by Lyn Gardner
“Not so fast, young ladies,” she hissed. “Theo’s not in. And if he was here, he wouldn’t want to see you. It would do no good anyway. You’re wasting your time. He signed up for the new movie an hour ago.”
Olivia felt crushed. They were too late. She turned to signal to the Swans to make another castell so they could get down. But Eel didn’t move.
“How do we know you’re not lying?” asked Eel loudly. “You said he’s out, and we know he’s in. We’ve got the front staked out. You were seen entering together, and no one’s seen Theo leave. Our man on the ground would have texted us if he had. You say he’s signed a movie deal but I won’t believe it until Theo tells us that himself, and that he doesn’t want to do the Swan panto.”
“Are you calling me a liar, little girl?” said Sheridan nastily. “Go away, both of you, and stop bothering Theo or I’ll call the police. You do realise that you’re trespassing? It wouldn’t look good for your beloved stage school to have that splashed all over the paper.”
“Are you blackmailing us?” asked Eel, a steely edge to her voice.
“Call it what you want,” said Sheridan, “but I won’t be held to ransom by a load of stage-school brats.”
“Two can play at that game,” said Eel. She flipped open her phone. “It looks so much better in HD, of course.”
It was a video of Sheridan standing on one of the seats in the Swan theatre. Her mouth was wide open and she was screaming, her normally perfect hair covered in dust, so she looked like the deranged survivor of some comical cosmic catastrophe. “It’s perfect YouTube stuff. It might even go viral.”
“You little rat,” shouted Sheridan, making a grab for the phone. Olivia looked at her little sister. She had no idea that Eel had taken the video. Eel was behaving as badly as Sheridan; her only excuse was that Sheridan was at least thirty years older than her and should know better. Olivia made a decision. If the only way they were going to get Theo back into the Swan panto was by behaving like this, then it wasn’t worth it. She was certain that her gran would be horrified if she knew that Eel had met blackmail with blackmail.
“I’m sorry,” said Olivia. “We made a mistake. We shouldn’t have come…” She tailed off. Her throat felt raw. “My sister will delete the video, I promise. If you say Theo is out, he’s out. I apologise for us both.” She leaned over the balcony and nodded to Pablo. “We’ll leave the way we came in,” she said quietly.
“Which I assume was by parachute,” said Theo, who had appeared soundlessly on the terrace behind them. He walked to the edge and peered over as the castell began to rise in the air. “Hey, that’s even more amazing than a parachute.”
The Swans whooped and laughed and broke into a spontaneous rendition of “Please Please Me”, putting their hands together in a beseeching gesture and going down on their knees.
Theo grinned broadly. He looked at Olivia and Eel. “I guess you’ve come to give me a ticking off. You’d better come in.”
“You can’t just invite in anyone who tries to bludgeon their way into your home, Theo,” hissed Sheridan.
“No,” agreed Theo reasonably. “I can’t. But Olivia and Eel Marvell aren’t just anyone. They’re my friends.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Theo sat alone in his flat, thinking. He had sat there so long that night had fallen and the street lamps had come on. He shivered. There was a real chill in the air. It felt as if snow was on the way.
Olivia and Eel had been persuasive, even more persuasive after he had sent a protesting Sheridan away and said that he would call her later.
“We really don’t have a chance of making it happen without you, Theo,” said Olivia softly. “You’d be keeping the chance alive. If you say yes, it may help us find a theatre.”
“Yes,” said Eel. “We’d all love you forever, Theo, and go and see all your movies, even if we thought they sounded really boring like that last one you did, which had all that silly kissing stuff in it.”
“Eel!” said Olivia. “You’re not helping.”
“Actually,” said Theo with a grin, “Eel’s right. I’m fed up of romcoms. I want to do something meaty.”
“There you are,” said Eel. “You should do Cinderella, and now Amber’s out of it and poor Sebastian too, you could play who you like, even Cinders, but I wouldn’t advise that cos she’s really soppy. At least, Amber made her seem soppy. You could be Baron Hard-Up! If you played Baron Hard-Up, Jon would let you do as much tap dancing as you wanted.”
Theo smiled. “What would Sheridan say?”
“But it’s your life, Theo, not Sheridan’s,” said Olivia seriously.
“Yes, but she’s supposed to be looking out for me.” He sighed. “I don’t know. I’m very tempted by your offer.” And he was. Like the movie cameo, Baron Hard-Up was a small but beautifully written role with lots of comedy. “But where would we perform?”
“Gran’s still trying to find somewhere,” said Olivia. “She’s put out lots of feelers, and I’ve got an idea of somewhere that might work but I have to tread very carefully.”
“So,” said Theo slowly, “you’re asking me to turn down the movie and loads of dosh and commit to something that might never happen, that’s just a pipe dream?”
“In a nutshell, yes,” said Eel. Then she added, “But dreams do sometimes come true.”
Olivia had looked at him very seriously with her compelling dark eyes and said simply, “It’s an act of faith, Theo. It’s about making something happen.”
“All right,” said Theo. “I’m not promising I’ll do it, but I am promising to think about it.”
“Thank you,” said Olivia. She and Eel got up to go.
Theo stood up too, and handed Eel an envelope. “You’d better take the tickets for the skating … just in case I don’t see you again before…”
But although Eel’s eyes lit up when she saw the envelope, she shook her head firmly. “No, Theo. You keep them. Think of it as an act of faith. That I believe you’re going to be there in the panto and be there skating with us at Somerset House.”
*
After they had gone, Theo did what he had promised to do and thought hard. Olivia and Eel were right. The Swan panto would collapse as surely as the theatre roof without his presence. It made Theo feel needed. One of the things he knew about his profession was that however famous you were, you were always replaceable. If he didn’t sign up for the movie, somebody else would. It wouldn’t just be cancelled. But if he dropped out of Cinderella, that would be the end of it. Sheridan might say that the movie people wanted him really badly and the amount they were prepared to pay for a cameo reflected that. But he also knew that if he said no, they’d just move on to the next actor on their wish list.
But what if this movie was his big break? The business was full of stories of actors and actresses who had turned down plum roles that had then been the making of someone else. And what if he said no to the movie, and then Cinderella couldn’t find a theatre? He’d have turned down a perfectly good opportunity for nothing. He sat in the fading light, his mind drifting, and he remembered being back at the Swan and sitting in Alicia’s office. He’d been sixteen going on seventeen and he’d just been turned down for a place at every leading drama school in the country. He had always been a bit of a golden boy at the Swan and he had thought he was going to stroll into RADA, but he hadn’t even got past the first audition. He was devastated and completely demoralised.
He had railed for a while and Alicia had listened quietly and said little, until he said, “That’s it. I’m giving up, there’s no point in going on.”
There was a pause.
“Yes, maybe you should, Theo,” said Alicia quietly. “If that’s what you want.”
Theo had stared, astonished, at Alicia. It was as if she had just thrown a hand grenade into the room. He had expected Alicia to protest at his intention to give up on acting and tell him how talented he was.
“But … but … but …”
&n
bsp; “Look, Theo,” said Alicia, “if you’re going to let the first knock-back affect you so badly, then maybe acting isn’t the profession for you. It’s hard out there. Maybe you’ll be one of the lucky ones; maybe you won’t. But you won’t know unless you try it and make things happen for yourself. If you don’t believe in yourself, nobody else will. You’ve got to get out there and work, Theo, because nobody is just going to hand everything to you on a plate. Go out there and do it, or don’t. Apply to RADA again next year, or don’t. But don’t whine about it. It’s your choice. You always have a choice.”
“You always have a choice,” murmured Theo to himself. Well, he was making his. He rang Sheridan and spoke to her swiftly and firmly for a couple of moments. He went and made himself a cup of tea and as he carried it towards his chair, his phone rang. Sheridan’s name flashed up on the screen. He was tempted not to answer, but he was glad he did.
“How unexpectedly obliging of them to offer more time,” he said.
As soon as the call finished he called Alicia. “You have very persuasive granddaughters. Count me in on Cinderella but on three conditions,” he said. “I want to play Baron Hard-Up and I want a tap solo with a 42nd Street-style chorus behind me, and you need to find a venue by midnight on Hallowe’en. That’s the cut-off point. Otherwise I’ll do the movie.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Georgia ran up the steps of the Swan, whistling. It was very early, only just gone seven thirty a.m., but she had arranged to meet Aeysha to rehearse their dance for the panto and it was the only time that a studio would be free. She had a good feeling about today. It had been two days since the screen test, and it felt as if she had been keeping all her fingers and toes crossed ever since. She knew her mum had too, even though Lydia kept warning her not to get her hopes up too high. But she was certain she would hear something today.
“Please,” she thought, “please let it be me.” She so wanted to play Zelda. She had done right from the moment Miss Swan first mentioned the auditions. But of course she hadn’t really had the confidence to think that she really would. It seemed like an unreachable dream, as remote and unlikely as her mum winning the lottery, or being picked to be the first child in space or discovering that in fact she was a child wizard with special magical powers. But as time had passed and she had kept being called back she had began to dare to dream that she might actually get it. She felt like a long-distance runner with the winning line in sight, and to fall at this point would be too, too cruel. She didn’t even want to think about it. She hurried towards the girls’ cloakroom, and as she did she saw somebody peer down the stairs and call her name. It was Miss Swan. Her face was unreadable.
“Georgia dear, will you step into my office a moment.”
Georgia took a deep breath. This felt like her date with destiny. She walked swiftly up the stairs and into Miss Swan’s cosy office. Her fingers and toes were tingling.
Alicia didn’t mince her words. “There’s no way to break this gently. I’m afraid it’s bad news about Zelda, Georgia. You haven’t got it. I’m sorry. I know it’s very disappointing and you’re going to be very upset, but you did extremely well to get so far.”
Georgia felt numb. She had never felt about a role the way she felt about Zelda. She wanted to scream her frustration out loud. She tried to hold back the tears so that she would look professional, but a big fat one rolled down her cheek, leaving a salty trail.
“Aeysha?” she whispered.
“Still in the running,” said Alicia. “It’s just her and another girl left.”
“Kate Carmichael,” said Georgia. “I bet she’s a blonde,” she added fiercely.
Alicia looked momentarily surprised at the name, and then the expression of someone who has just discovered the missing piece of a jigsaw under the sofa flitted across her face. “Carmichael? You’re sure she’s called Kate Carmichael?”
“Yes,” said Georgia. “Do you know her?”
“I sincerely hope not,” murmured Alicia.
“I’m pleased for Aeysha. I hope she gets it,” said Georgia. “I really do.”
“That’s very generous of you, Georgia, particularly in the circumstances. But I never expected anything less of you. You would have been a lovely Zelda, but there will be other opportunities for you, and I’m going to offer you one now.”
“A job?” asked Georgia, and she suddenly perked up.
“Yes,” said Alicia, “but I’m afraid it’s not a paid one, or as high profile as Zelda. And it’s not completely certain yet. But I think you’ll be pleased.”
“What is it?” asked Georgia.
“Jon would like you to play Cinderella in the Swan panto. Amber’s not coming back and now Theo has agreed to be a tap-dancing Baron Hard-Up if we can find a theatre, we need to find a new Cinders from the school.”
“Me? You want me to play Cinderella!” said Georgia breathlessly, her eyes shining.
“Yes, Georgia. We’re offering you the role. We had already decided even before I heard that you hadn’t got Zelda. It’s a really big opportunity for you. Provided of course we do go ahead. The Swan has never had a show that didn’t go on. We’re doing everything we can to make this happen.”
“Oh,” said Georgia, pink-cheeked. She suddenly thought of something.
“So who will play the prince?”
“Kasha Kasparian has kindly agreed to take the role. It will be quite a Swan reunion.”
“Me? Playing Cinders opposite Kasha?” Georgia blushed pink and her eyes shone. “Oh, thank you, Miss Swan. This is almost better than Zelda.”
“Just remember it’s not certain yet. Unless we find a theatre in the next few days, nobody will be going to the ball.” Alicia’s mobile rang. She glanced at it, and smiled at Georgia. “That will be Theo. Again. He’s desperate to hear that we’ve found a theatre.”
Georgia grinned. “Not as desperate as me, Miss Swan.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Olivia and Tom jumped off the high-wire on the Campion’s stage. Ella and Arthur clapped.
“Tea?” asked Ella.
“Yes, please,” replied Olivia and Tom. They put the flickering ghost-light back in its place centre stage and followed the two old people through to the kitchen at the back of the building.
“It’s nice to see you again, Tom,” said Ella. “I thought we had frightened you away.”
Tom blushed and looked a little uncomfortable.
“So how are rehearsals for the pantomime going?” asked Arthur. “Ella and I are looking forward to seeing you do your pantomime horse routine.”
“Ah,” said Tom. “I’m not sure you are going to be able to.” His eyes were signalling frantically at Olivia. It was now or never. They couldn’t expect to get a better opening.
“The thing is,” said Olivia, “we’ve had a setback. The roof of the Swan theatre fell in. It’s going to take ages to repair and we don’t have another venue. So unless we can find somewhere else to perform Cinderella we won’t be able to do it. It’s a pity after all the hard work that’s gone into it.”
There was a tiny silence.
“That’s a shame,” said Ella evenly.
“Of course, if we could just find somewhere else,” said Tom. “But it’s hard…”
“We wondered,” said Olivia, “if it might be possible to use Campion’s? It would be so perfect. The theatre is just sitting here, it seems such a shame not to use it, and we’d be so careful with everything.”
Ella looked at Olivia as if she had gone mad. “You mean put on public performances again at Campion’s Palace of Varieties?” The old woman’s eyes blazed. “Impossible! Over my dead body. How dare you! How dare you wheedle your way in here, trying to take over my theatre, stirring up the ghosts?”
“But we didn’t,” said Tom helplessly. “We found Campion’s by accident and you invited us in.”
“Because when I saw you walking the high-wire, you reminded me of somebody,” said Ella.
“Of Liz
zie and Davey?” asked Olivia very quietly.
Ella stared at her, white-faced and with blazing eyes. “What do you know about them?” She drew herself up and her eyes flashed dangerously. “You know nothing. Nothing at all. You’ve been poking around like spies, trying to find out my business. You’ve got your eyes on Campion’s, haven’t you? You’re trying to get it from me like he did. You’re spies for him, aren’t you?”
“No,” said Olivia helplessly. “We don’t want to take Campion’s from you. We just want to use it for a few performances of Cinderella. For charity. Nothing more.”
“It’s just a trick,” said Ella. “You’re trying to trick me out of Campion’s.”
“I’m sorry,” stuttered Olivia. “We should never have asked. I didn’t realise how much it would upset you, Ella.”
“Get out! Get out and never come back,” cried Ella, and she fell back against her chair, clutching her heart.
“Ella!” Olivia and Tom leapt to their feet, scared.
“She’ll be fine,” said Arthur quietly. “She has these funny turns when she gets agitated. But it’s best if you two go.”
Olivia and Tom hurried out into Hangman’s Alley. The street was gilded with frost and glittered in the darkness.
“What was all that about?” asked Tom. “Did she just go completely mad?”
“I don’t know,” said Olivia, shaking her head.
“Do you think she was having a heart attack?”
“No,” said Olivia. “I think that Ella’s heart is already broken. I just wish we could mend it for her.”
Chapter Thirty
Katie was passing reception when she heard Mrs Gibbs call her name. The school secretary had a letter in her hand.