THE MAN. _[sitting up as majestically as his ignominious posture allows]_ Woman: you have struck WILLIAM SHAKESPEAR.
QUEEN ELIZABETH. _[stupent]_ Marry, come up!!! Struck William Shakespear quotha! And who in the name of all the sluts and jades and light-o'-loves and fly-by-nights that infest this palace of mine, may William Shakespear be?
THE DARK LADY. Madam: he is but a player. Oh, I could have my hand cut off--QUEEN ELIZABETH. Belike you will, mistress. Have you bethought you that I am like to have your head cut off as well?
THE DARK LADY. Will: save me. Oh, save me.
ELIZABETH. Save you! A likely savior, on my royal word! I had thought this fellow at least an esquire; for I had hoped that even the vilest of my ladies would not have dishonored my Court by wantoning with a baseborn servant.
SHAKESPEAR. _[indignantly scrambling to his feet]_ Base-born! I, a Shakespear of Stratford! I, whose mother was an Arden! baseborn! You forget yourself, madam.
ELIZABETH. _[furious]_ S'blood! do I so? I will teach you--THE DARK LADY. _[rising from her knees and throwing herself between them]_ Will: in God's name anger her no further. It is death.
Madam: do not listen to him.
SHAKESPEAR. Not were it een to save your life, Mary, not to mention mine own, will I flatter a monarch who forgets what is due to my family. I deny not that my father was brought down to be a poor bankrupt; but twas his gentle blood that was ever too generous for trade. Never did he disown his debts. Tis true he paid them not; but it is an attested truth that he gave bills for them; and twas those bills, in the hands of base hucksters, that were his undoing.
ELIZABETH. _[grimly]_ The son of your father shall learn his place in the presence of the daughter of Harry the Eighth.
SHAKESPEAR. _[swelling with intolerant importance]_ Name not that inordinate man in the same breath with Stratford's worthiest alderman.
John Shakespear wedded but once: Harry Tudor was married six times.
You should blush to utter his name.
THE DARK LADY. | Will: for pity's sake-- | _crying out | | together_ELIZABETH. | Insolent dog-- |SHAKESPEAR. _[cutting them short]_ How know you that King Harry was indeed your father?
ELIZABETH. | Zounds! Now by--| _[she stops to grind her teeth with rage]._|THE DARK LADY. | She will have me whipped through | the streets. Oh God! Oh God!
SHAKESPEAR. Learn to know yourself better, madam. I am an honest gentleman of unquestioned parentage, and have already sent in my demand for the coat-of-arms that is lawfully mine. Can you say as much for yourself?
ELIZABETH. _[almost beside herself]_ Another word; and I begin with mine own hands the work the hangman shall finish.
SHAKESPEAR. You are no true Tudor: this baggage here has as good a right to your royal seat as you. What maintains you on the throne of England? Is it your renowned wit? your wisdom that sets at naught the craftiest statesmen of the Christian world? No. Tis the mere chance that might have happened to any milkmaid, the caprice of Nature that made you the most wondrous piece of beauty the age hath seen.
_[Elizabeth's raised fists, on the point of striking him, fall to her side]._ That is what hath brought all men to your feet, and founded your throne on the impregnable rock of your proud heart, a stony island in a sea of desire. There, madam, is some wholesome blunt honest speaking for you. Now do your worst.
ELIZABETH. _[with dignity]_ Master Shakespear: it is well for you that I am a merciful prince. I make allowance for your rustic ignorance. But remember that there are things which be true, and are yet not seemly to be said (I will not say to a queen; for you will have it that I am none) but to a virgin.
SHAKESPEAR. _[bluntly]_ It is no fault of mine that you are a virgin, madam, albeit tis my misfortune.
THE DARK LADY. _[terrified again]_ In mercy, madam, hold no further discourse with him. He hath ever some lewd jest on his tongue. You hear how he useth me! calling me baggage and the like to your Majesty's face.
ELIZABETH. As for you, mistress, I have yet to demand what your business is at this hour in this place, and how you come to be so concerned with a player that you strike blindly at your sovereign in your jealousy of him.
THE DARK LADY. Madam: as I live and hope for salvation--SHAKESPEAR. _[sardonically]_ Ha!
THE DARK LADY. _[angrily]_ --ay, I'm as like to be saved as thou that believest naught save some black magic of words and verses--Isay, madam, as I am a living woman I came here to break with him for ever. Oh, madam, if you would know what misery is, listen to this man that is more than man and less at the same time. He will tie you down to anatomize your very soul: he will wring tears of blood from your humiliation; and then he will heal the wound with flatteries that no woman can resist.
SHAKESPEAR. Flatteries! _[Kneeling]_ Oh, madam, I put my case at your royal feet. I confess to much. I have a rude tongue: I am unmannerly: I blaspheme against the holiness of anointed royalty; but oh, my royal mistress, AM I a flatterer?
ELIZABETH. I absolve you as to that. You are far too plain a dealer to please me. _[He rises gratefully]._THE DARK LADY. Madam: he is flattering you even as he speaks.
ELIZABETH. _[a terrible flash in her eye]_ Ha! Is it so?
SHAKESPEAR. Madam: she is jealous; and, heaven help me! not without reason. Oh, you say you are a merciful prince; but that was cruel of you, that hiding of your royal dignity when you found me here. For how can I ever be content with this black-haired, black-eyed, black-avised devil again now that I have looked upon real beauty and real majesty?