Hamlet: a novel Part 8

At his head a gra.s.s-green turf,

At his heels a stone."

As Ophelia sang, the queen, however, hardened her heart. The girl just needed a good talking-to. She had to pull herself together before she made trouble for all of them. Everyone had problems; that was the way of it, and it was no good to let them weigh you down until they drowned you. That didn't help anyone. If Hamlet were to be king one day, and Ophelia by his side as queen, she would need to be made of sterner stuff. "Ophelia, what silly words are these?" the queen began, thinking at the same time: Is she really speaking of her father? Since when did Polonius become the beauteous majesty of Denmark?

But Ophelia held up a hand so imperious that Gertrude could not go on. As though taking the queen into her confidence, she whispered: "Who has sent him to the grave?

Who has dug him deep?

Why, the ones who know him best

And ought his soul to keep."

We can't have this, thought the queen. For once Osric is right in his report.

"My dear child," she began, but was interrupted again, this time by Claudius entering the room.

He had been in a better frame of mind since driving Hamlet off. If England dealt with the prince as he had asked, he might never have to see that pretty head again. He might be out of the woods. So he came in whistling, his round red face s.h.i.+ning with eagerness to tell his wife of the nine-point stag he had brought down that very morning.

"Ah, who have we here? Ophelia! Where have you been hiding yourself? Mourning for your dear father? Well, most proper, but you are equally proper to emerge from your seclusion now, especially among us, your dear friends. Fathers die, you know; that is the way of it. Grief can be unG.o.dly, remember."

Only now, after he had sat down and arranged his robes, did he see Gertrude's warning frown and warning finger. He halted, puzzled. What did they have to fear from Ophelia?

The young woman appeared not to notice the king at first.

She sang on: "White his shroud as the mountain snow,

White as his heart so pure,

Red the blood that they cruelly spilled,

For them there will be no cure."

"What is all this, Ophelia?" The king was trying to maintain his jovial mood, though he felt it ebbing fast. He did not understand what was going on here, and he did not like what he did not understand.

"Well, G.o.d reward you," Ophelia said, but without looking at him or seeming to see anyone in the room. "I'll tell you a story I heard once, a story of Saint Valentine's Day, about a faithful young woman, knowing the tradition that whoever a man sees first when the day dawns will be his true love ever after, placed herself by his window the night before and waited till dawn. What do you think happened? Why, he never looked out the window, but opened his door and let in the maid. And she was no maid by the time she left his room again. Ah, perhaps I should have let him raise his tent."

"What on earth is she talking about?" the king muttered angrily to his wife.

"I have no idea. Don't look at me as though it's my fault. That stupid Osric brought her in, said she was talking wildly and starting rumors. I thought I had better check up on what crazy stories she might be spreading."

"This is all we need. How long has she been like this?"

"How should I know? Ask Osric. Apparently he's become the expert on life at Elsinore. Ask her ladies-in-waiting."

Ophelia had wandered away to the window and now was talking to no one. Not anyone who could be seen, at any rate. "Oh, pity the fate of a maiden! If she lets him take her, she is deserted. If she doesn't, she is deserted. I hope all will be well. We must be patient, but I cannot choose but weep to think they should lay him in the cold ground. My good brother shall know of it, and so I thank you for your wise advice. Come, my coach! Good night, ladies, good night, good night. Good night, sweet ladies."

She drifted out of the room by the western door. Claudius nodded to a couple of his wife's attendants.

"Follow her closely. Keep a sharp eye on her."

With a wave and a nod of dismissal, Claudius cleared the room of the other courtiers. He and Gertrude were left alone. The king turned to his wife. His good mood had been confettied and blown to Norway. "This is the poison of deep grief. It springs from her father's death. Honestly, Gertrude, when troubles come, they come not as single soldiers but as battalions, as armies. First her father slain, then your son gone - the author of his own downfall, but of course the people don't know that. It's started trouble and rumors and unrest from one end of the kingdom to the other."

Claudius tapped his finger against his teeth. "We did the wrong thing with Polonius, burying him so quickly. We should have given him a state funeral, put his old carca.s.s on a slab for a couple of days, invited the ma.s.ses to come and see him. Only the sticky-beaks would have bothered, but the people would have gotten the message, that we have nothing to hide. Instead, we've got a mood like mud, thick and unwholesome mud. And now, as if that's not enough, you give me Ophelia! I thought you were meant to be looking after her! I come in here after a good day out on the hills, and what do I find? A girl divided from herself . . . lost her judgment . . . and without judgment, Gertrude, we are no better than the beasts. We are mere pictures. We are two-dimensional.

"And to top it all off, Laertes is sneaking back into the country from England and won't listen to any accurate accounts of how his father died. He's already crossed the border and is ignoring all my messages. Needless to say, without any facts to go on, he won't hesitate to blame everything on us, on me. Gertrude, this castle, this kingdom, is more like a crime scene than a sovereign state."

A thumping and yelling from the courtyard interrupted him. The noise rolled through the room like echoing thunder. Boots running, more boots stomping up the stairs, more shouts. An angry voice: "You try to stop them, then!" Someone else shouted: "Well, he lives here!"

"What's going on?" Gertrude gripped the arms of her chair and sat up.

"Good G.o.d, it sounds like a riot." Both king and queen sprang to their feet. "Guards! Guards!" The king strode toward the door. "Guards!"

A captain hurried into the room, hat askew, eyes staring. "Your Majesty, Laertes is here at the head of a crowd of supporters. They've stormed past the outer defenses, it seems. There's a whole crowd of them calling for Laertes to be made king."

"King? Laertes?"

"Majesty, I fear so. It's as though tradition and law are suddenly of no account. As though the world is just opening its eyes to its first day, and suddenly history has no meaning. "Laertes shall be king!" They sound like a pack of dogs howling to the clouds."

"A false pack of dogs indeed," snarled Gertrude. She put her hand to her throat as the king advanced on the captain. "They're following the wrong trail."

"Of course, Your Majesty."

Another guard rushed in. "They've broken down the doors!" he cried. Three more guards followed, then, suddenly, a whole vomit of them. In among their red and gray uniforms came other colors, the purples and greens of the courtiers, pinks and whites and violets of ladies-in-waiting, scarlets and blues of palace servants, black-suited clerks.

Claudius, always formidable in a fight, retreated to his throne and stood in front of it, hands on hips. The queen sank back onto her chair, aware that she could pull no strings here, play no role, have no influence. All she could do was watch and wait for the scene to play itself out.

Noise hubbled and bubbled into the room. As the crowd got bigger and pushed in farther, the n.o.ble colors of those who resided at court gave way to grubbier clothes, grays and browns and blacks. The first wave, members of the royal household, forgetting protocol, no longer in control of their lives, had their backs to the royal couple, watching anxiously to see what their future might look like. The second wave all looked forward, with sharp and hungry eyes.

In the middle of them, like a young conqueror, through the huge oak doors, bright and excited, strode Laertes.

"Where is the king?" he shouted, and then, self-consciously, added, "Oh, there you are." He turned to the crowd. "Give me s.p.a.ce, I beg you. I need to talk to the king."

"No, no!" they shouted at him.

"Yes, please, I entreat you, I am here to speak of my father. If you honored him, then let me have this time to speak to the only man who can answer my questions."

Scowling, reluctant, but having to acknowledge his rights, the crowd began to withdraw. The guards, sensing the change in mood, began to move against them, applying pressure around the edges. The Elsinore residents and staff, too, started to shuffle away. In a short time, only three people were left in the room.

Laertes, trembling with excitement, faced the older man. Both were red-faced, chests puffed forward, staring at each other. "Oh, vile king," he exclaimed, "give me my father."

"Be calm, Laertes," Claudius urged.

"Calm! Calm! If there is a single drop of blood in me that is calm, then that drop of blood says that I am not my father's son. That drop of blood says my mother is a s.l.u.t, who slept with someone else to get me. I will not be calm."

In a frenzy of rage he grabbed the king by the front of his robe. The queen leaped to her feet and opened her mouth to call for the guards. But Claudius, who liked the physical as much as he hated battles of words and wit, disentangled himself and gestured to her to sit again. "Have no fear, Gertrude," he said. "A king is surrounded by the protection of G.o.d himself. When faced by true royalty, treason can only blink. Now, Laertes, tell me, what troubles you? What is the cause of such ma.s.sive rage?"

"Where is my father?"

"Dead."

"But not killed by the king," Gertrude interrupted.

Again Claudius waved her away.

"How did he die?" Laertes demanded. "I won't be juggled with. If G.o.d protects you, then I say to h.e.l.l with G.o.d, to h.e.l.l with my vows of loyalty, I say that my allegiance to the throne of Denmark can go to the blackest devil. My father was loyal to me, and I return that loyalty now. I don't care if I stand in the deepest pit of the fieriest furnace - as long as I get revenge."

"Tell me this," said the king, his voice rumbling from deep in his chest, "is your desire for revenge so overwhelming that you don't care who you attack? Will both friend and foe fall to your avenging sword?"

"Of course not. His enemies only."

"Will you know his enemies, then? And his friends?"

"I'll embrace his friends warmly. They will be my honored guests."

"Ah! Now you speak like a good son and a true gentleman."

Laertes opened his mouth to respond, but another disturbance in the doorway distracted him. He looked around and was astonished to see his sister enter. She drifted in like a wisp of mist in the late afternoon. Laertes' mouth stayed open. It was obvious that Ophelia was deranged. She wafted around the room with no sign that she was aware of her brother's presence. For two or three minutes Laertes watched, unable to speak. In that time he seemed to age ten years.

Ophelia began singing: "They took him to the graveyard near

And laid him in his bed.

Upon his corpse as he lay there,

How many a tear was shed."

Finally Laertes made his mouth work again. "Oh, sweet Ophelia! Oh, dear, kind sister! It is possible that the mind of a young woman could be as fragile as an old man's life? Could nature have sent a part of her to accompany our father? Oh heat, dry up my brains! Oh, let my tears be thick with salt and burn out my eyes so that I do not have to look upon this sad sight."

"There's rosemary," Ophelia said suddenly. "That's for remembrance. Remember that, love. There are pansies - they're for thoughts. There's fennel and columbines for the queen. Some say they speak of unfaithfulness, but what would I know of that? There's rue for you, sir, the king, sir, to show you repent, if indeed you do. There's rue for me, for my sadness. We may call it the herb of grace on Sundays. I would give you a daisy, for love, and some violets, for faithfulness, but they withered when my father died. They say he made a good end. . . .

"And will he not come again?

And will he not come again?