Page 55 of The Two Wills

“Beyond a moment of titillation at seeing two Roses entwined,” the Poet said coldly, aiming to wound further. “I’d say it looked most pathetic. On par with watching a pup try to mate with an overly ripe melon.”

“I’d watch again,” Burbage added. “From my experience, an overly ripe melon can be quite enjoyable.”

Despite all my previous hatred for her, my heart suddenly bled for poor Rose. How those brutes spoke about her was unforgivable. And that the Poet would suggest I had failed at my first attempt at loving a woman? I clenched my fists as my face grew hot. “Stop laughing!” I spat. “And it wasn’t her fault. It’s true. I was the seducer! I lost all sense. I couldn’t help myself. I ravaged her because … because, she’s … the most beautiful woman in London.” From the corner of my eyes, I saw the perplexed look on Rose’s face, which she quickly masked so as not to expose me to the Poet and Burbage. I went on, “I dressed as her to honor her, and … and … and I have grown deeply in love with her.”

“You?” the Poet said. “In love with Rose? You can’t be in earnest—”

I shrugged. “I surprise even myself.” My steady gaze glared straight into the Poet’s eyes as proof of my veracity. His disbelief was weakening. My skills as an actor were truly that astonishing.

Again, the Poet scoffed, but this time it was hollowed out by doubt. “This plot is beyond belief.”

Rose and I gazed at each other in understanding. She caught my game. We both grew serious, allowing our eyes to grow soft, as if we were really lovers caught in an embrace.

“He speaks the truth,” Rose told the Poet, her voice breaking as she took my hands and pulled them to her bosom. “I love this youth as I have never loved anyone in my life. The moment I saw him at the cliffs watching you and I make love; I wondered about him. Then when you told me of his talent and implied he possessed a pure wounded heart, I tried to stop what I was feeling, but it was too late.”

She too was most believable, and if women were allowed to appear on the stage, she might have had a career.

“We can’t help ourselves,” I said as I pulled Rose to her feet. To the Poet, I said, “Didn’t you write me all those sonnets, begging me to love women? Didn’t those sonnets say I was foolish to foreswear marriage, and that one day my stubbornness on the subject would pass? Well, it has.” I snapped my finger for good measure. “Now I find myself ravenous for women. In fact, when I saw Rose at the market in her green dress, with her bosoms all …” I gestured to her chest. “Pouring out the top and all, well I … I … er …”

She took up where I had lost the thread. “Yes,” she said. “I was buying some gillyflowers, and he was searching for pears. We tussled as before, but then there was this feeling betwixt us, like … like …”

“Like hot chestnuts crackling in our pockets,” I added.

“Chestnuts!” she cried. “Well said, Hughes!”

The Poet looked to Burbage who shrugged, quipping, “To be sure, ’tis a miracle fit for the book of Saints.”

“True, miracles like this don’t happen much,” I said, looking the Poet in straight in the eye. “But in your very plays and poems, isn’t there proof of miracles like ours?” I lowered my head and touched my heart; a gesture Augustine had taught me should I need to portray the “brave-yet-humble confession of a noble and possibly virginal young lady.” It had to be one of my most daring performances—though I began to wonder if I had gone too far, especially when Rose gave me the eye indicating as such.

“I am at a loss of words,” the Poet finally said, looking so truly heartbroken that it pained me. “How like a tragic play this all is. But all the world’s a stage, is it not?” He momentarily lost himself in thought, made a quick note in his tiny book, then mournfully walked to the door and opened it. Without looking back at us he said, “We still have a performance to do this afternoon, so we better get ready.”

“True, the show must proceed,” Burbage offered as he left the room shaking his head, muttering. “In the Book of Saints …”

“I’ll go too,” I said, my heart desperate to repair what I had only just damaged. “But maybe we should talk first, the three of us—”

“Enough!” the Poet snapped, his eyes aflame with damp fire. “Your betrayal has cut me to the quick, but our responsibility to the audience must come first. I’ll have no more of either of you. Our friendship is done.”

“Will?” I called out as the door shut behind him.

When I looked to Rose, her complexion had paled. “God’s teeth,” she mumbled. “What have we done?”

Twenty-ThreeThe Wrong Will

Mistress Rosalind Williams recounts her lamentable misstep into a most regrettable entanglement with the childish young man.

Will will fulfill the treasure of thy love,

Ay, fill it full with wills, and my will one.

—from Sonnet 136

It has been a fortnight since Willy Hughes and I began our lovers’ masquerade. Every night, we meet after his performance to go about Shoreditch, arm in arm, making a great display of our “love,” attempting to fill the Poet with a maddening jealousy. Alas, our awkward nuzzling, false cooing, and nearly nauseating stolen kisses mostly inspire expressions of befuddlement and laughter among the onlookers—many of whom seem to be unusually familiar with Hughes and what appears to be his lurid past.

“It’s Bathsheba and the Privy Prince!” one drunken sod calls out to laughter.

“Watch your purse, Madam!” another shouts. “The water-fly has sticky fingers!”

Still, we carry-on. Of course, there is no cuddling nor hand holding once we lose our audience. When in private, the boy and I barely speak, and when we do, we resemble two cats having come upon a single fish tail. The worst part is, for all of our effort, the Poet expresses no effort to win either of us back. He appears to have surrendered to Hughes and me being lovers. I have rutted myself into a corner with no apparent escape. Hughes, it appears, is in a similar mental state.