What Bloody Man Is That (23 page)

The trouble was, he hadn't got round to ringing her during the period of actual abstinence, and to ring her and speak of it retrospectively wouldn't have quite the same dramatic effect.

No, he'd have to think of another approach. He would ring her soon. Really.

‘Saw some of the kids coming in.' John B. Murgatroyd's muffled voice brought him back to reality. ‘Looked a right load of scruffs. Yes, I think they're going to be trouble. Still, Gavin's away,' he added innocently.

There wasn't much comfort for Charles in the director's absence. Gavin was in London auditioning for his production after next, Alan Ayckbourn's
Ten Times Table
. He was already into rehearsal for
Deathtrap
, the second show of the season. And he hadn't drawn Charles aside for a little chat about either play. So it looked as if Maurice Skellern's optimism about ‘other parts' had been misplaced. Once
Macbeth
finished its run, it was going to be back to London, with all the delights of his bedsitter and the Lisson Grove Unemployment Office, for Charles Paris.

Oh well, wouldn't be the first time.

And at least Russ Lavery had been kept on to play the young man in
Deathtrap
. Good part for someone so new to the business. That boy will go far, thought Charles, with only a twinge of jealousy.

John B. Murgatroyd reached into the folds of his Lennox gown and produced the hip-flask. This time Charles accepted his offer.

‘Settle the beer,' he said, somehow making the whisky sound like a medical necessity.

‘Five minutes, please,' called the Stage Manager's voice over the Tannoy, facing Charles with a dilemma of the bladder. He felt he should have a pee before the show started, but it was more a logical thought than an urgent necessity. And he knew, with that amount of beer inside him, if he had one pee, he'd be peeing all afternoon. Better to keep his nerve and hold it. Sometimes go for hours like that.

On the other hand . . . It would be dreadful to be taken short on stage. He didn't want to add a new legend to the apocrypha of stories of actors peeing into pot-plants, bottles and armour during performances.

Hmm. Tricky one.

He succumbed and had a pee.

As soon as the play started, it was evident that John B. Murgatroyd's assessment of the audience had erred on the side of charity. They were an awful load of little buggers.

They greeted the Witches' first appearance with raucous catcalls, which drowned most of their words. And, predictably enough, Duncan's opening line, ‘What bloody man is that?' got a huge belter.

The bloody man in question, waiting at the back of the auditorium, felt a tremor pass through Lennox, who was supporting him. ‘Come on, love,' murmured John B. Murgatroyd, and began to steer the Bleeding Sergeant down the aisle.

They would never be absolutely certain, but they both remained convinced to the end of their days that the leg outstretched across the gangway had been deliberately placed. Certainly no planning could have made it more effective. Charles lost his footing and stumbled forward, dragging John B. in his wake.

Their tumbled arrival at the foot of the stage was rewarded by a huge laugh. The audience of schoolchildren settled back. They were going to enjoy this.

Charles was still supported by Lennox, as per rehearsal, when he went through the Bleeding Sergeant's somewhat wordy account of Macbeth and Banquo's battle against ‘the merciless Macdonwald'. At one point he looked full into Lennox's face, and at that moment John B. Murgatroyd closed his eyes.

Charles realised instantly why his friend had kept his helmet on in the dressing room. This joke had taken preparation. Neatly written on the pale make-up of the right eyelid was the word ‘Fuck'; and on the left eyelid the word ‘Off'.

Charles, who was maundering on about ‘shipwracking storms and direful thunders', felt his voice begin to tremble as the giggle caught up with him. John B., making it look as if he were helping out his ailing comrade, slapped him on the back and took his hand in a comforting, manly grasp.

Charles felt something hard and round thrust into his hand. Squinting as he tried to continue his lines, he looked down.

There, nestling in his palm, was a walnut.

While being dragged off to have his gashes attended to (moving rather faster than usual because he was desperate for another pee), Charles managed to fall against Donalbain, and as the other actor reached to help him, shoved the walnut into his unsuspecting hand.

From there on, throughout the play it did the rounds, provoking a whole lot of giggling backstage, and a whole lot of new moves onstage, as actors desperately tried to avoid the fate of being the one who had to take the walnut off.

And the audience continued to chatter, whistle and devise other diversionary tactics.

They rustled crisp packets. Then one of them, no doubt a future captain of industry, had the bright idea of blowing them up and bursting them.

In a more planned campaign, a group of them set the alarms of their digital watches to go off at one-minute intervals.

And, meanwhile, the barracking also continued. Many lines took on new and filthy meanings. All the play's dramatic climaxes were defused by heckling.

‘I have done the deed,' Macbeth announced.

‘Ooh, you dirty beast!' came a cry from the audience.

In the Banquet Scene Lady Macbeth's line, ‘When all's done, You look but on a stool' was capped by a call of ‘Well, you should have flushed it, shouldn't you?'

As the Witches loaded their ingredients into the cauldron there were demands for more ketchup.

And so on and so on.

Once that kind of thing starts in a performance, it's difficult to stop, and the cast, relaxed into the second week of their run and secure in the knowledge that Gavin Scholes was in London for the day, made little attempt to stop it.

Mounting hysteria ran through the company. They knew it was unprofessional, they knew they shouldn't. But they did.

Felicia Chatterton alone seemed immune to the general mood. She was incapable of levity and continued, against all the odds, to give her Lady Macbeth.

And it was good. As ever, Charles had to admit that. But he really would like to see her break up on stage. Just once.

He watched her as she drifted about the stage in her low-cut nightgown for the Sleepwalking Scene. Oblivious to the catcalls from the audience, her concentration on the role remained total.

He moved his legs uneasily. Oh God, he couldn't need yet
another
pee, could he? He tried to think of something else.

The Gentlewoman in the scene seemed to be acting closer to him than usual, and as she said the line, ‘I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the dignity of the whole body', she suddenly tapped Charles on the shoulder.

He started at the unexpected action, and as he turned, felt a familiar object thrust into his hand. The Gentlewoman, backing away downstage, stuck her tongue out at him.

Charles Paris knew he shouldn't, but he couldn't resist it.

He walked across to the sleepwalking Lady Macbeth, and neatly dropped the walnut down her delicious cleavage.

He was rewarded by a look of amazement, and then a sweet, sweet moment as Felicia Chatterton dissolved into uncontrollable giggles.