There was a place called the Devil’s Tavern not far from the Inns of Court which was convenient as well as a couple of cuts above the dives in Southwark. I’d already arranged with one of my fellows, Jack Wilson, to stop off at the Devil on the way to our respective lodgings. With my side still aching from the clumsy fall onstage, I thought that a draught or three would numb the pain before I sought the shelter of my bed.
I spotted Jack in conversation with a man and a woman near the entrance into Middle Temple Lane. Not players but members of the audience. They were fitfully lit by the flare outside the porter’s lodge. Noticing me, Jack beckoned. I was going in that direction anyway.
‘Nick,’ he said, ‘you will help me out here, I am sure. I have a question, or rather this gentleman has a question. He wants to know whether William Shakespeare has ever been to sea. I thought you might know, since you are closer to William than I.’
This was such an odd thing to ask that I wasn’t sure what to answer, not that I knew the answer in any case. Instead, I glanced at the couple in the flickering torchlight by the lodge. The man was thickset, with firm features and a square-cut beard. He was wearing a long gown and holding an ornate but serviceable stick with one hand while the other grasped a bag. It was hard to see much of the woman, on account of her broad-brimmed hat, but I had an impression of a slight figure swathed in expensive clothes.
‘I know no more than you, sir,’ I said. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Your Shakespeare writes of the sea and seamen and shipwrecks with real feeling,’ said the man. ‘The struggle of the brother and sister to reach the shore, their poignant separation, the quiet courage of the captain and Antonio here.’
He gestured at Jack Wilson, who had taken the part of Antonio in Twelfth Night. I wanted to say that WS had created these figures and their emotions from his imagination, or perhaps that he had copied them out of old books, but somehow it would have seemed like giving away a trade secret, so I just replied, ‘Perhaps you’d better ask the author.’
I knew that they would be most unlikely to find Shakespeare, let alone ask him anything. The playwright was elusive, almost anonymous, unless he wanted you to know that he was there. But the large gentleman responded to my cursory answer with a warmth that made me feel slightly guilty.
‘Perhaps I will ask him! Thank you. I know Richard Burbage.’
He knew Burbage. That was different. The Burbage brothers, Dick and Cuthbert, were the most senior figures among the Globe shareholders. Dick was also a player.
‘We much enjoyed the play,’ added the man. ‘I believe that the French legate did, too. We were sitting near his party. A handsome fellow.’
‘ Il est un favori du roi.’ This comment came from Jack who, after sensing rather than seeing our baffled expressions, said, ‘Well, it’s no secret, is it? Queen Anne favours the Spanish ambassador while the King is… partial to the French legate.’
Jokes and ribald comments about King James’s tastes were everywhere in London, but those who voiced them tended to know and trust their audience. I was a bit surprised that Jack was speaking like this in front of a couple of strangers. Perhaps the man was, too, for he changed the subject by addressing me.
‘Have you recovered from your fall this evening, sir?’
‘Oh, that. It was just a piece of stage business.’
‘Surely not,’ said the man. ‘I could tell from the way you tumbled down and, more important, from the way you got up afterwards that you were hurt. Some damage to your ribs, perhaps?’
Since this was not too far from what I was already thinking and feeling, I gave the feeble reply: ‘It was nothing.’
‘I am glad to hear it,’ he said. ‘In recompense for the enjoyment of the play, however, can I offer you both some hospitality? I am staying fairly close by.’
I glanced at Jack. We sometimes got such invitations from people who want to consort with players, for various reasons. Was this gentleman someone important? Or could he be thanked for his kindness and then ignored? A few companionable drinks in the Devil and then my solitary bed seemed preferable, to be honest. But if he knew the Burbages, who were our employers…
‘I am a doctor,’ the man said conclusively.
‘Of law?’ said Jack Wilson.
‘No, a doctor of physic,’ he said, raising his bag as if it contained the tools of his trade. ‘Dr Jonathan Case. This lady is my young cousin, Thomasina.’
The lady dipped her head, or rather her hat, in acknowledgement but said not a word. Sensing reluctance to his offer on our part, Dr Case said to me in an oddly pressing way, ‘If you accompany me, I can give you something to soothe the pain in your side, Mr…?’
So both Jack and I were compelled to introduce ourselves. It would have been churlish to refuse the invitation now, particularly after Thomasina laid a gloved hand on my arm as if to reinforce the other’s words.
Jack and I followed the couple from the lodge. I observed that they stopped on the threshold and that Jonathan Case looked in each direction as if he was about to cross a busy street. But the lane was empty as far as I could see. To the right was a glow of light from the top of the stairs leading to the river. The trees in Temple Gardens, newly in leaf, rustled unseen in the breeze.
As they walked up Middle Temple Lane and into Fleet Street, Dr Case put his stick and bag in one hand and offered the other arm to his female companion. But she seemed unwilling to move closer to him. When we reached the broader thoroughfare, the physician once more looked carefully around. This time there were a few passers-by, but none of them paid us any attention. Case rapped his stick sharply on the ground before waving it in the air. A covered coach drawn by a pair of horses materialized from the shadows of Temple Bar and lumbered in our direction.
The driver reined in his team and leaned down from his perch to listen to the physician’s instructions, which I did not catch except for the name at the end. When Dr Case addressed the driver as Andrew, I realized that Jack Wilson and I were in the presence of an important gentleman, or at any rate one who was wealthy enough to own or to hire his own equipage. We clambered aboard, and the carriage pulled away up the gentle incline towards Ludgate.
‘How did you enjoy the play, madam?’ said Jack. Like all players, he wanted to talk about the most recent performance. It is what we would have discussed had we gone to the Devil’s Tavern.
‘She felt sorry for Malvolio,’ said Dr Case, answering for his companion. ‘The steward was most notoriously abused, but then he deserved to be.’
The cousins, young and middle-aged, were sitting opposite Jack and me. The seats were low, and the space between us was all knees. I had hoped to get a better look at them, but scarcely a glimmer penetrated the carriage from outside, since there was little enough illumination in the street and the window curtains were almost drawn. When we halted at Ludgate, instead of looking out as would have been natural, the physician pressed himself back into his seat, clutching his bag and his stick to himself. We heard the coachman exchange some words with one of the watchmen at the gates, which were not yet shut up for the night, and then we trundled on.
I wondered how far we were going. Where was Case’s house? Already I regretted accepting this invitation. Could Jack and I contrive an excuse to stop the carriage and get off?
‘Were you a guest of someone at Middle Temple, Dr Case?’ I said. ‘It was not Mr Burbage?’
‘No,’ he said curtly out of the gloom. Then, as if he owed us more of an explanation: ‘I am acquainted with a gentleman in the French legation. He suggested that Thomasina and I might be diverted by the play.’