“To your excellent health, Mac,” they said — Sir Charles aloud and his reflection silently. The raw, cheap whiskey burned a warm and grateful path.
Mac looked over and said, “You’re a screwy guy, Charlie, but I like you. Sometimes I think you really are a knight. I dunno.”
“A Hair perhaps divides the False and True” said Sir Charles. “Do you by any chance know Omar, Mac?”
“Omar who?”
“The tentmaker. A great old boy, Mac; he’s got me down to a T. Listen to this:
Mac said, “I don’t get it.”
Sir Charles sighed. “Am I all awry, Mac? Seriously, I’m going to phone and make an important appointment, maybe.
Do I look all right or am I leaning all awry? Oh, Lord, Mac, I just thought what that would make me. Hamawry.”
“You look all right, Charlie.”
“But, Mac, you missed that horrible pun. Ham awry. Ham on rye.”
“You mean you want a sandwich?”
Sir Charles smiled gently. He said, “I’ll change my mind, Mac; I’m not hungry after all. But perhaps the exchequer will stand another drink.”
It stood another drink. Mac went to another customer.
The haze was coming, the gentle haze. The figure in the back-bar mirror smiled at him as though they had a secret in common. And they had, but the drinks were helping them to forget it — at least to shove it to the back of the mind. Now, through the gentle haze that was not really drunkenness, that figure in the mirror did not say, “You’re a fraud and a failure, Sir Charles, living on black mail,” as it so often and so accusingly had said. No, now it said, “You’re a fine fellow, Sir Charles; a little down on your luck for these last few — let us not say how many-years. Things are going to change. You’ll walk the boards; you’ll hold audiences in the palm of your hand. You’re an actor, man.”
He downed his second shot to that, and then, sipping his beer slowly, he read again the article in Stagecraft the actor’s Bible.
There wasn’t much detail, but there was enough. The name of the melodrama was The Perfect Crime, which didn’t matter; the author was Wayne Campbell, which did matter.
Wayne could try to get him into the cast; Wayne would try.
And not because of threat of blackmail; quite the converse.
And, although this didn’t matter either, the play was being backed by Nick Corianos. Maybe, come to think of it, that did matter. Nick Corianos was a plunger, a real bigshot.
The Perfect Crime wouldn’t lack for funds, not if Nick was backing it. You’ve heard of Nick Corianos. Legend has it that he once dropped half a million dollars in a single forty-hour session of poker, and laughed about it. Legend says many unpleasant things about him, too, but the police have never proved them.
Sir Charles smiled at the thought — Nick Corianos getting away with The Perfect Crime. He wondered if that thought had come to Corianos, if it was part of his reason for backing this particular play. One of life’s little pleasures, thinking such things. Posing, posturing, knowing you were ridiculous, knowing you were a cheat and a failure, you lived on the little pleasures — and the big dreams.
Still smiling gently, he picked up his change and went to the phone booth at the front of the tavern near the door. He dialed Wayne Campbell’s number. He said, “Wayne? This is Charles Gresham.”
“Yes?”
“May I see you, at your office?”
Now listen, Gresham, if it’s more money, no. You’ve got some coming in three days and you agreed, definitely agreed, that if I gave you that amount regularly, you’d—”
“Wayne, it’s not money. The opposite, my dear boy. It can save you money.”
“How?” He was cold, suspicious.
“You’ll be casting for your new play. Oh, I know you don’t do the actual casting yourself, but a word from you — a word from you, Wayne, would get me a part. Even a walk-on, Wayne, anything, and I won’t bother you again.”
“While the play runs, you mean?”
Sir Charles cleared his throat. He said, regretfully, “Of course, while the play runs. But if it’s a play of yours, Wayne, it may run a long time.”
“You’d get drunk and get fired before it got out of rehearsal.”
“No. I don’t drink when I’m working, Wayne. What have you to lose? I won’t disgrace you. You know I can act. Don’t you?”
“Yes.” It was grudging, but it was a yes. “All right —you’ve got a point if it’ll save me money. And it’s a cast of fourteen; I suppose I could—”
“I’ll be right over, Wayne. And thanks, thanks a lot.” He left the booth and went outside, quickly, into the cool, crisp air, before he’d be tempted to take another drink to celebrate the fact that he would be on the boards again. Might be, he corrected himself quickly. Even with help from Wayne Campbell, it was no certainty.
He shivered a little, walking to the subway. He’d have to buy himself a coat out of his next — allowance. It was turning colder; he shivered more as he walked from the subway to Wayne’s office. But Wayne’s office was warm, if Wayne wasn’t. Wayne sat there staring at him.
Finally he said, “You don’t look the part, Gresham.
Damn it all, you don’t look it. And that’s funny.”
Sir Charles said, “I don’t know why it’s funny, Wayne.
But looking the part means nothing. There is such a thing as make-up, such a thing as acting. A true actor can look any part.”
Surprisingly, Wayne was chuckling with amusement.
He said, “You don’t know it’s funny, Gresham, but it is.
I’ve got two possibilities you can try for. One of them is practically a walk-on; you’d get three short speeches. The other—”
“Yes?”
“It is funny, Gresham. There’s a blackmailer in my play.
And damn it all, you are one; you’ve been living off me for five years now.”
Sir Charles said, “Very reasonably, Wayne. You must admit my demands are modest, and that I’ve never increased them.”
“You are a very paragon of blackmailers, Gresham. I assure you it’s a pleasure — practically. But the cream of the jest would be letting you play the blackmailer in my play so that for the duration of it I wouldn’t be paying you blackmail.
And it’s a fairly strong supporting role; it’d pay you a lot more than you ask from me. But—”
“But what?”
“Damned if you look it. I don’t think you’d be convincing, as a blackmailer. You’re always so apologetic and ashamed about it — and yes, I know, you wouldn’t be doing it if you could earn your eats — and drinks — any other way.
But the blackmailer in my play is a fairly hard-boiled mug.
Has to be. People wouldn’t believe in anybody like you, Gresham.”
“Give me a chance at it, Wayne. Let me read the part.”
“I think we’d better settle for the smaller role. You said you’d settle for a walk-on, and this other part is a little better than that. You wouldn’t be convincing in the fat role. You’re just not a heavy, Gresham.”
“Let me read it. At least let me read it.”
Wayne Campbell shrugged. He pointed to a bound manuscript on a corner of his desk, nearer to Sir Charles than to him. He said, “Okay, the role is Richter. Your biggest scene, your longest and most dramatic speech is about two pages back of the first-act curtain. Go ahead and read it to me.”