Dark Labyrinth 1 Read Online Free Page B

stopped, did light on the Thatch, where being thought at first but an idle smoak, and their eyes more attentive to the show, it kindled inwardly and ran round like a train, consuming within less than an hour the whole House to the very ground . . . yet nothing did perish but Wood and straw and a few forsaken cloakes. Only one man had his breeches set on fire, that would perhaps have broyled him if he had not by the benefit of provident will put it out with bottle ale.”
    —Sir Henry Wotton, eyewitness to the burning of the Globe Theatre

    “ . . . while Burbages’ Company were acting at the Globe the play of Henry VIII, and there shooting off certain (cannons) in way of triumph. the fire catched and fastened upon the thatch of the house, and there burned so furiously, as it consumed the whole house, all in less than two hours. the people having enough to do to save themselves. ”
    —Thomas Lorkins, eyewitness to the burning of the Globe Theatre

    Cuthbert Burbage found his brother Richard, much more shaken than he should have been from the fire, standing in the churning crowd around the flaming wreckage. Night was falling. A heavy beam collapsed in a shower of sparks.
    Silently, together, they watched their Globe Theatre burn . . . .

    SCENE VI.
    —Epilogue—

    Setting —London. Darkness. Cuthert Burbage has entered the cold, snow-covered wreckage. Voices.

    He listened, creeping closer—the voices were strange and scattered, speaking a pastiche of lines from old Shakespeare plays. They didn’t sound like children’s’ voices: in fact, they seemed to carry a great deal of emotion, sadness, loss.
    He stepped around some fallen timbers and came in view of the burned-out remnants of the stage. In the shadows he saw strange figures, masked and costumed.
    “What are you doing there? Who are you?” Burbage shouted, his anger rising before he had time to think. He expected them to scatter and run like frightened children, but instead the figures turned to look at him.
    Burbage stepped out from behind the wreckage and moved toward them. “Where did you get those masks?” he demanded, trying to place a tone of angry command in his voice.
    The central figure turned toward him; he wore an old mask of the ghost of Hamlet’s father, smashed-in but painstakingly repaired, blackened a little in the fire. He spoke in a deep, eerie voice, like many voices all in one.
    “ We are the Globe Theatre, and we are almost dead. Do not disturb our final performance.”
    Burbage halted a moment, then stepped forward. “You are trespassing,” he said coldly, standing directly before the figure, glaring at the mask. He saw nothing behind the eyeholes. Nothing.
    They confronted each other in silence; and, unexpectedly, Burbage reached up to pull the mask off. And beheld the face of a leering skull, desiccated and fire-blackened.
    Before Burbage could cry out, the mask was snatched away from his numb fingers and placed back on the figure’s head.
    Burbage felt cold, and his eyes misted over with terror and confusion. “ What are you?” The words slid through his clenched teeth like a cold wind.
    “ A truly talented actor leaves a part of himself, part of his soul, within the theatre in which he performs. This wood, these timbers, are from the very first playhouse in all of Europe, which has absorbed countless performances . . . . We are what is left.”
    Burbage first began to tremble. “ You! Ghosts! You are what Richard saw! You killed Thomas Radclyffe! Murdered him!”
    “ We acted only to protect ourselves. In vain.”
    Burbage stood motionless, only his thoughts whirling—fear, anger, confusion—and he could not function until he accepted his inability to accept. “I do not understand . . . I cannot believe this.”
    “ You are not an actor. You will not understand.” The central figure continued to stare at him with the frozen expression of the mask. “ Tell your brother Richard—he will understand. It will comfort