The Girl from the Savoy (18 page)

LONDON

1923–24

There is a gallery first-nighter—a girl or woman with a shrill treble—who most disconcertingly persists in screaming to actors and actresses, good, bad, and indifferent, “You're marvelous! You're marvelous!”

—Newspaper review, V&A Museum Theatre Archive

There is an art to dying convincingly.

Apparently, I do it rather well.

I
suppose one shouldn't need a reason to visit one's brother, but I have such an aversion to his dismal little flat above the theater that I must find compelling motives to go there at all. Discovering what happened with his muse is one. Telling him about my illness is another. Whilst I've thus far managed to admirably cover up my episodes with excuses about exhaustion and headaches and too many cocktails, I don't know how much longer I can keep up the pretense. And yet I struggle to find the words to tell them: Perry, Bea, Cockie, Elsie, Hettie, Aubrey, Mother and Father. How exactly does one bring such a grim and depressing matter into the conversation?

“Ice and a slice?”

“Yes, please, darling. Oh, and by the way, I'm dying. They tell me I have a cancer. Dreadful nuisance, isn't it. Anyone for croquet?”

If only somebody could write the script. If only I could rehearse the lines and deliver them as if it were all another performance. I have died at least a dozen times onstage. There is an art to dying convincingly. Apparently, I do it rather well. But this is not a performance. This is frighteningly real.

My hesitation not only comes from my staunch denial that I am ill at all, but from the knowledge that as soon as I tell people, everything will change. I won't be me anymore. I'll be someone who is dying. People will look at me in that awful sympathetic way and nobody will know what to say. They'll tell me how dreadfully sorry they are and we'll all feel crushingly awkward until it is me consoling them. I cannot bear it, and so my illness remains as silent as an unplayed gramophone record.

Perry's apartment at the top of the Strand Theatre is small and overfurnished with distasteful pieces collected from here, there, and goodness knows where. It is horribly suffocating in the summer and depressingly damp in the winter.

“How on earth Mrs. Ambrose can even begin with the dusting is beyond me,” I say, sweeping my glove across a wonky shelf cluttered with ghastly china dogs and blown-glass figurines of deer and swans. The trail my finger leaves behind in the dust suggests that dusting it is beyond Mrs. Ambrose too.

Perry ignores me and stares at his reflection in a small hand mirror perched on a shelf above the washbasin. The crack in the mirror has been there for as long as I can remember. He says it is a reminder of his imperfections.

I watch as he rubs at the lines on his forehead as if to erase the memories etched into them. He looks older than his twenty-nine years. Dark shadows beneath his eyes suggest another restless night. He has seen countless doctors, but they tell him there's nothing they can do for him, apart from the drafts they prescribe to help him sleep. They say the memories that haunt him will fade, that he'll forget, in time.

I light a cigarette and sit down on a couch that has seen better days in some far-distant past. “Can't you speak to the management about fixing the lift? It really makes me cross to think of you climb
ing those stairs every day. You are wounded, Perry. You aren't as physically capable as you used to be.”

He scoffs at my concerns. “Wounded! I have a limp, Etta. A bloody limp. Couldn't even get injured properly, could I?”

“
Perry!
That's a dreadful thing to say.”

“Well, that's what Father thinks. Some poor buggers came home without their legs or arms. After everything they did for this country, they're reduced to begging outside the train stations.
That's
what makes
me
cross.” He splashes water over his face and stares into the mirror. “In the grand scheme of things, I really don't think it is such an imposition to walk up a few stairs. Do you?”

He ignores my mutterings and disapproving tuts. “Anyway,” I continue, “I don't understand why you choose to live here at all when there are so many nicer places you could have.”

“I like the location. And this place has character. It talks to me.”

“It's the damp you can hear talking to you, darling. It talks to me too.” I take a bottle of perfume from my bag and spritz a little here and there to mask the musty smell.

The truth of the matter is that Perry doesn't want to live in luxury in Mayfair or Belgravia. He's had enough of grand houses and the stuffy rules they come with. I can't say I blame him. When I first started touring with productions, I relished the freedom of distant hotels and boardinghouses in much the same way that I had relished the freedom of the hospital dormitory. Cockie always made sure we stayed somewhere respectable and I came to enjoy the liberty those places provided. Even when I performed in London, I preferred to board at the Theatre Girls' Club in Soho rather than return home to Nine Elms. It was a shocking departure from the living standards I'd grown up in, but it was convenient and daring. More importantly, it was somewhere my mother wasn't.

Perry passes me a gin and tonic and pours himself a Scotch. I
swirl the liquid around in my glass, silently lamenting the absent clink of ice. “So, are you ever going to tell me what happened with your
muse
or am I going to have to play a tedious game of charades?”

“You don't have to say
muse
like that. You can just say ‘muse.'” I roll my eyes at him. “She was very pleasant.”

“Oh dear.”

“What do you mean, ‘oh dear'?”

“Pleasant is a dreadful way to describe someone. It's like saying someone is nice. Pleasant and nice people are like flat champagne. They're no fun.”

“Then she was delightful.”

“Better.”

“I already knew her, as it happens.”

“Oh?”

“She was the girl I bumped into outside The Savoy a few months ago. Do you remember? I was on my way to meet you for afternoon tea.”

“Yes. I remember. You had a hole in your trousers and you made a show of me in Claridge's. The very same girl? How extraordinary.”

“Isn't it.” He takes a long drag of his cigarette. That telltale pause of his.

“And?” I prompt.

“And I walked out on her.”

“You did what?!”

“I walked out on her. I left her in the Corner House.”

“Without saying good-bye?”

“I left her a note.” He takes a big slug of Scotch. “And paid the bill.”

“Oh, well, that's all right, then. I'm sure she was perfectly
happy and hasn't given it a second thought.” I stand up and walk to the fireplace to warm my hands. “What a beastly thing to do, Perry. One doesn't invite a person to tea and then simply disappear. You're not Harry Houdini, for goodness' sake. You're impossible. Really and truly.”

I'm restless. On edge. With every pause in the conversation I try to summon the courage to tell him, but the words won't come. I move over to the window seat and take a long drink as I look out of the large curved window, focusing my frustration on the busy street below. I watch a mother bend down to comfort her child who has fallen and grazed her knee. It is such a simple gesture, the two of them lost in a private moment as the world goes on around them. Little things like this catch my attention now. Quiet moments. Connections.

“So, what was wrong with her?” I ask.

Perry sits in his favorite chair beside the fire. He picks at his fingernails. Fidgets with his mustache. “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

I take a long drag on my cigarette holder. “Then I simply don't understand. You're so infuriating!”

Perry runs his hands through his hair, sending it sticking up this way and that. “I don't understand it myself. It just all felt too . . . sudden. The truth is that I haven't stopped thinking about that girl since I bumped into her. There was something about her that day; something different. And of all the people in London,
she
was the one to reply to my silly little notice. I know you don't believe in such things as love at first sight, Etta, and I know it sounds ridiculous and unconventional, but after spending half an hour in her company, I think I felt myself falling in love with her.”

“You
think
?”

“Yes. I'm not sure. How can one be?” He drains his drink and slams the glass down onto the mantelpiece. “That's why I left her,
and that's why I can't see her again, because the notion of falling in love terrifies me.”

I know he is thinking about Bea, that he is weighed down with the regret and guilt he carries heavy in his heart over her. I have no words to comfort him.

The room falls silent other than the crackling of the fire and the rumble of underground trains that rattle the glass in the window frames. Now would be a good time to tell him, but the words stick in my throat.

“Did she really leave that much of an impression on you? After one meeting?”

“Yes. And it's been two meetings. And a letter.” He pokes sulkily at the fire. “But she's just a maid. How can I possibly fall in love with a maid? Mother would die of shame. And as for Father. It doesn't bear thinking about.”

“Ah. I see.
Just
a maid. Not good enough for a Clements boy. That's what you're afraid of—other people. My goodness, Father was right. You really are a coward.” My words are unexpectedly harsh, smothering the room with an atmosphere as thick and heavy as the acrid fog outside. “There. I've said it. And now you hate me and will probably never speak to me again. But I'm not sorry. Sometimes the truth needs to be spoken, Perry, regardless of how painful it is to hear or to say. In fact, there's something I've been meaning to—”

“I don't hate you, Etta. I'm not especially fond of you at this particular moment, but I don't hate you.” He walks to the writing desk and sits at the chair, his shoulders slumped like an old man. “You're right. I
am
a coward. I didn't have the courage to stand up to my convictions. I shot men who were far braver than me. They stood by their principles, laid down their arms, refused to fight. I was just a puppet following orders, taking instruction, just like
I always have.” He kicks against the writing table in frustration. “I'm a coward and a failure. I can't even be pleasant to a bloody hotel maid.”

His voice is choked. It is uncomfortable to hear. I wish I could throw my arms around him and tell him it will be all right, but I don't know how. I stand stiffly by the window, as inanimate and cold as one of his silly little figurines on the shelves.

“You know what people are like, Etta. They have standards. Expectations. I could never take someone like Miss Lane to the Mitfords' New Year party. I'd be the laughingstock. They all think I'm enough of a joke as it is.”

“Miss Lane. So she has a name after all.” I sigh and stretch my arm behind my head. “What was in it for her, anyway, this arrangement of yours? Why did she want to be your muse?”

“I don't think she did particularly. She wants to be a dancer. Wants to be on the stage. Lead a more exciting life. I expect she was attracted by the prospect of getting to know someone in the business.”

“So she was using you to her own advantage?”

“I suppose she was.”

“Good for her. I rather like the sound of this Miss Lane.” I finish my cigarette, crushing it in the ashtray on the sideboard. “In fact, I wonder.”

“What do you wonder?” Perry eyes me suspiciously. “You worry me when you wonder.”

“I wonder if we might not be able to come to some sort of arrangement whereby she inspires you and we improve her.”

He looks at me. “What do you mean,
improve
her?”

“What if you were to have your weekly tête-à-têtes, let her amuse you and distract you from your melancholy, let her inspire your compositions, and in the meantime we teach her how to be
have more like the sort of person you
could
take to the Mitfords' party. It can't be that difficult. Rosie Boote was as sophisticated as a stick when she first started in the chorus. And now look at her, the Marchioness of Headfort! If Rosie Boote can become a lady, anyone can.” The more I think about it, the more I like the idea, and I'm quietly confident that Perry's lifelong affections for Bea will never be replaced by those for a maid. If I can just encourage him to play along, to let this girl into his life, it might lift him out of the doldrums he's been languishing in for far too long. “I can help with the more feminine things. I can give her dance training if she's serious about it. Does she get time off?”

“Yes. Wednesday afternoons and alternate Sundays.”

I am suddenly full of purpose and in a tremendous hurry. I grab my coat off the back of the battered old sofa. “Let me find her and apologize on your behalf. We can improve her together. It'll be fun.”

He looks doubtful. “You make her sound like a toy.”

“I'm serious, Perry. In fact, I'm most exhilarated at the prospect. Is she pretty?”

“Yes, but . . . this is madness, Etta. I'm the last person she'll want to see after my appalling behavior. And how on earth will you find her?”

I sigh and place my hands on my hips. “How many hotels do you know in London called The Savoy? Honestly, darling, have a little sense. I'll talk to Reeves-Smith. I could find her this afternoon if I wanted to. And in the meantime, you can start working on a new piece. Charlot was asking about you. Says he's looking for something new. Something different.”

“Like what?”

“I don't know. You're the composer. Write a piece about Miss Lane.”

“But I hardly know anything about her.”

“Precisely. You know enough to be afraid of falling in love with her, but not enough to have discovered her flaws and irritations and annoyances. There is no better time to write a song about her. Use your imagination. What does she look like?”

A small smile plays at his lips. “Deep brown eyes to get lost in. A face like a love heart. Perfect vermillion lips and a smile to brighten the dreariest day.”