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

The table had been cleared of trenchers and napkins, the crumbs brushed away, and a clean platter set before each guest with pared cheese, fresh cherries, biscuit, caraways, and wine.

There were about the long table, beside Master Shakspere himself, who sat at the head of the board, Masters Richard and Cuthbert Burbage, Henry Condell, and Peter Hemynge, Master Shakspere’s partners; Master Ben Jonson, his dearest friend; Thomas Pope, who played his finest parts; John Lowin, Samuel Gilburne, Robert Nash, and William Kemp, players of the Lord Chamberlain’s company; Edmund Shakspere, the actor, who was Master William Shakspere’s younger brother, and Master John Shakspere, his father; Michael Drayton, the Midland bard; Burgess Robert Getley, Alderman Henry Walker, and William Hart, the Stratford hatter, brother-in-law to Master Shakspere.

On one side of the table, between Master Jonson and Master Richard Burbage, Cicely was seated upon a high chair, with a wreath of early crimson roses in her hair, attired in the gown in which Nick saw her first a year before. On the other side of the table Nick had a place between Master Drayton and Robert Getley, father of his friend Robin. Half-way down there was an empty chair. Master John Combe was absent.

It was no common party. In all England better company could not have been found. Some few of them the whole round world could not have matched then, and could not match now.

It would be worth a fortune to know the things they said,—the quips, the jests, the merry tales that went around that board,—but time has left too little of what such men said and did, and it can be imagined only by the brightest wits.

’Twas Master Shakspere on his feet, welcoming his friends to his “New Place” with quiet words that made them glad to live and to be there, when suddenly he stopped, his hands upon the table by his chair, and stared.

The tanner stood there, silent, in the door.

Nick’s face turned pale. Cicely clung to Master Jonson’s arm.

Simon Attwood stepped into the room, and Master Shakspere went quickly to meet him in the middle of the floor.

“Master Will Shakspere,” said the tanner, hoarsely, “I ha’ come about a matter.” There he stopped, not knowing what to say, for he was overwrought.

“Out with it, sir,” said Master Shakspere, sternly. “There is much here to be said.”

The tanner wrung his hat within his hands, and looked about the ring of cold, averted faces. Soft words with him were few; he had forgotten tender things; and, indeed, what he meant to do was no easy thing for any man.

“Come, say what thou hast to say,” said Master Shakspere, resolutely; “and say it quickly, that we may have done.”

“There’s nought that I can say,” said Simon Attwood, “but that I be sorry, and I want my son! Nick! Nick!” he faltered brokenly, “I be wrung for thee; will ye na come home—just for thy mother’s sake, Nick, if ye will na come for mine?”

Nick started from his seat with a glad cry—then stopped. “But Cicely?” he said.

The tanner wrung his hat within his hands, and his face was dark with trouble. Master Shakspere looked at Master Jonson.

Nick stood hesitating between Cicely and his father, faithful to his promise, though his heart was sick for home.

An odd light had been struggling dimly in Simon Attwood’s troubled eyes. Then all at once it shone out bright and clear, and he clapped his bony hand upon the stout oak chair. “Bring her along,” he said. “I ha’ little enough, but I will do the best I can. Maybe ’twill somehow right the wrong I ha’ done,” he added huskily. “And, neighbors, I’ll go surety to the Council that she shall na fall a pauper or a burden to the town. My trade is ill enough, but, sirs, it will stand for forty pound the year at a fair cast-up. Bring the lass wi’ thee, Nick—we’ll make out, lad, we’ll make out. God will na let it all go wrong.”

Master Jonson and Master Shakspere had been nodding and talking together in a low tone, smiling like men very well pleased about something, and directly Master Shakspere left the room.

“Wilt thou come, lad?” asked the tanner, holding out his hands.

“Oh, father!” cried Nick; then he choked so that he could say no more, and his eyes were so full of mist that he could scarcely find his father where he stood.

But there was no need of more; Simon Attwood was answered.

Voices buzzed about the room. The servants whispered in the hall. Nick held his father’s gnarled hand in his own, and looked curiously up into his face, as if for the first time knowing what it was to have a father.

“Well, lad, what be it?” asked the tanner, huskily, laying his hand on his son’s curly head, which was nearly up to his shoulder now.

“Nothing,” said Nick, with a happy smile, “only mother will be glad to have Cicely—won’t she?”

Master Shakspere came into the room with something in his hand, and walking to the table, laid it down.

It was a heavy buckskin bag, tied tightly with a silken cord, and sealed with red wax stamped with the seals of Master Shakspere and Master Jonson.

Every one was watching him intently, and one or two of the gentlemen from London were smiling in a very knowing way.

He broke the seals, and loosening the thong which closed the bag, took out two other bags, one of which was just double its companion’s size. They also were tied with silken cord and sealed with the two seals on red wax. There was something printed roughly with a quill pen upon each bag, but Master Shakspere kept that side turned toward himself so that the others could not see.

“Come, come, Will,” broke in Master Jonson, “don’t be all day about it!”

“The more haste the worse speed, Ben,” said Master Shakspere, quietly. “I have a little story to tell ye all.”

So they all listened.

“When Gaston Carew, lately master-player of the Lord High Admiral’s company, was arraigned before my Lord Justice for the killing of that rascal, Fulk Sandells, there was not a man of his own company had the grace to lend him even so much as sympathy. But there were still some in London who would not leave him totally friendless in such straits.”

“Some?” interrupted Master Jonson, bluntly; “then o-n-e spells ‘some.’ The names of them all were Will Shakspere.”

“Tut, tut, Ben!” said Master Shakspere, and went on: “But when the charge was read, and those against him showed their hand, it was easy to see that the game was up. No one saw this any sooner than Carew himself; yet he carried himself like a man, and confessed the indictment without a quiver. They brought him the book, to read a verse and save his neck, perhaps, by pleading benefit of clergy. But he knew the temper of those against him, and that nothing might avail; so he refused the plea quietly, saying, ‘I am no clerk, sirs. All I wish to read in this case is what my own hand wrote upon that scoundrel Sandells.’ It was soon over. When the judge pronounced his doom, all Carew asked was for a friend to speak with a little while aside. This the court allowed; so he sent for me—we played together with Henslowe, he and I, ye know. He had not much to say—for once in his life,”—here Master Shakspere smiled pityingly,—“but he sent his love forever to his only daughter Cicely.”

Cicely was sitting up, listening with wide eyes, and eagerly nodded her head as if to say, “Of course.”

“He also begged of Nicholas Attwood that he would forgive him whatever wrong he had done him.”

“Why, that I will, sir,” choked Nick, brokenly; “he was wondrous kind to me, except that he would na leave me go.”

“After that,” continued Master Shakspere, “he made known to me a sliding panel in the wainscot of his house, wherein was hidden all he had on earth to leave to those he loved the best, and who, he hoped, loved him.”

“Everybody loves my father,” said Cicely, smiling and nodding again. Master Jonson put his arm around the back of her chair, and she leaned her head upon it.

“Carew said that he had marked upon the bags which were within the panel the names of the persons to whom they were to go, and had me swear, upon my faith as a Christian man, that I would see them safely delivered according to his wish. This being done, and the end come, he kissed me on both cheeks, and standing bravely up, spoke to them all, saying that for a man such as he had been it was easier to end even so than to go on. I never saw him again.”

The great writer of plays paused a moment, and his lips moved as if he were saying a prayer. Master Burbage crossed himself.

“The bags were found within the wall, as he had said, and were sealed by Ben Jonson and myself until we should find the legatees—for they had disappeared as utterly as if the earth had gaped and swallowed them. But, by the Father’s grace, we have found them safe and sound at last; and all’s well that ends well!”

Here he turned the buckskin bags around.

On one, in Master Carew’s school-boy scrawl, was printed, “For myne Onelie Beeloved Doghter, Cicely Carew”; on the other, “For Nicholas Attewode, alias Mastre Skie-lark, whom I, Gaston Carew, Player, Stole Away from Stratford Toune, Anno Domini 1596.”

Nick stared; Cicely clapped her hands; and Simon Attwood sat down dizzily.

“There,” said Master Shakspere, pointing to the second bag, “are one hundred and fifty gold rose-nobles. In the other just three hundred more. Neighbor Attwood, we shall have no paupers here.”

Everybody laughed then and clapped their hands, and the London players gave a rousing cheer. Master Ben Jonson’s shout might have been heard in Market Square.

At this tremendous uproar the servants peeped at the doors and windows; and Tom Boteler, peering in from the buttery hall, and seeing the two round money-bags plumping on the table, crept away with such a look of amazement upon his face that Mollikins, the scullery-maid, thought he had seen a ghost, and fled precipitately into the pantry.

“And what’s more, Neighbor Tanner,” said Master Richard Burbage, “had Carew’s daughter not sixpence to her name, we vagabond players, as ye have had the scanty grace to dub us, would have cared for her for the honour of the craft, and reared her gently in some quiet place where there never falls even the shadow of such evil things as have been the end of many a right good fellow beside old Kit Marlowe and Gaston Carew.”

“And to that end, Neighbor Attwood,” Master Shakspere added, “we have, through my young Lord Hunsdon, who has just been made State Chamberlain, Her Majesty’s gracious permission to hold this money in trust for the little maid as guardians under the law.”

Cicely stared around perplexed. “Won’t Nick be there?” she asked. “Why, then I will not go—they shall not take thee from me, Nick!” and she threw her arms around him. “I’m going to stay with thee till daddy comes, and be thine own sister forever.”

Master Jonson laughed gently, not his usual roaring laugh, but one that was as tender as his own bluff heart. “Why, good enough, good enough! The woman who mothered a lad like Master Skylark here is surely fit to rear the little maid.”

The London players thumped the table. “Why, ’tis the very trick,” said Hemynge. “Marry, this is better than a play.”

“It is indeed,” quoth Condell. “See the plot come out!”

“Thou’lt do it, Attwood—why, of course thou’lt do it,” said Master Shakspere. “’Tis an excellent good plan. These funds we hold in trust will keep thee easy-minded, and warrant thee in doing well by both our little folks. And what’s more,” he cried, for the thought had just come in his head, “I have ever heard thee called an honest man; hard, indeed, perhaps too hard, but honest as the day is long. Now I need a tenant for this New Place of mine—some married man with a good housewife, and children to be delving in the posy-beds outside. What sayst thou, Simon Attwood? They tell me thy ’prentice, Job Hortop, is to marry in July—he’ll take thine old house at a fair rental. Why, here, Neighbor Attwood, thou toil-worn, time-damaged