The Medieval Murderers - King Arthur's Bones

‘Edmund would see through that. He’d know the decision was mine. It would be cowardly and, besides, there are obligations within a family which have to be acknowledged. No, the only course is to get Edmund to see for himself that the stage is not meant for him. It will take time. We shall have to accommodate him by giving him small parts like any fledgling player.’

‘I began as an ambassador in Hamlet ,’ I said. ‘I was an ambassador from England, arriving at the end of the action.’

‘I remember your ambassador well,’ said WS, which was what I’d been hoping he would say. But he was softening me up, for his next words were: ‘I’d like you to keep a gentle watch on my brother, Nick. Have an eye on him backstage, accompany him to the tavern and… other places if necessary.’

‘Why me?’

‘Because I trust you and because I cannot think of who else to turn to in our company. You are older than Edmund and have a shrewd head on your shoulders.’

I don’t think I’d been called shrewd before, certainly not by William Shakespeare, so this was pleasing. But I must have looked doutbful, for he continued: ‘You were once fresh up from the country and you learned the hard way about this city and its snares. Edmund is as ready to be taken in as most newcomers but he might accept advice or a warning from you which he’d reject from me. I don’t mean that you should be responsible if things, ah, go badly. If Edmund chooses to ignore you, so be it. But at least you can whisper in his ear that that friendly group of card players in the corner of the Goat and Monkey are coney-catchers…’

‘… or that the new French girl at the Mitre will give you a dose of the pox,’ I said.

‘You’ve got the idea,’ said WS, suddenly finding something of great interest in the glass of sack he was holding.

‘And how is King Arthur involved in all of this? You said your brother found that bone for you.’

‘Edmund tells me that he is a reformed man, no longer the scapegrace of Stratford. He wants to stand well with me and, knowing that I am writing about the matter of Britain, he brought me this relic of Arthur. Like a dog acting against nature and wanting to please its master, he gave up a bone, you might say.’

Since Shakespeare disliked dogs, feared them even, this was far from being a flattering remark.

‘Where did your brother get it?’ I said. ‘Is it really Arthur’s?’

‘From one of the bookshops near St Paul’s. Edmund says he was searching for books that might help me in my labours and no doubt telling the seller how he was kin to a well-known playwright whose latest piece is about Arthur of Britain. The shopkeeper had no texts on the subject but offered him this bone instead. He claimed on his mother’s grave that it was a true bone. Edmund said he almost emptied his purse to purchase it for me. I think he meant well, but anyone who was not kin to him might call him gullible.’

‘But you don’t call him gullible,’ I said, ‘not on this occasion.’

‘Why, no,’ said WS. He put down his glass and picked up the arm- or leg-bone once more. I noticed that he handled it with the same care as before. ‘Tell me, Nick, when you touched this, did you… feel anything?’

‘Just a bone. It made me feel uneasy, no more. But then I didn’t know whose it is, whose it is supposed to be, rather.’

‘Perhaps that’s it. Edmund informed me of the nature of his find before giving me this relic. When I put my fingers on it, I experienced a queer kind of blankness, as though I had walked out of doors and into a mist. It was neither pleasant nor especially unpleasant. But was the sensation produced by Edmund’s words or was it some property of the bone itself? For nothing is either good or bad, you know, but thinking makes it so.’

He might have gone on in this vein – an abstracted look had entered his large brown eyes – but he was interrupted by a knock outside. WS barely had time to say ‘Come in’ when the door opened. I turned around in my seat and saw a figure standing there. Without being told, I knew who it must be. Edmund Shakespeare, WS’s scapegrace younger brother.

A couple of days later I was sitting with Edmund Shakespeare in the Mermaid tavern on Bread Street near St Paul’s. Although it attracted poets and other scribblers, the Mermaid was a well-run house with a reputation for good fish and wine. It was the place where William Shakespeare’s envious rival Ben Jonson, sometimes held court. Jonson haunted the tavern partly because of its food and drink – he reckoned himself a man of refined taste – but mostly because it was half a world away from the common drinking dens like the Goat and Monkey south of the river.

Ben Jonson wasn’t in session at the Mermaid today, but Edmund and I were awaiting the arrival of another playwright, Martin Barton, who was eager to meet Shakespeare’s brother. Barton was no friend of mine but, encountering him earlier that day, he’d badgered me for an introduction when I let slip that I was meeting Edmund once our playhouse business was done. It was characteristic of the man that he should now keep us waiting. The wait wasn’t too onerous, however, since Edmund and I were sitting side by side on a bench and occupying ourselves with a pile of oysters and a flask of wine.

During the past two days I’d been doing as William requested, keeping a ‘gentle watch’ over his brother. Because of WS’s position and authority as a senior member of the Globe shareholders, he had easily procured a role for Edmund at the theatre. Not yet as a minor player but as a general dogsbody, running errands for the book-man or assisting Sam, our little limping doorkeeper. Maybe WS hoped to convince Edmund that the playhouse was really a dreary place in which to work and that he’d be better off back home in Stratford-upon-Avon. If so, it was a forlorn hope, for Edmund was wide-eyed about being in London. He’d have been happy sweeping up the draff from a tavern floor. And he wasn’t sweeping up in an alehouse but helping behind the scenes in a playhouse where there is always a touch of magic, even among the wooden swords and the paste jewellery.

The quick picture that WS had painted of his brother – a gullible individual who was too impulsive, too undisciplined for the stage – didn’t fit with my first or second impressions of the man. Edmund had some physical similarities to his much older sibling. He was slight but tall and wiry, and his eyes had the same large gaze beneath a tall brow. He did not possess the same easy manners as WS, the almost courtly style that enabled the playwright to be comfortable anywhere. But then Edmund was fresh up from the provinces, as WS had once been and as I had been too. We’ve all got to start somewhere. Certainly I had not yet seen any indication of the rapid temper I’d been warned about. Nor had Edmund shown signs of falling prey to any card-playing coney-catchers. But there was a woman in the picture. At least there was one in the Mermaid, a pretty piece who was hanging about his ears when I arrived and whom Edmund daffed away, explaining that he wanted male company. I knew no more about her than that she was called Polly or Dolly and had dark ringlets of hair under a pretty hat and large breasts partly concealed by her dress. Obediently she withdrew, and Edmund and I started gabbing.

I’d go so far as to say that I was enjoying his company more than expected. Or, to be absolutely honest, I was enjoying playing the experienced citizen of London and the senior player.

‘You’ll come with me to visit this fellow Davy Owen, then, Nick?’ said Edmund Shakespeare. He reached forward to help himself to an opened oyster from the pile on a platter in front of us. He tilted his head and I watched his Adam’s apple bob as it slid down his gullet.