Shakespeare's Scribe by Gary Blackwood Page A

competition.”
    After the night’s exertions, we were all—with the exception of Ned and Sal Pavy—cross and tired the next day. Mr. Phillips and Jack had suffered superficial burns. To my surprise, they came to me—grudgingly, in Jack’s case—for medical advice. The best I could do for them was to smear on a salve of tallow mixed with comfrey, but it seemed to give them some relief.
    Despite everything, we managed a passable performance that afternoon and took in a respectable box—most of which we promptly laid out again to have the damaged costumes repaired. The town councillors profited as much as we did, or more, for they had men passing through the crowd hawking bottles of ale.
    As we stood behind the curtain waiting to go on, Sal Pavy, in his guise as the Princess, surveyed my dress, which was less elegant than the one I usually wore when playing Rosaline. “Why are you wearing
that
?” he asked distastefully.
    â€œBecause me better one has half the skirt burned away.” This dress, too, had an unpleasant smoky odor to it, as did Sam’s. Sal Pavy’s costume had escaped the conflagration; dandy that he was, he had taken it from the trunk beforehand and hung it in the stable to air out.
    â€œWell, you look more like a milkmaid than a maid in waiting,” he said. I let his remark pass, but I suspected Sam would not, and I was right.
    â€œDid you know you’ve a hole there?” Sam said innocently.
    â€œWhere?” Sal Pavy demanded, twisting his head around and feeling the fabric at his rear with both hands.
    â€œRight in the middle of your bum!” Sam said, and went into a fit of laughter that, though he muffled it with one hand, I was sure could be heard out front. Sal Pavy flushed angrily and, hiking up his skirts, stalked off—a short stalk, as the area behind the curtain was but one pace in depth and perhaps ten from side to side. “Oh, my,” said Sam. “I’ve offended Her Majesty.”
    Halfway through the play, I caught a glimpse of one of Pembroke’s Men, the paunchy fellow with the eye patch, standing just inside the door of the hall, watching the proceedings soberly—not like one who has come to enjoy himself but like one who is sizing up the competition. Somehow I suspected he had not bothered to pay his penny.

13
    W e could not depart the following day until the town’s tailors had our costumes ready, and so we got only as far as Southwell before night fell. Though it was a far smaller town than Newark, the sharers decided to try a performance there, in the only enclosed space that was large enough—the wool market. Despite the stench, we drew an enthusiastic crowd that must have comprised two-thirds of the local population.
    Buoyed by our success, we went on to perform in Mansfield, Sheffield, and Doncaster, where we were equally well received. By the time we reached York, we were ahead enough so that Mr. Heminges could pay the hired men six shillings apiece, and the prentices three—our regular weekly wage. But we had been on the road for nearly a month now, and these were the first wages we had seen. Still, it was certainly better than nothing.
    I had hoped the company might send a share of our earnings home to Mr. Pope and Sander, but Mr. Heminges did not feel we could spare any yet. Mr. Burbage, he assured me, would see that they and the boys were provided for. All the same, upon our arrival at the Black Swan in York, I wrote a letter to Sander at once and enclosed a shilling to buy treats for the boys and Tetty.
    Because we had changed our route, no letter from London had reached us yet. The sharers had by now a firmer notion of where our travels were likely to take us. Once we left York, we were to turn southwest and make a long loop that would take us through Leeds, Manchester, Chester, Shrewsbury, Coventry, and Mr. Shakespeare’s home town of Stratford before we returned to London. I