A Mystery Of Errors

Among the ventures that her father had invested in through several such contacts was a playhouse called The Theater, constructed by a man named Burbage. Some of the money that had been raised for the construction had come from Henry Darcie, and he had also financed several of the productions. He was not the sole investor who had been involved, and so the risk was spread out somewhat, and in this case, there seemed a better than average chance of making a profit, for the playhouse proved to be quite popular.

There was competition from the Rose Theatre, where the Admiral’s Men held court, and some of the other companies who mounted their productions at the inns, and then there was the children’s company at Blackfriers, which was proving to be quite a draw and had the advantage of being fashionable because it was an indoor venue. On the other hand, The Theatre could accommodate a larger audience and had, overall, higher standards of production. Here, Henry Darcie could bring his daughter to show her off before whatever members of the gentry were in attendance without fear of having her get sick and ruin the effect of the expensive clothing he had bought for her by vomiting upon them. And it was the one venue for her display to which Elizabeth did not object. Indeed, she looked forward eagerly to going.

From her seat up in the galleries, Elizabeth could look down upon the teeming groundlings in the yard, jostling one another and boisterously calling to the vendors as they waited for the play to start. The early arrivals would have already heard the first fanfare of the trumpets, and as the rest of the audience came streaming into the theatre, Elizabeth would revel in the energetic, cacophonous spectacle, allowing herself to get caught up in it so that she would forget that, as far as her father was concerned, she was on exhibit for everybody else, and not the other way around. She would gape at the ostentatious fashions that were on display up in the galleries around her as the members of the gentry attempted to outdo one another in their finery.

Men in elaborate saffron ruffs and scarlet doublets, puffed at the shoulders, slashed at the sleeves, and padded at the chest, with matching breeches and contrasting hose in hues of periwinkle, marigold, and popinjay vied for attention with gold pomander-sniffing ladies attired in elegant gowns of Venetian satin or taffeta, festooned with precious stones and shot through with gold and silver thread, or else sewn from rich, three-piled-piece Genoan velvets, with dainty leather or satin shoes that were pinked, raced, and rosetted, their hair dyed in fantastic colors and braided with pearls or tucked beneath elaborate caps with large gold and silver brooches holding flowing plumes and feathers to set off the carcanet collars of small, linked enameled plates adorned with jewels and tiny pendants, wrists languidly displayed bracelets of gold or enameled silver with beads of amber, coral, or agate, rings everywhere, on every finger of both men and women… it was a visual feast, a writhing tableau of endless fascination.

And then the play would begin.

From the moment that the first player stepped out onto the stage, Elizabeth became transported to another world, one that seemed even more real than the romances that she read, for these were living, breathing people bringing to life real characters upon the stage. And if, much of the time, these characters seemed less real than stagy, she did not mind and nevertheless allowed herself to be carried away by the illusion. For as long as the play would last, her gaze would remain riveted upon the stage, and if there were other gazes riveted upon her from some other vantage point, she was unaware of them and could thus forget them.

But now, there was a new drama unfolding that she wished she could avert her gaze from, for it was her drama and the ending she foresaw was not a happy one. Somewhere along the way, someone had gazed at her particularly long and hard, and favorably, and unbeknownst to her, her father had been approached, discussions had been initiated, and a marriage had been arranged.

She had no idea who Anthony Gresham was. Apparently, it was not really her concern, so she hadn’t been consulted. What little knowledge she had was painfully sketchy. The mysterious Anthony Gresham was young, supposedly well set up, and handsome, although she had long since realized that, to her father, any eligible young man from a socially prominent family was certain to be “well set up and handsome.” His father was a privateer, one of Drake’s celebrated Sea Hawks, who was in line, so it was said, to receive a knighthood. She knew next to nothing of such things, but she knew that the idea of marrying his daughter to the son of a knight would send her father off into transports of ecstasy. There was little else that he would need to know or care about.