Exit the Actress (20 page)

“Ha!” The king laughed, amused at my discomfiture. “Ellen, isn’t it? You see, I would never forget one who scolded me so charmingly.”

“Yes, Ellen, but…”

“But?” coaxed the black-eyed king.

“But they are calling me Nell out there.”

“And so you will be Nell out there. Here,” he said, leaning over to touch my forehead lightly with his long tapered fingers, “you will stay Ellen.”

“But
they
—”

“They, they, they …
they
will not know Ellen.” His expression suddenly shifted, and something dropped away. There was a fierceness about him, an anger even. “She will be secret, she will be safe. She
must
be. A person
must
have a secret if he is to be constantly on the stage.” And then, like the passing of a summer storm, he was back to being the king but not the king. Once again, he resumed his easy, flexible, royal self. As if the darkly fervent man had never been. With that, he thanked us for the wine and, gracefully rising, bade us good night.

“Good thing, too,” Becka hissed. “Look, Castlemaine is watching.” Sure enough, we looked over, and the famous lady, swathed in cherry-red ruffles, was unabashedly staring at us; that is, until her royal lover returned to her side, and then she did not give us another glance the whole evening.

“On the stage,”
I mused later.

“What?” asked Becka, arranging her skirts in the carriage, leaving little room for me.

“On the stage.” I wonder if he meant him or me.

“What a silly thing to think about,” chided Becka.

And we were silent the rest of the way home.

Note
—Beth told me that Lady Castlemaine is ill again in the mornings. Poor Queen Catherine. Perhaps it will be a girl, and then she might not feel as bad.

Today is proclaimed, at the king’s command, a fast day in support of the Dutch war. We have been terribly good and kept to it most solemnly. Rose was here going over dress designs. Her ideas are bold but expensive. “Simplicity is always expensive,” Hart said approvingly, looking over her shoulder at the drawings, asking how much each would cost.

Note
—All the talk in the theatre has been of our encounter with the king, although if Becka is to be believed, he did not speak to me at all. Teddy is in
anguish
(his word) that he missed it. Hart has just popped his head in to tell me that our performance at Whitehall has been cancelled. Could that be because…? How silly I am, and how self-important.

We heard in church this morning that we engaged with the Dutch. We captured three of their ships and lost none of our own. Happy with our success but still not sure
why
we are doing this.

Went with Teddy to see
The Ghosts
at the Duke’s. It was simply done, but the acting was excellent. “Gravitas,” Teddy proclaimed. “Betterton always manages to exude gravitas. I think I am too thin for gravitas,” he complained, looking in the mirror.

“Yes, but you look far better in yellow,” I consoled him. Betterton’s costume had been a ghastly banana hue.

Afterwards a quiet supper at the Bear with Hart, Lacy, and Teddy. There is talk of my being cast in a comedy—
at last
! I have become tiresome with my constant pestering.

Not a comedy but a dull, dull tragedy.
Love’s Mistress,
by Tom Heywood. I do not shine in such parts. Dryden is writing again; he has been sporting his floppy black cap, his favoured headgear when visited by “the Muses.” I fear it is another heroic tragedy. The Muses seem keen on heroic tragedy lately. Johnny Rochester is merciless in his persecution of Dryden’s pompous heroic style. Johnny does a wonderfully overblown hero’s death—a Dryden death, he calls it—lots of writhing in agony on the floor while spouting selfless sentiment in perfect diction.

The endless discussion:

“But she is
funny,
Hart!” pressed Dryden, dressed today entirely in lavender frills (minus the black hat: no Muses today). He has joined my cause and is fighting for me to play comedies. “Surely you must see that humour suits her light touch?”

“It is true, Hart. No one wants to see this bright little poppet
die
onstage. They want to see her
laugh,
” Lacy added, pinning his colours to the mast.

“I will not have her laughed at,” Hart responded adamantly, disappearing behind his news sheet.

“Not laughed
at,
dearest,” I said softly, taking his big hand in mine. “I wish to make others laugh. It is so very sad for me to play sad roles all the time. I would much rather be merry.”

“Humph,” grumbled Hart non-committally, tugging at his great periwig—new and too mousy for his rosy colouring and ill fitting to boot. “If you want her to play comedies, then you had better write comedies,” Hart said pointedly to Dryden.

“Yes, yes,” Dryden said airily, waving his frilly hand as if it were nothing to create such things, entirely forgetting the tortuous creating process.
“L’enfer,
darling,
l’enfer,
” he always calls it.

“We will talk to Tom and Robert,” Hart finally conceded.

“There, you see,” whispered Dryden in a conspiratorial tone, reaching for more toast. “Tom and Robert will agree. It is as good as done.”

Tom and Robert
did
agree. I am to laugh and laugh!

“Ugh.” Dryden held his head, realising what he has brought upon himself.

“Comedy is the
worst;
sad endings are far easier. There is always so much to
say
when one is dying.”

I hid my smile behind my hand.

Hart has agreed, on the condition that he play opposite me. I worry, as he is not known for comedy. His touch is certainly not
light
. I know I should not, but I resent his intrusion. Can I not stand alone as an actress, unclaimed and unsupervised?

Note
—Two plague deaths reported in St. Giles in the Fields, just north of Covent Garden.

“Johnny Rochester has become a kidnapper!” Teddy announced over breakfast, waving his news sheet about excitedly. He read out: “ ‘This known
bon viveur,
Wit, rakehell, and royal intimate, has abducted Mistress Elizabeth Malet, the great heiress of the North, who is only sixteen years old!’ Mmm, what good taste he has—she is scrumptious: swan neck, musical laugh, lovely hats.”

“Teddy, much as you love them, you can no longer
wear
women’s hats,” I said briskly.

“Who is she? I didn’t know he liked
anyone,
” Peg said, trying to read over Teddy’s shoulder.

“She is lovely,” I filled her in quietly. “Beautiful and sensible and entirely too good for him. He has always fancied her—since she was absurdly young—but there was never any chance of a match. Her grandfather would not hear of it. When the king spoke to him about Johnny, he apparently swore that he would not unhand such a sweet lady to one who would so surely make her unhappy.”

“Well, now her family will certainly raise a fuss,” Teddy said, scanning the news sheets for any mention of our wild compatriot. Relocating the article, he paraphrased, “She had just dined with
la belle Stuart,
who
still
refuses the king”—Teddy grimaced—“and then was leaving for home with her grandfather, Lord Haley, when she was snatched from under his very nose, stuffed into a coach and six, and whisked away.”

“How romantic,” swooned Peg.

“Hardly,” I snorted. “I would think she was terrified. How could Johnny resort to that?”

“Well, it does have a certain highwayman glamour, but these days Johnny plays entirely too rough for my taste,” Teddy said, not looking up from his paper.

Peg shot me a look. We had always wondered about Teddy and Johnny Rochester—Johnny who openly admits to sleeping with men, out of sheer boredom, he swears. What rot.

“Has she been recovered?” I asked, turning back to our subject. “And more importantly,
where
is he?”

“Ooh, listen to this: ‘Rochester, for whom the king has often spoken to the lady but without success, has been placed in the Tower, and the lady has disappeared!’“

“The Tower.” I shuddered.

“Oh, not to worry,” Teddy said without looking up. “Johnny loves the Tower. It is the only place he gets enough peace and quiet to write.”

“Is that that dreadful Ambrose Pink?” Peg asked, snatching the paper from Teddy. “He writes the most horrible drivel.”

“Accurate though,” Teddy said, pouring more coffee. “And quick—he always has it before anyone else. But he has been known to call me ‘Ned,’ and I really can’t bear that. Sounds like my name said through a stuffed nose. Remember when he linked me to Buckingham? We only spent one evening together. How he got hold of it, I’ll never know.”

Peg shot me another look.
That,
we didn’t know.

“I thought for ages it was Harry Killigrew, Tom’s son, but his writing is just not that good,” Teddy said mildly. “I hate bad writing.”

“It would make sense though—the court, the theatre—but the Duke’s as well. How would Harry manage that?” Peg puzzled, fanning herself with her news sheet.

“Harry has plenty of friends at the Duke’s, but he has been in Paris lately…” I shrugged. “Could be. But then it could be anyone. Why pick on Harry?”

Peg sighed, “I hate secrets.”

Note
—nine plague deaths in the city itself this week, and eight in the nearby countryside. I touch wood to ward off sickness. Rose and I are making up extra batches of plague water.

Great reports of plague in the city. Now everyone is worried. Rehearsals are cancelled. Frightened, we are staying home.

The theatres shut down today. The Lord Chamberlain has closed all public entertainments, including the Southwark and Bartholomew fairs as well as both playhouses, until the plague abates. As men in the Lord Chamberlain’s livery went round the theatre posting notices, the company gathered on the street in small clutches to discuss what to do. Tom passed around packets of tobacco—everyone is chewing tobacco against the pestilence. Dreadful taste—I must buy extra tooth tonic.