Fool(6)

 

“Maybe four,” said Drool.

 

“You do look the lost one, Pocket,” said Mary. “Face like a mourning orphan what’s been dumped in the gutter with the chamber pots.”

 

“I’m preoccupied. The king has kept no company but Kent this last week, the castle is brimming with backstabbers, and there’s a girl-ghost rhyming ominous on the battlements.”

 

“Well, there’s always a bloody ghost, ain’t there?” Mary fished a shirt out of the cauldron and bobbed it across the room on her paddle like she was out for a stroll with her own sodden, steaming ghost. “You’ve got no cares but making everyone laugh, right?”

 

“Aye, carefree as a breeze. Leave that water when you’re done, would you, Mary? Drool needs a dunking.”

 

“Nooooooo!”

 

“Hush, you can’t go before the court like that, you smell of shit. Did you sleep on the dung heap again last night?”

 

“It were warm.”

 

I clouted him a good one on the crown with Jones. “Warm’s not all, lad. If you want warm you can sleep in the great hall with everyone else.”

 

“He ain’t allowed,” offered Mary. “Chamberlain[13] says his snoring frightens the dogs.”

 

“Not allowed?” Every commoner who didn’t have quarters slept on the floor in the great hall—strewn about willy-nilly on the straw and rushes—nearly dog-piled before the fireplace in winter. An enterprising fellow with night horns aloft and a predisposal to creep might find himself accidentally sharing a blanket or a tumble with a sleepy and possibly willing wench, and then be banished for a fortnight from the hall’s friendly warmth (and indeed, I owe my own modest apartment above the barbican[14] to such nocturnal proclivity), but put out for snoring? Unheard of. When night’s inky cape falls o’er the great hall, a gristmill it becomes, the machines of men’s breath grind their dreams with a frightful roar, and even Drool’s great gears fall undistinguished among the chorus. “For snoring? Not allowed in the hall? Balderdash!”

 

“And for having a wee on the steward’s wife,” Mary added.

 

“It were dark,” explained Drool.

 

“Aye, and even in daylight she is easily mistaken for a privy, but have I not tutored you in the control of your fluids, lad?”

 

“Aye, and with great success,” said Shanker Mary, rolling her eyes at the spunk-frosted wall.

 

“Ah, Mary, well said. Let’s make a pact: If you do not make attempts at wit, I will refrain from becoming a soap-smelling prick-pull. What say ye?”

 

“You said you liked the smell of soap.”

 

“Aye, well, speaking of smell. Drool, fetch some buckets of cold water from the well. We need to cool this kettle down and get you bathed.”

 

“Nooooooo!”

 

“Jones will be very unhappy with you if you don’t hurry,” said I, brandishing Jones in a disapproving and somewhat threatening manner. A hard master is Jones, bitter, no doubt, from being raised as a puppet on a stick.

 

 

 

A half-hour later, a miserable Drool sat in the steaming cauldron, fully-clothed, his natural broth having turned the lye-white water to a rich, brown oaf-sauce. Shanker Mary stirred about him with her paddle, being careful not to stir him beyond suds to lust. I was quizzing my student on the coming night’s entertainments.

 

“So, because Cornwall is on the sea, we shall portray the duke how, dear Drool?”

 

“As a sheep-shagger,” said the despondent giant.

 

“No, lad, that’s Albany. Cornwall shall be the fish-fucker.”

 

“Aye, sorry, Pocket.”

 

“Not a worry, not a worry. You’ll still be sodden from your bath, I suspect, so we’ll work that into the jest. Bit of sloshing and squishing will but add to the merriment, and if we can thus imply that Princess Regan is herself, a fishlike consort, well I can’t think of anyone who won’t be amused.”

 

“’Cepting the princess,” said Mary.

 

“Well, yes, but she is very literal-minded and often has to be explained the thrust of the jest a time or two before lending her appreciation.”

 

“Aye, remedial thrusting’s the remedy for Regan’s stubborn wit,” said the puppet Jones.

 

“Aye, remedial thrusting’s the remedy for Regan’s stubborn wit,” said Drool in Jones’s voice.

 

“You’re dead men,” sighed Shanker Mary.

 

“You’re a dead man, knave!” said a man’s voice from behind me.