Stratford Jewel

by Oliver, Marina

  A STRATFORD JEWEL

  BY

  MARINA OLIVER

  In 1926 the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in Stratford-on-Avon burnt down, barely five weeks before the start of the annual Festival. Rosa Greenwood and her sister Celia were devastated. They had small roles in the Festival, hoping it would lead to acting careers.

  While helping to remove priceless treasures from the theatre Library Rosa met Max Higham, an American architect in Europe studying theatre design. He stayed to help when the Festival plays were performed in the converted Picture House, which became the Temporary Theatre for six years while a new design for a replacement Memorial Theatre was sought, and then built.

  Rosa was wary of her growing attraction to Max, yet reluctant to marry Adam Thorn, a lifelong friend and distant cousin. There was no future with Max, who kissed her and left her to return to Virginia and the girl his family expected him to marry. Celia was encouraged to run away to London and audition, by the actor Gilbert Meadows, and begs the help of her friend Agnes.

  Furious, her father forbad Rosa to contemplate more acting, while Jack, her older brother who was a changed person since he fought in the war, spends his days driving waggons for the family carrier business. Can any of them achieve their hearts' desires?

  *

  A Stratford Jewel

  By Marina Oliver

  Copyright © 2011 Marina Oliver

  Smashwords Edition

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Cover Design by Debbie Oliver

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

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  AUTHOR'S NOTE

  My first visit to the Shakespeare theatre was a school trip. Since then I have been to the town and theatre many times, but the most memorable visit was many years later when I was shown round backstage. My own experience of acting had been with small amateur groups, performing in church halls on inadequate stages. (And once in a men's prison, where I played the part of the murderer in Agatha Christie's The Hollow.) I was intrigued by the steep rake of Stratford's stage, and greatly admired those who could keep their feet while sword-fighting.

  I also love to see the huge Shire horses, often pulling brewery wagons, so decided to give my heroine Rosa's family a carter's business using these magnificent beasts.

  A STRATFORD JEWEL

  BY

  MARINA OLIVER

  Chapter 1

  1926, March 6th.

  'Rosa! Rosa, come quickly! Oh, do hurry!'

  'Celia, stop fussing! Catch your breath. What in the world's happening?'

  Celia, clutching the neck of her blouse, her long blonde hair streaming in wild disarray across her tear-streaked face, shook her head vehemently.

  'No time, we've all got to help. I came for my coat. It's an absolute tragedy! Didn't you hear the hooter? Oh do stop asking questions and just come!'

  She seized a coat from the hooks beside the door and ran back into the stable-yard, leaving the kitchen door swinging wildly in the wind.

  'Shut it, or we'll catch our deaths,' an elderly woman sitting sewing beside the range said irritably. 'Drat it. Now I've lost the thread,' she added, squinting as she tried to rethread the needle. 'It's time your flighty sister came down to earth. That blessed fire hooter's going all the time.'

  Rosa put down her own sewing and went to shut the door. Absently she stooped to pick up some wisps of hay fluttering on the mat. She grinned faintly. 'You know that's an impossibility, Winnie. She's always in the heights or the depths, but she did sound more distraught than usual. I'd better go and see what's the matter.'

  As she spoke she was struggling into her old thick coat, for the March winds were raw. It was a particularly blustery day.

  Winnie sighed, resigned. 'Thread my needle first, then. And don't be late for tea. Mr Thorn's coming.'

  Rosa nodded curtly, but didn't reply as she dealt with the needle and thread. She followed her older sister into the yard where two of the men were unhitching Blossom, their elderly mare, from a cart. Sid, no more than a lad, grinned bashfully and touched his cap, while old Ben, who'd worked for them as long as she could remember, nodded. He said something but she didn't hear as she ran under the archway and into the road. Harry, their other driver, stood there with a grim expression on his thin, handsome face. Rosa ignored him. His occasional inexplicable black moods never affected his work, and he was always polite to customers. She glanced both ways. Celia had vanished but other people were hastening through the market place. The stream of humanity flowed into Ely Street, and as Rosa began to follow she saw, rising high above the buildings towards the river, a dense plume of smoke silhouetted against the pale wintry sky.

  Beyond the Town Hall Sheep Street was blocked by the crush of people. Rosa swung into Chapel Lane. 'What is it?' she asked, apprehensive, as she sped along, and then almost collided with a man emerging from the Shakespeare Hotel.

  He was in his mid-twenties, tall and dark. He grinned apologetically and seized her hand. 'You OK? Come on. The Memorial Theatre. It's on fire,' he said.

  *

  He let go of her and his long legs carried him round the corner and past New Place gardens. Within seconds Rosa lost sight of him, though as she raced onwards she thought she could occasionally see his dark head, hatless, above the crowd. It can't be true, surely it couldn't be true, Rosa prayed as she hastened towards Waterside. But she knew it was. There were far more people about than normal on a Saturday afternoon, and the column of smoke seemed to have doubled in size in the few minutes since she'd first seen it. Then she heard the bells, clamorous and urgent, discordant as several fire engines raced to the scene. As she reached Waterside she caught sight of one rattling towards them, the horses straining, their coats flecked with foam. The men clung to the gleaming brass rails, incongruously bright against the grey sky and swirling smoke. It joined another in the Bancroft Gardens and the men began uncoiling the hoses.

  Rosa watched, appalled. Smoke poured from one end of the theatre building and the wind sent it gusting across the river. The firemen were directing water onto the bridge connecting the theatre and Library, as well as pouring hundreds of gallons through the broken windows of the theatre itself. The crush of people forced her along the road. Several cars were parked, unable to go further. Their passengers had joined the crowd of horrified spectators. All around people exclaimed in disbelief, demanding information, while in front the flames licked voraciously at the body of the theatre. Rosa saw with sick dismay that they were enveloping the auditorium. The jets of water couldn't reach them. Within a very short space of time the Juliet balcony above the entrance framed the blazing interior, the ornamental red and blue brickwork was blackened, while tongues of flame licked at the beams in the half-timbered decoration higher up. They flared up, sporadic beacons against the dense smoke, to be doused and reappear elsewhere, brighter and twice as big. The crackling grew louder by the second, and only the blindest of optimists hoped to save the theatre.

  'Started just on quarter to three,' one man informed
anyone who would listen.

  'Was there anyone inside?' a woman asked.

  'Don't know, do we?'

  'Mrs Crowhurst tried to get in, but the smoke was too thick.'

  'After the cat, so I 'eard.'

  'Aye. And Mr Pemberton tried. Looks as though it started on the stage.'

  Rosa shivered. The fire curtain would have been down but it clearly hadn't helped. What hope was there for the costumes in the room below the stage, in readiness for rehearsals? They'd be lost, and the properties in the room behind, and the Festival was only weeks away.

  'Captain Ball's here. He's sent for more engines.'

  'Warwick's just come. Those horses must have made record time. And here's another. Is it Leamington?'

  The firemen on the bridge hadn't prevented the fire from reaching the Tower. Rosa saw smoke pouring from the top, hiding the turrets as it swirled about them, then flickering flames edged out and soon the Tower became a roaring, doomed chimney.

  'Thought they put a water-tank at top in case of fire,' a man beside Rosa said scornfully. 'Fat lot of good it's done.'

  'They'll drain the Avon afore they stop it,' another agreed. 'A thunderstorm's the only hope.'

  His words drew Rosa's attention to the sensation of tiny raindrops on her face and hands, but when she looked down she saw her hands covered in flakes of ash. Numb with shock she watched the destruction of a building she'd been familiar with all her life, where she'd been going to act in just a few weeks' time.

  *

  'Come and help,' someone shouted, and Rosa jerked out of her abstraction. As yet the Picture Gallery and Library, in their separate building nearest the road, were untouched, and if the firemen could stop the fire from spreading across the bridge it might be possible to save the priceless, unique treasures housed there. She could see Alderman Flower and another man directing people into a chain. Books and pictures were being passed along, across the street and into the lecture room. Rosa ran to join them.

  'They got the Droeshout out straight away,' the woman next to Rosa told her excitedly.

  'The Dutch portrait, done when Shakespeare was alive?' Rosa asked, struggling to pass on another painting in its heavy frame.

  'The Romneys are safe, and the Folios and Quartos, but there's such a lot of stuff, most of it's irreplaceable. That's Sir Whitworth Wallis with Alderman Flower. He's Keeper of the Birmingham Art Gallery.'

  They worked quietly, exchanging only a few words. For the next hour or more Rosa passed endless treasures along the chain. Pictures were stacked and books piled in every space in the Lecture Room across the road. All the time the crackling flames and hissing water could be heard, and despite the hard work and her heavy coat the bitter wind cut through to the bone. Fire engines came from as far away as Solihull, but were unable to save the theatre.

  When most treasures had been moved to safety Rosa and the other helpers looked about them. Eddies of smoke drifted across the gardens, darkening the sky and obscuring the buildings, allowing occasional glimpses of gaunt trees across the river. Water hoses snaked across the grass, ruined by the fire engines. For all the effort the buildings still blazed.

  Then a woman screamed, and a murmur of alarm rose from the crowd. Rosa looked where they were pointing and saw a child, little more than a baby, staggering determinedly towards the firemen and waving his arms gleefully. Several men started towards him, at the very moment when the roof of the theatre collapsed with a tremendous roar, and flames leapt a hundred feet or more into the air. Most of the men hesitated, startled, but one, a tall slim figure who had just emerged from the library entrance, ignored the commotion and ran to sweep the child out of harm's way, shielding him from the burning debris showering around them.

  The crowd groaned, partly in dismay at the fresh destruction, partly relief that the child was safe. His mother rushed to take him from the rescuer's arms, while someone else beat out the flicker of a flame which had caught the man's hair. The woman was crying and laughing, thanking him as she scolded the child, then they melted into the crowd.

  'Thank God the wind's blowing towards the river,' the man next to Rosa said, wiping his hand over his sweaty face and leaving a trail of black smudges. 'If it was comin' this way we wouldn't have a cat's chance of savin' the rest.'

  There was little more she could do, and Rosa began to look for Celia. Her sister was no doubt somewhere in this human chain, but dusk was falling and most people were barely recognisable, smothered in ash and smuts, with smoke-smeared faces. As it became clear the fire was under control, the now-smoking ruins a mere shell, most engines departed. Only the Stratford brigade, under Lieutenant Harris, stayed to make sure the fire didn't flare up once more. All that could be saved was stored in the lecture room. Waterside was crowded with people watching, and as Rosa moved away, weary, filthy, cold and dispirited, she saw hundreds more on the Tramway Bridge and lining the far bank of the Avon.

  'We can't do any more,' someone beside Rosa said. She'd heard his voice before. It was deep, with the drawl she'd come to associate with the many Americans who visited Stratford, though she hadn't been consciously aware of it during that brief exchange as they'd raced towards the theatre.

  Rosa nodded. She had to tilt her head to glance up at him for he was over six feet tall. 'What shall we do?' she asked bleakly. 'Without the Shakespeare theatre the heart's gone out of Stratford.'

  *

  Celia stood on the edge of the kerb, silent tears rolling down her cheeks. One of her companions, brown-haired and broad-shouldered, had his arm about her shoulders while the other, a ravishingly pretty girl with bright golden hair, abstractedly patted her hand.

  'Adam, what shall I do?' Celia asked, turning towards the man as the Evesham fire engine rattled past them on its way home. There was a husky break in her voice. The contrast of her delicately slim figure, fragile prettiness and the breathy quality of her voice as she looked appealingly at him was enough, Adam Thorn thought in some amusement, to drive most men wild with desire. Celia was also one of the fortunate few who could weep without making their eyes red. Her face, framed in a big fur collar, was still as lovely as ever, her pink and white complexion unmarred by smuts and streaks of dirt, only her dishevelled hair and cornflower blue eyes glistening with tears indicating her distress.

  'What do you mean?' he asked. 'Isn't it time you went home? Your father has invited me for tea, remember.'

  Celia pouted. 'How can you think about tea when my entire life is ruined? They won't have the Festival now. I won't be able to act.'

  'Act?' the other girl exclaimed, dropping Celia's hand. 'You were only an attendant to Hippolyta, barely on stage at all.'

  'It's more difficult to act well without speaking, but just as important,' Celia insisted. 'Surely even you know that, Agnes! You helped backstage often enough at school.'

  Agnes shrugged and moved away. Her limp seemed more pronounced than when Adam had seen her some weeks ago, and he thought yet again how unfortunate it was that she, as lovely as Celia, was restricted by this malformed leg.

  'A small part like that won't impress people who matter,' Agnes said, a hint of malice in her voice.

  'I'm an attendant to Portia in The Merchant of Venice as well,' Celia said swiftly.

  'Anyone could do that.'

  'At least it's professional acting, Agnes dear, and everyone has to begin somewhere. Actually I expect to do one of Juliet's kinswomen too. And surely I'll do a speaking part before the Festival's over – I know all of them!' Her tears overflowed again. 'But now none of them will be performed. My only chance has been ruined.'

  'Rosa's too,' Adam reminded her, but she shrugged petulantly.

  'Rosa wasn't in the Dream. Who'll notice a Court attendant in a prosy old history play? Anyway, she's not dedicated to the theatre like I am.'

  'She doesn't make such a to-do about it,' Agnes said sharply. 'Even though she's a much better actress than you are,' she added spitefully.

  Adam suppressed a grin. He marv
elled at Agnes's temerity, he wouldn't have dared risk a tantrum by voicing his opinion so openly. Agnes had known Celia since they were babies, though, and despite constant quarrels the girls remained friends.

  'You know nothing about it,' Celia responded calmly, secure in her self-esteem.

  'Where is Rosa?' Adam asked. 'I thought she'd be here. Everyone in the town must have heard the hooter.'

  'I told her to come. She probably couldn't be bothered. That shows she doesn't really care. Oh look, I can see a couple of the men, I'm going to ask them what will happen. I won't get my dress dirty now the fire's almost out.'

  She smiled at them and went hastily towards the theatre.

  'I can't imagine why she wants to bother with a career on the stage, all that anxiety and petty fussing,' Agnes said.

  'Don't you want a career? Most girls seems to now.'

  'Why, when one only gets married and gives it up? I'm going home now, Adam. I help Mother cash up when she closes the shop. Are you coming?'

  Adam couldn't see Rosa. She'd be at home wondering where he was. He'd better go there soon.

  'I'll walk back to the High Street with you,' he said, and didn't see the glow of pleasure in Agnes's swiftly downcast eyes.

  *

  Rosa had forgotten the tea party. She stood by the Waterside cottages and watched as dusk, then darkness, descended. The firemen were dousing the occasional small flares as still-burning debris fell spasmodically from the tower. Newspaper reporters had arrived from Birmingham and other nearby towns, and were eagerly questioning the hundreds of spectators. One approached Rosa.

  'You live in Stratford?' She nodded. 'Do you know Mr Draycott, Miss? I understand he discovered the fire.'

  'I know him, but I haven't seen him today. Perhaps Mrs Crowhurst knows. She's in the lecture room.'

  'What do you think will happen now? About the 1926 Festival.'

  'I'm sure everyone will want it to continue. They must!'