Enter as to the Parliament Bolingbroke, Aumerle, Northumberland, Percy, Fitzwater, Surrey, [Bishop of] Carlisle, Abbot of Westminster, [Another Lord,] Herald, Officers and Bagot
BOLINGBROKE Call forth Bagot.
Now Bagot, freely speak thy mind
What thou dost know of noble Gloucester’s death,
Who wrought it with the King and who performed
The bloody office of his timeless end?
BAGOT Then set before my face the Lord Aumerle.
BOLINGBROKE Cousin, stand forth and look upon that man. (4.1.1-7)
It’s a reasonable assumption that every actor in the company, except those playing the women’s parts, will appear in this scene. (This is the Folio stage direction, with light editorial additions.) It’s a re-run of the opening scene in the court, and to a lesser extent the tournament scene, but this time Bolingbroke is the one in charge. Where he stands or sits will be crucial; not on the throne, yet, and so the stage picture might be unsettled: a crowd, but an empty chair, a canopy of state, centrally placed, to which the eye is drawn. This is a scene closely based on Holinshed, but it takes several months’ worth of events and condenses them into a single climactic, catastrophic action, set in Westminster Hall, where Parliament usually sat. So—like the opening scene—it’s formal, public, being staged in a space that is at once set up for debate, and hierarchical, spectacular, even ritualistic. (Hence the Herald and Officers.) It’s also a judicial space, used for state trials, and this scene is, in some ways, a trial scene. And so it begins with the summoning of Bagot (we probably have to remind ourselves that no, he wasn’t executed with Bushy and Green and the never-seen Earl of Wiltshire): the state he’s in (how is he dressed? is he under guard? is he in chains? has he been roughed up?) could shock, could set the tone by being a stark contrast with the appearance and demeanour of Bolingbroke and his companions.
The matter being tried here is that which was first explored, unsatisfactorily, in the play’s opening scene, the question of the duke of Gloucester’s death, or rather murder. (Gloucester was the brother of John of Gaunt and Edward the Black Prince, and hence uncle to both Richard and Bolingbroke, and to Aumerle.) Bolingbroke had accused Mowbray of involvement in Gloucester’s death, although historically it had been at Richard’s instigation, and it’s the King’s involvement here that is now being openly spoken of: who wrought it with the King—who else was involved in the plot—and who actually did the killing, that bloody office? Office here is duty, undertaking, job; who did the king’s dirty work, is one way of reading it. (Gloucester’s death was timeless because it was untimely; it was murder.) This is probably Bagot’s big chance to escape with his life. He’s got to pin the blame on someone else, squarely and explicitly; he’s got to distance himself from the King. And so he implicates Aumerle, who may well be in the thick of the group attached to Bolingbroke, who may be unwilling to emerge at this summons. Bolingbroke gives him no choice—it’s an order—but as is so often the case, he softens it, pragmatically, by referring to the family relationship: Cousin, stand forth and look upon that man.
