And with the passing of these first few weeks, of course, she was able to develop and particularize her first impressions of that highly individualistic troupe, referred to, in their own daily speech, as the Other Girls. She learnt soon to identify individual face-formations in a mass of (at first) almost indistinguishable confectionery. And it was not long before she was alive to specific character, even — of which there should have been a large diversity, nearly all ages from the ages of sixteen to thirty-five being represented in this chorus. But actually there was little diversity of character and habit, and the simplest method of differentiation, Jackie found, was either by the costliness or quantity of their finery, or by the costliness (and maybe quantity) of their Boys — and most particularly the latter. Boys, indeed, were axiomatic — the requisite complement of this community, which could actually not be conceived as existing without them. Chorus-girl presupposed Boy — as effect presupposes cause. Boys were therefore less their prey than their natural nourishment. The Boys…. My Boy…. Their Boys…. her Boy…. Our Boys…. Boys…. Boys…. Boys — they ran through their possessive feminine discourse unceasingly. And some of them had Nice Boys, and some of them had Horrid Boys, and some of them had Funny Boys, or Naughty Boys, while some of them even had Lovely Boys. But Jackie (who had positively no Boy) took some time to adjust herself to this calm outlook upon Boys — though she had plenty of opportunities, on leaving the rehearsal room at the lunch hour (when there were quantities of Boys in patient attendance), of observing by what measures one qualified as a Boy, and won the spurs of Adolescence. Which measures, it appeared, consisted principally in being anything over the age of forty, with all traces of a possibly once-existing boyhood permanently eradicated from one’s features and soul, and also by other measures — such as the sporting of long aluminum cars; the blending of blue suits, blue cheeks, and blue-striped shirts with the blue smoke of cigars; the adoption of a shrewd, sleek, and acquisitive expression; or the embellishment of one’s hands with signet rings — Boys being, in general, a bedecked, if quiet crew, and particularly ready with swift means of transport.
Not that there was not, on the other hand, a certain variety of admittedly (and even vaingloriously) Homely Boys, celebrated for common sense and integrity rather than parts, who (it was understood) were in the habit of taking no nonsense from the respective apples of their eyes and pearls beyond price, and gazed with glowing aversion upon the bedecked, whom they threatened to demolish, at any manifestation of indecency, with blows. These, in fact, maintained a heavy and nosy suspiciousness towards the Footlights, as objects favouring a libertine atmosphere, and clearly the little things would one day have to choose between these insecure gaieties and the nobler (if less effervescent) conditions imposed by his suburb.
And so week followed week (there were five and a half weeks of rehearsal altogether), and they came down on to the stage, and rehearsed there along with the stars. This constellation consisted (in order of merit) of Mr. Jack Laddon, whose business it was to be funny — Miss Beryl Joy, whose business also was to be funny — Mr. Lew Craik, whose business also was to be funny (but in a broader style and with a rather redder nose) — Miss Jean Lowe, whose business it was to be dainty and coy (and who was a great adept with ribbon-swung hats and crinolines) — Miss Lotty Brockwell, whose business it was to be vulgar — Mr. Dick Flower, whose business it was to be vulgarer — Miss Janet Lidell, whose forte was lingerie — and a few more comedian-feeders who, like the last three mentioned, appeared as maids, butlers, beauties, policemen, landladies, etc., in the countless little irrelevant sketches punctuating this costly pageant. Miss Marion Lealy, it will be observed, had thrown over her part, which had now fallen upon the shoulders of bewitching Miss Jean Lowe. Miss Lealy had done this for various reasons — among others a strong distaste conceived for and a subterranean quarrel directed against one Mr. Tom Crewe, who was also in the cast, and reflected her aversion. This young man, whose business it was to succumb in public to Miss Lowe, came from America and was a charmer of the first order. His simple, nonchalant, cigarette-smoking talent was occasionally defeated, if not distantly travestied, in this production, by the necessity of appearing as a Sheik, a Chinese Emperor, a Pharaoh or similar potentates of slightly imbecile demeanour; but he was a pleasant young man in private life, and very kind to Jackie when he had the chance.
The relations existing between this constellation and its chorus were roughly the relations between Above-stairs and Below-stairs — but as though in a very large establishment where there was much condescension on the part of the employers, and much familiarity on the part of the servants, and where the young gentlemen of the house were decided rakes as regards the maids.
It was not until the last week before opening that the floats went up on the stage, a sense of imminence prevailed, and Julius Cæsar, whose appearances and interferences had been growing daily more frequent and provocative, came down into the front and produced in earnest. It was then realized by all that they had let themselves in for this business, and that there was no backing out. Hitherto the possibility of the first night at Manchester, like the possibility of death to human nature, had been remote — but now there was a knocking at the gate. They awoke to find themselves committed; all fooling had to cease, and Julius Cæsar, glowing from the darkened stalls amid his patrons and right-hand men, was like some heavy-handed marshal (newly appointed in place of one recalled) who was to deal with the crisis. Chorus girls were best seen and not heard at these times — had best flit like pale obedient spirits around the mighty workings of authority. Ineffectual were their sneers, and insignificant their flauntings, and not until the show commenced might they resume their sway. And in the new state of affairs Jackie, of course, was the least significant of all, and escaped notice almost as much as she desired to do so.
Not that she escaped notice altogether. On the third day before opening, indeed, and in that most promising and Asiatic of numbers “Old Man Wong,” who, it may be noted, was herein celebrated as much for his Silly Old Song as for his almost incessant performances upon a Gong, in the district of Hong-Kong (where the next-door neighbours didn’t seem to mind, maintaining that such an enchanting, if infantile, old person could not possibly Go Wrong) — in this number Jackie came into direct contact with Julius Cæsar, and was picked out to sustain the arrows of his disapprobation by herself.
“What,” cried Julius Cæsar, from the darkness, “does that girl on the sixth from the right think she’s doing?”
There being no available answer to this conundrum, nor any answer expected, nor yet any means of ascertaining whether Julius Cæsar was referring (imperially) to his own right, or (sympathetically) to the right of the stage, there was no reply but a kind of obedient all-round wonderment along with him. What did the girl on the sixth from the right think she was doing? You couldn’t tell. But not what that girl on the sixth from the right ought to be thinking she was doing, they were quite sure….
An eager fluttering and murmuring of assistants ensued in the darkness — a murmuring in which the word “name” was to be sensed rather than distinguished — and then the voice of the stage-manager rang out.
“Miss Mortimer!” cried the stage-manager, half in reproach, half as identification.
There was a silence.
“Do you think we’ve come here for a funeral, Miss Mortimer?” asked Julius Cæsar.
Jackie looked blushingly on to the floor, as though she hadn’t been quite sure about it previously, but now saw her mistake.
There was then another silence. Julius Cæsar, who always got the best out of everything, delighted in silences of this sort.
“Because we haven’t, you know,” he added.
Clearly we had not.
“It’s not something congenital, is it? You are able to smile, aren’t you?”
Jackie acquiesced with a queer little smile at once.
There was then another very long and punitive silence, in which Julius Cæsar g
azed with enormous interest at her, as at a queerly behaved animal, and then, “Now then, please ——” he said, and led on to other matters.
And, moreover, in so far as there were positively no broken bottles, kettles of scalding water, consignments of vitriol, or the like, at that moment upon the stage, and in so far as Jackie could hardly have reached him, at that distance, even if there had been, the incautious gentleman continued his activities in security.
CHAPTER VI
HIGHMINDEDNESS
I
IT is half-past four o’clock on Sunday evening, and the train is on the last lap of its journey to Manchester — streaming blindly but resolutely through the falling and enveloping night.
It is the fifth hour of the journey, and the windows sweat a grey patchy dew, and reflect the compartment. This contains, in all, eight of her fellow-professionals. And none of these speak a word; but all are sprawling or lying back in varying attitudes of resentful lethargy — militant lethargy even, for they are Amazons even in repose and defeat, and they grudge every moment of this forced submissiveness. Indeed the Stygian light falling down on them from the sickly little bulb above, reveals lines of ill-temper and determination which, could they be seen and recalled, would cast an interesting aspect over the winning warm smiles and delectable kickings which will divert a northern city to-morrow night. But to-morrow night is now unspeakably remote….
Jackie has a corner seat, and opposite Jackie is Miss Stella Hawke, who is the eldest girl of the entire garden of girls. She is a girl of forty years, in fact, and she is a formidable girl. With her history, Jackie, along with others, is acquainted — that history being simple and consisting of the notorious fact that Miss Hawke is one who has been (in the existing phraseology) “sent back to the chorus.” Which means that Miss Hawke, at some period in the past, has sunned herself in the especial favour of the Sultan, and, having at last worn out her charms in that service, is now the object of a merciful and entirely matter-of-fact system of, as it were, half-pay. So long as her lost master lives she will remain in his choruses, though, with increasing age, she may not keep her hold in the No. 1 companies. She has, indeed, little to look forward to: but she is at present a lusty and unrepentant old pensioner, and has from the beginning struck a chill into the heart of Jackie, to whom she has never addressed a word, and to whom she will, as a point of pride, never address a word so long as they are thrown together.
But for all that she is not uninterested in Jackie, and, if Jackie but knew it, she has summed Jackie up and disposed of her in her own strange, hard, and perhaps even kindly way. But although she has summed Jackie up and disposed of her, there is something in Jackie which causes her to be recurringly not quite satisfied with the summing-up and disposing, and from this fact certain difficulties are at this very moment arising.
For Miss Hawke (who is naturally a deceptive creature), while at this moment feigning to be asleep, is actually opening her eyes, every half-minute or so, with a sudden pop, and drinking in as much of her junior’s face and demeanour as it is humanly possible to do in the time and in conjunction with ostensible oblivion. And Jackie is also fast asleep, but is also popping. And a quantity of simultaneous poppings are taking place which are proving ruinous to the peace of mind of both parties. But neither of them is able to leave off….
And so the train streams on, or slows down, or stops hissingly for ghostly joinings, and conversation is reopened, and fades out, and begins again, and excludes Jackie (whatever else it does), and the Stygian light burns on….
And all at once she begins thinking about him again. And foolishly imagining things….
If, for instance, by some miracle, he was there to meet her, at the other end….
Standing there to meet her — in front of them all….
And if, miraculously, he put her into a taxi and told her that this had got to Stop….
And if she asked him what had got to Stop…. And if he said that she knew what he meant…. And if she said she didn’t….
And if he said he loved her — beyond everything in this world — loved her and loved her and loved her….
And if she said she always had, from the beginning….
She wonders what he is doing at this moment. Touring the country, like herself — probably in a train….
She will write to him when she gets to her room this evening. Sit up in bed and write to him….
Or if this wasn’t a train going to Manchester at all, but a train going to Dover (like the train she went on when she went to Switzerland) — and if they were together…. And if she held his arm, as they left the train, and the sea was ahead….
If the sea was ahead for their venturing — a calm sea, and yet just flecked with foam — and stars overhead, and a wind, and a moon half hidden…. The old, dark sea ahead, for their venturing….
And if she smelt the sea…. And if she smelt the sea! …
II
Jackie’s landlady at Manchester was Jackie’s first taste of theatrical landladies, and a bustling woman of about forty named Mrs. Grounds. Grounds was alive, though seldom in evidence, and a Character. His affectionate wife, indeed, had constant occasion to allude to him as a Puzzle, a Problem, a Customer, a Proposition, a Desert Sphinx if you Like, a Facer, a One, or, fractionally, a One and a Half or Not Half a One — mystery and monosyllables being the leading traits of this Character. Jackie was of the private belief, in her very slight acquaintance of this individual, that he was, if the truth were known, a mere bundle of affectation; but she was alone in Manchester and had no choice but to adopt the more mysterious and adulatory interpretation of his manners. Also his wife took pleasure in recording, firstly, that he would Do Anything for you if you only Tackled him on the Right Side, and did not Cross, Rub Up, or Brook him; secondly, that a large amount of his apparent surliness was to be palliated by his own arrogant confession that he had been Brought Up in a Hard School; and lastly, that whatever he did it was Only his Way. And with these assurances Jackie had to be content.
III
It was a very successful first night, and an experience of panic which Jackie never forgot. From the moment of entering the harem, at seven o’clock, there was an air of hurry which nearly sent her out of her mind. It was as though the Sultan, while having given the date of his return, had arrived six hours before he was expected and thrown everything and everybody into scampering terror.
Jackie never forgot the dressing-room, where she found herself with seven or eight others; she never forgot the blazing electric bulbs, lighting the red-ochre walls, and reflected by blazing little mirrors on the wooden shelf all round; she never forgot the mad disorder of everything; the smarm and smell of greasepaint — Number 9 — Number 5 — Number 2½ — carmine — blue pencil — the clouds of powder and the scent of flesh. She never forgot the torrents of strident and lewd imprecation pouring forth around her with the monotony of a solemn, set incantation. She never forgot the call-boy’s raps upon the door, his buoyant “Arfnar Peas!” at the half-hour — his sinister “Quartnar Peas!” at the quarter. She never forgot the savage over-emphasis and over-colouring and intensification of trembling beauty when all were made up — the scarlet and blue and pink and white — as though all had been dipped in some sickly rainbow essence….
She never forgot the running down the cold stone stairs — the first clashings of the orchestra — the lining up for the opening chorus — the flowing murmur, talkative and genteelly zealous, of the stalls and circle — the stir and more callous expectancy of the high, packed gallery….
She never forgot how the curtain softly and suddenly arose amid the noise — how its rising gave the same breathless, irrevocable and utterly elusive sensation as a diver might feel in mid-air — how, for a moment after its rising, all consciousness was lost, and the body functioned like another body altogether, which, by some infinitely happy chance, knew the business in hand….
And then all at once she had run off the stage, and was in the
semi-darkness amid the electricians, and the stage-manager, and his assistants, and shifters of various kinds, and a very pale and trembling comedian who had not yet gone on….
IV
Jackie had imagined that all except the most mechanical exertion would cease after that first night, but here she was mistaken.
The fact that the reception in the press next morning was decidedly lukewarm and mixed gave Jackie some sly pleasure, of course (for she had a grudge against her employers and employment which no appeal to her pity could ever placate). But when, at the call next morning, she found herself, with the rest, being held personally impeachable for this, she was less pleased. There was, in fact, on the part of her superiors, an atmosphere of authoritative scolding — a self-important air of calm in a crisis — and an amount of talk about Saving the Day, Working Together, and Pulling this fantastic and offensive balderdash Round, which she found incredibly nauseating. The more so in that it was indulged in principally by the constellation, to whom it was obviously all part of the fun. Jackie soon discovered, indeed, that in such circles a crisis of some sort was little short of indispensable, for if you haven’t a crisis there is absolutely no means in this world of setting in and being Absolutely Frank, and (after all) having Nothing but the Interests of the Show at Heart, and Laying all your Cards upon the Table, and Only wanting to Do what’s Right, and only Wishing you could See it as they did, and so forth, and at last explaining everything beautifully, and kissing and making up, and going out in a large and large-hearted manner to the bars…. And after all, if you can’t be Absolutely Frank, and have Nothing but Interests of Shows at heart, and Lay Cards (at the right moment) upon Tables, what is the use of being this type of actor?
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