as smoothly as possible. It meant that he had to adjudicate at several running duels.
'Did you ever see such wanton cruelty, Nick?'
'Stand by for your next entrance.'..
'He cut my finest speech.'
'You ruined two or his.
'Gabriel is trying to savage my performance.'
'I believe he is only replying in kind.'
' The man has no honour.'
'Teach him some by example.'
'I think that you take his side.'
'No, Christopher. My concern is for the play itself
'Then why let Gabriel disfigure it?'
'You have been his able lieutenant in the business this past half-hour. It is to your mutual discredit.'
'I am the better player, Nick.'
'Your cue is at hand.'
'Speak up for me.
'Go forth and speak for yourself.'
Christopher Millfield surged back out onstage to continue his battle with Gabriel Hawkes. Both were fine actors who could carry off a wide range of supporting roles with assurance and each was a real asset to the company. But there would not be room for the two of them in the touring party. One had to give way to the other. They had never liked each other but, in all previous plays, their personal antipathy had been subdued for the sake of a common cause. Threatened with unemployment, they fell back on a raw hostility that was totally in keeping with the characters they were playing but which made for some rather alarming departures from the text.
Nicholas watched it all with a mixture of surprise and distaste. He might have expected such behaviour from Christopher Millfield, and arrogant and impulsive young man who was quick to take offence where none was intended. Gabriel Hawkes was a very different person, an unassuming and almost shy character who was ill at ease with the ribald banter of the players and who kept himself apart from the general throng. Nicholas admired the talents of both men but had much more affection for Hawkes. On a long and arduous tour, his soft-edged presence would be much more acceptable than Millfield's brashness.
Yet he was giving the worst possible account of himself. In descending to open combat, Hawkes was doing his cause irreparable harm. To the amusement of the audience-but the detriment of the play-the two of them were grappling like wrestlers, throwing each other to the ground with blank verse before pummelling away unmercifully with rhyming couplets.
Then, suddenly, it was all over.
Gabriel Hawkes seemed to concede defeat. He sagged visibly and the spirit went out of his defiance. He let Christopher Millfield walk all over him and could not even offer a token resistance. It was painful to watch.
Most of the onlookers were unaware of the intense personal conflict which had been going on in front of them. Hawkes and Millfield did not have leading parts and they melted into the scenery whenever Lawrence Firethorn came onstage. He was a true King in every sense and his regal brilliance outshone everything else in view, including the hilarious exploits of Barnaby Gill as a decrepit suitor. Firethorn's rule was paramount.
He led out the company to bask in the applause that echoed around the inn yard where they had set up their makeshift stage. Westfield's Men were due to play at the Queen's Head the following week but nobody believed that the performance would take place. The plague was closing in remorselessly. Spectators who would be deprived of entertainment for long months showed their appreciation of players who would be exiled from the city. It was a joyous yet rather wistful occasion.
Lawrence Firethorn wept genuine tears and delivered a farewell speech. Barnaby Gill snuffled, Edmund Hoode swallowed hard and the rest of the company were patently moved. Nicholas Bracewell was not carried away on the tide of emotion. His attention was fixed on Gabriel Hawkes who was strangely detached from it all. A man who loved the theatre with a deep and lasting commitment was now looking quite alienated by it all.
As they came offstage, Nicholas sought him out.
'What ails you, lad?'
'Nothing, Master Bracewell.'
'Can you be well?' I feel a sickness coming on but it is not serious.'
'What manner of sickness?'
'Do nor trouble yourself about me.'
'Shall we carry you to a physician?'
'It is of no account, I promise you.'
'Have care, Gabriel.'
The young actor smiled weakly and touched his arm.
'Thank you, Master Bracewell.'
'Why so?'
'You have been a good friend to me.'
There was an air of finality in his voice that upset Nicholas. As Gabriel Hawkes went off unsteadily to change out of his costume and make his way back to his lodgings in Bankside, the book holder had the worrying premonition that he would never see the man alive again.
Having toyed with the city for a few weeks, the plague moved in for the kill. London was helpless. It suffered from pounding headaches, icy chills, agonizing back pains, quickening pulse, heavy breathing, high fever and incurable restlessness. Ugly buboes began to appear in its groin and beneath its armpits. Vomiting was quite uncontrollable. As the body surrendered, the mind began to crumble as well. Delirium set in. The mortality rate climbed inexorably and people learned to pray once more.
'When will you leave, sir?'
'As soon as it is needful.'
'Is there no hope of escape?'
'Alas, no, my love. Seven deaths were reported in this parish alone and a dozen or more in Cripplegate. When all the parishes are reckoned up, the number will be well past thirty and even as high as thrice that number.'
'God save us all!'
'There's no comfort for we wretched players, who must be the first to be sacrificed to this scourge. The Privy Council has issued an edict. All theatres, bear-baiting arenas and other places of public consort must be closed forthwith. It is iniquitous!'
'It is inconsiderate, sir.'
Margery Firethorn clasped her husband to her and let him feel the warmth of her devotion. It had not been a placid marriage by any stretch of the imagination but he had never regretted it, even when the tempests were at their fiercest. Margery was a good wife, a caring mother, a thrifty house-keeper and a sound Christian. Living with such a rumbustious partner as Lawrence Firethorn would have cowed any other woman but she had met the challenge with unflinching bravery. They were destined for each other. Kindred spirits forged from the same steel.
'How long will you be gone?' she asked.
'Until the Queen's Head can welcome us again.'
'That day will be months away.'
'Michaelmas at least.'
'It will seem like an eternity.'
'My old heart is sad at the contemplation of it.'
'I will miss you sorely, Lawrence.'
Firethorn looked down at his wife as she lay beside him in bed and saw again the voluptuous young woman whom he had first courted all those years ago. Time had etched deep lines in her face and childbirth had been unkind to her figure but she was still an astonishing creature in her own way, with generous curves to her body that
