Enter Exton and Servants
EXTON Didst thou not mark the King, what words he spake?
‘Have I no friend will rid me of this living fear?’
Was it not so?
SERVANT These were his very words.
EXTON ‘Have I no friend?’ quoth he. He spake it twice
And urged it twice together, did he not?
SERVANT He did.
EXTON And speaking it, he wishtly looked on me,
As who should say ‘I would thou wert the man
That would divorce this terror from my heart’—
Meaning the King at Pomfret. Come, let’s go,
I am the King’s friend and will rid his foe. Exeunt (5.4.1-11)
Exton’s a nobody; this is his first named appearance in the play, although he may have appeared as Exton in previous ensemble scenes, such as the parliament scene. (He’s almost certainly been doubling other roles; Bushy is one possibility, and would resonate interestingly.) This tiny, crucial, deadly scene is based on Holinshed. Some time, but perhaps not much, has passed since the previous scene: Exton reports that Bolingbroke is anxious and frustrated; by quoting his actual words, he’s both emphasising their authority, and allowing the anonymous servant to attest to their accuracy: these were his very words. (Like an anonymous servant is going to disagree.) If Bolingbroke has been smiling and laughing in the previous scene with the Yorks, the contrast is chilling: here he is apparently commissioning murder, although in a coldly hands-off way; divorce this terror from my heart seems melodramatic by chilly Bolingbroke’s standards, although it has (of course) the desired effect. Murder by remote control, repeating the instruction so there’s no mistake. Bolingbroke has made the calculation, just as he did when deciding to pardon Aumerle, and come to the decision that Richard needs to go. What’s also being confirmed here is the jostling anxiety of his supporters, already seen in the parliament scene, their need to prove their loyalty to the new regime, to be known by the King—and by others—as the King’s friend. Presumably many people heard Bolingbroke say this, but Exton’s going to be the one to act on it, to claim the prize, the reward, for being the man, the King’s saviour, the King’s friend. There’s a poignant irony (although it’s probably mostly the demands of the verse) that Exton still refers to Richard as the King, so that there are two kings here, their identities and fates inextricably bound together. Bolingbroke, he fears, will always be in danger so long as Richard lives.
To a modern audience, and perhaps to one in the 1590s too, it might sound like Henry II’s outburst about Thomas à Becket, which led to his murder in 1170: ‘Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?’
