With the band of nymphs opposite they had little or no communication. They were, indeed, treated by these with direct or implicit hauteur — and not unlike some cast-off and expiring swains were they, with respect to these, as opposed to the full-blooded and satyr-like qualities of the two comedians, who carried all before them. The finer, the successful type prevailed, and lingerie-serials were only for supermen.
But Jackie, who had no taste for lingerie-serials either, if it came to that, was not so fastidious, and could not differentiate so sharply. And so Jackie’s heart rather went out to the chorus men. And because her heart went out she was able to concede certain minute civilities, when the occasion arose, which it was not difficult, but was not usual, to concede. And so it came about, it is believed, that the rumour that Jackie was the Little Lady of the company, was a rumour prevalent in the men’s dressing-room, as well.
CHAPTER VII
THE GIFT
I
IT is half-past six on Saturday evening, and Jackie, after a pleasant high tea supplied by Mrs. Grounds, is returning to the theatre. She is still, despite her tea and a short rest, a little giddy from the labour and stress of the matinée behind her, but she is gently reviving under the influence of the brisk, lit Saturday streets (which have revived Saturday-evening actors and actresses in the same way since the beginning of play-going), and she tells herself that she is, taken all in all, very happy and contented.
And she tells herself that she is an actress now, and that she can look back upon a clear achievement. And she is getting experience, she tells herself, and this cannot last so very long. And in so far as she has won out in this, her first and most arduous step — surely that is in itself some demonstration of her power to succeed throughout, and surely the heights are still for her victorious ascension.
And Jackie leaves the lighted shops, and takes to the quieter streets, and faces the stage door again, and walks quickly and confidently through.
But here she is arrested by the stage-doorkeeper, who after banging at his glass cage in an uncivil and excited manner, comes out and asks her if she is Miss Mortimer.
She confesses, not without some trepidation, to being this, and he hands her a parcel. This he does with a defiant and punitive air, and testily retires.
Jackie goes very white on receiving this, and does not appear to know what to do, for she does not know what it contains, but she knows from whom it comes, and is almost trembling in her eagerness to open it. And at last, after making for the stairs, she turns back again and goes out into the street, to open it, if not in privacy, at least without interruption.
And she walks two hundred yards before she takes the thrilling plunge.
And it is a volume of Shelley’s poems (apparently quite impulsive, for she cannot imagine why) and a letter.
And “My dear Jackie,” says this letter. “Thank you for your letter. Got this for you yesterday. Hope to meet you some time if we’re anywhere near each other. Let me hear your dates and addresses. Yours ever, R. G.”
And it is in a very elated and serene frame of mind that she returns to the theatre again, and goes in.
And what a different going-in is this, with her book under her arm! It is as though he has given her his own strength, as though he has joined forces with her, and that little volume is a little sword wherewith she may meet and do battle with all that may come her way. She feels no longer quite defenceless, and no longer quite alone.
*
But she is five minutes late already, and as she climbs the stairs she can hear a thick flow of talk, behind shut doors, from the packed dressing-rooms — a thick bubbling flow relieved every other moment by the sound of high cackling laughter, or strident challenge, or off-hand imprecation. And she opens the door of her own room and goes in.
And in this room are the Misses Cherry Lambert, and Honour Lang, and Effie Byng, and Biddy Maxwell, and Hazel Parry, and Dolly True, and Belle Hawke, and Dot Delane. All are present, in fact, and all are in the best of spirits, and all are in an advanced stage of undress — with the exception, that is, of Miss Biddy Maxwell, who is by the door, and whose existence is temporarily suspended, and vision temporarily blinded, by her dress, which she is hauling over head, with athletic motions, for the purpose of removal.
And Jackie’s opening of the door seems to waft out into the passage, for one swift moment, the pungent air of flexible and sensuous femininity that is within — but she closes the door at once, and the secret is intact. And from the other side of the door it may still appear to be a secret — and a very tantalizing and enthralling secret at that — but once in here, and there is no mystery whatever. No ascetic, having entrance here, need fear for his poise — only the rake might flee in horror from the immediate destruction of his cherished beliefs. For from here the breath of languor is expelled, and all feminine blandishment replaced by a vitality and overbearing practicality that does not challenge, but implicitly refutes illusion. This is a place of flesh, and blood, and sinew, and human need. This is not Revelation; it is letting the cat out of the bag. And if the door is shut fast (as of course it is), it is surely so shut as a protection less from the ardours than from the instant despondence of man, who could enter here (and such invasions are not unknown), as eunuchs might have entered a harem of old — disenchanted, liberated, as by magic, from his normal instincts.
There is quite a chorus of welcome as Jackie comes in — an ironic “Hooray!” in the friendliest of spirits, and much surprise that Jackie, of all persons, should be late. And “She’s got a Book, too,” says Miss Biddy Maxwell, coming into the world again. And Jackie is putting her book down on the shelf and commencing to undress.
There is a kind of energetic rustling all around her, and for a moment no one is speaking. But this is broken by Miss Cherry Lambert, a frivolous girl of about twenty-eight, who is highly interested in Jackie’s peculiarities and temperament, and who now, to Jackie’s horror (since all are listening), addresses her.
“Well, Jackie, been ————?” asks Miss Lambert, whose remarks are frequently, and for long stretches, unprintable.
“Been what?” asks Jackie, to whom Miss Lambert’s remarks are not unprintable, since they are not understood.
There are glances from each to each amongst the girls, and here Miss Delane cuts in.
“Don’t you know what a —— is, Jackie?” asks Miss Delane.
“No,” says Jackie, blushing.
“‘No,’ said she, blushing,” says Miss Biddy Maxwell, who is given to reporting her friends’ speeches and mannerisms in this way, being of a derisive turn of mind, and far from friendly towards Jackie.
Miss Delane elucidates the mystery.
“Oh,” says Jackie.
“‘Oh,’ said she,” says Miss Biddy Maxwell.
There is a silence.
“Then you haven’t been doing nothing since we saw you last, Jackie,” affirms Miss Lambert, in friendly tones.
“No,” says Jackie.
“Nothing will Come of Nothing,” says Miss Dot Delane. “Ain’t that so?”
“Sure,” says Miss Effie Byng, and it appears that a great truth has been hit upon.
“That’s Shakespeare, ain’t it, Jackie?” asks Miss Delane, plainly appealing to an expert.
“I don’t know,” says Jackie.
“Oh, I thought you knew all about Shakespeare,” says Miss Delane.
“Why should I?” asks Jackie.
“What? — don’t you, Jackie?” asks Miss Dolly True, who is next to Jackie at the dressing-shelf, and who speaks with some concern. “I thought you was a Reader.”
“Well, I may read a bit,” says Jackie. “But I don’t know anything about Shakespeare.”
“Said she,” caps Miss Biddy Maxwell, who considers this eminently and exquisitely worthy of report.
“Shakespeare? Hooz Shakespeare?” asks Miss Belle Hawke, in her thick, heavy voice, from the end of the room.
No one enlightens Miss Hawke.
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“You can ’ave the old bastard,” adds Miss Hawke, bestowing the dramatist with less magnanimity than vindictiveness upon her neighbours. She also adds that she will Shake his Something Else (in a moment).
There is a silence. They are now all facing their mirrors and smarming in their number five.
“The Tragedy of King Lear,” says Miss Hawke, with great significance….
“I read Shakespeare at our school,” offers Miss Dolly True. “We acted ‘The Merchant of Venice.’”
(“With Nobs On,” says Miss Biddy Maxwell quietly, but as one who would depreciate the achievement.)
“The Dark Lady of the Sonnets,” says Miss Hawke, again irrelevantly, but with the same air of implacable grudge against this author….
There is another long, greasy silence.
“Mr. William Bloody Shakespeare,” murmurs Miss Hawke, in the middle of this greasy silence.
“What’s your book, Jackie?” asks Miss Cherry Lambert, in an off-hand way. This young woman’s enormous curiosity with respect to Jackie and her quiet, mysterious ways, seldom leaves her alone for long.
“Well …” says Jackie, and does not know what to say. “I don’t know, really…. It was sent me….” Happily Miss Biddy Maxwell here cuts in.
“Well, I got many things in my time,” says she. “But I never got books.”
“No,” says Miss Lambert, “————.” Not Miss Lambert’s words, but rather her ideas, are unprintable.
The girls laugh.
Suddenly, “Come on, what’s ’er book?” cries Miss True, and snatches at it, and begins to read.
“Oh, my word!” announces Miss True. “It’s Poetry!”
“Jesus wept!” cries Miss Delane, genuinely overpowered.
“Poetry?” cries Miss Hawke. “I know some Poetry!’’ And Miss Hawke says this with the utmost bitterness and rancour, and it is clear that it is a very different kind of Poetry that she knows.
“Percy — Buysher — Shelley,” reads Miss True. “My word!”
“Oh, Perssaye!” cries Miss Hawke, who is becoming positively querulous.
“But I expect he’s a fine poet, though, ain’t he, Jackie?” asks Miss True, with some deference.
(Miss Maxwell adds Nobs to this conception, as well.)
“Yes. I think he is rather good,” says Jackie.
Here Miss Hawke again arrogantly reveals herself as no woman of letters, by remarking that she (if given Five Minutes for the purpose) would take some of the Shell out of him.
“Sure. I guess he’s one of the greatest,” says Miss Hazel Parry, who has hardly spoken before. And because Miss Parry speaks quietly, and because Miss Parry has hardly spoken before, and because Miss Parry has the reputation of being the Clever Girl in this company, this remark carries great weight, and there is a silence.
The breath of scholarship, indeed, is for the moment chilling.
But at this moment Miss Delane comes forward, and having the flimsiest of clothes upon her person, strikes a mock-athletic attitude, and offers to Wrestle some one.
Which challenge is taken up by Miss Biddy Maxwell, who is similarly clothed, and who takes some pride in her strength.
“Come on, then,” says Miss Maxwell. “I’ll Wrestle you.”
“All right, I’ll Wrestle you,” says Miss Delane.
But although both ladies assume Japanese positions, and declare with great firmness that they will Wrestle each other — neither of the two ladies give, at present, any manifestations of being about to close.
“I’ll Wrestle you,” says Miss Delane.
“Come on, I’ll Wrestle you, then,” says Miss Maxwell.
“Go on, Wrestle, you two,” urges Miss True.
“Wrestle her, Biddy,” urges Miss Lambert.
“All right, then,” says Miss Delane. “I’ll Wrestle her.” And she seizes her friend with diffident antagonism around the neck.
Whereat both ladies begin to pant very hard, and to push very hard, and to look very amiable very hard, and to grit their teeth and strain. And Miss Dot Delane, who is clearly Losing, grants a magnanimous “My, ain’t she strong!” and Miss Biddy Maxwell, who is clearly Winning, repeats, with humorous vindictiveness, that she will Wrestle her. And both young ladies are smiling the wrong side of their faces. And “Go on, Wrestle her, Dot!” cry Miss Delane’s supporters, and “Go on, Wrestle her, Biddy!” cry Miss Maxwell’s supporters, while Miss Hawke makes technical but rather caustic allusions to Half Nelsons. And at last there is a sudden withdrawal of strength, and both fall on to the floor with a heavy bump. But Miss Biddy Maxwell is well on top, and Miss Dot Delane is seen to be frowning and quiet — Hurt, in fact.
“Did I Hurt you, Dot?” asks Miss Maxwell.
“No — you’re too Rough,” says Miss Delane, and it is clear that she is upset.
“You’re Hurt, aren’t you, Dot?” asks Miss True.
“Oh no, I’m not Hurt. She’s too Rough, though.”
“Well, it was only Fun,” says Miss Maxwell. “Sorry if I hurt you though, Dot.”
“Oh, I guess that’s all right.”
There is a sharp double bang upon the door. “Quartnar Peas!” cries the call-boy. And recedingly down the passage he does the same. “Quartnar Peas! … Quartnar Peas! … Quartnar Peas! …”
“Lord, there’s the quarter,” says Miss Delane, returning to her place. And she has now quite recovered and is a little jealous of her prestige. “I guess I fell the wrong way, then, Biddy,” she adds lightly. “We’ll have another go some other time.”
And “Yes,” says Miss Dolly True, coming to her aid. “You’re a good match, you two.”
And for one passing moment it occurs to Jackie, who has watched this little episode from the beginning, that she has, perhaps, judged harshly of these — that each of these individuals is, if she but knew, the same solitary, defensive, defeated, striving creature as herself…. But the moment is a passing one.
There is now little time, and the conversation succumbs to the exertions of dressing. After ten minutes the call-boy returns to bellow “Oavtewer Peas!” at them, and they go in couples, or alone, down on to the stage, which is strongly lit in the set, but dark behind (where Jack and Lew, as impudent as ever, are already engaged in serials).
Jackie has brought her book down with her, and all through the show she is hugging it to herself, and glimpsing slyly at its pages, and putting it down, when she has to perform, on a little property table in the dark, and coming back immediately afterwards to embrace it again.
And this causes a certain amount of comment and hostility amongst the company (to whom Belles Lettres are anathema), but she does not mind that. Indeed she is intensely proud of the book, and it is as though she is telling them that she has a friend of her own now, and doesn’t care a hang for anybody.
And shortly after the interval she has a long time off the stage, and she takes it into the o.p. corner, and hugs it to herself, perfectly content, and watches the show. A Swiss scene is in progress at the moment, and Mr. Jack Laddon is causing great amusement with an alpenstock. He is also Yodelling with great skill, and receiving, with great inconsequence, ventriloquial slaps in the face from Miss Beryl Joy, who plainly considers him revolting…. And Jackie watches this dreamily, and listens dreamily, to the great hoarse roars of laughter that each movement of Mr. Laddon evokes in this Saturday multitude….
And in this corner she is quietly joined, after a little, by Miss Cherry Lambert and Mr. Lew Craik, who also want a glimpse. And these two have evidently been having some conversation before, for Miss Lambert comes up saying, “Oh, Lew, but you gave me a shock, then, you really did,” and Mr. Craik comes up saying that he will smack her backside for her in a moment — as though Miss Lambert is in the regular habit of chastising herself, and he is merely displaying practical and active sympathy with the disciplinary principle. And Miss Lambert replies, “Oh, will you, Lew?” very intrigued; and then, “Hullo, here’s Jackie. Still got your book?”<
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“Yes,” says Jackie.
“She’s always reading, Lew — this little girl,” says Miss Lambert.
“Oh — thasso?” says Mr. Craik, without looking at Jackie, and with some asperity, for this little girl is not at all the type of little girl with whom Mr. Craik has sympathy. But Miss Lambert has a kinder heart.
“I used to read Poetry at one time, Jackie,” she says.
“Did you?” says Jackie, smiling encouragingly….
There is a long pause.
“Used to read Carlyle, too,” adds Miss Lambert, and there is another pause….
And all three stand there, with painted, blanched faces, watching the show…. And Miss Lambert used to read Carlyle…. And an even greater roar of laughter goes up, and with it, simultaneously, the music begins. And a lightning and exquisite reconciliation takes place between Mr. Jack Laddon and Miss Beryl Joy, and they take hands, and face the audience, and dance together along the floor. And still the three look on, in the blare of the band — Mr. Craik dreamy and sophisticated, Miss Lambert dreamy and vague, and Jackie very dreamy, but very contented, and with a little eager thoughtful look behind her dreaminess. And under her arm her present of Shelley….
CHAPTER VIII
DESOLATION
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