cut eyelets over nails in each flat then let the fabric drop.
Sam had taken six of the sailors’ banners and flags, stitching them together with old blankets. Tommy had begged one from his colleagues in Three;
Goffe and Lord had found two in Seven. Together with three from their own, Sam had created a patchworked curtain of sailors’ protest. ‘Don’t Give up the Ship’, ‘Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights’ and ‘All of Canada or War Forever!’ were written or stitched on to the huge rectangles of cloth. Between them were American flags and images of large, aggressive eagles. The whole stretched across the stage, and Verona had all but disappeared.
‘Bravo!’ called Goffe. ‘You’re quite the artist.’
‘Wonder what Shortland will make of it, cuz?’ said Habs.
Sam shrugged. ‘He’s a Navy man, ain’t he? He can admire my stitchin’ if he don’t like anythin’ else.’
The King clapped his hands. ‘On stage, behind that curtain. Everyone in costume, now.’
Tommy Jackson, a fistful of shirts in one hand and his sword in the other, ran to the King’s side as they climbed back on the stage. ‘Which costume, King Dick?’
‘I’m Mercutio before I’m the apothecary,’ he replied, pushing past the curtain, ‘so something a kinsman to the Prince of Verona might wear. A military jacket, I reckon.’
‘Oh, right, sir,’ said Tommy, looking confused. ‘Sorry, but I meant which of these shirts for me, for Paris.’ He held up the shirts in his hand. ‘They’re all too big, but I can’t find anythin’ else in them baskets.’
The King sifted through the worn and torn shirts Tommy had been given and shook his head. ‘Paris is a young count, not a street urchin. None of these will do.’ He flung them back in one of the costume baskets. ‘Mr Daniels! Mr Singer!’ he bellowed, and the boys appeared in seconds. ‘Mr Jackson needs to look like a suitor of Juliet might look. Give him one o’ your shirts and see what he looks like. Dress ’im, boys, and be back in two minutes.’
The three boys sprinted from the stage, the cockloft doors crashing open like a musket shot. The Requin men playing soldiers, servants and torchbearers rummaged for anything to mask the yellow of their prison uniform.
