Edward Marston - The Fair Maid of Bohemia

‘Christian Dorsch.’

‘We can see why you changed it,’ said Elias. ‘Murder sits ill with a name like Christian.’

‘I have several names,’ boasted the other. ‘Usselincx has been useful before and, as you see, I can play the organ.’ He looked around. ‘Well done, gentlemen. A fine performance. I own myself privileged to have had a play written for me by so famous a company.’

He began to chuckle, then put his head back to laugh his fill. Nicholas was not fooled. Without warning, the prisoner suddenly produced another dagger from under his surplice and lunged at the book-holder. The latter moved even swifter and raised his swordpoint at precisely the right moment. His adversary’s surge was his own downfall. Impaled on the weapon, he could only scream in agony and squirm impotently. When Nicholas extracted the sword with a decisive pull, the German fell dead at his feet.

Richard Honeydew burst into tears at the shock. Firethorn took the boy in his arms to comfort him. He looked across at Nicholas’s resplendent attire.

‘Next time,’ he said. ‘ I will play Conrad of Brunswick. It is the only way I will marry my fair maid of Bohemia.’

Restored to favour and clad in a new gown, Doctor Talbot Royden was permitted to attend the wedding after all. He had a seat at the very rear of the cathedral and could see nothing of the ceremony itself, but that did not matter. He was there. Honour had been satisfied. When the organ swelled in celebration and the couple came down the aisle as man and wife, Royden got only the merest glimpse of them, but it was enough for him to make his prediction about their marriage.

Floating on the wishes of the Emperor and the goodwill of the congregation, Conrad of Brunswick and Sophia Magdalena of Jankau were filled with happiness and optimism at that moment. Royden wished that he could share it. But his work as an agent had given him too close an insight into the lethal religious undercurrents in the Empire. Rudolph had contrived to wed a handsome Protestant with a beautiful Bohemian maid, but it would achieve little in the way of permanent reconciliation. A man who had alternately ignored or exacerbated the schism in the Empire could not really hope that a two-hour ceremony in the Cathedral of Saint Vitus would solve the problem.

During the magnificent banquet in the Vladislav Hall, Royden kept his cynical reservations to himself. The Emperor was beaming, Sophia Magdalena was an angel in white and her husband was lovingly attentive. Rich wine and plentiful beer achieved a temporary amity between Protestant and Catholic. Every stage of the endless repast was accompanied by some kind of entertainment. Singers, dancers, musicians, tumblers, clowns, performing animals and conjurers were brought in to delight and divert. The portrait of the Emperor as a selection of fruit was borne aloft proudly by its artist. Royden at last understood the meaning of the fruit basket sent to his cell.

Westfield’s Men were given pride of place. Saved until the evening, when the celebrations were at their height, they were given a standing ovation as soon as they were announced. Without the bravery of the theatre troupe, there would have been no banquet. Westfield’s Men had foiled an assassination attempt on Conrad of Brunswick, designed to rescue Sophia Magdalena from marrying into a Protestant family. She had unwittingly become a symbol of Catholic defiance. Had the bridegroom been murdered during the rehearsal for the wedding, the consequences would have been hideous. The guests preferred not to contemplate them. Disaster averted, they now wanted to put it behind them, but they had not forgotten that Westfield’s Men were their saviours.

The Fair Maid of Bohemia was given its debut in the largest secular hall in Prague. Its size intimidated some of the company, who feared that their voices would not be heard. Built at the end of the previous century, the Vladislav Hall had the most remarkable ceiling they had ever seen. Its reticulated stellar vaulting covered a huge expanse, yet had no supporting pillars. Some of the actors could not understand how the ceiling stayed in position.

‘It is a miracle,’ said George Dart, gazing up.

‘So is our play,’ reminded Nicholas. ‘Edmund has written while we travelled across Germany in our wagons. Yet it holds together every bit as well as the ceiling.’

‘Thank you, Nick,’ said Hoode, ‘but you helped me to fashion the piece. Its lustre is partly due to you. We can but hope that Sophia Magdalena will like it.’

‘She will adore the play,’ said Firethorn confidently. ‘And dote on my performance as the Archduke.’

‘What about my role as the jester?’ asked Gill sniffily.

‘An ill-favoured thing, Barnaby, but we’ll endure it.’

‘My comic skills are the joy of this company.’

‘Yes. We never stop laughing at your absurdity.’

‘My Rigormortis in Cupid’s Fool was the shooting star of Frankfurt. Everyone loved it.’

‘None more so than Hugo Usselincx,’ noted Elias with a grin. ‘He has aped your performance and now plays rigor mortis himself.’

The laughter was mixed with groans of distaste. They were in the tiring-house, an ante-chamber off the hall. A high stage had been built up against the door and screened at the rear with curtains. To mount the stage, actors had to skip up five steps. Once there, they held a commanding position over the entire audience. After feasting for the best part of a day, that audience was in the most receptive mood possible.

Nicholas called the actors to order, then gave the signal for the play to begin. The quartet went out to set the mood with music, then Elias swept onto the centre of the stage to deliver a Prologue, which Hoode had kept deliberately short and simple. It began with one of the three German words he had mastered.

‘Willkommen, friends, to our new-minted play,

A humble gift upon this wedding day

To Brunswick’s Conrad and his lovely bride,

Sophia Magdalena, Beauty’s pride.

Our theme today is Happiness restored,

A long-lost child, remembered and adored,

Is on her sixteenth birthday found again

And reunited with her kith and kin.

In Prague’s great city is our action laid,

Prepare to meet Bohemia’s fairest maid.

To help your understanding ere we go,

Our play, its theme, we here present in show.

Elias bowed low and the tidal wave of applause carried him off the stage. When the sound finally faded, the musicians struck up again and the cast came on to perform the play in dumb show. It held the entire hall spellbound.

The Archduke and his wife were seen doting on their baby daughter. The girl is stolen by an unscrupulous lady-in-waiting and sold to childless peasants. Blaming the court jester, the Archduke banishes him and he commits himself to a search for the missing child. Sixteen years pass. She is now a gorgeous girl with a nobility of bearing that marks her out from the peasants. A prince falls in love with her but is forbidden to marry her because of her lowly station. The jester eventually tracks her down, identifies her, reunites her with her parents and is reinstated at Court. The play ends with the marriage of the fair maid and her prince.

Having seen the play in mime, the spectators had no difficulty in following its story in verse. Songs and dances were used in abundance. Eager to find his daughter himself, the Archduke disguises himself as a troubadour and goes among his people for the first time in his life. Firethorn extracted enormous pathos and humour out of his scenes and sang like a born troubadour. Richard Honeydew blossomed as the fair maid, with James Ingram as her handsome prince. Barnaby Gill added yet another mirthful jester to his collection, and Owen Elias displayed his comic touch as a drunken hedge-priest who keeps marrying the wrong people to each other. Edmund Hoode was the kind old peasant who brings up the fair maid as his own.