The compacted nobles pledge absent enmities before Edward, and Elizabeth asks Edward to receive Clarence into favour. Pleading again, he is eventually interrupted by "Look behind you, my lord" and is subsequently stabbed before being drowned in a butt of Malmsey wine (1478). One of the murderers explains that Gloucester hates him and sent them. Presuming that Edward has offered them payment, he tells them to go to Gloucester, who will reward them better for having kept him alive. He recognises their purpose and pleads with them. While the murderers are pondering what to do, Clarence wakes. The murderers arrive with a warrant, and the keeper relinquishes his office. Clarence relates a distressing dream to his keeper before going to sleep. Richard orders two murderers to kill Clarence in the tower. The nobles, all Yorkists, unite against this last Lancastrian and ignore the warnings. Queen Margaret, Henry VI's widow, returns, though banished, and she warns the squabbling nobles about Richard, cursing extensively. The established nobles are at odds with the upwardly mobile relatives of Queen Elizabeth, a hostility fueled by Richard's machinations. Richard exults at having won her over so and tells the audience that he will discard her once she has served his purpose. He offers to kill himself at her order, but she accepts his ring. He offers himself to her sword, but she drops it. He confesses the murder, and she spits at him. Richard appears, and Lady Anne says that "Henry's wounds bleed afresh". She bids them set down the "honourable load" then laments. Lady Anne attends the corpse of Henry VI with Trestle and Berkeley going from St Paul's Cathedral. What, though I kill'd her husband and her father? The play begins with Richard of Gloucester describing the re-accession to the throne of his brother, King Edward IV of England, eldest son of the late Richard, Duke of York (implying the year is 1471): Shakespeare, Act 5, Scene 9, painting by Nicolai Abildgaard. Synopsis Richard III terrified by nightmarish visions.
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