Death of Kings by Philip Gooden Read Free Book Online Page A

I said.
    “You are practising for the – Queen?”
    There was a breathy pause before she uttered the last word. Needless to say, Nell would have kissed the ground on which her Majesty trod. I have noticed that girls like her, and those of her
class in general, reverence royalty. So do I, but in an educated way if you see what I mean. Some weeks before, Nell had almost kissed the ground where I stood when I revealed that we were to
present
Twelfth Night at
court. Not that I was standing at the time. Well, not entirely.
    “Rehearsing for her this evening, yes we have been.”
    “
Her?
”
    “That’s what I said. Her.”
    But I hadn’t said it with sufficient awe for Nell. Her question was a little rebuke.
    Another reason I was tired was that, as on the previous night, I’d had to make my way across from Clerkenwell after the rehearsal session at the Old Priory. This meant walking to
Blackfriars to take the ferry to reach the south bank and then doing another foot-slog to reach Holland’s Leaguer, where Nell plied her trade. It also meant that I was constantly looking over
my shoulder or keeping my ears cocked for another arrest like last night’s. I jumped at the shadows. I flinched at cats and other late passengers. All this to-do – two plays, and a
couple of miles paced out in the star-lit dark, and a hidden mission for the Secretary of the Council – it took it out of a man, even a young, vigorous one like myself. My head whirled and,
exhausted as I was, I could not fall asleep in Nell’s loving arms. For her part, Nell seemed not inclined to rest but to talk and later on, I very much feared, to another bout of
night-work.
    “Is this not a grand privilege, Nicholas?”
    “What?” said I, deliberately obtuse.
    “To play before our sovereign lady.”
    “The Chamberlain’s are often before her. We are her men in all but name.”
    “Yes . . . but for you, Nicholas, it is the first time.”
    I had recently noticed that when Nell wanted to speak to me seriously, and particularly when she was discussing the royal performance (a subject to which she frequently adverted), she called me
Nicholas. Now I was Nick only in her careless or affectionate moments. I had noticed also that there was a kind of balance – or rather, imbalance – in these things, so that as the
woman’s eagerness mounted higher in the scale so it behoved the man to sink down and underplay his own excitement.
    “Remember, Nell, that my work is playing. Whether we have the highest in the land in our audience or the lowest, it is all one to the player. He performs his office for the love of it and
regardless of anyone’s regard.”
    “Then you don’t care if no-one is watching?”
    “Well, no, of course not. What I mean is that the player plays while the king is watching – or the beggar.”
    If I hadn’t been tired I could have continued in this king-beggar vein for some time, although I would have been laughed at if I’d spoken thus in the presence of a fellow-player.
Such talk would do, though, for one not initiated into the mysteries of our craft. Nell, however, was having none of it.
    “I do not believe you. For one thing, the king will pay and the beggar cannot.”
    “You’re right. I’m not sure I believe myself.”
    “That’s better, Nick, now you are smiling.”
    “I am always smiling with my Nell.”
    “Not tonight. You have looked grim and distracted ever since you arrived.”
    “The light is bad in here.”
    We had a feeble candle to light us to bed. Nell was prudent in her housekeeping. No doubt too her customers preferred themselves in that dim way, although Nell showed to advantage in any light.
(Such thoughts, to do with her and her customers, entered my mind unbidden.)
    “You fool, Nick, do you think I need to see you to tell how you are? I can hear it in your voice. I can feel it in you while you lie beside me. You are all stiff and uneasy.” I
am?
    “Except in the one part.”
    “I am tired.