Everyone in Elsinore welcomed the news that a well-known troupe of actors had arrived at the castle. It was unusual to see them so far from their homes. Normally they performed at a theater at the other end of the country, but now business was poor and they were reduced to shuffling their way around Denmark town by town. This appearance at the residence of the royal family was the last of their tour.

Hamlet had seen them frequently. He knew them well. They were favorites of his. Watching them approach, however, from his position on the parapet, he was at first too distracted by his own confusion to wonder what entertainment they brought. There is more tragedy here than they could show us on a stage, he thought. Here at Elsinore the play becomes real, the drama haunts us every moment of our lives.

Suddenly he changed his mind. He jumped up from his squatting position with an acrobatic leap and went looking for them.

The members of the group were milling around in the main entrance hall, waiting for lodgings to be found, rooms to be made ready. Hamlet counted eleven, all men and boys, the oldest a rosy-cheeked fellow who could have been seventy or more, the youngest a pair of twelve-year-olds. The boys were hired to play the female roles. Any other arrangements, involving the use of unchaperoned girls or women, would have been unseemly.

Hamlet stood in the shadows for a few minutes, watching with affection, before the manager of the little company saw him and came to him with hands outstretched and words pouring from his mouth.

Hamlet smiled and shook both his hands. “You are welcome, masters, welcome all. I am glad to see you. Welcome, good friends.” He moved among them, shaking more hands. “My old friend, your face is fringed since I saw you last. Now you have bearded me in my own lair. Ah, young Felix, you will not be playing the role of a lady much longer if you keep growing at this rate. My word, your voice will soon betray you. Claudio, you have not aged a whit. Braybar, what a fine Romeo you were. What entertainment have you brought us, good sirs?”

“We plan to perform The Murder of Gonzago, God willing, and may it please Your Royal Highness.”

“Ah! Most suitable. You’ve brought it to the right place.” Hamlet caught sight of Polonius scurrying through the hall on one of his errands. Polonius always looked as though he were on the way from somewhere important to somewhere even more important. But Hamlet, in a tone he did not often use, arrested the old man just as he was about to vanish down a corner corridor. “Polonius! I need you.”

Polonius swerved and trotted straight to the prince without missing a beat. “Highness, I am ever at your service.”

“Then kindly find some lodgings for these fine fellows. Be generous to them, for they are the ones who tell the stories of our times. Never mind getting a good epitaph after you’re dead if you got a bad report from this lot while you’re still alive.”

“Highness, I will arrange their accommodation, though it is not part of my normal duties. It really falls within the province of the comptroller of the household. But I will treat them as they deserve, depend upon it.”

“As they deserve! You will have to do better than that! Treat every man as he deserves and no one’ll escape a whipping. Treat them with as much honor and dignity as you’d treat yourself, Polonius. If you treat a man better than he deserves, why, then, the more admirable your generosity.”

Polonius, not quite so unruffled now, bowed and nodded to the actors to follow him. But Hamlet held back the manager, waiting until the others had gathered their bits and pieces and shuffled off after Polonius. An idea had come to him while he was organizing their welcome to Elsinore. “Tell me, my friend,” he said, when they were alone together. “You mentioned The Murder of Gonzago.”

“I did, Highness, but we can do Romeo and Juliet if that is your wish. It’s not a bad bit of work, although a bit far-fetched. Or we have a new comedy, a satiric piece, rather short, but most diverting, judging by the reactions we got in the south, where we —”

“No, no, The Murder of Gonzago is an excellent choice. But tell me, if I wrote a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, you could learn that and insert it in the play, could you not?”

Rather startled, the actor was nevertheless good enough at his craft to show no emotion. “Certainly, if that is what Your Highness wishes.”

“Good. Then, for now, follow the others. Mention nothing of this to the old man Polonius. I’ll write the speech and deliver it to you by dinnertime. We can have the play tomorrow night.”

“Very good, Your Royal Highness.”

And off he went, leaving the prince with his thoughts, which tumbled around in his mind, busy as a line of laundry in a windstorm. What can I say for myself? Hamlet wondered. I, who have done nothing? What can I say in my defense? I have seen these actors stand upon a stage and make themselves weep over the dead children of Hecuba. Real tears come out of their eyes! Hecuba, who lived, if she lived at all, two thousand years ago! Hecuba, who was turned into a dog and drowned. What’s Hecuba to them or they to Hecuba? Yet the tears run down their faces as they ponder her fate! If they can do that in a play, what would they do if they had real cause for passion? What would any of them do?

By God, if they were in my situation, they would weep. They would drown the stage with tears and burn the audience with the fire of their words. They would make the guilty mad and appall the innocent. The eyes and ears of the spectators would fill to overflowing. And yet, here I am, and what do I do? Why, that’s easy. I play games with a racquet and a ball. A king has his kingdom and his life stolen away, and I am silent. My father is murdered, and I sit down to table with his murderer. What does that make me? A coward, nothing else. One who has the liver of a pigeon.

If I were anything else, if I had a heart, and the guts to match it, I would have scattered the insides of this treacherous king across the fields to fatten the crows. That traitor. That bastard. That bloody, bawdy villain, remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, and vile. And all I can do, with my father come from heaven and hell or somewhere in between, telling me to take revenge, is to wallow in words. Muttering and cursing and bellowing.

Well, at least I have a plan now. I have heard that guilty creatures faced with a reenactment of their crimes fall on their knees and confess. I’ll have these actors play something like the murder of my father in front of my uncle tomorrow night. I’ll watch him, I’ll study him, and if he so much as blanches or trembles, I’ll know the truth, and I’ll know my course of action.

After all, I still cannot be certain what I saw that night. Was it my father? Did it tell me the truth? Or was it some fiend sent to lie and confuse and do evil? The devil can take any shape he wants, including that of my father. And while I am so sad about his passing, the devil has the perfect chance to take advantage of me.

That is what holds me back. It is a terrible thing to be a coward, but it is not so bad to be prudent. Well, tomorrow shall tell the next chapter of my story.

The play’s the thing, wherein I’ll test the conscience of the king!