Today, though, as they played with the kittens who escaped an early demise, she said she had a headache, a pain in her throat, she felt cold, then she felt hot, and she has gone into the house to lie down.
Hamnet goes back through the door to the main house and along the passage. He is just about to go out into the street when he hears a noise. It is a click or a shift, a minute sound, but it is the definite noise of another human being.
‘Hello?’ Hamnet calls. He waits. Nothing. Silence presses back at him from the dining hall and the parlour beyond. ‘Who’s there?’
For a moment, and just for a moment, he entertains the notion that it might be his father, returned from London, to surprise them – it has happened before. His father will be there, beyond that door, perhaps hiding as a game, as a ruse. If Hamnet walks into the room, his father will leap out; he will have gifts stowed in his bag, in his purse; he will smell of horses, of hay, of many days on the road; he will put his arms around his son and Hamnet will press his cheek to the rough, chafing fastenings of his father’s jerkin.
He knows it won’t be his father. He knows it, he does. His father would respond to a repeated call, would never hide himself away in an empty house. Even so, when Hamnet walks into the parlour, he feels the falling, filtering sensation of disappointment to see his grandfather there, beside the low table.
The room is filled with gloom, coverings pulled over most of the windows. His grandfather is standing with his back towards him, in a crouched position, fumbling with something: papers, a cloth bag, counters of some sort. There is a pitcher on the table, and a cup. His grandfather’s hand meanders through these objects, his head bent, his breath coming in wheezing bursts.
Hamnet gives a polite cough.
His grandfather wheels around, his face wild, furious, his arm flailing through the air, as if warding off an assailant. ‘Who’s there?’ he cries. ‘Who is that?’
‘It’s me.’
‘Who?’
‘Me.’ Hamnet steps towards the narrow shaft of light slanting in through the window. ‘Hamnet.’
His grandfather sits down with a thud. ‘You scared the wits out of me, boy,’ he cries. ‘Whatever do you mean, creeping about like that?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Hamnet says. ‘I was calling and calling but no one answered. Judith is—’
‘They’ve gone out,’ his grandfather speaks over him, with a curt flick of his wrist. ‘What do you want with all those women anyway?’ He seizes the neck of the pitcher and aims it towards the cup. The liquid – ale, Hamnet thinks – slops out precipitously, some into the cup and some on to the papers on the table, causing his grandfather to curse, then dab at them with his sleeve. For the first time, it occurs to Hamnet that his grandfather might be drunk.
‘Do you know where they have gone?’ Hamnet asks.
‘Eh?’ his grandfather says, still mopping his papers. His anger at their spoiling seems to unsheathe itself and stretch out from him, like a rapier. Hamnet can feel the tip of it wander about the room, seeking an opponent, and he thinks for a moment of his mother’s hazel strip, and the way it pulls itself towards water, except he is not an underground stream and his grandfather’s anger is not like the quivering divining rod at all. It is cutting, sharp, unpredictable. Hamnet has no idea what will happen next, or what he should do.
‘Don’t stand there gawping,’ his grandfather hisses. ‘Help me.’
Hamnet shuffles forward a step, then another. He is wary, his father’s words circling his mind: Stay away from your grandfather when he is in one of his black humours. Be sure to stand clear of him. Stay well back, do you hear?
His father had said this to him on his last visit, when they had been helping unload a cart from the tannery. John, his grandfather, had dropped a bundle of skins into the mud and, in a sudden fit of temper, had hurled a paring-knife at the yard wall. His father had immediately pulled Hamnet back, behind him, out of the way, but John had barged past them into the house without a word. His father had taken Hamnet’s face in both of his hands, fingers curled in at the nape of his neck, his gaze steady and searching. He’ll not touch your sisters but it’s you I worry for, he had muttered, his brow puckering. You know the humour I mean, don’t you? Hamnet had nodded but wanted the moment to be prolonged, for his father to keep holding his head like that: it gave him a sensation of lightness, of safety, of being entirely known and treasured. At the same time, he was aware of a curdling unease swilling about inside him, like a meal his stomach didn’t want. He thought of the snip and snap of words that punctured the air between his father and grandfather, the way his father continually reached to loosen his collar when seated at table with his parents. Swear to me, his father had said, as they stood in the yard, his voice hoarse. Swear it. I need to know you’ll be safe when I’m not here to see to it.