THE ROSE PLAY-HOUSE
The play-house was an eight-sided, three-storied, tower-like building of
oak and plastered lath, upon a low foundation of yellow brick. Two
outside stairways ran around the wall, and the roof was of bright-red
English tiles with a blue lead gutter at the eaves. There was a little
turret, from the top of which a tall ash stave went up; and on the
stave, whenever there was to be a play, there floated a great white flag
on which was a crimson rose with a golden heart, just like the one that
Nick with such delight had seen come up the Oxford road a few short
days before.
Under the stairway was a narrow door marked “For the Playeres Onelie”;
and in the doorway stood a shrewd-faced, common-looking man, writing
upon a tablet which he held in his hand. There was a case of quills at
his side, with one of which he was scratching busily, now and then
prodding the ink-horn at his girdle. He held his tongue in his cheek,
and moved his head about as the pen formed the letters: he was no
expert penman, this Phil Henslowe, the stager of plays.
He looked up as they came to the step.
“A poor trip, Carew,” said he, running his finger down the column of
figures he was adding. “The play was hardly worth the candle—cleared
but five pound; and then, after I had paid the carman three shilling fip
to bring the stuff down from the City, ’twas lost in the river from the
barge at Paul’s wharf! A good two pound.”
“Hard luck!” said Carew.
“Hard? Adamantine, I say! Why, ’tis very stones for luck, and the whole
road rocky! Here’s Burbage, Condell, and Will Shakspere ha’ rebuilt
Blackfriars play-house in famous shape; and, marry, where are we?”
Nick started. An idea came creeping into his head. Will Shakspere had
married his mother’s own cousin, Anne Hathaway of Shottery; and he had
often heard his mother say that Master Shakspere had ever been her own
good friend when they were young.
“He and Jonson be thick as thieves,” said Henslowe; “and Chettle says
that Will hath near done the book of a new play for the autumn—a master
fine thing!—‘Romulus and Juliana,’ or something of that Italian sort,
to follow Ben Jonson’s comedy. Ned Alleyn played a sweet fool about
Ben’s comedy. Called it monstrous bad; and now it has taken the money
out of our mouths to the tune of nine pound six the day—and here, while
ye were gone, I ha’ played my Lord of Pembroke’s men in your ‘Robin
Hood,’ Heywood, to scant twelve shilling in the house!”
Heywood flushed.
“Nay, Tom, don’t be nettled; ’tis not the fault of thy play. There’s
naught will serve. We’ve tried old Marlowe and Robin Greene, Peele,
Nash, and all the rest; but, what! they will not do—’tis Shakspere,
Shakspere; our City flat-caps will ha’ nothing but Shakspere!”
Nick listened eagerly. Master Will Shakspere must indeed be somebody in
London town! He stared across into the drifting cloud of mist and smoke
which hid the city like a pall, and wondered how and where, in that
terrible hive of more than a hundred thousand men, he could find
one man.
“I tell thee, Tom Heywood, there’s some magic in the fellow, or my
name’s not Henslowe!” cried the manager. “His very words bewitch one’s
wits as nothing else can do. Why, I’ve tried them with ‘Pierce
Penniless,’ ‘Groat’s Worth of Wit,’ ‘Friar Bacon,’ ‘Orlando,’ and the
‘Battle of Alcazar.’ Why, tush! they will not even listen! And here I’ve
put Martin Gosset into purple and gold, and Jemmy Donstall into a
peach-colored gown laid down with silver-gilt, for ‘Volteger’; and what?
Why, we play to empty stools; and the rascals owe me for those costumes
yet—sixty shillings full! A murrain on Burbage and Will Shakspere
too!—but I wish we had him back again. We’d make their old Blackfriars
sick!” He shook his fist at a great gray pile of buildings that rose
above the rest out of the fog by the landing-place beyond the river.
Nick stared. _That_ the play-house of Master Shakspere and the Burbages?
Will Shakspere playing there, just across the river? Oh, if Nick could
only find him, he would not let the son of his wife’s own cousin be
stolen away!
Nick looked around quickly.
The play-house stood a bowshot from the river, in the open fields. There
was a moated manor-house near by, and beyond it a little stream with
some men fishing. Between the play-house and the Thames were gardens and
trees, and a thin fringe of buildings along the bank by the landings. It
was not far, and there were places where one could get a boat every
fifty yards or so at the Bankside.
But—“Come in, come in,” said Henslowe. “Growling never fed a dog; and
we must be doing.”
“Go ahead, Nick,” said Carew, pushing him by the shoulder, and they all
went in. The door opened on a flight of stairs leading to the lowest
gallery at the right of the stage, where the orchestra sat. A man was
tuning up a viol as they came in.
“I want you to hear this boy sing,” said Carew to Henslowe. “’Tis the
best thing ye ever lent ear to.”
“Oh, this is the boy?” said the manager, staring at Nick. “Why, Alleyn
told me he was a country gawk!”
“He lied, then,” said Carew, very shortly. “’Twas cheaper than the
truth at my price. There, Nick, go look about the place—we have
business.”
Nick went slowly along the gallery. His hands were beginning to tremble
as he put them out touching the stools. Along the rail were ornamental
columns which supported the upper galleries and looked like beautiful
blue-veined white marble; but when he took hold of them to steady
himself he found they were only painted wood.
There were two galleries above. They ran all around the inside of the
building, like the porches of the inn at Coventry, and he could see them
across the house. There were no windows in the gallery where he was, but
there were some in the second one. They looked high. He went on around
the gallery until he came to some steps going down into the open space
in the center of the building. The stage was already set up on the
trestles, and the carpenters were putting a shelter-roof over it on
copper-gilt pillars; for it was beginning to drizzle, and the middle of
the play-house was open to the sky.
The spectators were already coming into the pit at a penny apiece,
although the play would not begin until early evening. Those for the
galleries paid another penny to a man in a red cloak at the foot of the
stairs where Nick was standing. There was a great uproar at the
entrance. Some apprentices had caught a cutpurse in the crowd, and were
beating him unmercifully. Every one pushed and shoved about, cursing the
thief, and those near enough kicked and struck him.
Nick looked back. Carew and the manager had gone into the tiring-room
behind the stage. He took hold of the side-rail and started down the
steps. The man in the red cloak looked up. “Go back there,” said he,
sharply; “there’s enough down here now.” Nick went on around
the gallery.
At the back of the stage were two doors for the players, and between
them hung a painted cloth or arras behind which the prompter stood. Over
these doors were two plastered rooms, twopenny private boxes for
gentlefolk. In one of them were three young men and a beautiful girl,
wonderfully dressed. The men were speaking to her, but she looked down
at Nick instead. “What a pretty boy!” she said, and tossed him a flower
that one of the men had just given her. It fell at Nick’s feet. He
started back, looking up. The girl smiled, so he took off his cap and
bowed; but the men looked sour.
At the side of the stage was a screen with long leather fire-buckets and
a pole-ax hanging upon it, and behind it was a door through which Nick
saw the river and the gray walls of the old Dominican friary. As he came
down to it, some one thrust out a staff and barred the way. It was the
bandy-legged man with the ribbon in his ear, Nick looked out longingly;
it seemed so near!
“Master Carew saith thou art not to stir outside—dost hear?” said the
bandy-legged man.
“Ay,” said Nick, and turned back.
There was a narrow stairway leading to the second gallery. He went up
softly. There was no one in the gallery, and there was a window on the
side next to the river; he had seen it from below. He went toward it
slowly that he might not arouse suspicion. It was above his head.
[Illustration: “NICK PUT ONE LEG OVER THE SILL AND LOOKED BACK.”]
There were stools for hire standing near. He brought one and set it
under the window. It stood unevenly upon the floor, and made a wabbling
noise. He was afraid some one would hear him; but the apprentices in
the pit were rattling dice, and two or three gentlemen’s pages were
wrangling for the best places on the platform; while, to add to the
general riot, two young gallants had brought gamecocks and were fighting
them in one corner, amid such a whooping and swashing that one could
hardly have heard the skies fall.
A printer’s man was bawling, “Will ye buy a new book?” and the
fruit-sellers, too, were raising such a cry of “Apples, cherries, cakes,
and ale!” that the little noise Nick might make would be lost in the
wild confusion.
Master Carew and the manager had not come out of the tiring-room. Nick
got up on the stool and looked out. It was not very far to the
ground—not so far as from the top of the big haycock in Master John
Combe’s field from which he had often jumped.
The sill was just breast-high when he stood upon the stool. Putting his
hands upon it, he gave a little spring, and balanced on his arms a
moment. Then he put one leg over the window-sill and looked back. No one
was paying the slightest attention to him. Over all the noise he could
hear the man tuning the viol. Swinging himself out slowly and silently,
with his toes against the wall to steady him, he hung down as far as he
could, gave a little push away from the house with his feet, caught a
quick breath, and dropped.