STAGS 2, page 22
‘This is crazy town. We can’t do this play.’ With a pang I mentally kissed goodbye to a good mark in my drama Probitio, and potentially to Oxford, but I wasn’t selfish enough to exploit a grieving girl who clearly had major issues.
Cass knelt by the bed, took my hand away from my face and gripped it, as if she was about to propose.
‘But I want to. I do.’
‘Even though you know it’s hopeless?’
‘Yes. If we do it, then I’ll know.’
‘And then you’ll drop this … this crazy resurrection thing?’
‘Yes.’
I took a breath. ‘Last year, after Henry … passed –’ I used the horrible jargon – ‘the Old Abbot put me on to this woman called Sheila. She was pretty crap, but she was someone to talk to. She might know about … grief counselling or whatever.’
Cass got up slowly, walked to the window and started fiddling with the clasp. ‘I don’t know, Greer.’
‘But you will get help?’
‘If it works, I won’t need it.’
‘And if it doesn’t?’
‘The same. He’ll still be gone, and I’ll just have to deal with it.’
I looked at her for a long time. Then I got up too and said, ‘OK. Well, it’s your funeral.’
Of all the incredibly dumb things to say at that moment, I’d somehow found the dumbest.
Scene iii
I made it down to the theatre at a quarter to midday.
Nel was already there, lighting candles on the stage, and Shafeen was helping her. We’d already arranged that since this was one of his study periods, he could watch the play for the first time in its entirety. And I was glad we had, because I had some pretty deep stuff to tell them. ‘Any one else here?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Good. You might want to sit down for this.’
We all sat on the stage while I told them about my meeting with Cass and the police report. In that circle of candles, we were more like conspirators than ever. The fact that we spoke in hurried whispers, because we were expecting the rest of the cast any minute, only added to the impression.
‘Henry can’t still be alive,’ said Shafeen. ‘We saw him die. We all did.’
‘I know. But I couldn’t exactly tell her that.’
‘And to be fair, we didn’t see him die, we saw him fall,’ said Nel.‘My question would be: if he’s still alive, where is he?’
I had my own theory about this. I told them about the ‘Havisham’ room at Longcross, the room that looked as if Henry had just left it. ‘It had his clothes, his scent, his ring, everything. At first, I thought it had just been kept as a shrine to him, you know, like grieving families do? But it definitely looked very lived in. Then again, if he was still there, the twins would know. And they clearly don’t. They have such different attitudes to Henry, and neither one would have behaved in the way they have if they knew he was alive.’
‘How d’you mean?’ asked Shafeen.
‘Remember the attitude of the twins to the tragedy, and how very different they were? Even from that first conversation in the Queen’s Dining Room, Louis wanted to know if we’d seen Henry’s body. He was bummed out that we hadn’t; Cass was glad. In the crypt, Louis wanted to look in the family tomb, Cass didn’t. And conversely, when we didn’t find Henry’s body, Cass was delighted, and Louis devastated. When we were rehearsing the play, Louis didn’t want to say the incantation, Cass did. It all comes from their very different relationship with their cousin. In the picture in “Henry’s” room, Cass is embracing him, Louis is scowling. I think Louis hated Henry, but Cass loved him and just can’t accept that he is gone.’
‘And – even creepier – wants him back,’ said Nel.
‘But for Louis, the stakes are much higher,’ said Shafeen slowly. ‘The stakes are Longcross.’
‘If Henry is dead, he becomes the heir the minute he turns eighteen.’
‘If Henry is alive, he gets nada.’
‘He’s dead,’ said a voice from the wings. Ty walked out from the shadows into the light.
She sat down on the stage with us, joining, uninvited, the charmed circle. ‘When Louis and I went back to his room after breakfast there was a letter waiting for him. He read the letter over by the window. He looked so … happy.’
I could see it all in my mind’s eye, playing like a movie, because I’d seen it before. A figure in a black Tudor coat, with close-cropped blond hair, reading a letter by a window, and looking up from it with a beaming smile. I’d seen that scene play out only that morning, but with Cass instead of Louis.
‘What was in the letter?’
‘His cousin’s death certificate. From the police.’
‘Henry de Warlencourt’s death certificate?’
‘Yes. The covering letter said that further to the twins’ enquiries at the weekend, they were enclosing the death certificate, and they hoped this would be the end of the matter.’
I gaped at Nel and Shafeen. This was nuts. The twin who’d wanted Henry dead was sent a death certificate, and the one who wanted him alive was sent a police report saying that no body had ever been found. Ty was watching us, measuring our response, but I didn’t really know what to say.
I wasn’t sure how much she had heard of our earlier discussion, but I did know she was totally in Louis’s camp. I didn’t feel it was up to me to tell Ty what Cass had been sent. At the same time, to be fair to her, Ty had decided to share a discovery with us.
‘What do you think of that?’ she asked, clearly a bit freaked by the lack of response.
In the end I found something totally truthful to say. ‘I think that after centuries of them messing with everyone else, someone’s messing with the de Warlencourts.’
And whoever was messing with their heads was messing with mine. I couldn’t tell the other three about the doubt – or was it the hope? – that had started to seep into my soul since Cass had told me what was in the police report. A question mark, that tiny, innocent piece of punctuation, suddenly assumed an enormous significance. That single character – a little squiggle and a dot, which meant that something wasn’t quite settled, that a case wasn’t closed, that an answer wasn’t definite – loomed large in my mind and prompted me to think the unthinkable:
I might not be a murderer.
The chapel bell struck twelve, snapping me out of my daydream. ‘They’ll be here in a minute. Whatever the truth of all this, we have a play to perform.’
Nel said, ‘Did you show Act Five to Nathani— Abbot Ridley?’
‘Yes.’
‘Was he surprised? Or did he look like it’s all part of the Grand Plan of the Grand Stag?’
‘His gob couldn’t have been more smacked. I’m with you here – I don’t think Ridley is the Grand Stag. He was just mega excited at the idea of putting on the play. He’s got his old tutor coming from Oxford and everything. So –’ I got to my feet and brushed down my Tudor coat – ‘the show must go on.’
Ty got up too. ‘What about the lines?’
‘Which lines?’
‘The incantation. We’ve never yet read the words out loud. Do I say them today or not?’
I groaned. ‘Oh Jesus.’
‘No, but really.’
I thought for a minute. And in that minute, the theatre doors opened and Cass herself came in with Louis. They walked in tandem, shoulder to shoulder, no one ahead and no one behind. For the first time they looked like total equals, neither one having the upper hand. They looked more alike than they had ever looked, and for a very particular reason. They were both happy – shiningly, joyfully happy. I wasn’t about to upset that particular cart of apples. I turned to Ty and whispered hurriedly, ‘Don’t say the words properly. Change the order or something. I don’t want Cass freaking out at every rehearsal, expecting to see Henry popping up out of the shadows. It would be impossibly cruel.’
She nodded and everyone found their places for Act One, Scene One.
The art types gathered in the wings to do the scenery and the music types tuned up in the minstrels’ gallery. Abbot Ridley, after greeting Nel so fondly that she blushed, vaulted easily onto the stage. He said the teachers’ catchphrase – ‘Settle down everyone’ – then went on: ‘There’s some exciting news about the performance, but I’ll let Greer share that. My only role in this – apart from the earl’ – people laughed politely, as you do when teachers make jokes – ‘is to remind you that this play constitutes two-thirds of your drama Probitio, with the other third being the written exam. So let’s see some concentrated effort. And now I’ll hand you over to your director. Greer?’
‘Right,’ I said. ‘The good news is, we have Act Five.’ I waited for the little ripple of surprise to die down. ‘The bad news is, we have just over two weeks left to rehearse. So,’ I said, ‘no pun intended, we’re going to have to work like dogs.’
Scene iv
The day itself had arrived.
We’d had all the usual end-of-term stuff like the carol service and the Christmas lunch (goose and all the trimmings – turkey was considered too newfangled and, even worse, American). And now it was time for the end-of-term play. Our play. Ben Jonson’s play. The Isle of Dogs.
We had indeed worked like dogs since our return from Longcross. The craziness of that weekend had been mostly forgotten in the hectic schedule of the play. As far as I knew, neither Cass nor Louis had heard any more about Henry’s case from the police. I never asked – there was too much to do.
We rehearsed over and over until we were sick of the play and knew every line, but there was one section that no one had ever heard out loud. The incantation, a mere couplet of lines, read by all of us but spoken by none, remained the only unsaid part of the play, a little isle of silence amid all the words. For every rehearsal Ty had swapped the real words with the same thing. There had been some chat about what should replace the incantation, and it was Nel who had the idea. ‘Lorem ipsum, of course. The standard replacement text.’
So Ty, instead of the words of power, said, each time: Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.
Then came the day when we first did the play in costume, and the whole production, miraculously, woke up. Having the right clothes and the right props breathed life into something that had become stale and mechanical. It made such a difference for us all to be in our authentic period costumes, shipped in specially from the oldest costumier in London (of course – this was STAGS). My costume was one of the least showy – a plain black doublet and hose and my black poet’s cape – but some of the others looked fantastic. Ty looked beautiful, particularly in the green hunting dress, which seemed spookily to bear a very close resemblance to the one in the Longcross Portrait. Abbot Ridley did, I have to admit, look very dashing in his gold doublet and ruff, but it was his costume as the Grand Stag that really made an impression. The first time he came onstage in antlers and a red hooded cowl, I actually felt genuinely scared. The antlers gave him such height, and the cowl so perfectly shaded his face that there could have been any monster lurking beneath that hood. It was not until he spoke that I could actually relax.
We did our own hair and make-up, as there was nothing so modern as a beauty school at STAGS. I was just me, and my black bob was deemed fine for a sixteenth-century male poet (I tried not to be offended by that). The twins’ blond hair looked great with their black courtier clothes, and Louis aged himself with some talcum powder in his hair and a few lines round his eyes. We tried a beard on him too, but it fell off with such predictable regularity that I was convinced it wouldn’t survive the performance, so we ditched it. In the end, with his white-blond hair and the fine lines around his eyes and mouth, he looked like my fantasy version of Henry’s father, Rollo, a man I’d never met and now never would. Ty took the prize as the Elizabethan period’s Next Top Model though. She teased out her afro and set it with white pearls in a fantastic up-do that really set her apart.
Props were another thing to get used to – we had some unintentionally hilarious mishaps with people’s swords whacking other actors if they turned around too fast, or cups being empty when they were supposed to be full, or full when they were supposed to be empty, or the ribbons of blood not falling properly from the Earl of Greenwich’s cuffs as he died. But eventually the play came together, we got used to our costumes and props, and we were as ready as we were ever going to be.
The night before the play I don’t think I slept at all. The dress rehearsal had been disastrous – everything that could go wrong did and no amount of people (and there were a lot) telling me this was a ‘good sign’ could comfort me. On the day itself I got up, grey-faced, went to breakfast, had one slice of dry toast and just made it to the bathroom in time before I threw it up. People wishing me luck made me feel sick. Just looking at the theatre in the distance made me feel sick. Catching sight of one of the many playbills that had been posted up around the school, featuring a stylised black dog’s head with red eyes, also made me feel sick. In the end I retreated to my room. That whole day there were no lessons; the students were just packing anyway, as most people were going home for Christmas the following day. Some, who had parents coming to the play, were leaving that night. I wasn’t leaving until Sunday, but as I looked from my window down the drive I wished I was going home right that minute. My dad was away in Madagascar filming until just before Christmas, so I was going to stay with Nel. Nel, at breakfast, had been as grey as me. Only Shafeen, who had nothing to do with the play except as an audience member, was chipper. ‘This time tomorrow it will all be over,’ he said. But for once I found that reliable old cliché of absolutely no use. And it was also, as it turned out, wholly inaccurate.
The day crawled by, and it seemed impossible that seven o’clock would ever come. But of course it did, and I found myself, along with my very jittery fellow cast members, huddling in the wings of the De Warlencourt Playhouse. Abbot Ridley, looking proper in his Earl of Greenwich gear, walked out to centre stage. The theatre looked completely different, and completely terrifying. All the candles were lit, and the familiar smell of warm beeswax filled my nose. But the really different thing was the audience. I’d never seen the theatre full before, and the concept of an audience was utterly horrifying. And not just any audience, but the very well-heeled, tweed-and-pearls audience made up of mega-rich STAGS parents. The thought of them judging me made my heart sink into my black deer-leather boots. I almost didn’t hear the first bit of Abbot Ridley’s speech.
‘It’s not often that we get to be part of history,’ he began, ‘but those of us on this stage this evening have that chance. For tonight, for the first time in four hundred years, we’ll be performing The Isle of Dogs, a play by playwright, court poet and contemporary of Shakespeare, Ben Jonson. The play was performed only once, in 1597, after which it was immediately supressed, and every copy destroyed. Every copy,’ he said, ‘except one.’ You could feel that he had the audience in the palm of his hand. No one breathed. ‘The sole remaining copy was found at Longcross Hall by one of our students, Cassandra de Warlencourt, who is a descendant of one of the play’s original cast members, Gabriel Spenser, to whom this theatre is dedicated.’ I looked sideways at Cass – I hadn’t warned her that she’d be getting credit for this. She looked pink and pleased. ‘The play is directed by another one of our drama students, Greer MacDonald, who first brought the play to the school’s attention. I’m also delighted to say that we are joined tonight by Professor Jennifer Nashe, of the University of Oxford.’ He indicated a kindly-looking woman with merry eyes and grey hair in a bun, sitting in the front row. ‘Along with her impeccable credentials as the world’s foremost Jonsonian scholar, she also possesses the much more dubious distinction of having been my tutor at Christ Church. I can’t tell you how many times she had to deal with my pathetic excuses for late essays.’
The lady with the friendly face smiled, nodded and rolled her eyes in a way that made everyone laugh.
‘I won’t try your patience any longer, but instead will let the play speak for itself. Considered seditious, treasonous and even demonic, you must judge Jonson’s work for yourselves. I’ll just say the words that no one thought they would ever say again – it’s my honour to present The Isle of Dogs, by Ben Jonson.’
Under the cover of applause, I grabbed Ty’s sleeve. The Abbot’s speech had really got to me. For the first time I was really getting how significant this was – I was the first person to direct this play since Ben Jonson, and I had to do it right. And that meant word for word.
Every word.
Ty turned to me, her eyes wide with excitement. ‘What?’
‘The lines. The incantation. Remember to say it properly. Tonight’s the night.’
‘Are you sure? No Lorem ipsum?’
‘No.’
‘You’re certain?’
‘Yes.’ And then I said another of those really dumb things. ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’
Scene v
And then it was time for my entrance.
The candelabras were winched to the ceiling by the backstage dudes, with only one left hanging to light my Prologue. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been so scared as I was then, walking out onto the stage in my black poet’s cloak, in the character of Poetaster, ready to speak the Prologue to The Isle of Dogs. I know this will sound weird when you remember that I was fished out of Longmere lake the year before, and then chased through a priest’s hole by a hellhound two weekends ago, and then through Longwood by a pack of dogs. But this – looking out at all those white blobs of faces, and hearing the supressed coughing and shuffling and rustling of programmes all fall still, and the expectant, endless silence – was far, far worse.
I opened my mouth and nothing came out. I tried again and made just a very little trembly sound. Then, in all those white faces I saw one, just one, brown one. Shafeen. He put up two thumbs and smiled. And on my third try, I could speak.
