Seven Dials (28 page)

‘Well, well,’ he murmured softly. ‘If it isn’t dear old Katy! It’s been an age since I’ve seen you - how goes the battle, coz?
Sweet
coz -’

‘No better for seeing you,’ Katy said, almost hissing it between her teeth and Brin turned, startled at the venom in her voice.

Theo laughed and then, as the next act, a troupe of famous jugglers who did amazing things with beach balls and Indian clubs, went running past him to go on stage, said, in the same soft voice, ‘Still so sweet, my darling? Oh, it
is
a comfort to know that things don’t change in this wicked world! London looks as grey as ever, the people here are as phlegmatic as ever, and Katy Lackland is still as much of a little bitch as ever!
Sweet
girl - I see you’re playing your namesake in the
Shrew
. Such splendid casting. Dear old Letty, always gets it right, doesn’t
she?’

And he moved past Brin and with a very practised move swept her into his arms and kissed her soundly.

She struggled furiously and then, as at last she managed to get away from him, turned her head and with great inelegance spat into the dust on the floor.

‘You make me sick!’ she blazed. ‘You disgusting old - old
queer
!’ and Brin stared in fascinated amazement, taken aback not only by her rage and the look of sheer glittering loathing in her eyes but also the professionalism of the pair of them, for they were still talking in the whispers essential in the wings when the tab is up.

‘Darling!’ Theo almost purred it. ‘I can think of a much better word for you! Several in fact. Let’s start with the nice ones - like little tart and -’

She lifted her hand and slapped his face so hard that the sound of the impact reached the stage and one of the jugglers, momentarily distracted, almost fumbled one of his Indian clubs, and Brin hissed automatically, ‘Quiet!’ even though he was, if the truth were told, greatly enjoying the little scene. But Katy seemed unaware of him and turned on her heel to walk away and cannoned straight into Rollo who was standing immediately behind her, as wide-eyed with interest in all that was going on as were Brin and several other people who were standing in the dimness staring.

Quite what happened then no one could ever be sure of. Rollo went sideways, turning away from Katy in an attempt to dodge her headlong rush, and the sword which was part of his costume tangled itself between his legs and sent him sprawling against a flat that was propped against the wall, and it swayed dangerously. Then, as Brin flung himself at it to hold it steady, Rollo twisted again to avoid it, and this time landed heavily on the floor.

He lay there for a moment seeming almost stunned and then tried to get up, but as he moved his left leg he yelped with pain and again Brin called ‘Quiet!’ automatically.

People clustered round as applause broke out for the jugglers, and Letty appeared almost from nowhere with Peter close behind her. She took one look at Rollo, still on the floor, and at Katy, now standing still and horror-struck as she stared down at her leading man who was whimpering with pain, and
said crisply to Brin, ‘Send the jugglers back on as soon as they come off - tell David in the pit they’re to do an encore and then get the dancers on to repeat their first line-up routine. We can hold the
Shrew
another ten or twelve minutes that way -’ And she knelt beside Rollo and with careful hands touched his left leg and tried to straighten it.

All the time Brin was obeying her instructions he could hear what was going on; Rollo in real tears of obviously agonizing pain and Letty’s voice soft but commanding as she tried to help him and then her demand for someone to help her get Rollo out of his costume.

‘He can’t go on,’ she said shortly. ‘And he needs medical attention, so the sooner we get him out of this stuff the better. Peter, send a callboy out front to find a doctor. The house must be littered with ’em -’

‘Max is here with Johanna,’ Peter said swiftly. ‘Somewhere in the dress circle - I’ll get him -’ And he vanished as Brin came back to stand eagerly beside Letty, tense with excitement as the jugglers, puzzled but obedient, went back on stage to start their encore.

‘Who’ll do the part?’ he asked urgently, having to concentrate on keeping his voice low, so eager and anxious did he feel. ‘Letty? Who?’

‘No one,’ she grunted, as gently, with the help of Theo who had said not a word throughout the whole contretemps, she eased Rollo out of his constraining doublet and then began to ease the hose off his now rapidly swelling left leg. ‘You know quite well that this one we didn’t understudy -’

‘I’ll do it,’ Brin said, his voice seeming almost to ring in his own ears with the tension that was in him. ‘I’ve rehearsed this one over and over, remember? Rollo wanted a lot of time, and so I held the book for them umpteen times - I know every move and every inflexion, I could do it exactly the way he did -’

Letty looked up at him briefly and then went on methodically helping to get Rollo into the bathrobe someone had brought from his dressing-room. ‘Rollo?’ she said after a moment. ‘All right with you?’

‘Fine with me,’ Rollo was sweating under his makeup, his normally cheerful face strained and white. Clearly he was in severe pain. ‘Be grateful if you would, old man - shit, but this
hurts! I must have torn a hamstring again - I did that once before when I was a kid and it was just like this -’

‘There’ll be a doctor here soon. Can you relax so that a couple of the boys can pick you up and carry you, Rollo? Good lad - just take it easy, now.’

She got to her feet as carefully two of the male ballet dancers made a carrying cradle of their arms and eased the tall figure into it, their trained muscles rippling easily under their leotards. ‘Katy,’ she said then, not looking at her. ‘All right with you?’

‘Yes, oh yes, Letty,’ Katy said in a small voice and then, in a little rush, ‘God, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to be so - Rollo, I’m so sorry -’

She moved forwards and now her face was more easy to see and she looked stricken and Brin without thinking put a hand out to take hers and convulsively she squeezed it, grateful for the touch.

‘Me too, Letty,’ Theo said, his voice a little brusque. ‘It was my fault. I indulged myself baiting Katy. It’s an old game we play, but I should have known better - really sorry, Rollo -’

‘Never mind.’ Rollo was now leaning against one of his bearers, his face wet with sweat but seeming a little less agonized. ‘Just get me out of here, for pity’s sake, and let Brin get on with it -’ And Letty nodded and the two dancers carried him away.

‘Right, get into the costume, Brin,’ Letty said and reached for the clipboard tucked under his arm. ‘I’ll take over here. It probably won’t fit too well, but do your best -’

‘As long as the doublet’s a decent length,’ Brin said. He was already hopping on one leg as he pulled off his trousers and now he tugged them off completely and threw them aside and reached for the tights and began to get into them. ‘I’ll not be too decent if it isn’t - no jockstrap - oh, hell, turn your back, all of you - I’ve got to get rid of my underpants. They’ll look awful under these -’

With help from Katy who was now in a fever of willingness to assist in an attempt to expiate her guilt, and with Theo fastening on his sword, he was dressed in the costume by the time the dancers were taking a bow to rather thinner applause. The audience was getting restive now, and wanted something different, and Brin lifted his chin and stared out at the great
vivid expanse of brightly lit stage and thought - me. They want me, and I’ll show them - wait till they see me - And then suddenly his excitement and confidence collapsed about him like a child’s brick house.

‘Oh, my God,’ he said blankly. ‘Makeup. I’ve got no bloody makeup on -’

‘Sod makeup,’ Theo said succinctly and pushed a soft-feathered hat into his hand. ‘It’s the acting they’ll see, not your bloody face -’

‘But -’ Brin turned to him, almost piteously, and touched the scar on his cheek. ‘But this - oh, Christ, how can I go on without makeup and with this?’

‘Idiot!’ Theo said. ‘They’ll love it - get on with it -’ And he reached for the red leather book that held his script and walked forwards to go on stage as at last the music cue that heralded the wooing scene started on its way.

He hesitated only one more fraction of a second and then came back and leaned over Katy and kissed her cheek gently. ‘Sorry, Katy,’ he whispered. ‘You call it quits and I will -’ And then he was gone, marching on stage to rapturous applause.

But he did not do as he was meant to do and go to stage right to take his place behind the lectern that was set there for him. Instead he walked down to the centre stage and held up his hand to the still applauding house.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he cried and at once the clapping stopped and they sat there hushed and expectant, row after row of pale oval faces gleaming in the light from the stage and turned upwards towards the figure standing there. Brin, who had moved further back so that he could see into the auditorium, felt a moment of such acute sick horror that he thought he was actually going to throw up there and then. His stomach seemed to move up into his throat as he caught a glimpse of the great composite animal that was a full house audience. It could, if it loved him, make him the happiest man in the world, make him feel real as he had never been in all his life; but it could also, as he well knew, become savage and turn on him, booing and jeering its hatred and boredom.

That such an audience as this very fashionable one was unlikely to behave so didn’t occur to him at that moment. It was an audience and as such to be deeply feared as much as it
was adored and needed. He wanted it and hated it in the same moment and for a brief second he actually contemplated turning and running away, had actually made a small sideways lurch, but then Theo’s voice began and he stopped and listened, unable to move at all.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he repeated in those golden, liquid tones for which he was so justly famous. ‘Alas and alack, problems have beset us backstage! That fine and much loved actor Rollo Groom has been injured. We are not asking if there is a doctor in the house -’ He laughed musically. ‘We don’t want the entire staff of Nellie’s backstage - and actually we have already sent for such help. But we do want to announce that there is no need to fear you will be deprived of seeing the item that he and his enchanting co-star, our own lovely Miss Katy Lackland, were to give you. Because there is backstage tonight another fine actor - untried as yet, and unknown to you, but his time will come, as you will, I know, agree when you see him in the part he is to play for you. It is indeed a very remarkable thing that fate has decreed he take this role tonight as you will understand when I tell you that he is one Brinsley Lackland - a brother to our own dear Katy, and therefore - like your humble servant’ - and he sketched a little bow -’ a member of the family whose efforts in founding the great hospital of Queen Eleanor’s we are here tonight to celebrate.

‘So, ladies and gentlemen, I here give you another Lackland, eager to ensure that Nellie’s, our own wonderful Nellie’s, which has served London so faithfully for so long, will continue to be an establishment that is Rising High. In the wooing scene from Shakespeare’s
The Taming of the Shrew
, here are Katy Lackland and Brin Lackland - welcome them as only a London audience can!’

And as the applause broke on his ears like a great flood of water breaking on stone cliffs, Brin, with Katy’s hand firmly in the small of his back to push him on his way, went sweeping on to the vast stage of the Stoll Theatre.

At first Charlie had been so startled that she couldn’t react at all. She had sat there in the middle of the sixth row of the stalls staring up at Theo as he rolled out the words and hadn’t believed what she was hearing. It was one of those silly fantasies she sometimes drifted into when she was trying to fall asleep, she told herself a little wildly and closed her eyes, screwing then tight till they hurt, but she didn’t wake, for when she looked again at the stage Theo was still there, making his announcement. But then he stepped back, merging into the shadows at the rear of the stage as Brin came on with Katy close behind him.

The audience began to applaud, rising to Theo’s manipulation of them as obediently as one end of a seesaw rises to the fall of the other, and Brin stood there centre stage, quite still, with his head up, and that made the applause falter for a moment and then start again, and Charlie felt her own face get hot as she realized why there had been that moment of hesitation.

It was his scar. He looked pale and somehow less real than Katy, and Charlie realized after a moment of puzzlement that he was, unlike all the other people she had seen that evening, quite without any greasepaint. His eyes were dark enough to be clearly seen, however, and the lines of his jaw defined the shape of his face well, but the light, that cruel penetrating light in which the entire stage was washed, did more. It outlined the scar on his face in a way that made it more vivid than it actually was. It was the same clarity of view that she had when she looked at a patient under the special operating theatre lights which cast their careful and pitiless shadow-free glare on the area in which she was to work and she wanted to jump up and cry out: ‘No - don’t look - don’t stare - we’re going to cure that - make it better, get rid of it - please, don’t look - don’t
look -’

But of course she sat still and then became aware that around her the applause was increasing, that some people were standing up to make it easier to thump their hands together and she stared round as one after another rose to give Brin a standing ovation that went on and on, until her head was ringing with the noise of it.

She looked back at the stage and this time saw Theo standing beside Brin, his hands up as Brin still stood there and made no move, and then at last the noise stopped as people sat down and prepared to listen.

‘Please,’ Theo said simply. ‘Please - the wooing scene from
The Taming of the Shrew
!’ and he stepped back and cried in a loud voice, ‘Signior Petruchio, will you go with us, or shall I send my daughter Kate to you?’