THE MOLDING OF THE MASK.
Jove sometimes masked in a shepherd’s weed,
And by those steps, that he hath scaled the heavens,
May we become immortal like the gods.
—I Tamburlaine, i, 2.
Conceal me what I am, and be my aid
For such disguise as haply may become
The form of my intent.
—Twelfth Night, i, 2.
The silence in Peele’s chamber at the Boar’s Head had continued many minutes. The three hearers of Marlowe’s vivid recital looked at each other expectantly; but as all had quaffed his cup of misery, silence was alone the fit expression of their depth of feeling and interest. The intense personality of the man had aroused in them sentiments like those he entertained. They recognized his genius [[note 18 to 24]], the height from which he had fallen, the deplorableness of his situation. It was as though his intellect had unseated theirs and mounted on the thrones thus vacated. Thus the boon companion of their riotous follies, the good fellow, the well-beloved and revel-loving Kit, had in a thrice vanished in thin air, and a veritable king of men assumed his place.
He had simply summoned the power that he knew was lodged within him, deep in the inexhaustible fountain from which he had drawn his lines of fire and figures of immortal mold.
“Let us calmly consider your situation,” at length said Tamworth, looking feelingly at Marlowe, “Against thyself lieth now an accusation of blasphemy upon which a warrant hath been issued. Even now, undoubtedly, with this in hand, the officers shadow thy customary haunts. During their search, news will soon come of thy death at Deptford; for, from what thou sayeth of the unfortunate Frazer’s resemblance to thee, he will be buried under thy name. The warrant will be returned; the information pigeonholed, and thou wilt have little to fear from that source.”
“Unless he goes abroad among those who know him,” ejaculated Peele.
“That can not be,” whispered Marlowe.
“Then we will take it, that, as Marlowe, thou art like one dead beyond all resurrection,” continued the lawyer with emphasis.
“It can not be otherwise,” rejoined the subject of these comments, “unless in some retreat of assured safety, and at some future time, I reveal myself.”
“As the slayer of the Count?” was asked.
“There’s the rub,” whispered Marlowe, shaking his head.
“Well that is for later consideration,” said Tamworth calmly. “Let me continue. On the morrow a hue and cry will be raised for the arrest of Francis Frazer. The character which you have assumed for the last few hours cannot avail thee further. It has answered its purpose. Thou hast kept thy name from being sullied with the crime of murder. But as the Count, or Francis Frazer, thou canst not walk forth.”
“Assuredly not,” said Peele.
“An arrest before noon would follow,” interrupted Shakespere, “and then, thy trial, in which, perchance, the true situation of affairs would come to light.”
“Wherein lieth safety?” asked Marlowe, raising his eyes and glancing from one face to the other of his friends.
“A life of obscurity,” answered Tamworth, “is all I can see for thee, unless thine efforts at concealment are undone; you deliver yourself up and stand trial. I cannot guarantee an acquittal, but it is not going too far to place firm hope in one.”
“No,” exclaimed Marlowe, “rather the concealment and obscurity than such course. The die has been cast; so far it worketh well, and even with an acquittal, this untried charge of blasphemy would stick in the burr. What is it? How far doth it reach? Hast thou a copy of the accusation?”
“I have,” said Peele, again producing the paper and handing it to Marlowe.
“The severity and falsity of the charges appall me,” exclaimed Marlowe, “nothing could be blacker. Are there no means to vindicate my name?”
“Your memory,” suggested Shakespere.
“True, that is all the world hath of me, but in all seriousness can not this false swearer, Bame, be punished?”
“He can, if you desire it,” answered Tamworth.
“Desire it? What man would not demand it?”
“I know of none.”
“Much of it is too vile for utterance, and that I knew one Poole in Newgate, and intended coining English shillings is as false as Hell. When shall his prosecution be pushed?”
“At once,” answered Tamworth.
“On what charge?”
“Perjury.”
“The penalty is what?”
“He can be tried either under the statute or the common law. Under the latter, the punishment is death.”
“Let it be the latter,” said Peele and Shakespere before Marlowe could answer.
“But to return to the suggestion of your concealment,” said Peele, “How can you remain concealed for any length of time?”
“No one will look for me. All who know me will hear the account of my death at Deptford.”
“But someone besides us and the wife of Frazer will doubtless encounter thee.”
“Can I not lie safely housed until passage can be secured for the continent?”
“But in what quarter?”
“Far from the old familiar places, Peele,” answered Marlowe. “Not at the Black Bull, nor at Gerard’s Hall; nor at the Mermaid Tavern. And are these names to be but memories? Why, it is not two weeks since we secretly played Tancred and Gismund to the crowded galleries in the Bull; and then the dance around the fir-pole in the high-roofed hall at Gerard’s! That was not a month since, Peele. And verily my lips have not yet dried from the last glasses of fine old wine drank with thee, Nash, Jonson and the other merry wags at the round table within the bow-window at the Mermaid.”
Peele rocked backward and forward without speaking.
“Ah well, such frivolity should have ended long ago,” Marlowe went on, in a tone growing sterner with every word. “When mine enemy, Greene, dying of his surfeit of Rheinish wine and pickled herring, besought his friends in his Groat’s Worth of Wit [[note 35]] to abandon dissolute companions and in solitude nourish their spirit’s fire, why should I, despite his attack upon me, have not listened to his warning voice addressed to others, and not have waited for a finger dipped in blood to write, ‘Here endeth thy career?’”
A pause followed in which no one spoke, and again he continued: “’Tis well that this has happened. Without it what could have stayed me from wasting the hours which henceforth can be spent only in intellectual effort? Now the devil is chained. I can not even sell my soul to him. The world with its temptations lieth as distant as the fields of Trasymene. Is it not a subject for congratulation? What campaigns may I not enter; what conquests may I not gain?”
With the egotism of a god, knowing himself, and the source from which he drew his inspiration, he continued his torrent of words:
“Tamburlaine was written with the collar of the university about my neck; Faustus, while my hatred of the existing laws designed to chain one’s belief, prevented a just appreciation of true religion; the Massacre of Paris, with my mind disturbed from the effects of continuous dissipation; Hero and Leander, while deep in Love’s young dream; and so on with the list. But now what is there to clog or muddy the fountains? Is my mind not broader; are not the impediments to studious application and undisturbed contemplation removed? For twenty, thirty, yea forty or fifty years, what is before me but the opportunity to produce immortal and transcendent work? Nay, give me ten years in solitude, O thou dread force, and under my hand all form, all thought, shall find expression in written words!”
He fell forward on the table with outstretched arms and clenched hands. Shakespere lifted him up; pityingly brushed back the hair from his face, and said: “Forget the matter for a moment.”
No other words were spoken; still the rain pattered on the window opening towards St. Michael’s, and no sounds came up from the narrow walks in Crooked Lane.
At length Tamworth broke the silence. “I do not doubt, dear Kit, that whatever may be thy aim, thy arrow will reach. But life can not be maintained without capital or revenue. Your design being linked with an ambition for personal immortality precludes the publication of thy productions till after thy death or when hope of life is gone. Now, where will come the fund for thy maintenance?”
“Thou canst not appear as an actor,” suggested Shakespere.
“And neither can the works you may produce be sold as thine,” said Peele.
“Could they not be sold under some one else’s name?” asked Marlowe. “At the proper time their authorship could be confessed and established.”
“But in whose name?” queried Peele.
“Why not thine; at least temporarily?”
“Bah,” ejaculated Peele, “I could not pass thy dramas off as mine. The style, my dear fellow, the style. Henslowe would at once say, ‘What Peele, this thy drama? Marry, and where didst thou steal this new fire? Off with thee. It is none of thine. Leave it. I will look up the older dramatists, Greek and Latin, from which I ween thou hast taken its entire,’”
“Then why not as thine, Shakespere?”
“Mine,” exclaimed Shakespere, shaking with laughter which he could not control, “Greater objections than those stated by Peele would arise. Only a few years ago I held horses before the Curtain and Theater. I write a play; Ho! Ho!”
He laughed so heartily that Tamworth joined with him.
“Stop,” said Peele, endeavoring to interrupt the sudden mirth, “The suggestion is a good one. What does Henslowe know of your horseholding, friend Will?”
“But,” answered Shakespere, “he knoweth that I came from the miserable village of Stratford-on-Avon only six years ago, where there are few books and nothing better than a grammar school. [[note 36]] Although I can say ‘Stipendium peccati mors est,’ as being learned from thy Faustus, Marlowe, I would die in the attempt to give its meaning.”
“He surely will not question thee about thy Latin or thy Greek,” said Tamworth, joining in with the scheme, “and as thou hast never turned a hand at such work, there are not, as in Peele’s case, fair-skinned children of earlier birth to give the lie to the paternity of the later ones of different complexion.”
“And am I to claim them as mine?” asked Shakespere.
“Only as may be necessary for the sale to theatrical managers,” answered Marlowe.
“And perchance grow famous; for we know the depth and strength of thy work.”
“Only for a time,” said Marlowe, impressively, “In the end all will be clear.”
“So be it then,” said Shakespere.
“But thy handwriting, Marlowe, is too well known. Still,” continued Tamworth, “the manuscript may be copied, and as I write a clear hand I would gladly aid thee.”
“But where are you to live, Kit?”
“At Southwark?” questioned the latter.
“Nay,” exclaimed Tamworth, “the Rose is there, with many players who know thee, and its numerous hangers-on. The heart of this city is far better. I know of a retreat. No hunted deer ever found so secure a covert. It is the building known as the Prince’s Wardrobe on the Old Jewry. Its corridors are unfrequented except by the few tenants who, through the benevolence of the present keeper, dwell in some of the chambers. Its demolition, begun many years ago, has been stayed. Once vacated because of notice of its contemplated razing, it is again being occupied through the apparent inertness of its owners. But this inaction is due to other causes—”
“I have heard of secret chambers there,” interrupted Peele.
“There are,” continued Tamworth, “It was once used as a palace, but its early history is lost. Some of its stone walls are down, and above the cleared ruins at one end, divers lordly buildings have been reared; but the half portion towards St. Olave is intact. A question concerning its title being now unsettled in the courts, no progress can be made either in its repair or its destruction. Years may pass before the question is finally determined. The receiver appointed by the courts is a descendant of Sir Anthony Cope, who purchased the property from the crown in 1548, and, due to my acquaintance with him, and late services rendered, I now have a furnished chamber therein. The way out, or in, may be easy of discovery, and my quarters are occasionally visited by friends, but to me alone is known an inner room where you can dwell in perfect safety.”
“Thy words are of good cheer,” exclaimed Marlowe, “and no delay must be incurred.”
“Did you encounter no one upon entering here?” asked Peele.
“No; I came in at the side entrance. It was open. Crooked Lane was deserted as far as I could see.”
“And on the road from Deptford?”
“No one who knew me appeared upon the road. At the Golden Hind as I passed the tap-room door I caught a glimpse of the drawer, one of the actors who had been with me early in the evening, and the wife of Frazer.”
“Ah; she has not escaped then?” exclaimed Tamworth. “This is serious. She may be held until after the discovery of the deed.”
“Undoubtedly she has been,” answered Marlowe, “I could not catch the occasion of her resting in the tap-room, neither could I pause, for discovery would have been certain.”
“Did she see thee?”
“I think not, for the drawer stood before her, so that only a portion of her gown was visible to me. I mounted hurriedly in the inn-yard and riding to the gnarled oak I waited under it, and in the thick fog for at least an hour. She did not come.”
“She will testify against thee.”
“Never,” exclaimed Marlowe.
“Ah,” said Tamworth, prolonging the word and opening wide his eyes.
“Have no fears of that,” continued Marlowe, firmly, and then as though to turn their thoughts into another channel, he continued: “The ride over that country road was lonely beyond all comparison. I slunk by the lights at Redriffe like one unarmed passing by the known lair of a sleeping lion. At the moment they struck my face I could have fallen from the saddle. But no eye of careless watcher was apparently following their seams into the darkness; for no haloo broke the night. The wood of oak and elm fencing the road this side the half-way house was resonant with swaying limbs. A wind was coming from the river, and the fog was like rain.”
“Was it dark?”
“So dark I could not see the ground.”
“Thy horse found the way and reached the bridge?”
“No, I turned not in towards it; but passing Bataille’s Inn, I rode down to a waterman’s house close by the river’s bank. There I dismounted, tied my horse and found the waterman. He was tying his wherry at the foot of the landing. With much persuasion, I induced him to row me across and, reaching the stone steps somewhere near the Swan, I came here with all haste.”
“And when were you last at your quarters in Coward Lane?”
“Just before starting for Deptford.”
“Whatever is there must be left.”
“Nay,” exclaimed Marlowe, “I have much unfinished work there.”
“Doth not Nash lodge in the same tenement?”
“Yes, in the room adjoining.”
“Doth he know of these writings?”
“All about them. He is engaged with me in writing the tragedy of Dido. I read him the two sestiads of Hero and Leander only two nights since.”
“Well then such things can not be taken unless Nash is numbered with us.”
“’Twould not be well,” said Tamworth, “the lesser the number holding the secret, the less fear of discovery.”
“Thy judgment is sound, Tamworth,” said Marlowe, “let Nash finish the tragedy, and have him place the poem of Hero and Leander in the hands of Chapman with word that it was my dying request that he complete it [[note 37]].”
“Good,” exclaimed Peele, “and perchance embodying within it some golden lines touching thy unfortunate demise.”
“Most excellent,” said Marlowe, smiling at the thought of reading of his own death and the estimate of his own worth expressed in the poetic language of a loving friend.
“These matters,” said Tamworth, “will be attended to as strictly as bequests should be by an executor. We must at once reach my lodgings.”
“Leave the Count’s cloak and take this of mine,” said Peele, taking down a short mantle from a hook against the wall.