The Opening Night Murder (11 page)

Suzanne never noticed the carriage turning around toward London, but soon they were back among the close buildings and narrow streets of Southwark. When she realized they were going north instead of south, it was as if the entire world suddenly spun beneath her, dizzying her. It nearly made her laugh.

Daniel delivered her to Horse Shoe Alley, silent and still in the predawn darkness. There, standing on the cobbles next to the carriage, he kissed her good night. Or nearly good morning, based on the lightening sky. He took her hand and pressed a gold guinea into it. “Thank you,” he said. Then he gave her one last peck on the cheek and stepped back up into his carriage. A word to his driver, and he was off, leaving Suzanne standing in the street.

She looked at the coin in her hand. At first she didn’t want to realize what had just happened, for the happiness of having been restored to Daniel’s affections was still full in her heart. For it to evaporate so quickly would be too painful, would leave too big an emptiness to bear. But as she stared at the gold piece, shining bright in the full moonlight, she knew the love she’d thought was hers hadn’t existed at all. She’d been paid for sex, and furthermore she’d sold herself cheap. A real
mistress would have been able to negotiate a yearly stipend, and a wife would have been entitled to the complete support of all her husband’s wealth. One guinea, while a fortune to a street whore, was evidence he did not love her even enough to pay her more than once.

The emptiness, where glowing happiness had been only moments before, darkened and hardened quickly. The edges of it dried and curled so that her chest felt tight and she couldn’t breathe. Tears tried to come, but she wouldn’t let them. She grasped the coin hard in her hand until the edge of it hurt her palm. Then, slowly and with deliberate care, she slipped it into the pocket beneath her skirts. She turned and made her way into her house and up the stairs to her bedroom. There she washed herself well in the washbowl, dressed in her nicest nightgown, and slipped under the covers. She lay there, thinking about how good a thing it was that she now knew exactly where she stood with Daniel. She could now harden her heart to him and never wonder whether he might care for her. Nobody had ever loved her except Piers. Not her father, not her brothers and sisters, not Daniel, and certainly not any of the men she called clients. She now told herself what a good thing it was to know the truth. To rid herself of hope and never let disappointment cut her again, and never again waste her time pursuing something Daniel would dangle before her but never give her. She closed her eyes against the dawn, to make the world go away in sleep.

Fall came, then winter. As the days grew shorter, so did the money. By spring they would have to let Sheila go and move to a less expensive house. Each day when Suzanne awoke to hear the rattle of rain on the windows or feel the sharp chill of snow in the air, she dreaded the future. Soon rising in the morning took enormous effort and a steel will.

One evening in mid-January a crowd of five or six gathered at the Goat and Boar, around the large table near the stairs, and perhaps another three or four stood nearby, listening to the boisterous conversation. Suzanne sat with her back to the wall, the only woman at that table; a couple of young whores were chatting up three well-dressed men at the other table, ignoring the less-moneyed locals at the front. Big Willie Waterman was carrying on in a loud, braying voice to another street musician whose name Suzanne didn’t know, but she thought he played a flute. “I heard there’s a new theatre a-gonna be built.” He nodded as he spoke, with an air of inside knowledge, though he’d surely had the news by eavesdropping in the street. His perch was the back of a heavy wooden chair, his feet in the seat and his elbows on his knees, a tankard clutched in both hands and his chin nearly dipping into his ale as he hunched toward his listeners gathered about the table.

“Where?” said the other, whose round face and cheeks like apples made him appear fat, though he was not.

“Dunno,” Willie replied. “Somewhere across the river, I thinks.” He made a broad, sweeping gesture with his tankard to indicate the general direction of the river and potential theatre.

Suzanne’s attention sharpened, and she listened closely. The other musician wanted to know how Willie knew this.

“I heard it from a drummer I sometimes let play with me on the corner. You know Arthur.” He made another gesture to indicate the direction of his corner, though everyone present well knew where it was and who Arthur was. “He were angling to be hired to drum for it, he says to me. I laughed, I did.” Big Willie let go a chuckle as if to demonstrate how he’d laughed. “That one playing for the king? Not bloody likely. But in any case, I hears the theatre is a-gonna be a big and fancy one.
A right palace, they says. One might call it a sort of fare-thee-well to Cromwell, if you will. A bit of a nose-thumbing, I thinks. Take that, you old fire blanket!” He raised his tankard to cheers and laughter, then took a draught and emitted a belch that caught the attention of the patrons at the other end of the room.

Suzanne asked, “What sort of theatre will it be?”

Willie turned to focus on her as if he’d just then realized she was present. At his bright grin she thought it might be possible he only just then knew a woman was listening. “I hear they’re bringing in all the new plays from France. Ones with backdrops and such.”

Backdrops?

“What are those?”
Backdrops?
“Do you mean paintings on the back wall of the stage?” Suzanne found it hard to imagine. Every stage she’d seen, including the temporary ones Horatio had used in alleys, were slightly sloped affairs with two large curtained entries at the back wall and no attempt at decoration.

“Oh certs, ’tis paintings, it is. And set pieces.”

“But how can the audience imagine the scene if there’s a painting behind it?”

“I ain’t certain myself, but I think the painting is of where the scene is supposed to take place.”

Suzanne squinted, trying to picture it. “But how, then, do they do a new scene that’s supposed to be a different location?”

Willie shrugged. “I can’t tell ye. But I hear ’tis all the rage, it is. Set pieces and backdrops, to make the scene real-looking.”

Suzanne took a sip of her drink, then said thoughtfully, “Well, it strikes me as awfully silly. And awfully cumbersome as well. Good actors should be able to create their own scene, with words and voice and posture. You should be able to
picture the place by how the actors act and not have to have a painting behind him to tell you where they’re supposed to be.” She tried to imagine what Horatio would say about such a thing as backdrops, and had to smile. Yes, the friend of Hamlet would have a great deal to say, and none of it very nice.

She asked Big Willie, “What do people say of these things? Do they like the French theatre? What sorts of plays are they?”

Willie screwed his face into a thinking pose, then said, “Dunno what sorts of plays they is, but you know them nobles and all will like anything the king likes. He lived there long enough, I suppose he’s as much French as anything.”

“No, he’s English,” said the round-faced musician.

Another standing nearby with an ear to the conversation said, “Nae, he’s a Stuart and Scottish, and dinnae allow anyone to tell ye different.”

“His grandfather was a Scot, and not such a good one for all that.”

“
In any whatever,
” said Big Willie in a loud, overriding voice, “he appears to like to see a play now and again, wishes to let the followers of Cromwell know it, and now he and his brother is both o’ them putting money into bringing back stage plays. For the nobility, at any rate.”

One of the listeners at the table said, “I wish they’d bring back the bearbaiting. I like a good brawl.”

“Oh, they will,” said another. “Sure as anything, they’ll have the bear arena opened soon, I’ll just wager on’t. There’s good old English entertainment, says I.”

“I wonder whether they’ll let us ordinary folk see them new French plays,” said the Scottish fellow.

“Can’t see why not,” replied Willie. “They always let us in before.”

“But I hear there’s nae pit. Nae pit, nae groundlings, and ye ken they must charge a dear price to sit in a chair.”

“There’ll be a pit. Sure there’ll be a pit.”

“I hear the stage will be all up under the heavens.”

There was a brief pause as the listeners absorbed that, then Willie snorted. “Nonsense. You can’t have a play without a downstage.” A general murmur of agreement burbled about the table. Willie continued, “They’ll have to let us in. Without groundlings, nobody will watch the play. They’ll all be watching each other.”

That brought a laugh, for they all knew it was true.
Groundlings
. The hoi polloi. The unwashed masses who loved to spend their money on entertainment as much as did the nobles. They had less of it, but also there were more of them. They were willing to pay to stand where the rich folk wouldn’t care to sit.

A thought sparked in Suzanne’s head that actually made her blink. It surprised her, for the idea was outrageous and impossible, and she couldn’t yet see any of its defining characteristics. All she could see was the Globe Theatre. Nothing else, but the Globe as she’d seen it months before, rain-soaked and overrun with vermin. But still a theatre. One as they had been before the war. It made her heart race as she began to imagine how the return of sanctioned theatre could change everything. Not just the entertainment options of the rich, but it could change everything and everyone. For her, at any rate.

She said to the cluster of men, “So, what plays would you fellows care to see?”

“I want to see the bears and bulls.”

“Aye, ye said that already, Warren.”

“Seriously, tell me, all of you.” She leaned forward in her
excitement and held her drink in both hands. “What plays do you like best?”

“I likes the ones where everyone dies,” said Willie.

“
Hamlet
,” Suzanne nodded. “The Scottish play as well.”

“Oh aye, the Scottish play. But I also likes the ones as make me laugh. The one about the forest faerie in particular.”

“
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
.”

“Aye, that one.”

They all seemed to know the Shakespeare plays, but nobody knew any of what had been brought from the Continent.

She asked, “Would you pay to see those plays again?”

There was a general roar of approval at the table, and Willie added, “Sure enough, Suze. I always loved to see them stories. Hard, though, to find them during the past twenty years. I misses them, I does.”

“Anything you would see other than Shakespeare?”

“I suppose were I the king I would be pleased to be entertained by whatever means was at hand, but I do so miss the ones I know best. Maybe Marlowe a bit, but old Willie Shakespeare wrote all the ones I truly like.” The others murmured in agreement.

The idea that had popped into Suzanne’s head took root, and she could almost feel it grab hold behind her eyes. She sipped her ale and continued to question the fellows. Her heart pounded and breaths came hard, though she struggled to control herself and not let on how excited she was.

The next morning, at home, she spoke to Piers when he rose for breakfast. She hadn’t slept much that night, and in the small, quiet hours of the morning had risen to sit up next to a candle, thinking. When that candle had guttered, she continued to sit in the dark until dawn, when Sheila rose to poke the fire in the kitchen. The sun was well up when Piers
came for the breakfast Sheila had prepared. He walked through the ’tiring room on his way to the table without noticing her presence. When she spoke, he startled.

“Your hair is a disgrace,” she said.

He stopped to peer at her in her dark corner. “Oh. Mother.” He ran a hand through his hair and checked his collar to be certain the cravat he wore was straight, graceful, and proper. Even in his unemployed state she wouldn’t allow him to neglect his appearance. It was a constant struggle, but she knew if she let him give in to the heartache of his situation he might never regain himself. If this kept on and their finances sank enough, he might think it advisable to turn to illegal means of support. With no job and no cash, desperation would certainly force him to more nefarious means, and for a man that meant crime of some sort, and that usually involved violence for those who were not wealthy or sly. Piers had been raised among actors, but had never been a good liar. He had never been raised to be a criminal; he could not succeed at it.

“Good morning,” he said, remembering his manners.

“Good morning indeed. We must talk.”

Suzanne rose from her chair and went to the table in the next room, but ignored the meat put before her. Piers followed her, a little hesitant at her manner. She read curiosity all over his face.

He tucked into his food as soon as it was set on the table, and Suzanne watched him eat for a moment. She began in a casual voice, as if she hadn’t been waiting all night to ask him this.

“Piers, do you remember when you were ten or so and we worked for Horatio?”

Piers stopped chewing for a moment, thinking, then smiled. “Yes, I do. Good times, those.”

That rather surprised her. “Good times, you say?”

“Indeed. You were happy then. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you happy except for then.”

Suzanne was mildly surprised to learn Piers had a thought for her happiness; she’d always been so focused on his well-being. Then she smiled at the memory of those days and knew he was right. She had been pleased with the life the troupe had offered. There had been far more money since then, but never the joy of a fine performance, lively audience, or the camaraderie of fellow troupers. Not even the playacting when she pretended to be enthralled with tedious William. She said, “And you liked the work?”

He nodded. “Oh yes. The apprenticeship was good for the learning of business, and I hope to put that knowledge to work for me soon, but playacting is like a game. There’s a great deal of fun to be had, knowing that an audience is enjoying themselves. And when you’ve moved them to throw money, it’s so much the better.”