The Prince and the Bard
Evette Louise
For us and for our tragedy,
Here stooping to your clemency,
We beg your hearing patiently.
Hamlet paces, distraught. Not two months past his father dead, and now his mother married? To his uncle? And now, his good friend Horatio tells of how he and two soldiers have seen his father walk again in the dead of sable night.
"I knew your father; these hands are not more like," the good scholar finishes his tale.
"But where was this?" Hamlet inquires.
"My lord, upon the platform where we watch." Marcellus, a soldier and friend answers.
"Did you not speak to it?" Hamlet asks. It seems obvious to have attempted so.
"My lord, I did, but answer made it none. Yet once methought it lifted up its head and did address itself to motion, like as it would speak; but even then the morning cock crew loud, and at the sound it shrunk in haste away and vanished from our sight." Horatio says again.
"'Tis very strange."
"As I do live, my honored lord, 'tis true. And we did think it writ down in our duty to let you know of it." Hamlet nods.
"Indeed, sirs, but this troubles me. Hold you the watch tonight?"
"We do, my lord," the men all answer, all, and another - there is a fourth voice! Hamlet studies his company more closely; yes, there is indeed a fourth man. He is tall and stately; not old, but not young either, yet his hairline had already receded to his ears. He smiles. Hamlet has no recognition of such a man.
"Hold, now, who are you?" the prince asks the stranger.
"Simply a bard, my lord," the man replies.
"How do I not know thee?"
"I am but a recent addition to your lordship's service," the bard explains. "I did hap upon the apparition yesternight, aye, but I know not if it were thy father - I had never known the man. And I doubt that my companions are sure of their sight as well, although them I know naught of either."
"I am sure good Horatio knows what he speaks."
"Nevertheless, no harm is done in making certain." Hamlet sees the wisdom in these words and turns to look at the other three men. The only three men. For some reason the prince finds himself doubting their word. They may have been mistaken. They did not know his father like he did. He began to question them.
"Armed, say you?"
"Armed, my lord."
"From top to toe?"
"My lord, from head to foot."
"Then saw you not his face?"
"O, yes, my lord, he wore his beaver up." Horatio confirms by his own. The conversation becomes exclusive.
"What, looked he frowningly?"
"A countenance more in sorrow than in anger."
"Pale or red?"
"Nay, very pale."
"And fixed his eyes upon you?"
"Most constantly."
"I would I had been there."
"It would have much amazed you."
"Very like. Stayed it long?"
"While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred."
"Longer, longer," the soldiers argue. Horatio turns to them.
"Not when I saw't."
"His beard was grizzled, no?" Hamlet asks again, reclaiming Horatio's attention.
"It was as I have seen it in his life, a sable silvered." The myth was confirmed: it had to be his father. Or, at the very least, it was worth a look into. He ponders a moment as to why he even thought to doubt Horatio's story in the first place.
"I will watch tonight," the prince decides aloud. "Perchance 'twill walk again."
Polonius paces in his sitting room, relaying several instructions to his servant Reynaldo concerning his son's doings in Paris. A boy of Laertes's age could not be trusted to run free just yet; sending Reynaldo as an espial was simply a measure of fatherly concern.
"Marry, sir, here's my drift, and I believe it is a fetch of wit. You, laying these slight sullies on my son, as 'twere a thing a little soiled i' th' working, mark you, your party in converse, him you would sound, having ever seen in the prenominate crimes the youth you breathe of guilty, be assured he closes with you in this consequence: 'good sir,' or so, or 'friend,' or gentleman,' according to the phrase or the addition of man and country -"
"Very good, my lord," Reynaldo interrupts. Polonius, slightly flustered, continues on.
"And then, sir, he does this, he does-"
"Oi, Polonius!" a voice interrupts. Polonius turns to look. A man had called to him; on sight of the intruder, Polonius seems to recall that he is the king's bard. "How badly would thou be injured if thy speech were some portion shorter? Make haste to the end of it!" Polonius thinks this rather rude and returns his attention to his servant, ready to continue. He finds his mind to be blank.
"What was I about to say? By the Mass, I was about to say something. Where did I leave?"
"At 'closes in the consequence,' at 'friend, or so, and gentleman.'"
"At 'closes in the consequence' - ay, marry -" and so on proceeds he to lecture his plan to his servant, the speech of which, he mentally notes, takes far less time than had been expected.
Hamlet's life seems to brighten, if only a moment. His childhood friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, are return to Denmark. It is a shame, he thinks, that he can not be himself; he must not drop act for even a moment, even if they are his best friends. Some relaxed conversation, a little bit of pretend madness, and of course, dirty jokes, leaving off at the "fact" that the prince could not reason.
"We'll wait upon you," they offer. Hamlet is shocked at the proposal.
"No such matter," he protests. "I will not sort you with the rest of my servants, for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?"
"To visit you, my lord, no other occasion." Rosencrantz answers with a smile.
"Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you, and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny."
"My lord," a voice whispers in Hamlet's ear. The prince turns to find the bard standing behind him, his head over the prince's soldier.
"Yes?" Hamlet bites back.
"I just thought it my duty to alert you. The king had sent for these men to come to you."
"Wherefore?"
"They are your uncle's spies, my lord."
"What?!" He jerked his head back towards his friends. He forgets what he is going to say. Something confuses him: Rosencrantz said there was no occasion. Hamlet remembers hearing otherwise, though when and from whom he has no recollection. "Were you not sent for?" he asks. The friends' faces fall and blanch. Guilty. "Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation?" They avert their eyes; they do not want to tell the truth. "Come, come, deal justly with me. Come, come; nay, speak."
"What should we say, my lord?" Guildenstern stammers. Anger rises hot in Hamlet's chest.
"Anything but to th' purpose. You were sent for, and there is a kind of confession in your looks which your modesties have not craft enough to color. I know the king and queen have sent for you." The conversation continues. Hamlet pushes his friends into confession. Now he knows well that there is not one soul of Earth that he can trust.
Hamlet paces the empty hall in a fury. Anger directed at only himself taunts him mercilessly. To think: a player can move himself to tears with imagined grief - and Hamlet must not say a word to anyone! He strides through the hall, ranting to himself, certainly appearing mad to anyone watching. No one is.
"Oh vengeance!" he screams into the air. "Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave. That I, the son of a dear father murdered, must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words and fall a-cursing like a very drab, a scullion! Fie upon it! Foh!" He falls to the ground in his rage. Tears threaten to stream forth from his eyes, and some do o'erflow his eyelids' dams. He sits a while, sniveling.
"My lord," a voice murmurs. Hamlet jumps to his feet; his attention drawn to the intruder. 'Twas again the bard. "What troubles you?"
"What business is it of yours?" Hamlet snaps; hiding sadness with anger. "Who do you believe yourself to be, that you can interrupt my thoughts and hope to be made privy to such matters that do not concern you?"
"I am simply the Bard, my lord," the mysterious man replies.
"No," Hamlet opposes. "No. You appear, and you suggest, and yet as soon as my attention turns, you vanish from substance and memory; and I, left behind, am left with nothing but the will to complete your commands. What power is this? And how dost thou come by it?"
"It is of little import, my lord. However, I shall confide in thee thus: I come only as an aid to your lordship - I offer the advice of my years, and I'll swear to any swear thou couldst dream that I am not an agent of the king. And, as it is known in my experience, as I am not quite a young man, that words spoken from the stage have an inherent power to make men weep, or cry with joy. And that this power could draw forth such confessions from the guilty that could never have come out of their own accord."
"Why inform me thus?"
"You have doubtless faith in the spirit's words. But how may you make certain that it was indeed your father's? For surely your grief has left you open to the barbs of Satan, and surely that devil, being as frugal as a devil, would take such weakness for advantage."
"By God... could it mean to damn me in ruse of just cause?"
"Perchance may be so. But, as I have said, words in a play are words of power."
"The play's the thing..." Hamlet murmurs. He turns about. The conversation forgotten, he returns to his misery. A new and welcome idea emerges. "About my brains! - Hum, I have heard that guilty creatures sitting at a play have, by the very cunning of the scene, been struck so to the soul that presently they have proclaimed their malefactions. For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak with most miraculous organ. I'll have these players play something like the murder of my father before mine uncle. I'll observe his looks; I'll tent him to the quick. If he do but blench, I know my course. The spirit that I have seen may be a devil, and the devil hath the power t' assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps, out of my weakness and my melancholy, as he is very potent with such spirits, abuses me to damn me. I'll have grounds more relative than this. The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King."
"To be or not to be - that is the question: whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles and, by opposing, end them." Hamlet removes his dagger from its lair, and studies its blade with both longing of rest and the fear inherently joined to such objects of death. "To die, to sleep - no more- and by a sleep to say we end the heartache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to- 'tis a consummation devoutly to be wished." His mind quieted, his will convinced, he raises the dagger to his throat and pauses - offering silent prayer to his God.
"My lord! Prithee desist!" a voice behind cries out. Hamlet whips around and lashes out with his dagger at the words' owner. 'Tis only the Bard. The blade must nearly have missed; for no blood was seen nor resistance felt.
"Faith! I should've slain thee!" Hamlet chides. "And 'twould serve thee rightly, to ambush such madness!"
"Art thou truly mad?" the Bard questions, a playful spark dancing in his eye. "I had believed it were but the shadow of madness."
"'Twas intended to be so," Hamlet answers, defeated, "but the shadow doth gain some substance, or, perhaps, begin to catalyse the removal of the substance of my wit. Truly I fear it. And truly I would end it!" He returns the dagger's point to its place aside his breath's passage.
"Nay! Do not behave so rashly my lord!" the Bard insists. "Pray, think a while first. Who would avenge thy father?"
"Not myself! I am weary of revenge; it drives me from sanity. I desire peace and rest. I desire immortal sleep."
"Perhaps," the Bard agrees. "But, with sleep often do dreams come. And the dreams of death could never be awakened from, no matter how torturous. What if thou dreams a life that is more burdensome than this? Sleep is not rest if such visions plague it." Hamlet relaxes. He drops his weapon to his side.
"Who are you," he wonders again, "with wisdom so infinite and power so great? Thou art not simply a bard."
"This may be revealed to you in time. But for now I must take my leave." Yet still the Bard stood, until Hamlet once again twists his head around, and loses the knowledge once more.
"To die, to sleep -" he continues to himself, "to sleep, perhaps to dream. Ay, there's the rub, for in that sleep of death what dreams may come, when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause. There's the respect that makes calamity of so long life. For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, th' oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, the pangs of despised love, the law's delay, the insolence of office and the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes, when he himself might his quietus make with a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that the dread of something after death, the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns, puzzles the will and makes us rather bear the ills we have than fly to others we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, and thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, and enterprises of great pitch and moment with this regard their currents turn awry and lose the name of action." Hamlet hears footsteps approach him. He returns himself to the world. Ophelia walks close, reading on a book, taking no notice of the prince. "Soft you now, the fair Ophelia." He approaches her to speak with her. His speech is saddened. "Nymph," he calls her, "in thy orisons be all my sins remembered." She looks up from her volume.
"Good my lord," she greets him with a gentle smile, "How does your Honor for this many a day?"
"I humbly thank you, well."
"My lord," she offers nervously, "My lord, I have remembrances of yours that I have longèd long to redeliver. I pray you now receive them." She holds out to him the letters of love he himself had wrote. Act as if you are mad! his mind reminds him.
"No, not I," he answers with only half his heart. "I never gave you aught." Her face changes; he sees a pang of grief - her distress over his madness.
"My lord, you know right well you did, and with them words of so sweet breath composed as made the things more rich." Her eyes showed her heart; that she craves to fall into his arms again. Something holds her back. "Their perfume lost, take these again, for to the noble mind rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. There, my lord." He takes the letters from her hands, dazed. What had he done to prove unkind?
"Hamlet," a voice calls again. Hamlet turns and sees the Bard in his original position, as if he had never left. "You see that her behavior is curious. Are you sure you can trust even her?"
"No," Hamlet insists. "No. Don't you dare. She is not a spy, she has proclaimed her love to me time and again!"
"As did your mother to your father." Hamlet's fists clench. "I assure you, it is not of her own choosing. Her father hath placed her up to this act, and you know full well how he is."
"Has the whole of creation turned against me?" the prince wails. "Will the earth now swallow me up, the air forsake my lungs, the flowing water o'erthrow its banks to sweep me away that Ophelia forsakes me?"
"Trust naught and doubt all," the Bard advises. "Then thy uncle's forces cannot o'ertake thee."
"Even Ophelia..." Hamlet mutters. His anger turns on the Bard. "I hate you!" And with that, he returns to Ophelia. He remembers only what he must do, and it is the most painful yet to fall, and the most painful of all yet to come.
Claudius sits at the play his nephew had called to be performed. Truthfully, the speeches were far too prolix. Now he sees the character of the king sleeping in a chair. The king glances through the audience to see that Hamlet directs a mad, unsettling stare not at the play, but at Claudius the king. Movement from the stage: another character slinks on, dressed all in black. Hamlet breaks from his stare to converse a while with Ophelia.
"Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing," the character announces from the stage, "confederate season, else no creature seeing, thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, with Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected, thy natural magic and dire property on wholesome life usurp immediately." The player acts pouring the toxin into the king's ears. The scene is strangely familiar...
"He poisons him i' th' garden for his estate," Hamlet cries. "His name's Gonzago. The story is extant and written in choice shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago's wife." Hamlet returns his watch of the king ever more intently.
"Your honor," a voice whispers urgently in Claudius's ear. The king turns to see a bard standing there. "Young Hamlet had written a piece of this scene. He must know of the murder you have committed in secret!" Claudius stands angrily. Suddenly everything is forgotten. What was he going to say? His jump sends the room into chaos. The audience looks about confused.
"The King rises," Ophelia tells Hamlet. He smiles to the king with wicked madness.
"What," he shouts triumphantly, "Frighted with false fire?"
"How fares my lord?" Gertrude turns to her husband, laying a concerned hand upon his arm.
"Give o'er the play," Polonius commands. The players flee the stage.
"Give me some light," the king requests from his haze. "Away!" He heads for his chamber to escape the confusion.
I must kill Claudius. Hamlet's directive echos through his mind as he wanders the dark corridors of his father's castle. His own castle, rightfully. He stumbles into the chapel and catches himself at the sight of his uncle; alone, kneeling and praying, but, and most of all, venerable.
"Now I might do it," the prince whispers. "now he is a-praying, and now I'll do it." He draws his sword, and makes to stab the king when lo! in the reflection of the blade - the Bard! Or the man who calls hisself so. Hamlet turns his blade on the intruder. "Who art thou?!" he demands. The strange man smiles, but voices naught. "Speak! I charge thee! And let thy speech be just, lest my point find passage through thy heart!" The man chuckles.
"You cannot wound me here, Hamlet. This world is not mine, though I stand in't," he finally speaks.
"You say 'tis so, yet I have doubt of it," the prince replies.
"Then I bid thee try thy doubts, as one always should." Hamlet strikes, but the sword plunges straight through - no blood is drawn, and the stranger recoils not - doesn't even wince! Hamlet withdraws his sword and claims defeat.
"Tell me who you are," he says, this time an ask and not an order.
"My title is of scant import. But look you now - your uncle, praying; his soul a clean slate. And think - to kill him now would but begin a peaceful passage to paradise. This is not vengeance! Wherefore would you not wait, and in doing so ensure his damnation? Look to it now!" Hamlet turns to his uncle. Suddenly his mind is blank. He is in the chapel... now his thoughts return. I must kill Claudius.
"Now I might do it pat, now he is a-praying, and now I'll do it." He raises his sword to strike. Something stays his hand. "And so he goes to heaven, and so am I revenged. That would be scanned: a villain kills my father, and for that I, his sole son, do this same villain send to heaven."
Hamlet stalks into his mother's chamber. "Now, mother, what's the matter?" he spits.
"Hamlet," she scolds him, "thou hast thy father much offended."
"Mother, you have my father much offended."
"Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue."
"Go, go, you answer with a wicked tongue."
"Why, how now, Hamlet?"
"What's the matter now?"
"Have you forgot me?"
"No, by the rood, not so. You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife, and (would it were not so) you are my mother."
"Nay, then I'll set those to you that can speak." Hamlet rushes at his mother, grabbing her shoulders. He drags her to a chair and sits her down firmly. He releases his hands. She clings to the chair, terrified. He circles her like a lion.
"Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge. You go not till I set you up a glass where you may see the inmost part of you." He comes to a stop in front of her.
"What wilt thou do? Thou wilt not murder me?" She glances towards the curtains "Help! Ho!"
"What ho! Help!" A voice shouted from behind the curtains. Hamlet looks to them and sees the Bard.
"Is it the king?" he asks frantically.
"I confess, I do not know. But it may be." Lost in rage, he draws his rapier.
"How now, a rat? Dead for a ducat, dead." He thrusts the blade through the curtains and sees them bleed red.
"O, I am slain!" they cry.
"O me," the queen wails, turning Hamlet to her, "what hast thou done?"
"Nay, I know not," Hamlet answers truthfully. "Is it the King?" He removes his bleeding sword and rolls back the curtains. The body falls forward. It is Polonius.
"O, what a rash and bloody deed this is!"
"A bloody deed - almost as bad, good mother, as kill a king and marry with his brother."
"As kill a king?"
"Ay, lady, it was my word." Hamlet takes the body and pulls to where it can be seen. "Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell. I took thee for thy better. Take thy fortune. Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger." He looks to his mother again. "Leave the ringing of your hands. Peace, sit you down, and let me wring your heart; for so I shall if it be made of penetrable stuff, if damnèd custom have not brazed it so that it be proof and bulwark against sense."
Hamlet sleeps, and Hamlet dreams. He is caught in chains. The metal twists and entangles, prohibiting his breath. The manacles cut deep into his flesh. And all the while his uncle gloats over him with wickedness burning in his eyes...
Hamlet awakens and sits up immediately. His breath is heavy. He is not bound in chains as the dream supposed; he is in his bed. In his cabin. On the ship to England. Knowing he will be unable to return to his rest, he leaves the bed to walk the deck. The gentle sound of the waves lapping against the hull soothes his spirit, as did the cool midnight air, and the moon's mellow smile from above. During his pacing, he discovers a lone man staring off the port rail into the sea. He approaches the yet unknown soul.
"There now, sir," he greets the man, "how does thy lonesomeness on this fine afternoon?" The man turns to him with a crafty smile. The Bard again.
"Faith, my lord, I am doing quite well. I would ask of you, but I would guess thy sleep escapes thee, does it not?"
"By the Mass, it's you again," Hamlet retorts.
"This is hardly the manner to greet a good friend."
"You are hardly a friend, and never a good one. What would thou have with me this time?"
"Well, as it may be known to you, your two schoolfellows came aboard with a letter from the king to that of England. Art thou not curious as to what it contains?"
"I have no choice but to be what thou wouldst design. However such curiosity can never be satisfied - Rosencrantz holds the word to his heart even at rest. 'Twould be foolish to attempt to free it."
"Have you anything to lose? Your very household sends you away with glee. The risk could never be great enough to outweigh the prize."
"As you wish," the prince snips. "But, prithee go with me! I would not have you leave my sight again so I forget my purpose!" The Bard gave a short, smirking laugh. "What?" Hamlet demands.
"Just to think - how quickly you've gone from attempting on my life to wishing 'Thou must never leave my sight!'"
"I never said I loved thee!" Hamlet insists. "And I call thee friend only as thou art not foe."
"What have I done to injure thee so?"
"Above all else, you made me scorn Ophelia. You made me scrape off her fair heart into the dust. And for that I can never forgive thee. But, nay, come. We have no time to recall past injuries." They both turn and walk together. "Would that I could know your name."
"Why wouldst thou think it import to know, my lord?"
"I feel it injust that you may call me by name whilst I am left to call you by title."
"Fair enough. It is William, my lord."
"Ah, will and protection, though perhaps not the will to protect."
"What would make you think so?"
"You didn't protect Polonius."
"How could I have? I'm not entirely physical here. The only thing my jumping out in front would have accomplished would be my getting run through. Again."
"Soft you now - we've arrived." Hamlet gently creaks open the door to his old friends' cabin. He spots Rosencrantz asleep on the covers, the letter held under one hand. He sees William sneak over to the side of the cot. The man produces a feather from his pocket and tickles the sleeper's nose with it. Rosencrantz's hand moves off of the paper for a moment to scratch, and while it is engaged Hamlet takes the letter from underneath it. He motions to the Bard, and they both steal away to Hamlet's cabin snickering to themselves. Hamlet carefully opens the envelope and reads. It is a royal knavery - an exact command, larded with many several sorts of reasons importing Denmark's health and England's too, with such bugs and goblins on Hamlet's life that on the supervise, no leisure bated, no, not to stay the grinding of the ax, his head should be struck off. Hamlet lowers the order from his eyes, horrified and enraged.
"They will to murder me? My good friends! Or, they were thought so. But this! How mean they to do this? No matter. The command will not come to pass, at least not the way it was commanded." Hamlet grabs a sheet of paper, as well as a quill and ink. He writes in his best, most clerical handwriting essentially the same letter, but instead of citing himself for execution he places his once-friends in his stead. England would strike their heads off, not his own. This good counterfeit was completed by a flawless copy of his uncle's signature. "Hold, now," he interrupts himself. "How shall I seal it?" He looks to the Bard.
"Oh!" William jumps. "It would seem you have use for me again. I would happen to your father's signet ring with me. It is modeled after the seal of Denmark." He drops the ring onto the desk where Hamlet writes. The prince smiles.
"Thank you, good sir. You may take your leave of me know; I will know what to do, and if I don't I'll figure it out." He seals the forged letter and places the original inside the pocket of his coat for the next day. The Bard leaves; Hamlet forgets everything except what he has done and what he is to do. He completes his task and returns to bed. His sleep is sound and undisturbed.
As Laertes makes his leave from Paris, he is stopped by a shadowy man in a long black coat. The man claims to be a doctor; claims he carries a potion of life everlasting. Laertes is no fool; there is no such thing, and if there were, he fain would have knowledge of it previously. As he rejects the mountebank his business, another man confronts him with advice.
"Perhaps the purchase would not be so unwise," he suggests.
"But sir," Laertes protests, "surely it is a vile contagion - it would mean death to any who were to consume it!"
"Indeed. And such poisons have their place."
"Not in my usage."
"Really? For I have heard that the good lord Polonius is slain in the court of Denmark."
"What? Slain how?"
"By some villainous relation of the King." Laertes turns back to the mountebank. He forgets the other stranger. He buys a vial of the toxin. He has a bizarre feeling he will need it.
A problem and a solution in quick succession: Hamlet has somehow escaped his doom at England and bids to return, while Laertes returns from France seeking vengeance for his father's murder. Vengeance that Claudius now offers him. The king tells Laertes how he plans to stage a duel between the two young men; Hamlet with a blunted sword, while Laertes's weapon is unbated.
"I will do 't, and for that purpose I'll anoint my sword. I bought an unction of a mountebank so mortal that, but dip a knife in it, where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare, collected from all the simples that have virtue under the moon, can save the thing from death that is but scratched withal. I'll touch my point with this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly, it may be death." Claudius is satisfied in this answer. This plan could not fail. The king feels a tap on his shoulder and turns. The bard that warned him of his nephew's plot.
"Ah, good sir," the King greets. "You were the man who hath alerted me of my nephew's danger. For that I give thee much thanks. What news now? What have you to say?"
"My lord, I could not hinder myself from overhearing your Highness's plotting. I would interrupt that I may put my own piece into the plan."
"Speak, I shall not inhibit thee."
"Perchance Laertes would fail his task, how would Hamlet be disposed of? The maneuver is clever indeed, but nothing can ever be flawless."
"Wisely put. What wouldst thou suggest?"
"Fencing is such heavy exercise - if you were to offer young Hamlet a glass during the match, I doubt he'd refuse it. You may also poison him that way, in event of his escape from Laertes's point."
"Excellent idea! I shall suggest it at once." The king returns his gaze to Laertes. All is forgotten. Oh - that's right! They need a second plan to back the first. "Let's further think of this, weigh what convenience of both time and means may fit us to our shape. If this should fail, and that our drift look through our bad performance, 'twere better not assayed. Therefore this project should have a back or second that might hold if this did blast in proof. Soft, let me see. We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings - I ha 't! When in your motion you are hot and dry (as make the bouts more violent to that end) and that he calls for drink, I'll have prepared him a chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping, if he by chance escape your venomed stuck, our purpose may hold there."
Hamlet had returned to Denmark and is telling his good friend Horatio about his adventure on the sea. After several thrilling (and partially true) tales of his exploits as a pirate, he begins to delve into the day before, which was of utmost importance as well.
"So much for this, sir. Now shall you see the other. You do remember all the circumstance?"
"Remember it, my lord!"
"Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting that would not let me sleep. Methought I lay worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly - and praised be rashness for it: let us know, our indiscretion sometimes serves us well when our deep plots do pall;" the prince catches sight of the smiling and winking William the Bard and holds it, "and that should learn us there's a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will-"
"That is most certain," Horatio interrupts. Hamlet returns to his friend and to his story, his last few words forgotten.
"Up from my cabin, my sea-gown scarfed about me, in the dark groped I to find out them; had my desire, fingered their packet, and in fine withdrew to mine own room again, making so bold (my fears forgetting manners) to unfold their grand commission; where I found, Horatio, a royal knavery - an exact command, larded with many several sorts of reasons importing Denmark's health and England's too, with such bugs and goblins in my life, that on the supervise, no leisure bated, no, not to stay the grinding of the ax, my head should be struck off."
"Is 't possible?" Horatio questions in disbelief.
"Here's the commission," Hamlet replies tartly, handing him the letter. "Read it at more leisure." Horatio studies the document a few minutes. "But wilt thou hear now how I did proceed?" Hamlet offers.
"I beseech you," his friend begs. Hamlet rambles on then into the tale of how he replaced the letter with a false one, knowing full well that if Rosencrantz and Guildenstern yet live, it is but to die.
After returning to the castle yet living (much to his uncle's displeasure, which then added pleasure onto him), Hamlet and Horatio learn of a wager the king had placed on Hamlet's skills against the returned Laertes. Hamlet agrees confidently. After all, the last few months of piracy left Hamlet much in the practice of swordplay.
"You will lose, my lord," Horatio worries. The scholar is as uncertain as his friend is opposite.
"I do not think so. Since he went to France, I have been in continual practice."
"Horatio's right," the Bard's voice interrupts. Hamlet turns and looks.
"Hold off now, Will; no need to spoil the ending," the prince snips back. "Mary, I ought to know my own ability. And even if I were to lose, the king's possessions are worth nothing to me. Or to him either, if I have my way in his hasteful end."
"That's not all I fear for. Claudius hath already taken one attempt on thy life. Another would likely be soon to follow the first's failure. And another after that."
"His life or mine, than. He lives and I die, or he dies and I live. That is to say, assuming we do not both die together, but even then I am appeased."
"You do not fear foul play, then? You do not fear for your own life?"
"The tree of life holds no fruit for me. Ophelia dead; my closest friends vile traitors, my father passed. Even thought of the throne grows stale in my mind. I will duel; let thy will be done, William." Hamlet returns to Horatio. "I shall win at the odds; but thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart," he tells his one friend somberly. "But it is no matter."
"Nay, my good lord-" Horatio protests.
"It is but foolery," the prince assures, "but it is such a kind of gaingiving as would perhaps trouble a woman."
"If your mind dislike anything, obey it. I will forestall their repair hither and say you are not fit."
"Not a whit. We defy augury. There is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it not be now, yet it will come. The readiness is all. Since no man of aught he leaves knows, what is 't to leave betimes? Let be." And so Hamlet goes to the duel that will derive his fate.
After a much owed apology to Laertes, the duel begins. The men leap at each other; Laertes fights for his father, Hamlet fights for his life. Hamlet manages to land a hit on his opponent.
"One," he shouts triumphantly.
"No," Laertes argues back.
"Judgement!" Hamlet calls to Osric, the appointed appraiser.
"A hit," he decides, "a very palpable hit." Hamlet punches the air in celebration.
"Well, again," Laertes challenges, and makes to attack. The king bars his way with an arm.
"Stay," he says, "give me drink." A servant brings a large goblet to the king. As if he were thirsty! Hamlet scoffs in his mind. The king pulls a large, shimmering pearl from his garment. "Hamlet," he tells his heir, "this pearl is thine. Here's to thy health." He drinks from the glass and drops the pearl inside. He motions to his servant. "Give him the cup." The servant approaches. Hamlet is sultring and dry; ready and willing to accept Claudius's offering.
"Oh, come now!" he hears. He looks to his side to see the Bard. "You've only played one course! You can't be that thirsty. Play one more!" Hamlet scowls at the man.
"If there be a way to kill you," he growls, "pray I do not find it!" He turns back to the servant. Suddenly he is not so parched. "I'll play this bout first," he says. "Set it by awhile." He looks to his opponent. "Come," he offers. They play.
How quickly things turn sour. Gertrude poisoned, Laertes slain. Hamlet himself now dying, comforted only in that his charge is met: Claudius is breathless as well. The toxin from his sword whirrs through his blood, pain in everything it touches. He sits on the floor, unable to stand. Horatio stands horrified over him.
"I am dead, Horatio," Hamlet tells the survivor. "Wretched queen, adieu. - You that look pale and tremble at this chance, that are but mutes or audience to this act, had I but time (as this fell sergeant, Death, is strict in his arrest), O, I could tell you - but let it be. - Horatio, I am dead." He turns his head forward, and the man called William is standing there in front. "So I die," the prince informs the Bard. "But not yet - not whilst I gaze upon you."
"What would have you believe 't?"
"Time comes to a halt while I talk to thee, does it not? I think of it now: in the chapel. Claudius should rightfully have heard my shouting but he did not. So here I lie, dying but not yet dead." A sharp pang in his stomach forces the prince to pause. "You never did tell me your true brand."
"Now, now, you really must know?"
"Come, come," Hamlet says with a pained smile. "Your secrets are safe among the dead. Out with it."
"I am properly known to men as... William Shakespeare." Hamlet's eyes widen.
"Shakespeare..." he repeats. "You're a playwright! This is a play!" He makes to stand and charge at the man, but his anguish soon brings him howling to his seat again. "I am dying for the pleasure of an audience!"
"Not simply for their pleasure," Shakespeare corrects, "For their own good. You teach them the dangers in being rash; that is is better to be sure than wrong. That nothing is ever certain."
"That's not matter enough to die for."
"But you never die - not truly. You and I are immortals. We live in the hearts and minds of the masses, and endure in memory for centuries past our time."
"But I still die! I feel it! This world goes on beyond me. Who will care for Denmark in my place? Who is left?"
"There's always Fortinbras."
"What claim has he to the throne?"
"I'll work something out. But look you now to your loyal friend, Horatio. See the pain in his heart at your loss. He is desperate for your fate. Speak to him. Someone must survive to tell your cause." Hamlet returns to his friend.
"Horatio, I am dead," he tells the survivor. "Thou livest; report me and my cause aright to the unsatisfied."
"Never believe it," Horatio denies. "I am more an antique Roman than a Dane. Here's yet some liquor left." He picks up the poison goblet and gazes inside. Hamlet lunges at it.
"As thou 'rt a man, give me the cup. By heaven, I'll ha 't. O God, Horatio, what a wounded name, things standing thus unknown, shall I leave behind me! If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, absent thee from felicity awhile and in this harsh world draw breath in pain to tell my story." Horatio drops the cup, which falls clanging to the ground. Marching is heard afar off, and shots from within the castle. "What warlike noise is this?" Osric rushes in short of breath.
"Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from poland, to th' ambassadors of England gives this warlike volley." Another sharp fire ripples through Hamlet's stomach.
"O, I die, Horatio!" he cries out. "The potent poison quite o'ercrows my spirit. I cannot live to hear the news from England. But I do prophesy th' election lights on Fortinbras; he has my dying voice. So tell him, with th' occurrents, more and less, which have solicited - the rest is silence." The prince cries out in pain four times before falling forever. The sound of the room leaves him, and then the light, and then the life.
Fortinbras marches into the hall of Denmark's castle to be met with a gruesome surprise: four bodies and only one survivor.
"Where is this sight?" he asks in shock.
"What is it you would see?" the lone survivor wonders. "If aught of woe or wonder, cease your search."
"This quarry cries on havoc. O proud Death, what feast is toward in thine eternal cell that thou so many princes at a shot so bloodily hast struck?" Suddenly his sight catches on another man. Not waiting for an answer, he addresses the other man immediately. "Soft now, who are you?"
"I am just the bard, my lord, and witness to these bloody events. 'Tis a shame: not only the deaths, but that Denmark is left uncrowned. Hamlet has left us no heir. Although, now that I think on 't, he did make certain to mention your name..."
"My name? Are you certain?"
"Either yours or that of your father long dead. And as I recall, your father's father's brother's wife's mother's daughter's son's father-in-law's uncle had a sister who was the mother of the wife of King Hamlet's sister. Thereby, I believe you may have some claim to the throne."
"Ay, you are correct. It seems I am most fortunate. I shall make my claim presently."
"Oh yes, that would be most wonderful." The bard makes to leave. He changes his mind presently. "Oh, and prithee feign sorrow if you feel none. Four good people have left us presently." Fortinbras nods his head in agreement. The bard takes his leave. Fortinbras's mind returns to present: the ambassador from England gives his news. The sole survivor accepts it, and offers the story of events in return.
"Let us haste to hear it and call the noblest to the audience. For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune. I have some rights of memory to this kingdom, which now to claim my vantage doth invite me." The survivor agrees. A military funeral for the prince is ordered.
And thus it ends.