A Warwickshire Lad

IV

Meanwhile Will plucked Hamnet now blubbering on his stool, by the doublet. But Hamnet, turned sullen, shook him off. Perhaps he did not know that Will and Judith had not laughed. But since Hamnet saw fit to shake him off, Will was glad that just then, with a rush of cold air and a sprinkling of snow upon his short coat, Dad came in. His face was ruddy, and as he glanced laughingly around upon them all, he drew deep breath of the spicy evergreens, so that he filled his doublet and close-throated jerkin to their full.

"Good-even to you, neighbors," says Dad. "An' is it great wonder the boy will run away to hie him here? The rogue kens a good thing equal to his elders. But come, boy; your mother is even now sure you have wandered to the river."

And Dad, with a mighty swing, shoulders Will, steadying him with a palm under both small feet; then pauses at Mistress Snelling's questioning.

"Is it true," she inquires, "that the players are coming?"

Sandy-hued Mistress Sadler stiffens and bridles at the question. The Sadlers, whisper says, are Puritanical, whereas there are those who hold that John Shakespeare and his household, for all they are observant of church matters, have still a Catholic leaning. Fond of genial John Shakespeare as the Sadler household are, they shake their heads over some things, and the players are one of these.

"Is it true they are coming?" repeats Mistress Snelling.

"Ay," says Dad, "an' John Shakespeare the man to be thanked for it. Come Twelfth Day sennight, at the Guild Hall, Mistress Snelling."

"Am I to see them, Dad?" whispers small Will, his head down and an arm tight about his father's neck as they go out the door.

"Ay, you inch," promises Dad, stooping, too, as they go under the lintel beneath the penthouse roof, out into the frosty night. The stars are beginning to twinkle through the dusk, and the frozen path crunches underfoot. On each side, as they go up the street, the yards about the houses stand bare and gaunt with leafless stalks.

"Yes," says Dad. "Ay, boy, you shall see the players from between Dad's knees."

[Illustration: "'Ay, boy, you shall see the players'"]

And like the old familiar stories we put on the shelf, gloating the while over the unproven treasures between the lids of the new, straightway Gammer's tales are forgot. And above the wind, as it whips scurries of snow around the corners, pipes Will's voice as they trudge home. But his pipings, his catechisings, now are concerned with this unknown world summed up in the magic term, "The Players."