Break of Dawn

by Rita Bradshaw

  The upshot of their conversation that day was Toby leaving to work in the West End, and her remaining at the Lincoln. It meant they saw each other a lot less, and in the last two or three months Toby’s name had been linked to that of his leading lady, an accomplished actress who, as Cat put it, had the morals of an alley cat in spite of being a married woman. He had denied anything other than a working relationship, of course, but all in all Sophy had been pleased when the opportunity to tour had arisen and she could leave London for some months. She hoped the time apart would convince Toby he couldn’t do without her. If not . . . Well, she would deal with that when she had to.

  Now she answered Cat with a forced smile. ‘He’s terribly busy and we agreed it’s hopeless to try to write with me being on tour. But he’s fine, I think.’

  Cat made no reply to this. She thought Toby Shawe was an arrogant womaniser, but Sophy loved him and so she bit her tongue when they talked about him. It amazed her that Sophy seemed oblivious to the effect she had on men; she could have anyone she wanted with very little effort, but she seemed stuck on Toby. Even Mr Gregory was smitten, she could tell – although he was always very correct and proper with everyone. But there was a look on his face sometimes when he thought no one was observing him . . . Still, it was none of her business. She was Sophy’s friend and she’d back her to the hilt, but she wouldn’t presume to tell her what to do.

  When the two girls entered the back door of the theatre everyone was helping to put the scenery in place. It was like that on tour. Although they had a stagehand, there was too much for Bart to handle by himself so everyone mucked in. They were running late and there was no time for a rehearsal once everything was crammed on to the tiny stage, but they had been acting the play for weeks so it wasn’t really necessary. Or then again, perhaps it was – in view of what happened when the play began.

  The play was a work by Ibsen – ‘glorious actable stuff’, as Cat put it – with enough drama to satisfy the most fervent actors, but Sophy was on stage when all the set doors jammed, owing to the constricted space. She waited for Cat – the actress who was supposed to open the door and join her on stage – in vain, but she could hear the huffing and puffing as Bart and some others tried to force the door. In the middle of the stage there was a wardrobe. It was a bedroom scene and the wardrobe was never opened so it had no back to it; it went straight on to the rear of the stage. After a few minutes of ad libbing Sophy was just thinking they would have to bring the curtain down, when the wardrobe opened and Cat sailed out for her part. Throughout the whole of the rest of the play, Sophy and the other actors went on and off through the wardrobe, barely able to control their laughter on stage and giving free vent to it off stage.

  It wasn’t until the final curtain had come down that she realised Mr Gregory had been in the theatre when he joined them backstage. He did this occasionally and always without notice. ‘To keep us on our toes,’ Cat said, and she was probably right.

  He walked over to where she and Cat were watching Bart and a couple of the actors attacking the offending door with brute force. ‘You handled that’, he nodded towards the door, which suddenly gave way with a tremendous and ominous cracking sound, ‘like true professionals, if I may say so. Well done, ladies.’

  He smiled at them, and not for the first time Sophy thought what a difference it made to the craggy, somewhat stern face. She dimpled at him. ‘I remember you did say to me that touring provides opportunities to learn the craft of acting like nothing else.’

  ‘Did I?’ His smile widened, his eyes lingering on the lovely face in front of him. ‘That was uncommonly wise of me.’

  ‘I don’t think Henrik Ibsen would have appreciated the laughter from the audience tonight though, do you? He might have preferred us to bring down the curtain rather than use the wardrobe.’

  ‘No doubt, but then he wouldn’t be the one who would have to refund the ticket money.’ Kane dragged his eyes away from the woman who haunted his dreams and tormented his days, saying to the cast in general, ‘Anyone fancy supper on me? I think you all need a glass of something and a good meal after this evening.’

  He didn’t look directly at Sophy again, but he was vitally conscious of her as she bustled off with the rest of the group to change out of her costume. She had no idea in that beautiful head of hers how he felt about her. Which was good, in view of her attachment to Toby Shawe which had effectively tied his hands about presenting himself as a suitor.

  That she was grateful to him was abundantly clear, and she didn’t seem to dislike him. On the contrary, he imagined she saw him as something between a kindly uncle and an exacting benefactor, and being double her age he could understand that. But he didn’t have to like it. And Shawe of all people. The man wasn’t worthy of her. He was a philanderer and shallow into the bargain, she was throwing herself away—

  He caught the thoughts, mentally shaking his head. Enough. With or without Shawe, she wouldn’t have looked twice at him. If ever there was a case of Beauty and the Beast . . . He unconsciously raised his hand to the savagely pock-marked skin of his lower face where the smallpox which had nearly killed him as a twelve-year-old child had left its brand.

  Kane Gregory was something of an enigma to his friends and family – ‘a lone wolf’, as Augustus Jefferson, who knew him better than most, was apt to say. Born of well-to-do parents he’d had a privileged and happy childhood until the smallpox which disfigured his face killed his older and younger brothers, and his mother. The three boys had been inseparable, there being only a year between each of them, and Kane had been grief-stricken; however, his father had been inconsolable at the loss of his wife and two of his sons. After six years of heavy drinking, he had fallen off his hunter one day whilst drunk and had broken his neck, and Kane had inherited what was left of the family estate after his father’s downward spiral into gambling and liquor.

  Kane had gone into his twenties a troubled young man, devoid of a foundation in his life and given to wine, women and song. This state of affairs had lasted for three years. Then something had happened, something he never spoke about, and he had disappeared from all his old haunts for two years, only to return to London at the age of twenty-five with enough money to invest in two theatres. He’d proved himself to be a shrewd businessman, building on his success until now, at the age of thirty-four, he was very comfortably well off. He was also taciturn and cynical, and did not suffer fools gladly, with a well-earned reputation for having a tongue like a whip when he was displeased with something or someone.

  ‘This is so good of you, Mr Gregory.’ Sybil Brannon, another young actress in the company with fluffy blond hair and doe eyes, had positioned herself in front of him, and Kane sighed inwardly. The girl was a competent enough actress but he rather suspected she thought she might take a short-cut to playing the lead female role by sharing his bed.

  ‘Not at all.’ Kane took a step to the side but not towards Sybil, calling over to one of the actors who had already changed and returned promptly at the prospect of a slap-up supper, ‘Mark, a word, please. I think your entrance in the second act needs to come sooner. Perhaps we can bring it forward a minute or two? When Christabel and Sophy have finished their dialogue about the sick child would be about right, I think. I’ll have a word with Leopold about it over dinner.’ Leopold was the actor-manager of the touring company.

  It was a merry little party who ate and drank in the private dining room at the inn Kane was staying at, but Sophy couldn’t enter into the general jocularity as she might have done before Cat had brought up Toby’s name. She didn’t understand why he hadn’t written to her. It had been a lie that they’d agreed not to correspond whilst she was on tour. She had written to him every day to begin with, but when after the first month she had only had one letter waiting for her, care of the theatre they were playing at on the itinerary of their bookings she had written out for him before she’d left, she had curbed her pen and tried to put a brake on her feelings. But it was hard
. The more so because she couldn’t share her despair with anyone.

  She knew Cat didn’t like Toby. Her friend had never said, but she knew. But Cat had never seen the side to him she had seen, the vulnerable, soft, sweet side. Perhaps she should have thrown all her principles and morals aside and followed him to the West End and ultimately into his bed? He had said more than once that if she truly loved him she would want to belong to him, body and soul. And she did. Except . . . Sophy’s breath escaped her in a deep sigh. Her mother had followed that route and where had it got her?

  She believed utterly in women having the vote, along with equal pay, equal job opportunities and equality before the law to free them from the domestic tyranny of men. She and Cat had talked often about such matters, and their seeing eye-to-eye on these issues had been one of the things which had cemented their friendship in the early days. But Sophy couldn’t hold with the view of some suffragettes that women should be free to take as many lovers as men and act accordingly. She didn’t personally believe it was right for men to use women for pleasure and then cast them aside when the attraction had worn off, so why would she condone women doing the same? Cat had agreed with her, and sensibly warned her not to let the view of a very small minority among the movement cloud what she felt about the real issues.

  Look at Vesta Tilley and Bessie Bonehill and the other women in the music halls who impersonated men as male comedians, Cat had pointed out. They satirised men and a cavalier attitude to women through song and were applauded for it, but none of them were loose women in their personal lives. Rather, they pointed out how unfair society was, a society which labelled men as young bloods sowing their wild oats, and the girls they sowed them with as sluts and whores.

  ‘My brother got one of our maids pregnant when I was still at home,’ Cat had told Sophy quietly one day. ‘The poor girl was shipped off to the workhouse, while my parents sent Alexander off abroad. There he was, enjoying himself with his cronies in Italy and France, while his child was being born in squalor and misery. It was the thing which finally made me leave home. That poor child will never amount to anything now – society will make sure of that, especially if it’s a girl. Illegitimacy is the ultimate sin for the child and the mother, but the man, he walks away with his reputation intact. It’s so wrong, so unfair.’

  Cat knew nothing about her beginnings, no one in London did, but her friend’s words, although spoken in innocence, were a sword through Sophy’s bruised heart. Even Cat, if she knew about her mother, would look at her differently.

  Sophy glanced around the table. Everyone was laughing at something which had been said, their faces happy and carefree. She mentally shook herself. What was she doing, brooding like this tonight? Dredging up the past did no good, she knew that, which was why she had determined to put it behind her and concentrate on the future. But some days this was harder than others.

  Kane sat at the head of the table, joining in the conversation and paying everyone a little attention so no artistic feathers got ruffled. But little Sophy said or did escaped him.

  Did she know that the new arrangement whereby Bart guarded the stage door and sent any stage-door johnnies packing was because of her? He had been meaning for some little while to do something about the impossible position his young actresses often found themselves in when touring but Sophy joining the company had prompted his hand. The number one tours playing the big cities with famous actresses provided chaperones as a matter of course – elderly ladies who dragooned the young women most effectively – but smaller companies couldn’t afford such measures. Mind, in Sophy’s case he didn’t think it would be long before she was in such a position; her star was rapidly rising.

  ‘What do you think, Mr Gregory?’ He came out of his thoughts to find Sybil had brought everyone’s attention to him. He’d been vaguely aware of Christabel – he considered the soubriquet of ‘Cat’ entirely inappropriate for a woman and always gave the girl the dignity of her legitimate name – engaged in a heated discussion with Larry, another of the actors, about the success of female stereotypes in the big West End theatres. However, his mind had wandered. He seemed to recall words along the line of ‘. . . horrible artificiality of the empty-headed doll wife and mother’ from Christabel, and it had been clear that Larry was delighting in provoking the girl by making more and more outrageous statements about a woman knowing her place and so on. But he didn’t intend to get into a discussion on the merits of parts for women in the independent theatre versus those traditional parts on the commercial stage. Not tonight.

  He let his eyes pass over the assembled throng. He was weary and out of sorts. He was always out of sorts when in the company of Sophy. Why he kept torturing himself by seeking out the very thing that was the cause of his distress he didn’t know. He hadn’t been aware of masochistic tendencies before he’d met her, he thought wryly.

  Forcing a smile, he said firmly, ‘What I think, young ladies and gentlemen, is that it’s time for you all to get some beauty sleep so you can be up bright and early in the morning to organise that scenery before the matinée.’ He glanced at Leopold who immediately took his cue and stood to his feet.

  Everyone thanked him again for the meal as they left, Christabel and Sophy bringing up the rear. He kept the smile on his face as he said goodbye, but looking at the two young women standing side by side, it only reinforced his earlier thoughts. Both girls were beautiful, both talented actresses as well as being clear-headed and intelligent, but Sophy had an extra quality which was indefinable. There was a depth to the amber eyes, an emotion that reached out and gripped the onlooker and held them transfixed. He had seen it on the faces of the audience tonight when they had looked at her, and on other occasions too. She had held them in the palm of her hand. She and Toby would make a stunning couple, he could see them being the toast of theatreland. How could he imagine, for one moment, that she would ever look at him in that way.

  Chapter 12

  Patience sat on the edge of her bed, the letter dangling in her fingers and tears in her eyes. Sophy was alive and safe. It had been over eighteen months since that snowy morning when her cousin had left, and many times since she had feared the worst, especially as month after month had gone by without a word. But she was safe and happy, although beyond that Sophy had said very little and there was no address on the letter. She read it through again, slowly this time:

  Dear Patience,

  First I must apologise for not having written before. I could say I have been too busy, but although that is partly true, it is not the whole truth. I think I needed time to come to terms with what I found out that day before I left Southwick. Your help the morning I departed was crucial and I want you to know that.

  Looking back, I don’t know how I imagined I would manage without a penny to my name, but I wasn’t thinking clearly, of course. I am very happy in my new life but I will write more of that next time. For now, I wanted to thank you and to say that when I think of you, it is with fondness. Give the boys my best wishes and I hope you are all well.

  Your cousin,

  Sophy

  Patience carefully folded the single sheet of paper back into the envelope before slipping it in her handbag, and then walked across to the window where she gazed out over the garden and drive. It was a sunny morning and the sunlight glancing over the grounds gave a tranquillity and beauty to the day. She drank it in, drawing strength from the birdsong and blue sky. And she would need strength in the coming hour, she thought grimly, when she faced her mother.

  Her mother . . . Patience’s thin mouth tightened into a line. How had her father put up with her all these years? Oh, she knew he wasn’t perfect, far from it, but compared to her mother . . . In the space of the last eighteen months her mother had caused Sophy to run away to goodness knows where, and made life so impossible for John and Matthew when they wouldn’t give up their girls that they now resided together in a small flat over a butcher’s shop in Bishopwearmouth – the rent of which they coul
d ill-afford as both were saving to get married. Even David saw to it that he was invited to his pals’ homes over the hols whenever he could so he was rarely at the vicarage. And she had been left living at home, if you could call the four walls within which a silent war was played out day after day, ‘home’. But no more.

  Patience dried her face with her handkerchief and straightened her narrow shoulders. Today she was going to do something that would almost certainly result in the doors of the vicarage being closed to her for ever, and she couldn’t wait. She had the rest of her life in front of her and she didn’t intend to waste it. The seed of rebellion against her lot which had been planted the day Sophy had left, had come to flower. It was strange that she had received Sophy’s letter this morning of all mornings, in view of what she intended to do – but she would take it as a positive sign. She was glad the letter had come by first post, which meant that Molly had brought it to her with an early morning cup of tea. It meant her mother knew nothing about it.

  She glanced at her trunk packed full with all of the clothes and belongings she wanted to take with her, and her stomach fluttered, whether out of excitement or the thought of the ordeal ahead, she didn’t know. She had arranged for the cab to call at nine-thirty after breakfast and it was now ten past eight. Morning prayers would begin in the drawing room at eight-fifteen and last for exactly fifteen minutes. As a child she hadn’t minded the daily prayers; in fact, she had found them comforting. It seemed right to start the day by asking God to oversee it. But now this ritual grated on her as the height of hypocrisy. Her parents couldn’t stand the sight of each other and yet they sat there in front of the servants every morning as pious and righteous as they came. However, from today she wouldn’t have to endure that any more, along with many other things which regularly got under her skin.