Seven Dials

by Claire Rayner

  ‘I didn’t know that - I mean, that it was Theo who got you to Hollywood.’

  She laughed then, a rather thin little sound. ‘No, I don’t suppose you did. I didn’t exactly make a song and dance about it. Damnit, I felt such a bloody fool, I’d have died rather than let anyone know what he did to me, but now -’ Again she shrugged. ‘Now it doesn’t matter so much.’

  ‘What did he do?’

  She looked at him briefly and then away and looking at her face in the bright morning sunlight that was pouring in through his bedroom window to fill the small area with golden light he thought - she’s getting older. My kid sister, getting older. I suppose I am too, a bit -

  ‘Made love to me. Oh, not real love, you understand. But all the chat and the attention and the sexy come on - and I fell for it. Like a bloody ton of bricks.’ She looked at him briefly again and managed a grin. ‘Stupid, wasn’t it? There he was, a raging queen, and I fell head over ears for him and wanted him so badly I could - well, never mind. And it was just what the lousy bastard intended me to do. Do you wonder I get so livid when he’s around? I could kill him every time I see him - and then - oh, then I get used to seeing him again, and we go back to being more civilized. But it isn’t a thing a girl forgets that easily.’

  ‘You’re still in love with him,’ Brin said, startled at his own prescience, and she went suddenly scarlet.

  ‘If you ever say anything like that in public I’ll kill you,’ she said, and her voice was low and thin but it made him draw back a little into his pillows all the same. ‘The way I feel is no one’s goddamned business but mine - you hear me? And I’ll tell you this much - I don’t go in for falling in love with people. I may fall for sexiness but I don’t get soggy with it and burble on about love. That’s for the idiots, not for me. Other people drool over me, in case you hadn’t noticed, and that’s the way it’s supposed to be. So don’t you go trotting out any of that sort of romantic garbage about me ever again or -’

  He put up both hands in a gesture of mock terror. ‘All right, all right! Not another syllable do I utter, ducky. I don’t give a damn anyway. I’m more interested in my own career than I am in your love life.’

  ‘That’s sensible. Keep it that way.’ She seemed to calm down as fast as she had caught fire and once more wriggled comfortably into the counterpane.

  There was a little pause and then Brin said, ‘So you think Theo told these people at this studio that they ought to take me? Why should he? It sounds crazy to me –’

  ‘No, it isn’t. It’s the Hollywood way. And listen, ducks. Let’s be clear about this. Getting this sort of contract may sound delicious, but it’s not for real, you know – not for the big side of the business.’

  He looked alarmed and opened his mouth to protest, but she shook her head impatiently. ‘Oh, it’s for real in that they’ll take you out there, pay you the money, do the test and groom you and prime the old publicity machine and so forth, but whether it’s a big career – that’s another kettle of catfish. You’ll have to do something good – and then – then, of course the sky’s the limit, as long as you don’t make any mistakes.’ She looked bleak for a moment. ‘I made a mistake, agreeing to let my studio lend me to Letty. That damned The Lady Leapt High did me no good at all –’

  ‘You’ll do all right, Katy, for God’s sake!’ Brin said. ‘I mean, everyone knows you, you couldn’t be more famous and –’

  ‘Oh, yes I could. I’ve a long way to go yet. But I’ve learned a lot doing that rotten film. Like the importance of using every chance you get, and not getting cocky. Remember it too, Brin, if you want to make it in this lousy business. Never get cocky. I did, and I’m paying for it –’

  She bent her head over the cable once more and then, slowly, her lips curved and she looked up at Brin with her eyes wide and very bright. ‘Hey, I have me a sizeable idea. I think it’s time we talked to Theo, what say you? Thank him nicely for tipping off the studio and getting them to offer for you and then suggest that maybe they’d like to go for a cuteness award.’

  He stared at her, puzzled by the way she was getting less and less English the more she talked. It was as though even thinking about Hollywood imbued her with Hollywood ways and a Hollywood voice.

  ‘A cuteness award?’

  She clambered off the bed and reached for his dressing-gown from the chair and threw it at him. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’m going to phone Theo. He’s leaving from Southampton tomorrow for New York – we’ve time to do a bit of parsnip buttering before he goes –’ And she went out to the living– room and he could hear her dealing with the telephone as he struggled into the robe.

  By the time he reached the sitting–room she was talking to Theo and he stood leaning against the door jamb listening, and marvelling a little. This was a side of her he had never seen, this crisp businesswoman, and it was a revelation to him; and an agreeable one.

  Ever since he had started on his attempt to build a career as an actor he had felt at a disadvantage because of his younger sister. She had got there first, she had taken the limelight first, she had succeeded first. There had been a sense of isolation in him as he had tried to push his way through into the damnably exciting, frustrating and eternally seductive business he had chosen, but now, listening to Katy, he felt the warmth of kinship. He had always had the ambition to succeed, the burning hunger for the stage that was even more important than talent, as he knew perfectly well, but deep down he had doubted, often, whether he could make it. When his long dreary years as an ENSA entertainer had ended in that stupid flying bomb incident he had been sick with terror that this was indeed the end of the road. All there was for him in the future, he had told himself despairingly, was working for his father and brothers in that hateful Mill in Haworth, and contemplation of that had sharpened his desperate need to renew his damaged face, to try again to make the bitch success bow her head to him.

  But now, listening to Katy on the phone, the fear dripped away, and was gone. He had her support now, and he could do it, he knew he could, and he grinned at her as she winked back at him.

  ‘I thought you’d like it, Theo. Tell ’em when you get there, then? There’ve been sisters who’ve made it, of course, but we’ll be different from the Cummingses and the de Havilands and the Fontaines. We’re one of each kind, so we won’t be competing for lovers, or with looks, and we’re going to be the closest pair in Hollywood – the columnists’ll adore us and the Hays Committee will purr with all that cosy family life. Sounds good, hmm?’

  She listened for a while, nodding and then said, ‘Theo, you’re a lousy bastard. Always was, always will be –’ But there was no rancour in her voice. ‘What? Oh, right. He’s here.’

  She held out the phone to Brin. ‘He wants to talk to you.’

  ‘Brin?’ Theo said, his voice thinned and remote. ‘Glad to hear they got in touch so fast. I told ’em to move it or everyone else’d snap you up.’

  ‘It was – thank you, Theo,’ Brin said a little lamely. ‘It was very good of you.’

  ‘Not good – realistic. Ask that spitfire sister of yours. She’ll tell you what a jungle Hollywood is. I behave like a jackal when I’m there, and you’ll have to do the same. This new idea of hers. Good for her, of course, first and foremost – it’s a better studio than the one she’s with and they’ll be better for her – but it’s good for you too. Nice big brother and sister act – it’s different. And it’s a help to ride on someone else’s back, and she was good for you on Saturday. D’you know how good?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  There was a little silence and then Theo said, ‘Well, never mind. Maybe you can pull it off on your own eventually. But at this stage you need Katy, so for God’s sake hold on to her. When she gets bitchy – as she will, my friend, as she will – hold on. Don’t let her get away and leave you. You need her –’

  ‘Er – yes,’ Brin said and frowned, a little mystified. ‘Look, you know I’m really quite fit? I mean I know I have
this scar, but I’m going to get that fixed. It’s all arranged – but once that’s done I’ll be as right as ninepence. I mean, you don’t have to worry about my health or whether I can cope. I don’t need looking after. I’ve got one sister who does that, and I loathe it – one of the best things about Katy is that she doesn’t fuss over me. I don’t think I could cope if she did.’

  ‘I doubt she’s ever going to do that!’ Theo said and laughed. ‘And it wasn’t your health I meant. Never mind. Just remember what I said. Stick with her – you need her – oh, and by the way –’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘Stick to the scar, too.’

  Brin blinked. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Stick to the scar. It’s great – a major asset. You wouldn’t have half the charm you’ve got for the studio without it. War hero – never let it go. I didn’t.’

  ‘You didn’t what?’

  Again there was a little pause and then Theo said lightly, ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s just that I had my share of war the first time around. They made a lot of play on it, when I first got out to the coast. They’ll do the same to you. However much you hate it, let ’em do it. Encourage it, even. It pays off. I’ll see you in LA, old man. Let me talk to Katy again –’

  Brin handed the phone over and stood by the window as Katy chattered and then, as she at last hung up, turned and said shortly, ‘What did he mean, I need you?’

  She looked at him consideringly, her head on one side, and then seemed to make a decision.

  ‘Listen, ducks, you have a lot to learn about the business of acting. It’s all tricks, you know. Tricks and now and again magic when the feeling gets to be right. Well, on Saturday night I got the feeling right and I made magic happen for you. Didn’t you feel it?’

  ‘I felt myself doing a good job,’ he said a little stiffly. ‘The best I could. And they seemed to like it.’

  ‘It’ll get better,’ she said cryptically. ‘And then they’ll know what it is they’re getting. That lot on Saturday – they didn’t have a notion what they were seeing.’ She shook her head. ‘Never mind, ducks. Let it be. Just listen to what Theo said, if he told you you needed me. You do need me, so be nice to me. However tough I get, you need me. And I dare say I might need you, quite a bit. It’s a bloody lonely place, Hollywood’, and her face seemed to look old again for a brief second.

  Beside her the phone trilled again and she picked it up.

  ‘Who? Oh, hello, Charlie,’ she said and then listened, her eyes on Brin and her brows lifted. ‘I don’t know – I just got here. I’ll see if he’s in – I haven’t found out yet – hold on.’

  She covered the mouthpiece with her hand. ‘Do you want to talk to her?’ she asked softly. ‘It’s up to you, of course, but if you’ll take my advice you’ll be out. She’s crazy over you – anyone can see that – and you’ve got other things to think about right now, haven’t you?’

  He stared at her, frowning slightly, and then nodded.

  ‘Tell her I’m out and you don’t know what time I’ll be back. And don’t take a message.’

  24

  Charlie tried very hard not to believe it. She told herself that it was inevitable that he should be preoccupied with what had happened to him, that people in the theatre business would be fussing over him, offering him work perhaps, and there was certainly enough in the newspapers to feed that belief. It seemed impossible to open one of them without finding articles about him, and seeing photographs.

  She would sit in the medical common room over her breakfast looking at those photographs and especially at the way no attempt was made to hide the scarred cheek, how indeed some seemed to go out of their way to display the way his eye puckered and his lips curled when he smiled, and doubts would curl their way into her mind, but she would push them away. There was nothing mysterious about it. He was heavily occupied, obviously, but he would turn up at Nellie’s as she had arranged for him to do and then they would be able to talk, before she did his operation, and afterwards too, when she checked the dressings and took out her spiders’ web stitches. It would all be fine, she was anxious for no reason – and she would close the paper and set about work, hurrying on her way to the wards and the day’s business.

  But the anxiety was there, and she found that after all she couldn’t just wait for the day of his planned admission. She phoned his flat, often, but most of the time there was no answer. Once Mrs Burroughs had spoken, shouting loudly and obviously far from comfortable in dealing with the instrument, and she had tried to leave a message but despaired at the woman’s inability to cope with that and arranged to call back. Then she had got his sister Katy and she said she didn’t know where he was, and for a while Charlie had considered just going to the flat and knocking on the door. But she shrank from that. Suppose he was in the middle of some sort of interview or discussion about his future? That such interviews and discussions were a major part of his life at the moment she could not doubt; newspaper report after newspaper report made that clear, and she would read them and despair at the thinness of real news in these hot summer days, that made constant gossip about Brin so staple a part of the papers’ diet.

  Once, almost a week after the Benefit when she had still heard nothing from him, nor been able to reach him, she became so very anxious that she actually phoned Sophie. She had thought hard about that, remembering how angry the woman had made her, but it was different now, she told herself. Quite different. And anyway, all she was doing was trying to reach Brin –

  But Sophie had been of no help. ‘My brother?’ she had said, in that flat Yorkshire voice of hers, when she answered the phone. ‘Nay, he’s not here, he lives next door, in his own flat –’

  ‘I’m well aware of that,’ Charlie had snapped. ‘But I don’t seem able to find him in and –’

  ‘Oh, he’s very busy at present,’ Sophie had said. ‘I’m told he’s been offered any number of these acting engagements. I don’t know what, of course, he hasn’t told me. But his cousin, Peter, he’s told me. I’d phone his flat again, if I were you. Or write him a letter –’

  And Charlie had done just that, but it had made no difference. He didn’t answer, and she told herself on the Wednesday morning when he was to be admitted that that was why; he had seen no point in letters when they were to meet so soon, and she had set about her day’s work feeling better than she had since the night of the show. Today they’d be able to talk, today he would explain his silence, and all would be well.

  At three o’clock the admissions clerk phoned her on Elm Ward where she’d been asked to deal with a difficult case of abdominal ascites which needed tapping, and she finished setting the last cannula carefully in place and washed her hands quickly, her pulses thumping slightly in her ears before she picked up the phone. He’d arrived at last, she told herself, working very hard at being calm. She’d asked the clerk to let her know as soon as he got here, and at last he had. A little late – he’d been told to come at noon – but he’d arrived.

  ‘Miss Lucas? I’ve a bit of a problem. Your patient, Mr Lackland – he hasn’t shown up, and I’ve got an urgent request from Mr Fitzsimmons’ firm. They’ve got a compound fracture they want to plate, and there aren’t any beds anywhere, apart from this one on Spruce. Is Mr Lackland going to take it up? I can’t really turn Mr Fitz down, you see. I mean, he’s a consultant and –’ She let the words hang in the air and Charlie stared sightlessly at the ledger on Sister’s desk where she was sitting and thought – I’m just a registrar dealing with an unpopular speciality. She’d had enough trouble getting this bed against the disapproval of several of the senior surgeons who didn’t regard the work she was trying to do as sufficiently important, and to block Fitz, the highly mercurial little orthopaedic consultant, was to court all sorts of trouble.

  ‘How long can you hold the bed?’

  ‘Well, till four, perhaps. But no longer. This patient’s in Cas, you see, and though Sister Briar said she was going to try to clear her side ward
for him, she’s not too hopeful. She’s got extra beds up as it is – I am sorry, Miss Lucas, I really am –’

  ‘I’ll call you back,’ Charlie said decisively. ‘If you haven’t heard from me or the patient by four, then let the bed go to Fitz –’ And she hung up the phone with a clatter and went half running over to her room to shed her white coat and pull on a jacket. She’d have to go to the flat, find him and remind him. The ass, she thought; he’s forgotten. In all the excitement of the reaction to that damned show he’d forgotten the most important thing in his life –

  And that was when she had to believe what had happened, when all her attempts at self-delusion collapsed.

  She had run all the way to Cambridge Circus and then across Earlham Street, dodging the traffic by the skin of her teeth, because she was looking up at his living-room window to see if she could see him there, and gone running up the stairs to the first floor and banged imperiously on the door. After a long wait it was opened cautiously by Mrs Burroughs.

  ‘Oh!’ she said, staring at Charlie closely. ‘Oh. It’s you –’

  ‘I’ve got to see Mr Lackland,’ Charlie said peremptorily. ‘It’s important.’

  The woman seemed to bridle and then looked uneasily over her shoulder.