ILL WEAVED AMBITION.
The machinations of Pouncet Grasp had not been without their due effect. His evil disposition was as great as his industry, and his very face and form, twisted and contorted as both were, proclaimed the mind of the man as plainly as if he had carried a window in his breast.
Few specimens of the human countenance presented indeed less of the divine about it than did that of the Stratford lawyer. The term ugly as sin might, in verity, have been applied to him, for, when he was hatching any particular piece of rascality, the working of his features gave him a diabolical look.
Not only had he succeeded in his design of weaving a web about Walter Arderne, and getting incarcerated within the walls of a prison for debt, but he even managed, by some strange underhand practice, to bring him under the suspicion of the Queen's council for treasonable matter. And yet, with all this malignancy of disposition, Grasp carried about him such an air of bonhommie that, until he was found out, he was seldom distrusted. After he had, by the most careful approaches, (like a spider securing a victim in his web, who is too powerful to be openly attacked), fairly enmeshed Walter Arderne, he turned his thoughts upon his old Stratford enemy, William Shakespeare, and, whose whereabout he now had little difficulty in discovering, since after the successful performance of Romeo and Juliet, the author's name was in the mouths of many.
Sir Thomas Lucy had departed only few days before for Stratford, or Grasp would immediately have sought him out, and, as he himself was also on the eve of returning to Warwickshire, together with his new client, in order to take immediate possession of the inheritance succeeded to, he resolved to delay till his arrival the discovery he had made.
Meanwhile, the situation of Arderne was sufficiently disagreeable. He was arrested for an enormous sum, and-when Sir Hugh Clopton sought to clear him of the difficulty, by making some great sacrifices, that good old man found, to his further dismay, that some secret foe had denounced his nephew as a conspirator against the life of the Queen.
In Elizabeth's reign, those persons of condition who came under suspicion and were confined within the walls of a prison found it no easy matter to clear themselves, and some, even in the higher ranks of the nobility, without any sustained charge but "for mere suspicion, were treated as if for surety," finding their graves in the dismal chambers of the Tower.
The news of the imprisonment of his early friend greatly troubled Shakespeare. He was just at this time contemplating a return to his native town, for now that he had so far achieved success, and felt within himself the power of future fame, the longing for home, added to the desire of once more embracing all he had dear there, he felt to be irresistible.
To leave London, however, without an effort to serve his early friend was impossible. He visited Arderne in his prison, and afterwards sought Lord Leicester in order to interest that noble in his favour.
The time was, however, somewhat out of joint for making a successful suit to Leicester at this moment. He was in one of those periodical fits of ill-temper which usually attacked him when his "high-reaching" schemes failed. He was out of favour with the Queen too, somewhat on the sudden, and so wide was the breach that, albeit he was seeking by some underhand contrivances to regain a place in her good graces, all his attempts were futile.
To explain this to our readers, we must remind them that after the services of Leicester at Tilbury, Elizabeth had created for the favourite the office of Lord Lieutenant of England and Ireland; an office which would have invested him with greater power than any sovereign of this country had ever ventured to bestow on a subject. The patent for this unprecedented dignity was actually made out, and only awaited the royal signature, when Burleigh and Hatton, by their earnest remonstrances, deterred Her Majesty from investing him with such power.
It was during the fit of rage consequent upon disappointment, that Leicester had behaved with a degree of intemperance so distasteful to Her Majesty, that she dismissed him in anger, and refused to be reconciled.
The despondence which followed the violence of his rage on this occasion brought on an illness, from which he, in truth, never recovered.
At the moment Shakespeare obtained an interview, he accordingly found the earl in so ill a frame of mind, that he refused to interest himself in favour of Walter Arderne.
He was about, he said to quit London for his castle of Kenilworth, and was so utterly disgusted with Courts and all pertaining, that he vowed to Heaven he would no more return.
As the poet looked in the face of this ambitious and still powerful noble, he thought it not unlikely his words would prove true; for the inroads of his peculiar disease were so apparent in his countenance, that the grisly tyrant seemed to have put his mark upon him.
Leicester, at this period of his life, had grown bulky, and lost much of that striking beauty of face and form for which he had been so celebrated. His countenance shewed traces of his ungovernable temper and evil disposition; his hair, lately coal-black, had become a "sable silvered;" his frown had contracted into an habitual scowl; his dark complexion, and from which he had obtained the sobriquet of "The Gipsey," had changed to a sickly yellow; his fine features had become bloated; and every part about him seemed blasted with premature age.
As he rose from his seat during the interview, the poet observed that he looked the personification of an evil-disposed but powerful man. One who was torn by the fiend of avarice, the lust of power, and the chagrin of blasted ambition. The Court smile was gone for ever from that once pliant brow, and the scowl of hate seated in its stead.
To the surprise of the poet, whilst he flatly refused interference on the subject of Arderne's imprisonment, he even seemed to experience satisfaction at that youth's danger. The poisonous mind of the most successful poisoner of the age was now recklessly displayed. He seemed to rejoice in the misfortunes of his fellow-men, whilst he felt that his own further success in life was ended. He was indeed at that moment sinking into the grave a hopeless unbeliever, "a bold bad man."
"Sir Thomas Lucy," he said, rudely and abruptly, "hath sought me on the subject of this Arderne, praying of me to intercede with the Queen. But I meddle not again with matters of state or the business of others. My health requires change from the pestilential vapour of this city. I have done with Courts and seek my castle at Kenilworth."
Shakespeare bowed, and was about to withdraw, when Leicester turned and again spoke.
"I advise you yourself, Master Shakespeare," he said, "to keep free of such matters. Peril not your present favour by mixing in treasonable affairs, and so farewell."
"Nay, my Lord," said Shakespeare, "this gentleman, my friend, hath been most unjustly accused. He is one to whom I owe much love. I may not cease from making what interest I can in his favour."
"And I tell thee then," said Leicester, imperiously, "that in me you will find an opponent in his cause; my interest lieth in the very opposite direction, since I am informed by a law-man of your native town that, in right of my wife, I can claim some of those estates in Warwickshire so lately in possession of this Arderne."
Shakespeare felt surprised at this intimation, and immediately the interview terminated.
There was evidently a secret enemy at work, he thought, as he left the house; and, as he passed through the gateway, he ran against a man who was entering.
The poet was so wrapped in his own thoughts that he observed not the features of this person; but Grasp (for it was no less a person who was entering the courtyard) started at the well-known form of his sometime clerk, and, hesitating for the moment, seemed divided as to whether he should not defer his present business and follow the poet.
Whilst he stood undecided, Shakespeare took boat, and so Grasp turned towards the building.
"I shall find the pestilent fellow," he said, "and I shall also penetrate into the mystery of that fair Lindabrides who dwells beneath his roof, and masquerades about the city at nights. My certie, but I'll spoil his actings, his writings, his inditings, his poetizing, and rhapsodizing. I can myself indite, aye, and play a part, too, as well as he; and so, Master William Shakespeare, look to thyself, for thou art in jeopardy;" and so Grasp turned and proceeded, across the court of Leicester House rejoicing.