King of Shadows by Susan Cooper Read Free Book Online Page A

thatched roof, a long burbling sound.
    Master Burbage called down, “I told thee! I told thee!So now I am thy Bottom, heaven help me.”
    The bearded face tilted up to us. “Thou art my top and my bottom and all things between, Dick Burbage, saving decency.” His eyes were a strange color, a dark tawny mixture of hazel and green. They shifted toward me. “Is this the boy?”
    â€œWill Kempe’s lad, who will not now be playing with Will Kempe.” He poked me in the back. “Greet Master Shakespeare, boy.”
    Shakespeare. William Shakespeare.
    It was as if he’d said, “Say hello to God.”
    I stared down at the stage, speechless. I suppose we were ten feet or so above him. For a moment I couldn’t move—and then more than anything I wanted to be closer to him. On impulse I grabbed up the climbing rope and tossed it over the rail; then swung my legs over and went down it, hand over hand, feet gripping the rope. Fortunately he was far enough forward that I didn’t kick him in the head.
    My feet hit the stage. Harry had jammed my cap so firmly on my head that it was still there, so I pulled it off and ducked my head in what I hoped was a neat little bow, the way Arby had taught us.
    Will Shakespeare grinned at me. He wasn’t a tall man: he was about Gil’s size. His hair was receding, leaving lots of forehead, like in the pictures you see in books, but he didn’t otherwise look much like the pictures at all. There were more lines on his skin, lines from laughing, and a thicker beard. He wore a little gold hoop in his left ear.
    â€œSo you are Nathan Field.” The hazel eyes were looking me over, appraisingly.
    I said rather shakily, “They call me Nat.”
    â€œWell, Nat, welcome to the Chamberlain’s Men. Thy friend Will Kempe has left us in a huff—wilt play in our company even now he is gone?”
    â€œOh yes!” I said instantly. The words must have come out so fast, so eager, that both Shakespeare and Burbage laughed.
    â€œWhen he was my friend he spoke highly of thy tumbling,” Shakespeare said. “And Dick Mulcaster of thy voice, bless his generous soul. We have all whirled you about London this past day or two, Nat—do you under-stand what’s happening?”
    This was so on the nose that for a dizzy moment I thought he must know where I really came from, who I really was. “No, sir,” I said.
    But he didn’t know. He said, “Three days from now we are to play a piece of mine from some years past, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. We had more boys in the company when first we played it—now we have only enough for the women, and we lack a boy for Robin Goodfellow, for the Puck. So Richard Mulcaster, having played the play of late, has of his kindness lent us his Puck. You.”
    I wished I could ask him who Richard Mulcaster was. “I know the lines,” I said.
    â€œAh. He says thou hast the memory of a homing pigeon. Who knows, I may keep thee.” He smiled his quick smile, to show he was joking. “We had no love for the Paul’s Boys when we were playing on your side of the river, but Dick is a friend of mine from long ago. A wise, gentle man. And a gentleman too.”
    â€œYes,” I said. Down in the pit, the two men had finishedtheir raking and were starting to untie and scatter new bundles—of what I now saw was not grass but a thicker green stem. Reeds, I guess. They gave off the odd smell that I’d noticed all through the theater; they made a kind of disposable carpet.
    â€œâ€™Ware heads, below,” said Master Burbage from above, and he swung himself over the edge of the gallery and shinnied down the climbing rope fast and expertly, with his blue cloak billowing out behind him.
    Shakespeare shook his head. “The man is all actor,” he said.
    â€œAnd a good thing for you,” said Burbage, “considering he plays four parts this