The Little Shadows

by Marina Endicott

  ‘And do these girls have a name?’ The portly man who had been mending chairs pressed himself upright and came inching through the seats towards the stage. The scrubwoman had set her bucket down to listen. She pushed it out of his way but made no move to get up herself. So this must be Mr. and Mrs. Cleveland.

  ‘Oh certainly, sir, they are the Three Graceful Avery Girls.’

  ‘Avery’s Ivories?’

  Mama laughed obediently. ‘Perhaps! Or we thought of using my name, you know. The Dora Belles? Their father’s relations might not like to think of us having to earn our bread. But that’s the way of the world, for dear Arthur had no kind of head for business and all we had was books and our lovely piano. Which the girls put to good use—’

  Clover put quiet fingers on Mama’s elbow; Mama ended on a false-trilling laugh.

  ‘Repertoire?’

  ‘Very sweet and tender lyrics and melodies—we’ve no aspiration to be confused with Tanguay, or that kind of display or licentious behaviour …’

  Mr. Cleveland was not a conversationalist and Mama was irking him, Aurora could see that. ‘We do Daddy Wouldn’t Buy Me A Bow-Wow,’ she put in, feeling the hypocrisy in the cold air on her white-tighted legs—and then regretted it. In Prince Albert, Mrs. Sadler had refused to let her daughters sing that song because Mr. Sadler had laughed his barking head off at some saucy meaning. But Cleveland waved his hand and Mama began the intro vamp.

  Bella took the story part, lisping with all her might, while the others danced and pranced in on the horrible chorus.

  ‘Daddy wouldn’t buy me a bow-wow! bow wow!

  I’ve got a little cat,

  And I’m very fond of that!’

  (At this line, the girls grimaced in kittenish suggestion.)

  ‘But I’d rather have a bow-wow, wow, wow, wow.’

  ‘See what you can do with this little ditty.’ Mr. Cleveland handed a sheet of music across the shell-backed footlights. Clover, used to being helpful, bent down to take the music, but he snatched it back. ‘The older gal, the blonde.’

  Already bending, Clover was confused and nearly fell, but Bella was beside her with a small strong hand, and Aurora came forward to take the music. Clover and Bella retreated to the piano. A man had appeared there, the one called Mendel. He slid his sheet onto the piano’s music rest and himself onto the bench beside Mama, who twitched her skirts and then herself away just in time. She and the younger girls stood in a clumsy group too close to the piano, till Clover backed them away.

  ‘We heard little Willie cry in his sleep:

  I’ll give it to Mary!

  Mary’ll give it to John,

  And John will give it to the cook,

  She’ll pass it right along.

  The cook will give it to Father,

  Pa’ll give it to Ma, you bet …’

  Singing along as pert as was suitable to the jaunty tune, Aurora’s brain caught up with the lyrics—how could Cleveland be known as a prude and offer her such a song to sing? Hardly even double entendre, it was pretty well single entendre: whatever the traffic would bear, she thought. Or, glancing down, whatever Mrs. Cleveland didn’t squash.

  She looked away from that tight-latched, crosspatch woman quickly, not wanting to spoil the buoyant mood of the piece—and there in the wings was the tail-coated young man from downstairs, smiling while he danced along to the tune, showing her how to do the step: a simple soft-shoe shuffle turned into a jumpy waltz. He waltzed alone over there, so she waltzed alone onstage, turning from one partner to another.

  Once she’d got it, he saluted, hopped over the railing and left, walking straight out of the theatre so she could see him go, his nice straight back and springing step keeping time with her dancing. Infectious, like the song.

  ‘And Ma’ll give it to the ice-man,

  That’s the feller I want to get.’

  A lighthearted finish and a flowery bow, and Mendel stretched out his arm with another sheet for Aurora to take, motioning the other girls to take sheets too.

  He struck into the intro instantly, not waiting for Cleveland’s say-so, and they were off. Grateful that it was familiar, Aurora could abandon the sheet and add a soaring embellishment, knowing the other two would hold the line. Mendel smiled at her; his face was altered by it, made bright and kind.

  ‘My true love hath my heart, And I, and I have his,

  By just exchange, the one to the other given

  He loves my heart, for once it was his own,

  I cherish his because in me, in me it bides.’

  Clover loved singing this, one of Papa’s favourites, and loved singing the bottom line while Bella and Aurora ran up above her. She loved being the true heart. Her heart was full of loving them both, and Mama; she had expected to be frightened but found herself lifted on the music to a serene pleasure in beauty and order.

  But Mr. Cleveland hummed when they were done, and hawed his loveless tombstone face towards Mrs. Cleveland for confirmation, and Mendel, sober-eyed, took the sheets of music back and made a little bow to each of them.

  Very Fond of That

  ‘Nothing to offer us this week,’ Mama said bravely to Sybil, whose upturned face was waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs. ‘But will keep us in mind and perhaps when he’s on the circuit—and every possibility in Medicine Hat next February. As if we can last until—’

  Sandwiched between Mama and Aurora, Bella could not escape back upstairs, so she slid away from them and leaned against the tunnel door as Julius K. went up the stairs, taking them one at a time, putting a first and then a second foot on each step, waiting, then lifting to make the next six-inch ascent. He must be very sick, she thought, to go so slow up stairs. There was a scratching sound behind her, and then the door buffeted her gently. She turned and pulled it open, and there was the flat-faced boy, Nando, come through the tunnel.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ she asked, in a sudden fright for him, now that their own worry was over and they’d failed.

  ‘Not at all! Or only when—Not more than a tad. The funny thing about our act is that Dad gets by far the worst of it, although it looks like he’s wiping the floor with me.’

  Bella laughed at that.

  ‘It’s all how you land limp, and break the fall with a foot or a hand. I’ve got the knack, because they started me so young—I been doing this twelve years, you know, and I’m not fifteen yet.’

  She put out a hand and patted his arm because his face again looked so tired and flat.

  ‘You got to land like a cat. Nobody can do that better than me.’

  ‘I’ve got a little cat, and I’m very fond of that,’ she sang.

  He laughed and darted his head forward and kissed her mouth.

  A Gallows Kind of Shout

  Stuck at the top of the basement steps, Clover waited while Julius Foster Konigsburg climbed up painfully, stopping from time to time to crack a deep, throat-adjusting cough.

  As he climbed she went to the props man’s area to fetch him a paper cup of water from the jug kept there. When he reached the landing, Julius took the cup and drained it down before attempting the flight of steps up to the stage.

  ‘Just a snatch of water, thank you—a paper cup—like drinking from a letter.’ He coughed hugely again. ‘Well, I’m off. All new material, naturally, stolen from the greatest modern masters. If I use anything of yours, dear miss, I will pay you five cents.’

  He surged out onto the stage, into the pool of lights left over from when the girls had been turned down, and made a tremendous bow.

  ‘Forgive me, dear sir, for my tardiness. I was performing my toilette—had squeezed out too much Toothpaste, and had the devil of a time getting it back into the Tube.’

  He waited a beat for an imaginary laugh, striking a very professional pose, Clover considered. But she could see that he was not going over big with the manager. Mr. Cleveland slumped in his newly mended chair, one hand shading his eyes with a folded newspaper. Since the footlights did n
ot shine outwards, there was nothing much to shade his eyes from, except Julius Foster Konigsburg.

  ‘I have been Cognito in Vaudeville these many years, raconteuring to beat the band—to bedazzle the crowned fatheads of Europe—’ Julius Foster Konigsburg’s beautiful voice swam out, lush and confiding, from his ragged bearish torso, and Clover wanted to be kind to him, as Sybil was. ‘It’s close upon time that I retired from Treading the Boards myself and became a Writer of The Melo-Drama … I thought to pen a little thing about a Vampire, after the most blood-curdling tale of the last paralyzed century, but it’s hard to be a Count, living on a long slim pedigree and what the neighbours bring in. That was a vein attempt at humour. In a Democracy, you know, your Vote counts—in Feudalism your Count votes.’

  Clover could tell these were little throwaway jokes, as if Julius were making fun of the whole idea of jokes. But it was not funny and Clover began to worry that he was in trouble.

  ‘A Count walks into a bar … No, no,’ he corrected, and seemed to take himself in hand. ‘Let’s begin: I will play all the characters, on account of the current Hard Times.’

  This will be a thrill, she thought. Julius was a famous Protean, a quick-change artist—except he didn’t use costumes, he just transformed himself with a hat or a length of cloth.

  ‘Our scene is laid in Winnipeg—I forget the hen’s name. A beautiful spot in Winnipeg, with not one mosquito—but this is all imaginary, of course.’

  Julius seemed to be back on his feet. Clover could see only the back of his head, so she crept forward to stand beside the curtain-ropes. Others had come to watch, crowding backstage.

  ‘The Villain enters, hiding behind his moustache. Ha-ha!’ He pulled his sleeve into a wicked cloak. ‘Then retreats, mincing horribly, behind some scenery—then the Hero-een enters’—and he became a mysteriously lovely heroine—‘wondering where Felix, her Lover, might be. She sings for him, a low flutter that gradually soars upward as fast as the price of coal. Felix is so handsome it hurts him. He enters yodelling, but has the presence of mind to put it back in his pocket.’

  He was standing still and yet it seemed to Clover that he peopled the stage, flashing as he spoke from face to face, person to person, and though they were so ridiculous, they were real, for an instant—and she wanted to see that play. How difficult it must be to do this all alone, with no audience helping you. Their own turn was much easier. All they had to do was what they did at home: sing the right notes, dance on the right feet, watch each other, be sweet.

  ‘You will see her return, pursued by the villain, who is pressing his wiles upon her, and much else—she holds him back: Would you die for me? But remember! Mine is an undying love. Ah, she was only a whiskey-maker, but he loved her still—’

  Mr. Cleveland shouted, ‘Move it along! Puns are scarcely accounted as humour in this house, sir.’ He had a gallows kind of shout, rude and unkind. Clover hated him.

  ‘But wait, there’s more: the soubrette has a lantern jaw and can only sing light music.’ Julius was going faster and faster—frightened, Clover thought. Too far out on some limb of memory barely attached to his original tale, he was busily sawing away at it regardless of sense or consequence, unable to clamber back to any kind of safety. ‘She pulls out the last joint of her upper register—her mouth is a stab in the dark. She is accompanied in her flight by a running mate with straggling foliage round the front stoop …’

  He blinked his boiled-onion eyes and stopped. There was a dense, active silence backstage, and no sound at all from the seats down front.

  Julius K. said conversationally, looking up to the unpeopled balcony, ‘If someone will bring me the river, I’ll drown myself.’

  ‘That’s quite enough of that!’ said Mrs. Cleveland, her tight voice a surprise from the darkness.

  Julius K. remained still. Then his face gleamed as he changed direction: from a wide imaginary audience he brought his eyes to bear on Mrs. Cleveland, and shouted with great good humour, ‘Let’s have a good time, let’s make it a party—all the men lean over and kiss the ladies in front … and the men in the front row can kiss the ladies behind.’

  In the wings, behind Clover, Sybil’s breath hissed. ‘That’s torn it,’ she said. ‘Now he won’t get the gig. It’s sheer pig-headedness, he’s done it a-purpose.’

  Mama put her arm around Sybil’s plump shoulders and said, ‘No, no!’

  But they all knew it was true. Some managements might think the pun amusing but certainly not this one. Clover had read the sign. So had Julius Foster.

  Sybil turned away from the stage. ‘You let him know I’m down here packing, will you?’

  ‘I will,’ Mama said.

  ‘With any luck we’ll run into you farther down the line, Flor. Old times, old times.’

  Clover could see she was crying a little, but Sybil ducked down the flight of stairs so they wouldn’t have to watch.

  Talked Me into It

  They’d tidied themselves up and brushed their skirts and coats, and had no reason to linger, so Mama said, ‘Well, girlies, back to the hotel, and perhaps the purse can stretch to a cup of tea to warm us up.’

  Aurora drew her sisters into line and followed. As they filed up the aisle, Mr. Cleveland turned from where he was talking to a stagehand and said, ‘Madam …’

  Mama stopped, her back tense. Aurora watched her soften her face to polite inquiry before she turned.

  Cleveland did not step towards them, nor raise his voice, but said, ‘My orchestra leader likes your girls. He’s talked me into it.’

  Aurora found that her heart was pounding. She could feel a tremor in her hands and thighs, but she bit down on her cheek to stop it, and to stop herself from speaking.

  ‘Well, I’m sure!’ Mama did not specify exactly what she was sure of.

  Mendel smiled at them from the stage, his mild squirrel’s face seeming to know them well. Cleveland said, ‘I’ve lost my opener. I’ll take your girls to do it in one, right off the top. Start tomorrow. Dispense with the baby frills, let them sing in shirtwaists and skirts. More hightone, if you get me. And stick with the heartfelt ballads for now.’

  He held out a booking sheet. ‘We’re here till Tuesday, then packed up and a one-night stand in High River and then we’re out to Crowsnest for three—’

  Mama found her voice again: ‘And the girls can perform on Sunday, Sunday acts not in costume being permissible. They have the dearest little dove-grey challis walking suits, almost nun-like if you take my—oh, you won’t regret this! When they performed in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, at the Sunshine Sunday Concerts at the Prince Albert Hotel, the boards were an inch deep in nickels and dimes and quarters. Not a penny to be found among them!’

  Aurora could not bear that Mama had mentioned the Sunshine Sundays, as if it were a real gig instead of an amateur charity concert.

  Mrs. Cleveland had been crouched, winkling at something stuck on a chair-seat, but now she stood. ‘Well, they’ll need a better name.’

  Mama pinched Aurora fiercely, for something to hold onto. ‘Aurora, Amelia, Arabella, my three lovely girls. The Adora Belles.’

  ‘There’s a set of them already at a box-house in Montana—you don’t want a mix-up with them, skirtless hussies,’ Mrs. Cleveland said. ‘Aurora Dawn, how about?’ Asking her husband, rather than Mama.

  Mendel swung round on the piano bench and said, ‘The Belle Auroras. Got the French tone and the dawn thing, got a ring.’

  Mr. Cleveland shut his eyes and seemed to think. Then he nodded his stiff head once and made to turn away, but Mama had not finished.

  ‘And we would not be prepared to commit for less than $200 a week.’

  He turned back, eyes darting into sharp focus.

  ‘$150. Offer is final.’

  ‘Well.’

  Mrs. Cleveland piped up. ‘And we play a split week, so half of that, Cleveland.’

  He looked irritated, but nodded his head at Mama. Stuck in a cleft stick with that wife, Auro
ra thought.

  ‘Done, then,’ Mama said. ‘$75 for this week. ’And out went her hand to shake on it. ‘I’—she bowed—‘come gratis, as their accompanist.’

  She was good with exit lines and stepped smartly, spinning the girls before her, up the aisle and out.

  ‘First show 2 p.m., band call at noon, keep strict to time,’ Mendel called after them.

  Gold Silk

  Clover tucked one mouse-coloured glove into the other, a bit sad that she was left out of their new name. But as she was feeling sorry for herself she spied Julius Foster Konigsburg limping down the street in front of them, heading for the hotel—and then where?

  Back in their crowded room at the hotel, bread and milk for supper, they were subdued. Julius K. and Sybil’s room was close down the hall. There could be no congratulating themselves when all this had only come about by the miserable loss of the work for Julius. Mama pulled out the sealer jar of brown sugar and sprinkled a dusting on each bowl. ‘We won’t despair, my chicks, they’ll get back on their feet,’ she said. Clover watched the silver apostle spoon clink in the glass jar, flutter in the air above the bowls.

  But although truly distressed for her old friend, Mama could not be sad for long. ‘And of all the lucky breaks, when you think of it! We’re on our way! A hundred and fifty!’

  ‘Seventy-five,’ Aurora said softly.

  ‘You’ll get a thousand a week, a thousand a week yet. Oh, I can see your names in lights, pricked out in silver on the bill of the Pantages, or Keith’s—true talent will rise to the top, you’ll see. If only we had a bit of cream this would be so nice.’

  Each with her own bowl. When they were travelling, Clover would sometimes think of their supper bowls during the day, the little dishes nestled safely in Mama’s humpbacked trunk. Bella’s was pearly-white with a clump of bright flowers in the bottom, revealed as she ate her porridge or bread and milk. Clover had the Irish bowl with clovers on it, thin and delicate, Papa’s mother’s bowl—she’d been called Clover too, when she was a girl. Aurora’s was lustreware, golden as her hair. The shine had tarnished on one side and Aurora always ate with the shine out, the tarnish turned towards her so no one would see, even though it was only them in the room. And Mama ate from the pot, crying again, as she often cried over her supper since Papa and Harry died.