Hamlet shrugged, but Horatio could sense that he was bursting. "I am as always the king"s to command. If he is in a rush, I will accommodate him."
Rather more confidently, Osric performed a bow and replaced his hat on his head. "Sir, the king and the queen and indeed all the court are on their way to the hall now to enjoy the entertainment."
"Then I too am nearly at the entrance. Not here, Osric, but just outside the hall. Half a dozen steps away."
Horatio expected that this would be enough for Osric, but not so. Now he executed another bow, removed his hat, and added, "Most Excellent Highness, I am bidden by that most n.o.ble lady the queen your mother to convey a further request to you."
Hamlet was leaning against the stone wall, as he had been for some time. Yet Horatio was aware that he was never still. Now, at Osric"s words, Hamlet stood rigidly, and the difference was stark. The twitching finger, the lively eyes, the nervous jiggle, all were gone as he waited in straining silence to hear the message from his mother. What power she has over him, Horatio thought.
Hamlet waited until Osric spoke again.
"Well, n.o.ble prince, it is simply this, that she desires you speak warmly to Laertes before the bouts begin. I believe she seeks a rapprochement. I understand there was a certain indelicacy at the cemetery. . . . I was not able to attend, but the queen spoke most feelingly upon her return. . . ."
Hamlet seemed to shudder for a moment. Horatio could not understand his reaction. But he sounded willing enough when he answered. "She gives good advice."
Osric made off, glad to be gone. Hamlet drummed his bottom lip with a finger. Horatio waited to hear what he would say. At last he spoke. "He thinks he is the new Polonius," he remarked.
"Osric?"
"Yes. Pulling our strings and expecting us to dance. But Osric to Polonius is as a stuffed sheep to a fox." Horatio didn"t reply. After a minute Hamlet added, "You wouldn"t believe how sick at heart I feel, Horatio. A strangeness has come over me."
"Sir -" Horatio began.
But Hamlet cut him off. "It"s nothing. It might trouble a woman, perhaps, but I"m not letting it concern me."
Horatio took a step toward him. "Hamlet," he said, "if your heart dislikes anything, obey it. Trust your instincts, which are good ones. I"ll go and tell them you"re not fit and they"ll have to postpone."
"No, no. I defy these feelings. When a sparrow falls from the sky, it affects the whole universe. If something happens now, it won"t happen later; if it happens later, it won"t happen now. Since no one leaves with anything, what does it matter when we leave?"
Again Horatio was baffled by his friend. He stared at him as the sky turned red around them and the new detachment of guards marched past to take over the watch.
The great hall was the coldest place in Elsinore. Even with huge logs banked in the giant fireplaces at either end, the temperature seemed hardly above freezing. The king sprawled on his cedar throne, crown by his side, a pewter mug to hand. Despite the temperature, he was hot and sweaty and from time to time wiped his brow with a grimy handkerchief.
The queen, in white fur robes, sat on a settee, avoiding the throne beside her husband. She too seemed nervous. Horatio wondered if she had lost weight; she looked much leaner, almost gaunt. He remembered how when he was little she had seemed kind, most of the time, remembering to order Horatio"s favorite meals after his mother died, giving him little presents for his birthday, taking the boys to the circus. She had never been warm or funny or loving, the way Horatio"s own mother had been, but he had never felt unwelcome at the palace. He knew she could be sarcastic, and that she could lose her temper in an instant, but when she was in a bad mood, he and Hamlet had learned to melt away to the tower or the woods or the fields and let the servants suffer her wrath.
The sudden pa.s.sing of the old king, Hamlet"s father, had put Denmark on a different path, but no one had been sure at first where it would lead. There had been trepidation, and almost a stench around the new regime from the first days, but as far as Horatio knew, these feelings had not been articulated by anyone. Gertrude had still been all right, he thought. A bit grimmer, a bit sharper, a bit more cynical. Just a bit more of everything, really.
The most noticeable changes had come since the death of Polonius. Nothing had gone right for her and her new husband these last few months. It was as though the old man"s death had put an end to the momentum of the tawdry couple. Hamlet"s mad stabbing of Polonius had been like a kiss of corruption on the lips of the royal couple. It had blocked all exits, closed off all possibilities.
Hamlet and Horatio walked into the great hall as though they were actors entering a scene. All the others were a.s.sembled, not just the king and queen, but Laertes, standing alone and carving figures in the air with a rapier; Osric, dancing in front of the throne like an annoying gra.s.shopper; three ladies to wait upon the queen; a group of minor lords cl.u.s.tered around the king; attendants and servants and courtiers, spectators and minor relatives . . . The two young men stood out. Hamlet for his sheer physical beauty, of course, but those in the castle were used to that. It was more that he and Horatio possessed a certain lightness of being. It would not be too fanciful to say that a glow surrounded them. They seemed as much like acrobats as actors, connected to the earth only by the thinnest of lines, almost invisible bonds.
The great hall fell still as they entered. Horatio came to a halt halfway between the door and the thrones. Hamlet went forward alone. The only person moving in the whole vast s.p.a.ce, he was the focus of every eye. He strode straight up to Laertes. "If I have hurt you, Laertes," he said in a strong voice, "I say now, in the company of all present, that I regret it. I have not been myself. And if I am not myself, then whoever wronged you was not me. In fact, the unbalanced Hamlet who wronged you wronged me also, for to be out of my own mind is not a condition I would ever desire."
Laertes swallowed. He had been caught off guard. "Your Royal Highness, I accept what you say on a personal level," he said at last. "But I cannot yet accept your apology. I must be guided by advisers who are older and wiser. In the meantime, I will treat the friendship you are now demonstrating as though it is true."
Hamlet had to be satisfied with that. He nodded and turned to take the foil offered to him, while Laertes accepted his from another servant. They each tested the blade.
"Too heavy," cried Laertes, laying his down.
"I am content," said Hamlet.
The king watched anxiously. "You know the wager, Hamlet?" he asked, his voice thick. He had to clear his throat before he spoke, and again as he finished.
"Certainly. But Your Majesty has laid the odds on the weaker side."
"Well, well, Laertes has made himself a proficient swordsman. But the odds are fair, I think."
Laertes had chosen his weapon and now turned to face the young prince. The king spoke out again. "Set the stoups of wine upon that table. If Hamlet scores a hit in the first three rounds, I"ll drink his health; nay, I"ll do more than that. I"ll drop a jewel into his gla.s.s to spur him further. A jewel brighter than any worn by the last four kings of Denmark! There"s motivation for you, my son."
Claudius burst into a fit of coughing so severe that the two sportsmen waited for him to finish before they began their duel. At last, however, the king was able to signal to them to start. "Let the judge bear a wary eye," he commanded, before putting the mug to his lips once more for another long drink.
And so they went to it. Hard, too. The audience knew straightaway that this was a match charged with potency for them both. Spectators retreated as the two young men, quick and graceful, slashed at each other from one end of the hall to the other. The beginning was all Laertes; he believed he had improved so much since Hamlet had last seen him that he could take the prince by surprise and score easy points.
Yet smugness allows no other point of view; smugness lacks imagination. It never entered Laertes" head that the prince, who had been his superior when they were children, might have improved too. In truth, Hamlet had spent as many hours at practice as Laertes, and with better teachers.
At first Hamlet foxed, doing no more than he had to, allowing Laertes to believe that victory would be quick. But Laertes found attack after attack failing, finding s.p.a.ce where there should have been flesh, or Hamlet"s rapier where there should have been an opening, and he began to suspect that this might not go as easily as he had planned. And then, in the course of a spectacular turn that should have left Hamlet"s flank exposed, Laertes heard his opponent cry out, "A hit!"
"No," shouted Laertes, but he wondered if there might have been a sting on his right side.
"Judgment!" demanded Hamlet with staring eyes.
"A hit, a palpable hit," confirmed the judge.
In his excitement the king rose from his throne. He seemed more than excited, agitated even. Horatio thought he was drunk.
"Again! Let"s go again," shouted Laertes, who was flushed and angry, suspecting that he had been betrayed by his own sense of superiority.
"Wait," croaked Claudius. "Wait, the pair of you. I promised Hamlet he should have a jewel should he score a strike, and a jewel he shall have."
Hamlet scowled at his stepfather, but the man appeared not to notice. With some difficulty, fumbling in his robes, Claudius found a large diamond and held it up to the light. The courtiers gasped, and a lady-in-waiting squealed. Osric broke into excited applause. "Most generous, Your Majesty," he shouted. "Exceedingly generous."
The king gazed proudly around the great hall. "This is the way we govern," he proclaimed. "There is plenty for everyone." He nodded to a servant, and the man, trembling with cold in his threadbare uniform, hurried to fetch Hamlet"s gla.s.s of wine. The king held it aloft and, after a last glance at the crowd, dropped the diamond into it. People gasped again, giggled, then a soft tide of whispers ran everywhere at once, like foam fizzing on the beach. Claudius dropped back onto his throne, wiping his face again and nodding to the same servant to refill his gla.s.s.
"I fancy that was rather well done, my dear," he said to his wife, in what he imagined to be a whisper, but which was heard all around the hall. She gave only a nod of acknowledgment. Claudius raised his voice again. "Give Hamlet the gla.s.s."
"Later, later," Hamlet shouted back. "After the next round, perhaps."
He did not see the king"s glare. Laertes had already launched himself at the prince, hoping to gain the advantage of surprise. It was within the rules but only barely within the conventions of sportsmanship. Hamlet was able to deflect the blade by nothing more than a centimeter, at the same time trying to sway out of the path of its vicious point. Somehow it was enough, and the thing pa.s.sed him by. He twisted away and ran half the length of the hall before ducking to the right, turning, and preparing to face the oncoming Laertes.
Now Laertes fought with cold determination. It was all Laertes, wave after wave of skillful flourishes, at times moving so fast that the crowd could barely see the blade, darting and feinting and stabbing, driving the young prince back and back and back, like a dozen waves breaking in quick succession upon rocks that seemed too weak to withstand them.
Laertes" body and blade had become one; the young man was nothing but movement. Although his mind was diseased, his body, for a brief interval, threw off its knowledge of his intentions and reached the apogee of its physical perfection. Perhaps too the body knew it had only minutes left to live, knew it would soon lie pierced and dying on the floor; perhaps some knowledge of that gave it the power and skill for this last expression of beauty and training.
Whatever, it was a new and glorious Laertes who with pa.s.sion and grace fought Hamlet. His swordsmanship stopped the breathing of the spectators, returned sudden sobriety to the king, and set the queen swooning on the sofa where she sat.
Then it was over.
Laertes leaped, twisted, and stabbed at the s.p.a.ce where Hamlet should have been. For a moment he seemed suspended in the cold air, a G.o.d who cared nothing for gravity. But the prince was too quick, and an instant later Laertes felt truth touch him in the side of his ribs.
"Another hit!" shouted Hamlet, emerging from under his opponent like a rat from a collapsed tower.
"A touch, a touch, I do confess," gasped Laertes. He stood, breathing like man who is about to go to a very different place, one he has never visited before and cannot know. Yet his intention was to send Hamlet there, today, as soon as possible, by means foul or fair.
"Our son shall win," said the king nervously.
"He"s short of breath," said the queen. "Look how he sweats. Hamlet, my darling, come." She went to him and dabbed at his brow with her napkin, then gave it to him so that he could wipe his whole face. At this cameo, Laertes stared and glared. No one was left now in his family to perform this service for him.
Gertrude turned and saw what she was looking for. A gla.s.s of wine. It was Hamlet"s. It stood on a small black wooden table, cold and alone. She picked it up. The king thought she was about to offer it to Hamlet, and he felt a glow of relief. If it came from her hand, the prince would surely drink! Claudius was so close to the solution! Why the young man was here at all instead of lying in two parts in an English graveyard was a mystery for which he had no explanation, but no matter, a sip from the deadly mixture would clear the air of Elsinore. Drink, drink, drink it!
Instead the queen raised the gla.s.s to her lips. "A toast to your good fortune, Hamlet," she said in her thick, luscious voice.
Claudius felt paralysis numbing his feet at the same time as it froze his heart. Nevertheless he managed to half rise from the throne. "Dear Gertrude," he croaked.
She did not hear him.
He saw the arch of her neck as she exposed it to him for the last time. Her beautiful neck, still smooth and unmarked, after all these years. The gla.s.s was at her lips. "Gertrude!" he shouted. It was as though he had shocked her into drinking. He saw the movement of her throat as the foul wine ran down into her stomach to begin its work. She drank enough. More than enough. A sip would have done.
"Yes?" she asked, putting the gla.s.s back on the table and turning toward him.
"Your Majesty, are you all right?" Osric pressed forward.
The king sank back onto his throne. No matter now. Too late, too late.
"Nothing," he muttered. "It is nothing. It is all nothing." Claudius shuddered and wiped his handkerchief over his face. In the s.p.a.ce of a moment, everything had gone irreversibly wrong. His reign was over; his life would probably be forfeit. After all, the ancient curse was on him. He had killed his own brother. In his bowels he had always expected this.
Gertrude shrugged. Her hand still held the cup. She offered it now to the prince. Claudius watched, indifferent. Hamlet would drink or he would not. He would live or he would not. It didn"t seem important anymore. Through the window at the end of the hall, the king saw three swans on the mound above the pond. The shadows of the castle made them look black. He almost smiled. Black swans. The day swans turned black, truly that would be the end of the world.
"I dare not drink yet, madam. In a while." Hamlet pushed his mother away.
"Come, let me wipe your face properly." Her voice was more throaty than ever. There had been a time when Claudius had thrilled to that voice. All through those years while his brother courted and won her and took her, the younger man had been a willing prisoner of her voice. Now Claudius had her, and he thought her voice sounded like the honk of a swan.
She clung to Hamlet, but he tried to push her away again. Claudius became aware that Laertes had somehow drifted to a position near the throne. With everyone watching the mother and son, the young man muttered, "Your Majesty, I could do it now. I"ll hit him now."
Both of them knew of the deadly venom on Laertes" sword. They knew because they had anointed the tip themselves, not much more than half an hour earlier. None but they knew. They were a pretty pair, these two, one intent on power, one on revenge, and both riddled through and through with the most potent force of all, hatred.
"No, no," the king mumbled. "Not now."
"This is not the time to be troubled by conscience," Laertes whispered, as if to himself. "Even so, I am troubled . . ."
But no one heard him say it, so perhaps he did not say it.
They all heard a scornful Hamlet. He had cast his mother away. She staggered, although he had used no force. Now he challenged Laertes. "Come for the third round, Laertes. You are wasting our time. Don"t you take me seriously? Or are you getting nervous?"
"Say you so?" bellowed Laertes. "Come on, then."
He rushed out in a clumsy charge more fitted to a drunk farmer trying to drive a cow into a bail. Hamlet was disconcerted and missed an easy chance for a hit. For a few moments the young men, so graceful and accomplished in the previous round, fought with all the skill of five-year-olds wrestling in a sandpit. They met and grappled and parted again, three times, except that as they parted from the third grappling, both stabbed at each other. They turned to the judge, each hoping he might have nicked the other.
There was a pause, then the judge, an old man named Voltimand, said quietly, "Nothing either way."
Hamlet grimaced and made to step back, to ready himself for the resumption. As he did, Laertes, now chaotic with rage, shouted, "Have at you now," and with a sudden awful stab wounded Hamlet in the arm.
He felt a certain dark relief that the poison was now irreversibly inside the prince"s body. Ophelia could rest in whatever peace she was able to attain, and his father could go to his last destination. But he was unprepared for the immediate outcome. With a roar Hamlet threw himself upon the young man, he who had once been his friend and who, unbeknownst still to Hamlet, had now murdered him.
The two fought furiously and had to be dragged from each other. Hamlet felt a curious buzzing in the head but was not yet slowed by the poison. The moment they were released, both rushed for their rapiers and picked them up.
"You"ve got the wrong ones," called Osric, but neither man took notice. Hamlet heard the words but attached no importance to them. Either sword suited him well enough. Laertes heard the words but did not understand them until a sudden tearing pain burned into his heart. It all happened so quickly. The cut on his chest was nothing, yet it was everything. The pain should have been slight, but it was the bearer of a deeper pain that could not be borne. Laertes dropped to one knee, realizing with awfulness what had happened and now hearing Osric"s words properly. "The wrong sword," he whispered. "The wrong sword."
Osric appeared at his side. "My lord, are you all right?"
"All right? No, Osric, all wrong."
As if through a dense thundercloud, he heard someone call, "Look after the queen. Quick. Something"s wrong."
"She"s fainted."
"Get a doctor."
Laertes looked up and saw Horatio at Hamlet"s side. To his right he saw the queen lying on the floor, surrounded by attendants. He heard Hamlet asking, "The queen? My mother? What is wrong with her?"
From the throne came the king"s frightened voice. He seemed unable to move. "She swoons to see her son bleed."
"My lord, are you all right?" Osric asked again. "What is it? Are you hurt?"
Before Laertes could answer, the queen"s voice, suddenly shrill with fear, cried, "No, no, the drink, oh G.o.d, the drink, it was poisoned. Dear Hamlet, I am poisoned."
Despair filled Laertes. His voice filled the hall, even though he did not seem to speak any louder than usual. "Like a rabbit caught in his own trap, Osric, I am killed with my own treachery." He forced himself to stand. When he did, he found himself confronting Hamlet again.
The prince was struggling to his feet, his face demented. "Let the doors be locked!" Hamlet shouted. "There is villainy here. There is treachery. I will seek it out."
Laertes felt an extraordinary calm. A new strength entered him, to sustain him for the last moments of his life. "You do not have to seek far, Hamlet," he said. "It is here, in me. Hamlet, you are murdered. You have only a few minutes to live. The weapon is in your own hands: the sword you hold is poisoned. It is I who applied the poison to it, and it is fitting that the foul wasp has turned on me and stung me as well. Your mother has sipped poisoned wine, which we also meant for you."
With no warning, all his strength rushed from him. He was staggered by its swiftness. He dropped to his knees. No act in his life took more resolve than the simple raising of his hand to point at the king. "There is your enemy," he said. With a sudden surge, a last expression of the life force, he stood, then in an instant fell forward, lifeless, hitting the hard stone floor with a thud that must have broken every bone in his face.
To see Horatio now was to see love at work. His expression was as demented as Hamlet"s, but he held his friend even as he shouted to the servants to carry out his prince"s orders. "Seal the doors! Let no one leave. Let no one draw a weapon, should he set any value on his life. Hamlet, over here."
He tried to draw Hamlet to a seat, but the prince threw him off easily and staggered to his mother. Hamlet had so much he wanted to explain to her. He wanted to tell her all the reasons for everything he had ever done, everything. But time had lost interest in them both. Time had already turned itself to other affairs. Gertrude had slipped away while the men were shouting, her tortured soul gone to another world where her first husband awaited her and her second was about to join her. Her eyes were closed and her skin cooling. The ladies-in-waiting were starting to step back, to distance themselves. Gertrude had never inspired affection or devotion in other women, and they understood already that their futures lay elsewhere. They had to think of themselves.
Hamlet wanted to shout obscenities at them for their lack of loyalty - they did not love his mother as much as he did, and that was unforgivable - but he knew time would not spare him for such things. All he could hope now was that it would grant him another minute, for the last task of his life, the one he had been charged to do so long ago. His failure to execute it had caused chaos. It had caused tragedy.
Claudius trembled to see him coming. "Guards," he called feebly. "Guards, seize him."
"Let no one move!" bellowed Horatio. He held a rapier in each hand. Feet apart, he faced the guards. "Move, and I"ll skewer you."
No one moved, and Claudius watched the terrible specter come at him. Hamlet"s face appeared to be all stubble and eyes, not gray anymore, but white, with no discernible pupils. He was relentless. A rapier appeared as if by magic in his hand, and Claudius found enough spirit to stand. The sword ran him through. A cold line went through him from front to back, and the king understood that nothing would ever be the same again. The line ignited and turned to fire inside him, an awful fire that burned everywhere and could not be put out. "Guards," he whispered, "guards, I am not yet dead. I might yet live. Put a stop to this. Stop him."
No one responded.
"Not yet dead?" the ghastly apparition screeched at him. "Then try this." The prince"s hand was at his face; the back of the hand hit him and it hurt; how it hurt; didn"t the prince realize he was hurting him? He should stop. Claudius"s mouth was forced open and cold wine was splashing inside him. Perhaps it could put out the fire. Perhaps this was love. The king drank eagerly. Yes, it was working. The fire was going out; the furnace in his stomach was becoming cold. The wine turned into a snake and crawled down into its hole and wrapped itself around the hot bear that now lived in his bowels; it was a desert and ice rolled across it and all turned to ice it became a cave the blackest cave Claudius had ever been in too black nothing could be this black or this cold and the king"s eyes rolled back in his head and he died.