‘I’ll help you. What does it matter what I do now?’
‘Transcendental meditation no good? Doesn’t the “earth’s plenty” — ’
‘Listen, Charles!’ Alex turned in fury, his fist clenched.
‘Sorry. Stupid remark. I’m as screwed up as you are.’
‘Yes, I must say this is a wonderful “new start”.’ Alex laughed bitterly. ‘For the last few months I’ve really been feeling together, an integrated personality for the first time since my breakdown. And now. . Do you know, my psychiatrist spent hour after hour convincing me that it was all in the mind, that nobody really was out to get me, that the world wasn’t conspiring against me. . And I’d just about begun to believe him. And now — this. Something like this happens and you realise it’s all true. The world really is conspiring against you. I’d like to see a psychiatrist convince me this is all in the mind. It’s a — ’
Charles interrupted him crudely. ‘Glasses. Be too sordid for both of us to drink out of the bottle.’
Alex went off for glasses and Charles put the bottle down on a coffee table. As he did so, he moved a handkerchief that was lying on it.
He uncovered a gun. The Smith and Wesson Chiefs Special.
Alex saw him looking at it as he came back with the glasses.
‘Yes, I’d just got that out when you rang the bell.’
‘Thinking of using it?’
Alex smiled a little twisted smile. ‘Had crossed my mind. Trouble was, I couldn’t decide whether to use it on myself or on the rest of the bastards.’
Charles laughed uneasily. ‘I’m sure your psychiatrist wouldn’t recommend suicide.’
‘No, he wouldn’t. He was a great believer in expressing aggression, not bottling it up. If I were to take this gun and shoot. . who? Paul Lexington? Micky Banks? Bobby Anscombe? Doesn’t matter, there are so many of them. No, if I were to do that, my psychiatrist would reckon it proved my cure was complete.’ He suddenly found this notion very funny and burst into laughter.
Charles poured two large measures of Bell’s and handed one over. The laughter subsided, leaving Alex drained and depressed.
‘So what are you going to do, Alex?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘About the understudy job.’
‘I don’t know,’ the actor intoned lethargically. ‘It’d be work, I suppose. I could keep on the flat.’
‘And see Lesley-Jane. .’
‘Yes.’ The name evinced no sign of interest. ‘Give me another drink.’
Charles obliged, and filled up his own at the same time.
‘Were you offered the same deal, Charles?’
‘What — the great honour of understudying my own part? Oh yes, Paul nobly offered me that.’
‘And what are you going to do about it?’
‘God knows. Ask my agent, I suppose.’
‘Hmm. Give me another drink.’
‘Maurice, it’s Charles.’
‘I wish you wouldn’t ring me at home. I try to keep work and my private life separate.’
‘I know, but this is important. And it’s the weekend.’
‘You don’t have to tell me that, Charles.’
‘Was that your wife I spoke to?’
‘Mind your own business.’
‘Listen, Maurice, about The Hooded Owl. . I’ve got the boot.’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘Oh, all of a sudden you know. On Thursday you didn’t even know the show was transferring.’
‘No, I had a call yesterday afternoon from Paul. . Leamington?’
‘Lexington.’
‘Yes. Pleasant young man he sounded.’
‘Oh, a great charmer.’
‘Anyway, he told me about the necessity of recasting. And I said, of course, I fully understood.’
‘Thank you very much.’
‘Now what’s that tone of voice for, Charles?’
‘Well, really! You “fully understood” that your client had got the sack. Why didn’t you stand up for me?’
‘Now come on, Charles. We both know you’re a very good actor, but you’re not a name, are you?’
‘Hardly surprising, with you for a bloody agent,’ Charles mumbled.
‘What was that, Charles? I didn’t catch it.’
‘Never mind.’
‘Well, anyway, the good news is that Mr. Leventon — ’
‘Lexington.’
‘Yes, has offered most attractive terms for an understudy contract for you.’
‘Oh, terrific.’
‘No, really very generous. I mean, a hundred and fifty a week — that’s as much as I’d’ve expected you to get for actually acting.’
Blood money, thought Charles.
‘Six-month contract, too. I mean, when were you last offered a six-month contract for anything?’
‘So you reckon I should take it?’
‘Well, of course, Charles. What’s the alternative?’
‘No other lucrative jobs on the horizon?’
‘’Fraid not, Charles. As you know, it’s not a good time. All the provincial companies have sorted out their seasons, most of the big tellies are cast, there’s not much on the — ’
‘Yes, all right, all right. In other words, things are exactly as usual.’
‘Yes.’
‘And you really think I should take it?’
‘Yes. I can’t think why you’re havering. It’s obvious. A very good offer.’
‘Yes, but it is understudying a part I’ve already played — and played well.’
‘So?’
‘So. . it becomes a matter of pride.’
‘Pride? You, Charles? Oh, really.’ And Maurice Skellern let out a gasping laugh, as if the joke had really cheered up his weekend.
It was inevitable that, when rerehearsals started on the Monday, the centre of attention should be Michael Banks. His theatrical successes exceeded those of all the rest of the cast added together (and the money Paul Lexington had agreed with his agent quite possibly exceeded their total too).
His face was so familiar that he seemed to have been with the production for weeks. Few of the cast would have seen him in the revues of the late thirties where his career started, but they would all have caught up with the films he had made in the immediate post-war years. He had had a distinguished war, being wounded once and decorated twice, and had spent the next five years recreating it in a series of patriotic British movies. Michael Banks it always was who gazed grimly at the enemy submarine from the bridge, Michael Banks who went back for the wounded private in the jungle, Michael Banks who ignored the smoke pouring from his Spitfire’s engine as he trained his sights on the alien Messerschmidt.
He had then gone to Hollywood in the early fifties and stayed there long enough to show that he could cope with the system and be moderately successful, but not so long as to alienate his chauvinistic British following.
The West End then beckoned, and he appeared as a solid juvenile in a sequence of light comedies. He was good box office and managements fell over themselves to get his name on their marquees.
That continued until the early sixties, when, for the first time, his career seemed to be under threat. Fashions had changed; the new youth-oriented culture had nothing but contempt for the gritty, laconic heroism of the war, of which Michael Banks remained the symbol. The trendies of Camaby Street flounced around in military uniforms, sporting flowers of peace where medals once had hung. Acting styles changed too, as did the plays in which they were exhibited. The mannered delivery of West End comedies sounded ridiculous at the kitchen sink, and became the butt of the booming satire industry.
‘The wind of change’, that phrase coined by Harold Macmillan in 1960, grew to have a more general application than just to Africa, or just to politics. It represented a change of style, and this new wind threatened to blow away all that was dated and traditional.
Amongst other things, it threatened to blow away the career of Michael Banks.
And it might well have done. He had reached that most difficult of ages for a successful actor, his forties. The audience who had loved him as a stage juvenile were themselves growing old, and could not fail to notice the signs of ageing in their idol. The rising generation was not interested. To them Michael Banks represented that anathema — something their parents liked. If they saw him in a play, they saw a middle-aged man pretending to be young, in an outdated vehicle that bore as much relation to their reality as crinolines and penny-farthings.