William Again (2 page)

William had quietly abstracted the top hat as soon as he heard definitely that his father would not be present at the performance. William’s father was to preside at a political meeting in
the village hall, which was to be addressed by a Great Man from the Cabinet, who was coming down from London specially for the occasion.

‘Vast as are the attractions of any enterprise promoted by you, William,’ he had said politely at breakfast, ‘duty calls me elsewhere.’

William, while murmuring perfunctory sorrow at these tidings, hastily ran over in his mind various articles of his father’s attire that could therefore be safely utilised. The robing of
William himself as the villain had cost him much care and thought. He had finally decided upon the drawing-room rug pinned across his shoulder and a fern-pot upon his head. It was a black china
fern-pot and rather large, but it rested upon William’s ears, and gave him a commanding and sinister appearance. He also carried an umbrella.

These preparations took longer than the cast had foreseen, and, when finally large moustaches had been corked upon the hero’s, villain’s and crowd’s lips, the lunch-bell
sounded from the hall.

‘Jus’ all finished in time!’ said William the optimist.

‘Yes, but wot about the rehearsal,’ said the crowd gloomily, ‘wot about that?’

‘Well, you’ve had the book to learn the stuff,’ said William. ‘That’s enough, isn’t it? I don’t s’pose real acting people bother with rehearsals.
It’s quite easy. You jus’ learn your stuff an’ then say it. It’s silly wasting time over rehearsals.’

‘Have you learnt wot you say, William Brown?’ said the heroine shrilly.

‘I
know
wot I say,’ said William loftily, ‘I don’t need to
learn
!’

‘William!’ called a stern sisterly voice from the house. ‘Mother says come and get ready for lunch.’

William merely ejected his tongue in the direction of the voice and made no answer.

‘We’d better be taking off the things,’ he said, ‘so’s to be in time for this afternoon. Half past two it begins, then we can have a nice long go at it. Put all the
things away careful behind that box so’s bothering ole people can’t get at them an’ make a fuss.’

‘William, where
are
you?’ called the voice impatiently.

The tone goaded William into reply.

‘I’m somewhere where
you
can’t find me,’ he called.

‘You’re in the stable,’ said the voice triumphantly.

‘Seems as if folks simply couldn’t leave me alone,’ said William wistfully, as he removed his fern-pot and fur rug and walked with slow dignity into the house.

‘Wash yourself first, William,’ said the obnoxious voice.

‘I
am
washed,’ returned William coldly, as he entered the dining-room, forgetting the presence of a smudgy, corked moustache upon lips and cheeks.

It was an unfortunate afternoon as far as the prospects of a large audience were concerned. Most of the adults of the place were going to listen to the Great Man. Most of the
juveniles were going to watch a football match. Moreover, the cast, with the instincts of the very young, had shrouded the enterprise so deeply in mystery in order to enjoy the sensation of
superiority, that they had omitted to mention either the exact nature of the enterprise or the time at which it would take place.

On the side-gate was pinned a notice:

In the stable was a row of old chairs all turned out of the house at various times because of broken backs and legs. As a matter of fact, the cast were little concerned with
the audience. The great point was that they were going to act a play – they scarcely cared whether anyone watched it or not. Upon a broken chair in the middle sat a small child, attracted by the
notice. Her chair had only lost one leg, so, by sitting well on to one side, she managed to maintain an upright position on it. At a stern demand for money from William, she had shyly slipped a
halfpenny into the fern-pot, which served the double purpose of head-gear and pay desk. She now sat – an enthralled spectator – while the cast dressed and argued before her.

Outside down the road came the Great Man. He had come by an earlier train by mistake and was walking slowly towards the village hall, intensely bored by the prospect of the afternoon. He stopped
suddenly, arrested by a notice on a side gate:

He took out his watch. Half an hour to spare. He hesitated a moment, then walked firmly towards the Bloody Hand. Inside an outhouse a group of curiously dressed children stared
at him unsmilingly. One of them, who was dressed in a rug and a fern-pot, addressed him with a stern frown.

INSIDE AN OUTHOUSE A GROUP OF CURIOUSLY DRESSED CHILDREN STARED AT HIM UNSMILINGLY.

The Great Man sat down obediently and promptly collapsed upon the floor.

‘You shu’n’t have sat on a chair with two legs gone,’ said William impatiently. ‘You’ve broke it altogether now. You can manage all right if you try one with
only one gone. We’re jus’ going to begin.’

The Great Man picked up himself and his hat and sat down carefully upon the farthermost edge of a three-legged chair.

William, holding the mangled remains of an exercise book in his hand, strode forward.

‘The Bloody Hand,
by William Brown,’ he announced in a resonant voice.

‘Well, an’ wot about us?’ said the heroine shrilly.

‘You didn’t write it, did you?’ said William. ‘I’m only saying who wrote it.’

‘Well, aren’t you going to say who axe it?’ she said pugnaciously.

‘No, I’m
not
!’ said the stage-manager firmly. ‘You jus’ say the one wot wrote it. You don’t go on saying all them wot axe it.’

‘Well, I’m not going to be in it, then,’ she said. ‘I’m going home.’

William decided to be a woman-hater for the rest of his life.

‘All right,’ he capitulated, ‘if you’re going to be so disagreeable – jus’ like a girl’ – he strode forward again and raised his voice, ‘
The Bloody
Hand,
wrote, every bit of it, by William Brown – acted by Molly Carter an’ Ginger an’ Douglas an’ Henry – they jus’ learnt wot William Brown wrote. Now, if you’ll
be quiet a minute,’ he went on to his silent audience, ‘we’ll begin. You begin,’ he said to the damsel in the lace curtain.

She advanced. The rest of them stood in a corner and watched.

‘She’s
on
,’ William announced to the audience. ‘We’re
off.
Go on!’ he repeated to her.

‘I’m jus’ going to,’ she replied irritably, ‘soon as you stop talking.’ Then, changing her voice to one of shrill artificiality, ‘Ho! Where am I? Lorst
in a dreadful forest—’

‘It’s meant to be a forest,’ explained the author to the audience.

‘I wish you’d stop keep on saying things,’ said the heroine. ‘I forget where I am. Lorst in a dreadful forest. What shall I do? Ah, me! Crumbs! Who is this who yawns upon
my sight?’

‘Dawns!’
corrected the prompter.

‘A fierce villain,’ went on the heroine, ignoring him, ‘methinks. I shouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t Carlo Rupino of the Bloody Hand. Oh Lor! What shall I do? Ah
me! He draws nearer.’

‘It is him,’ prompted William.

‘I was jus’ going to say that, if you wouldn’t keep on interrupting. It is him. I was jus’ going to say it. Ah me! What shall I do? Whither shall I flee? Nowhere.
Gadzooks! He draws nearer.’

‘I come on now,’ explained William to the audience, holding on to his fern-pot with one hand to steady it. ‘I’m him.’ He advanced threateningly upon the maiden.
‘Aha!’ he sneered. ‘Gadzooks! Doest thou happen to know who I am?’

‘I am lorst in the dreadful forest,’ she replied. ‘Ah me! What shall I do?’

‘I am Carlo Rupino of the Bloody Hand. Go on,
faint
!’ he urged in an undertone.

‘ ’F you think I’m going to faint on this dirty ole floor,’ she replied, ‘I’m jus’ not. You should have brushed it up a bit ’f you wanted me to
faint on it.’

‘You don’t know how to,’ he jeered.

‘I
do!
I
can
! I can faint beautifully on our drawing-room carpet. I’m jus’ not going to faint on a dirty ole stable floor an’ I’m not going to be
in
your nasty ole play ’f you’re not going to be nice to me.’

‘All right, then, don’t be. You jus’ take off my sister’s petticoat, an’ our lace curtain an’ don’t be in it, if you don’t want to be.’

‘Well, I jus’
won’t,
if you’re going on like this at me.’

‘Well, ’f you keep on talkin’ not out of the play who’s to know when you’re talkin’ play an’ when you’re jus’ talkin’
yourself?’

‘Anyone with any sense could—’

‘Oh, get on with it,’ said the hero off the scenes. ‘You’ll never get to where I come in, if you’re going on like this all day.
Pretend
she’s fainted
and go on from there.’

‘All right,’ said the villain obligingly. Aha! I hast thee in my power. I wilt hang thee ere dawn dawns from my remote mountain lair.’ The toilet-cover train caught on a nail
and the petticoat tore with an echoing sound. ‘That’s right,’ he went on, ‘go on messin’ up my sister’s things, so’s she’ll never be able to wear
them again.’

‘ ’F you’re going to keep on being nasty to me,’ said the heroine again, ‘I’m going straight back home an’ I’m not going to be
in
your ole
play.’

‘Well, anyway,’ said William, with a mental determination that his next play should contain no heroines, ‘now we go off and they come on.’

The hero and his friend advanced.

‘Alas!’ said Sir Rufus Archibald Green, ‘I see no trace of her. What canst have happened to her? I hope she hast not met yon horrible ole villain, Carlo Rupino, of the Bloody
Hand. Seest thou any footmarks of her, the Hon Lord Leopold?’

The Hon Lord Leopold examined the stable floor.

‘Lookin’ for footmarks,’ explained the stage-manager to the audience.

‘Ah me! None!’ said the Hon Lord Leopold. Then, looking more closely. ‘Crikey! Yes!’ he said. ‘I seest footmarks. ’Tis hers and Carlo Rupino’s. I
knowest their boots.’

‘Ah me!’ said the hero. ‘What cattastrop is here? Gadzooks! Let us follow to his remote mountain lair. I will kill him dead and cut out his foul black heart and put an end to
his foul black life.’

He waved Mrs Brown’s best umbrella threateningly as he spoke. ‘Now they come off,’ explained William, ‘an’ we come on. Here’s the gallows.’

He carried forward a small reading stand, taken from his father’s study, then advanced holding the hand of the fair Elsabina. The crowd in his top hat and mackintosh stood in
attendance.

‘Aha!’ said Carlo Rupino to his victim. ‘I hast thee in my power, thou ole girl! I am now going to hang thee from yon lofty gallows! Go on!’ he addressed the crowd.

The crowd took off his top hat and uttered a feeble ‘Hurray!’

‘You couldn’t hang me from that old thing,’ remarked the heroine scornfully.

‘That’s not in the play,’ said William.

‘I know it isn’t. I’m just saying that myself.’

‘Well, say wot’s in the play.’

At that point the chair, upon which the Great Man was with difficulty sitting, collapsed suddenly, precipitating the Great Man among its fragments. William turned upon him sternly.