‘I daresay that you would like to view the Great Hall,’ she said.
‘If we may, Lady Eleanor,’ said Nicholas courteously.
‘Then here it is.’
Taking hold of the two handles, she flung open the doors and strode into the room as if making an entrance on stage. Nicholas and Elias went after her, pleased to have exchanged a haughty steward for the benevolent lady of the house. Moving to the middle of the Great Hall, she spread her arms and pirouetted on her toes.
‘This is your playhouse, sirs,’ she declared. ‘Will it serve?’
‘Extremely well,’ replied Nicholas.
Elias nodded enthusiastically. ‘It’ll be a joy to perform in here.’
‘That’s why I urged my husband to invite you,’ she said.
As soon as they entered, Nicholas knew that the place could be easily adapted for their purposes. The major decision of where to set their stage made itself. The Great Hall was a long rectangular room with oak panelling on the walls and a high ceiling that was supported by a series of beams into which the Greenleaf coat of arms had been expertly carved. At the far end was a minstrels’ gallery where the company’s musicians could sit and which could also be used for certain scenes in the plays. Curtains could be hung from the balustrade. Doors at either end of the wall beneath the gallery made it the ideal place of entry. Enough light streamed in through tall windows to make afternoon performance feasible without any additional illumination. Candelabra would be needed if a play were requested for an evening show.
‘Well?’ said Lady Eleanor.
‘We’ve never had a finer playhouse,’ complimented Nicholas.
‘It does not match The Rose.’
‘It surpasses it,’ said Elias with gallantry. ‘When we play at The Rose, we have to endure the vulgar manners of the Bankside spectators and the foul breaths of the ruffians who fill the pit. Here we perform to a select audience in conditions that any actor would envy. When I die and go to heaven, Lady Eleanor,’ he said with a dramatic gesture, ‘this is what I expect to find.’
‘I trust that you’ll favour us with your presence before you go,’ she said.
Elias gave a chuckle and strode around the room to get a feel of it. Nicholas was measuring the place with his eye, arranging the seating, wondering how high the stage needed to be built and envisaging how scenery could best be employed. Lady Eleanor looked on with a contented smile as the two of them explored the space in which they were to present their six plays. Both men were patently well satisfied. They met beneath the gallery to have a silent conversation but it was short lived.
A loud explosion suddenly went off somewhere close by and the floor seemed to shake. Elias reacted with a yelp of surprise and Nicholas looked around in bewilderment. Lady Eleanor remained as serene and imperturbable as ever.
‘That will be my husband,’ she said sweetly. ‘His experiment is completed.’
Close confinement with Egidius Pye was not something that Edmund Hoode either sought or relished but, in the interests of Westfield’s Men, he endured it manfully. It was not merely the lawyer’s bad breath and irritating manner that made him an unlovely companion. Pye also revealed a passion for debate that slowed down the creative process until it almost came to a halt. Acceding to all of Hoode’s suggestions, the novice author nevertheless insisted on arguing over each new line that was inserted, finding at least a dozen variations of it before reaching a conclusion. Hoode’s career as a playwright had been long and testing. He had never been allowed the luxury of time to reflect and refine. Plots had to be devised within a strict time limit. Characters had to spring instantly into life, verse had to flow like a fountain. Last minute changes had to be accommodated. It was, in every sense, drama on the hoof. Pairing a comparative beginner with a practical man of the theatre only served to widen the gulf between them. Hoode did his best to stave off exasperation. After another interminable quarrel, he sat back in his chair.
‘We must strive to work more quickly, Master Pye,’ he sighed.
‘Speed is the enemy of felicity.’
‘I’d sooner be infelicitous than late with the delivery of a play. Whatever we write, it will probably be amended in rehearsal. Leave room for the actors to act. You must not expect to make all their decisions for them.’
Pye was horrified. ‘Won’t they speak the lines we set down for them?’
‘To a certain degree.’
‘But I laboured so hard over the piece.’
‘It’s still a play,’ Hoode reminded him, ‘and not Holy Writ.’
‘But it took me well over a year to write it.’
Another sigh. ‘I feel that we’ve already spent as long trying to improve it.’
‘To good effect, Master Hoode.’
‘More or less.’
‘Shall we move on to the next scene?’ asked the lawyer eagerly.
Hoode raised a palm. ‘No, Master Pye. I think not. We’ve gone as far as we decently can today. Let’s start again in the morning and see if we can’t at least break into a respectable trot.’ He got up from the table. ‘Let me show you out.’
After showering him with apologies and thanks, Pye put on the moth-eaten cloak and the floppy hat. He followed his host out of the room and down the staircase. As the two men stepped out into the street, evening shadows were just beginning to fall. Hoode was blatantly anxious to send his visitor on his way. Before the lawyer could depart, however, a familiar figure bore down on them. Lawrence Firethorn’s voice boomed inimitably along the street.
‘Do I spy a brace of happy poets?’ he said, arriving to clap both men on the shoulders. ‘Well met, sirs.’ He stood back to look closely at Egidius Pye. ‘Every inch a playwright! Welcome to the company, Master Pye! We owe you thanks.’
‘It’s I who should express gratitude,’ said the lawyer, quivering nervously as if in the presence of royalty. ‘You have no peer as an actor, Master Firethorn.’
Firethorn grinned. ‘I’m glad that we agree on that point.’
‘When you step out upon a stage, it’s like Zeus descending from Mount Olympus to grace us with your genius. Oh, sir,’ he said obsequiously, ‘this is a signal honour. I’m quite lost for words.’
‘I wish you had been so inside my lodging!’ murmured Hoode.
Firethorn introduced himself properly, exchanged a few pleasantries with Pye then sent him on his way. He was always careful not to fraternise too much with a playwright until his work had proved itself in performance and he was, in any case, convinced that actors of his standing were naturally superior to the clever scribblers who provided their lines. Edmund Hoode, a competent actor as well as an author, was the exception to the rule, the only playwright whom Firethorn allowed close to him. He invited himself into his friend’s lodging and the two of them were soon sharing a cup of wine. Hoode’s desperation was etched deeply into his brow.
‘What ails you, man?’ asked Firethorn. ‘Another disastrous love affair?’
‘Not this time, Lawrence.’
‘Then what?’ His eye ignited. ‘Unlooked for fatherhood?’
‘Not even that,’ said Hoode mournfully. ‘At least some pleasure would have been involved in that instance.’
‘Pleasure and repentance.’
‘It’s all repentance here. I bitterly regret my lunacy in agreeing to it. Pregnancy of a kind is indeed the root of my misery. I wish that I’d never been persuaded to act as midwife to Egidius Pye’s play.’
‘I thought that you admired the piece.’
‘I did, Lawrence. I still do.’
‘Then where’s the problem?’
‘Walking home to the Middle Temple with that ridiculous hat on his head.’
‘The fellow’s a lawyer,’ said Firethorn contemptuously. ‘He deserves ridicule.’
‘Pye is insufferable,’ wailed Hoode. ‘He disputes every vowel and defends every consonant as if they were brought down from Mount Sinai on a stone tablet. And the worst of it is that he does it without rancour or spleen. Master Pye is Politeness itself. He doesn’t even grant me an excuse to lose my temper with him.’