by P. G. Glynn
“Why wait and see whether Dolly Martin condescends to play the part,” Marie asked, construing from his prolonged silence and the expression in his deep blue eyes that she was teetering on the brink of a breakthrough, “when I am willing and more than able?”
Impudence the child had in plenty, but she had talent too and her voice was pure pleasure to listen to. If it pleased him it could please his public, discerning as they were. “You have a high assessment of yourself,” he said, “perhaps with, perhaps without foundation. But – and it’s a big ‘but’ – you have a long way to go before it is shared by people in the know. I cannot risk … ”
“Cannot?” Marie’s eyes blazed at him. “Or will not? I’m disappointed in you. I thought, you see, before coming to your rescue or trying to, that you were a man of vision, a man above mere mortals – one who saw beyond mundane strictures to essential truths. And the truth is that I know myself as Nancy. I immersed myself in her while with my stock companies in Bath and Swansea and I’ve also watched you coaching Dolly. So I’ve seen where your expectations differ from those of my former managers … and I shall fulfil your every expectation once you put me to the test. I’ll give of my best, Mr Brodie, sir, and my best is better than you can guess. I don’t just play a part. I live it. Instead of masquerading as Nancy I become her, thinking her thoughts, feeling with her heart … loving Bill. So, truly, you wouldn’t be taking as much of a risk as you might think on me … and, unlike Dolly, I would always put the play first, myself second. There you are,” she smiled. “You won’t get a better offer – not in time for tonight!”
Despite himself, Charles felt breathless and a little light-headed. What could he say in the face of such persuasion, such faith? He said: “You are Welsh. The fact was evident here and there. It should not have been evident if you are anything like the actress you say you are.”
“I suppose,” Marie countered, “that even Sarah Siddons let a lilt steal into her voice occasionally, off-stage. I wouldn’t let that happen on-stage, unless the part called for it, any more than she would.”
“So you compare yourself with Mrs Siddons? I doubt she would regard the comparison as flattery.”
“I share your doubts,” Marie happily agreed, deciding that Mr Brodie – despite his brusqueness and big sideburns – was really rather sweet. “I have little more in common with her than my nationality. And as a matter of fact if I’m to follow in anyone’s footsteps I’d sooner follow in Lillie Langtry’s.”
“How so?”
“I was born on the day her horse won the Cesarewitch and my uncle, who had his shirt on Merman, telegraphed my parents saying I should be an actress and own racehorses when I grew up. They kept the telegram – that is, Pa did, not Mam – and later on I read it and … and here I am!”
“So a bet on a horse decided your future for you?”
“Oh, no!” Marie looked shocked at such a suggestion. “I decided my own future. But it was thanks to Uncle John that the theatre came into my life so soon. I lived in a remote village, you see, where such things as theatres seem to belong in a distant land. With or without that telegram I’d have become an actress. I was born to act.”
Perhaps. She certainly had him listening to her and he was not normally much of a listener. As a rule Charles preferred speaking to being spoken to. But today was no usual day and Marie Howard no usual girl. She had fire and verve, not to mention audacity, and he had found himself attentive to her every word. Which was worth exploring further. He said to her: “We are all born, maybe for some purpose, maybe not, and we all have to die. It is how we use our brief span of time that sets us aside from our fellow men or preserves our initial anonymity. There is also the question of whether we are equipped to rise to the heights. A few are, but the majority are not. They die and are forgotten. The West End public are far from easily pleased. Actresses without number have come from the provinces and wished they had not come. Success in Swansea bears no relation to success in London. It can be a painful experience to be stripped of one’s illusions publicly. Why risk such pain prematurely?”
“The pain would accompany failure,” Marie said, meeting Charles Brodie’s steady gaze, “and I shall not fail. If you have no faith in me I have enough in myself for us both. You will have faith, though, once you’ve seen my portrayal.”
He was in the presence of a witch – a sorceress. He must be, to be so swayed by a pair of sparkling eyes, albeit supported by a spirited fight. Would he live to regret a decision to pursue this? Buoyant suddenly, he knew he must take that risk. “Let me see it, then,” Charles said, “from page seven of the script.”
3
Nell’s gaze was glued to the clock on the wall. It was almost four. Marie had been gone for almost two hours and still there was no sign of her. Nell could not imagine what this might mean. It surely could not mean that Marie was still in Mr Brodie’s office with him. Such a thing was beyond imagining. So had he fired her for presumption and, afraid to show her face in here again, had she left the theatre? No, that would not be at all like her. Marie was, to the best of Nell’s knowledge, quite fearless. Afraid of nothing, she would brave the Green Room no matter what had gone on after she put her proposition to Mr Brodie. What had gone on?
The idea that the Guv’nor might have taken Marie seriously and that he was currently rehearsing her was absurd. But was there any other explanation for the time-lapse since Marie swept out of here like royalty? If there was, it was beyond Nell to think what it might be. And it seemed to be beyond Clive Swindall, who was beginning to flounder after stating so emphatically that Marie Howard did not have a cat in hell’s chance of convincing Charles that she should go on tonight in place of Dolly Martin. Clive was still issuing similar sentiments but, if Nell was any judge, with less and less conviction. She would like to see his face were Marie to walk in saying that she was the new star of OLIVER TWIST. She would like to see all their faces!
Nell had not stayed in the Green Room throughout her friend’s lengthy absence. It would have been impossible to do that, listening to all the talk and feeling completely out of things. She felt isolated by her friendship with the girl at the centre of the present speculation, for – following Clive’s lead – several of the cast appeared to regard her as a sort of leper. Nell would undergo actual leprosy, though, to stay friends with Marie who, she sometimes thought, had saved her life.
Until Marie’s arrival at the end of last year, Nell had believed it was not just Billy who had died. Since learning of his death in that Flanders trench she had often felt dead inside. And the rest of the time she had wished herself dead so that she need not face life without him. The prospect of living with no Billy at her side had seemed unbearable and she had longed to join him in the hereafter. Then Marie had arrived and quickly changed her thinking. Marie was so very alive, so bursting with energy, that Nell had felt energised and realised she was wrong in wanting to die. She would join Billy sometime but meanwhile why not live life? Marie saw to it that Nell was kept forever on her toes … forever guessing what would happen next.
Nell had crept out undetected from the Green Room and, with a heart beating like thunder, had tiptoed down the long, dank corridor to where it widened behind the stage. There, from a vantage point at the foot of stone steps leading up to the wings, she had been able to see Mr Brodie’s distant office door – which had remained closed throughout the time that she had stood watching and waiting for Marie to emerge.
Returning to the warmth of the Green Room once the cold had seeped right through to her bones, Nell had been greeted by Clive with the words: ‘Where’s your friend, then: getting her just deserts?’ To which she had summoned the nerve to reply ‘You’re about to be very surprised!’
Every so often since then he had taunted her with the sarcastic remarks in which he so excelled. Nell had tried not to mind … but oh, for Marie to march in and inform them all that she, not Dolly, was to play Nancy tonight! Oh, for pigs to fly!
The clock n
ow said ten past four. Its pendulum swung rhythmically to and fro, almost mesmerising Nell as it ticked the seconds and minutes away. So focussed was her gaze that she did not notice the door opening until it was fully open, by which time every eye in the room was turned toward it … and toward the tall, thin figure of Gerald Atkins.
Standing framed in the doorway, the stage-manager rather relished the task before him. He had never cared much for Dolly Martin nor her flighty ways. Pulling himself up to his full height he announced without altering the droopiness of his features: “Full dress rehearsal on-stage straight away. Curtain to rise on OLIVER TWIST as arranged at half-past-eight. Oh, and by the way,” he delayed here, watching their faces, “we have a new leading lady.”
Gasps greeted his announcement. Then there was a hubbub of disbelieving tongues. Pandemonium reigned as the room emptied and the cast, led by a livid Clive Swindall, headed for the stage.
+++++++
Marie stood beside Charles Brodie as he raised his hand for silence and started addressing the assembled cast. She had watched them assembling – seen that Nell had arrived last. The stage-manager’s news had probably set Nell’s head spinning! Marie herself had not been especially surprised when Mr Brodie, after putting her through her paces as Nancy, finally decided to take a chance on her. His decision, she felt, was inevitable. So there had been little euphoria: more a sense of destiny. Yes, she was destined for fame and Mr Brodie was not chancing anything. He was simply fitting in with things … giving Marie her rightful wings. But he was speaking and she was not listening …
“From the darkness of the morning some light has begun to filter in. Through determination and discipline we must put the dark behind us and never permit it to dominate again. We are one playhouse among many and cannot risk such domination. For there will be no less than forty-two theatres competing with us in Town tonight and offering the public a varied bill of fare. They can dine on Shaw if that is their inclination, or on Maugham or on Arnold Bennett, unless of course their taste dictates Pinero, Wilde or any one of nine musical shows. So, to ensure that the Tavistock features prominently on their menu, we must dedicate ourselves one hundred per cent to making Dickens palatable. We must not merely play parts: we must live them. We must not merely act: we must breathe our breath into the characters of Dickens’s creation until the moment is reached – that fine moment – when we are no longer ourselves but the people we are portraying. I will not tolerate anything less than total dedication. Every member of this Company is, as I trust I have amply demonstrated, expendable. Oh,” he looked about him until his warning gaze came to rest on Clive Swindall, “and support the new Nancy all you can. By God, she needs our support!”
His message to Clive had been clear: no trouble-making or Dolly would not be alone in her fate. It cheered Charles to see the sobering effect his action in sacking Dolly, along with his little speech, had had on everybody. A periodic shock was obviously what they all needed if he was to be shown the respect so lacking this morning. His image would rival Irving’s before he was through – and if Miss Howard could come up trumps his Company would be unblemished in its record of excellence!
Charles Brodie’s was in essence a repertory company presenting a continuous succession of Dickensian plays. The accent was on continuity, so that except on Sundays the theatre was never shut. Thus when a new play was in rehearsal the cast as a rule rehearsed during the day while performing another play from their repertoire at night. It was a fairly arduous schedule but reaped results that in turn attracted audiences. When criticised for driving his actors too hard Charles was unrepentant, for it was his task to maintain the Tavistock’s reputation. He founded his methods on Irving’s – and Sir Henry had not been dubbed ‘Guv’nor’ for nothing!
During the ensuing condensed dress rehearsal, wherein young Marie Howard needed to be absorbed into his new production as Nancy, Charles drove his cast as never before and when finally they began to flag his energy was still intact.
He said at the end: “We are far from where we should be but must stop there. The curtain will rise within two hours and I entreat you to see that it rises on a performance worthy of us. We each need to give of our best, plus something extra. There is much at stake. I am sure you are all aware that this is the first time in our Company’s history we have risked everything on an unknown leading lady.” He spoke now, with a frown, to Marie: “See to it, Miss Howard, that our faith isn’t misplaced. Very well – you may all take a break.”
There were mutterings as they tiredly trooped from the stage. Why did Charles always criticise, never praise? He was far too hard a taskmaster and would reap more from them if he complimented now and then. Not that they could give more than they had given today. It would not be their fault if OLIVER TWIST failed. Nor, to be fair, would it be the fault of the new Nancy, whose interpretation of Dolly’s role had been astonishingly professional – and word-perfect. She couldn’t entirely be blamed for Mr Brodie’s decision to rest the fate of his play on her inexperienced shoulders. Barely an adult, she was not to know the depth of the water into which she had stuck her toe. The water was very deep, though – and heaven help Marie Howard once Dolly got to know that her reign at the Tavistock was over! Then the fun would really begin. It would be like the war all over again, except that the fuse would be lit here, in this very theatre. If the paying public but knew it, there were better dramas off-stage today than there were likely to be on-stage.
“Well!” said Nell as she and Marie, having hung back from the rest of the mass exodus, descended the steps from the wings en route for their dressing room. “Well, I never did! You’re a one, you are! And you can act, on top of everything else.”
“I should hope I can act. Otherwise, I might as well have become a chimneysweep instead of an actress. On top of what else?”
“Oh, you know – entering the lion’s den and getting him to do what everyone said was out of the question. You’re a marvel, Marie, and no mistake. How on earth did you pull it off? I want to know all that went on, right from when you first set foot in Mr Brodie’s office.”
“That’s as may be,” said a voice from nearby, “but you’ve no time for talkin’ just now, Miss Marie. So come along of me!”
Giggling, Marie went with homely Sarah Hodgkiss, Dolly Martin’s dresser. She soon found herself in a different world from the one she had shared with Nell and two older women at the very top of the building. Instead of cramped, stuffy surroundings she now had exclusive use of a big, airy dressing room befitting her new status. Well, as leading lady she was entitled to more comfort than she had been accustomed to! Looking round appreciatively, Marie saw that her clothes were already arrayed on hangers along a horizontal bar running the length of one wall. Sarah must have climbed all those stairs and brought her belongings down during the dress rehearsal. How clever of her to work out, amidst the chaos up there, which garments were Marie’s! And how tidy this room was, compared with that communal one! The chintz-covered couch at the far end was clutter-free, as were the two matching easy chairs nearer the door. And the dressing table facing her – its rectangular mirror lit across the top and down both sides by a series of naked light bulbs – was a picture of orderliness.
“All this mine and not a cat in sight!” enthused Marie, wearing a satisfied smile. “My friend Nell’s a devil for cats and nothing will stop her feeding them scraps. I wouldn’t care but for their claws if I accidentally sit on one. Still, what are a few scratches compared with being overrun by rats?”
“Nothin’,” Sarah agreed comfortably. No lover of cats, she liked rats even less and they’d been clobbered good and proper since Nell Sedgwick’s ‘family’ had started to breed. Back when the Tavistock was overrun with the pests a right nuisance they had been, eating everything including the scenery. So Nell’s cats were a godsend and even the Guv’nor turned a blind eye to them. “But I reckon,” she said, sizing up her new charge as she spoke, “before you’ve bin long in ’ere, cats ’n rats�
�ll likely be the least of your worries.”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“A cat’s claws aren’t nothin’ to Miss Dolly’s and that’s for sure. She won’t take none of this lyin’ down … and old Ben’s never goin’ to keep her out. He might be the stage-doorkeeper but he’s no match for her. So stand by for Trouble, I should, Miss Marie … with a capital T. That’s my advice and beyond it I’m keepin’ quiet.”
Hearing disapproval in Sarah’s tone and feeling somewhat apprehensive at the prospect of Dolly turning up prior to the performance, Marie said: “Mr Brodie told me that Gerald Atkins will take care of things and that Dolly Martin won’t get past him. Remember, Sarah, it’s on Mr Brodie’s say-so that I’m in here … and you are now my dresser.”
“Let’s get you dressed then,” Sarah said, reaching for Dolly’s costume that would need a tuck or two and some other adjustments to fit this young whippersnapper. Word had it that Marie Howard had had a hand in Mr Brodie’s decision but it wasn’t Sarah’s place to judge either her or the Guv’nor. Women might have earned the right to vote last year but it was still a man’s world and always would be, if Sarah knew anything about it – and she did. Hadn’t her husband left her when the six kids were just nippers and hadn’t she had to scrub floors on hands and knees to keep the wolf from their door? Yes, Wally had got off scot-free while she had had all the drudgery and worry of bringing up their family. Well, the kids were off her hands now, thank the good Lord, and back in 1912 she had found herself a nice little number when she got taken on here. She’d been like a duck finding water and the theatre certainly suited her. Why, she even loved the smell of the Tavistock! It smelled, backstage, of canvas and glue, size and rope, as well as of greasepaint and there was no finer air to be breathed anywhere. Sarah was sure of that, though there were those as would dispute it. And she was sure of something else: Miss Dolly would not take kindly to finding she had been replaced and that all her personal belongings were packed in a suitcase. If Mr Brodie and Miss Marie thought she’d go quietly they were much mistaken. They might yet live to rue this day.