The Bawdy Basket Read Free Page B

sunshine were zealous customers, their numbers swelled by the arrival of the actors. The atmosphere was convivial, the noise increasingly deafening. Quilter squeezed into a place on the oak settle between Hoode and James Ingram, one of the younger sharers. He felt accepted again. He was one of them. His mind was still preoccupied with the fate of his father but he was grateful that he had elected to join the other actors. They were his family now.
    Edmund Hoode did not linger. After finishing his drink, he made his apologies and rose to leave. Elias tried to persuade him to stay.
    ‘Toast your success, Edmund,’ he urged. ‘
Hannibal
was a triumph.’
    ‘Thanks to my fellows,’ said Hoode modestly. ‘Plays are nothing but words on a blank page. Only actors can breathe life into them.’
    ‘You are an actor yourself, remember. You took your part.’
    ‘And I was happy with the result, Owen. But now, I must leave you.’
    ‘When the carousing has not yet begun?’ asked Ingram.
    ‘Yes, James. I have an appointment elsewhere.’
    ‘An assignation, more like,’ said Elias, nudging his companion. ‘Who is she, Edmund? Only a beautiful woman could tear you away from us. What is the divine creature called?’
    Hoode smiled. ‘Thalia,’ he confessed.
    ‘A bewitching name for a mistress.’
    ‘She occupies my brain rather than my bed, Owen,’ explained the playwright. ‘Thalia is the muse of comedy and idyllic poetry. It is to her that I fly.’
    Brushing aside their entreaties to stay, Hoode made his way to the door.
    ‘Is Edmund at work on a new play?’ wondered Quilter.
    ‘Yes,’ replied Ingram. ‘He is contracted to write a number of new pieces for us each year, as well as to keep old material in repair. Truly, he is a marvel. No author in London is as prolific. Words seem to flow effortlessly from his pen.’
    ‘It’s one of the reason I sought to join Westfield’s Men. Your stock of plays outshines all others. Banbury’s Men had no Edmund Hoode to supply fresh work of such a high standard.’
    Gill flicked a supercilious hand. ‘It has no Barnaby Gill either.’
    ‘Then fortune has favoured them,’ said Elias waspishly.
    ‘I suspect that this latest play of Edmund’s is something of note,’ said Ingram. ‘He has been working on it for weeks and has shunned our fellowship many times.’
    ‘What can it be that it absorbs him so completely?’ wondered Quilter.
    Elias looked up. ‘Here’s the very man to tell us,’ he said, seeing Nicholas Bracewell pushing his way through the crowd. ‘Come, Nick. There’s room on the settle for you, and George can sit on my knee.’
    George Dart recoiled at the suggestion, even though it was made in fun. As the smallest, youngest and least experienced member of Westfield’s Men, the assistant stagekeeper had become its familiar whipping boy. He was a willing labourer. While the actors were relaxing in the taproom, Dart had been busy. Under Nicholas’s supervision, he had helped to put away the costumes and properties, and clear the stage of its scenic devices before dismantling it. The oak boards on which Hannibal had trod were put away with the barrels that had supported them. Trotting at the heels of his master, Dart had accompanied Nicholas when he paid the rent to Sybil Marwood and enquired after her husband’s health. Only now could the two of them join their fellows in the taproom.
    Nicholas took the place vacated by Hoode and Dart found a corner of a bench on which he could perch. Drink was ordered for the newcomers. After the usual badinage, Elias returned to his theme.
    ‘What is this new play that Edmund is writing for us?’
    ‘He will not tell us, Owen,’ said Nicholas.
    ‘Is it comedy, tragedy or history?’
    ‘A mixture of all three, from what I can gather.’
    ‘He said that Thalia was his inspiration,’ recalled Quilter.
    ‘Then the drama will tilt more towards comedy.’
    ‘Has he given you no hint of its content, Nick?’ asked