The Medieval Murderers - The Tainted Relic

‘Well, if you should happen to find yourself in the region of Smithfield…’

He paused, waiting to see whether I would flat out deny this possibility. When I said nothing, Shakespeare continued, ‘If you were to visit Smithfield, I say, I would be most obliged if you could call on a certain gentleman who is set up at the fair. A book vendor.’

‘Of course, but why?’ I said this with genuine curiosity. I’d no objection to being asked to do my friend a favour but was unable to see why he couldn’t cross the short distance to Smithfield and call on the bookseller himself. In addition, there was a trace of discomfort in his voice, something very unusual in WS.

‘I want you to recover what one might call a-ah-relic,’ said the playwright.

‘A relic?’

‘I shall explain.’

And so he did, as we paced slowly in the direction of the Goat and Monkey alehouse.

It turned out that in his very early days in London, William Shakespeare had penned a journeyman drama about Domitian, one of the mad emperors of the Romans. Not liking the work-which was packed with rape and dismembered limbs and written in three days to catch a public fashion for sensational drama-he’d put it to one side and forgotten about it.

‘Don’t mistake me, Nick,’ said WS. ‘It wasn’t the subject matter of my Domitian which I rejected. Shortly afterwards I wrote a thing called Titus Andronicus . That had more than its fair share of horrors and was accounted a success.’

‘I’ve heard of Titus ,’ I said.

‘It was simply that the piece about Domitian was rough in the wrong way. Crude, crude…I should have destroyed it there and then. Put it in the fire. Sometimes flame is the author’s best friend. But I didn’t destroy it. And at some point in my shift from one set of lodgings to another, Domitian went missing. I don’t suppose I’ve thought of it more than twice in the last fifteen years. You see why I call it a relic of my early days. Now I hear that a book vendor has somehow acquired my foul papers.’

(Don’t get the wrong idea about ‘foul papers’, by the way. This is simply the earliest stage of the writer’s finished composition before the material is sent to a scrivener to make fair copies. As the expression suggests, a foul paper is likely to be full of blotches and crossings-out.)

‘Are you sure that it’s in the hands of this book dealer?’ I said. ‘After all, if you haven’t seen it for the past fifteen years…’

‘I have it on good authority,’ said WS. ‘Yes, I’m sure he has my Domitian .’

‘I suppose he’s going to sell it,’ I said.

‘Sell it to you, I hope,’ said WS, quickly adding, ‘I want you to buy it, Nick. I don’t want this thing falling into the wrong hands, one of our rival companies, for example, like Henslowe’s. Hatch would go a long way to embarrass me.’

‘Hatch?’

‘This book vendor rejoices in the name of Ulysses Hatch. For the most part he’s a dealer in scurrilous ballads and scald rhymes rather than books. In fact, he will trade in anything that turns a profit. A long time ago he and I had a falling-out over…something. Even after all these years he wouldn’t miss an opportunity to get back at me.’

I didn’t ask WS why this oddly named gent wanted to get back at him. Instead I said, ‘Does it matter if this piece of yours is sold elsewhere? After all, you have such a reputation…’

An eavesdropper might have thought that I was flattering Shakespeare but I was speaking no more than the truth. Nor did he waste our time with false modesty. ‘Yes, I have a reputation now,’ he said, ‘yet I might be struck down tomorrow. No man can see the future. I would be unhappy if I knew that a ragged piece about a mad emperor was resurrected after my death to be staged and laughed at-for the wrong reasons. It was journeyman work, I tell you. Would you like to be remembered for your earliest, halting attempts to speak verse on the stage?’

‘Well, no, I wouldn’t…’

I was about to say that there was no comparison between an obscure actor and the most famous playwright in London. But I stayed silent, slightly surprised-but also touched-that even so notable a man as WS should be concerned about his posthumous reputation. Until quite recently, he’d been seemingly indifferent, and given to statements such as ‘Let them sort it out after we are all dead’. Maybe it was age which was causing him to change his tune.

By this time we’d arrived at the Goat and Monkey. Absorbed in listening to Shakespeare’s story I’d almost forgotten my thirst. But not quite. We paused by the door of the alehouse.

‘I cannot go and see Master Ulysses Hatch myself,’ said WS. ‘We know each other too well, fat Hatch and I. He would most likely refuse to sell it to me out of sheer spite.’

‘But the foul papers are yours,’ I said. ‘You never sold them but mislaid them.’

‘Proving title to a piece is very difficult,’ said WS. ‘He could claim to have come by them honestly, and for all I know he did. Bought them from a landlord perhaps.’

‘What about sending one of the shareholders?’ I said, instinctively reluctant to undertake this task.

‘He would recognize any of my fellows. He is familiar with the stage world.’

‘But he wouldn’t recognize an obscure player?’

‘Obscure? Do not say so. Bitterness isn’t in your repertoire, Nick, for all that you’re a good player. One day, perhaps, a fine player.’

‘Then why me?’ I said. ‘Why are you asking me to recover your old play?’

‘Because you are a straightforward person,’ said WS. ‘No one will suspect you of double dealing.’

In another man one might have suspected flattery, but with WS I chose not to. Instead I strove to hide my smile in the glaring sun of early evening and, almost before I knew it, agreed to visit St Bartholomew’s Fair the following morning. Agreed to track down Ulysses Hatch and, without revealing who had sent me, to obtain the foul-paper manuscript of a play entitled Domitian , if it was in his possession. WS authorized me to offer up to to five pounds for the play. This was a hefty price and, if questioned, I was to insinuate that I was a member of a rival company to the King’s Men-one of Henslowe’s men, say-interested in getting hold of an early work by the tyro Shakespeare.

So it was that on this fine morning I found myself at St Bartholomew’s Fair with Jack Wilson and Abel Glaze. I’d met my friends in the Goat and Monkey the previous evening and outlined Shakespeare’s request. I’d no hesitation in doing this since WS himself had suggested I might take some company to give ‘colour’ to the enterprise, as he put it. He gave no other instructions on how to go about getting hold of his Domitian foul papers, merely leaving it to my ‘discretion’ and ‘good sense’. Perhaps he was a flatterer after all.

The three of us threaded among the crowds and between the confectioners and horse dealers, the barbers and the pin-makers. At one point Abel said, ‘Isn’t that Tom Gally?’

Crossing the path ahead of us was an individual with unkempt black hair. The man certainly looked like Gally, who acted as a kind of unofficial agent for Philip Henslowe, the owner and promoter of playhouses, bear pits and much else besides. I knew Tom Gally and distrusted him. His long, soft hair was reminiscent of a sheep’s fleece but there was a wolf beneath. I wondered what was his business at St Bartholomew’s Fair and whether he was after the Domitian foul papers too.

We came to a relatively quiet little quarter of the fairground, one given over to the vendors of books and pamphlets and printed ballads. We weren’t long in finding our objective. Among the stalls was a more elaborate yellow-and-white-striped tent with its flaps folded back on one side. Hanging from a crossbar above a trestle table scattered with sheets and tatty volumes was a sign announcing the presence of Ulysses Hatch, Publisher . Many booksellers are also publishers and prefer to advertise themselves as such. There was no one to be seen at the mouth of the tent.