Shottery
Will hardly understood what moved him to defend Anne, but he knew what he had said to Gilbert was true. Anne was worth a dozen of Catherine. But that didn’t mean he wanted to marry her. He needed to hear from her lips what was true and what was not. He thought of his ring lying against the soft skin of her neck and he shivered. The biting wind at his back hurried him toward Hewlands Farm. It stirred the withered stalks in the fields, sending up clouds of thistledown that floated through the air like snow unable to settle.
And there she was, meandering through the field. Though she was wrapped in a cloak with her head down, he recognized her gait.
Will had no idea what to say to her. He stepped behind a bush to collect his thoughts. She was approaching; in a moment she would see him and think he was hiding from her.
He came forward. “Anne, ’tis I.” He reached up to take off his hat and realized he had lost it in the scuffle with Gilbert.
“I know. I saw you first.” She smiled. There were little lines at the corners of her gray-green eyes.
“Why did you pretend not to see me?”
“I wondered if you would turn away from me.” She lifted her hand to shade her eyes.
Will stepped to the side so she would not have to look into the sun. He took her hand and brought it down, held it in his own. It was small and cold. He wanted to ask, Is it true? But when her eyes met his and he saw such regret and fear there, he knew.
“Believe me, Will, I did not want this to happen. It was not a ruse to trap you into marrying me, no matter what my sister says. I did love you.”
“Do you still?” Will blurted out.
“Why should I say yes and add to my own grief?” She paused. “Did you love me?”
“Let’s not play games with each other,” Will said gently. “What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Sit with me and let us talk.”
There was a fallen tree nearby and Will led her to it, still holding her hand.
“What happened?” she asked, touching his swelling cheek.
Will groaned. “A fight with my flap-mouthed brother.” He didn’t tell her what they had argued about. They sat with the sun warming their backs as the wind fell to a mere whisper in the dried grass. Will tried to describe London to Anne, who had never been outside of Warwickshire. He told of his adventures with Mack, though neglected to mention Mack was a woman, an omission that made him feel a little guilty.
“This Mack sounds like a merry friend,” said Anne. Her silvery laughter ended in a sigh. Though they sat shoulder to shoulder for warmth, there was something between them holding them apart. Will realized it was the babe growing inside Anne. It was also Meg, whom he had nearly kissed not two days ago.
“I have little news save gossip of poor Anne Hathaway, whose trouble is everybody’s business.” She said this without self-pity. “So be careful, Will. Once Fulke Sandells knows you are hereabouts, he’ll be escorting us to the nearest church.”
“I’m not afraid of Sandells. No man will keep me from my ambitions. I’ve just been hired to act and write plays for a London company.” Saying this, Will felt awkward and self-serving, but he had to let Anne know of his situation.
The wind lifted Anne’s brown hair and scattered its strands. Her silence rebuked him.
“Neither of us wants to be married, do we?” said Will.
“I do want a husband, but not one who is unwilling.”
“And I won’t be forced to marry!” said Will in some agitation.
“Nor will I.” Anne stood up abruptly. “So marriage is not for us.”
“We have taken different paths, Anne.”
“You took a different path. I am still on this one.” She lifted her foot and planted it again. “And I am not free to choose another.”
Here was proof of Meg’s assertion that women were less free than men. Will could walk away from the child. Anne could not. He stood up but Anne’s words stopped him before he could take a single step.
“Why did you come here, Will? Your presence gives me hope, which your words then deny.”
“I did not know.” He gestured to her lap. “My father summoned me about a legal matter, or so I thought.”
Anne looked at him despairingly. “If you had known of the baby—”
The baby. She had spoken of it, finally. Will seemed to see a newborn thing writhing in her arms. Her baby and his.
“If you had known, would you have come back?” Her voice became a whisper.
Will could not say yes, nor could he with certainty say no. His eyes began to sting and he realized his cheeks were wet with tears. He sat back down and wiped his eyes with his forearm.
“Did our vows of love mean nothing?” Anne said, staring at her hands in her lap. “I am the same woman who spoke them and you are the same man, yet everything has changed.”
“You deserve better than me,” said Will. “I fear I would be no good husband, for I have too much mischief and longing still in me.” His voice broke with tears. He had not wept like this since he was a boy and cut his arm and saw his own lifeblood pouring out.
“Long ago I loved someone,” Anne said. She told Will how David Burman had died and that she slept with Will to seize a moment of happiness before it fled. “But I learned I cannot hold someone who is destined to leave me. Therefore go, Will Shakespeare. I will not keep you here.”
Sorrow, Will saw, was deep in her bones. It made her strong. Her child would also be strong. He admired Anne yet could summon no words that would not sound like base flattery. She was not the same Anne who had flirted with him, tricked her sister, and lain with him for the purpose of delight. It would take him longer than a November afternoon to know this new Anne.
When Will did not move, Anne said, her voice rising with hope. “If you decide to stay, I’ll not cling or be jealous.”
Her kindness was too much to bear. He pushed against it. “How can I forgo all my opportunities in London and remain here? You know how miserable I would be.”
“Go then, and let me deal with my neighbors,” she said. Will heard the disappointment in her voice. “I will say we never vowed our love.” She forced a smile. “Perhaps Sandells will marry me. He once wanted to.”
Will knew she said this not to make him feel guilty, but to assure him she would be well without him. He stood up again. How should he bid her farewell? No words would suffice. A kiss might mislead her and fail to convey his undefinable passion: his strange sorrow at the loss of her, Anne. Or was it joy he felt to be granted his freedom? A poet he was and yet could not describe his own heart or express its love. For a kind of love it surely was, to long to be as noble and wise as another person.
In the end he said nothing. He kissed his hand to Anne as he withdrew, holding her gaze until she looked away. Then he turned toward the long shadows cast by the setting sun. He began to run as if trying to overtake the dark image of himself.
By the time he reached Henley Street dusk had swallowed every shadow. He saddled up his gelding and took to the road. At Daventry he would find a room for the night and give a false name in case Sandells or his father came searching for him. Perhaps he would ride through the night. Burbage was expecting a play.
Meg, too, would be waiting for him. What should he say when she asked about the crisis in Stratford? Would he lie to her and say nothing about Anne? She was so perceptive he doubted she could be fooled. And think of the consequences of his lie being discovered!
“Fie upon Truth, who in time always shows herself,” he said to the night.
Anne’s face, bearing a sad smile, floated into his mind. Lying to Meg would doubly disown Anne. Did two lies make one truth? No. Two vows made one marriage though. The ring, he thought. I did not get my ring back from her. He didn’t notice her wearing it. The thought came and left again like a curious creature in the night.
He tried to turn his tired mind to the play and plan it scene by scene, but his troubles distracted him.
He decided to tell Meg the truth: that Anne was carrying his child and had chosen to raise it alone rather than compel Will to marry her. Meg must admire Anne’s courage. But what would she say of him? He could guess. You are no better than Roger Ruffneck, who abandoned his wife and child for his own vile pleasures. The champion of wronged women and neglected orphans, Meg would have good reason to despise him. She would say the child’s misfortune—its bastardy—was his fault, for he had the means to prevent it and did not.
Will remembered as a child seeing a round-bellied woman in a white sheet standing before Holy Trinity Church, her head bowed in shame as the preacher expounded upon her sins. Would Anne suffer the same humiliation and be called a harlot by everyone in the village? It was too harsh a word for one whose only fault was to love Will unwisely. He could keep her from the shame. If he married her.
The gelding had halted in the road while Will’s thoughts ran every which way. Will snapped the reins but the stubborn horse did not move. He leaned forward and rested his forehead on its rough mane.
Fulke Sandells must be fifteen years older than Anne. If she married him she would become mistress of his hog farm. Would Sandells be a kind father to her child? To Will’s son? For surely it would be a boy and might even resemble him. But if he chanced to see Anne and the boy, he could not call him “son.” If Anne did not marry, the boy would have no one to call “Father.” He would be a bastard. “Whoreson,” they would shout at the boy, a word harder than a stone. Was there such a word for him, Will? Varlet. Vile knave. Not for getting Anne Hathaway with child but for leaving her to face the consequences alone.
Will would be nineteen years old when Anne bore their child. I have too much mischief and longing still in me. That was his excuse for why he could not be her husband. Was there any time of life or any place of abode free from mischief and longing, trouble and desire? He would be in trouble for certain once Meg discovered why he fled Stratford. As for wooing her, that seemed impossible now, for Anne and the child, though absent, would stand between them like the wall that separated Pyramus and Thisbe. Meg, the best kind of woman, deserved a better man than himself.
Will imagined Anne holding the boy’s hand as he learned to walk. The child would totter and he, Will, would take his other hand and steady him. His heart swelled up at the thought. But what if the child was a girl? She would have Anne’s strong nature and freckles across her pretty nose. How could he live on and never touch the face of his daughter? Or look at his own face in a glass and not wonder if its features were copied in a son who longed to call him “Father”?
If you stay, I’ll not cling to you. What more could Will ask? Anne’s generosity shamed him. Would it be so terrible to live near Stratford and raise their child together? One babe would not be much trouble. He might write plays as well in Stratford and send them to Burbage, visiting London from time to time. When the child was old enough and if Anne remained healthy, they would move to the city. It seemed to him possible and even desirable to have a piece of both worlds, Stratford and London. As Antony had Rome and Egypt, knew his duty yet satisfied his desire.
A night owl sounded, interrupting Will’s reverie. He tugged the reins. The gelding obeyed his hand and turned around. At Hewlands Farm Anne waited beneath the overhanging thatch of the cottage. She led Will to the barn, where they lay together on fresh, sweet hay. Will found his ring still around her neck and, lifting the ribbon over her head, placed the ring on her finger and said he would marry her.