“Ah, because, that is, I, er, …” Shakespeare began to flounder.
“Because,” said Burghley evenly, “because the writer is in Italy?”
There was a long silence, broken only by Shakespeare and Budsby drawing breath as the impact of the statement hit them.
Shakespeare turned and looked at Walsingham in shock. “You mean,” sputtered Shakespeare, “you mean Lord Burghley knows about … about …”
“About the events at Deptford?” interjected Burghley suddenly. “The fact that Christopher Marlowe is not dead? That fact that you do not write the plays? Of course I know!”
The two theatre men stared in astonishment at each other.
Walsingham and Burghley began to laugh.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Walsingham soothingly, “you may think that I exercise considerable power across this land. But believe me, it pales into insignificance when compared to that wielded by my good friend Lord Burghley, here, Lord Chancellor of the Exchequer and principal adviser to Her Majesty. Of course, he knows. State security is an important part of his portfolio.”
“And master Marlowe has been a vital part of our force,” added Burghley.
“Well, then,” said Budsby eventually, “you will know, sir, that unless this challenge to write a play within fourteen days is met, the whole scheme will unravel.”
“Why should the challenge not be met?” said Burghley.
“Yes,” goaded Walsingham. “Why is that, young Master Shakespeare? All you require is a series of words, written on paper.”
“But, I can’t, that is, I …”
“Sir Thomas,” said Budsby, regaining his composure, “we, all of us, and that includes, apparently, Lord Burghley, understand that in the scheme of things, writing the words is not William’s job.”
“It isn’t?” said Walsingham, whimsically. “Not as far as the rest of England is concerned, the Queen included. As far as they know, our William here is The Writer, and so …”
Shakespeare gulped hard. “You mean, you want me to write this one?”
There was a long silence as Walsingham glared into William’s eyes.
Finally, the older man burst into laughter. He threw his head back, and laughed until he began to cough. Burghley joined in with him.
“Oh, dear,” Walsingham said, finally regaining his composure. “The look on your face, William, you should have seen it. You looked like you were confronting your worst nightmare. I did not realise that writing a mere play would hold such terrors for anyone. I now have even more respect and admiration for Christopher, seeing as he actually does sit down and scribble out the words.”
“It’s just that I haven’t got a play,” replied Shakespeare. “At least, not one about Falstaff. I’ve searched through the material in the drawer where we hide them - you know how he sends them in twos or threes - and so far, he has written nothing remotely like a follow-up to Henry IV.”
“Oh, yes, he has,” said Walsingham, as a smile crept across his face. He looked at Burghley, turned, and walked over to a huge oak sideboard. Opening the drawer, he pulled out a tight sheaf of papers wrapped with a red ribbon, walked back to the table, and dropped them in front of Shakespeare. “Here, a little surprise for you.”
William picked the sheaf up, and was concerned to see that his hands were shaking. They were jiggling so much, he had difficulty untying the ribbon. So distracted by this operation was he, that he barely heard the little spot of repartee between the two government master spies.
“He is well-named,” said Burghley.
“Master Shakespeare,” said Walsingham with heavy emphasis on the ‘Shake’.
And they began to giggle like two schoolboys laughing at someone having farted in chapel.
William eventually got the papers open, spread them out in front of him, and looked at the first page. Unfolding before him was the familiar handwriting of Christopher.
He saw a title, and handed the page to Budsby, who whistled softly and read it out. ‘Presenting a Most Pleasant and Excellent Conceited Comedy of Sir John Falstaff and The Merry Wives of Windsor.’
“Here? Written! How could this be?” said Shakespeare. “I can’t believe how …”
The two hosts began to laugh.
“Mr Shakespeare,” added Burghley, with an impish grin, “who do you think organised the Queen’s challenge for you in the first place?”
This last statement was too much for William. His head began to swim, and he grabbed the armrest of the tall leather-backed chairs for support.
Budsby cleared his throat and tried to talk on behalf of both of them. “Are you saying, you manipulated Her Majesty into challenging William to write a play in fourteen days?”
“Naturally,” said Burghley, waving his hand dismissively. “That is what I am good at.”
“Don’t you see?” interjected Walsingham grandly, “it’s the perfect cover. It underlines William’s skills as a great playwright, both now and forever in history, and…”
“ … and,” continued Burghley, taking up the sentence, “it puts to the sword those rumours that are circulating that Marlowe may be alive and William is not the author. You’ve no doubt heard them.”
That is true, thought Budsby. Despite the secrecy, he had heard whispers along the grapevine that people were running around the Royal Court pointing out the remarkable similarity between the works of the late Christopher Marlowe and those of the new shining literary light, William Shakespeare.
“Once this play is presented,” continued Walsingham, “anyone suspecting that Christopher is alive will now think, ‘Well, Marlowe can’t be alive. No one could get a message to him in Italy or wherever he is, in time for him to write a play about a given topic and have it sent back so it could be rehearsed and presented, all within two weeks. It’s impossible! Heavens knows, it takes a coach days just to get from London to Paris.’”
There was silence as the pair of entrepreneurs took this latest astonishing piece of information in.
The two master-spies allowed their guests time to turn it over.
“Gentlemen, it goes like this …” said Walsingham eventually.
“ … several months ago,” continued Burghley, “we began to get worried that our little scheme might be coming undone.”
Shakespeare and Budsby looked at each when Burghley said ‘our’ scheme.
My God, thought Will, this is bigger than I thought.
“Rumours were flying around, questions were being asked, that sort of thing,” said Walsingham.
“So,” continued Burghley, stepping forward and assuming the role of the storyteller. “We had a little think about how we could put an end to all that.”
“And?” said Budsby.
“And,” said Burghley, “we decided the best thing would be for William to be seen to being publicly put to the test.”
“Thanks,” said William. “Thanks a lot.”
“We felt that if you were seen putting a play together - under circumstances that would show that you, and only you, could have written it - then it would confirm your status forever,” said Burghley. “The point was, what to get you to write?”
“Our prayers were answered shortly after,” interjected Walsingham, “when the usual packet of material arrived from Christopher. It contained Henry IV.”
“I remember that,” said William. “You gave it to me and said there was nothing else in the courier’s pouch this time.”
“I lied. It also contained this follow-up, The Merry Wives of Windsor.”
“What?” said Budsby.
“Christopher had written them both, in a surge of productivity,” said Walsingham. “We gave you the first one, and put the other aside.”
“All we needed now,” interjected Burghley, “was for someone, some way, some how, to demand its portrayal, under testing circumstances.”
“And there is no better person at demanding things than Her Majesty,” said Walsingham. Then he added, “But I never said that, right?”
“With just a little assistance from your good self,” added Walsingham.
“I played my role,” said Burghley, giving a little theatrical bow.
And he had, too, thought Budsby, casting his mind back to that first presentation. He remembered watching from the wings at The Globe how Burghley had sat next to Elizabeth, that unmistakable figure with the rich red hair and the brilliant white Virgin Queen make-up. He recollected how Burghley had quite often leaned over to her chair and whispered comments in her ear, especially when the amusing Falstaff character was on stage.
“You praised it to high heaven,” said Walsingham. “She came out of the performance bubbling with excitement, especially about Falstaff.”
“So much so, a few days ago,” continued Burghley, “I had little trouble when I said to her, ‘Ma’am, the Ambassador for France is arriving in a little over a fortnight, could I suggest a Shakespeare play as the centrepiece of the welcoming festivities? Perhaps something in a vein similar to things that you have enjoyed especially of late?’”
“Yes,” said Walsingham, “Gentlemen, I was there when Lord Burghley said it. And she was onto it straight away. ‘Shakespeare?’ she replied, ‘a wonderful idea! Remind me, Lord Chancellor, what was the name of that play we saw with that fat fellow running all over the stage? Tell Master Shakespeare we want some more of him and his little foibles, in time for the arrival of our French guest!’”
The two entrepreneurs looked at each other, slowly taking on board the fact that they were part of a plot, a set-up, a conspiracy, whose machinations were almost beyond belief.
“So,” said Budsby, eventually, “how come, if you were spending all this time guiding the Queen toward setting up this challenge, why didn’t you give us the play earlier, to do some preliminary work on it?”
“Couldn’t risk it,” said Walsingham, “the word would have got out!”
“Well, I, reject any suggestion that we would have …” began Budsby, bristling.
“No, no, Mr Budsby,” said Burghley, soothingly, “we are not suggesting that you would have let the cat out of the bag. Why, the pair of you have been peerless in maintaining your silence over what happened at Deptford. It’s just that …”
“ …once you had given the play to some of the actors to rehearse,” continued Walsingham, “the rumour would have spread around.”
That is true, Budsby thought. Actors, especially those in work, can’t wait to tell those not in work about their latest project - and either boast about, or whinge about, the relative size of their role.
“So,” said Walsingham, breaking the silence, “all you need to do now is persuade the Chamberlain’s Men to do their duty, and get it up and ready by Saturday week.”
“I’m not sure if that can happen,” said William forlornly. “That’s a fraction of the usual time they need to even get it to first rehearsal stage.”
Burghley came forward and leaned over Shakespeare. William noticed that the cheery figure, up until now studding proceedings with cute little theatrical bows, had been replaced by the customary, serious, dangerous Burghley.
“It will be done, Master Shakespeare,” said Burghley. “Make no mistake about that. We did not dump the Admiral’s Men after the presumed death of Christopher, and replace them with the Chamberlain’s Men as our prime acting troupe for nothing. They will do what they are required to do.”
“I understand,” Shakespeare said. “I understand.”
“I hope you do,” added Walsingham, in a similar tone, “it’s important that your role as the number one playwright remains unsullied, and that Christopher remains in France and Italy sending us back information, and occasionally sowing the seeds of foment amongst the city-states.”
“It is a situation that is to the advantage of none other than Her Majesty’s Government,” said Burghley.
“Phew,” said Shakespeare, shaking his head slowly. “This thing is bigger than I ever would have possibly thought.”
“What? A plot so intriguing it is beyond even the imaginative skills of England’s great playwright?” said Burghley, drawing back and laughing. “Never!”
And with a little bow, Burghley suddenly vanished.
“I’ve had enough, too,” said Walsingham, “this meeting of the playmakers is adjourned. You know what to do. Someone will see you out.”
He opened the door, and Shakespeare watched in astonishment as a young female hand - a hand that he judged to be barely nineteen years old and presumably that of Walsingham’s third wife - suddenly protruded through the doorway.
Walsingham took the hand, tenderly kissed it, said, “Coming, my dear,” and in an instant was gone.
“My God,” said Budsby quietly. “And we thought we were in this merely up to our necks …”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
By 1598, the Chamberlain’s Men were being acknowledged throughout London as England’s premiere acting group.
Headed up by the towering presence of Richard Burbage, they had, in the preceding five years, attracted capacity audiences with the sheer drama of Richard II, mesmerised them with the comedy of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and astonished them with the realistic assassination of the lead character in Julius Caesar.
Their reputation had grown to epic proportions since they had been formed immediately after the distressing death of Christopher Marlowe.
That had been the saddest of days for everyone in the London theatre scene.
The sudden extinguishing of a great talent in a tavern punch-up had sent shock waves through the small, tightly knit army of actors, directors, back-stage staff, promoters, and theatre-owners. Not so much the death of a friend, but being typical egocentric theatre types, more a matter of, “My God, now where will my next play, and my next pay, come from ..?”
So frenzied and absorbed were they about their cloudy future, they did not notice that only one person around them stayed calm and cool in the aftermath.
Sir Thomas Walsingham.
It was strange. His boy wonder, his literary star, his investment - nasty critics had even incorrectly suggested, his lover - was now dead. Yet he showed not one glimmer of emotion. He was so workmanlike, so focused, so matter-of-fact.
“It’s his way of dealing with grief,” was the generally accepted explanation. “To get on with things.”
So consumed with their own little lives were they - “Do you think Master Shakespeare can go on and fill Christopher Marlowe’s shoes?”- that they took little notice when Walsingham abandoned all links with the Admiral’s Men.
The Admiral’s Men, that doughty group of individuals lead by a giant of an actor, Edward Alleyn, had up until that point, been the major performing company in the city. Few eyebrows were raised when Walsingham formed a new group, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, and named it after Edward de Vere, the actual Lord Chamberlain himself. After all, de Vere, the first Earl of England and Queen’s favourite, was a bit of a theatre man - a sometime poet and would-be actor himself. No one made much of an issue of the fact that he was also the son-in-law of one of Walsingham’s closest friends, Lord Burghley …
So intense was the navel-gazing that the theatre community at large did not even realise that Sir Thomas was also behind the later re-build of the Globe Theatre on the south side of the River. They had dutifully volunteered to carry the lumber from the remains of the dismantled playhouse, simply called The Theatre, across the city to be re-assembled in the shape of a roundhouse at Bankside.
Nor did they care much that Burbage’s brother, Cuthbert, played a leading role in its management, or that William Shakespeare, now the hope of them all, had been quietly given ten per cent interest in the new theatre.
In the end, few people noticed, knew, or cared that, despite the loss of his front-line writer, Sir Thomas Walsingham - busy enough as a politician, businessman, and, some said, spy-master - had for
some reason jockeyed himself into the control of the theatre scene in London.
It was a scene that was tawdry in many ways - the lowest of the social strata paying a mere ha’penny to view a play from the heaving, sweating, smelling audience pit at the foot of the stage. Yet it had a certain nobility - the aristocrats, well-to-do merchantmen and courtiers paying anything up to sixpence to view from the relative sanctuary of the dress circle, sometimes in the company of the Queen herself.
No one had been bothered to make much of the fact that one of their own, the actor Derek Berkhardt, had suddenly dropped out of the business and disappeared, too. Gone back to Germany, to find his roots. So the rumour mill said.
Everyone was more distracted by the potential impact of their loss.
“Christopher was a truly great writer,” had been the general lament raised during a hastily organised wake at Percy Fletcher’s tavern, the only real celebration conducted after the body had been inexplicably and rapidly buried without ceremony at Deptford.
In these conversations it had always been left unsaid that William Shakespeare, too, was proving to be a genius with the pen, and a writer of plays that, ironically, captured the essence of the effervescent, poetic style of the now-dead Marlowe.
But, it was also generally concluded that the phlegmatic William was, well, different.
As Burbage put it, “Whereas Christopher exuberantly loved his plays like a pet dog or a favourite toy, William seems to treat them more like a commodity. Whereas Christopher caressed every syllable across the page with a loving, creative stroke of the quill, William appears to turn them out as a carpenter would construct a pigsty. Whereas a Marlowe play went through a period of exciting, overt gestation - the writer involved in weeks of musing, earnest discussion with associates over an ale, try-outs of dialogue on astonished strangers - a Shakespeare play seems to suddenly, almost secretly, turn up, practically overnight.”
And still, five years on, as the actors assembled for a read-through of a brand new script brought across to them at the re-built Globe by Budsby, the doubts lingered.
“Another one?” boomed the great Burbage, as he accepted the hand-written pages from Budsby. “It is as if he does it by magic.”
The Playmakers Page 28
