“Sh!” said Shakespeare, shaking his head madly. “Hush. Nobody’s said anything about that. This is purely a discussion of Othello.”
“The fiddling ex-Emperor Nero,” said Bacon, loudly enough to be heard all about the room, “is mistaken when he attributes Othello to me.”
“Aha, Master Nero!” cried Shakespeare triumphantly. “What did I tell you?”
“Then I erred, that is all,” said Nero. “And I apologize. But really, my Lord,” he added, addressing Bacon, “I fancied I detected your fine Italian hand in that.”
“No. I had nothing to do with the Othello,” said Bacon. “I never really knew who wrote it.”
“Never mind about that,” whispered Shakespeare. “You’ve said enough.”
“That’s good too,” said Nero, with a chuckle. “Shakespeare here claims it as his own.”
Bacon smiled and nodded approvingly at the blushing Avonian.
“Will always was having his little joke,” he said. “Eh, Will? How we fooled ’em on Hamlet, eh, my boy? Ha-ha-ha! It was the greatest joke of the century.”
“Well, the laugh is on you,” said Doctor Johnson. “If you wrote Hamlet and didn’t have the sense to acknowledge it, you present to my mind a closer resemblance to Simple Simon than to Socrates. For my part, I don’t believe you did write it, and I do believe that Shakespeare did. I can tell that by the spelling in the original edition.”