EXTON                        From your own mouth, my lord, did I this deed.

BOLINGBROKE          They love not poison that do poison need,

Nor do I thee. Though I did wish him dead

I hate the murderer, love him murderèd.

The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labour

But neither my good word nor princely favour.

With Cain go wander thorough shades of night

And never show thy head by day nor light.

[Exit Exton]     (5.6.37-44)

Exton’s entitled to feel aggrieved, his flat, uncompromising monosyllables squarely placing the blame on Bolingbroke: from your own mouth, my lord, did I this deed. You as good as told me. But in the tiny scene where Exton announced his intentions, he apparently repeated Bolingbroke’s exact words, Have I no friend will rid me of this living fear? Exton made a big deal of it, but it’s not quite the same thing; plausible deniability, just. Open to interpretation, not an order, not quite. The tone of Bolingbroke’s reign is set in this moment, and the silent lords might well recoil slightly, shift feet, clear throats: they love not poison that do poison need, nor do I thee. You’ve just done my dirty work, on your own initiative, and I’m not going to reward or even thank you. Politics is a brutal business, and this is politics, not sovereignty, not in the glorious and gilded sense in which that has been performed by Richard. Though I did wish him dead—a sharp intake of breath from the lords? a moment of startling honesty, again confirming Bolingbroke’s grip on power; he can afford to admit to it—I hate the murderer, love him murderèd.

If the coffin’s open, this might be the moment when Bolingbroke’s voice catches, as he looks down at the man whom he has destroyed, his cousin, in some ways his doppelgänger. He’s really speaking of himself from this point on, as well as to Exton: the guilt of conscience take thou for thy labour but neither my good word nor princely favour. Guilt, terrible guilt, the gnawing pangs of conscience; that’s what’s going to mark Bolingbroke’s reign as Henry IV, guilt, isolation, and rebellion. With Cain go wander thorough shades of night, Cain not only the first Biblical murderer, but a fratricide, the killer of his brother; in some interpretations that’s what Bolingbroke’s done too. Exton is—banished? cast out? condemned to ignominy and opprobrium. Bolingbroke imagines a future of darkness for him; he is never to show his head by day nor light.

It’s a sombre, ominous start to a reign. One last entry still to come…