The Muse of Fire

by Carol M. Cram

  A wild-haired figure rushed from a side street toward Ned. He recognized Daisy. She was dressed only in her shift, her stays flapping. Daisy stopped and dropped to her knees in front of a body.

  Her wail tore open the dawn.

  Chapter 12

  Things without remedy

  Should be without regard: what’s done is done.

  Macbeth (3.2.11–12)

  “The place was reduced to ash in just three hours,” said Mr. Madison, a wide man with a cherry-cheeked face, who presided over his company with all the complacency of an emir.

  Grace was seated to Mr. Madison’s right, across the table from her aunt and several places above Percival. She had spent the day in a restless agony of uncertainty—the stink of smoke a pall over the city. She would have rushed to the theater to see the damage for herself but was forestalled by the arrival of Percival. Her aunt had insisted that Grace accompany them to dine with the Madisons, and Grace had no choice but to comply.

  “I heard that a poor girl who made her bed under the portico was roused by the smell of smoke and knocked up the box office keeper,” said one of the women at the table, her eyes shining.

  “Scandalous the way these vagrants sleep wherever they please. London’s not fit for respectable people,” Mr. Madison said.

  The rest of the company nodded and murmured.

  “Quite.”

  “Terrible business.”

  “Something should be done.”

  “Does anyone know how the fire started?” asked Mrs. Madison, a tiny woman with a large mouth, who rarely took her eyes off Percival.

  “Oh, dear me, yes,” said Mr. Madison.

  “Well?”

  “The fire chief believes that the wadding in a pistol that was used in the play caught fire.”

  “What play?”

  “Pizarro. By that ubiquitous Sheridan fellow.”

  Grace ground her hands into her lap. A pistol? Impossible. Ned would have seen it on the script table and stored it away safely.

  “Ah!” Several of the ladies and gentlemen nodded.

  An eager woman to Percival’s right leaned forward and assured everyone that the play was first rate. “I saw it at Drury Lane two years ago in ’06. Charming performance by Mrs. Siddons. Her Elvira was so pathetic. I got chills watching her.”

  “She never disappoints,” said a gentleman seated across from her. “I saw her last week in Macbeth.” He raised his eyes to the elaborately decorated ceiling. “A triumph, particularly considering her age.”

  “Dear me, quite so. She must be well past fifty, and yet she still has such a powerful presence,” said Mrs. Madison. “I dare say this fire will not sit well with her. She’s firmly entrenched in her brother’s company. I’ve heard that she’s gone completely away from Drury Lane, a circumstance which I’m sure must not suit Mr. Sheridan.”

  Laughter and nods of agreement rippled around the table. Grace wanted to scream. How could they be so easily distracted? So unmoved? The fire had just wiped out everything she cared about. She took advantage of a brief pause.

  “Does anyone know if people were hurt in the fire?” she asked.

  “You haven’t heard? Almost two dozen souls perished!” Mr. Madison delivered the news with what seemed to Grace unnecessary relish.

  “Most of the dead were firemen,” said Mrs. Madison. The three white feathers on her cap quivered like a panicked goose. “Shocking business! A dozen or so of the poor wretches were operating a water engine under the stone portico and were crushed when the roof fell in on them.”

  Several ladies sat forward, their cheeks flushed and lips parted in contemplation of such dreadfulness. Few things were more fascinating than a tragedy that did not affect them.

  “This may perhaps change your answer, my dear.” Percival’s voice, so close to her ear, startled her. She hadn’t noticed that the young man placed to her right had left the table and that Percival had slipped into his empty seat.

  “There is still the Theatre Royal at Drury Lane.”

  “Yes, but you have no connections at Drury Lane. They already have several excellent singers in their employ, and you can’t expect to be taken on ahead of the more seasoned actresses who will now be looking for work.” Percival moved even closer. “Perhaps it is a sign.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked through clenched teeth. The hostess gave the signal for the ladies to retire. People rose from their seats, the men bowing, the ladies gathering fans and proceeding through double doors into the drawing room.

  “You should accept my offer, Grace,” he said, his smile close lipped and confident.

  “Why now?”

  “You cannot stay with my mother forever.”

  “I can make my own way.”

  “Not easily.” Percival reached for her hand. “What could you do? A governess? I think not. Such a life would not suit you. I suggest you reconsider. I was sincere when I told you that I wish to make amends for your father.”

  “Ladies? Shall we retire?” Mrs. Madison bustled over.

  Grace pulled her hand away and followed the chattering flock of overdressed women into the drawing room.

  * * *

  The smoke still rising from the theater’s charred remains mingled with Grace’s tears. A few beggar children, their skins gray with ash and squalor, picked through the rubble, squealing with excitement when they found something worth selling—the tassel from a costume, a half-melted candleholder, a slab of metal. Everything disappeared into bags slung over thin shoulders. Grace let herself get distracted by their antics rather than dwell on what the devastation of the theater meant for her. Pulling her cloak around her to ward off the damp, she kept her gaze fixed on the children. They laughed and hallooed as they combed through the debris. Such easy pickings were rare in their miserable lives.

  “Grace?”

  Ned plodded toward her, his face fixed in a scowl, his eyes red rimmed. “What do you make of this?”

  “Oh, Ned! How can we bear it?”

  He shrugged. “We don’t got much choice.”

  “Did you help fight the fire?”

  “I did.” He continued staring straight ahead. His defeated look was almost worse than the destroyed theater.

  “I read in the Chronicle that a subscription is being solicited for people from the theater who have been put out of work by the fire,” she said. “I hope that’s true.”

  “A subscription, is it? That’ll be the day when the quality give money to support actors and actresses, never mind the rest of us backstage.”

  “Do you think people are so uncaring?”

  “I’ve not often seen different, Grace,” he said, his gaze moving to the children picking through the ruins. “Have you?”

  “We can’t let this disaster turn us into cynics, Ned.”

  “I can’t say as I know what that is, Grace, but if you mean people that’s only out for themselves, then I hope I ain’t one of them.” He nodded at the children. “If everyone’s a cynic, what chance have they got?”

  Grace put her hand on his arm and felt even through her glove the soot sliding across his wool jacket. He appeared ready to collapse.

  “I got to ask you something,” he said after a long pause. “Do you remember the pistol you took off Renfrew?”

  “I do.” Grace turned and stared at Ned, her eyes wide with horror. “You don’t think . . .?”

  “Dunno, but I’ve heard talk.”

  “I should have taken the pistol right to you.”

  “Don’t get yourself worked up about it,” Ned said. “They can’t prove nothin’, and besides, it’s Renfrew’s fault if it’s anyone’s. Mr. Kemble hasn’t said one thing or t’other about it. So long as he gets the insurance, he ain’t bothered.”

  “I won’t say anything, Ned.”

  “Thanks.”

  “What will happen now?”

  “I wish I knew. I guess I’ll try for work at one of the other theaters, or get somethin’ in the market. Ma
ybe Mr. Kemble and the other managers will decide to rebuild the theater.”

  “I’ve already heard talk of it.”

  “Mr. Kemble ain’t a man to let grass grow under his feet.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  Ned grinned, dull gray teeth almost white against his blackened face. “I learned early on that you can’t change what you can’t change.”

  “Wise words.”

  “Them’s words I can’t quarrel with, and maybe it’s better than being a cynic.” He leaned forward as if to embrace her and then appeared to think better of it. “I’d best get going, Grace,” he said, touching two fingers to his forehead.

  “Goodbye, Ned.” She stood very still and watched him tramp back to the steaming pile of rubble, scattering the children with a shout. They squealed and pretended to run, but Grace noticed that none of them ran far. She suspected that Ned was well known as someone who showed them kindness when most others in their lives kicked them to the gutter.

  A gust of wind swirled the ashes around her feet, the soft sound a counterpoint to her desolation. Ned had been the first person since her mother died who had been truly good to her, who did not blame her.

  * * *

  Ned watched Grace walk back into the Piazza. She’d been crying when she stood before the smoking ruins. His heart turned over for her. She might have a more comfortable home to go back to, but her future was probably even more uncertain than his.

  Alec hopped across a blackened beam to come and stand next to Ned. The top of his head grazed Ned’s shoulder. Apart from the filthy sling supporting a broken arm and the blood-streaked bandage circling his head, Alec was as ready as ever to take on the world and win. When Daisy had found him sprawled unconscious in the Piazza, she’d assumed the worst. It had fallen on Ned to carry Alec back to Mrs. Gellie’s establishment and hold him down while the surgeon set his arm.

  Ned gestured to the children creeping back into the debris. “I’ve told ’em three times to leave off their scrambling.”

  “Yer too soft on them,” Alec said. “They know you’re all bark and no bite.”

  “And you’d do better?”

  “’Course.” To prove his point, Alec picked up a charred piece of wood with his good hand and rushed forward. He bared his teeth and roared a string of expletives. One of the boys squealed in terror and backed up to his mates, urging them to run. Within seconds, the ruins were deserted. “They’ll stay away at least for today,” Alec said, dropping the wood. A whoosh of ash rose and subsided.

  “What’s going to happen to us?” Ned asked.

  Alec kicked at the ashes. “You want to be the one to ask him? He’s over there talking to the newspaperman.” Several yards away, Mr. Kemble stood with hands clasped behind his back, his distinctive hooked nose wrinkled against the reek of charred wood. In a world that had very little use for him, Ned had seen his share of men bowed with despair and anger, but never any with such a look in their eyes—the eyes of a man who had climbed to the top of the world before plummeting to its depths. Perhaps it was harder to accept defeat when you’d spent most of your life at the top.

  The newspaperman backed away, and Mr. Kemble swiveled his gaze to Ned and Alec.

  “Why are you not working?” he barked. “I don’t pay you to stand around.”

  Ned stepped forward, emboldened by Mr. Kemble’s mention of payment. Maybe he’d keep them on—to do what, Ned couldn’t imagine. But if there was any chance . . .

  “Please, Mr. Kemble, sir.”

  “Yes? What is it?” His penetrating eyes bored into Ned.

  “What’s to become of us, sir?”

  “Become of you? I am ruined! How can I know what will become of you?”

  “I heard there was a subscription, for the workers, like.”

  “Some such nonsense is in the papers, but I wouldn’t go putting much stock in it.” Mr. Kemble glanced down at Alec. “You were hurt?”

  “Yes, sir, but I’ll be right as rain in no time. I can do whatever needs doing. Me and Ned both.”

  “We will rebuild.”

  “Sir?”

  “My theater. I will rebuild it.” He waved one arm toward the ruins. “I’ll build the most magnificent new theater in London.”

  “How, sir?” Ned asked.

  “Let me make something clear to both of you,” Mr. Kemble said. “The question is not how. The question is why.”

  Alec laughed nervously, but Ned hushed him with a flick of his wrist. He met Mr. Kemble’s gaze. “You mean why build a new theater, sir?”

  “Exactly. And what do you say to the question?”

  “That you must rebuild, sir, because London cannot do without you.” A flash of resentment burned across his mind. Mr. Kemble would always have a place to live and clothes on his back. Both he and Mrs. Siddons were to go over to the King’s Theatre the following week. They’d not suffer from the destruction of the theater—not like Ned and Alec would.

  “You’re a good lad, Ned,” Mr. Kemble said. “I’ll see to it that you don’t lack for work.” He nodded at Alec, who was grinning like an idiot. “You too, Alec. Now, get back to cleaning up this unholy mess. We’ve got a great deal of work ahead of us.”

  He stalked off, his feet plowing trails through ashes that noiselessly collapsed in on themselves.

  Chapter 13

  . . . for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.

  Hamlet (2.2.157–58)

  Two weeks after Covent Garden’s Theatre Royal burned to the ground, Percival pulled a chair out for Grace at the small table set for three at his mother’s house. Grace was in no mood for his gallantry. She had been all set to spend a quiet evening alone in her room when Percival had arrived and announced he would dine with Grace and his mother.

  “I have procured tickets for the theater tomorrow evening,” he said as he took his own seat.

  “What theater?” Grace asked indifferently. Why should she care how Percival spent his leisure hours? The life she wanted for herself was as good as over.

  “The King’s Theatre at the Haymarket. I wish you to accompany me.”

  “I hardly think that would be proper.”

  “Dear me, Grace, you are a fine one to talk about what is proper.”

  “That is unkind,” Grace said.

  Augusta dismissed the footmen who had seated her, and once again took command of the conversation. “I heard you mention the Haymarket, Percival. Surely you are not intending to go to the performance tomorrow?”

  “Indeed, I am, and I am hoping that my fair cousin will come with me.”

  “I have no wish to go, Aunt.”

  “I’m surprised to hear that,” Percival said. “I thought you were a great admirer of Mrs. Siddons, although I suppose you have seen her several times by now.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Mrs. Siddons and Mr. Kemble are performing. Did you not read that the principals have moved to the King’s Theatre?”

  “You should not even suggest it,” Augusta said. “Grace’s career on the stage has thankfully been cut short. What is the point of upsetting her?”

  “The King’s Theatre only puts on operas,” Grace said.

  “As a rule, yes, but these are extraordinary circumstances.”

  “Are they acting Macbeth?”

  “Regrettably, no. I believe the play is Douglas with Mrs. Siddons as Lady Randolph, but I have heard the term transcendent excellence used to describe how she handles the role. Ridiculous overstatement, of course, but that is the theater for you.”

  Grace glanced over at her aunt, who was scowling her disapproval. Her heart leaped with excitement at the prospect of again seeing Mrs. Siddons, even if now Grace was in the audience and not backstage. With an effort, she kept her voice cool. “Thank you, Percival. I will accompany you.”

  “Capital! Mr. Kemble is to give an address before the play goes up.”

  * * *

  Ned headed for Picca
dilly, where he knew Olympia lived with her mother, the mistress of a retired general and a former actress herself. With the theater in ashes and the company out of work, he knew his chances of getting close to Olympia were even less now than they’d been, but he had to at least make sure she was well. The three-story building had quite recently been converted into sets—apartments that were home to many of London’s dandies and a fair number of retired military men.

  There was a time, when he was younger and job prospects were dim, that Ned thought about signing himself up for the army. He fancied carrying a gun and wearing a red coat. But after he got his first position at the theater as a scene changer, he realized he had it good compared to the poor buggers limping back to England with legs and arms shot off by Boney’s cannons.

  He entered the building. His inquiry about the whereabouts of a Miss Olympia Adams brought a disapproving look from the sour-faced footman and a grudging direction to a set of rooms on the second floor. Ned mounted the stairs with growing trepidation. Would Olympia thank him for coming? The building was very grand—nothing like the mean lodging house he shared with Alec. With each step up the marble staircase, Ned grew more uncertain. Olympia was used to living like this? His pay would never extend to such a place, especially now when he had no pay.

  He reached the door to the general’s rooms and stopped, thinking he should write a note instead. But that was the coward’s way out, and besides, he had no paper, and his penmanship was worse than bad. At the Foundling Hospital, training in basic reading and some number work was deemed sufficient for children with dismal prospects.

  The door opened before Ned got up the nerve to knock.

  Framed in the doorway was the reddest-faced man Ned had ever seen. He wore a tight jacket and shiny black boots pulled to his knees. Pale breeches puffed out over ample hips, and his stomach expanded under a grubby white waistcoat. A hint of grease slicked his chin.

  “Yes? Who the devil are you? Tradesmen go around the back. Didn’t they tell you?” The general was a good foot shorter than Ned, but he had an air of command that made Ned step back. He could well imagine this barrel-shaped little man standing atop a hill, surveying his troops from a safe distance—barking orders and sending men to their deaths before tea.