Hamlet: a novel Part 6

Now I can do it, Hamlet exulted. Now he is mine. Revenge is mine. He was creeping forward even as his mind formed the thoughts. He knew his sword would make a sound as he withdrew it from its scabbard; therefore he resolved not to draw it until he was within a few steps of the praying king. It would be done with perfect speed. The king, mumbling prayers that Hamlet could not hear, was lost in his devotions, and so he would lose his life.

Yet suddenly an awful thought gripped the young prince. Prayers! Praying! What was he thinking? A man in the middle of his prayers is a man in the presence of G.o.d. Such a man, were he to die at that moment, must fly to heaven, surely? Hamlet was about to send the murderer of his father to heaven! What kind of revenge was that?

Eyes staring in horror, the prince began to retreat, as noiselessly as he had advanced. This was not the moment to execute his uncle. He would wait until the man was in a drunken sleep, or a violent rage, or in the bed of sin he shared with Hamlet's mother. He would wait until he was gambling or swearing or flirting with one of the maids. Then the slain Claudius would go to the blackest, deepest corner of h.e.l.l, the place where he belonged.

Hamlet left the room. A moment later the king staggered to his feet, head throbbing. "My words go to heaven, but my thoughts stay here," he whispered to himself. "And words without thoughts b.u.mp upon the ceiling."

Hamlet went down the stairs uneasily, still consumed by the memory ten minutes earlier of the king at prayer. He had found a lavatory and sat on it, emptying his bowels in an exhausted rush. Perhaps he should have struck the king as he knelt, and left it to G.o.d to do the rest. But when it came to carrying out the duties his father had set him, Hamlet knew there must be no mistake. His father had been a hard taskmaster. Critical whenever the boy had acted rashly or shown poor judgment, he would never forgive any error in this, the greatest challenge he had ever set his son, the greatest challenge any man could set his child.

As Hamlet walked along the corridor, his feet slowed. He had the sense that he was walking toward feathers, and they would not be the comforting feathers contained within a mattress but rather they would be loose and uncontrolled. The air would be full of them, and he would get them in his lungs every time he breathed. He had experienced this before, down in the poultry yard, and the memories slowed him further, until, about ten meters from his mother's door, he stopped and leaned against the wall, hugging himself with both hands under his armpits. His hands felt sticky with blood, and yet they were clean and pale.

He could hear his mother talking and a man's voice replying. The king! His uncle! Now the hotness of his thoughts just minutes earlier was cooling and starting to confuse him. He began to regret this trip down the cold corridor. He could not bear to face both of them in her suite. He would not! His uncle had no business there, no right. He was the usurper. The son had more right than the husband. The prince's hand went to his sword again. Was this the right moment? Was it time? Could he do it in front of his mother?

The voices were quiet.

Trembling, Hamlet called out, "Mother!" He wanted to warn the pair of them that he was coming. He wanted to avoid any scene that would disturb him further. He called again, "Mother! Mother!" Even to himself he sounded querulous.

He opened the door and walked in. There she stood, one hand to her throat. Only four candles were lit in the great chandelier. The room was dim, the gold furniture glowed, the vases on the shelves were empty. She looked flushed. Hamlet was enraged by the sight of her but kept his face icy.

"Why did you send for me?" he asked. He looked around the room. No sign of the king, who must have gone through the other door into the boudoir, the innermost chamber. Hamlet was blackened by rage. He was staggered by his own rage. That the uncle should be in there, while the mother talked to her son as though she had no thoughts of the usurper, as though she were pretending she did not know what was going on.

He looked back at her. He no longer trembled. He was sustained now by his sense of righteousness. He could see the great effort she made to speak to him calmly.

"Hamlet, you have much offended your father."

Father? The lie had come so easily to her lips. That man had cuckolded his true father, the only one who had the right to the t.i.tle.

"Mother, you have much offended my father."

"Come, come," she said, "you answer with an idle tongue."

"Go, go, you question with a wicked one."

It was childish, but he had never openly defied her before. The words almost stuck in his teeth. His mouth felt dry.

She was uneasy and embarra.s.sed, and held her throat more tightly, as if to keep something in.

"What do you mean, Hamlet? You are not yourself. This is not the Hamlet I know."

"You? Who are you? Do you know me?"

"Have you forgotten me?"

"No." He spoke slowly, wanting her to remember every cut that he was about to inflict, every stinging slash across her face. "No, I know who you are. You are Gertrude, the queen, your husband's brother's wife. And - I wish it were not so! - you are my mother."

"That is enough. You have said enough."

"I thought of you once as the soul of virtue," he continued deliberately. "I thought of you as the woman who modeled virtue. Now I know you for who you are. And I will tell you what you are."

"Leave me, Hamlet. I don't like you when you're like this. Come back when you can be lovely again."

"There are crimes that shriek to heaven to be avenged. Crimes that corrupt even the purest."

"Go, Hamlet, or I'll call the guards. You are ill. You are mad. You must go."

Relentless, boring in on her, gray eyes arctic, he took her by the shoulders and forced her back into a chair. "You shall not budge," he hissed at her. "Now you shall hear it. You will not leave this room until I have held up a mirror that shows you what is within."

She was frightened, and she tried to fight him off, to pull away the strong hands that held her. But his grip was too hard, and she feared bruises that would disfigure her arms. "What are you doing?" Her mask slipped, and she cried out. "Help me, someone, help! He's mad. He'll kill me. Stop it, stop it!"

From behind Hamlet came an echoing cry. "Help! Help the queen!"

By G.o.d, he thought, there he is, hiding from me and spying on us. It is enough. If ever I was going to do it, I'll do it now.

He let go of his mother, spun with the speed that had won him a hundred matches, and drew. Against the wall was the great half-finished tapestry of the death of Paris. The weaver from Russia had been working on it for eight months already. Behind it someone was struggling, caught up in the loom and the threads and the rolls. The fat king, surely. With a hoa.r.s.e cry, Hamlet ran his sword through Paris's shoulder and on into a soft body on the other side. On and on, forever, the sword ran, until it hit the wall. There was a sickly sweetness about the action that entranced Hamlet for a moment. A kind of ecstasy seized him, like the full-moon madness that led him to the pigpen. He stayed there, quivering, unable to move. A high-pitched scream came from the man and then a series of gasping sobs.

It is not the king, Hamlet thought. Does she have another lover? He pulled back, bringing his sword with him and starting to shudder.

"What have you done?" his mother moaned. "What have you done?"

Hamlet look at her stupidly. "I don't know. Is it the king? Isn't it the king?"

She seemed incapable of answering. She closed her eyes and covered her face. He dropped his sword as though it were no use to him and fought with the huge tapestry to move it. Eventually he had to pull it away from the wall. The sobs from behind it were now replaced by a soft noise, almost a whistling sound, as the last breaths left the body. Hamlet stepped around the tapestry and saw Polonius. The old man lay on his side, an unnaturally white hand flung out to his right, and a pool of sticky blood spreading across the floor. His eyes were closed.

He heard his mother sob, "Oh G.o.d, Hamlet, what is to become of us?"

Staring at Polonius, the young prince tried to imagine how he came to be there. He knew Polonius had not come to the apartment to make love: he was too feeble and s.e.xless for that. It would be part of some scheme, no doubt, another little conspiracy, another attempt to spy on Hamlet, perhaps. This was the man who laid traps to ensnare everyone. It was his favorite hobby. Hamlet felt no pity for him. He could only think: This will teach him to stick his nose into other people's business. He went back out to where his mother was thrashing around on the chair like a drowning woman.

"What have you done?" she hiccuped. "What mad and b.l.o.o.d.y deed is this!"

He was stung. His mind was still a ma.s.s of conflicting thoughts. But to be attacked by her now, like this - it was too much. A rush and roar of blood filled his head. With a great sense of cutting a rope and watching himself drop down a mountainside, he replied, "Yes, a b.l.o.o.d.y deed, b.l.o.o.d.y indeed, almost as bad, good Mother, as killing a king, and marrying his brother."

"Killing a king!" she gasped.

Hamlet was cold now, but white-faced and sweating. He picked up his sword and wiped it against the tapestry. The drops of blood on the ground, the smears on the material, these were familiar to him. They gave him strength for what he had to say. "For you, Mother, I have kept the sword of truth in my scabbard until now."

"What have I done, that you say these things to me, Hamlet? How can I have earned your violence and your horrible words? I do not deserve this."

"What have you done? Why, that's easy. Something that would cause a rose to turn into a wart, an act that spits in the face of the wedding vows, that embarra.s.ses heaven itself. Mother, look at this."

With one easy motion he lifted from the wall a small oil painting of two men. Gertrude had an uneasy feeling that perhaps he came in here often and took down the picture. Against a background of forest and mountain the men in the portrait stood, clad in thick, warm robes, arms around each other in brotherhood. Hamlet pointed to the one on the left. "Remember him, Mother?" he inquired. His tone was of cold fury. "Look at him. Look at him! Here are Mars and Jupiter, Hyperion and Mercury. Here is majesty indeed. It is in his face, his eyes, his bearing. Here is greatness. And beside him, what? This toad, this vermin, grumbling and grunting and shuffling through rooms that were made for finer stuff. How could you choose this over that? Where were your eyes, your ears, your senses? You must have sense, or you would not be taking breath now, but what kind of sense is it that chooses the rat over the stag? And don't tell me you fell in love. At your age, what can you know of the pa.s.sion that lubricates love! It must have been judgment, but judgment of the devil indeed."

He threw the painting onto the sideboard. The queen tried to answer him, but as she was about to speak, a trickle of blood ran across the floor between them. She groaned and covered her face again. Hamlet, not seeing it, was encouraged to go on. Waving his sword in the air, wanting to spear her but knowing he never could, he stabbed her again and again with words. Little, impotent things, but they would have to do. "To take him into your bed, to give him access to that most sacred place, to besmear and besmirch yourself, to lie in his sweat while you exchange honeyed words . . ."

"Please, Hamlet, enough, enough, please."

"To make love with that bag of bloated flesh . . ."

"Hamlet, no more, I beg you!"

"Here you have a mountain, and here a pile of donkey s.h.i.t . . ."

"Oh, Hamlet, have you no pity, have you no understanding?"

"Without a thought of me, me, me . . ."

"Hamlet, I cannot bear it. I cannot look into my soul the way that you ask. I am afraid of what I may see. You show me such black and cancerous spots within, that my vision fails me. It is too much for anyone, too much for you, even. For now, be concerned only with Polonius. It is enough, surely. Do something about Polonius."

"Let the fat bag of guts lie there until I have your promise."

"My promise?" she said faintly. She could no longer deal with him.

"That you will not sleep with him," the boy replied. "That the next time he comes to your bed, you will send him away. Keep yourself pure, Mother," he begged. "Please, you don't need him."

She shook her head. He was too young. He did not understand anything. "You have split my heart in two, Hamlet -" she began to say, but he cut her off again.

"Then throw away half of it, the rotten half. Keep only the half which is good."

When she did not answer, he took the silence to mean that she was beaten. He was satisfied that he had made his point. He had penetrated to her inner being and left his mark there. He felt exhausted but triumphant. He had slain the serpent and barred its way to her bed, keeping her safe for his dead father and himself. After all, she was theirs. She belonged to them, not to the insidious, nefarious, pernicious, cuckolding snake.

"You know I must go away?"

"Hamlet! I cannot speak of that with the old man lying there. All the blood. What do you take me for? I have feelings. I do not know you when you are in this state. Do something, please."

Hamlet took her by the elbow and steered her into the next room. She was too frightened to resist. "This is not what I meant by doing something," was all she could say.

"You know about my being sent away," he demanded again, ignoring her emotions as much as he was ignoring the dead Polonius.

G.o.d, let him not be mad, she thought. Anything but madness.

"Sent away!" he demanded again.

"Yes, yes," she said. "You're going with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The king has commanded it. The old man had been telling me when you arrived."

Hamlet was instantly suspicious. "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern? What have they got to do with it?"

"Why, I think he said they are to keep you company . . . keep you safe."

"They may have been my friends at school, but I trust them as much as I'd trust a pair of rats with a piece of pork. Knowing Claudius, he'll send me to some brigand to get me knocked off. I'll watch Rosencrantz and Guildenstern more closely than they could ever watch me. They may be in for a shock. A hangman's rope can fit the neck of the executioner as well as it fits the neck of the condemned man."

The queen nodded, faint with fatigue. Hamlet did not appear to notice her condition. "Polonius," she said, her eyes closed.

This time Hamlet seemed to hear her. He went back to the first room. She followed and stood, one hand covering her mouth, as he took hold of the old man's body at the waist and swung it around so the head was against the wall. "There'll be trouble with this one," he remarked. "He may weigh more in death than he did in life."

He picked up the old bag of guts by the heels, and dragging him behind, as a groom would take a sled of hay to the horses, he left the room.

To Horatio fell the melancholy task of telling Ophelia the news. Adolescence had changed their relationship, so that the easy familiarity of childhood had given way to a more awkward ebb and flow between them. Now every comment was charged with a different energy. But their affection for each other was still strong, and Horatio knew he was the right person to inform Ophelia that she was now orphaned.

He climbed the stairs to Polonius's apartment with his heart beating slowly but loudly. This was a well-worn staircase, the carpet completely split on many of the steps. As the king of conspiracy, the master of plots, the State Secretary of Gossip, Polonius had received many visitors.

Horatio pa.s.sed through the reception rooms. They were cold and silent in the early morning. Everything here was severe, from the hard leather sofas to the bare tables, to the gla.s.s cabinets that stood in each corner, symmetrical and uncompromising. They contained Polonius's medals, certificates of commendation, letters of thanks from a dozen European monarchs. A black fur coat thrown roughly across a chair had the appearance of a dead animal. The fireplaces had not been cleaned from the night before.

Horatio trod softly, this messenger of death, ill suited to his task, afraid to create any eddies, to disturb the air. At the end of the first room hung a large portrait of Polonius, glaring down at the boy who came in search of his daughter. In the second room, the heads of stags and wolves bared their teeth, as if defying Horatio to bring any more death into an apartment that was full of it. In the third room, gazing out the window, was Ophelia.

Her white silk gown was so plain that Horatio, unknowing of the ways of women, wondered if it was the garment she slept in. With no one to announce him, no warning of his coming, he already felt compromised. But then he remembered, to whom could she complain? Who was left to protect her? Who would come thundering into the room, waving his arms, remonstrating, admonishing Horatio for his intrusion? The closest person was Laertes, and he was in England.

Ophelia showed no signs of outrage. Indeed, she showed no signs of anything. She continued to gaze through the window. Horatio coughed gently, then, when she did not respond, cleared his throat more loudly. She turned to him and said, "He has gone far away."

"H-he . . . who has?" Horatio stammered. He decided that someone had already notified her of her father's death, and he felt relieved. Now he would not have to find the difficult words.

"Who has? What did I say? Pay no attention. Sometimes I dream." Perfectly composed, she gazed at him. "Are you here to see my father? I don't know where he is. He's normally at his desk by this hour. Writing his letters. Doing his business."

He realized that he had been wrong: she had no idea of Polonius's death. Blood rushed to his face and he began to stammer again. "Ophelia, I have . . . there has been . . . something terrible's happened."

She sank down on a piano stool. She was so naturally pale that it was hard to imagine her becoming paler, but now her face was no longer even white; she lost all color. "Is it Hamlet?" she asked. As he hesitated with his answer, she turned to the piano, which was open, and, astonishingly, began playing a tune that he remembered from their childhood, though he did not know its name. It was a sweet and cheerful song that they used to sing on long walks, something about a blackbird in the snow.

When she finished the tune, she closed the piano and walked to the window. Horatio was stupefied. He did not know what to say or how to act. She swung the window open and then horrified him by climbing through it and sitting on the sill, with her back to him. Cold air rushed into the room. Horatio started forward, then hesitated. Bound by the strict rules of etiquette that applied even between those who had been childhood friends, and despite his awareness that she no longer had a protector in the castle, he nonetheless was afraid to touch her.

"Ophelia!" he screeched, in a voice he had never heard from his mouth before. "What are you doing? Nothing's happened to Hamlet." Though even as he spoke, he knew this was not true.

She glanced around at him. "Do not fear," she said. "Say what you have come to say. Then I will stay, or fly away."

He stared at her. "Are you crazy? Come back inside. I'm not telling you anything while you're sitting like that. You're twenty meters from the ground."

She immediately became very docile. She climbed back in at once and came toward him, head bowed, hands clasped in front of her. "What do you have to tell me?" she muttered. "Go ahead, say it. I'll be good."

He took a deep breath, stood taller, and began. "Ophelia, a terrible accident happened last night. Quite late. There was an awful scene in the queen's apartment. I'm still not sure of the details, but it seems that Hamlet . . . I think perhaps Hamlet mistook your father for an intruder. . . . There was some kind of fight. . . . Well, I don't know how to tell you this, but . . ."

"He's dead, he's dead." The girl began to rock herself. "He killed him. I knew he would. Oh, I knew he would. Sweet Jesus. Sweet mother."

"It's true, he is dead."

"You said nothing had happened to him."

Horatio realized she still had not understood the truth. He cursed himself for making such a mess of it. "No, no, Ophelia, it's not Hamlet who has died; it's your father. Hamlet mistook him . . . There was some kind of terrible confusion . . ."

She fell back onto a sofa, her hands covering her face. "Oh! My father! Then not Hamlet! Oh G.o.d, forgive me, I did not want it to be Hamlet." Suddenly she sat bolt upright, took her hands away, and stared at Horatio. "Are you saying that Hamlet has killed my father?"

The boy nodded.

"He killed my father," she whispered, unable to take her eyes from his face. "Oh, better that he kill his own father. To kill a father! But, G.o.d help me, I am as bad. The reek of this must reach to heaven itself. We will all be d.a.m.ned."

"No, Ophelia, please, you cannot think like that. You must not. It was an accident. I don't know the details, but I'm sure that when it all comes out, we will find that Hamlet's honor remains intact."

"Yes, yes, honor. That is everything. To keep honor intact. So, men fight. Oh, how little they know. How little they understand me. So, the young man must fight the old. They think that is the only way."

Horatio did not know what she was talking about. He was greatly relieved when the door to his left opened and Ophelia's maid came in. Ophelia had never had a maid until recently, and Horatio did not even know the girl's name. She was from the north, daughter of a farmer, unused to the ways of the court, but Polonius had gotten her for nothing more than the cost of her board, in exchange for the promise of experience in serving a n.o.ble family. Well, Horatio thought, she'll get a lot more experience than she bargained for.

Seeing her mistress's distress, the maid hurried to her side. "Madam," she said, "what is wrong?"