by (epub)
And the telegram says: “Am desperate please telegraph immediately. Viva.”
Take these words, cut them out with sharp little scissors, cut the words to letters, jumble them about, one two—three—voilà! Here you are. Now paste them on to a telegram form and you have an entirely different message. It reads like this: “Can’t come will explain later. Julian.”
And this telegram flutters on to the floor and up and down Viva walks in her little room of her boarding-house in Brighton, furious. And the two chorus girls, one darning a pair of stockings, the other smoking a cigarette, glance at each other, whisper something and disappear. Viva Naldi, the star, seems to be very nervous and excited indeed, so it’s no good sitting about until she hisses an insult at you. So they leave and walk down the corridor and they meet Coco, who is taking his little Wizard out for an airing.
“Good-night,” says the first chorus-girl. “This looks like a thunderstorm. Did you see what it said on the telegram?”
“How could I?” says the other girl. “You saw how she threw it on the floor.”
“Lovely morning,” says Coco in his high-pitched voice. “I’m taking Wizard on the beach,” he says.
“And take a plunge, Coco, it will do you good.”
And the other one: “But don’t you get drowned like your sister Milly.”
And Coco, bursting into hysterical laughter: “Yes, Milly, my sister, got drowned, and I remember it!”
“What’s up?”says Kraut, who comes out of his room, shoving his belly into his trousers in chivalrous, hearty fashion. “How is the star?” he says in a low, respectful voice. “How is Miss Naldi?”
“Not so good,” says one of the girls.
“Then I’d better get dressed,” says Kraut, quite seriously and very much concerned about Miss Naldi’s interests. “I will probably have to go to the post-office soon.”
“She is packing,” shouts one of the girls. “She is going herself. No more little errands for you, Mr. Kraut.”
“I think that rather worries me,” says Kraut, very much distressed. And then: “I shall have to see about that.”
He snatches his coat from his room, blows out his cheeks and puffs up his chest, and like a toreador entering the ring he approaches the door of Viva’s room.
A strong knock. One—quite loud and determined. Two—three—more romantically subdued. That is, in gallant style again.
Shark appears on the landing, shouting loudly and heartily—the weather has changed, and the sun is shining brightly again: “Kraut! Are you ready for a quick one? It’s twelve o’clock!”
But as there is no sound from Kraut, he advances towards his room, knocks, opens the door, and he doesn’t have to look under the bed to see that Kraut is just not in his room, so he leaves the room with a quick glance towards Number Eight, smiles, and tiptoes down the hall.
Now he knows something. More than the rest of the troupe . . .
“Time will tell,” says Kraut, kneeling on the floor before one of the wooden boxes where they keep the costumes while on tour. “He doesn’t want to hurt you.” And he hands another costume to Miss Naldi, who puts it on a hanger. “He has to come to his senses. He is young. His feelings for his mother have just run away with him.” And he hands two slippers softly to Viva, and continues: “You just give him a lesson—he has no business to run away like this. You know”—and handing her two satin slips—“these boys have no sense of duty. I was brought up with it. ‘Duty first, beauty last,’ my grandfather back in Berlin always used to say. Especially when he knows your number is really spoiled without him.” And, interrupting his awkward tirade, pointing at a pair of silk drawers: “Quite expensive, aren’t they? If I love somebody—I mean, a woman—I go through fire and water without blinking. I do anything.”
Closing the empty box he shoves it towards the door and Viva says: “Thank you, Mr. Kraut.”
“Oh,” says Kraut, “you mustn’t thank me. That’s what I’m here for.”
Viva says, smilingly: “You’re very kind, Mr. Kraut.”
“Thank you,” says Kraut heartily, and encouraged, he settles down on top of the box.
“I shall dress now,” says Viva.
“Then I’d better go,” says Kraut smilingly, but doesn’t move an inch. He probably has some more on his hairy chest he wants to disgorge gradually, but there is a dead pause, as he has to put his grey matter not only in order but set it going. “A brisk walk in the fresh air would do you the world of good, Miss Naldi. No talk, just walking along at a moderate speed, breathing freely to get the lungs clear.”
The last word is the cue for a rather hideous boisterous trombone-like sound from his huge larynx. And not waiting for an answer he says, quite determinedly: “I shall wait downstairs. You, I trust, won’t be long.”
Kraut is gone. Viva takes off her dressing-gown and starts getting ready. Then she puts one foot on the chair, pulling up her stocking. She starts whistling a song. Kraut probably amused her, and, whatever you might say, he is a nice man. Sound and practical and good average. But she can’t find the other garter and so she turns over the cushion on the chair, and she looks on the floor, and she looks under the bed. Hell, it’s got shoved right underneath. So she has to go down on her knees and she succeeds in getting that damned garter, and there is the crumpled-up telegram, too. And she rises, slips the garter over her leg, still holding the telegram. Slowly she unfolds it and looks at it, and sits down on the empty wooden box. She still looks at the telegram, then raises her head and looks straight ahead, and she doesn’t see the wall, or the calendar of last year, or the two ugly holes where pictures were once fixed. Nothing, nothing. And suddenly one big tear creeps out of her eye, slowly pearling down her cheek. The tear of a child who is very disappointed because she doesn’t understand the ways of life, the ways of the gods. And a faint, very beautiful melody seems to come out of nowhere into this cheap boarding-house. Up the stairs, through the deserted corridor, through the door, and finally into this room. But it doesn’t stay. . . .
It is Julian playing.
The keyboard. White patches of keys sprinkled with black ones here and there. Only an ordinary keyboard such as you find on an ordinary baby-grand. But how those rows of black and white ivory are made sound under his slender hands! Down they go, on the white: and in between, here and there, a deep black one. Strange that hands can create these unearthly sounds. Ivory and wire: that’s all. Not to forget the wind, the air, which is always around us.
And those three people are listening. One is standing next to the window facing Charing Cross Road; another sitting on the couch, and a third, who looks like a chartered accountant, at a desk. And he stops playing with his pencil and listens; and the one on the couch beats time with his shoe; and the third one doesn’t seem to see Charing Cross Road, people, traffic, or any of the paraphernalia of life in a city.
They’re absolutely carried away by Julian Spencer’s ‘Dream of London Symphony.’ And it is quite an elaborate thing, this symphony of his, not really written for the piano. If one closed one’s eyes one could see the harbour: swinging cranes, tug-boats, steaming, whistling up, flags swaying in the wind. Flags of different nations. And strange quaint streets down in the city. A city at midnight. And farther up life in the West End. Cocktails, foaming champagne, and a beggar selling matches on a street-corner in the Strand. And men and women, buses, and Undergrounds, and blinking electric signs in Trafalgar Square. And suddenly—quiet. St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields, and the fountains sizzle up into the night sky. Millions of drops: atmospheric glissandos. Just look at those hands! And the whole piano seems to lose its elegant and so conventional shape, and bursts, falls open, and just sound, nothing but rhythm and sound springs out triumphantly, victory over wire, ivory, mechanics, humanity. . . .
“That was very beautiful,” says Mr. Bosworth, Renaldo Bosworth, who used to be a musician himself before he entered business as a concert-manager in the well-known firm of the same name.
> “It doesn’t sound much on the piano,” says Julian apologetically.
“Oh, it’s beautiful,” says Bosworth. “At least, I think so. What do you think, gentlemen?”
The man with the look of an accountant doesn’t want to commit himself, so he says quietly: “Temple Bar 1245” into the telephone.
And the other one: “It just cries for a performance!”
And the one at the telephone: “Hallo, Lizzie, it’s me. I shall be late for lunch. Good-bye.”
“I think,” says Mr. Bosworth, “I shall ask you to play this again. We could send your Symphony as it is to Beecham, or Adrian Boult, but I have another idea.” And turning to the gentleman at the desk: “What do you think, Catfish?”
The man at the desk lifts up his head, and with his long pointed nose he suddenly looks like Pinocchio. Very unreal. And his eyes slowly close like a Venetian blind; and then up again and down and up again: “Do you mean Sir Desmond Castle, Bosworth?”
Bosworth nods his head. “Right.” And turning to Julian: “You probably heard of him, Mr. Spencer?”
“I’m afraid I haven’t.”
“Now,” continues Bosworth, “Sir Desmond is one of those charming amateurs who have tons of money and who like not only to patronise young unknown talent, but what’s more”—at this moment Mr. Catfish goes into an absurd laughing giggle—“anyway, he likes to conduct their works. You’ll find him a most understanding and helpful man. Of course, if you two don’t get on together I can always—can’t you stop giggling, Catfish?” Bosworth is very much annoyed. “I really don’t understand——”
Julian, at this moment, lifts himself out of the chair. He says, frightened: “Is his name Catfish? I mean to say—excuse me—is this Mr. Catfish?”
“Oh,” says Bosworth heartily, “you haven’t met? May I introduce Mr. Catfish? This is Mr. Spencer.”
But Catfish doesn’t reach out for Julian’s extended hand; he looks with great interest at a sheet of paper in front of him and all he says is: “I have known Mr. Spencer for a long time. I know the whole story.”
So Julian is terribly frightened. But Bosworth says: “Have a cigarette? Must have been a terrific strain, playing the whole Symphony in one stretch.”
“Quite,” says Julian, “thank you, Mr. Bosworth. I have a match.”
And suddenly Catfish’s voice: “You haven’t any, Mr. Spencer. Not one.” And he hands him a lighter. “Here.”
“Thank you.”
The office boy appears at the door: “Sir Desmond Castle to see you, sir.”
“Good,” says Bosworth, “show him right in.” And turning to Julian: “That’s marvellous! Talk of the devil! How are you, Sir Desmond?”
Now, let’s get this right. Sir Desmond Castle has just entered the room, and he is quite a strange man to look at. He has side-whiskers, and a little goatee; a little bit of France, 1880, Flaubert and that lot. He wears smoked glasses, and he doesn’t take off his hat, which is a curious mixture of a bowler and a top-hat—rather Eighteenth Century. A very high wing-collar and no tie, but an expensive-looking fur coat with a bunch of violets in his buttonhole. Firmly holding a rather big and bulky umbrella. He stands with his short legs wide apart in the middle of the room, hands on the umbrella, a little bit like his own monument, and like a Field Marshal looking at his troops, he nods silently, slowly, to each in turn.
But they all seem to know Sir Desmond’s ways, so they all smile.
“Sir Desmond,” says Mr. Bosworth. “We’ve just had the great pleasure of hearing one of the best modern Symphonies.” And, turning to Spencer: “It is really more of a Rhapsody. He calls it ‘Dream of London.’ Absolutely magnificent. And we’ve just decided that Mr. Spencer should meet you at once. Something splendid for your Saturday evening recitals.”
Sir Desmond doesn’t move. He has been looking and still looks, at Spencer all the time through his smoked glasses, and slowly, with the movements of a robot, he reaches into the inner pocket of his fur coat, pulls out a little card, and in a monotonous, staccato voice, he says: “To-night. Eight-thirty. Be two minutes late. Full dress. Black tie. Don’t sneeze. It’s only the wind. You have a song. Bring all your songs. Play now. Your song ‘It’s all for You.’ ”
Bosworth nonchalantly turns to Julian: “You brought some songs, didn’t you? You might play one for Sir Desmond.”
And absolutely dazed, Julian walks over to the piano and sits down. He looks at Sir Desmond, who hasn’t moved an inch, and he can’t see his face, as he is standing with his back to him. And very nervously he starts playing.
Quite suddenly a shrill, unearthly sound. High-pitched, unreal, and intense—Sir Desmond has sneezed.
But he doesn’t blow his nose. Only says, in his monotonous voice: “Close the window! Open the window! The wind.”
So the man with the look of an accountant who called himself a minute ago by the utterly absurd name of Catfish, opens the window wide. And it’s quite hard for Julian to go on playing, as the sound of a barrel-organ that has just parked itself in front of this very house in Charing Cross Road drowns every note of his song. And there is suddenly that voice again—the voice of this strange little girl who danced in front of the barrel organ. Click-a-clack, click-a-clack!
“Take a candle
Take a candle
And light it if you can,
The wind of death is blowing hard . . .”
Julian looks up. He sees Sir Desmond Castle, with his huge umbrella, standing between the piano and the open window, ponderously conducting with his umbrella both barrel-organ and Julian.
A ponderous, solemn movement of his arms. And like a clock he says: “One—two—one—two.”
“A candle is a tiny thing;
It gives so little light.”
“One—two—one—two.”
“Burn it here, and burn it there,”
“Three—four and six—seven—eight.”
“You must burn it everywhere,
It gives so little light. . . .”
“Fifteen—twenty—twenty—three.”
“The wind of death is blowing hard,”
“One—one—one—one.”
“You don’t know what to do,
Light your candle here and there,”
“A—B—C—D.”
“The wind won’t blow it out.
A flame is better than a light,”
“Yes—yes—yes—yes.”
“A flame will always burn.”
“Gluck,” says Sir Desmond, quieting his orchestra to the final stop. And the window, with a terrific crash, slams to. And his face. And his raised forefinger on the tip of his nose: “The wind!”
The wind. Wind. Wind chasing down the dark streets. Scraps of paper; rubbish; empty tins; stuff torn out of open-mouthed dustbins. It really is a gale, and an umbrella tries a hectic marriage with the wind. Off it flies! The man runs after, and his hat flies away, and a stout man laughs loudly, but you can’t hear in this awful wind. And off goes his hat, too! Hell! It would be so funny, if it weren’t a gruesome picture. And windows are slammed to pieces—bang! It’s good to be home on a night like this.
Julian is dressing. He is sitting on the edge of his bed in a boiled shirt, and trousers.
Why don’t you get dressed, Julian? All you have to do is slip on your coat, get up, tie your tie, take your heavy overcoat as it is cold, with an awful cold wind blowing. It is quite late. Now don’t sit on the edge of your bed and meditate. After all, there is a chance for you to-night. Just think of Sir Desmond Castle. You might get a splendid dinner, too. Don’t bury your face in your hands. Get up! You might get some wine, too. It’ll warm you up, because it’s cold—an East wind—the wind.
Julian gets up suddenly with a deep sigh, and there are two ties, a black one, a white one, hanging over the chair. And he takes the white one and puts it down again as if it burnt him. And with a tortured expression he takes the black one. It’s like signing a life-term contract with Satan,
Esquire, himself. He stands before the mirror with a lit cigarette in his hand, and the black tie dangles around his collar and he simply can’t find the strength to tie it.
And it’s so easy, Julian, and you’ve done it so many times. Don’t you remember? Every evening before you left for the Melody Theatre, Hammersmith?
He looks at himself in the mirror: face, hand, cigarette, the bare wing collar, and the brass stud in the middle. And he comes closer with his face to the mirror, and he opens his eyes wide, and his left hand slides over his face, and with his forefinger he tips his face in the mirror and slowly, faintly, he speaks to this mirage of his: “That’s you, Julian.” And pointing at himself: “And this is me. We both stand here, and we look at each other—we have known each other for many years, we had the same mother and we both—don’t you ever forget—we have the same brother. Back here, in our heads, behind this thin bony wall. Don’t you ever forget it’s your brother, too! Upstairs he lives, and waits for you, just as he waits for me. You can’t escape. I shan’t escape. I shall stay and fight, fight to the last moment. Blood will run, blood in streams, all over the world! But still we live, crippled, crippled to death! You mustn’t leave me, you, my brother, my mind, swear!”
And the mirage in the picture says faintly: “I swear! Amen.”
Julian turns away. So much horror was never seen in any human eyes. A voice came from the mirror—just think of it!
And Julian slowly looks back and his hand reaches up to his forehead and he ties his tie and—there! Suddenly: a noise from upstairs!
Because Julian looks up to the ceiling and his arms fall down in despair; and as if under hypnotic power—or better, like a somnambulist—he walks through the door, through the living-room, with sagging shoulders. Upstairs. And with two weak fingers he turns the key in the Yale lock, and the door falls wide open.
“What do you want?” And after a pause: “You had your food. Why don’t you sleep?”
And a voice from a very dark corner: “I am so frightened, Julian. It’s all so cold and dark up here. Why don’t you take me down?”
