Hamlet by John Marsden Read Free Book Online Page A

cold tower room, with nothing but his own hands to hug him, nothing but himself to keep him warm.

Everyone in Elsinore welcomed the news that a well-known troupe of actors had arrived at the castle. It was unusual to see them so far from their homes. Normally they performed at a theater at the other end of the country, but now business was poor and they were reduced to shuffling their way around Denmark town by town. This appearance at the residence of the royal family was the last of their tour.
    Hamlet had seen them frequently. He knew them well. They were favorites of his. Watching them approach, however, from his position on the parapet, he was at first too distracted by his own confusion to wonder what entertainment they brought. There is more tragedy here than they could show us on a stage, he thought. Here at Elsinore the play becomes real, the drama haunts us every moment of our lives.
    Suddenly he changed his mind. He jumped up from his squatting position with an acrobatic leap and went looking for them.
    The members of the group were milling around in the main entrance hall, waiting for lodgings to be found, rooms to be made ready. Hamlet counted eleven, all men and boys, the oldest a rosy-cheeked fellow who could have been seventy or more, the youngest a pair of twelve-year-olds. The boys were hired to play the female roles. Any other arrangements, involving the use of unchaperoned girls or women, would have been unseemly.
    Hamlet stood in the shadows for a few minutes, watching with affection, before the manager of the little company saw him and came to him with hands outstretched and words pouring from his mouth.
    Hamlet smiled and shook both his hands. “You are welcome, masters, welcome all. I am glad to see you. Welcome, good friends.” He moved among them, shaking more hands. “My old friend, your face is fringed since I saw you last. Now you have bearded me in my own lair. Ah, young Felix, you will not be playing the role of a lady much longer if you keep growing at this rate. My word, your voice will soon betray you. Claudio, you have not aged a whit. Braybar, what a fine Romeo you were. What entertainment have you brought us, good sirs?”
    “We plan to perform
The Murder of Gonzago,
God willing, and may it please Your Royal Highness.”
    “Ah! Most suitable. You’ve brought it to the right place.” Hamlet caught sight of Polonius scurrying through the hall on one of his errands. Polonius always looked as though he were on the way from somewhere important to somewhere even more important. But Hamlet, in a tone he did not often use, arrested the old man just as he was about to vanish down a corner corridor. “Polonius! I need you.”
    Polonius swerved and trotted straight to the prince without missing a beat. “Highness, I am ever at your service.”
    “Then kindly find some lodgings for these fine fellows. Be generous to them, for they are the ones who tell the stories of our times. Never mind getting a good epitaph after you’re dead if you got a bad report from this lot while you’re still alive.”
    “Highness, I will arrange their accommodation, though it is not part of my normal duties. It really falls within the province of the comptroller of the household. But I will treat them as they deserve, depend upon it.”
    “As they deserve! You will have to do better than that! Treat every man as he deserves and no one’ll escape a whipping. Treat them with as much honor and dignity as you’d treat yourself, Polonius. If you treat a man better than he deserves, why, then, the more admirable your generosity.”
    Polonius, not quite so unruffled now, bowed and nodded to the actors to follow him. But Hamlet held back the manager, waiting until the others had gathered their bits and pieces and shuffled off after Polonius. An idea had come to him while he was organizing their welcome to Elsinore. “Tell me, my friend,” he said, when they were alone together. “You mentioned
The Murder of