Quick Curtain

by Alan Melville

  Mr. Wilson crossed to the wall at the door of the sitting-room. He appeared highly interested in the pattern of the wallpaper. Being an ultra-modern flat, it was an ultra-modern wallpaper, and not the sort of thing one would have imagined anyone wishing to study at close range for any length of time.

  “What’s the matter?” repeated Derek.

  “That’s a queer thing to write on a bit of wallpaper, isn’t it?” said Mr. Wilson.

  “If you’d get out of the way, I might be able to pass an opinion,” said Derek. “Why should anyone write anything on wallpaper, anyway? Perfectly good box of notepaper over there on the desk. What is it?”

  “C-r-a-i-l-e,” said Mr. Wilson.

  “Craile?”

  “C for catarrh. R for rheumatism. A for adenoids. I for ingrowing toenails. L for leprosy. E for elephantiasis. Craile…”

  “What is Craile, when it’s at home?”

  “I haven’t the foggiest,” said Mr. Wilson. “Craile…”

  Chapter Seven

  At this stage of the proceedings it might be as well to follow the example of Lot’s unfortunate wife and take a look back over our shoulder at things.

  Mr. Ivor Watcyns—but before going a syllable further, do you remember who Mr. Watcyns was? Of course you don’t. How true the newspapers are when they say that the Memory of the Reading Public is Notoriously Short-Lived. Look back, then, as Mrs. Lot looked back, to the first-night programme of Blue Music. The chances of being turned into a pillar of salt for doing so are extremely slight. You will find, if nothing saliferous happens, that Mr. Watcyns was the gentleman responsible for the words and music of Blue Music. Settled? Splendid.…

  On the morning of the day which included, inter alia, Brandon Baker’s inquest, Brandon Baker’s funeral (these two reported in huge headlines on the front pages of the evening papers), Hilary Foster’s inquest, Hilary Foster’s funeral (these two tucked away in tiny paragraphs on the back pages of the same evening papers), Mr. Wilson’s visit from Miss Davis, and Mr. Wilson’s visit to Miss Astle’s flat—on the morning of the day when all that happened, Mr. Watcyns wakened with a brute of a head. The daily religious service broadcast by the B.B.C. was launching into the second verse of its first hymn. Or, to be more concise, it was just after ten-fifteen. Mr. Watcyns, sitting up in bed in a pair of black-and-yellow pyjamas and scratching his hair vigorously, is not altogether a pleasing sight. It would be much better if we waited until he has got out of bed, stretched himself, drunk a tumblerful of orange-juice, slipped on a dressing-gown, steeped for half an hour in a bath heavily laden with salts which bear suggestive Continental titles, dried himself, poured his elegant figure into a lounge suit with a waist that would put any average hour-glass to shame, had his nails manicured, attended to his hair with (a) a brisk dry shampoo, (b) a quick run-through by the Branewave Electric Comb, and (c) a liberal douche of Itfixis, the Hair Tonic of Quality, slipped on another violent dressing-gown, and tripped along to the sitting-room for his iced grapefruit. It will be a longish time to wait, but undoubtedly it will be worth it.

  Mr. Watcyns was a remarkable young man. It seemed only yesterday that the shiny seat of his blue-serge trousers was perched on a high stool in the general office of Trewitt and Trevor, Shipbrokers and Shipping Agents. In those days Mr. Watcyns was twenty-one and earned the same number of shillings per week. Mr. Watcyns stayed on his little stool for six months, at the end of which time Mr. Burton (assistant secretary to the firm of Trewitt and Trevor) passed suddenly away as a result of leaving a tin of canned salmon open for a fortnight and then eating the contents in the form of salmon sandwiches. Mr. Watcyns removed the seat of his pants from the stool, knocked at the private office door of the senior partner, and recommended himself for the job. He got it.

  It was a good thing, for the blue-serge seat was by now dangerously transparent. With the job he got a rise of ten shillings a week and a room of his own. The room of his own was the important thing. Once installed in it, Mr. Watcyns settled down to work with a goodly amount of vigour. Not, it must be admitted, on anything to do with Messrs. Trewitt and Trevor, but rather on the first act of a play called Infernal Triangle. He finished the play inside a month, using a great deal of the firm’s foolscap in the process. He then paid a second visit to the senior partner’s private sanctum, and suggested that he would be able to get through the invoices much quicker if he had a typewriter of his own. After a spot of humming and a little hawing, he got a second-hand portable. Infernal Triangle was typed and checked in another three weeks, this time on the firm’s quarto paper.

  There remained only the little matter of getting it produced, and Mr. Watcyns did not expect any difficulty about that. He bound it neatly in one of Messrs. Trewitt and Trevor’s filing folders, took the afternoon off, and parked himself at the stage-door of the Ambassador’s Theatre. The show at the Ambassador’s at that time was a farce called What Bloomers! and contained Miss Vivienne Sinclair in the leading part. Mr. Watcyns couldn’t see why Miss Sinclair should go on wasting her time and talents in a play like What Bloomers! when there was a gem of a part for her in his own Infernal Triangle. His plan of campaign was, roughly speaking, to thrust the play at Miss Sinclair as she left the theatre and sign a fairly fat contract the next morning. Unfortunately, Miss Sinclair was unavoidably absent from this performance owing to a sudden indisposition with a stockbroker at Brighton. Fortunately, the matinée audience that afternoon contained no less a person than Mr. Douglas B. Douglas, the well-known theatrical producer. Mr. Douglas had heard that there was a pair of highly commendable legs with two lines to say in What Bloomers! and had come along to give them the once-over on the off-chance that they might come in handy for his next musical show. Mr. Watcyns seized both his opportunity and Mr. Douglas’s elbow, shoved his masterpiece into the theatrical magnate’s fist, and said, “I’d like you to produce that. It’s a very good play.”

  Infernal Triangle was not a very good play. It was a very bad play, which was just what Mr. Douglas B. Douglas was looking for at the moment. Its entire action took place on a heavily upholstered settee which was the main attraction of Jimmy Weldon’s country-house at Maidenhead. For the work of a young shipping clerk, it was fairly incandescent. Many of the situations were of the kind that are only allowed to be performed in London on Sunday evenings. Much of the dialogue was the sort of thing that made Mrs. Patrick Campbell’s remark in Pygmalion sound merely like “Bother!” or “Tut!” The point is that Mr. Douglas read it and pronounced it good. Infernal Triangle was put on at the Ambassador’s as soon as What Bloomers! stopped blooming, and ran for three hundred and eighty-seven performances, wearing out five complete settees in the course of its run. Mr. Watcyns went back to Messrs. Trewitt and Trevor, but only to collect a month’s salary that happened to be due to him and to tell the senior partner, somewhat ungratefully, to go to hell.

  Since when there has been nothing at all Lot’s-wifish about Mr. Watcyns. He followed up Infernal Triangle with two more plays which had the same plot and characters but which were carried out not on a settee, but in a ship’s cabin and the dormitory of a girls’ convent respectively. He then wrote a one-man revue for Mr. Douglas in which he not only wrote the book, composed the music, concocted the lyrics, designed the scenery, played the leading part, produced the production and trained the chorus, but also wrote most of the notices himself for the London papers.

  Mr. Watcyns was made. His last musical show was transformed into an unrecognizable American talkie for which he received two hundred thousand pounds. His last straight play has been a sensation in every country in the world except Tibet. And still the man wakened on this particular morning with a head. Odd.

  “Good morning, sir,” said Mr. Watcyns’ man Williams.

  Mr. Watcyns grunted.

  “I trust you slept well, sir?” said Mr. Watcyns’ man Williams.

  “Then put your trust in something else,�
�� said Mr. Watcyns. “I didn’t even sleep badly.”

  “Indeed, sir,” said Williams. “A pity, sir. Iced grapefruit, sir, provides a refreshing apéritif after an evening marred by insomnia.”

  “Lead me to it,” said Mr. Watcyns.

  Mr. Watcyns was in the habit of breakfasting alone, enjoying a cigarette, and then pushing the bell for one of his three stenographers to break the calm. The morning mail had to be attended to. It is a peculiar fact that the more celebrated a celebrity becomes the duller and more uninteresting becomes his correspondence. In the old blue-serge-trousers days, Mr. Watcyns received an average of two letters a week: one from his mother in Peebles every Monday, and another every mail day from his married sister in Waterville, Maine. And the letters of those days fairly throbbed with interest. Never a Monday went by without Mrs. Watcyns’ daily help giving notice or Mrs. Watcyns’ Persian cat having kittens. Never a mail day passed without Mr. Watcyns’ married sister’s house being engulfed in a tornado, or Mr. Watcyns’ married sister’s husband’s employer decreeing a ten per cent. salary cut all round. Or something of the sort.

  Nowadays, if Mr. Watcyns received less than fifty letters in the morning he was forced to the conclusion that Sir Kingsley Wood was not trying. And, as a rule, only about one out of each fifty contained any atoms of either interest or intelligence. If it wasn’t letters from passionate females in Rochdale demanding his autograph, then it was letters from passionate females in Wolverhampton beseeching his photograph. Or more probably letters from passionate females in Dundee asking for both. Mr. Watcyns’ three stenographers attended to these, ordering a thousand more photos when the supply ran dry, and signing “Very truly yours, Ivor Watcyns” on countless albums without a tremor of their consciences. That kind made up about seventy-five per cent. of the Watcyns post, and the other twenty-five consisted of letters from his agents advising him of the sales of his latest published play, receipts of the tour of his last musical comedy, cheques for the foreign translation rights of his last farce, and Press notices about his latest revue. All terribly boring. Mr. Watcyns looked at the pile of letters on the table in front of him and agreed with the fellow Byron when he talked about the martyrdom of fame.

  “Williams,” said Mr. Watcyns, “get Miss Briggs in, will you?”

  “Certainly, sir,” said Williams, and got Miss Briggs in.

  Miss Briggs was Mr. Watcyns’ second-best stenographer, and arrived with notebook poised at the alert and pencil stuck in her hair.

  “Photograph…” said Mr. Watcyns, on the lines of the film-star in the Noel Coward revue. “Photograph.…Tell them no, as politely as possible.…Photograph.…Ask them to draw up a contract on the lines suggested.…Photograph.…Photograph.…What the hell’s this?”

  Mr. Watcyns read the letter in his hand several times.

  “Williams!” he said.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Get the car out at once.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And pack a suitcase.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I may be going away for the week-end.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And answer the rest of that muck as you think fit, Miss Briggs.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And get out of the way, Williams.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mr. Watcyns went back to his bedroom in a hurry. He had the outspoken dressing-gown off and his overcoat and hat on in its place within thirty seconds. Another thirty to collect gloves and stick and arrive at the door of his flat. Fortunately the car had been just as speedy in getting out of the garage. Mr. Watcyns slipped into the driving-seat.

  “If anyone calls, tell them I’m in Czechoslovakia,” he said.

  “Yes, sir,” said Williams. “Czechoslovakia, sir. It shall have my attention, sir.”

  Mr. Watcyns was at Mr. Douglas B. Douglas’s offices in Great Kempton Street on the stroke of twelve.

  ***

  It was Mr. Douglas’s habit to arrive at his office shortly before that time. Anything earlier than eleven-thirty was a phenomenon. Consequently the staff of Douglas B. Douglas Productions, Ltd., had got a nasty jar when their lord and master clocked in at nine-thirty that morning. They were busily engaged with the racing pages, the society gossip, and the football news of the Daily Gazette, according to their individual tastes, at the time, and Mr. Douglas said just what he thought of them in a few well-chosen sentences. He then shot into his private office and slammed the door. At ten o’clock Mr. Douglas put through a transatlantic ’phone call to Middleschmidt and Jacobson, Theatrical Agents, New York City. At ten-thirty-five the call came more or less through. The noise in Mr. Douglas’s right ear was not unlike Niagara after a particularly heavy year’s rainfall. “Hullo,” said Mr. Douglas. “Is that New York? Hullo. Hullo? Hullo, hullo, hullo. Hell. Hullo! Is that Middleschmidt and Jacobson, New Ork? Douglas B. Douglas speaking from London. Listen. I have a big musical show opening here in three weeks. I want a leading man, and I want him badly. Needn’t be an actor within the meaning of the act, needn’t have a voice, but must be able to dance. Name and personality essential. Grand part for the right man. I understand you’ve got a fellow of the name of Elmer Clarkson doing nothing at the moment. Listen, then.

  “There’s a boat leaves New York at midnight to-night. Gets in to Southampton Saturday midday. I want that bird Clarkson on the stage of the Grosvenor Theatre, London, England, by ten o’clock Monday morning. And I won’t take no for an answer. Is that perfectly clear?” New York, after a brisk bout of atmospherics, said, “Pardon?” Mr. Douglas mopped his brow and repeated the recitation more or less verbatim. New York then said, “Sorry. Line’s bad. You’d better cable us. So long.” Mr. Douglas jammed back the receiver and swore several times in three languages. He then selected a cigar from the large box on his desk, removed the band, spat the end accurately across the desk and past a secretary on the other side and into a waste-paper basket standing against the wall opposite, and tried Paris. Was there such a thing as a leading man doing nothing at the Folies Bergère at the present moment?

  Paris, needless to say, said no—there being precious few moments when men, leading or led, are wasting their time doing nothing at the Folies Bergère. Berlin, Mr. Douglas’s next port of telephone call, merely said, “Es tut mir leid,” over and over again in a highly exasperating fashion. Mr. Douglas swore again and champed the remains of his cigar into an ashtray. At twenty to twelve Mr. Douglas had another go at New York. He had just got through when Ivor Watcyns burst on the scene.

  “Shut up,” said Mr. Douglas. “Shut up and sit down.”

  The atmosphere over the Atlantic seemed to have cleared up a little as the day went on. It was now rather less like Niagara and rather more like the resumption of work on the giant Cunarder.

  “Hullo,” said Mr. Douglas. “Hullo? Hullo. Hull—Middleschmidt and Jacobson? Fine! Douglas B. Douglas speaking from London. I want a leading man for a new musical show opening here in three weeks. How about this fellow Elmer Clarkson?”

  “Glad to get rid of him,” said New York.

  “Fine. Boat leaves New York to-night, arrives here Saturday. Put him on board. Rehearsal ten o’clock Monday, Grosvenor Theatre, London. All set?”

  “Oke,” said New York. “Hey!…”

  “What?”

  “What’s the salary?” asked New York in a mercenary way.

  “Um…four hundred a week,” said Mr. Douglas.

  “Dollars?”

  “Pounds,” said Mr. Douglas, biting his upper lip in agony. He had intended to leave it an open question, but New York had said that “Dollars” in a very superior sort of way.

  “Not a chance,” said New York.

  “Make it four-fifty.”

  “Don’t make us laff.”

  “Five hundred a week. Get him here by Monday morning.”
>
  “Huh!” said New York.

  “What was that you said?”

  “We said ‘Huh!’ There’s a new show opening on Broadway in six weeks. We got Elmer under option for the leading part at six thousand dollars a week. Sorry. So long.”

  Mr. Douglas threw down the receiver and chose another cigar.

  “Look here…” said Mr. Watcyns.

  “Do me a favour, Ivor. Go quietly away for a Mediterranean cruise or something. Any other time I’d have been crazy about seeing you. There’s a lot of things I want to talk over with you before the show reopens. That third act’s got to be rewritten. And a lot of Brandon’s songs taken out. But just now I’m rather busy, see? Brandon Baker was never much use as an actor when he was alive, but he’s a damn’ sight less use now he’s stiff. And I’ve got to find someone to take his place, you see? So run along, Ivor, and leave me to it.”

  “What’s this about Gwen Astle throwing up her part?” asked Mr. Watcyns, refusing to run along.

  “What?”

  “She’s walking out on the show. I had a note from her this morning.”

  “What does she think this is, eh—an epidemic? What’s she think a contract is, eh? Dammit, it’s not a peace treaty, you know. You’ve got to take some notice of a contract. What’s biting her, eh?”

  “She’s got the jimjams. Over this Brandon business. Says she can’t carry on with her part. Listen, D. B. D.—you’ve got to make her play her part, understand?”

  “I’ve got to?” said D. B. D. “Listen here. My hands are going to be plenty full finding another leading man without bothering about leading ladies. If Gwendoline wants to clear out, she can clear. There were eighty-nine actresses sitting on my doorstep when I was casting that part, and I don’t expect all the other eighty-eight have got jobs by this time. You can tell Gwen Astle with my compliments that she can get out and stay out, for all I care. And that is that.”

  Mr. Watcyns leaned over the desk and gripped Mr. Douglas by the lapels.