“Is it? Do you think it’ll stay there another ten years?”
He tightened his arms.
“For ever and ever. Amen.”
CHAPTER XVI
L.L. smoked a cigar and gazed at the roof, there was a new and permanent anxious pucker between his brows. Ferdie had his eyes shut; anyone not knowing his method of concentrating might have supposed him sleeping. He wore a dull green pullover the colour of which seemed to reflect in his cheeks. Ambrose Hay was talking. He sat at the piano, he was unaware that the eyes of neither of the others were on him because his own were glued to the opposite wall on which his visual imagination was painting those things his tongue and fingers were telling. He was a tall, scraggy young man, with long fidgety fingers; it was no wonder he was emaciated, for his nerves and brain ate up any fuelling his body received. He had thought success would be fun and an end in itself. He got it immediately he put a pen to paper and found it was neither; it seemed to mean very little time to himself and the certainty of being talked to by hundreds of people he would rather avoid. He was kept going by the rather pathetic belief that under the layers of his facility was a stratum of genius. He had every chance to probe for it, for no scrap of music or writing fell from his fingers but somebody snapped it up. In the silence of the night a nagging voice whispered to him that such wholehearted support of all he did was unlikely to produce any one worth-while thing.
“—and the mermaid, a mere silhouette she is, against the evening sky, slips back into the sea. There’s a fade-out there and the lights go up again on the cove and the sea, and there’s the young man singing the love refrain.” He played it softly. “Then there should be a slow fade-out, and then one of your big effects, L.L., the sea”—Ferdie groaned, “waves and spray, and suddenly the little pale head of the mermaid rising, and then her arms stretched out to answer the love refrain, and then slowly she’s drawn back into the sea. The last notes of the love-song come across the water. Black-out.”
L.L. nodded.
“That’s fine, Ambrose. It’s a grand melody. But what you said about the little pale head. Were you thinking Virginia’d play this?”
Ambrose looked surprised.
“Of course.”
“But her contract’s up. She’s finishing the run of ‘Golden Girl’ because there was a clause in her contract about the run of the show she was in. But her five years expired in September.”
“And we’re not in mourning,” Ferdie put in.
“But I must have her.” In Ambrose’s voice was all the hurt wonder of the spoilt child thwarted for the first time. “The actual stuff’s muck, of course, but the music’s all right, and it’s written for her. When I write for a person it’s for them and nobody else.” There was a very slight threat in his last remark.
L.L. glanced at Ferdie who was sitting up taking notice. He crossed to the piano and leant on it over to Ambrose.
“The trouble is your ballet, I must have a leading lady who can dance it and who’ll pass muster with George Gene.”
“My ballet!” Ambrose’s tired eyes surveyed the other with amusement. “That ballet isn’t written for a hop-skip-and-jump Miss out of a musical comedy; it’s written for a dancer. Dancing’s an art.”
“My dear man,” L.L. tapped the top of the piano with his forefinger, “it’s all very well to talk like that, but do you realise what’s happening around you? There’s the most almighty slump on the way, it’s already started, things are worse in the theatre than I’ve ever known them, and they’re not going to improve, not for a long time anyway. We’ve got it partly because they’re making talking pictures, but mostly because of the state of the world. In spite of all this and the most appalling returns for ‘Golden Girl’ I’m going all out on your revue, but I daren’t overweight the salary list because that’ll mean we can’t afford a bad night.”
Ambrose nodded.
“I know all that and I’ve been watching it coming, which most of you haven’t. But the dancer needn’t upset everything, they’re cheap enough.”
“I know.” L.L. looked at Ambrose as though he would like to shake him. “But George wants an enormous corps to support the principals.”
“Well, you always do have an enormous chorus; choose properly trained dancers this time.” He grinned at L.L. “But I must have Virginia.” He struck a few chords on the piano. “I don’t like the girl from hearsay. She sounds an unpleasant bit of work.”
Ferdie nodded.
“You’ve said it.”
“But she has something which no other actress possesses in anything like the same degree: Glamour. She looks as though she bathed in champagne and slept on rose-leaves, and all the things that no one ever did. She’s what every man in the stalls has paid to see when he takes a seat for any musical show, and she’s the Pit and Gallery’s dream come true. I was passing the stage door one evening when she arrived for the show. She was in an enormous car—”
“It’s a nice car, Ossie Bone’s,” Ferdie murmured.
“Yes, Ossie Bone’s, he was with her. The chauffeur, helped by Ossie, took the rug off her as though she were a bed of lilies, and she stepped out. A crowd was waiting to see her go in and they, and the other drab folk in the street, looked beside her like beings from another planet. A white-faced young man in evening dress was waiting to see her, he stepped forward and humbly asked her something which she imperiously, with a shake of her head, refused, then she vanished through the stage door. The crowd moved away. To be pitied? Oh dear no. To be envied, because they had seen that fairly-tale princesses can come true. That’s glamour.”
Ferdie looked at him with reproach.
“We’ve been watching it for over five years.”
But Ambrose was carried away and did not notice the interruption.
“I went back to my studio and tried to think of other things, but she lodged in my mind, so I sat at my piano, and saw her. Exquisite, remote. That night I wrote ‘Mermaid’ and a week later, the Blues number, ‘Oh, Lady of my Delight’ and the sketch ‘Meet Gloria Blonde.’ I’ve done the other stuff for her since, but those three are for her and nobody else. If I don’t have her, L.L., you can’t have those.”
L.L. took some quick steps about the room.
“She’ll be so damned expensive.”
Ambrose played the love-song.
“Not to you perhaps, as you gave her her first chance.”
Ferdie yawned.
“That’s a funny story.”
“I suppose you’ll have to have your way.” L.L. turned to Ambrose. “I like having her in the theatre. She’s always brought me luck. Even this last show hasn’t lost any money yet.”
“There’s a little thing you two haven’t thought of.” Ferdie lit a cigarette. “Virginia won’t sign any contract if she hears there’s a girl being brought in for the ballet.”
“Oh, surely not,” Ambrose protested; “the girl must know she’s not up to the standard of that sort of stuff.”
“You know, L.L.,” Ferdie said, “I think he’d better meet Virginia, it might make things easier.”
L.L. continued his perambulations.
“Of course we can just sign her up to star if it comes to that. After all, nobody knows about the ballet but we three and George, and he’s still in America.”
“That ought to be all right,” Ambrose agreed happily. “After all, why should she mind about the ballet, it’s only about twenty minutes or so of the show.”
Ferdie sighed.
“And only the best bit of music you ever wrote, and only George K. Gene being brought over to arrange it, and it’s only bound to get all the critics and all the writes-up. Oh dear no, Virginia won’t mind.”
“Well, it’s nearly lunch-time; let’s go and have a drink.” L.L. opened the door. “I’ll have a talk with Virginia to-morrow, and see if I can persuade her.” He turned to F
erdie. “Will you remind me when George comes over that I saw a kid in pantomime might do for the ballet? Only one of Madame Elise’s little treasures, but I thought her remarkable. If he passes her, she won’t cost anything, and then if Virginia’s reasonably cheap—”
“Little optimist,” said Ferdie.
Mouse and Flossie were having lunch. Mouse laid down her knife and fork.
“Not bad lamb.” Flossie looked pained, she knew it to be the height of ill manners to discuss what you were eating. Mouse saw the look and grinned. “Sorry, with all your efforts I can’t improve my ways. But you’re going to get rid of me. Jasmine rang up this morning while you were out, she has taken a house near Deal where the children can get over the measles, she wants me to stay with her. I’ll be there till September.”
Flossie raised her eyebrows.
“Somebody I know will have something to say about that, won’t he? He’ll miss coming here in the evenings.”
“His name is Jim Menton, and the answer’s ‘No.’ He’s coming to Deal each evening. The point is, would you like to rent the flat?”
“Rent it? Do you mean take the whole of it?”
“Yes, I shall let it. I’m offering you the first refusal.”
“What do you want me to pay?”
“Vell, Mrs. Goldsmid, to you it will be eight guineas a veek.”
“Eight? But that’s more than it costs you.”
“But there’s my furniture and I’m throwing Mrs. Hodge in with it.”
“Shouldn’t dream of paying it.”
“Right, then will you move out on Saturday?”
“Well, I can stay in my own room, I suppose.”
“Of course not, I’m going to let the flat.”
Flossie looked at her in fury. Could there be a meaner person in the world? she wondered. Eight guineas a week? How could she move? Everybody knowing her telephone number, and Mrs. Hodge used to her ways. Besides, where should she move to? Things would be very difficult in an hotel, men were so odd. Besides, if she moved into one, or a flat, it had to be very expensive; people would expect her to take something expensive. But eight guineas!
Mouse watched her face with amusement.
“Shall I ring?” she asked sweetly. Flossie nodded, Mouse went to the bell. Mrs. Hodge pushed the door open with her tray. She looked up at her. “I’ve just been telling Miss Virginia I’m going away until September.”
Mrs. Hodge rested her tray on her hip.
“Are you, dear? Where?”
“Lady Menton has taken a house near Deal.”
“I think we rang for Mrs. Hodge to clear,” said Flossie coldly.
Mrs. Hodge gave Mouse a wink and began collecting the attachments to the meat course.
“Well, that will be nice for you. Lovely part, I hear. I was never there meself. I had a fortnight by the sea once, Lowestoft it was, the ’orspital sent me there after I had Georgie. Oh, it was grand.” She picked up the vegetable dish. “I been down to Margate and Southend, and Clacton for bank holidays since, but not to stay, ’aven’t ’ad a chance since Alfie was took.”
Mouse made a mental note to see if some time a seaside holiday could not be arranged.
“I’m going to let the flat, I’m suggesting Miss Virginia takes it.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Hodge looked anxiously at Virginia. She yielded to no one in her admiration of her on the stage, but at home she found her difficult. ‘Funny, Virginia is,’ she confided to her friends, ‘I suppose it’s her being Royal makes her stand-offish, but she’s not easy like Miss Shane; the laughs her and me have, you wouldn’t berlieve.’ All the same, difficult or not, she would be someone to pay the wages, she’d known people try to let their flats before, and even if they let them, there was no saying the new people would take her on to do for them.
“You’d be all right, miss,” she said encouragingly. “I’d have more time to look after you with Miss Shane away.”
Flossie looked at her coldly.
“This is hardly the time to discuss it. Will you bring the sweet, please?”
Mrs. Hodge, cast down by her tone, and the thought of being out of work, went out without a glimmer of a smile at Mouse, and quietly brought in the tart and departed again, and shut the door.
“It’s no good biting Mrs. Hodge’s head off, or scowling at me,” Mouse said cheerfully, “helping the tart; it’s not much I’m asking, and God knows you can afford it. I know L.L. had to raise your salary ten pounds if he kept you on to finish a run after your contract expired, that means you’re getting forty.”
Flossie wriggled her shoulders.
“It’s all very well for you to talk as if I were a millionaire. It isn’t much with all I’ve got to do with it.”
“Oh, for God’s sake can that stuff. Odd the way you never have been able to talk naturally to your Aunty Mouse. I don’t want to pry into your affairs, I don’t care what you do with your money, but don’t try and put that ‘I’m only a poor little girl’ business over on me. Now eat your tart, and don’t break a million hearts by putting a wrinkle on that forehead. You’ll have to pay up and you know it, it’s too inconvenient to move.”
Flossie folded her napkin, and got up; she was intensely royal.
“I shall not discuss it. I will take the flat. As you say, it will be inconvenient to me to move. But I hope you feel ashamed.” She opened the door and swept into the sitting-room.
“I shan’t, ma’am,” Mouse called to her back, “and you didn’t wait for my curtsy.” She paused for the sitting-room door to be closed and then popped her head into the kitchen. Mrs. Hodge was eating her dinner. “You old fool, you didn’t really think I was throwing you out of a job, did you? But it’s worked a treat. She’s taking it and paying me eight guineas a week, and I’m living free till September. Won’t the creditors be pleased? I’ll even pay the dentist.” She went gaily into the passage, and then remembered she had something else to say to Flossie. This sobered her, she loathed interfering in other people’s business, but Jim had spoken to her about it, and Jasmine on the phone that morning had said she must speak. She hesitated. Flossie was in a bad temper, this was a wretched moment, perhaps to-morrow, but how unlikely Flossie would be in to-morrow except in the early morning, always an unsatisfactory time. She pushed open the sitting-room door with a now-or-never gesture. She looked at Flossie; her face as usual expressed nothing, she was lying in an arm-chair polishing the nails of one hand on the palm of the other. Mouse lit a cigarette. She leant against the mantelpiece where she could look down on her.
“It’s six years that you’ve lived with me, and you’ll give it me that in that time I’ve never interfered with you.”
Flossie raised surprised eyes.
“Of course not. Why should you?”
“Well, I’m going to now. Can you do something about Derwent?”
Flossie went on polishing her nails.
“What about him?”
“He’s drinking like a fish, and generally going to bits.”
“I suppose Jim Menton’s been talking about me.”
“He’s not blaming you, he’s blaming his own stupidity in letting you meet.”
Flossie’s eyes flashed.
“He only did that because he wanted Ossie to give him a job, and he knew Ossie’d come to stay if I was coming. It was pretty obvious. I’ve never been asked since, as I’m not wanted to be useful about anything.”
Impatiently Mouse flicked some ash into the fireplace.
“How can you be so silly, Virginia? Why should they suppose it would amuse you staying with them? They’re not your contemporaries, Meriel’s nearer your age.”
“Say what you like,” Flossie said sulkily, “but I know.”
Mouse looked at her consideringly. She was making a mess of this; she steered back to her objective.
“Derwen
t’s no good to you, you don’t want to be bothered with him. Why don’t you tell him so once and for all, and make it quite clear that you won’t see him?”
“What good will that do?”
“A friend of the family has offered to take him big-game shooting. You know the dear old traditional method of curing a broken heart.”
“Well, I’m not stopping him going.”
“Oh yes, you are. As long as there’s a chance on earth that you’ll see him, he won’t budge.”
Flossie looked at the floor. If there was one thing she hated, it was being pushed into corners where she had to make decisions; she liked things to drift, she hated this direct sort of talking. It was true she didn’t want Derwent, penniless yard of misery that he was, but after all, he was Jim’s heir and so useful as a well-connected person to make an extra man if one were wanted. Besides, as a love-sick caller at the stage door, he was just what the gallery liked, he created the right sort of atmosphere with his desperate face and miserable eyes. Of course now he had taken to drink it wasn’t so funny, he looked so queer sometimes, she was almost afraid of him. All the same, if the Mentons were going to fuss about him, and this talk from Mouse must have started with them, he had his uses. Stuck-up beasts, they thought they’d only got to ask for a thing to get it. She’d show them. She would pretend to do what they wanted, and really keep him just where she wanted him. In a month or two they wouldn’t be sending Mouse with messages, they’d come and beg themselves. Or perhaps instead, she would pretend to be working with them, that would mean lots of meetings and week-ends. She gave a pleased smile, invisible to Mouse; stupid of her not to have thought before that she could make use of that wet fool.
“Poor boy,” she said sweetly. “I’ll see what I can do.”
CHAPTER XVII
It was at the third rehearsal of Ambrose’s revue ‘Tread On It’ that Flossie learnt about the ballet. Monty Paile, who was producing the dancing numbers, had just finished working out with her and the three Polsky Brothers the routine for ‘When the Sun Sets on London.’
“Well, that’ll do for the moment,” he said, “we’ll come back to it.” He turned to the chorus. “Come on, girls, take the gum out of your mouths and jump to it.”
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