'My dear Doctor, when on earth are you going to let me have a drink?' he started as usual. 'I was passing such a delightful time going through the barman's cocktails. I'd just reached that most interesting concoction of tomato juice and vodka. There is so much to catch up on in life!'
'Next Monday you might run to a glass of _vin blanc,'_ I told him sternly.
'But Doctor, the Film Festival! It starts tomorrow, and I do so want to give a little party for those bright young people. I've never met a real film star, you know. Indeed, the only one I remember is a dog called Rin-tin-tin. I don't expect he'll be coming, of course.'
He offered me a cigar.
'They say this young lady is arriving at the hotel from London this afternoon,' he added, picking up a magazine with Melody Madder on the cover.
It was difficult at the time to pick up any magazine that hadn't. She was a red-head in a tight dress, who-not to put too fine a point on it-struck me as suffering from pronounced mammary hyperplasia. But it seems a condition in which people are widely interested, and in the past few months she'd become better known to the British public than the Britannia on the back of a penny.
'Fascinating creature,' mused Lord Nutbeam. 'Remarkable how the point of interest changes, isn't it? Forty years ago it was all legs, and forty years before that the girls wore bustles. I do so hope I shall live to see what it is next.'
'The odd thing is,' I remarked, 'I've a feeling I've met her somewhere. I suppose I saw her in a picture.'
'I only wish you had met her, Doctor. I should so much like the pleasure of doing so myself, though Ethel seems most unenthusiastic at the idea. If you could ask her to my party I should certainly express my appreciation tangibly. You haven't a Rolls, have you?'
I promised to do my best.
'And how is the book coming along? Alas! For some reason I seem to be getting so behind with my reading these days.'
For the past couple of days the hotel had been steadily filling up for the Festival, mostly with actresses who were more or less overdressed or more or less undressed and all anatomically impossible, actors holding their breath while photographed in bathingtrunks, and film stars' husbands discussing their wives' income tax. The rest I supposed were the financial wizards, who could be spotted through their habit of approaching closed doors with their hands in their pockets, with about fifteen people fighting to grab the handle first.
It didn't seem easy to make the acquaintance of such a high-powered hotsie as Melody Madder, even if we were staying in the same hotel. I didn't even see more of her arrival than the top of her famous red hair, what with all the chaps trying to take her photograph. I found a quiet corner of the lobby and searched for a plan to present her with his Lordship's invitation. There wasn't much point in simply going along with a bunch of flowers, even Lord Nutbeam's name not cutting much ice with the woman who'd become as much a national institution as the lions in Trafalgar Square. I supposed I could send up an elegant little note, which at least might produce her autograph in return.
As the first step seemed finding her room number, I was approaching the reception desk trying to remember the French for 'suite' when I was elbowed aside by a fat woman in a hat with cherries dangling from it.
'It's an utter disgrace,' the fat woman started on the unfortunate chap behind the counter. 'Our room's that stuffy I daren't draw a breath. Hasn't been aired for years, if you ask me. And as for the beds, I don't even like to think about them.'
'But if madame will open the shutters-'
'Open them? You try and open them. You'll have to use dynamite.'
I was a bit annoyed at the elbowing, though I saw her point-fresh air is provided free in English hotels, all round the windows and under the doors, but in France they get some inside a bedroom and like to keep it for years.
'And another thing. The light won't go on and I got stuck in the lift.'
'The hotel engineer will attend to it at once, madame.'_
'As for the plumbing, it's disgraceful. What's the idea of that ridiculous washbasin six inches off the ground? Sir Theodore Theobald shall hear about this, believe you me. Furthermore, my daughter is still airsick, and I must have a doctor at once.'
'A doctor, Mrs Madder? We shall send for the best available.'
I pushed myself forward.
'Forgive my butting in,' I said quickly, 'but if you want a doctor, I happen to be the chap.'
She looked as if I were another of the local inconveniences.
'The gentleman, madame, is personal physician to Lord Nutbeam.'
'Oh, are you? Well, I suppose you'll do.
But I don't mind telling you here and now you can't expect any fancy fees.'
'In an emergency, Mrs Madder, it would be quite unethical for me to make a charge.'
This seemed to tip the scales, and I felt pretty pleased with myself as I followed her into the lift and up to a bedroom stuffed with flowers. Not only could I issue old Nutbeam's invitation as I felt Melody Madder's pulse, but I might be able to go over her chest as well.
'Get yourself ready, my girl,' said Mrs Madder, advancing to the bed. 'I've brought the doctor.'
'Good Lord!' I exclaimed. 'Why hello, Petunia.'
15
Petunia gave a little shriek and sat up in bed.
'Gaston! What on earth are you doing here?'
'But what are you doing here? In that hair, too.'
'What's all this?' demanded Mother.
'Mum, it's Dr Grimsdyke-you know, the one who used to bring me home in the rattly old car.'
'Oh, it is, is it? Yes, I remember now. I've often seen him from the bedroom window.'
'You seem to have come up a bit in the world, Pet,' I observed warmly. 'Jolly good job you didn't get the mumps after all.'
I kicked myself for not recognizing all those photographs. Though I must say, she'd been heavily camouflaged since the days when we shared the same bedroom. In her natural state old Pet would never strike you as particularly short on the hormones, but the way the film chaps had got her up she looked like an endocrinologist's benefit night.
'She's still feeling sick,' said Mother.
'Mum, I'm not. I told you I'm not.'
'Yes, you are. It was just the same when we went on the coach to Hastings. You're always sick for hours afterwards.'
'Perhaps you will permit me to prescribe, Mrs Madder-or Mrs Bancroft, rather.' I took charge of the situation. 'If you'll run down to the chemist's with this, they'll concoct it on the spot.'
'What's wrong with the hall porter, may I ask?'
'Better go yourself to see they make it up properly. These French pharmacists, you know.'
Mum hesitated a moment, but seeming to think it safe because I was the doctor, left the pair of us alone.
'Gaston, it's divine to see you again.'
Petunia held out her arms. 'But what on earth are you giving me to take?'
'Bicarbonate of soda, which you could get from the chef, I just wanted a moment to find how the transformation had taken place.'
She laughed. 'Of course, I haven't seen you since that place up north-what's it called? Mother was furious. She'd no idea I'd met you, though. Wanted to hear what I'd been up to, fog or no fog. You know what she's like.'
'I'm beginning to find out.'
'She almost threw me out of the house. I was terribly hurt. After all, nothing in the slightest immoral happened there at all.'
'Quite,' I said.
'She told me to get a respectable job-usherette, nursemaid, secretary, or something. I was awfully upset, because I never really wanted to leave the stage. Not even if I hadn't half a chance of reaching the top.'
'You seem to have disproved that one, anyway.'
'Oh, being an actress isn't much to do with all this.' Pet picked at the bed-cover. 'It's the other things that count. I wanted a mink coat.'
'And what girl doesn't?'
'I mean, to get a start you have to wear the right clothes. Appear in the right places.
Meet the right people. The only people I met were as broke as I was, which I knew for a fact because I tried to borrow money from all of them.'
'I know the feeling.'
Petunia smoothed back her new red hair.
'The very day after the fog I went to Shaftesbury Avenue to see my agent, and as usual he said, "Sorry, darling, nothing at the moment. Unless you happen to be a distressed gentlewoman."
'I asked why, and he told me Monica Fairchild had just been in. You know who she is, Gaston?'
'I certainly do. I was her doctor for a bit. Before she had the baby.'
'Whoever her doctor is now told her to get away from it all and have a rest. She was leaving the baby with her husband and taking a Mediterranean cruise, and wanted this distressed gentlewoman as her secretary-expenses paid, no other dibs, of course.'
I remembered Miss Fairchild was as openhanded as a dyspeptic tax-collector.
'When I got out into Shaftesbury Avenue again,' Petunia continued, as I took her hand in a professional sort of clasp, 'it struck me-wham! If I could play a doctor's wife in a fog, why couldn't I play a distressed gentlewoman on a cruise? And if I got friendly with Fairchild, there's no knowing how she'd help me along. Anyway, I'd have four square meals a day, and perhaps a bit of fun. Also, I could get away from Mum for a bit. So I put on my old tweed skirt and went round to her flat in Mount Street and got the job. She didn't know me from Eve, of course.'
'You then developed one of these famous shipboard friendships with the Fairchild,' I suggested, 'and that's how you got on all the magazine covers?'
'Not on your life. In fact, when I see her again, she'll probably tear my hair out to stuff her pillow with.'
I looked surprised.
'We went down to the ship with enough luggage for a circus,' Petunia went on. 'You can't imagine the fuss, with the photographers, flowers, and all the sailors trying to get her autograph. Nobody took any notice of me, of course, especially in my old tweed skirt.
'If I didn't know I was dogsbody there and then, I soon found out. It was "Miss Bancroft, tell the Captain I must have my special diet," and "Miss Bancroft, complain the water's too hard for my complexion," and "Miss Bancroft, if they don't stop that awful siren thing this very minute, I shall positively have hysterics." I should have gone crackers if the old hag hadn't been sea-sick. You know she usually looks like a combined operation by Dior and Elizabeth Arden? Lying on her bunk groaning under an icebag, she reminded me of one of my touring landladies when the rent was overdue. I think it gave me a bit of confidence.'
'Great leveller, the nausea,' I agreed.
'In fact, it gave me enough confidence to put on my new dress. I'd bought it with all the money I had left in the world. It was the one I wore on the cover of last month's _Gentlemen's Relish.'_
I remembered it was a thing fitting Petunia as closely as her epidermis, to which it gave way for large areas about the upper thorax.
'It was the first night we had dinner at the Captain's table. He was ever so nice. Kept leaning over to pass me the butter and things with his own hands. He didn't take half as much notice of Fairchild, sitting there in her best mink. She was furious, of course. Developed a headache and disappeared to her cabin, and next morning the steward told me I'd been shifted to another table. It was behind a pillar thing in the corner, with five commercial travellers from Birmingham.'
'A bit of a come-down,' I sympathized. 'Eating below the old salt's salt.'
'Can't blame Fairchild, I suppose. Even off-stage a star has to keep in the limelight. And don't I know it now.'
'But I don't quite follow how this made you into Melody Madder.' I felt puzzled. 'All Fairchild did was chase you about enough to have made all Cleopatra's slaves give notice.'
'That all started when we got to Naples.
When Count Longrandesi came aboard.'
'What, the terribly rich chap, who takes horses all round the world to jump on them over bits of wood?'
Petunia nodded. 'By then Fairchild had found I was in the profession. She wasn't so easy to fool as that little fat man up north. I had to read scripts to her in the afternoons, and one day she turned on me and said, "You've been on the stage, Miss Bancroft." I said yes. "You came to me under false pretences," she said. I told her an actress could still be a gentlewoman, and I happened to be a distressed one. That turned her nasty, and she made me do all her laundry. Pretty grubby, some of it was, too.
'Anyway, the Count appeared with his horses for London. He was all big eyes and kiss your hand, and, of course, Fairchild was after him.'
'Out for the Count, in fact,' I laughed.
'He saw me first,' Petunia continued, not seeming to see the joke. 'I had that dress on. Ever so sweet he was, what with buying me a Green Chartreuse in the Veranda Cafй. Though I suppose I should have known better than putting Fairchild's nose out of joint all over again. The next morning she told me I wasn't to wear my dress any more.'
'What a bitch in the manger!'
'After that the Count didn't take much notice of me, not in my old tweed skirt. But at least he kept Fairchild quiet for the rest of the cruise. She hardly spoke to me until we were nearly home again. Then, just before we got in she said, "Miss Bancroft, I'm sorry if I've been overwrought during the cruise. My nerves, you know. Do tell me if there's anything I can do in London to help you, though, of course, I'm going to Hollywood in a couple of weeks for the next two years. Just look at this lovely blue mink the Count's given me," she said. "He was bringing it to London for his sister, but he'll buy her another one at Bradley's. Isn't he sweet?" she said.
"Do be a darling," she said, "and slip it over your shoulders when we go through Customs. They'd charge me the absolute earth if I tried to bring two minks through the barrier. And I can't possibly afford to throw my money away on stupid things like duty. Why, it quite suits you," she said.'
'And you agreed, Pet?'
'Didn't have much choice. Actually, the Customs' man was an absolute darling, though I suppose he rather liked the idea of running his hands through Monica Fairchild's underwear. As soon as he'd done that little squiggle with his chalk and left us, Fairchild said, "Thank you, Miss Bancroft."
'So I said, "Thank you for what?"
'And she said, "For wearing my mink, of course."
'So I said, "Your mink? But my dear, this is my mink."
"Don't be an idiot, Miss Bancroft" she said. "You know perfectly well I only asked you to wear it through Customs."
"Did you?" I said. 'I can't remember. Perhaps we'd better call back that nice Customs' man and see if he does?"
'"Miss Bancroft! Petunia! You wouldn't-!"
'"As you know yourself, Monica dear," I told her, "the road to success is strewn with unfortunate accidents. Goodbye, and thank you for a lovely trip. By the way, I noticed on that little card thing that the penalties for even suspected smuggling include long periods in the clink."
'So there I was Gaston-loose in London with a blue mink cape and an old tweed skirt. I suppose I wasn't very honest, really, but I promise I'll send it back once she's home from Hollywood.'
'Jolly quick thinking, if you ask me,' I said admiringly. I suddenly felt that Pet had a bit more power under the bonnet than I'd imagined. 'It's about the most innocent way I've heard of a girl getting a mink coat, anyway.'
'After that, all the breaks seemed to come at once. My agent took me to lunch-in the mink, of course. We met Adam Stringfellow. He's a director, who was casting some models for a picture. He gave me a few days at the studio, and since then everything sort of built up.'
'And what's it like?' I asked.
'Bloody hard work,' said Petunia.
I looked surprised, having gathered from the newspapers that all she did was drive about in big fat cars with big fat chaps and draw a big fat salary.
'Do you know what time I get up in the morning? Before my milkman. I have to be at the studio by six, if you please, for hair-do and make-up. You can't imagine how ghastly it is play
ing a passionate love scene before breakfast, lying on a bed and remembering to keep one foot on the ground to make it all right for the censor.'
'Like billiards,' I observed.
'And I'm not myself any more.'
'Oh, come. Perfect health, I assure you.'
'I mean I'm Melody Madder Limited. With a board of directors, and things. Everyone does it because of the tax. And, of course, there's Mum.'
'Ah, yes, Mum.'
'Then there's another thing…' She looked up at me, fluttering her brand-new eyelashes. 'Gaston, my sweet-do you remember how once you loved me?'
'Only too well, Pet my dear.'
I was still getting a bit of rheumatism in the shoulder, the long-term after-effects of Clem's Caff.
'Do you know, I believe you're the only friend I've left in the world? And I need help, darling.'
'Good Lord, do you?'
'Desperately. I'm in terrible trouble.'
'Oh, yes?'
I looked cagey, knowing the sort of trouble girls specially reserve the doctors among their old friends for. But Petunia went on:
'It's all Mum's fault, really. Promise cross your heart you won't say a word?'
'Of course not. We doctors, you know. Professional secrecy.'
'Well, I'll tell you. It's simply that-'
But at that moment Mum arrived back with the medicine.
'This will have your daughter spry in no time,' I told her, shaking the bottle. 'I particularly hope she's in form again tomorrow night, because I've been asked to invite her to Lord Nutbeam's little party.'
'She'll have to get permission from Sir Theodore first,' said Mother. 'And from Mr Stringfellow, of course.'
'I have to ask their permission for everything,' Petunia apologized from the bed.
'And my permission, I might say,' added Mrs Bancroft. 'I'm still your mother, you know.'
'Yes, Mum,' said Petunia.
16
'I do so hope the young lady is free,' agreed Lord Nutbeam, when I arrived at his suite to explain the snags. 'I'd planned such a splendid little evening. There will be champagne, of course, and a band to play South American dances. Have you heard of the rumba, Doctor? It does my hip tremendous good. I wanted fireworks as well, but Ethel seems most disinclined.'
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