Theatre (5 page)

'You'll have to find your rich old woman,' said Julia gaily.

She only half believed all she had been saying, but it excited her to discuss a plan that would bring her into a close and constant relation with Michael. But he was being very serious.

'I don't believe one could hope to make a success in London unless one were pretty well known already. The thing to do would be to act there in other managements for three or four years first; one's got to know the ropes. And the advantage of that would be that one would have had time to read plays. It would be madness to start in management unless one had at least three plays. One of them out to be a winner.'

'Of course if one did that, one ought to make a point of acting together so that the public got accustomed to seeing the two names on the same bill.'

'I don't know that there's much in that. The great thing is to have good, strong parts. There's no doubt in my mind that it would be much easier to find backers if one had made a bit of a reputation in London.'

It was getting on for Easter, and Jimmie Langton always closed his theatre for Holy Week. Julia did not quite know what to do with herself; it seemed hardly worth while to go to Jersey. She was surprised to receive a letter one morning from Mrs Gosselyn, Michael's mother, saying that it would give the Colonel and herself so much pleasure if she would come with Michael to spend the week at Cheltenham. When she showed the letter to Michael he beamed.

'I asked her to invite you. I thought it would be more polite than if I just took you along.'

'You are sweet. Of course I shall love to come.'

Her heart beat with delight. The prospect of spending a whole week with Michael was enchanting. It was just like his good nature to come to the rescue when he knew she was at a loose end. But she saw there was something he wanted to say, yet did not quite like to.

'What is it?'

He gave a little laugh of embarrassment.

'Well, dear, you know, my father's rather old-fashioned, and there are some things he can't be expected to understand. Of course I don't want you to tell a lie or anything like that, but I think it would seem rather funny to him if he knew your father was a vet. When I wrote and asked if I could bring you down I said he was a doctor.'

'Oh, that's all right.'

Julia found the Colonel a much less alarming person than she had expected. He was thin and rather small, with a lined face and close-cropped white hair. His features had a worn distinction. He reminded you of a head on an old coin that had been in circulation too long. He was civil, but reserved. He was neither peppery nor tyrannical as Julia, from her knowledge of the stage, expected a colonel to be. She could not imagine him shouting out words of command in that courteous, rather cold voice. He had in point of fact retired with honorary rank after an entirely undistinguished career, and for many years had been content to work in his garden and play bridge at his club. He read
The Times
went to church on Sunday and accompanied his wife to tea-parties. Mrs Gosselyn was a tall, stoutish, elderly woman, much taller than her husband, who gave you the impression that she was always trying to diminish her height. She had the remains of good looks, so that you said to yourself that when young she must have been beautiful. She wore her hair parted in the middle with a bun on the nape of her neck. Her classic features and her size made her at first meeting somewhat imposing, but Julia quickly discovered that she was very shy. Her movements were stiff and awkward.
She was dressed fussily, with a sort of old-fashioned richness which did not suit her. Julia, who was entirely without self-consciousness, found the elder woman's deprecating attitude rather touching. She had never known an actress to speak to and did not quite know how to deal with the predicament in which she now found herself. The house was not at all grand, a small detached stucco house in a garden with a laurel hedge, and since the Gosselyns had been for some years in India there were great trays of brass ware and brass bowls, pieces of Indian embroidery and highly-carved Indian tables. It was cheap bazaar stuff, and you wondered how anyone had thought it worth bringing home.

Julia was quick-witted. It did not take her long to discover that the Colonel, notwithstanding his reserve, and Mrs Gosselyn, notwithstanding her shyness, were taking stock of her. The thought flashed through her mind that Michael had brought her down for his parents to inspect her. Why? There was only one possible reason, and when she thought of it her heart leaped. She saw that he was anxious for her to make a good impression. She felt instinctively that she must conceal the actress, and without effort, without deliberation, merely because she felt it would please, she played the part of the simple, modest, ingenuous girl who had lived a quiet country life. She walked round the garden with the Colonel and listened intelligently while he talked of peas and asparagus; she helped Mrs Gosselyn with the flowers and dusted the ornaments with which the drawing-room was crowded. She talked to her of Michael. She told her how cleverly he acted and how popular he was and she praised his looks. She saw that Mrs Gosselyn was very proud of him, and with a flash of intuition saw that it would please her if she let her see, with the utmost delicacy, as though she would have liked to keep it a secret but betrayed herself unwittingly, that she was head over ears in love with him.

'Of course we hope he'll do well,' said Mrs Gosselyn.
'We didn't much like the idea of his going on the stage; you see, on both sides of the family, we're army, but he was set on it.'

'Yes, of course I see what you mean.'

'I know it doesn't mean so much as when I was a girl, but after all he was born a gentleman.'

'Oh, but some very nice people go on the stage nowadays, you know. It's not like in the old days.'

'No, I suppose not. I'm so glad he brought you down here. I was a little nervous about it. I thought you'd be made-up and... perhaps a little loud. No one would dream you were on the stage.'

('I should damn well think not. Haven't I been giving a perfect performance of the village maiden for the last forty-eight hours?')

The Colonel began to make little jokes with her and sometimes he pinched her ear playfully.

'Now you mustn't flirt with me, Colonel,' she cried, giving him a roguish, delicious glance, 'Just because I'm an actress you think you can take liberties with me.'

'George, George,' smiled Mrs Gosselyn. And then to Julia: 'He always was a terrible flirt.'

('Gosh, I'm going down like a barrel of oysters.')

Mrs Gosselyn told her about India, how strange it was to have all those coloured servants, but how nice the society was, only army people and Indian civilians, but still it wasn't like home, and how glad she was to get back to England.

They were to leave on Easter Monday because they were playing that night, and on Sunday evening after supper Colonel Gosselyn said he was going to his study to write letters; a minute or two later Mrs Gosselyn said she must go and see the cook. When they were left alone Michael, standing with his back to the fire, lit a cigarette.

'I'm afraid it's been very quiet down here; I hope you haven't had an awfully dull time.'

'It's been heavenly.'

'You've made a tremendous success with my people. They've taken an enormous fancy to you.'

'God, I've worked for it,' thought Julia, but aloud said: 'How d'you know?'

'Oh, I can see it. Father told me you were very ladylike, and not a bit like an actress, and mother says you're so sensible.'

Julia looked down as though the extravagance of these compliments was almost more than she could bear. Michael came over and stood in front of her. The thought occurred to her that he looked like a handsome young footman applying for a situation. He was strangely nervous. Her heart thumped against her ribs.

'Julia dear, will you marry me?'

For the last week she had asked herself whether or not he was going to propose to her, and now that he had at last done so, she was strangely confused.

'Michael!'

'Not immediately, I don't mean. But when we've got our feet on the ladder. I know that you can act me off the stage, but we get on together like a house on fire, and when we do go into management I think we'd make a pretty good team. And you know I do like you most awfully. I mean, I've never met anyone who's a patch on you.'

('The blasted fool, why does he talk all that rot? Doesn't he know I'm crazy to marry him? Why doesn't he kiss me, kiss me, kiss me? I wonder if I dare tell him I'm absolutely sick with love for him.')

'Michael, you're so handsome. No one could refuse to marry you.'

'Darling!'

('I'd better get up. He wouldn't know how to sit down. God, that scene that Jimmie made him do over and over again!')

She got on her feet and put up her face to his. He took her in his arms and kissed her lips.

'I must tell mother.'

He broke away from her and went to the door.

'Mother, mother!'

In a moment the Colonel and Mrs Gosselyn came in. They bore a look of happy expectancy.

('By God, it was a put-up job.')

'Mother, father, we're engaged.'

Mrs Gosselyn began to cry. With her awkward, lumbering gait she came up to Julia, flung her arms round her, and sobbing, kissed her. The Colonel wrung his son's hand in a manly way and releasing Julia from his wife's embrace kissed her too. He was deeply moved. All this emotion worked on Julia and, though she smiled happily, the tears coursed down her cheeks. Michael watched the affecting scene with sympathy.

'What d'you say to a bottle of pop to celebrate?' he said. 'It looks to me as though mother and Julia were thoroughly upset.'

'The ladies, God bless 'em,' said the Colonel when their glasses were filled.

Julia now was looking at the photograph of herself in her wedding-dress.

'Christ, what a sight I looked.'

They decided to keep their engagement to themselves, and Julia told no one about it but Jimmie Langton, two or three girls in the company and her dresser. She vowed them to secrecy and could not understand how within forty-eight hours everyone in the theatre seemed to know all about it. Julia was divinely happy. She loved Michael more passionately than ever and would gladly have married him there and then, but his good sense prevailed. They were at present no more than a couple of provincial actors, and to start their conquest of London as a married couple would jeopardize their chances. Julia showed him as clearly as she knew how, and this was very clearly
indeed, that she was quite willing to become his mistress, but this he refused. He was too honourable to take advantage of her.

'I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honour more,' he quoted.

He felt sure that when they were married they would bitterly regret it if they had lived together before as man and wife. Julia was proud of his principles. He was a kind and affectionate lover, but in a very short while seemed to take her a trifle for granted; by his manner, friendly but casual, you might have thought they had been married for years. But he showed great good nature in allowing Julia to make love to him. She adored to sit cuddled up to him with his arm round her waist, her face against his, and it was heaven when she could press her eager mouth against his rather thin lips. Though when they sat side by side like that he preferred to talk of the parts they were studying or make plans for the future, he made her very happy. She never tired of praising his beauty. It was heavenly, when she told him how exquisite his nose was and how lovely his russet, curly hair, to feel his hold on her tighten a little and to see the tenderness in his eyes.

'Darling, you'll make me as vain as a peacock.'

'It would be so silly to pretend you weren't divinely handsome.'

Julia thought he was, and she said it because she liked saying it, but she said it also because she knew he liked to hear it. He had affection and admiration for her, he felt at ease with her, and he had confidence in her, but she was well aware that he was not in love with her. She consoled herself by thinking that he loved her as much as he was capable of loving, and she thought that when they were married, when they slept together, her own passion would excite an equal passion in him. Meanwhile she exercised all her tact and all her self-control. She knew she could not afford to bore him. She knew she must never let him feel that she was a burden or a responsibility. He might desert her for a game of golf, or to
lunch with a casual acquaintance, she never let him see for a moment that she was hurt. And with an inkling that her success as an actress strengthened his feeling for her she worked like a dog to play well.

When they had been engaged for rather more than a year an American manager, looking for talent and having heard of Jimmie Langton's repertory company, came to Middlepool and was greatly taken by Michael. He sent him round a note asking him to come to his hotel on the following afternoon. Michael, breathless with excitement, showed it to Julia; it could only mean that he was going to offer him a part. Her heart sank, but she pretended that she was as excited as he, and went with him next day to the hotel. She was to wait in the lobby while Michael saw the great man.

'Wish me luck,' he whispered, as he turned from her to enter the lift. 'It's almost too good to be true.'

Julia sat in a great leather armchair willing with all her might the American manager to offer a part that Michael would refuse or a salary that he felt it would be beneath his dignity to accept. Or alternatively that he should get Michael to read the part he had in view and come to the conclusion that he could not touch it. But when she saw Michael coming towards her half an hour later, his eyes bright and his step swinging, she knew he had clicked. For a moment she thought she was going to be sick, and when she forced on her face an eager, happy smile, she felt that her muscles were stiff and hard.

'It's all right. He says it's a damned good part, a boy's part, nineteen. Eight or ten weeks in New York and then on the road. It's a safe forty weeks with John Drew. Two hundred and fifty dollars a week.'

'Oh, darling, how wonderful for you.'

It was quite clear that he had accepted with alacrity. The thought of refusing had never even occurred to him.

'And I –I,' she thought, 'if they'd offered me a thousand dollars a week I wouldn't have gone if it meant being separated from Michael.'

Black despair seized her. She could do nothing. She must pretend to be as delighted as he was. He was too much excited to sit still and took her out into the crowded street to walk.

'It's a wonderful chance. Of course America's expensive, but I ought to be able to live on fifty dollars a week at the outside, they say the Americans are awfully hospitable and I shall get a lot of free meals. I don't see why I shouldn't save eight thousand dollars in the forty weeks and that's sixteen hundred pounds.'

('He doesn't love me. He doesn't care a damn about me. I hate him. I'd like to kill him. Blast that American manager.')

'And if he takes me on for a second year I'm to get three hundred. That means that in two years I'd have the best part of four thousand pounds. Almost enough to start management on.'

'A second year!' For a moment Julia lost control of herself and her voice was heavy with tears. 'D'you mean to say you'll be gone two years?'

'Oh, I should come back next summer of course. They pay my fare back and I'd go and live at home so as not to spend any money.'

'I don't know how I'm going to get on without you.'

She said the words very brightly, so that they sounded polite, but somewhat casual.

'Well, we can have a grand time together in the summer and you know a year, two years at the outside, well, it passes like a flash of lightning.'

Michael had been walking at random, but Julia without his noticing had guided him in the direction she wished, and now they arrived in front of the theatre. She stopped.

'I'll see you later. I've got to pop up and see Jimmie.' His face fell.

'You're not going to leave me now! I must talk to somebody. I thought we might go and have a snack together before the show.'

'I'm terribly sorry. Jimmie's expecting me and you know what he is.'

Michael gave her his sweet, good-natured smile.

'Oh, well, go on then. I'm not going to hold it up against you because for once you've let me down.'

He walked on and she went in by the stage door. Jimmie Langton had arranged himself a tiny flat under the roof to which you gained access through the balcony. She rang the bell of his front door and he opened it himself. He was surprised, but pleased, to see her.

'Hulloa, Julia, come in.'

She walked past him without a word, and when they got into his sitting-room, untidy, littered with typescript plays, books and other rubbish, the remains of his frugal luncheon still on a tray by his desk, she turned and faced him. Her jaw was set and her eyes were frowning.

'You devil!'

With a swift gesture she went up to him, seized him by his loose shirt collar with both hands and shook him. He struggled to get free of her, but she was strong and violent.

'Stop it. Stop it.'

'You devil, you swine, you filthy low-down cad.'

He took a swing and with his open hand gave her a great smack on the face. She instinctively loosened her grip on him and put her own hand up to her cheek, for he had hurt her. She burst out crying.

'You brute. You rotten hound to hit a woman.'

'You put that where the monkey put the nuts, dearie. Didn't you know that when a woman hits me I always hit back?'

'I didn't hit you.'

'You damned near throttled me.'

'You deserved it. Oh, my God, I'd like to kill you.'

'Now sit down, duckie, and I'll give you a drop of Scotch to pull you together. And then you can tell me all about it.'

Julia looked round for a big chair into which she could conveniently sink.

'Christ, the place is like a pig-sty. Why the hell don't you get a charwoman in?'

With an angry gesture she swept the books on to the floor from an armchair, threw herself in it, and began to cry in earnest. He poured her out a stiff dose of whisky, added a drop of soda, and made her drink it.

'Now what's all this Tosca stuff about?'

'Michael's going to America.'

'Is he?'

She wrenched herself away from the arm he had round her shoulder.

'How could you? How could you?'

'I had nothing to do with it.'

'That's a lie. I suppose you didn't even know that filthy American manager was in Middlepool. Of course it's your doing. You did it deliberately to separate us.'

'Oh, dearie, you're doing me an injustice. In point of fact I don't mind telling you that I said to him he could have anyone in the company he liked with the one exception of Michael Gosselyn.'

Julia did not see the look in Jimmie's eyes when he told her this, but if she had would have wondered why he was looking as pleased as if he had pulled off a very clever little trick.

'Even me?' she said.

'I knew he didn't want women. They've got plenty of their own. It's men they want who know how to wear their clothes and don't spit in the drawing room.'

'Oh, Jimmie, don't let Michael go. I can't bear it.'

'How can I prevent it? His contract's up at the end of the season. It's a wonderful chance for him.'

'But I love him. I want him. Supposing he sees someone else in America. Supposing some American heiress falls in love with him.'

'If he doesn't love you any more than that I should have thought you'd be well rid of him.'

The remark revived Julia's fury.

'You rotten old eunuch, what do you know about love?'

'These women,' Jimmie sighed. 'If you try to go to bed with them they say you're a dirty old man, and if you don't they say you're a rotten old eunuch.'

'Oh, you don't understand. He's so frightfully handsome, they'll fall for him like a row of ninepins, and poor lamb, he's so susceptible to flattery. Anything can happen in two years.'

'What's this about two years?'

'If he's a success he's to stay another year.'

'Well, don't worry your head about that. He'll be back at the end of the season and back for good. That manager only saw him in "Candida". It's the only part he's halfway decent in. Take my word for it, it won't be long before they find out they've been sold a pup. He's going to be a flop.'

'What do you know about acting?'

'Everything.'

'I'd like to scratch your eyes out.'

'I warn you that if you attempt to touch me I shan't give you a little bit of a slap, I shall give you such a biff on the jaw that you won't be able to eat in comfort for a week.'

'By God, I believe you'd do it. Do you call yourself a gentleman?'

'Not even when I'm drunk.'

Julia giggled, and Jimmie felt the worst of the scene was over.

'Now you know just as well as I do that you can act him off his head. I tell you, you're going to be the greatest actress since Mrs Kendal. What do you want to go and hamper yourself with a man who'll always be a millstone round your neck? You want to go into management; he'll want to play opposite you. He'll never be good enough, my dear.'

'He's got looks. I can carry him.'

'You've got a pretty good opinion of yourself, haven't
you? But you're wrong. If you want to make a success you can't afford to have a leading man who's not up to the mark.'

'I don't care. I'd rather marry him and be a failure than be a success and married to somebody else.'

'Are you a virgin?'

Julia giggled again.

'I don't know that it's any business of yours, but in point of fact I am.'

'I thought you were. Well, unless it means something to you, why don't you go over to Paris with him for a fortnight when we close? He won't be sailing till August. It might get him out of your system.'

'Oh, he wouldn't. He's not that sort of man. You see, he's by way of being a gentleman.'

'Even the upper classes propagate their species.'

'You don't understand,' said Julia haughtily.

'I bet you don't either.'

Julia did not condescend to reply. She was really very unhappy.

'I can't live without him, I tell you. What am I to do with myself when he's away?'

'Stay on with me. I'll give you a contract for another year. I've got a lot of new parts I want to give you and I've got a juvenile in my eye who's a find. You'll be surprised how much easier you'll find it when you've got a chap opposite you who'll really give you something. You can have twelve pounds a week.'

Julia went up to him and stared into his eyes searchingly.

'Have you done all this to get me to stay on for another year? Have you broken my heart and ruined my whole life just to keep me in your rotten theatre?'

'I swear I haven't. I like you and I admire you. And we've done better business the last two years than we've ever done before. But damn it, I wouldn't play you a dirty trick like that.'

'You liar, you filthy liar.'

'I swear it's the truth.'

'Prove it then,' she said violently.

'How can I prove it? You know I'm decent really.'

'Give me fifteen pounds a week and I'll believe you.'

'Fifteen pounds a week? You know what our takings
are. How can I? Oh well, all right. But I shall have to pay
three pounds out of my own pocket.'

'A fat lot I care.'