Shakespeare's Witch

by Samantha Grosser

  Now she bustled along towards home a pace behind her mother, the weariness of the night catching up with her at last, as well as sorrow for the little girl, Mary, whose life, if she survived, had begun so inauspiciously. Perhaps it would have been better if she had gone the same way as her older siblings, she thought. Perhaps a child with six fingers is truly cursed.

  At home she drank a little ale as breakfast, ignoring her mother’s order to take some bread, then hauled herself up the stairs to her bed. Tom was nowhere to be found and she guessed he had left already for the playhouse. She would have liked to be there at the first rehearsal with Nick as Macbeth and she considered it for a moment, gazing out of the window of her room, tracing the journey to the Globe in her mind, but the call of the weariness was stronger, so she dragged off her boots, slid under the covers and within moments she was asleep.

  Chapter Five

  Can the Devil Speak True?

  In the morning Tom bought a piece of apple pie for a penny from a street seller he passed on his way to the playhouse. He had not slept and he could taste the weariness and the headache that was starting to build behind his temples. But the food helped, the pastry still flaky and warm from the oven, and it shifted the bad taste from his mouth and gave him some energy for the day’s rehearsal and performance ahead. He wanted to be home in his bed but he refused to allow the desire any space in his thoughts.

  He had left the house late, creeping out through the door from the kitchen at the back of the house. There were no bolts on the inside, just a heavy key that worked from both sides, and he had long since had a key of his own to open it. Leaving the house unnoticed was a skill he had learned as a very young boy; he was at home in the Bankside streets, becoming known in the taverns and alehouses, attaching himself to those men who interested him – men who had something to give or to teach. Quickly bored with the education at school, he had sought out other learning, filling himself with an understanding that no schoolmaster could have ever given him.

  Spending his nights in the inns and bawdy houses, he met men of all sorts with knowledge he could take and enticing tales of distant places: dark handsome women whose breasts were bare, and women with veils and skin that was sweet with scented oils. He heard of fabulous spices and jewels, and of palm-fringed islands with pellucid waters full of bright and vari-coloured fish. He learned too of different gods, and of rituals to commune with daemons and the dead. He absorbed it all, unafraid to ask for their knowledge and willing to do whatever they asked of him in return. For a time he toyed with the notion of taking to a ship to experience it all first-hand, but the life of a sailor held no appeal – he knew himself too well to think he would enjoy the deprivations of shipboard life, so he chose to let the learning come to him and keep the comforts of a dry bed, with good food and wine and women.

  But he kept on searching, spending his nights quizzing strangers who passed through the Bankside taverns, probing for some truth that might one day satisfy his yearning. Sometimes he wondered where it came from, this insatiable desire that burned in him at times to the point of physical pain. He had met other men who sought truth and knowledge also, but he knew of no one else who suffered for it as he did. His sister’s faith in the ancient magic of the earth and the symbols of the heavens was not enough for him: he had always craved something more, a desperation in his need to know all of life in its entirety.

  Now he wandered on through the early morning, finishing the pie. With the coming of the dawn the bridge gates opened to admit the travellers who had stayed in Southwark overnight, and the streets were coming alive in the growing light. A trail of carts trundled from the farms of Kent, the air rowdy with their calls for buyers as their voices vied with the shouts and clatter of stall holders opening up, shutters flinging to. Apprentices and housewives swept their doorsteps clean, and two prostitutes, weaving their way home arm in arm, staggered into his path. They looked him up and down, and one of them reached out and trailed her hand across his face and over his chest with a gap-toothed smile of encouragement. He preferred the hidden darkness of the night-time: in the daylight hours too much of life was out on show.

  ‘Two for the price of one?’ she offered, stepping closer, her hand shifting down, fingers pulling at the waistband of his breeches. ‘For a fine gallant like yourself?’

  ‘Another time perhaps,’ he answered, taking her hand and removing it.

  ‘All right, my sweet wag.’ She grinned and stepped back. ‘We’ll be waiting.’

  He dipped his head with a smile of acknowledgement. A small band of horsemen clattered through on their way to the bridge and into the city, retainers for some nobleman in a livery he did not recognise riding fine horses in rich apparel, and he stood back to let them pass. Finishing his pie, he watched their backs grow smaller until they were swallowed up by the crowd. Then he turned off the High Street and skirted the market as it stuttered into life, heading towards the river. Though the morning was cold and damp with drizzle, he was early yet for rehearsal and he took his time. Only when the unseen church bells tolled the hour of eight did he finally bend his steps with purpose to the playhouse.

  The players slipped into their new roles with ease. Nick’s Macbeth was chilling, a dangerous intensity in the soft-spoken words, and it was easy to believe the dark forces at work within him, the conflict of his flesh and spirit. Even now, in these early rehearsals with the lines as yet unlearned and constant interruptions, there was a latent power in his delivery. It was a world away from the kingly projection of Burbage’s portrayal, and Tom found himself rapt, his own duties as wardrobe-keeper forgotten and neglected as he spent every spare moment enthralled by each unfolding scene. He understood his sister’s desire – Nick would be a passionate lover, he thought again, ardent and intense. His own passion began to stir at the idea of it, heartbeat quickening, and his gaze wandered across the yard toward John, who was sitting alone close to the stage, observing his master at work, head tilted in concentration.

  Tom wanted to go to him, to sit beside him and savour his closeness, but he guessed John would not welcome him now and he knew that timing was everything. So he watched from afar, studying each slight movement John made, each small change in expression, committing them to memory. Knowledge is power, someone once told him, and he had never forgotten it.

  The scene ended and the players left the stage for a break. His own scenes over for a while, Tom was considering going up to the wardrobe to begin work on the costumes when Nick came and sat beside him and the half-formed thought was forgotten.

  ‘How goes it, Tom?’ Nick asked, settling himself on the bench, lifting one foot to rest it on the seat in front. ‘You look tired.’

  ‘A little,’ Tom replied. ‘But not so much I don’t want to watch.’

  ‘Too much ale and company of women?’ They had parted at the bawdy house the night before as Jane had settled herself between them.

  He shrugged. ‘Perhaps. You should have stayed.’ Then, ‘Why didn’t you?’

  Nick gave a small wry smile. ‘I’ve no more stomach for whores – they leave me cold.’

  ‘There’s someone else?’ Tom was quick to ask.

  ‘Aye. In my dreams. But she’s long been out of my reach and I am nothing to her.’

  ‘And still you want her?’

  ‘I will always want her.’ He looked at Tom with an expression that was hard to read. Regret, perhaps? Resignation?

  ‘She is at Court?’

  ‘She was.’

  ‘Have I seen her?’

  Nick shrugged. ‘Perhaps. Her name was Catherine Shawe. Now she is Lady Catherine Thomas.’ He sneered her title with all the derision he could summon. ‘And her new master has taken her away from Court to breed for him.’

  ‘You’ll find another,’ Tom said, gently. ‘Time will mend thee.’

  ‘Ah, but you didn’t know her. She was a woman like no other.’

  ‘They are all women like no other,’ Tom laughed. ‘Trust me. You will fin
d some other woman that will move you the same, and she may be closer than you think.’

  Nick nodded, and turned away with a deep breath, silent with his thoughts.

  They sat quietly then until the rehearsal began again.

  Sarah came to the playhouse late in the morning and brought bread and sweet omelette from home for her brother. Tom was still watching the rehearsal: he loved these early days of production as the players discovered the characters they inhabited and made their first steps to bring the world of the play alive. Each day brought surprises – a new meaning, a new connection.

  ‘What, can the devil speak true?’ Banquo’s words sounded across the theatre as Sarah sat down beside her brother. She was wearing the altered dress, new curves shaping her breasts. But she was pale, he thought, and her eyes spoke of sleeplessness and bad dreams.

  ‘Are you well?’ he asked, taking the hunk of bread she gave him, picking at it with his fingers.

  ‘We attended a birth last night, a drab in a low place by the river. She was barely more than a child herself.’ She shook her head as though to dismiss the memory. ‘The child had a six-fingered hand and the mother disowned it as cursed. We took it to the orphanage.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Tom said. He could think of nothing else to say. She rarely spoke of the births she witnessed, the mysteries of the confinement chamber a secret shared only by women. It was a world of magic denied to men, a ritual of creation he would never know, and a part of him envied such knowledge.

  She gave him a half-shrug of resignation. Then, nodding towards the stage, she said, ‘How goes the play?’

  ‘It goes.’ He smiled. ‘Slowly, as always at this stage.’

  She nodded and took out the omelette in its wrapping from the basket, holding it between her hands. He waited patiently for her to give it him but her mind seemed to be elsewhere, her gaze roaming the playhouse without apparent purpose.

  ‘The dress becomes you,’ he said, to break the silence.

  His voice snapped her thoughts back to the present. Looking down she saw the omelette in her hands and laughed as she passed it to him. Then she ran her hands across the bodice. ‘Do you like it?’ she asked. ‘I look down and they look like someone else’s breasts. I hardly know myself.’

  ‘It suits you,’ he said.

  She smiled, still regarding her own body with doubt, fingers tracing the lines of the bodice. He watched her for a moment as she learned to appreciate this new facet of herself. But the dress was merely a prop, a tool that gave her faith in her womanhood. She was starting to bloom and ripen, he thought, her sweetness almost ready to be tasted.

  He said, ‘Have you spoken to Nick today?’ He made a gesture towards the stage, where the players were in heated discussion with Will about the scene.

  ‘Not yet.’ Her eyes followed his to rest on Nick. Her lips quivered almost imperceptibly at the corners as she watched him, and Tom wondered what dreams she had of him, the reach of her imagination. She was still just a girl after all, still an innocent, dependent on a man to lead her into knowledge. He was glad it would be Nick, for he guessed that he would lead her there with tenderness. Then he hesitated, uncertain whether to tell her or not, afraid of denting her new confidence. But he decided she had the right to know.

  ‘I found out something this morning,’ he began.

  She turned to him, eyes awakening with interest. A pang of misgiving for his next words pulsed through him. He hoped it was the right decision.

  ‘Nick has feelings for another woman,’ he said.

  She took in a sharp gasp of shock and the smile she had been wearing gave way to lips drawn tight in pain.

  ‘In love?’ she breathed. ‘And she with him?’

  ‘I don’t know. But either way, it’s over. She is married now and gone from Court.’

  Sarah turned her face away from him, gazing out across the playhouse towards the stage, eyes unfocused, unseeing. He observed her face in profile, the jaw set taut against emotion, her mouth clamped and hard, the full lips pulled to a narrow line.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘But I thought you should know.’

  She swung toward him, her disappointment finding its mark. ‘You said I could win him. You said he was as good as won. And now you tell me this?’ The actors on the stage flicked glances towards them – her voice, in its anger, had carried.

  ‘Hush,’ Tom said. He went on in a whisper. ‘I didn’t know. But it isn’t hopeless, Sarah. It’s over with this woman – you can help him to heal. And I can still help you win him, I promise. We will just have to try a little harder.’

  Her eyes half-closed in disbelief, she shook her head. But the first spark of temper had passed and lasting anger was not in her nature. ‘Do you know her?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ve seen her. At Court.’ He remembered the last time they played there a few weeks before, and the gaggle of ladies who came to see the players afterwards, giggling and flirtatious, looking for danger. Except for one who had stood apart and not said a word, her attention fixed on Nick. Tom had thought little of it at the time but he was sure now that she was the one, a small drama enacted between the two of them, unspoken and invisible to all but themselves.

  The rehearsal ended with the morning, the church bells striking noon. Macbeth was forgotten and all minds turned to the business of King Lear. The flag was raised above the theatre to summon the crowds – black for tragedy – and the players began their preparations, practising new lines as the roles were rearranged.

  Sarah attended to Will in the tiring house, making last-minute alterations to the robes of the king – a stitch here and there to adjust them to fit their new bearer – and helping with the chalk and soot to age him. Will was distracted; his talent was for writing, and the role of Lear was no easy task. He snapped at his seamstress, uncharacteristically tetchy, and she let him be, though the work was only half-done. But all of them were on edge – Burbage’s fall had unsettled them and upset the balance. He was their leader on the stage, and without him their confidence was dented. Then Will took the stage and there were ripples of disappointment around the galleries, and in the yard there were jeers.

  ‘Where’s Burbage?!’ someone shouted. ‘We want Burbage!’

  Another man threw a half-eaten apple which failed to connect, splattering instead across the wooden boards. The actors paused for just a moment and Sarah saw the collective deep breath they drew before Will spoke his first line.

  ‘Attend the lords of France and Burgundy, Gloucester.’

  The hubbub dropped a notch.

  ‘I shall, my liege.’

  ‘Meantime we shall express our darker purpose …’

  Will’s voice carried over the grumbling, which began to dwindle slowly as their interest was lured once again by the words of the play, and their desire to see Burbage was forgotten.

  He would pass, Sarah thought from her place behind the curtain, and though he lacked the gravitas of Burbage, she could believe him as the king. Slowly the audience came to think so too, drawn in at last and caught up in the illusion. And when Will left the stage at the end of the scene, the relief was clear in his face. She smiled, and he raised his eyebrows in answer. It was going to be all right.

  Nick had known that it could not last forever, and that one day Catherine Shawe would be sold off in marriage to someone else, a man with money, power, status. But he had lived for a year in hope that somehow the Fates would save them, each moment precious, each memory hoarded against the pain he knew must eventually come. The conversation with Tom had stirred up the feelings again, the images of another man’s hands touching Catherine’s pale body, kissing her, entering her, another man with mastery over her happiness. He wondered if her husband would realise she was not a maid, and he closed his eyes against the thoughts, but the images remained.

  ‘Are you all right, Master Tooley?’ John’s voice nudged at his thoughts, disturbing the recollections.

  They were seated before the hearth at home i
n the small house Nick had bought with the money his father had left him, an inheritance he never expected to get. Whatever he had thought of his father he would always be grateful for the legacy – it had bought him a home and a share in the King’s Men, and with them a more certain future.

  ‘Master Tooley?’ John repeated.

  Nick opened his eyes and looked across to his young apprentice, seated now on the rug before the fire, the pages of the play open in front of him. He wondered how much the boy knew, how much he had observed. Only a little, he guessed. For all his talent and the time he had spent in the Company, John was still an innocent, eyes wide at the world as though it shocked him.

  ‘Is something amiss?’

  Nick shook his head in answer and drained off the last mouthful of wine in his cup. ‘I’m just tired,’ he said. ‘It was a long day.’

  ‘But it is going well, I think?’ John ventured, hesitant, as if afraid to irritate his master. Nick wondered what he had ever done to deserve such fear – he had never so much as raised his voice to the boy, had only ever been kind. He couldn’t imagine how hard it must be for a man to be so afraid of the world, but he had no idea how he might instil more courage. As John’s master he felt responsible – the boy had no father to teach him. Then he remembered John’s transformation on the stage and it bewildered him. How could such uncertainty transfigure itself so utterly? It was impressive to be sure, an act of magic for which he had no explanation.

  ‘It is a good play,’ Nick replied, sitting up straighter, blinking himself more awake. ‘Very powerful.’

  ‘Would you like to go over the lines?’ John asked, indicating the pages he had been studying.

  Nick smiled and shook his head. ‘No. I’m too tired and I shall only stumble over them. We should probably take ourselves to bed.’ He took a deep breath and unfurled himself from the chair, standing before the fire and stretching. John nodded, unable to hide his disappointment, and levered himself to his feet, the script held tightly in one hand.