by John Gardner
‘The story of my life.’
‘You even flogged your father’s most cherished bit of jewellery for a bloody monkey, remember? His prize ring for a smelly little ape. Now the audience is supposed to see the two of you as beautiful people full of lyrical romance together in Portia’s garden. Balls. There’s a damn great hammock; you’ve tried it most ways, so now you’re going to try it in a hammock. The words are romantic, but you’ve got to get more lust, more purpose into it. Then you get disturbed by Stephano and there’s the usual discovered lovers’ panic. In a hammock it can be sexy and, at the end, very funny.’
‘It’s very interesting, I promise, especially with Asher.’
It’s hard to tell if Asher still really loves me like he used to. At least like he used to say he did. He certainly humps enough, but he’s spending so much time rehearsing with randy birds. Doing his Romeo opposite that big black bit, Carol Evans, makes him come on terribly. I’m sure I’m only a substitute. What a pity we can’t get into their minds and see who they’re really fucking when they’re at it.
However, life is far from dull here, if only I could be really certain of Asher it would be paradise. Work keeps all of us busy and it’s going to be a marvellous summer, you can feel it all around. I’m heady with Shakespeare, desperately involved in the plays. You ask about Douglas Silver. He really is an inspiration to work with, and, between the two of us, I have designs on him. Think big, Julia, is what you used to say to me...
‘That’s splendid, Conrad. I like the, Is thy name Tyrell?, and camping it up with the, Art thou indeed? It’s a good contrast to the ruthless bitchiness with Buckingham.’ Douglas turns to Ronnie Gregor. ‘Look, while we’ve got Tyrell here, let’s just reflect for a moment on scene three.’
‘Tyrell’s description of the princes’ murder?’
‘Yes.’ Then looking up, loud to the company. ‘We’ve been discussing how we might use some projected abstracts. You remember, as well as the gate and wall there’s a screen we can drop into the back of the set. I think the description of the princes’ murders might work with a projection.’ Catellier catches his eye. ‘Yes, Conrad?’
‘Not film. I mean not acted out on film?’
‘No. It would have to be something pretty horrible in abstract.’
‘Two little hearts, in medical detail, working diagrams, pumping.’ Frank flashes an unattractive smile, on and off. ‘Then one struggles and stops. Then the other.’
‘That’s good. That’s very good.’
‘It’s a bit naughty isn’t it?’ Ronnie whispers.
A bleak look from Douglas. ‘Very, but Tyrell isn’t very good is he?’
The images in Carol Evans’s mind swarmed like hornets; velvet luxury; lust, the ripping apart. Which did her body need and crave for? Douglas with his firm approach and steady thrust into the mind as well as the body? No, the time with Joe Thomas, that remarkable energy which made her twist and roll like someone in a death agony. Faster yet. This one was different, unseen, tender, imagined, Asher Grey, her Romeo, lover, friend. Leaping the fence of passion, their bodies heaving to the same enormous swell. The long drawn agony, conscious of her swivelling buttocks against the sheet; then back to reality. It was going to be difficult, that scene, naked in bed with Asher Grey. She would be so aware, and he...? She had to be alone with him; she had to talk to Romeo.
In wardrobe they had all the costumes completed, but for minor detail, for the first two productions. The sets were finished, and operating, for Othello, The Merchant and Romeo and Juliet. Props were clear for Othello and The Merchant.
Each morning the company worked out together, their exercises becoming more complex, before rehearsals. Each day the productions advanced. March moved slowly towards its cold close and the air around Shireston stirred with the excitement of once more creating four new productions. New minds and bodies brought to bear on the Bard. It was all professional, all work and all concentration; the tensions would mount later. Spring was near and the opening of the season.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Emilio Benneto was happy; in a little over a week his restaurant would be operating on a full and permanent basis. His chefs were up to it; he had spent much time with the five young waiters and the three girls he had been forced into accepting, against his better judgment, and they were all as ready as they ever would be. In the past weeks he had ironed out nearly all the catering problems in the entire organization; the buying of food had been reorganized, the kitchens put under more strict supervision; he even had an easy and friendly relationship going with the gaunt Mrs. Doul. As he once observed to his young wife, Doris, ‘I would like to know the whole history of Mrs. Doul. In there somewhere is great personal tragedy. I sense it.’
On this Monday morning, Emilio was particularly happy, and, while he went through the accounts for the previous week, he reflected how lucky he had been; many men do not get second chances like him.
Back in their small house in Shireston, Doris Benneto finished off the week’s washing, did a quick repair job on her face, put on her coat, the red one with big lapels and brass buttons which Emilio liked so much (It makes you like a soldier. Wanton and desirable. The licentious soldiery.’), picked up her shopping basket and left to get half the week’s groceries.
At eleven o’clock, just as Doris was shutting the front door of their home, Emilio began his weekly Monday morning inspection of the festival’s catering facilities. It had become almost an occasion of military precision, but, by this time, most people had got used to it. Some still smiled: Benneto, a little Napoleon of the kitchens, but very professional. Accompanied by Mary Doul and the chief chef, Dominic, Emilio would make his way, first around his own kitchens at the theatre restaurant, then across to the permanent staff cafeteria, and finally to the company restaurant and the green room.
The driver of the lorry was a big Irishman called Dave Riley who had been piloting heavy vehicles for twenty years and should have known better. He took the hill too fast; there was no other traffic in sight; he slowed down, but not enough; he realized that he was taking the turn too wide and fast, but could do nothing about it; he did not even see the woman in the red coat until it was hopeless. Riley swore, pushed both feet on to the brake pedal, pumping furiously; wrenching at the wheel so that the lorry bumped and ground, swinging violently. Then the crunch and bang.
Doris Benneto did not feel a thing. If anything she only experienced momentary horror, suddenly confronted by the inescapable, the rear end of the lorry mounting the pavement, striking her full on into blackness. Her body was thrown against the wall where the side of the truck, rebounding, struck it again, crushing.
They laughed a little in the permanent staff cafeteria because the fish had been under-ordered last week. It was unusual, normally they were in excess by Saturday. Last week there had been an unaccustomed demand for fish.
‘I think we get Mr. Silver to give us a research assistant to find out when things will be in greatest demand,’ Emilio Benneto said.
The police and ambulance were at the scene within minutes. Riley was treated on the spot for cuts, bruises and shock. What remained of Doris Benneto was identified, wrapped in a blanket and taken to the mortuary at Shireston Hospital about a mile away. It was half-an-hour before the police discovered the next of kin was the dead woman’s husband, Emilio Benneto, restaurateur to the Shireston Festival Theatre.
By the time Emilio was back in his office the police were sitting with David Wills.
‘Someone’s got to break it to him, sir,’ the uniformed inspector told the executive director. ‘You’re his immediate superior.’
David’s horror was the most complete emotion he had yet experienced, and, on top of it came the terror of having to break the news. He needed help desperately, but this time there was nobody for him to turn to: Douglas was in a Richard rehearsal and could not be disturbed; he thought of Rachel but she was also in rehearsal.
‘Isn’t there some friend?’ He looked at
the police officer for help, but his eye met the look of cold immobility. The inspector shook his head. ‘Apparently they had few friends.’
‘How do I...?’
‘Tell him, sir?’
‘Yes.’
‘You make sure he’s sitting down and you’re as careful and sympathetic as possible. It’s never easy. I’ll have to be with you if that’s any help.’
‘Have to be with me?’
‘I have the harder job, sir. I have to ask him to come and identify...’
‘He has to?’
‘I’m afraid so, and it’s not at all pleasant. We really should be getting on with it.’
It was appalling. For David a private nightmare. At first Emilio could not grasp what David was telling him, and when he did it was tinged with the utter disbelief which is usually present, until the inspector added a word or two and reality set in. The restaurateur’s face took on the grey parchment pallor of death, and, for a minute, they thought he was going to collapse altogether.
‘It can’t be. No. I was with her this morning, last night we...’ And he lapsed into a flow of Italian, laced with anger. The real grief would come later.
Douglas was told as soon as the rehearsal broke, and he exploded with rage at David, for having let Emilio go off with the police by himself. He took Jennifer to one side and broke the news to her and together they got the car and Mrs. Doul.
Douglas quickly instructed Ronnie, Frank and Robin to carry on with the normal Othello run-through in the afternoon if he did not get back in time; then they drove to the hospital in silence; once there it took fifteen minutes to discover that Emilio had been sedated and taken home by the police.
The restaurateur opened his own door to them, a wreck, as though the flesh and blood had disappeared from his body and the skin had sunk on to his bones, red eyed, his hands clutching at a dress. Down the hall a young policeman and policewoman shuffled in embarrassment.
‘Is there anyone you can go to, Emilio?’ Douglas’s hand on the man’s arm.
‘There are only her parents. I wasa never close to them. The police hava told them. They haven’t come ‘ere and I don want them to come ‘ere.’
‘Why not come back to the house, to the festival?’ Jennifer stepped towards him. ‘We’ve got a spare apartment, I’m sure.’
‘Someone could look after you there,’ Mary Doul, her thin face bleached with the shock felt on Emilio’s behalf. ‘Even I could look after you there,’ she looked up at Douglas, an inquiring face.
Douglas nodded in reply and turned back to Benneto. ‘Emilio, have you got a solicitor? A lawyer?’
‘No.’
‘Well, don’t worry about a thing, Emilio. Come back with us, please.’
‘All her things...here...’ His arm went out in a limp gesture.
‘That’s exactly why you shouldn’t be here.’
When they got back, Jennifer took Mrs. Doul and Benneto to their apartment while Douglas routed out David Wills.
‘You get hold of Robert Hughes and tell him I said he would deal with everything, get in touch with the girl’s parents, make the funeral arrangements, everything. Right? Now I want some spare accommodation. At least a room for Mrs. Doul who seems to be the obvious person to look after Benneto at the moment. And we’ll need a whole flat for him. We can’t let the man stay completely alone at a time like this.’
‘I’ll fix it.’ David most anxious to make up for his earlier bungling.
Asher Grey had been through a hard day. He had started to sit in at some of the Richard rehearsals in order to observe Conrad at work, even though Douglas had told him that it was not necessary at this point. So he spent the morning watching Conrad. The run-through of Othello in the afternoon was tiring, particularly as Douglas did not get in until around four o’clock. Then, the full news of the tragedy depressed the young actor.
The news, in fact spread quickly and was felt by all. Nobody, apart from Dominic and a few of the catering staff, had known Doris Benneto well, but they all liked the little Italian restaurateur, and the very nature of the tragedy made it almost a personal shock to company and permanent staff alike.
When they finally broke at five Julia went over to tell Asher that she was getting a lift down to Shireston with Liz Column and asked if he would like to come; the shops were mostly open until six and there were one or two things she had to buy.
‘I think I’ll just go back to the flat and take a shower, love.’
‘You sure? I hate leaving you alone, Ash.’
‘I’m sure. You won’t be long will you?’
‘About an hour.’
Asher waved good-bye and set out for the house. On the stairs he met Carol Evans and for a second felt that she had been loitering there in the hope of seeing him.
‘Hi, you okay?’ she asked.
‘You heard about Benneto’s wife?’
‘Yes, it’s terrible, I can’t get it out of my head.’ Then, as though she had just realized that he was alone, ‘Where’s Julia?’
‘Gone into Shireston with Liz Column and Frank Ewes.’
As he said it the butterflies began low in his stomach and his hair tingled at the nape of his neck. There was a long pause.
‘I think we’ve got things to talk about.’ She leaned back against the banister rail; he could see the small curve of her stomach hard against the denim skirt.
‘We have to talk about your Juliet.’
‘And your Romeo.’
‘Yes.’
‘We can talk in my place.’
Asher nodded.
Inside her rooms there was air and light. Even though Julia professed to love the country so much she was no fresh air fiend when indoors; rarely was a window left open. Now alone, the particular, almost electronic, communication between Asher Grey and Carol Evans seemed to rise.
‘When’s it going to happen?’ she asked.
‘There’s little chance.’
‘It has to be before we do the love scene properly. I couldn’t meet you in public, if you see what I mean.’
‘It’s been worrying me. It could be embarrassing for both of us.’
‘What is it, Ash? I feel like a whore.’
‘Don’t. Don’t talk like that. I don’t know what it is. Perhaps it’s...’
‘Don’t say, love, it isn’t that.’
‘No, I was going to say that perhaps it’s simply the two of us playing Romeo and Juliet. It’s more than just a physical thing.’
‘I don’t know. My feeling is definitely physical.’
‘Come here, then.’
‘No, in bed, under the sheet, Asher, like it will be.’
They reached the bedroom before the frenzy broke over them, washing away Douglas, Julia, Joe Thomas, everyone who might get in the way, clog their memories. Clawing at each other’s clothing, mouths wide, bodies not in complete control. In a pinpoint corner of his consciousness, Asher wondered if this was what Shakespeare had in mind. The scene not played. Grab the experience hold it tight, so that you can recall it when you awoke with her on stage in a contrived dawn with the audience watching. Naked now, they rolled on to the bed, her fingers around him and his hand reaching for her, wet and running with desire.
Carol’s own body filled her mind, then beyond it the sensation of flying through colour. Asher was bigger than she had expected and so a small pain at first, but not now in the heaving wild gasping storm.
Emilio Benneto on the bed staring out of the window; his face vacant, though the mind’s eye crammed full of pain: unbelievable; Doris, his other self, the only person, active and alive; young, moving, now all gone, finished, disappeared. That could not be; yet it was; the awful sick joke of life, the tunnel to nothing, and there was not a thing one could do about it. Where are you? Where? The images so brilliant, close and clear, bringing only agony and warm tears.
‘Cry. Cry now and as much as you can.’ A thin hand on his shoulder. Mary Doul standing beside the bed. ‘If I had cried it would hav
e made life easier for me.’
‘She was...’
‘I know. I promise, Emilio, I know exactly what you’re going through.’
‘Why Doris?’
‘Why anyone? Why you, eventually? That’s why I wanted to look after you, because I know about it. I’ve been through it.’
Asher got back to his apartment only five minutes before Julia returned from Shireston. He and Carol had lain together when it was over, bathing in each other’s warmth and afterglow.
‘Is that how it always is for you?’
‘With Julia you mean?’
‘With anybody.’
‘It’s very good with Julia, but not like that. And you?’
‘It was something different, something for the memory.’
‘Really it’s what we have to describe through the text.’
‘I know it. That was everything that Shakespeare wrote about them, even if they never existed.’
Asher chuckled and the laugh built between them.
‘Our secret?’ she asked.
He placed a finger on her lips. ‘Our secret.’
Julia came into the bathroom as he was showering, and he to turn away, put his back to her so that she would not glimpse the redness, praying that Carol had not clawed too deeply around his shoulders.
‘Is he modest, then?’ Julia coming too close for comfort.
‘You’ve taken a long time to shower.’
‘I lazed about some. How was the big city?’
Happily she headed for the door. ‘Brash, as always.’ She stopped at the door. ‘Ash, what happens when you die? What’s happened to Mrs. Benneto?’
He slung a towel around his waist. ‘That’s the big one. The end product of life. For my money the end product is nothing.’
‘But that’s illogical.’
‘Life?’
‘Everything. It makes nonsense out of it all.’
‘Perhaps. Maybe that’s the trick, living for every moment. With no end product, the fact is here and now. Nothing more.’