He hung his jacket on a hook in the Green Room. As it swung against the wall, there was a thud of something hard in the pocket.
Alex Household gave a twisted smile and announced ironically, ‘Right, here we go. Tonight will be the climax of my career. Twenty-three years in the business has all been the build-up for this, as I take on my most challenging role ever — bloody prompter!’
‘Come on, Alex. It’s not so bad, it’s — ’
‘Isn’t it? What do you know about how bad it is?’
Charles retreated under this assault. ‘I just meant. . Never mind. Back to what I said first — break a leg.’
‘I should think that will be the very least I will break,’ said Alex Household, and walked towards the stage.
Charles knew it would be unprofessional to use the pass-door from backstage to the auditorium once the house had started to fill, so he went out of the Stage Door to walk round.
The first thing he came across outside was Malcolm Harris being sick in the gutter.
‘Are you O.K.?’
‘Yes, I. . will be.’
‘Don’t worry. It’s going fine. And at least Micky’s deaf-aid thing guarantees that he does actually say the lines you wrote.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’ The schoolmaster looked up at him pitifully. ‘I just don’t think I can sit out there and watch it all. I’m so jumpy, I’ll be sick again or. .’
‘Then don’t sit there. Stand at the back, go backstage, go out for a walk, do whatever makes you feel most relaxed.’
‘But if I don’t sit in my seat, I’ll be leaving my wife and my wife’s mother on their own.’
‘Well, you could do that, couldn’t you?’
‘Yes, I suppose I could.’ But obviously it was an idea that had never occurred to him before, and his mind would take a little while to accommodate it.
‘Frances, I’m sorry I’m late.’
‘When were you ever otherwise?’
‘I wasn’t late for that meal in Hampstead.’ Even as he said it, he wished he hadn’t. There was something about the memory of that evening that made him uneasy. He kissed her clumsily to change the subject.
‘Anyway, what is all this? Why aren’t you going to be on-stage? When we last met, you told me. .’
‘I’ll explain. Have we got time for a drink?’
They would have had, but there was such a crush in the bar, there was no prospect of getting served before the curtain went up. Which was annoying.
While they reconnoitred the bar and found their seats (on the aisle, so that, if his services as an understudy were required, Charles could be quickly extracted), he gave Frances a brief resume of how he had lost his part.
‘Well, I think that’s rotten,’ she said, with genuine annoyance. It cheered Charles, to hear her angry on his behalf. He took her hand and felt the scar on her thumb, legacy of an accident with a kitchen knife in the early days of their marriage. Accumulated emotion made him weak, needing her.
‘Charles!’
‘Well, if it isn’t that naughty Charles Paris. .’
‘With his lovely wife. .’
‘Frances, isn’t it? Oh, it’s been so long. .’
‘An absolute age. .’
This stereo assault on them came from two men in late middle age, bizarrely costumed in matching Victorian evening dress. Instantly Charles recognised William Bartlemas and Kevin O’Rourke, a pair of indefatigable first-nighters.
‘And how are you, Charles?’ demanded Bartlemas.
‘Yes, how are you?’ echoed O’Rourke.
Neither waited for a reply as they galloped on. ‘Are you still up to your naughty detective things we hear so much about?’
‘Yes, are you?’
‘No, not at the moment. I — ’ was all he managed to get out.
‘Another first night. I don’t know. .’
‘Not as glittering as it should be, is it, Bartlemas. .?’
‘No, not really glittering, no. .’
‘So few people dress up for first nights these days. .’
‘It is disgraceful. .’
‘Appalling. .’
‘That lot. .’ he gestured to a large block of seats full of people in evening dress, ‘have made the effort. .’
‘Yes, but they’re Micky Banks’s chums. .’
‘Oh well. .’
‘At least that generation knows how to behave at a first night. .’
‘That generation, dear? They’re our generation!’ This witticism reduced both of them to helpless laughter. But not for long enough for Charles or Frances to say anything.
‘Lot of paper in tonight, isn’t there?’ said Bartlemas, looking up to the Circle and Gallery.
‘Lot of paper, yes. .’
‘Paper?’ Frances managed to query.
‘Free seats, love. Often happens for a first night if it’s not selling. .’
‘Yes, blocks of tickets sent round the nurses’ homes, that sort of thing. .’
‘Believe me, love, if you go to as many first nights as we do, you get to recognise them. .’
‘Recognise individual nurses even. .’
‘There’s one with a wall-eye and a wart on her nose who I swear goes to more first nights than we do. .’
This also was apparently a joke. They roared with laughter.
‘Why is there so much paper?’ Charles managed to ask.
‘No publicity, dear. .’
‘And the theatres out of the way. .’
‘People’d flood to see Micky Banks. .’
‘Simply flood. .’
‘But they’ve got to know where he is. .’
‘As you say, no publicity. .’
‘By the way, who’s Dottie with tonight?’
‘Don’t know, but looks such a nice young man. .’
‘Joy-boy?’
‘Maybe. .’
‘Oh,’ said Charles. ‘You mean she and Micky don’t. .’
‘Now you don’t want us telling tales out of school, do you?’
‘Oh, you naughty Charles Paris, you. .’
They seemed set to continue talking forever, but the auditorium lights began to dim, so they scuttered off, giggling, to find their seats.
Charles and Frances sat down too. And with feelings too complex to itemise, he watched the curtain rise on the first official London performance of The Hooded Owl.
The applause at the interval was very generous. It almost always is on a first night, when the audience tends to be Mums, Dads, husbands, wives, lovers and friends-in-the-business. But, even allowing for that, Charles reckoned they were enjoying it.
Michael Banks was giving a performance of effortless authority. Some of the cognoscenti had recognised why he was wearing the deaf-aid, but for the majority, it just seemed to be part of the character, justified by a couple of new lines.
The performances were all up, with the possible exception of Lesley-Jane Decker, who seemed to be giving a little less than usual. Probably the result of nerves at her first West End opening.
But what also shone through was how good a play The Hooded Owl was. It was very conventional, even old-fashioned, but its tensions built up in just the right way, and it gripped like a strangler’s hand.
Charles looked round to where he knew Malcolm Harris should be, but the seat between the ferret-faced women was empty. The author had taken his advice and was presumably prowling around somewhere. His ferret-faced women looked unamused by his absence.
Charles and Frances joined the exodus to the bar and met another couple coming towards them. The man was unfamiliar, but there was no mistaking the woman with her subsidised red hair.
‘Charles, darling!’
‘Oh. Valerie. I don’t think you know my wife, Frances. .’
‘But of course I do. We met in Cheltenham.’
‘Did we?’ asked Frances, clueless as to whom she was addressing.
‘Yes, yes, all those years ago.’
‘Oh.’
‘And this. .’ said Valerie Cass, with no attempt to disguise her contempt, is my husband.’
He was twenty years older than his wife and looked meek and long-suffering. As indeed he would have to be. Either that or divorced. Or dead.