Shakespeare for Squirrels

by Christopher Moore

  “No, no, no, I didn’t even see him.”

  Cobweb jumped off Demetrius and landed before Lysander, who cowered against the mossy rocks. “How about you? Did you kill the Puck?”

  “No, no, madam, I did not see him.”

  Cobweb leapt to a spot between Helena and Hermia. “You? Did you kill him?” She raised the arrow over Helena’s breast. “I will pop your black, broken heart from your chest and eat it while you watch, shoe whore!”

  “I don’t even know what that means,” said Helena, shaking.

  “Did you kill him?”

  “No.” Helena turned and hid her face in her hands, preferring to take the fairy’s killing blow in the bum, evidently.

  “You!” Cobweb said to Hermia, who was small enough that the fairy could menace her eye to eye. “Tell me, did you kill the Puck or do I pin your tits together like bloody apples on a spit?”

  “No. No! I saw him put the drops in the boys’ eyes. That is all. I didn’t even speak to him.”

  “RAWR!” Cobweb roared in Hermia’s face, and the ingénue burst into tears and turned away.

  Cobweb spun on a heel to face me. “They didn’t kill him.” She trotted back to me and handed me the bolt. I replaced it in the sheath at my back. “These well-kept types don’t do their own killing, though. They would have hired an assassin.”

  “And they might be lying,” said I.

  “Oi, are you lying?” Cobweb called to the lovers. They all shook their heads ardently, even Demetrius, who held his bloody chin and grimaced in pain with the movement. “See?”

  “Sweet Cobweb,” said I, “you are the very vicar’s knickers when it comes to nest building and rescuing seafarers, but you are shit at interrogation.”

  “You’re shit at it,” she said. “What’s a vicar?”

  “Are you all right, love?” I asked her.

  She regarded me with recrimination.

  Over by the lovers, Lysander said, “I told you I should have brought my crossbow.”

  “Wait,” said I. “What? You have a crossbow?”

  “As do I,” said Demetrius.

  “Ladies are only allowed longbows,” said Hermia, “but I am quite a proficient archer myself.”

  “And she is ever so pretty, with her arrows quivering,” said Helena, “while I lumber like a great ox spraying bolts about the green, willy-nilly.”

  “Oh, stop it,” said Hermia. “If you are going to feel sorry for yourself at least wait until you don’t have two suitors hanging on your skirt hem.”

  I was about to inquire whether everyone in this bloody country was armed, when from behind the rocks there came a great raucous caterwaul that set my various sphincters on high tension, even as I reached behind my back for a dagger.

  “Bear!” said Cobweb.

  The lovers, who had huddled together at the first call, bolted, led by Demetrius and followed by Lysander, who herded the girls ahead of him, all of them letting out horrified yowls as they ran. I thought to follow, but then I saw Cobweb was laughing, nearly doubled over with her private joke.

  The caterwauling sounded again, closer now. It was definitely not a bear.

  “That’s not a bear,” said I, the very herald of the obvious. We’d had a trained bear for a while at the French court and it made no sound like this bellowing in the forest. Did she ever tire of frightening people with possible bears?

  The bushes by the trail parted and a great horse-headed creature stepped into view.

  “Holy rancid fuckcheese!” said I. “A centaur.” The thing had the body of a man—fully dressed in trousers, a shirt, and a fine woven waistcoat—and the head of some equine creature. It let loose another bellow, a bray, really, illuminating its species as a donkey, not a horse. I suppose the long ears might have given it away, but rather than committing the time to study, I was considering fight and flight, and would have done one of those, I’m sure, had Cobweb not exclaimed, “Bottom, what are you doing here? The night queen will be furious if she wakes to find you gone.”

  “Bottom?” I said, to myself more than the world. The waistcoat did look familiar.

  “Oh, Master Cobweb, that is just the trouble,” said Bottom. “I awoke in Titania’s bower utterly alone, the lady had abandoned me. I was desperately in need of breakfast. I see you know Master Pocket. So good to see you, maestro.”

  Cobweb turned to me and grinned. “Master Bottom was an honored guest in the queen’s bower last night. Very honored guest.” She made a vulgar thrusting gesture while rolling her eyes and lolling her tongue.

  “Bottom,” said I. “Thou art transmogrified. How happened this change?”

  “It were a revelation, maestro, for I was using the very method you taught our troupe of players. When last evening the queen wished that I have the personage of a donkey, I conjured the memory of when in the past I had sensed myself to be an ass, thus your coaching transformed me.”

  “Good Bottom, that is a fluttering firkin of fairy wank. I invented that method on the spot because Snug was so bloody stupid he crafted a lion’s roar from chicken sounds.”

  “Nevertheless, here you see the result,” brayed Bottom. “Your method and magic have enchanted me.”

  “The Puck,” Cobweb whispered in my ear.

  “The Puck? You saw the Puck last night? Why didn’t you say so?”

  “You were busy chatting up your fancy Athenian shoe tarts,” said Cobweb. “The Puck often keeps company with the night queen, as she employs him for spying and other services.”

  “I thought Puck was the jester for the shadow king.”

  “Do you not have spies in the mortal world? Dual loyalties are rather their speciality.”

  “Well, we need to see the night queen, then,” said I.

  “And have her command me to imagine myself a weaver again,” said Bottom. “Mrs. Bottom will be very cross if I return in this form.”

  “You may be surprised,” said Cobweb, giving an encouraging pat to the prodigious bulge snaking its way down the inside of Bottom’s trouser leg.

  “Oh my,” said Bottom, letting loose a laugh that degraded into a string of wheezing whinnies.

  “Come on then,” said Cobweb. “The queen will need tending to.” And she led us off down a path opposite from the direction in which the lovers had run.

  As we walked, Bottom said, “The lads must be beside themselves. This will be the second rehearsal I’ve missed. I fear the part of Pyramus may be more of a challenge than before, unless you may work another spell on me, perhaps sharpening my jaw and giving me the steely-eyed aspect of a hero.”

  “Bottom, I do not have magical—”

  “Shush!” said Cobweb, spinning around and shaking her head in a stern and angry manner, followed by a less-than-subtle wink, which wasn’t lost even on Bottom.

  “But I myself saw you disappear in front of the watch, and this . . .” He gestured to his ears and muzzle.

  Cobweb growled a threat, a sound as if she might be concealing a small dog under her frock.

  “Quite right,” said I. “Magical. We shall see about the magic in a bit. But, good Bottom, I’ve just encountered several young Athenians, all of whom said that they owned bows or crossbows. Is everyone in this bloody country armed?”

  “Just the toffs,” said Bottom. “Working folk aren’t allowed.”

  “But Snug the joiner told me that only the watch and soldiers were permitted to carry weapons.”

  “Well Snug is a ninny, isn’t he?” said Bottom.

  “There you have it,” said Cobweb. “Right from the horse’s mouth. Come on, you, the night queen will shit a hedgehog if she finds her donkey boy gone. And you’ll want to have a chat with her, Pocket.”

  Cobweb went ahead, leading us down a forest path that was all but invisible to me, but the fairy moved in the moonlight as sure as under the noonday sun, so Bottom and I kept in sight of her pale frock as we navigated the dark forest at a quick pace. We’d gone perhaps a half mile—hard to say with the me
andering and whatnot—when a banshee scream sounded out of the dark above us and three slight figures dropped out of a tree, nearly landing on Bottom. Before I could draw a dagger or shimmy up a tree they were on him, tugging and tickling and generally making a ruckus. Three fairies, no bigger than Cobweb, swarmed the donkey-headed man, who brayed with delight as they tugged his ears, rubbed his muzzle, and dry-humped various parts of him, none designed for such purpose.

  “Oi! Oi! Oi! You lot, get off of him,” cried Cobweb, and the fairies turned their attention on her, leaping and tackling her, trying to pull her frock over her head, wetly and loudly kissing her ears, and generally shaping themselves into a giggling pile.

  “Stop!” Cobweb shouted. “We got fucking guests, you twats. To see the queen.”

  The fairies fell into a rough approximation of a line while Cobweb crawled to her feet. “This here is Pocket of—of the Far Away, and he’s a king’s fool.” With that, the fairies came to attention. Three of them, two female, one male, the latter wearing black military trousers and no shirt. They stared at me in bloody awe, I reckon, all of their eyes as disturbingly wide as Cobweb’s.

  “That’s right,” said Cobweb. “Like the Puck, so don’t give him no trouble or he’ll change you to a toad quick as you please.”

  “Sorry,” said one of the girls. “We was looking for Bottom and was excited to find him.”

  “And I am most abundantly found,” said Bottom.

  “These here are my mates,” said Cobweb. “That there is Moth.” The first girl in the line curtsied and grinned. She had hair the color of an eggshell, short, like Cobweb’s, and wore a similar rough linen frock, in mossy green, that hung to just above her knees, although there were fewer burrs and sticks tangled in hers. “That there is Peaseblossom, she’s dead simple.” Peaseblossom, with light brown locks, rounder and a bit shorter than Cobweb and Moth, curtsied and nodded in agreement. “And that rascal there is Mustardseed.”

  “I am also simple,” said the boy. Well, not boy, really, just a small, slight man, with pointed ears and short black hair, cut in the same manner as the others’, which was, from appearances, with a knife, in the dark, by someone who was angry. He bowed. “At your service, good sir.”

  “Fancy a frolic, Master Pocket?” said Peaseblossom.

  “Oh, that would be lovely,” said Mustardseed, jumping on his toes.

  “Yes!” said Moth.

  “Master Pocket don’t frolic,” said Cobweb. “Now, we need to get Master Bottom back to the queen’s bower or she’ll roast our dicks on a stick. Go on.”

  Mustardseed and Peaseblossom took Bottom, each by a hand, and led him further into the forest. Moth hung back and held her hand as if for me to take it.

  “Go on,” said Cobweb. “Follow the others. I got this one. Go, and no fucking frolicking along the way.” She waved Moth on and fell back beside me, letting the others get far enough ahead that all I could see was Moth’s white hair bobbing in the dark like, well, a moth.

  “Don’t say nothing about the Puck being killed. Not yet,” Cobweb whispered as we went along. “And you can’t let on you haven’t magic like him. Do some tricks with your puppet stick there, and juggle and sing and hint that you have fearsome powers.”

  “You think that will work?”

  “It must. Show the queen your passport from the duke, too.”

  “How do you know about that? I didn’t show you that.”

  “And she’s going to try to shag you, so be ready.”

  “I am no stranger to deflecting the attention of lascivious queens. My aspect is fair, but I have a particular charm that keeps them at bay.”

  “I know, you are a shit. But the queen has a particular taste and you’ll want to stow that cracking big codpiece or you’ll never be rid of her.”

  “Perhaps you could wear it as a lovely elven hat,” said I.

  She rolled her eyes at me in the manner of a priest surrendering my filthy soul to hell, which is an expression I had seen more than once, and called, “Oi! Mustard! You want to wear the fool’s stupid codpiece?”

  “Is it magical?” Mustardseed called back.

  I nodded furiously.

  “No,” said Cobweb, “but it’ll be cracking for carrying your nuts and berries.”

  Mustardseed made his way back to us. I untied my codpiece and handed it over.

  “This will be smashing with some black kit the Puck give me,” said Mustardseed. “Trousers, a jerkin, and now a codpiece. I’ll be fancier than a mortal watchman.”

  Cobweb whispered, “And I still don’t believe the Puck’s dead.”

  “I’m sorry, lamb, he is. I held his chill form in my arms.”

  “You don’t know how tricky he can be,” Cobweb said.

  Chapter 9

  Queen of Tarts

  Bottom led us into an open space in the forest canopy where, bathed by moonlight, a multitude of fairies were lashing saplings together into great Gothic archways and weaving a cupola of willow over the lot, tying branches with vines and strips of bark, until it appeared that a great green cathedral was rising out of the forest floor as fairies scurried up, down, and around the branches and beams, fitting in new pieces with industrious fury.

  “The night queen’s palace,” announced Moth.

  I looked to Cobweb. “It’s just a great bundle of sticks.”

  “Don’t let the queen hear you say that,” said Cobweb.

  “How many fairies attend her?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. Seven?”

  “Seven? There are at least a hundred I can see.”

  “I don’t know,” said Cobweb.

  “We’re not good at counting,” said Moth.

  A team of four fairies dashed around the edges of the construction snatching fireflies out of the brush and tossing them into lanterns constructed of gold-flecked mica, until each lantern glowed brighter and softer than any oil lamp. Then one would climb into the growing dome and place it among the arches.

  “We build it every night,” said Mustardseed.

  “The queen is ever so particular that it’s suitable for entertaining,” said Peaseblossom.

  “She’s been right cranky since Oberon chucked her out the Night Palace,” said Moth.

  “How long ago was that?” I inquired.

  Moth shrugged. “Many.” She danced into the fray and began helping another fairy to lash branches to the dome.

  The fairies were all as slim and tattered as Cobweb but dressed in many colors and styles, as if they’d found their kit on a beach, the flotsam of a shipwreck. None wore shoes or any jewelry, although some had striped their limbs with clay or dye. Meanwhile, Mustardseed was strutting around the perimeter wearing my codpiece, thrusting it at anyone who dared look up from their work.

  A flaxen-haired girl fairy called from atop the dome, “Mustard! What you got there?”

  “It’s my new kit,” said Mustardseed. He thrust it at her. “Fancy a frolic?”

  The blond fairy ran down one of the ribs of the dome, as sure-footed as if she were on flat ground, and, while still five yards above the ground, leapt off the edifice, landed with a roll, and came up onto her feet in front of Mustardseed, where she honked his codpiece. “It’s lovely,” she said. She grinned around our group, her hand still on the cod, her gaze coming to rest on me. “Who are you, sir?”

  “He’s a fool,” said Cobweb. “Like the Puck. Pocket of the Far Away. Pocket, this here’s Fluffer-Nutter.”

  Fluffer-Nutter curtsied and averted her gaze to the ground. “Beg pardon, sir.”

  “Enchanté,” said I, in perfect fucking French.

  “Is he fucking French?” Fluffer-Nutter whispered to Mustardseed.

  He shrugged. “Don’t know. Mayfly, I reckon.”

  Dismissing it all with a wave, Fluffer-Nutter looked back to the ribs of the great growing dome. “We’d best get to work. We’re behind and the queen will be steaming if we don’t finish before she arrives.” With that she turned and ran bac
k up a sapling making up one of the arched openings, as quick and agile as Jeff the monkey might have been. Mustardseed, Moth, and Peaseblossom followed her up with the grace of dancers. I am an accomplished acrobat myself, having been trained as a boy to be a second-story man for a thief, and later as an entertainer to the king, so I could climb and tumble as well as anyone I’d ever seen, but these fairies moved about the green rigging of their cathedral like they were born to the trees.

  A tattoo of drumming sounded from out of the clearing and a cohort of perhaps fifty fairies marched out of the forest bearing a covered litter festooned with flowers upon their shoulders, followed by a line of fairies carrying trays of fruits, others carrying earthenware amphorae, presumably filled with wine, or maybe, since these were fucking fairies, some kind of nectar.

  “That’s her,” said Bottom. “And if past is prologue, I am to be most grievously and jauntily used—used like a—like a—”

  Bottom snuffled his muzzle against my shoulder and his long ears batted about the tentacles of my coxcomb as if trying to make friends.

  “Like a beast of burden?” I suggested.

  “Aye,” said the ass-man. “Like a beast.” He hid his eyes against me and let loose a wheezing whinny.

  With that, the diaphanous curtain of the litter was swept aside and Titania, queen of the night, stepped out onto the green. She was no taller nor rounder than the other fairies, and, but for garlands of flowers draped across her hips and breasts, quite naked. Her skin was as pale as the moon, so pale it seemed that she might be composed of moonlight herself. Her cape of curls was woven with flowers and fragrants so numerous that a moment passed before I could discern that her hair was the same light brown as Peaseblossom’s. Her eyes were emerald green and so wide it seemed she was in a perpetual state of surprise, or perhaps excitement, but definitely—as they darted around like minnows in a bucket—undeniably, as mad as a fucking bedbug.

  “Oh, sing again, my glorious mortal, thy song is as beautiful as thy shape.” She danced, tiny steps, across the forest floor until she stood by Bottom, where she stroked his long ears with delicate fingers. “Oh, sing again, my love. Sing again.”