The Foreigner

by P. G. Glynn

  She pushed blindly at Charles, who sidestepped, and all but collided with Will, the carroty-haired callboy, as he arrived to announce: “Not twenty minutes to your entrance Mr Brodie, sir, and not thirty to yours, Miss Martin … I mean, Howard.”

  “A curse on you, too,” spat Dolly as she exited. Her parting shot echoed stridently from outside in the corridor: “She’ll flop tonight and then how you’ll wish you hadn’t done this!”

  Suddenly it was all too much for a bruised and very dishevelled Marie, who cried from in front of the mirror: “Crikey, just look at me! I can’t go on in half-an-hour – I simply can’t!”

  “Take that ‘t’ off immediately and make it ‘can’,” Charles Brodie commanded. “The future of this theatre rests on your shoulders.” Then he said sternly as he left for his dressing room: “Have her in the wings, Sarah, in time for her cue.”

  4

  Disturbing news had reached Charles Brodie from his house manager Seymour Carlysle. Charles was doubly disturbed – and cursed himself – because he should have anticipated what Dolly’s next move would be, after Gerald had escorted her finally from the premises. And he should have taken appropriate action to prevent her entering the foyer where, in a hysterical outburst, she had informed startled patrons that if they were there to see her they were about to be disappointed.

  Their best bet, she told them, before Seymour saw what was happening and dispatched her in a taxi-cab, was to demand their money back and go to see a professional show in a theatre where the manager knew how to manage.

  Some had acted on her suggestion and Seymour had only stemmed the tide by advising curiosity above undue haste. They were surely curious, weren’t they, to see the exceptional qualities of Charles Brodie’s new leading lady? If by the interval they were dissatisfied, then a refund was no more than their entitlement.

  Seymour had done well. Thanks to his quick intervention there were few empty seats out there, but heaven help the Tavistock should the first half of OLIVER TWIST not achieve general approval. Marie Howard must fulfil her potential. That was the beginning and end of it. Unless she did, there would be a stampede for the box office and Charles could be bankrupted.

  “Lights, Gerald,” he instructed. “Flood the house with light!”

  This the stage manager did, much to everyone’s astonishment. Having been expecting the lights to dim for the start of the performance, they were still dazzled by the unexpected brightness when, preceded by a long roll from the drum, Charles Brodie strode on to the stage. Dressed as Bill Sikes he strode in front of the closed blue curtains and authoritatively raised his hand for silence.

  The speculative hum that had filled the auditorium ceased abruptly. Were they about to learn what was going on or be fobbed off with tommyrot? Whichever the case, why should they pay good money to see someone other than the billed leading lady?

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Charles began, all too conscious of the prevailing mood, “good evening!”

  “What’s good about it?” a Cockney shouted from the gods. “And where’s our Dolly?”

  “I’m coming to that – with your permission.” Directing a half-bow toward the shouter, Charles heard an approving clap and went on: “Welcome, all of you, to the Tavistock Theatre where in true tradition we have prepared a fine feast of entertainment.” Spotting in his usual front-row seat of the stalls Anthony La Motte, critic from THE ERA, Charles addressed his next words to him: “You came here, I know, in the expectation of seeing my usual leading lady, Miss Dolly Martin, and you are entitled to feel a certain … chagrin that this expectation is not due to be fulfilled.”

  “Too right we are!” The shout was from a female heckler now, deep in the pit, who was unfamiliar with the word ‘chagrin’ but who had got the gist. “It’s Dolly we want, not some stand-in!”

  “Believe me, I appreciate your sentiments. I would share them, had I not seen what you are about to see. We have an unparalleled treat in store for you tonight. I believe that you are due to witness theatrical history written and to be at the birth of a new star – a star, moreover, destined to ascend to the very heights. There are no words adequately to describe the talent I am about to present for your discerning eyes. Look at her, hear her – take pleasure in her advent, for Miss Marie Howard is, to put it mildly, a delight. An actress of her calibre is so rare that I deem it a privilege to have discovered her. With enormous pride I am now offering you the rare opportunity to share in my discovery. Ladies and gentlemen, have I your permission to let the curtain rise?”

  Applause sounded from the rear of the theatre, led as briefed by Seymour Carlysle. After initial indecision this spread, rippling through the auditorium until it became a wave of approbation. The house lights dimmed.

  +++++

  Waiting in the wings, Marie had heard everything. How she wished she had not heard … how she wished she had not gone to Mr Brodie’s office! Had she not gone she wouldn’t now be black and blue from Dolly’s punches, with the Tavistock’s future depending on her. Giddy godfathers, what was wrong with her, pushing her nose in where it wasn’t wanted and landing up in soup such as this? Would she never learn to let things happen in their own good time instead of going at them hammer and tongs to make them happen? Marie despaired of herself … despaired of ever getting through the performance, never mind triumphing in the role Dolly should rightfully be playing.

  She felt sick. Her palms moistened and her mouth dried. The curtain was rising and she could not remember her lines. Sarah might have made her look all right but she could still feel Dolly’s scratches … still hear her yelling that Marie would flop tonight. Suppose she did flop? Suppose everybody booed and threw things? Suppose the critics slated the play and its new leading lady?

  “Sikes says: ‘Send her here. C’mon. Send her here’, and then Barney comes for you,” a nearby voice whispered as if in answer to a prayer. “Will that get you there?”

  Marie looked down to where young Guy Brodie was gazing earnestly up at her. He had reminded her of her cue and from the cue followed the rest. Alleluia! “Yes,” she told him, finding a smile, “that will get me there … that will get me everywhere! You little darling! How did you know I needed rescuing?”

  “From your eyes,” answered Guy, Charles’s son, who was playing Oliver. This was the first time in his life that he had been termed a darling of any kind, or told that he had rescued someone, and now he beamed with pride. “There was nobody in them, which is a sure sign of stage-fright. I’m not in mine sometimes. Are you all right?”

  Awaiting her response Guy looked serious again – and seriousness was the state Marie associated with him. A pretty, pale child with fair hair and blue eyes, he had in her view grown up too soon. “I am now,” she assured him. “I’m fine! And it’s all thanks to you. If I succeed tonight – as I intend to – that will have been in part your doing, Guy.”

  “Will it? Will it, truly?”

  “Truly!” she told him, stooping to kiss the tip of his snub nose. She added with a wink: “So you see, you’re my knight in shining armour.”

  “And you are … better than Dolly any day,” Guy whispered as his cue came, taking him from her side. But his approval remained behind.

  The organ-grinder was playing his barrel organ in a nineteenth century street to unappreciative groups of bystanders who were more concerned with their own affairs than with his music. A boy known as Dodger, hands thrust deep in his pockets, sauntered to the centre of this scene where he began striking up acquaintance with a certain Oliver Twist …

  Watching from the wings, she ceased to be Marie. Her crisis over, she travelled through time to Nancy’s London and on easily into Nancy’s skin. Her hips started swaying to the music while a bold expression stole into her eyes. She belonged to Bill Sikes and if she dreamed any dreams they were of him.

  “Well, it’s a very suitable name,” Dodger said. “Come on. We’ll get some grub and push on slow to where we’re going.”

  As he and
Oliver strolled off down the street the curtain fell so that the scene could be changed to Fagin’s den. The stagehands shifted the scenery so fast and so silently that when the blue velour with its gold-tasselled fringe rose within a mere matter of seconds to reveal the dank and dismal warehouse loft, the audience burst into spontaneous applause. Further applause followed for Bill Sikes and his dog, making their first entrance. Then Bill and the old Jew settled down to engage in a business transaction.

  “Is anybody here, Barney?” enquired Fagin after a time.

  “Dobody but Biss Dadsy,” replied Barney, who always spoke through his nose.

  “Nancy!” exclaimed Sikes, pouring a glass of liquor. “Where? Strike me blind if I don’t honour that ’ere girl for her native talents. Send her here. C’mon. Send her here.”

  Nancy saw Barney coming for her and was ready. A basket slung nice and casual over one arm, her plaid shawl provocatively off-shoulder, she ambled on to the stage.

  A wave of anticipation surged through the audience, for this newcomer was very easy on the eye. But had her acting ability been praised too highly?

  “Well,” said Mr Sikes to Oliver by and by, “as near as I know, there isn’t anyone as would be asking very partickler arter you, if you was disposed of; so I needn’t take this devil-and-all of trouble to explain matters to you, if it warn’t for your own good. D’ye hear me?”

  “The short and the long of what you mean,” said Nancy, speaking very emphatically and slightly frowning at Oliver as if to bespeak his serious attention to her words, “is that if you’re crossed by him in this job you have on hand, you’ll prevent his ever telling tales afterwards by shooting him through the head and will take your chance of swinging for it, as you do for a great many other things in the way of business, every month of your life.”

  An approving murmur was heard from the auditorium and Bill Sikes waited before saying generously: “That’s it! Women can always put things in fewest words – except when it’s blowing up and then they lengthens it out.”

  Act One ended with Sikes telling Nancy she was a pretty subject for the boy Oliver to make a friend of and with Nancy answering: “God Almighty help me, I am. And I wish I’d been struck dead in the street before I lent a hand to bring him here. He’ll be a thief and a liar and a devil, and all that’s bad, from this night onwards. Isn’t that enough for the wretch without beating him? I thieved for you, Fagin, when I was a child not half as old as this. And I’ve been in the same trade, the same service ever since. For twelve years the cold, wet, dirty streets are my home. And you’re the wretch that drove me to them long ago - and that’ll keep me there, day and night till I die.”

  Sikes caught hold of her as she rushed at Fagin. The curtain fell as she fainted.

  There was a deathly hush as the lights went on. The people who had paid to see Dolly Martin seemed to have been turned to stone. Like statues they sat until, suddenly, life returned to their limbs.

  Hearing the crescendo of applause from her side of the curtain Marie lay, disorientated, on the stage. Who was she … where was she? Was it a storm she could hear roaring, or was it … could it be … ? She knew the answers suddenly and raised her head just as Charles Brodie and Clive Swindall exited and Nell rushed in from the wings.

  “Are you listening?” Nell asked her friend. “That’s all yours! They love you, Marie. You’ll be a star after tonight. You are a star – isn’t she, Guy?”

  “Yes, she is,” he agreed vehemently. Then he said, furrowing his brow: “Father wants to see you in his office, Marie.”

  “Does he?” He had been holding her as Sikes and she could not remember being released or seeing him disappear. It was as if she were only half here. But Nancy remembered liking Sikes holding her. “I’d best go to him, then, hadn’t I?”

  She went expecting praise but should have known better. Almost before she was through the door Charles told her: “Act Two will need very different handling from Act One. When you make your first entrance there might be applause, which you must be sure to allow for before attempting speech. Then, forget the audience, forget being applauded and remember above all else to forget yourself. Unless you continue to breathe with Nancy’s breath … ”

  Marie listened to him wondering how he could think this lesson was necessary. They had not been acting, had they? And nor would they be acting when they returned on-stage. He was standing here in Bill’s black velveteen coat, drab breeches and the grey cotton stockings that showed his calves to such good effect and he was Bill, just as she was Nancy. So shouldn’t they just be, rather than consider how to be? “You’re confusing me,” Marie said.

  “I beg your pardon?” He frowned. “In what respect?”

  “You’re Bill and I’m Nancy … so why, in mid-performance, do we have to pretend to be Charles and Marie playing parts?”

  Now he was confused, and somewhat irked at having been interrupted. “We are not pretending to be us. We are who we are – and need to perfect our technique.”

  “Do we?” She saw that she was making him angry and hastened to say: “I mean, is it absolutely essential to perfect it during the play? ‘Technique’ is such a cold word for something that seemed to me to be coming naturally – something that had such warmth in it while we were on-stage. I’m sure I’ll do better out there if we just let the feelings flow for now and reserve the technicalities for later. I didn’t do too badly in Act One, did I?”

  Charles felt that he should reprimand her before she became as bossy as Dolly. But she was not trying to boss him, was she? Marie was simply stating a truth as she knew it and perhaps this was a truth that he should listen to. He was not used to thinking in terms of feelings flowing. He had seen, though, how hers flowed and there could be no doubting that the audience had taken her to their hearts, which was no mean achievement considering the way the performance had started. Few actresses had ever been off to a worse start and yet almost from the moment Marie walked on to the stage she had made it her own. So it had come as no surprise to know from Seymour after the curtain fell on Act One that he was expecting no further demands for refunds. Charles felt himself to be a better man for having had the courage to do as he should long since have done … and he felt humbled by the bravura of Marie Howard’s West End debut. So he said in answer to her question: “No, you did not – do too badly, that is. Which isn’t to say you mightn’t do better in Act Two.”

  +++++

  His mood murderous, Bill Sikes returned home to find Nancy lying in his bed. “Get up!” he ordered unceremoniously.

  “It is you, Bill!” she said, her expression one of pleasure because he was there.

  “It is,” came his response. “Get up!”

  There was a candle burning, but he hastily drew it from the candlestick and hurled it into the grate. Seeing the faint light of early day without, Nancy rose to undraw the curtain.

  “Let it be,” said Sikes, thrusting his hand before her. “There’s light enough for wot I’ve got to do.”

  “Bill,” said the girl, in the low voice of alarm, “why do you look like that at me?”

  The robber sat regarding her for a few seconds, with dilated nostrils and heaving breast; and then, grasping her by the head and throat, dragged her into the middle of the room and looking once towards the door, placed his heavy hand upon her mouth.

  “Bill, Bill!” gasped the girl, wrestling with the strength of mortal fear; “I won’t scream or cry – not once – hear me – speak to me – tell me what I’ve done?”

  “You know, you she-devil!” returned the robber, suppressing his breath. “You were watched tonight; every word you said was heard.”

  “Then spare my life for the love of Heaven, as I spared yours,” rejoined Nancy, clinging to him. “Bill, dear Bill, you cannot have the heart to kill me. Oh, think of all I have given up, only this one night, for you. You shall have time to think, and save yourself this crime; I will not loose my hold, you cannot throw me off. Bill, Bill, for dear God’s sa
ke, for your own, for mine, stop before you spill my blood! I have been true to you, upon my guilty soul I have!”

  The man struggled violently to release his arms, but those of the girl were clasped round his, and tear as he would he could not tear them away.

  “Bill,” cried Nancy, striving to lay her head upon his breast, “the gentleman and that dear lady told me tonight of a home in some foreign country where I could end my days in solitude and peace. Let me see them again and beg them, on my knees, to show the same mercy and goodness to you; and let us both leave this dreadful place, and far apart lead better lives, and forget how we have lived, except in prayers, and never see each other more. It is never too late to repent. They told me so – I feel it now – but we must have time – a little, little time!”

  Bill freed one arm and grasped his pistol. The certainty of immediate detection if he fired flashed across his mind even in the midst of his fury, and he beat it twice upon the upturned face that almost touched his own.

  She staggered and fell, nearly blinded with the blood that spurted from her forehead, but raising herself, with the last of her strength, on her knees, drew from her bosom a white handkerchief – Rose Maylie’s own – and holding it up, in her folded hands, as high towards Heaven as her weakness would allow, breathed one prayer for mercy to her Maker.

  It was a ghastly figure to look upon. The murderer, staggering backward to the wall, and shutting out the sight with his hand, seized a heavy club and struck her down.

  There were cries of outrage from the audience as the curtain fell, for she should not have died, not like that, not for that reason – not loving Bill as she did. Nancy had not deserved to die. Now the light had gone from countless lives and in the resulting darkness they grieved deeply.

  For many it was as if the play ended then, though Sikes’s hanging and Fagin’s fate were still pending as well as Oliver’s happy homecoming. When the play did end there was just one name on the people’s lips … and how they shouted it: “Nancy! Nancy!”