Master Skylark: A Story of Shakspere's Time by John Bennett (top rated books of all time txt) 📕

waved his hand, impatient of interruption. Nick arose and went with Jones.

As they came up Newgate street to the crossing of Giltspur and the Old Bailey, the black arch of the ancient gate loomed grimly against the sky, its squinting window-slits peering down like the eyes of an old ogre. The bell of St. Sepulchre’s was tolling, and there was a crowd about the door, which opened, letting out a black cart in which was a priest praying and a man in irons going to be hanged on Tyburn Hill. His sweating face was ashen gray; and when the cart came to the church door they gave him mockingly a great bunch of fresh, bright flowers. Nick could not bear to watch.

The turnkey at the prison gate was a crop-headed fellow with jowls like a bulldog, and no more mercy in his face than a chopping-block. “Gaston Carew, the player?” he growled. “Ye can’t come in without a permit from the warden.”

“We must,” said Jones.

“Must?” said the turnkey. “I am the only one who says ‘must’ in Newgate!” and slammed the door in their faces.

The player clinked a shilling on the bar.

“It was a boy he said would come,” growled the turnkey through the wicket, pocketing the shilling; “so just the boy goes up. A shilling’s worth, ye mind, and not another wink.” He drew Nick in, and dropped the bars.

It was a foul, dark place, and full of evil smells. Drops of water stood on the cold stone walls, and a green mould crept along the floor. The air was heavy and dank, and it began to be hard for Nick to breathe. The men in the dungeons were singing a horrible song, and in the corner was a half-naked fellow shackled to the floor. “Give me a penny,” he said, “or I will curse thee.” Nick shuddered.

“Up with thee,” said the turnkey, gruffly, unlocking the door to the stairs.

The common room above was packed with miserable wretches, fighting, dancing, gibbering like apes. Some were bawling ribald songs, others moaning with fever. The strongest kept the window-ledges near light and air by sheer main force, and were dicing on the dirty sill. The turnkey pushed and banged his way through them, Nick clinging desperately to his jerkin.

In a cell at the end of the corridor there was a Spanish renegade who cursed the light when the door was opened, and cursed the darkness when it closed. “Cesare el Moro, Cesare el Moro,” he was saying over and over again to himself, as if he feared that he might forget his own name.

Carew was in the middle cell, ironed hand and foot. He had torn his sleeves and tucked the lace under the rough edges of the metal to keep it from chafing the skin. He sat on a pile of dirty straw, with his face in his folded arms upon his knees. By his side was a broken biscuit and an empty stone jug. He had his fingers in his ears to shut out the tolling of the knell for the man who had gone to be hanged.

The turnkey shook the bars. “Here, wake up!” he said.

Carew looked up. His eyes were swollen, and his face was covered with a two days’ beard. He had slept in his clothes, and they were full of broken straw and creases. But his haggard face lit up when he saw the boy, and he came to the grating with an eager exclamation: “And thou hast truly come? To the man thou dost hate so bitterly, but wilt not hate any more. Come, Nick, thou wilt not hate me any more. ’Twill not be worth thy while, Nick; the night is coming fast.”

“Why, sir,” said Nick, “it is not so dark outside—’tis scarcely noon; and thou wilt soon be out.”

“Out? Ay, on Tyburn Hill,” said the master-player, quietly. “I’ve spent my whole life for a bit of hempen cord. I’ve taken my last cue. Last night, at twelve o’clock, I heard the bellman under the prison walls call my name with the names of those already condemned. The play is nearly out, Nick, and the people will be going home. It has been a wild play, Nick, and ill played.”

“Here, if ye’ve anything to say, be saying it,” said the turnkey. “’Tis a shilling’s worth, ye mind.”

Carew lifted up his head in the old haughty way, and clapped his shackled hand to his hip—they had taken his poniard when he came into the gaol. A queer look came over his face; taking his hand away, he wiped it hurriedly upon his jerkin. There were dark stains upon the silk.

“Ye sent for me, sir,” said Nick.

Carew passed his hand across his brow. “Yes, yes, I sent for thee. I have something to tell thee, Nick.” He hesitated, and looked through the bars at the boy, as if to read his thoughts. “Thou’lt be good and true to Cicely—thou’lt deal fairly with my girl? Why, surely, yes.” He paused again, as if irresolute. “I’ll trust thee, Nick. We’ve taken money, thou and I; good gold and silver—tsst! what’s that?” He stopped suddenly.

Nick heard no sound but the Spaniard’s cursing.

“’Tis my fancy,” Carew said. “Well, then, we’ve taken much good money, Nick; and I have not squandered all of it. Hark’e—thou knowest the old oak wainscot in the dining-hall, and the carven panel by the Spanish chest? Good, then! Upon the panel is a cherubin, and—tsst! what’s that, I say?”

There was a stealthy rustling in the right-hand cell. The fellow in it had his ear pressed close against the bars. “He is listening,” said Nick.

The fellow cursed and shook his fist, and then, when Master Carew dropped his voice and would have gone on whispering, set up so loud a howling and clanking of his chains that the lad could not make out one word the master-player said.

“Peace, thou dog!” cried Carew, and kicked the grating. But the fellow only yelled the louder.

Carew looked sorely troubled. “I dare not let him hear,” said he. “The very walls of Newgate leak.”

“Yak, yah, yah, thou gallows-bird!”

“Yet I must tell thee, Nick.”

“Yah, yah, dangle-rope!”

“Stay! would Will Shakspere come? Why, here, I’ll send him word. He’ll come—Will Shakspere never bore a grudge; and I shall so soon go where are no grudges, envy, storms, or noise, but silence and the soft lap of everlasting sleep. He’ll come—Nick, bid him come, upon his life, to the Old Bailey when I am taken up.”

Nick nodded. It was strange to have his master beg.

Carew was looking up at a thin streak of light that came in through the narrow window at the stair. “Nick,” said he, huskily, “last night I dreamed I heard thee singing; but ’twas where there was a sweet, green field and a stream flowing through a little wood. Methought ’twas on the road past Warwick toward Coventry. Thou’lt go there some day and remember Gaston Carew, wilt not, lad? And, Nick, for thine own mother’s sake, do not altogether hate him; he was not so bad a man as he might easily have been.”

“Come,” growled the turnkey, who was pacing up and down like a surly bear; “have done. ’Tis a fat shilling’s worth.”

“’Twas there I heard thee sing first, Nick,” said Carew, holding to the boy’s hands through the bars. “I’ll never hear thee sing again.”

“Why, sir, I’ll sing for thee now,” said Nick, choking.

The turnkey was coming back when Nick began suddenly to sing. He looked up, staring. Such a thing dumfounded him. He had never heard a song like that in Newgate. There were rules in prison. “Here, here,” he cried, “be still!” But Nick sang on.

The groaning, quarreling, and cursing were silent all at once. The guard outside, who had been sharpening his pike upon the window-ledge, stopped the shrieking sound. Silence like a restful sleep fell upon the weary place. Through dark corridors and down the mildewed stairs the quaint old song went floating as a childhood memory into an old man’s dream; and to Gaston Carew’s ear it seemed as if the melody of earth had all been gathered in that little song—all but the sound of the voice of his daughter Cicely.

It ceased, and yet a gentle murmur seemed to steal through the mouldy walls, of birds and flowers, sunlight and the open air, of once-loved mothers, and of long-forgotten homes. The renegade had ceased his cursing, and was whispering a fragment of a Spanish prayer he had not heard for many a day.

Carew muttered to himself. “And now old cares are locked in charmèd sleep, and new griefs lose their bitterness, to hear thee sing—to hear thee sing. God bless thee, Nick!”

“’Tis three good shillings’ worth o’ time,” the turnkey growled, and fumbled with the keys. “All for one shilling, too,” said he, and kicked the door-post sulkily. “But a plague, I say, a plague! ’Tis no one’s business but mine. I’ve a good two shillings’ worth in my ears. ’Tis thirty year since I ha’ heard the like o’ that. But what’s a gaol for?—man’s delight? Nay, nay. Here, boy, time’s up! Come out o’ that.” But he spoke so low that he scarcely heard himself; and going to the end of the corridor, he marked at random upon the wall.

“Oh, Nick, I love thee,” said the master-player, holding the boy’s hands with a bitter grip. “Dost thou not love me just a little? Come, lad, say that thou lovest me.”

“‘WHY, SIR, I’LL SING FOR THEE NOW.’ SAID NICK, CHOKING.”

“Nay, Master Carew,” Nick answered soberly, “I do na love thee, and I will na say I do, sir; but I pity thee with all my heart. And, sir, if thy being out would keep me stolen, still I think I’d wish thee out—for Cicely. But, Master Carew, do na break my hands.”

The master-player loosed his grasp. “I will not seek to be excused to thee,” he said huskily. “I’ve prisoned thee as that clod prisons me; but, Nick, the play is almost out, down comes the curtain on my heels, and thy just blame will find no mark. Yet, Nick, now that I am fast and thou art free, it makes my heart ache to feel that ’twas not I who set thee free. Thou canst go when pleaseth thee, and thank me nothing for it. And, Nick, as my sins be forgiven me, I truly meant to set thee free and send thee home. I did, upon my word, and on the remnant of mine honour!”

“Time’s good and up, sirs,” said the turnkey, coming back.

Carew thrust his hand into his breast.

“I must be going, sir,” said Nick.

“Ay, so thou must—all things must go. Oh, Nick, be friendly with me now, if thou wert never friendly before. Kiss me, lad. There—now thy hand.” The master-player clasped it closely in his own, and pressing something into the palm, shut down the fingers over it. “Quick! Keep it hid,” he whispered. “’Tis the chain I had from Stratford’s burgesses, to some good usage come at last.”

“Must I come and fetch thee out?” growled the turnkey.

“I be coming, sir.”

“Thou’lt send Will Shakspere? And, oh, Nick,” cried Carew, holding him yet a little longer, “thou’lt keep my Cicely from harm?”

“I’ll do my best,” said Nick, his own eyes full.

The turnkey raised his heavy bunch of keys. “I’ll ding thee out o’ this” said he.

And the last Nick Attwood saw of Gaston Carew was his wistful eyes hunting down the stairway after him, and his hand, with its torn fine laces, waving at him through the bars.

And when he came to the Mermaid Inn Master Shakspere’s comedy was done, and Master Ben Jonson was telling a merry tale that made the tapster sick with laughing.