The Secret Life of William Shakespeare Read online

  ‘Do I? Most mornings when I wake I’m not sure who I am. And seldom does the day reveal it.’

  They were in the tiny courtyard behind the house where Madame Vautrollier grew herbs and other plants. In summer, she said, he should see it in summer, but even now greenery quivered in the numberless pots and trays. Looking up at the hatch of sky, Will wondered how she did it.

  ‘Oh, you mean because you are a player,’ she said, plying the water-jug, pressing down loam. A cloth always at her waist, prompt to mop spills, dab sullied fingers: she would never, he felt, be taken unawares. The indeterminate eyes saw far.

  ‘Something like that.’ It wasn’t what he meant.

  ‘Well, after all, you wake alone,’ she said, looping back a strand of black hair. It seemed heavy as a string of pearls. ‘That’s never good for anyone.’

  Will knew who Jacqueline Vautrollier was, though. Temptation. She was temptation personified, in the way of the older plays that still pleased the inn-yard sort, with a Vice who stalked on winking at the audience and demonically chuckling over his villainy. Useful, he thought, if everyone you came across in life located themselves in this way, so you knew just where you were.

  That was what he believed when he was not at Blackfriars, at any rate; when he dwelled on blood and stones and renewed the terms of the pact with himself. Fidelity, absolute fidelity to Anne, was the price of his being allowed to leave her and pursue this dream, otherlife, firstlife, coin it how you will. Whatever he was seeking in London – and he glimpsed it here and there, through the brakes and thickets of the everyday – it must be untouched by anything of flesh and heart. That was elsewhere, under seal and promise.

  When he was with her it was not quite so easy. She was not a Vice or one of the Seven Deadly Sins: she was too interesting for that. Her Frenchness: some quality beyond complexion and accent that he could not define, and fascinated him, though she was not forthcoming about the country of her birth. ‘France is dead to me now,’ she said. ‘And to all the godly. A land of ghosts. Here we can live.’ Conversation with her sparked and kindled him. And Richard was so very busy, and it was pleasant and agreeable to everyone for Will to pass a little time with her in the courtyard among the tender shoots and fronds. And when she spoke out to him one afternoon, bare and honest, he thought that at least she was not playing the coquette, and so …

  ‘Richard is from home. Business at Gravesend. He lies there tonight.’ She laid her hand on Will’s. She made it seem a very natural action, almost as if he had asked her to do it. ‘Now you’re surely not going to run away because of that, are you?’

  ‘You are to marry Richard very soon,’ Will said, after a moment. ‘Isn’t that so?’

  ‘Yes, so I am. And you are Richard’s old friend, yes. All this is very easy to get over, very smooth, but the English go along so heavily. Like carthorses.’ A twitch of a smile: more nervous, perhaps, than she appeared.

  ‘Carthorses,’ he said, gently disengaging his hand, laughing a little. ‘Madame, such flattery.’ He had a brief hope that it could end thus, dissipate in froth. But she stepped forward and kissed him on the mouth, and then stepped back: formal, as a dance or duel.

  ‘Call it running away, if you like,’ he said, ‘but I must go.’ His voice was strangely thick; and though he meant to move, nothing happened.

  ‘Who are you afraid to hurt? I ask because I am truly curious. Richard? He won’t know. Richard has the measure of his bargain. He esteems me pretty well and he esteems the business very well, and he knows that I need someone to manage it and maintain my household as I am used to it. Marriage means looking at the same face every day, you know: it’s best if it’s an ordinary one, not exciting; it’s more restful. Are you afraid to hurt me? That won’t happen. Once married, I shall be faithful. William, I mean only a little fair-day together, a little indulgence, and then back to work, with some sweet honey memories for the savouring.’

  ‘Marriage. There, you’ve said the word, and that’s all that was needed. You can’t have forgotten that I am married—’

  ‘Indeed no, and how is your wife?’

  He jerked his head back: he had not thought her capable of this. ‘Madame, your servant—’

  ‘William.’ She held his arm, forcing him to turn. ‘I mean no insult to your wife. I wish her well. I wish her all happiness and you with her, when you return to the country one day. But I ask how she is because you don’t know – do you? You suppose this and that. It’s all supposes. You’re miles and miles away. Distance, time, they change things. When something is very, very far away, it appears small. God made it so. Otherwise the stars would blind us and the birds in the sky would look like dragons.’

  It would have been so easy to kiss her. He could hardly think of an easier thing. But he remembered where they stood: their roles. The essence of temptation was that it appeared harmless. ‘Sweet honey memories may spoil,’ he said. ‘And I don’t think God is pertaining to this, you know.’

  She smiled. He supposed pride would let her do nothing else. But, no, she was at ease, picking up her basket and jug, glancing over her plants. ‘Come spring, I mean to have tulips. Have you ever seen tulips? They come from the gardens of the Turks, they say. Too beautiful for the infidel. Are you in love, William?’

  ‘With my wife, yes.’

  She stared as if he had made a crude joke, then laughed lightly. ‘Very well. I’ll say no more – except that life isn’t like a book, you know: you can never turn back to a page. Never mind. You will still come to see us, won’t you? I mean it. Because it really doesn’t matter.’ Her eyes were large and candid. ‘That above all is what I wanted you to understand.’

  Will attended the wedding of Richard Field and Jacqueline Vautrollier; and come spring, he was there, in the little courtyard, to see the tulips blooming. Rich upward-sucking mouths without faces. They seemed to him, like most things in life, fearfully unlikely. He had in him a sense of conquest or defeat, as elusive as the colour of the bride’s eyes.

  * * *

  In Stratford, spring was becoming summer and summer the first without him. But Greenaway the carrier arrives from London one bright warm afternoon, when all the talk is of the Spaniards landing and Gilbert and Richard are doing pike-drill with the local muster, and puts a packet in Anne’s hand. It contains two crowns, one gold, one silver, and a letter from her husband.

  John Shakespeare is hovering beside her in the doorway. He snatches up the letter and reads it to himself, lips moving, breathing the words. Will is the only person she has known who can read silently.

  ‘Bravely, I thank you … And how does Mistress Greenaway now? We were sore grieved for your little one. He rests with God … Bonfires built all along? Nay, if they come they’ll have such a fight shall make them wish their bread dough … And Will was in good looks, say you? So, so…’

  She has to do all of this, while her father-in-law broods blindly at her side. He grows more and more awkward in company, she thinks. But then this, this moment is exceptional, as Will enters their lives again, if only remotely. And though she cannot read the words, it does not feel remote, really – his presence: when it was his hand that made those rippling ink-marks, and his hand, too, touched these coins. They feel warm to her: an illusion she is quite happy with, for she judges illusions by their quality. Torn between missing him, hating him, and imagining him deserting her for London for ever, she has not expected hearing from him to produce this: simple happiness. Complexity will follow, no doubt, but for now she is content to clutch the warm coins, and wait to hear the letter.

  Bidding farewell to the carrier, Anne goes in to find John Shakespeare sitting by his unseasonal fire. The letter – the letter is on the floor.

  Edmund’s feet pattering.

  ‘Oh, is that from Will?’

  ‘Hie down to the cellar, Edmund. Fetch me ale.’

  Anne draws close, puts a hand on his shoulder. The fire in the warm day seems to her scarcely bearable, but perhaps that is the
point: a refusal of the real.

  ‘What does he say?’ Suddenly fear possesses her. ‘For God’s sake, what does my husband say? Is anything wrong? Will Greenaway said he was hale when he saw him—’

  ‘Peace, peace, he’s well.’ He twitches away from her. ‘How much did he send you?’

  Anne opens her hand. The coins do not glitter, London coins dull with use, but they have their brilliance.

  ‘Well. A man in a proper way of trade would do well to earn such in a fortnight.’ He looks away from them. ‘Are you happy with it? A husband in London, far away, naught of him but this?’

  ‘A husband still.’ Her voice surprises her with its sharpness. ‘A son still.’

  Edmund appears, solemnly balancing the ale-jug. His father watches him as if expecting him to drop it. This is his look with his children now: a steady expectation of disappointment. Anne takes the jug from him and pours. But drink never alters John Shakespeare, not in the way of making him softer or harder. It only makes him more stubbornly himself. In the end it is Gilbert, coming in sweat-soaked and sunburned from drilling, who reads the letter out.

  It is short. Recommends himself to the favour of his father and mother, presents his truest fondest love to his dear wife Anne, earnestly prays that this finds all at home well. Reports that he finds himself, after some small travails, in good case, and regularly employed in the London theatres as a player by my lord Sussex’s Men, on such terms as enable him to send by his good friend Greenaway the enclosed sum, with the firm hope of more anon. Reports that there is but little sign of summer plague in London this year, praise be to God. Reports that he will soon be undertaking a summer tour of the southern and midland parts of the kingdom with his company, and hopes to be among them for a short time when they come by Wycombe and Oxford. To Anne his wife again much love, and for the babes kisses …

  Her father-in-law drains his tankard. ‘So, you see. He will try just to include us on his way about the country with his players. A few days, perhaps, think you? And after, gone again. That’s all there is, daughter, and all there will be.’

  Anne makes a subtle face at Edmund to wipe his nose. ‘Well, we’ll see. He’s new in the profession, so he has to work hard. In time—’

  ‘You delude yourself, Anne.’

  ‘Do I? I try only to hold fast to my belief, and not change it. After all, you told me he’d come slinking home like a beaten dog. Now he’s a coxcomb who won’t come at all. He can’t be both, Father John.’

  He stares. Anne feels the enormity of it too, and tries not to flush. This is new: she has never quarrelled with him before, never found the grounds. She sees it in his eyes also – if we fall out, where will the power shift to next, and who will be the winner or loser?

  ‘As long as you are happy with this – this life that he forces on you,’ he says at last, ‘who am I to speak? You do well to reproach me, daughter.’

  He goes out. There is still ale in the jug. Gilbert, after a moment, scoops it up and drinks from it. Over the foaming rim his eyes salute Anne’s with a crackle of rebellion. Another shift.

  But Anne fears it as she fears all change. She is summoned to the yard by a roar from Hamnet, who has been shoved over on to the cobbles by Judith. She wipes his tear-mashed face, soothing, wondering whence the easy sentiment about twins: sometimes these two resemble overgrown birds in a small nest, each trying to push the other out. Then she goes in search of her father-in-law.

  She finds him at the front of the house. He has borrowed the neighbour’s ladder and propped it up so that it reaches the roof on the west gable and he is climbing. A few spectators have gathered, as they will for anything, a dog-fight, a drunk spewing.

  Anne grips the wobbling ladder. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Attending,’ comes his voice. ‘Attending to matters.’

  The holes in the roof. Reaching the top, he begins poking at them ineffectually. Nonsense: the tiler’s job. He lunges and sways and Anne tastes metal. Strong, yes, but he has put on weight lately, grown splay-legged and stiff, like the spinster’s overfed cat.

  ‘Come down, Father John.’ Try to keep the voice level, no pulse of panic in it. Like when Susannah cut open her knee: don’t let her tell from your face how bad it is. ‘That’s no work for you, and it can’t be patched. The rain doesn’t come in. Leave it.’ The ladder wobbles again. She feels his stubbornness, stabbing down with the sun: recognises it. ‘You’ll hurt yourself.’

  ‘Aye, what then?’

  Then, of course, it will be Will’s fault. She understands the reasoning. Susannah has it when she throws one of her rare tantrums; she herself had it when her father was dying, and she preferred him to suffer rather than leave her. ‘If you won’t come down,’ she says, ‘I’ll come up.’ Anne hates heights, but grimly starts the climb. A fine pair of monkeys on a stick … The overburdened ladder creaks. He looks down, white-faced. ‘Climb as high as you like,’ she says, ‘but he still can’t see you.’ Nor will he pity you, come home, and change. She does not say that part, but her father-in-law feels it, perhaps, as an emanation, for he makes a growling sigh and begins to descend.

  On the ground they face each other.

  ‘You may not direct me, Anne,’ he says breathing hard. ‘I am not yours to direct.’

  ‘Love doesn’t seek to direct.’

  ‘Then love is oft the loser.’ He shakes his head. She sees him at a point of perplexity, about to ask, Whose side are you on?

  Which is a good question. My side, Father John: my side alone. It occurs to her that you have only one life. All the time as you walk on, the ground falls away behind your heels.

  That evening her father-in-law loses his temper with Edmund over something and nothing, and raises his arm to beat him. Her mother-in-law intervenes. No more trouble, she mourns. Her sad, bitter look is inclusive: she wishes they could all be better. Follow her example. Anne mixes his favourite drinks and stirs his fire, and secretly promises Edmund a tale later. Gilbert’s expression is habitually cool and dry, but she sees more in it now when his eye falls on his father: sees the contempt. Would it have been better if Will had reached that point? The point of looking at his father and thinking, you sad old fool. And then the break, without mess. But she shivers, imagining a Will so single-minded, so terrifyingly capable.

  She tells Edmund a tale separately, after her own children are asleep, the way he likes it. Only three years older than Susannah, he keeps adult hours, has an adolescent’s eager pallor.

  ‘Edmund,’ she says, ‘bring your hornbook.’

  ‘Oh,’ he groans, ‘study now?’

  ‘Not you, me. Will you teach me a little, Edmund? I barely have my letters. I want to read swift and clear. Let’s learn together, hey? But a secret betwixt us.’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Nothing he likes better: he already belongs to her and Will, bought and sold. Then a little grin of calculation. ‘And after study, we can dance?’

  They danced at Christmas, at Hewlands Farm, on one of her rare visits. (Bartholomew on Will’s defection to London: dear God, a hundred carefully withheld remarks, a thousand wry faces.) Since then, whenever there is music in Stratford, a wedding, a street-fiddler, Edmund hankers for it. Sometimes Anne foots it with him, just humming the tune, to please him. But here is a fair bargain. ‘Yes. After, we shall dance.’

  They do, trying not to make the floorboards creak, while vowel sounds skip round her head. She ignores the voice that says, You’ll never learn. Edmund looks so much like Will she could almost weep – but Anne is setting a course away from those rocks, where the wrecks of tears lie wasting.

  * * *

  Will reaches Stratford a day before his company by walking all night. Anne, coming down early to light the fire, finds him in the kitchen drinking in great blind gulps. For a moment she thinks she has actually imagined him into being. Even the curious whiteness of the image seems to confirm it, as if her longing sorcery could not quite manage the colours.

  Then she sees: he is
covered with road-dust.

  ‘Your boots,’ she says.

  He looks down at the floor, then pats his doublet so the dust puffs out. ‘My everything,’ he says. And then: ‘My everything.’

  * * *

  Here, coiled in the crook of his arm, all is well and it is hard to see how all can be otherwise. And it is only a night, but nights can stretch themselves out and in them you can do and say and think and feel much, much that won’t fit in the squeeze of day.

  ‘He’s not always like this,’ she says. They have talked of many things: the beautiful progresses and infinitely varied impossibilities of the children; his life in London, his lodging and living, the struggle up the slope; crowds and coaches, processional court ladies with white barn-owl faces above great icy ruffs, Bridewell prisoners clearing dung from the streets with a cart they pull themselves like horses; the sweaty agitation of the theatre tiring-houses where the mutter has changed from a hostile Who’s this? to an indifferent It’s Will Shakespeare. (And she is glad of this knowledge, but gladder, a hundred times, of her own secret conclusion: on his lips she has tasted him only, the hands that devour her body have been long empty, thank God. And, of course, that’s not real knowledge, that’s mere mind-magic too, but what else does she have?) Still their talk comes back to this: John Shakespeare, the peg to which they are chained.

  ‘Not always, meaning very often?’

  ‘No. This is – exceptional.’

  His laugh gently shakes the bed. Yes, here they can even laugh, recalling how he was today: the giant silences, the sickly flicker of a smile when Joan or Gilbert shouted aloud at some anecdote of Will’s, the way he would say nothing in response but would turn, like a slow sunning lizard, to Anne. Well, Anne? Well, daughter? Throwing it all on her. For who was he…?

  ‘I’ve come back,’ Will says. ‘And I shall come back whenever I am able, Lent, summer, whenever I have space and money to ride home, and if I can rise higher as a player then I will be freer to do so … Isn’t this enough for him?’