earnest beginnings of a moustache and goatee. His long black hair flowed over his collar and looked like ebony against the hue of his smooth skin. He had mischievous blue eyes and a winsome smile that never seemed to fade. His elocution was clear and precise, and he possessed a presence that demanded men take him seriously.
He had known John Cantwell since childhood, when both of them attended the King’s New School in Stratford. Though Will was far and away the superior student, Will’s father, a merchant, lacked the means to send him to university. When John was expelled from Oxford, he returned to his country seat and remade acquaintance with the lad. The two of them became fast friends again, reveling in each other’s bawdy company.
Will squirted ale into his mouth from a skin and seized the bow from his drunken companion. “Indeed I can do better, sir.”
He smoothly pulled the bowstring back, aimed, and let an arrow fly. It sailed true and straight and struck the target in its center.
John groaned loudly, “Damn you to Hades, Master Shakespeare.”
Will grinned at him and threw down the bow in favor of more ale.
“Let us go inside,” John said. “It is too hot for sport. To the library, your favorite spot!”
In truth, whenever Will entered the Cantwell library, he looked like a little boy who had stumbled upon a roomful of unguarded fruit pies. He made a straight line for one of his favorite books, Plutarch’s Lives, pulling it off a shelf and sinking into a large chair by the window.
“You should let me take this home, John,” he said. “I will make better use of it than you.”
John called the hall servant for more ale then flopped onto a divan, and replied, “You should steal it. Hide it under your shirt. I do not care.”
“Your father might.”
“I think he will never know. He does not read any longer. He does much of nothing. The only time he comes in here is to hold The Book in his lap and pet it like an old dog.” He said The Book with mock reverence. He pointed contemptuously at the book sitting in its pride of place on the first shelf, its spine engraved with the date, 1527.
Will laughed, “Ah, the magic book of Cantwell Hall.” Will affected a child’s voice, “Pray tell me, sir, when shall I meet my darkest fate?”
“Today if you do not shut your mouth.”
“And who will be the instrument of my death, knave?”
John sloshed more ale down. “You are looking into his eyes.”
“You?” Will laughed. “You and what legions?”
This was an invitation to wrestle, and both boys rose and circled, sniggered at each other. When Will charged to upend his friend, John reached for the first book his hand could grasp and flung it hard at the back of Will’s head.
“Ow!” Will stopped his charge, rubbed his occiput, then picked up the book from the floorboards. The pages had violently separated from the cover. “Ye Gods! A tragedy!” he cried melodramatically. “You have torn asunder a Greek tragedy and have awoken the wrath of Sophocles!”
A voice from the door startled them. “You ruined one of Father’s books!”
Young Richard was standing there, hands on hips, like an indignant lady. His lips were trembling with rage. None in the family was more attuned to the sentiments of his father, and he took personal umbrage with the behavior of his brother.
“Be gone, brat,” John said.
“I will not. You must confess to Father what you have done.”
“Leave us, little toad, or I will have more to confess than that.”
“I will not leave!” he said stubbornly.
“Then I will make you.”
John dashed for the door. The boy turned and fled but not fast enough. He was caught in the center of the Great Hall just before he was going to slip under the banqueting table.
John roughly laid him on his back and straddled him, knees on shoulders, hips on waist so the boy was powerless to move. All he could do was spit, which so enraged his older brother that he boxed him on the side of his head with a closed fist, his signet ring scraping flesh and opening a scalp vein. A gush of blood brought the proceedings to an abrupt halt. John released him with an oath and as the boy ran off, he shouted at him that he had caused the incident by his own insolence.
Minutes later, John was moodily drinking back in the library; Will had his nose buried in a book. Edgar Cantwell appeared in their midst, painfully shuffling on his bad foot, an unseasonably heavy cloak lying over his shoulders. He had a fearsome visage, a mixture of rage and disgust, and his rasping shout curdled his son’s blood, “You have hurt the boy!”
John pouted drunkenly, “He hurt himself. It was an accident. Shakespeare will tell you.”
“I saw it not, sir,” Will said truthfully, trying to avoid the old man’s stare.
“Well, young sirs, what I can see are drunken idiots good for nothing but their inclination to idleness and sinful pursuit. You, Shakespeare, are your father’s concern, but this wretch is mine!”
“He is to marry, Father,” John snorted impudently. “He will be Anne Hathaway’s concern soon!”
“Marriage and procreation are nobler than any of your aspirations! Drinking and whoring are your sole desires.”
“Well, Father,” John sneered, “at least we share one common bond. Would you like more wine?”
The old man exploded, his face sanguineous. “I am not only your father, I am a lawyer, you fool! One of the best in England. Do not rest your haunches on primogeniture. There is precedent for ultimogeniture, and I have the influence at the Court of Assize to declare you an invalid heir and elevate your brother! You carry on without reform, and we shall see what happens!”
Shaking with anger, Edgar withdrew, leaving the two young men speechless. Finally, John broke the silence, and dryly croaked with a forced cheerfulness to his voice, “What say I have a servant fetch us a bottle of mead from the cellar?”
It was late at night, and the household had gone to bed. The two friends had whiled away the hours in the library getting drunk, napping, becoming sober, then drunk again. They had slept through the family supper, and the servants had brought them a tray later on.
The waxing and waning inebriation had turned John dark and surly. While Will flitted from one book to another, John stared into space and brooded.
By the glow of candlelight, he suddenly asked a question he had been ruminating on all day, “Why should I aspire to more than wine and women? What’s the point of reading and studying and working myself silly? All this is mine anyway. I’ll be a baron soon, with land and money enough.”
“And what if your father makes good on his other plan of succession? Would your bleeding brother keep your jug and purse full, I wonder?”
“Father was spouting words, nothing more.”
“I would not be so sure.”
John sighed. “You, young Willie, have not the burden of nobility.”
Will mocked him. “A burden, you say!”
“I have no inclination to better myself as I have always trusted time to do the job. To your credit, you have had to set lofty goals.”
“My goals are not so lofty.”
“No?” John laughed. “To be among the great actors? To be a writer of plays? To have London worshipping at your feet?”
Will waved his hand as an actor might. “Mere trifles.”
John uncorked yet another bottle of mead. “You know, I have an aspiration long held and never shared, and it plays with a certain advantage I hold over my dear little prig of a brother.”
“Other than your size?”
“The book,” John hissed. “I know the secret of the book. He does not and will not until he is older.”
“Even I know it!”
“Only because you are my friend, and you have sworn an oath.”
“Yes, yes, my oath,” Will said wearily.
