‘Does one have to be consumed by the things one loves?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’ His cigarette smoke drifted into the purple twilight. Tt is a law of nature, for the world of the emotions is a jungle. You know, Lauri, if you are not careful you will find yourself desperately in love with a man, a much more dangerous undertaking than being a lover of the dance.’
She met his glance, which held challenge and curiosity. A pulse in her throat gave a quick little beat.
What are you, Lauri?’ he murmured, ‘An elusive sorceress, or an unawakened child?’
‘I am neither,’ she said, with her husky laugh. ‘I am just an ordinary English girl caught up with a lot of brilliant people who say the oddest things. Aunt Pat will love hearing about all of you when, as I hope, she comes here for the start of the ballet season. I’ve written to ask her,’ Lauri clasped her hands together on the parapet of the bridge, ‘and I do hope she’ll be well enough to make the journey. It would make such a difference, having her with me. I should feel much more confident,’
‘Any wish of yours is my wish, too,’ Michael said in his foreign way that was so disarming at times. The waters of Venice flowed under the centuries-old bridge, and from an open-air restaurant drifted the Tales from the Vienna Woods, lovely and lilting. ‘Shall we dance?’ Michael hummed a snatch of the music,
‘Ballet dancers waltz badly,’ she said, peering over the bridge at the water that was becoming star-sprinkled.
‘Are you looking for mermaids?’ She felt Michael’s arm slide round her waist. There, lean a little forward—do you see that one with the long dark hair, the white skin and mysterious eyes? She uses the dance to lure her victims to her.’
‘You fool!’ Lauri laughed, and at once with a strong, dexterous movement of his arm he swung her close to him and pitched his cigarette into the water.
‘You owe me a tribute, you little devil, and now you’ll pay it.’ Her protest was smudged from her lips by his, and to anyone passing by in a gondola or on the banks of the canal, they were sweethearts kissing on the Bridge of Sighs.
The girl, was seen to struggle, and a gondolier called out to another one, ‘What of it? Love without a little fighting is like potatoes without salt.’
Lauri heard the laughter as the boats sped beneath the bridge, and breaking free of Michael she ran, off the bridge, under an arcade, and down an alleyway. She hurried on under the lamps that cast sudden pools of light that made the shadows seem denser, uncaring that she might lose herself in this Venetian maze of alleys. Her feelings were in a tumult. All she could think of was that things would be better when Aunt Pat came.
Dear Aunt Pat, she must come. She was the only refuge Lauri was sure of.
The next day came, and the next, and no letter arrived from England. But Lauri discovered that rehearsal time was so busy, so filled with urgency, that there was little time left for any personal brooding. The striving, creative tension, the aching muscles, the sounds of music heard all over the palazzo, helped to dispel a fugitive depression.
The great mirrors of the hall reflected the leaping imp-cats, the linked cygnets, the enraptured maenads. Bruno’s arm sliced the air as he counted, while his assistant thrummed the piano.
Maxim was like dark lightning at the centre of the storm, being consulted on the music, the decor, the costumes. There was nothing he did not know about the mood and content of each ballet, and apart from that he was arranging the publicity and the design of the posters and programmes. There were daily cables and calls from the European capitals the company would tour when the opening of the new season had been started in Venice.
Piano scores and stage sketches littered tables and chairs, and while the beat of the dance echoed through the palazzo, discussions went on with artists, wardrobe staff and musicians. Victor Arquest, the composer and conductor, was at the palazzo night and day, a fiery friend of Maxim’s who understood the art of ballet music as Stravinsky had understood it.
He played the piano like a wicked angel, and at the end of a long, strenuous day it felt good to relax in chairs and listen to the music, and talk. How they talked! They discussed each ballet in detail, for they were all part of what was being created. The feu sacre burned in each one of them, and Vitya, as they called the composer, would call for more coffee, and silence, for he had another inspiration. The music resounded, up to the painted ceiling, and the world of reality went on outside while these egotists, these wild and lovely people, created their own special magic which in three short weeks would be presented to the world.
Every detail, every movement from the little to the large was being brought to life and any day now they would go by steamer to the Fenice for their first stage rehearsal.
Lauri felt apprehensive, and was glad of the urgency of the hours through which she now lived. Michael was kept as busy as she, and there was no time, no place, for them to be alone. Sometimes their eyes would meet across a crowded room, and her heart that had grown up told her that he wanted only a love affair with her. The entire meaning of life lay for him in his dancing career. His work possessed him and his heart.
It was the best and only life for him, a complete dedication. For her the future loomed like a chasm which she must leap alone—all she could hope for was that Aunt Pat would be waiting in the wings of the Fenice the night she danced in a theatre for the first time.
But still there was no letter from her, and the hours were rushing by, taking with them the days and nights. Lauri rushed off early to the post-office, the day they were to go to the Fenice for the first time, and sent off a telegraph wire to her aunt. ‘Are you quite well?’ she wired. ‘Please let me know. I love you and need you, if you can come.’
She came out of the post-office in a worried trance, and when she reached the small bridge that crossed to the palazzo, Maxim was waiting, tall, dark and rather grim on the other side. ‘Where have you been?’ he asked.
She told him, and saw his lips tighten. ‘My aunt is more important to me than your ballet rehearsal,’ she flared.
‘I realize that, child—’
‘I’m sure you don’t.’ She brushed past him and went to join members of the corps de ballet, who chattered like jays on the landing stage, holding in their hands the square cases that held practice clothes, a bottle of eau de cologne, and a rough Turkish towel for a rub down after rehearsal. Apples too, probably, and maybe an orange or banana. Each dancer guarded zealously her wand-like figure and smooth complexion, and Lauri thought often that Maxim di Corte had one of the best-looking dancing companies, as well as one of the most disciplined.
‘I put your things in with mine.’ Concha gazed at her English friend with concern in her Latin eyes. ‘You are very troubled, is this not so, chiquita?’
‘Yes.’ Lauri bit her lip, and gazed at the shimmer of the canal water and the green reflections from sea-mould on stone. She told herself fiercely that Maxim couldn’t keep her here if Aunt Pat was sick. He hadn’t that power, to keep her away from the one person who really cared about her.
‘Perhaps your Tia Pat plans a lovely surprise for you and is already on her way to Venice.’ Concha’s eyes flashed eagerly, ‘Yes, it is very possible, Lauri, You British people, after all, are very unpredictable.’
‘No more than most,’ Lauri said, but her eyes had brightened. It would be like Aunt Pat to spring such a lovely surprise on her, and she had her fingers crossed as with the other dancers she climbed into the steamer that was to take them to the Fenice Theatre.
The front of the Fenice was impressive and columned, and the auditorium inside was almost circular. There were tiers of handsome boxes, and above the stage the carved, mythical phoenix that gave the theatre its name.
The dancers changed into their leotards in the rather chilly dressing-rooms at the rear of the stage. Lauri felt cold with nerves, taut as a violin string, and she was relieved when the cast of The Firebird were called onstage.
Concha was dancing the role of the Firebird, and s
he tossed a scarlet shawl to Lauri as she ran past her. Lauri drew it around her, over her black leotard, as she stood in the wings watching the vivacious Latin girl dancing across the boards to the spot where the golden apple tree would stand. She was pursued by the princely hero, while an eerie spotlight was played over the Petrified Knights, sweethearts of the princesses abducted by the sinister magician into whose castle garden the Firebird had flown.
Maxim was directing from the left of the stage, a black sweater to his chin, his black hair as tousled as that of his dancers. Lauri looked at him, and electricity seemed to curl about her heart. His eyes were leaping like the devils’ on-stage. He looked utterly determined that each member of his company should give body, heart and spirit to the forthcoming season.
The proceeds of the first night in Venice were to go towards the restoration of farms and homes destroyed in the floods that had swept through Italy last year, and Lauri knew suddenly that she would not be able to walk out on a ballet company so dedicated. She closed her eyes there in the wings of the theatre and prayed that Concha was right and that Aunt Pat was on her way to Venice already.
When Lauri opened her eyes, she felt the force of a strange silence behind her. She turned round and found herself face to face with Lydia Andreya. Lauri tensed. Her hand touched her mouth as though to stop a small cry of alarm. She stood like a helplessly magnetized moth—with flame close to her wings.
‘What are you afraid of?’ Andreya’s smile was mocking, and her hair was drawn back from her strange eyes in a calot of gold. I have no need to harm you, you will do that yourself when you go out on to that stage. You are afraid of it, eh? Afraid of its rake, the rows of seats below, the proscenium arch above, and the phoenix in flames—‘
‘Don’t!’ Lauri backed from the ballerina, almost to the edge of the stage where it sloped to the orchestra pit. The fall behind her was dark and deep, and she and Andreya were curiously isolated from the rest of the company. Someone was playing the Firebird music at the piano, dancers were skimming and leaping across stage, while Maxim was now in discussion with the couple who had designed the settings for the new ballets, a voluble French husband and wife who were both arguing at the same time.
Lauri could hear the nasal French voices, the deep pitch of Maxim’s, the beat of the music and her own heart. Andreya drew a step nearer to her, and again she backed away. The scarlet shawl quivered against her black leotard like flame...
‘You know you will make a fool of yourself out on that stage,’ Andreya taunted. ‘Everyone will laugh at you—I am the dancer that people pay money to come and see. Without me the di Corte Company would be nothing—nothing do you hear?’
Lauri heard, but Andreya’s voice was pitched low so that no one else could do so. Nearby a stage-hand was hammering, his back turned to them. Andreya’s mouth was the line of a bow drawn taut to aim her poisoned arrows.
‘What have you got that anyone would pay money to see?’ Her eyes swept Lauri from head to toe. ‘No beauty, no brilliance, only your false air of innocence. Men are always fooled by that sort of thing, and everyone here has seen you using it on Lonza—and on Maxim.’
‘That isn’t true,’ Lauri gasped.
‘I must say,’ Andreya laughed softly, ‘that you put on a very good act of injured innocence. Is that how you got Maxim to promise you the role of Giselle?’
‘Maxim has done no such thing.’ Lauri could feel a tremor rising from the backs of her knees and running all through her body. ‘I am merely your understudy, and quite safe in that respect from ever having to dance the role.’
‘You think so?’ Andreya arched her eyebrows. ‘What if I were deliberately sick the first night of the new season, just for the fun of seeing you laughed off this stage? There is nothing crueller than the scorn of an audience—unless it is the panic of one. Panic,’ Andreya spoke softly and drew another step nearer to Lauri, ‘fear of fire, screams as a defective boiler explodes and the stage is curtained by flames...’
As in a nightmare, Lauri was a child again, running from her bed to the boarding-house window that faced the theatre where her parents were dancing. A loud noise had woken her, and when with shaking young hands she pulled aside the curtains, she saw people and flames shooting from the theatre. The dome above it, that made it look like a temple, was tongued by flames. People were rushing into the road and screaming. There was a clang of firebells ... a toll of doom in young Lauri’s heart...
As she swayed, there on the brink of the orchestra pit, hands caught at her. She was lifted and held and carried to a dressing-room. Someone gave her some brandy and after that she felt a little better.
‘Go home with her to the palazzo.’ There was anger in the deep voice, and Lauri glanced up and saw Maxim standing behind Viola, who was holding her hands and chafing them. His face was as angry as his voice, and Lauri felt cold and wished she could say that she felt all right and could go on with her part in the rehearsal.
But she couldn’t say it. She wanted, desperately, to get out of the haunting atmosphere of the theatre, with its musky scent of greasepaint that reminded her of a day long ago when she had sat on her father’s knee in front of a dressing-room mirror and he had run a fat stick of greasepaint round her childish face. ‘It’s in your blood, Lauri baby,’ her father had laughed gaily. ‘You will no more escape it than we ever could.’
He had smiled into the mirror at her mother, and Lauri had felt safe and secure in their love for her and each other.
‘Viola,’ she spoke quietly, you don’t have to come with me.’
‘You will do as I say.’ Maxim frowned as he spoke, and Lauri wanted to say that she didn’t need a keeper. She wouldn’t run away, because no matter how far you ran you couldn’t escape from yourself.
‘Signor di Corte,’ she met his eyes, darker than ever because of the drawn-down visor of his black eyebrows, ‘I shall be all right, and I don’t wish to upset your rehearsal more than necessary. Please let Viola stay. She loves to dance so much.’
‘Very well.’ He gave Viola a brief smile. ‘Go back on stage, little one.’
The pretty Italian dancer smiled and padded off in her ballet slippers. Lauri heard Maxim sigh, and wondered why he bothered with someone as complicated as herself. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘For upsetting things—’
‘Things are certainly upset.’ He prowled up and down the dressing-room. ‘I have put up with a lot from Andreya, but not this. This intimidation of another dancer I will not tolerate. She goes—’
‘Signor,’ Lauri jumped to her feet, ‘let me go, then things will settle down. Andreya is too valuable to you—’
‘Valuable?’ He stood still, like a great, dark graceful cat who had come to the end of his tether. ‘Because I am just the master, eh, and my dancers mere puppets? Because in your estimation I place dancing ability above humanity, compassion, love for others?’
‘That’s business, isn’t it?’ Lauri said tiredly.
‘Yes, just business.’ There was a flare to his nostrils, and the black sweater seemed to cast shadow in his chin cleft. ‘I am glad you realize it, for tomorrow you will start rehearsing Giselle with Lonza.’
As Lauri stood looking at him, stunned and dismayed, he swung towards the door of the dressing-room. ‘Andreya has been threatening for some time to leave this company,’ he threw over his shoulder. ‘She has had big offers from her own country to go there and dance as a star, so you need not worry that you are the cause of the rift between her and me.’
‘But she depends on you,’ Lauri said helplessly.
‘Andreya depends on no one,’ he rejoined. ‘Only those with a heart have such a need, poor fools.’
He strode off down the passage that led to the stage, and Lauri was left alone. There were nylon tights thrown over a screen, a box spilling ribbons, and a little glass of brandy dregs on the dressing-table. The sound of the piano drifted along the passage outside, and the scent of greasepaint was pervasive.
Lauri�
�s knees shook and she sat down again as the full force of Maxim’s decision hit her.
Here at the theatre of the phoenix—the bird in flames—she must dance the role of Giselle. She must remember everything Maxim had taught her about the ballet. Every subtle gesture, every nuance, every step. She must forget, if she could, every taunting word of Andreya’s.
She dressed in a while, and made her way out of the theatre by a side door. She walked about aimlessly, looking at things in the shops, and trying to feel the reality of what that scene with Andreya had led to. She found herself in front of the Madonna Cafe and went in for a cup of coffee. From the window beside her table she could see the Fenice, so romantically old and columned, where Travilla had danced long ago.
The crowds had loved her, but what would be their reaction to the Giselle her grandson would spring on them in two weeks’ time?
Lauri drank her coffee in an attempt to find warmth, but when she rose to leave the cafe she had made a decision. She returned to the theatre and stayed for the remainder of the rehearsal. Maxim made no comment, but she thought she saw a gleam of approval in his eyes
Two mornings later Lauri received an answer to the wire she had sent to Aunt Pat. It came in the form of a letter from their neighbour at Downhollow—who was writing for Aunt Pat because her arthritis was affecting her hands and making it awkward for her to write personally to her niece. She had also delayed writing because she had hoped very much to be able to make the journey to Venice, but her doctor advised against it.
‘I don’t want you to worry about me,’ ran the dictated letter. ‘Concentrate on your dancing, Lauri, and on having a big success when you appear at the Fenice, which I am sure is a beautiful theatre. Signor di Corte has been kind enough to write to me, and he assures me you are doing well, and he has high hopes of you. He is a much kinder man, my dear, than I think you realize. I know you would like me with you at the present time, and I wish with all my heart that it were possible, but I am sure you can depend on Signor Corte as much as on me. My arthritis is a nuisance, but you will be home in no time at all, and I shall be able to see you dance in London. I think of you constantly, Lauri dear, and send you all my love, all my best wishes, and all the strength I can. Dance for me, dear, and dance as I know you can.’
Tender Is The Tyrant Page 14