Short Plays · The Dark Lady of the Sonnets (4/4) (2/2) (1/2)
A Beefeater on guard. A Cloaked Man approaches.
The Beefeater Stand. Who goes there? Give the word.
The Man Marry! I cannot. I have clean forgotten it.
The Beefeater Then cannot you pass here. What is your business? Who are you? Are you a true man?
The Man Far from it, Master Warder. I am not the same man two days together: sometimes Adam, sometimes Benvolio, and anon the Ghost.
The Beefeater Recoiling. A ghost! Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
The Man Well said, Master Warder. With your leave I will set that down in writing; for I have a very poor and unhappy brain for remembrance. He takes out his tablets and writes. Methinks this is a good scene, with you on your lonely watch, and I approaching like a ghost in the moonlight. Stare not so amazedly at me; but mark what I say. I keep tryst here tonight with a dark lady. She promised to bribe the warder. I gave her the wherewithal: four tickets for the Globe Theatre.
The Beefeater Plague on her! She gave me two only.
The Man Detaching a tablet. My friend: present this tablet, and you will be welcomed at any time when the plays of Will Shakespeare are in hand. Bring your wife. Bring your friends. Bring the whole garrison. There is ever plenty of room.
The Beefeater I care not for these newfangled plays. No man can understand a word of them. They are all talk. Will you not give me a pass for The Spanish Tragedy?
The Man To see The Spanish Tragedy one pays, my friend. Here are the means. He gives him a piece of gold.
The Beefeater Overwhelmed. Gold! Oh, sir, you are a better paymaster than your dark lady.
The Man Women are thrifty, my friend.
The Beefeater ’Tis so, sir. And you have to consider that the most openhanded of us must e’en cheapen that which we buy every day. This lady has to make a present to a warder nigh every night of her life.
The Man Turning pale. I’ll not believe it.
The Beefeater Now you, sir, I dare be sworn, do not have an adventure like this twice in the year.
The Man Villain: wouldst tell me that my dark lady hath ever done thus before? that she maketh occasions to meet other men?
The Beefeater Now the Lord bless your innocence, sir, do you think you are the only pretty man in the world? A merry lady, sir: a warm bit of stuff. Go to: I’ll not see her pass a deceit on a gentleman that hath given me the first piece of gold I ever handled.
The Man Master Warder: is it not a strange thing that we, knowing that all women are false, should be amazed to find our own particular drab no better than the rest?
The Beefeater Not all, sir. Decent bodies, many of them.
The Man Intolerantly. No. All false. All. If thou deny it, thou liest.
The Beefeater You judge too much by the Court, sir. There, indeed, you may say of frailty that its name is woman.
The Man Pulling out his tablets again. Prithee say that again: that about frailty: the strain of music.
The Beefeater What strain of music, sir? I’m no musician, God knows.
The Man There is music in your soul: many of your degree have it very notably. Writing. “Frailty: thy name is woman!” Repeating it affectionately. “Thy name is woman.”
The Beefeater Well, sir, it is but four words. Are you a snapper-up of such unconsidered trifles?
The Man Eagerly. Snapper-up of⁠—He gasps. Oh! Immortal phrase! He writes it down. This man is a greater than I.
The Beefeater You have my lord Pembroke’s trick, sir.
The Man Like enough: he is my near friend. But what call you his trick?
The Beefeater Making sonnets by moonlight. And to the same lady too.
The Man No!
The Beefeater Last night he stood here on your errand, and in your shoes.
The Man Thou, too, Brutus! And I called him friend!
The Beefeater ’Tis ever so, sir.
The Man ’Tis ever so. ’Twas ever so. He turns away, overcome. Two Gentlemen of Verona! Judas! Judas!!
The Beefeater Is he so bad as that, sir?
The Man Recovering his charity and self-possession. Bad? Oh no. Human, Master Warder, human. We call one another names when we are offended, as children do. That is all.
The Beefeater Ay, sir: words, words, words. Mere wind, sir. We fill our bellies with the east wind, sir, as the Scripture hath it. You cannot feed capons so.
The Man A good cadence. By your leave. He makes a note of it.
The Beefeater What manner of thing is a cadence, sir? I have not heard of it.
The Man A thing to rule the world with, friend.
The Beefeater You speak strangely, sir: no offence. But, an’t like you, you are a very civil gentleman; and a poor man feels drawn to you, you being, as ’twere, willing to share your thought with him.
The Man ’Tis my trade. But alas! the world for the most part will none of my thoughts.
Lamplight streams from the palace door as it opens from within.
The Beefeater Here comes your lady, sir. I’ll to t’other end of my ward. You may e’en take your time about your business: I shall not return too suddenly unless my sergeant comes prowling round. ’Tis a fell sergeant, sir: strict in his arrest. Go’d’en, sir; and good luck! He goes.
The Man “Strict in his arrest”! “Fell sergeant”! As if tasting a ripe plum. O‑o‑o‑h! He makes a note of them.
A Cloaked Lady gropes her way from the palace and wanders along the terrace, walking in her sleep.
The Lady Rubbing her hands as if washing them. Out, damned spot. You will mar all with these cosmetics. God made you one face; and you make yourself another. Think of your grave, woman, not ever of being beautified. All the perfumes of Arabia will not whiten this Tudor hand.
The Man “All the perfumes of Arabia”! “Beautified”! “Beautified”! a poem in a single word. Can this be my Mary? To the Lady. Why do you speak in a strange voice, and utter poetry for the first time? Are you ailing? You walk like the dead. Mary! Mary!
The Lady Echoing him. Mary! Mary! Who would have thought that woman to have had so much blood in her! Is it my fault that my counsellors put deeds of blood on me? Fie! If you were women you would have more wit than to stain the floor so foully. Hold not up her head so: the hair is false. I tell you yet again, Mary’s buried: she cannot come out of her grave. I fear her not: these cats that dare jump into thrones though they be fit only for men’s laps must be put away. What’s done cannot be undone. Out, I say. Fie! a queen, and freckled!
The Man Shaking her arm. Mary, I say: art asleep?
The Lady wakes; starts; and nearly faints. He catches her on his arm.
The Lady Where am I? What art thou?
The Man I cry your mercy. I have mistook your person all this while. Methought you were my Mary: my mistress.
The Lady Outraged. Profane fellow: how do you dare?
The Man Be not wroth with me, lady. My mistress is a marvellous proper woman. But she does not speak so well as you. “All the perfumes of Arabia”! That was well said: spoken with good accent and excellent discretion.
The Lady Have I been in speech with you here?
The Man Why, yes, fair lady. Have you forgot it?
The Lady I have walked in my sleep.
The Man Walk ever in your sleep, fair one; for then your words drop like honey.
The Lady With cold majesty. Know you to whom you speak, sir, that you dare express yourself so saucily?
The Man Unabashed. Not I, nor care neither. You are some lady of the Court, belike. To me there are but two sorts of women: those with excellent voices, sweet and low, and cackling hens that cannot make me dream. Your voice has all manner of loveliness in it. Grudge me not a short hour of its music.
The Lady Sir: you are overbold. Season your admiration for a while with⁠—
The Man Holding up his hand to stop her. “Season your admiration for a while⁠—”
The Lady Fellow: do you dare mimic me to my face?
The Man ’Tis music. Can you not hear? When a good musician sings a song, do you not sing it and sing it again till you have caught and fixed its perfect melody? “Season your admiration for a while”: God! the history of man’s heart is in that one word admiration. Admiration! Taking up his tablets. What was it? “Suspend your admiration for a space⁠—”
The Lady A very vile jingle of esses. I said “Season your⁠—”
The Man Hastily. Season: ay, season, season, season. Plague on my memory, my wretched memory! I must e’en write it down. He begins to write, but stops, his memory failing him. Yet tell me which was the vile jingle? You said very justly: mine own ear caught it even as my false tongue said it.
The Lady You said “for a space.” I said “for a while.”
The Man “For a while.” He corrects it. Good! Ardently. And now be mine neither for a space nor a while, but forever.
The Lady Odds my life! Are you by chance making love to me, knave?
The Man Nay: ’tis you who have made the love: I but pour it out at your feet. I cannot but love a lass that sets such store by an apt word. Therefore vouchsafe, divine perfection of a woman⁠—no: I have said that before somewhere; and the wordy garment of my love for you must be fire-new⁠—
The Lady You talk too much, sir. Let me warn you: I am more accustomed to be listened to than preached at.
The Man The most are like that that do talk well. But though you spake with the tongues of angels, as indeed you do, yet know that I am the king of words⁠—
The Lady A king, ha!
The Man No less. We are poor things, we men and women⁠—
The Lady Dare you call me woman?
The Man What nobler name can I tender you? How else can I love you? Yet you may well shrink from the name: have I not said we are but poor things? Yet there is a power that can redeem us.
The Lady Gramercy for your sermon, sir. I hope I know my duty.
The Man This is no sermon, but the living truth. The power I speak of is the power of immortal poesy. For know that vile as this world is, and worms as we are, you have but to invest all this vileness with a magical garment of words to transfigure us and uplift our souls till earth flowers into a million heavens.
The Lady You spoil your heaven with your million. You are extravagant. Observe some measure in your speech.
The Man You speak now as Ben does.
The Lady And who, pray, is Ben?
The Man A learned bricklayer who thinks that the sky is at the top of his ladder, and so takes it on him to rebuke me for flying. I tell you there is no word yet coined and no melody yet sung that is extravagant and majestical enough for the glory that lovely words can reveal. It is heresy to deny it: have you not been taught that in the beginning was the Word? that the Word was with God? nay, that the Word was God?
The Lady Beware, fellow, how you presume to speak of holy things. The Queen is the head of the Church.
The Man You are the head of my Church when you speak as you did at first. “All the perfumes of Arabia”! Can the Queen speak thus? They say she playeth well upon the virginals. Let her play so to me; and I’ll kiss her hands. But until then, you are my Queen; and I’ll kiss those lips that have dropt music on my heart. He puts his arms about her.
The Lady Unmeasured impudence! On your life, take your hands from me.
The Dark Lady comes stooping along the terrace behind them like a running thrush. When she sees how they are employed, she rises angrily to her full height, and listens jealously.
The Man Unaware of the Dark Lady. Then cease to make my hands tremble with the streams of life you pour through them. You hold me as the lodestar holds the iron: I cannot but cling to you. We are lost, you and I: nothing can separate us now.
The Dark Lady We shall see that, false lying hound, you and your filthy trull. With two vigorous cuffs, she knocks the pair asunder, sending the man, who is unlucky enough to receive a righthanded blow, sprawling an the flags. Take that, both of you!
The Cloaked Lady In towering wrath, throwing off her cloak and turning in outraged majesty on her assailant. High treason!
The Dark Lady Recognizing her and falling on her knees in abject terror. Will: I am lost: I have struck the Queen.
The Man Sitting up as majestically as his ignominious posture allows. Woman: you have struck William Shakespeare.
Queen Elizabeth Stupent. Marry, come up!!! Struck William Shakespeare quotha! And who in the name of all the sluts and jades and light-o’-loves and fly-by-nights that infest this palace of mine, may William Shakespeare be?
The Dark Lady Madam: he is but a player. Oh, I could have my hand cut off⁠—
Queen Elizabeth Belike you will, mistress. Have you bethought you that I am like to have your head cut off as well?
The Dark Lady Will: save me. Oh, save me.
Elizabeth Save you! A likely savior, on my royal word! I had thought this fellow at least an esquire; for I had hoped that even the vilest of my ladies would not have dishonored my Court by wantoning with a baseborn servant.
Shakespeare Indignantly scrambling to his feet. Baseborn! I, a Shakespeare of Stratford! I, whose mother was an Arden! baseborn! You forget yourself, madam.
Elizabeth Furious. S’blood! do I so? I will teach you⁠—
The Dark Lady Rising from her knees and throwing herself between them. Will: in God’s name anger her no further. It is death. Madam: do not listen to him.
Shakespeare Not were it e’en to save your life, Mary, not to mention mine own, will I flatter a monarch who forgets what is due to my family. I deny not that my father was brought down to be a poor bankrupt; but ’twas his gentle blood that was ever too generous for trade. Never did he disown his debts. ’Tis true he paid them not; but it is an attested truth that he gave bills for them; and ’twas those bills, in the hands of base hucksters, that were his undoing.
Elizabeth Grimly. The son of your father shall learn his place in the presence of the daughter of Harry the Eighth.
Shakespeare Swelling with intolerant importance. Name not that inordinate man in the same breath with Stratford’s worthiest alderman. John Shakespeare wedded but once: Harry Tudor was married six times. You should blush to utter his name.
Crying out together.
The Dark Lady Will: for pity’s sake⁠—
Elizabeth Insolent dog⁠—
Shakespeare Cutting them short. How know you that King Harry was indeed your father?
Elizabeth Zounds! Now by⁠—She stops to grind her teeth with rage.
The Dark Lady She will have me whipped through the streets. Oh God! Oh God!
Shakespeare Learn to know yourself better, madam. I am an honest gentleman of unquestioned parentage, and have already sent in my demand for the coat-of-arms that is lawfully mine. Can you say as much for yourself?
Elizabeth Almost beside herself. Another word; and I begin with mine own hands the work the hangman shall finish.