Tempest-Tost

by Robertson Davies

  While you here do snoring lie,

  Open-eyed conspiracy

  His time doth take.

  If of life you keep a care,

  Shake off slumber and beware:

  Awake, awake!

  it was observable that Gonzalo stirred in his rest like a tortured man, and a single, unmistakable tear crept down his left cheek. Fortunately he had little to do in the Third Act, for what he said was inaudible and when he moved he seemed to stumble more often than a simulation of old age could excuse.

  SHE HAD SEEN HIM, of course. The throwing of that rose to Roger was coldly calculated; it was a sign to him that she had received his message, understood it, and scorned it. Well, let it be so. He had had no solid food that day; his head ached and buzzed, and often dizziness overcame him so that he stumbled. But it would not be for long.

  The single interval which Valentine had decreed for the play was over, and Act Four was about to begin. Gonzalo was not wanted in Act Four. Gonzalo was not wanted anywhere, it appeared. Very well. When you weren’t wanted there was only one thing to do, and that was to get out.

  Hector hurried quietly along the path to The Shed. Good, it was empty. He did not need long. No necessity to rule his black book into Pro and Contra. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, and it would not take much time to do it.

  Would she be sorry? Would she ever know? There were his roses, and their message, to speak for him. Perhaps she would be sorry that she had not accepted the help which he had offered. Would she ever know that behind that offer of help there lay a great love, everything that a man of forty, who had made his own way in the world and risen in a difficult profession, could offer? Surely she would realize it. And, realizing it, would she not sicken of the hateful Roger, reject him and live a good life—a life beautiful and sad—ever after? Or might it not be that in the course of time she would meet some kind and understanding man whom she would marry, and with whom she would bring up a family in which the name of Hector Mackilwraith would be honoured? Undoubtedly that would be it. Indeed, in this terrible hour he was certainly gifted with prophecy; that was what would happen. But as every good thing must spring from sacrifice and atonement, he must not falter now.

  Plenty of cord here; good, heavy stuff; a superior sort of sash-cord. He unfastened one of the many ropes which controlled the glasswork in the roof of The Shed, and sought to tie a noose in it. But one cannot tie a good noose without some training and previous experience, and after ten minutes all that Hector had achieved was a loop, contrived with clumsy granny-knots. The knot which his purpose demanded had, he had been told, thirteen turns in it; however, this would serve. He was ready. After a few unsuccessful throws he managed to get the noose over one of the iron supports in the ceiling, and it hung above some boxes which were hidden behind a screen. Good. He estimated the drop at about eight feet; in that, at least, he could be sure of accuracy.

  Before climbing on the boxes he looked at himself in one of the make-up mirrors. His face was hideous with Auntie Puss’s handiwork, and his hair was streaked with yellow paint. He tore off the false beard, and mopped his face with a towel. He was calm now, though he felt deathly ill.

  With the aid of a chair he climbed upon the boxes, and settled the noose about his neck.

  Well, this was it. But before he left the world forever, should he not say some word of committal? It was many years since he had prayed, but he had always thought of himself as a religious sort of man, and he believed firmly in God. Would God understand this sudden abandonment of a decreed existence? Yes, undoubtedly Hector’s God would understand Hector; there would be no TOSASM scribbled across his final record. God would know that it was an atonement, a sacrifice that another might be cleansed, indeed the only way to save the soul of Griselda Webster. God would know why he had done it.

  Nevertheless, something seemed to be called for. He groped in his mind for prayer, but nothing came. A favourite phrase of his father’s, used often when the Reverend John was gravelled for lack of matter in an extemporary prayer, came back to him. “O Lord, take Thou a live coal from off Thine altar and touch our lips.” Yes. Then what? By now Hector was weeping desperately, and all that he could think of was “O God, here I come!” It seemed unworthy of the moment, but it was the best he could do.

  Sobbing, hardly conscious, Hector leaped from his platform into the unknown. There was a jerk, a crash, a sound of artillery fire, and oblivion.

  8

  Into Hector’s consciousness swam a fearful eye, a blue iris rolling upon what might have been a mound of bloodshot blancmange. Sometimes it was horribly clear; sometimes it retreated into nauseating deliquescence. A huge, accusing eye, set, no doubt, in the Head of the Supreme Being. The eye seemed to melt, growing larger as it did so; then it suddenly became very clear again, and from far away he heard a voice.

  “Whatever made you do such a wicked thing?”

  At the sound he experienced that sensation of falling swiftly which is so common after the first few minutes of sleep. Sensations rushed upon him. He was wet and miserable; his head ached dreadfully; he had a pain in his neck; he was cold. And there, kneeling beside him on the floor of The Shed, was Auntie Puss, staring intently into his face through her magnifying glass.

  “You poor, wretched, sinful man,” she said. “Are you all right?”

  “My head aches,” he said. And immediately: “My throat hurts.”

  “You may think yourself lucky that your head is still on your shoulders,” said Auntie Puss. “Can you get up?”

  Hector tried to raise himself, but sank back dizzily, squelching in a pool of whatever it was he was lying in.

  “Is it blood?” he asked, his eyes closed.

  “No; I presume it is whatever you were drinking before you attempted this rash act. You appear to have had plenty of it, I must say.”

  Under this unjust accusation Hector stirred a little, and the liquid foamed and seethed all about him.

  “I must get help,” said Auntie Puss, and added unnecessarily; “you stay where you are.”

  She went out, locked the door of The Shed and carried away the key in her pocket. Backstage she found Valentine, and plucked her by the sleeve. Then she whispered in her ear.

  “You must come with me at once. Most important.”

  But Valentine was in an extremely bad temper. Professor Vambrace, disregarding her opinion in the matter, had sneaked a stem of seven grapes upon the stage, and had attempted to eat them during the most famous speech in the play. It is not simple to eat seven grapes while speaking thirteen lines. Three grapes had undone him, and five made him sound like a man talking under water; he had desperately gulped his mouthful, and pushed in the last two grapes, but he was badly rattled by his experience, and as he tossed away the empty stem—the crown of his ingenious bit of byplay—a loud and prolonged belch had burst from the depths of his beard. There had been laughter and some ironical applause. Valentine was waiting for the Professor to come off the stage. She had something to say to him.

  Auntie Puss tugged at her sleeve again, and drew Valentine down so that she might whisper in her ear. A moment later they were hurrying toward The Shed.

  VALENTINE WAS, AS COBBLER HAD SAID, a thorough professional, and her first remarks to Hector proved it.

  “What the hell do you mean by trying to kill yourself in the middle of a performance?” said she. “Before a performance, perhaps: after a performance, possibly. But what in the name of common sense possessed you to do it while you still have an entrance to make? Do you realize that there are eight hundred and thirty-two people out there, of whom seven hundred and ninety have paid admission, whose pleasure you have imperilled? Do you realize that you have very nearly ruined the effect of seven weeks’ rehearsal? Get up at once, and pull yourself together.”

  Hector was startled by this display of heartlessness and bad temper, and he tried to do as he was told. But he could not rise beyond a kneeling posture, and fell down again. Valentine was contrit
e at once.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Mackilwraith, but I’m terribly angry at that fool of a Vambrace, and I’m taking it out on you. What’s the matter? Do you feel very dreadful? What can I get for you?”

  The kindness in her voice was too much for Hector, and he sobbed.

  “What made you do it? Can you tell me? I’ll help you if I can.”

  He tried to speak, but the only word he could say was “Griselda”, and then he wept again, hiding his face in his arm.

  That was enough for Valentine, however. So the poor, silly man loved Griselda Webster, and it had brought him to this! There he lay, in a pale frothing liquid which she had, for a dreadful moment, believed to be some eccentric vital fluid of his own, but which issued from a case of broken bottles which lay near him. He was drenched, his face was smeared with makeup, and there was yellow paint in his hair. All pity for him, she dragged him to drier ground, and sat upon the floor, with his head in her lap. She wiped his face with a handkerchief.

  “Poor Hector,” said she; “was it very bad?”

  He nodded, and she could feel his body relax a little. Her comfort had started him back on the road to self-possession. It was for the best part wordless comfort—the warm, cherishing, unquestioning feminine sympathy which he had not known (and then, how meagrely) since his childhood—which Valentine gave him, but it drew him gently back from Death and the longing for Death. And so they sat for perhaps ten minutes, during which she said little, and he said nothing, but his face, which had been shapeless and hideous with grief, began to take on a more human look. His spirit was returning.

  Larry’s voice boomed from the loud-speaker: “Everybody for Act Five please. Act Five in three minutes. Has anybody seen Gonzalo? Act Five.”

  All the healing stillness left Valentine in an instant. “Oh, God!” she cried; “what do I do now?”

  But almost as she spoke she had leaped to her feet. Hector’s beard was upon the table; she quickly dabbed her face with spirit gum and fastened it on. He had removed his cloak and cap before he had climbed upon the boxes. She put them upon herself. “If Sybil Thorndike could play Lear, I don’t see why I can’t play Gonzalo,” she said to Hector, and in her voice the actress had wholly supplanted the divinely tender creature who had seemed to coax him back from the realm of the dead. “Stay here; I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  Transformed into a somewhat odd old gentleman, she rushed through the door. Auntie Puss was keeping faithful guard there.

  “Is he all right?”

  “He will be, Miss Pottinger. Don’t let anybody in.”

  “You may rely on me.”

  “I’m sure I may.”

  “Did he say anything to you about why he tried it?”

  “Yes. To you, too?”

  “He was unconscious, but he mentioned a name, more than once.”

  “We’d better keep that quiet, don’t you think?”

  “Miss Rich, nothing could make me divulge it.”

  AUNTIE PUSS HAD NEED of all the resolution which an old-fashioned upbringing had given her, in order to keep her word. As soon as Valentine appeared upon the stage as Gonzalo, the whole cast seemed to know, magically, that Mackilwraith was ill, that there was some mystery about his illness, and that Auntie Puss had the key to the mystery. The audience suspected nothing, for they had paid little heed to Gonzalo before, and idly noted that he appeared to have come to life in the last act, although he played most of it with his back to them. But the audience did know that Roscoe Forrester had beckoned Dr. Bliss from his seat, and that Dr. Bliss had tiptoed out with that stealth peculiar to doctors, which is so much more noticeable than a frank exit. The play came to its end, and the cast was recalled for six bows, but Valentine did not remain with them. She ran at once to The Shed and was locked within with Hector and the doctor, while Auntie Puss stood guard at the door, and refused to say anything to anybody.

  The general opinion was that Hector had had a fit. Some said it was apoplexy; others said it was heart. Geordie Shortreed, for no reason that anybody could discover, thought that it was a scandal of some kind; those quiet ones were the worst, he said with relish; perhaps it was something about a boy. The cast would not go to their dressing-rooms and change; they stood about behind the stage, chattering and gossiping and speculating, big with the mystery of The Shed. There were those, however, who had other concerns. Nellie Forrester, near to tears, rushed to Professor Vambrace.

  “Oh Walter, wasn’t it awful?”

  “Distressing, certainly, but it will be all right tomorrow night.”

  “But how can it be?”

  “I shall rehearse it all day tomorrow.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “My business with the seven grapes: I shouldn’t have called it ‘awful’, myself. I’m sure the audience didn’t notice. It just needs touching up.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Indeed? I suppose you are engrossed in this nonsense about Mackilwraith.”

  “I don’t know anything about him. But didn’t you see her go?”

  “Who?”

  “Mrs. Caesar Augustus Conquergood. She left before the beginning of the fifth act. I felt so humiliated.”

  “Probably she found the night air a little chilly. But don’t be distressed; there are still four performances. I’ll buy a pound of grapes tomorrow and make Pearl work with me all afternoon. I shall have my business with the grapes perfect by tomorrow night.”

  “I don’t think it was cold at all. She left because she was bored. I just knew it. Do you suppose we ought to have put her name on the programme in bigger type? She was as big as Val and bigger than Shakespeare. It was a mistake ever to do this play out of doors. I’ll never have anything to do with a pastoral again.”

  IIT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO KEEP everyone in the dark. When Dr. Bliss had assured himself that there was nothing wrong with Hector except shock, hunger, and a wetting, he suggested that he be moved to a place where he might rest, and that meant that Mr. Webster had to be let into part of the secret. Both guestrooms at St. Agnes’ were occupied, one by the Nymphs and the other by the girls who had speaking parts in the play, for at the last minute Griselda had decided that it would be inhospitable to make the girls use makeshift dressing rooms. Mr. Webster was a humane man, but something within him powerfully resisted the idea that an unsuccessful suicide should curl up in his bed, and therefore he led the way to his daughter Griselda’s pretty room, and Roscoe and Dr. Bliss helped the feeble Hector to slip off his wet clothes, put on a pair of Mr. Webster’s pyjamas, and crawl into the bed there. As they passed the Nymphs’ dressing room the door was opened a crack, and a bright eye appeared for a moment, and within a few minutes the Nymphs, and the girls in the other dressing room, and all their friends, knew that Hector Mackilwraith had attempted to drown himself, and had been taken upstairs in St. Agnes’, soaking wet.

  Fortunately The Shed had not been used as a dressing room for the men of the cast, but only as a makeup room and a greenroom. But even so, there were a variety of personal articles in it which had to be restored to their owners, and it was not Valentine’s wish to have everyone snooping around The Shed, guessing at what had happened. Therefore she sought out Solly and Cobbler, told them that she wanted to keep The Shed closed, and asked them to see that the men’s property was taken back to the men’s dressing room, which was in the basement of the house. They went to The Shed and found the way barred by Auntie Puss.

  “No one may go in here at present,” said she.

  “But Miss Pottinger,” said Solly, “we have special orders from Miss Rich.”

  “Perhaps, then, Miss Rich will be good enough to come here and tell me so.”

  “My dear lady,” said Cobbler; “it is needless to dissemble; we are privy to the dark secret of The Shed. We are going in to mop up the blood.”

  “I don’t understand what you are talking about,” said Auntie Puss.

  “It’s really quite all right,
” said Solly; “we know what happened.”

  “If that is so, you have no right to speak of it in that flippant tone.”

  “And why not, if I may ask?” said Cobbler, argumentatively. “Why should we go all solemn because Mackilwraith has hashed up his attempt at suicide?”

  “Hush!” said Auntie Puss, fiercely. “Don’t you dare to use that word.”

  “It’s the right word, isn’t it?”

  “It will provoke a scandal if it gets around. Do you want to ruin the man’s life?”

  “He’s just done his best to ruin it himself.”

  “That has nothing to do with it. He has been spared, doubtless for some purpose beyond our understanding. If you so much as hint at it again, Mr. Cobbler, I’ll speak to the Dean about you, and you will have to find yourself another position.”

  “Blackmail!” said Cobbler.

  “Call it what you like,” said Auntie Puss. “This man deserves his chance, and I shall do whatever I can to see that he gets it. I do not approve of the modern custom of babbling disgraceful secrets to anybody and everybody. I do not know Mr. Mackilwraith well, and what I do know about him I do not care for, but I will not be a party to his ruin. Do you understand me, Mr. Cobbler?”

  “I hear you, Miss Pottinger, but I shall never understand you. The world is full of people who have tried to kill themselves, or who have at least thought about it. It’s as natural as falling in love or getting one’s heart broken. I don’t see what’s so disgraceful about it. It’s the first interesting thing Mackilwraith has ever done, so far as I know.”

  Valentine appeared around the corner of the house.

  “Thank you so much, Miss Pottinger,” said she. “Will you let me have the key now? Mr. Webster is offering some refreshment in his library. Perhaps you had better have a hot drink. You’ve been wonderful, keeping watch for so long.”