We buried my father three days later, in the graveyard I had watched over so often from the tower. He wore his newly embroidered cuffs, which I had finished the night before.
The king led the procession, and I walked at the queen’s side, but neither spoke to me. Behind us came Lady Annika, Lady Anna and Lady Hilda, and a small party of the king’s men. The queen’s ladies had each kissed me upon the cheek and pressed my hand and whispered words of condolence. I hardly heard them. How could old women’s sympathy help me now?
A small procession seemed a poor farewell for the man who had given so much to Denmark.
It is the custom after a funeral for guests to take a cup to toast the family’s loss. But the members of the royal party were the only mourners here, and I couldn’t invite the king and queen to come to our house. They alone could grant the honour of visiting their subjects. I’d had the servants prepare wine and cakes in case they suggested it, but they didn’t. When the funeral words were said, when we had walked the short way from the graveyard to the palace, I received a pat on the cheek from the queen, another kiss from her ladies, and a sentence of warning rather than comfort from the king, though it was lightly said. ‘We are glad to see you stay here, Lady Ophelia.’
I sank into a curtsey, my black silk skirts rustling. ‘As Your Majesty directs, so do I obey.’ By the time I had risen, they had gone.
Gerda waited for me at the palace steps. She followed me back home; helped me change from black silk to black bombazine. It seemed there would be no callers today, nor could I go out for the next three months of mourning. A good daughter hid her face and mourned. It was all I wished to do.
You do not know your loss until you feel it. I had laughed at Father’s long-winded speeches, thought little of his wisdom because he so enjoyed dispensing it. Yet it was wisdom. And if he had not always acted wisely, who in this kingdom had? Father had done better than most, and with a better heart.
A good epitaph for any man, I thought, as I sat dressed in black, the house’s curtains drawn, the doors shut to the summer breeze, as was proper for a house of mourning.
No one came. Not the queen, to tell me of her sorrow. Not Ladies Anna, Annika or Hilda. No visits of condolence. Usually, friends send food to a house of mourning, to feed the family in their grief and the mourners at the funeral. But no haunches of venison were delivered to our kitchen, no hare pies, no flasks of pickled herring or loaves of fresh rye bread.
During those long weeks I learned how truly alone I was.
All my life, the dining table had been spread for each meal with cheeses, breads, ale, meat and fish, dishes of fresh or dried fruits, olives, nuts; the silver salt cellar, the silver butter platters, the silver centrepieces, all well-polished. There seemed little point in all that work just for me. I ate barley bread and cheese, sitting on the cushions in my sewing room. Only the cheeses changed as the weeks went by. Green cheese gave way to Wette Willie; then the small oval cheeses soaked in whey that we call ‘cheeses of the Moon’.
Gerda sat with me, mending a petticoat, while I read one of Father’s books: the play he had told Hamlet he had acted in all those years before. I almost smiled to think of my portly father as Caesar. Better to smile than cry.
Gerda sliced another hunk of cheese for me: a plain Summer Round today. ‘There are strawberries in the market,’ she said, trying to tempt me. ‘Would you like me to buy you some, my lady?’
I shook my head. I did not want to send Gerda or the footmen out to the market, in case seeing my servants reminded King Claudius of me. All I can do, I thought, is wait for Laertes.
‘Laertes! Laertes!’ The yells came from outside, as if my imagining had conjured up a crowd to call his name.
‘Has Lord Laertes come?’ cried Gerda.
I ran to the front window and peered out. There was no sign of my brother’s horse or carriage. Instead, a rabble yelled at the palace walls, men waving hoes and picks and rakes. ‘Laertes!’ they shouted. ‘Laertes must be king! We want Laertes!’
The butter-sellers took up the chant. ‘We want Laertes! We want Laertes!’
I looked towards the palace. The doors were closed and bolted. Up on the battlements, men in armour held their bows at the ready to speed their arrows down.
I let the curtain fall.
‘Why does the crowd call your brother’s name?’ asked Gerda uncertainly.
‘They want him to be king,’ I said.
‘King!’ Gerda almost glowed. ‘That would be wonderful.’
‘No. It may mean our deaths. It is treason to even say the words! Stop the other servants talking about it too. No one must leave the house. No one! You understand?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
I had been stupid, sitting here in my grief without thinking of what else might be happening in the kingdom. Others had seen the signs of the king’s guilt that night, servants as well as lords and ladies. Word had spread. Treason was a dish best served in private. It seemed the men yelling my brother’s name had eaten of it too.
The people of Denmark didn’t want a poisoner for a king, nor his mad nephew Hamlet. They wanted Laertes, son of their good lord chancellor.
Was Laertes behind this? I wondered. Was he planning rebellion? Or did the crowd shout his name because it was the only one they trusted?
I had no way of knowing. But I had to act quickly. My first duty was to keep the servants safe. How long would it be before guards came here; men with swords to take me to the palace? To imprison my servants in case they tried to warn Laertes?
‘Gerda, go to the kitchen, if you please. I would like herring pies made. A host of pies for when my brother comes. You must help the cook make them.’
‘Me, my lady? I have no hand for pastry.’
‘Then you must pick out the fishbones.’
The palace guards were good men, even if they obeyed an evil king. They would recognise the truth if Gerda and the other servants said honestly that they didn’t know where I was, and hadn’t heard from Laertes either. Servants planning rebellion didn’t have time to decorate herring pies.
I ran up to my room. Had Laertes arrived in Denmark already? Had he brought an army — men from our estates and soldiers from the other lords’ estates? Or were the people yelling his name simply because they’d had enough of the family who had won the kingdom in a bet, then plotted and murdered each other. My father had been the best of men compared to the two kings he had served. Laertes must seem a paragon compared to Hamlet, who they thought was mad, and a murderer too.
Poor Hamlet. I realised suddenly that any love I still felt for him was like that of a mother for her child. Poor lonely man, kept away from his land and his family so long, unfit and untutored to carry the burdens life had given him.
But I must watch out for myself now. If I had been in danger as Hamlet’s love, I was in worse danger as the sister of the man the people wanted as their king. King Claudius could take me hostage and tell my brother, ‘Disband your army or we will kill your sister. Come any closer to Elsinore and we will cut off her head and raise it above the battlements as a warning to all traitors.’
I had to flee. But how? This house was watched, so close to the palace. Even if I managed to sneak out, I would be found before I had put any real distance behind me. Perhaps there were watchers along the roads to our estates, to see if I disobeyed the king’s orders and tried to escape to safety.
Where could I hide? Under the bed, like a child playing hide and seek? Even if I vanished into my tower, the guards would search every corner of our house and the palace till they found me.
I looked about my room, as if the cushions and rugs might help me. Some flowers I had arranged in vases weeks ago were faded now, their water dried. Suddenly it came to me. I still had a girl’s weapons: smiles and flowers. If I used them properly, I might, perhaps, survive.
I chose my dress with care: a linen shift, bleached by the sun and age. It had been my mother’s, and my grandmother’s. Good linen grows softer with the years. I felt it caress my skin as Gerda dropped it over my shoulders. I hoped I had their blessing as I wore it. I needed blessings now.
Gerda fastened on the wide black silk skirt held out with whalebone. It had been my mother’s too, part of the mourning clothes every family kept.
‘No, don’t sew it on,’ I said quickly. ‘Just use a sash.’
She stared. ‘But, my lady, what if you trip on your skirt? It might fall off if it is not sewn on.’
‘Peasant girls manage not to lose their skirts,’ I said. ‘No, do not sew my sleeves on either. Just tie them up with a ribbon.’
‘You cannot wear tied-on sleeves to court!’ Gerda hesitated. ‘That is where you’re going, isn’t it?’
Where else would I wear black silk?
‘Yes. Give me a shawl to cover the ribbons. That will do. Now leave me. Go back to making the pies. I … I need to think before I leave the house.’
‘Yes, my lady,’ Gerda said doubtfully.
‘Gerda, will you do something else for me?’
‘Of course. Anything at all, my lady.’ She glanced out the window to where the rabble still called my brother’s name. ‘We all would, my lady,’ she said softly. ‘Every servant. Every man on the estates. Whatever you and Lord Laertes need.’
My heart ached at her kindness. I forced myself to smile. ‘It won’t come to that,’ I said, and pressed two gold coins into her hand.
She looked at them, as surprised as if they had been eggs. ‘I don’t understand, my lady.’
‘The queen may wish me to stay at the palace,’ I said carefully. ‘If I should not return this afternoon, that money and the food in the cellar will keep the household till my brother returns.’ And for months afterwards if he rebels, I thought.
Gerda looked at me. She was no fool. ‘Madam, you know I would give my life for you.’
‘But I want you to keep it.’ I kissed her cheek. ‘Leave me now.’
I thought she might argue, but after another serious look at me, she bobbed a curtsey, and shut the door behind her as she left the room.
I bent and stripped off the stockings she had put on me. I stuffed one with Laertes’s old shirt, the other with the breeches I sometimes wore at night. I added men’s shoes. They were bulky, but with a lot of shoving I got them in. I tied the stockings about my waist, under the wide skirt, then jumped up and down to see if they fell off. They didn’t.
Now for the flowers, my final weapon. Faded flowers, from the vases. I pulled my hair loose from Gerda’s careful plait and poked the flowers in hither and thither, knotting my hair in places to hold them. Dead flowers for a poor mad girl.
Sauce for the gander can be sauce for the goose. If Hamlet could play mad, then I could too.