Cards of Identity (39 page)

1
ST ATT
:
Captain, the milkmaids have put up their buckets, the kine is browsing these many hours and we approach a noon sun.

CAPT
:
Icar showed that to stop the sun were a fool’s errand.

1
ST
ATT
:
The duke is heated hotter nor any Icar; nay, he is flaming rabid, rattling his bars like a bedlam Joseph.

CAPT
:
What says the Prince of Antioch?

1
ST
ATT
:
He counsels patience, sir.

CAPT
:
Then take thou heed of his counsel, which is excellent.

TURN
:
Sir-Captain, my lord demands that I undo the door.

CAPT
:
Hast the door’s key?

TURN
:
How may I have what hangs on thy belt?

CAPT
:
And how mayst thou worry, then, to do that for which thou hast not? (
Exit
Turnkey
.) Inform me, sir: what’s the Duke do in mornings?

1
ST
ATT
:
As the whim takes him: to hunt, if buck have showed; to judge, if judgement’s arose; elsewise, to talk, game, be clowned and see his espaliered peaches how they’ve prospered.

CAPT
:
So I too. Yet a man who’s dressed for the poop must redress if he’s to talk to a splayed peach. Fetch me clothes, Privy Counsellor.

1
ST ATT
:
Didst call me Privy Counsellor?

CAPT
:
Ay, sir: wouldst not be?

1
ST
ATT
:
Ay, indeed: ’tis most elevating.

CAPT
:
Then bid my valets, grooms, and chamberboys dress me a degree higher than myself. And, passing the armoury on thy way, see that the locks are fast, or thou and I may drop like the said Icar.

HERM
:
Where’s my lord?

CAPT
:
About to doff small canvas and put on royalty’s whole rig.

HERM
:
Nay, he’s seized and flummoxed.

CAPT
:
Flummoxed, madam? Does he not stand before you, poised as a line of kings?

HERM
:
Thou scabby tar! Unhook that crooked elbow from his throne! Blunt, raucous starling; get you to other eaves for your droppings!

CAPT
:
Have a care, strumpet! E’en monarch’s mercy hath an elastic snap!

HERM
:
Monarch! Algerian goat! Muscovite dissembler! Undo the Duke!

CAPT
:
Out, bawdy-toy! Here are my cooks will shave and put a fresh apple in my mouth, that I may come to banquet glowing.

1
ST
ATT
:
Do your work, dressers. But first, do ye swear fealty?

GROOMS
:
We do.

VALETS
:
If need be, fifty times.

CAPT
:
Thank you, my Privy Counsel. Where’s my court?

1
ST
ATT
:
Closeted tight for the most part, fearful of a change in the wind, my lord.

CAPT
:
They’re fully pardoned. Summon them. Remove this frantic whore, lest she blush at sight of a naked man.

1
ST
ATT
:
Now, sire, thou’rt all complete – throne, seal, keys, sceptre, and the little bouquet that gives hard monarchy his sweet touch.

CAPT
:
Now farewell dangerous sea, and impudence

Of high waves’ spray, farewell, farewell!

Power and appearance, twin necessities,

Are grid and mantle to the new-rose peer.

And now my dictive tongue must change its tune,

Forswear its vulgar past, and choppy mode,

Drop finally the coxon’s hoy, belay,

The galley mandate and the sailman’s curse,

Pronouncing hencetoforth in prime blank verse.

Ah, how this throne rides neatly in my swell!

How most becoming is this sceptre’s spar!

Two little minutes under ermine’s flag

Convince my keel ’twas ever over me.

Prick me a genealogy, my Counsellor,

Limn it ablaze with lilies and with crowns,

Plantagenista in a dragoned field

And quarterings of Geoffrey and Capet.

Next week, I’ll hear the fierce uproarious tales

Of how my grandsire with his train of knights

Grasped Christ’s sweet body from the maudlin Turk

And built thereon this happy, purple world!

1
ST ATT
:
Thyself to be a sirer, good my lord.

For shortly comes thy grand imbroglement

With noble Artois’ daughter, Radegund.

CAPT
:
Sweet Radegund, art thou the unknown dam

Wilt loose my princely spate?

Fertility’s expensive, doth she bring

A gorgeous dower?

1
ST
ATT
:
Ten thousand livres, my lord.

CAPT
:
A stingey price. Command my brother,

The lord Artois, to make it twenty.

1
ST
ATT
:
He’ll be much vext, my lord.

The contracks are all signed, the lawyers drunk.

CAPT
:
Hereby I them unsign.

Artois must learn, as must

Each duke and princeling in the cope of France,

That Brittan’s fields have now a stronger sun.

Send out my couriers and tell the world

That for the nonce I hereby do suspend

All treaties, greements, truces, and allies

Formed antecedent to mine own ascent.

Dickrings and bargains made by simpleton

Shall be dismissed unread by this cold eye;

And so I bid you trumpet on my men

To gallop up and down intelligence

That: ‘Brittan’s throne is took by Captain Jack;

Old parleys join old clothes in sea’s deep wrack!’

HERM
:
Weep, woman, weep; the coup has fell.

The very throne whereon his elbow leaned

Doth now uphold his butt.

Methought the stone, melted by ’pugnant ire,

Would vomit up and toss him off itself.

Alas! it stands rock-ribbed, shows no dismay,

And bears his false impression with aplomb.

CATRI
:
Deep in its heart, too deep for handkerchief,

I vow it weeps, poor throne!

HERM
:
And those the Duke loved well?

Are they, in whispers, framing dreadful plots

Will shrill betimes the usurper from his seat?

CATRI
:
Much otherwise. Within the library

I saw young Albert, whom the Duke so loved,

Stitching embroidery upon a gilded frame.

Strike you no blow for freedom? I inquired.

To which the pigeon, trimming his needle,

Remarked that brawls so much upset him

That any conflict was not to his taste.

So say they all, some furtive, some unshamed;

And armoury’s lockt as tight as is their hearts.

HERM
:
When men to wax inmelt at sight of fire,

Ladies must steel their flesh and take the glint.

Good Catriona, thou and I are such

Must sprout a mannish stance and save the realm.

CATRI
:
Wield halberds, Madam? How?

I have no craft in cleaving, lopping, chops;

Even stilettos make my soft womb turn.

I ne’er have shrunk from any man’s embrace,

But do reject his cannon, out of face.

HERM
:
I speak of art, not arms.

Nay, woman-like, we must dissimulate,

Practise for virtue’s sake our nastiest vice

And boldly feign to be what we are not.

CATRI
:
Disguises, Madam?

HERM
:
Ay, thick as thick. I’ll not see Baalbeck founder.

CATRI
:
Baalbeck, Madam?

HERM
:
Ay, he’s writ me a sonnet, and I love him. In truth, I ever have. She that loved the Duke was some other: I know her not.

CATRI
:
Methinks, Madam, thou has been thoughtful, as I advised.

HERM
:
Nay, I thought not at all, only remained silent; at which, my heart did speak.

CATRI
:
I’ll not press thy heart, then, Madam, knowing well how tripping is the tongue of my own.

HERM
:
Well spoken. Let’s turn to our disguises. To find what they should be, we’ll ask: What is their purpose? What our mission?

CATRI
:
Why, marriage, Madam.

HERM
:
Marriage is no mission, methinks.

CARTI
:
Is’t not, Madam? It were surely a mission to save men from celibacy. There’s but one man may have no wife and that’s the Devil himself.

HERM
:
Devil or no, our weddings must await. Our mission now must be to free our friends: we’ll bind ’em in due course.

CATRI
:
And they the riper for it, being under obligation to us and so, ashamed to spurn the hands which loosed them.

HERM
:
I am ever shamed by thy blunt speech, Catriona.

CATRI
:
’Tis from the heart, Madam, or thereabouts. Let’s disguise as pedlars, and buy entry to the gaol with knick-knacks. Or as vintners, and regale the turnkey till he snore. Or spinners of yarn that’s making a rope of hemp and would try if it fits.

HERM
:
These are too rough. We cannot feign the too robust.

CATRI
:
How’s piety, Madam, to feign?

HERM
:
Better, better. Proceed.

CATRI
:
Once, in a moral play, good ma’am,

I was the part of Lazarian nun.

My eyes so low they bandied with my toes

And all agreed I was the thing herself.

But that’s long since, and many a broad moustache

Has rubbaged off the mantle of my bloom. Yet,

I could feign once more.

HERM
:
Nay, Catriona, nuns are grown naughty.

At night, when all’s asleep, the Abbess

Rises, and takes a pick and spade in hand.

Helped by her sisters, emulating moles,

They tunnel underground for leagues and leagues,

Come up at last i’ the Bishop s cell

And ravish every friar.

CATRI
:
Is’t so, Madam? Why, when

I’ve walked the meadows, I’ve remarked,

How, underfoot, the ground springs up and down.

I’d not believed ’twas all athrob with nuns.

HERM
:
Catriona, we must be friars.

CATRI
:
What, Madam? Do friars not tunnel too?

HERM
:
Nay, ’tis woman’s work, sappery.

CATRI
:
What of our beards, Madam? Can we raise them up,

And set them to our chins?

HERM
:
We’ll be young friars, in whom the academy

Hath gaoled the refulgent whisker under skin.

CATRI
:
And what thereafter, ma’am, when we’re made vicars?

HERM
:
Thereafter comes hereafter, we shall see

What chance and skill provide. Attend

The chapel vestry, Catriona bring two garbs.

CATRI
:
I’ll choose the most becoming,

Intact with hood and necklace rosary.

Yet not delay and haver, as it were

A pedlar’s holiday.

DUKE
:
Open, open, foul, dismal, and abominable! I’ll have thee on the rack, heresiarch, soon as my foot’s on stool again!

TURN
:
’Tis not a promise doth much coax my key to the lock. Nevertheless, ’twill help forward thy own limbs to the rack, doubtless.

DUKE
:
What, rat’s guts! Dost threaten me with my own rack?

TURN
:
Racks, beds, thrones – they, inanimate, agree and accommodate whomsoever may fall into their keep. Now, here’s a platter of old tripes will stuff thy gab.

DUKE
:
Like to like! See Master Tripe twine with his brother!

So’ll a halyard twine soon to Master Mariner.

PRINCE
:
Impetuous duke! Prithee, recall ’tis all a play for our improvement; a play played with much subtlety and earnestness, that we may learn, and for which we should tout thanks and not ingratitude.

DUKE
:
If it’s a play, ’tis drawing out so long and miserable that, willy-nilly, it’s grown true to the life and beastly. What say you, Count?

COUNT
:
That if it’s a play, we must make our own words and acts, for they’ve forgot to give us the book; and that if it’s life, similarly we must plot to do what worms and prisoners do – discover a way out. If it’s life, then death’s coming on the heels of the tripes; if it’s play and unrehearsed, then let’s meet art with art. Those that have no identity but that which is foisted upon them, must embrace it or create a better.

DUKE
:
I warrant; if thy brother the Prince had but a bead of thy sagacity in his noddle, he’d still have a crown to set atop it. So, Prince, ’tis a play for our instruction: master has set us a problem and left us to cudgel an answer: he asks us, how do we propose to make exit? Wilt play in this play?

PRINCE
:
Ay, readily. I had not thought it was so subtle. Now I’m all fire to begin.

COUNT
:
Good brother, damp the fire somewhat, like a good player, lest thy plot appear in the face to be read before thou’rt ready to disclose it.

DUKE
:
Ay, try to pretend that thou art truly locked in a dungeon. Now, let’s huddle to plot. Insinuous Count, make suggestion.

COUNT
:
’Tis known through all the world that mariners

Are superstition cased as fish with scales.

This wicked sailor seated on the throne

May easily put off his salt regail

And stride inpompous on a royal stage:

Yet, in his heart, where valet may not buff,

Must still reside the supernatural quake

Awaiting apparitions of distress.

Could we but find apparel of the mist,

Some chalky-white enclosure for ourselves,

Remove from here and hover round his throne,

We’d throw him in a fit.

DUKE
:
Design’s so sweet and cunning to my thought

That it doth quite transport me to that place.

I see him frothing on his velvet knees

While three inspiréd ghosts do circle him

And moan and gibber him to mental crack.

And yet, and yet, withal my lovely dream,

He’s there and we are here.

PRINCE
:
When all’s done, we’ll explain ’twas all a jest.

DUKE
:
An’ he survive the jest, ay, explanation will be forthcoming.

PRINCE
:
We were better witches, brother Duke, meseems.

DUKE
:
Howso?

PRINCE
:
In that the ghost is an element which is already resident within him that observes it.

DUKE
:
I’d not heard so.

PRINCE
:
Ay, ’tis the latest discovery among froward alchemists.

DUKE
:
What say you, Count?

COUNT
:
That we await the coming of a suitable disguise before we anticipate the nature thereof. And that we ready ourselves to provide whatsoever it may be that our enemy is loth to project from within.

DUKE
:
Excellent man!

PRINCE
:
Ay, ’tis sage advice, inasmuch as our dear Master, being innocent, may lack the propulsive guilt which, alone, may fire forth a destestable apparition.