Free Foul Deeds: A Rosalind Mystery by Linda Moore Page A

player who would recite “The Prologue” and play a recorder to accompany the first part—the dumb-show. Player King, Player Queen and wicked Lucianus the Poisoner would be behind the sheet creating a shadow play. Claudius, Gertrude, Polonius, and Ophelia were going to sit out among the real spectators, thus making the audience part of the court.
    As Hamlet prepares for the arrival of Claudius and his entourage, he takes his old friend Horatio into his confidence:

    There is a play tonight before the King:
    One scene of it comes near the circumstance
    Which I have told thee of my father’s death:

    He then exhorts Horatio to keep his eye on Claudius. As the court arrives, Gertrude invites Hamlet to sit with her, but he declines, moving in on Ophelia saying, “
here’s metal more attractive.
” The scene goes on:

    Lady, shall I lie in your lap?
    No, my lord.
    I mean my head upon your lap?
    Ay, my lord.
    Did you think I meant country matters?
    I think nothing, my lord.

    Tom was delivering Hamlet’s dialogue quite flatly, as though removed from the action. Sophie stopped the scene for a moment to ask a question.
    â€œRoz. Does ‘country matters’ mean what we think it does?”
    â€œOh yes,” I said. “It’s an Elizabethan double entendre. He’s taunting her, purposely making her uncomfortable with lewd remarks and innuendoes.”
    â€œBut why is he treating her like this on this occasion?” Sophie asked. Tom and the other actors in the scene were all looking at me, so I decided to go for it—tell them what I thought was going on in this key scene.
    â€œWell, Hamlet has finally taken action—he’s set a trap for Claudius—and he’s so wired he’s almost out of control. Look at the text. He starts the scene by answering Claudius’s benign query about how he fares, with: ‘
I eat the air, promise crammed
.’ In other words, he has an enormous visceral appetite for what is about to unfold. This spills over into crudity with Ophelia. Then, he can scarcely contain himself through the opening dumb-show. ‘
You are as good as a chorus, my lord
,’ Ophelia says to try to quiet him down. And, ‘
You are keen my lord, You are keen
,’ to which he replies, ‘
It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge
.’
    â€œNext, hardly taking time for a breath, he goes after the players to stop their miming and get on with the play proper. ‘
Begin murderer! Pox, leave thy damnable faces and begin. Come—the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge!
’ Next poor Lucianus hardly has his devilish speech out of his mouth before Hamlet fairly shouts to the whole court: ‘
He poisons him i th’ garden for’s estate. His name’s Gonzago. You shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago’s wife!
’
    â€œThen BOOM! All hell breaks loose. The story is a direct hit—Claudius leaps up and starts moving out of the room calling for lights, echoed by Polonius’s ‘
lights! lights! lights
!’ It’s as though Hamlet has set a match to a fuse and has been impatiently watching the flame travel to the explosive point. You see, Claudius’s reaction gives Hamlet indisputable proof of his guilt—he has just seen it with his own eyes! And he has corroboration from his trusted friend.
    â€œâ€˜
Didst perceive?
’ he asks Horatio. ‘
Very well, my lord
,’ Horatio replies.
    â€œâ€˜
Upon the talk of the poisoning?
’ Hamlet asks. ‘
I did very well note him.’
‘
Ah Ha!
’ Shakespeare writes a shout of triumph for Hamlet here because now he knows the ghost was speaking the truth. The apparition of his father might after all have been a devil’s trick or a hallucination. In the aftermath of The Mousetrap, he’s absolutely beside himself with glee, tormenting Rosencrantz and Guildenstern as they attempt, at