Exit the Actress (35 page)

“Well, your children must like them,” I said, finally easing into myself, comforted by the growing sense of familiarity. “I know I longed for a dog as a child but was not permitted one.”

“Would you like one now?” he asked in all sincerity. I felt like, if I asked, this extraordinary man would rise from this table and help me to choose a dog immediately.

“I have a lovely pug called Ruby,” I reassured him. “I adore her. She is waiting with my friend Tom.”

“Tom Killigrew? Careful, his Kitt is a beast who would probably devour your Ruby like a macaroon.”

His face softened into a gentle smile, and he patted my hand.

At his touch I felt tilted: tipped out of myself into someone new.

“Terrible that you did not grow up with one. All children should have dogs,” the king pronounced merrily, aware of his affect on me and clearly amused by my disorientation. “How else are they to learn what it is to be responsible for another creature? My children each have at least one. My eldest, Jemmy, has six.”

“Well, if there is only so much food to go round, I suppose children can learn that lesson another way,” I said in a light attempt to regain my footing. I had intended to tease, but it fell flatly like a criticism. Grasping about wildly for a topic, I asked how his family fared. “Your mother, Queen Henrietta, and your sister?”

“Both well,” he said, pleased by the question. “Henriette is the Queen of France socially, the most admired and accomplished young woman.” He smiled warmly when speaking of his sister. I understood. It is good to see a sister made happy.

“And your wife is recovering well from her … disappointment?” I had meant the question kindly, but I read the absolute impropriety of my words in his shocked face.

“You must excuse me, Mrs. Gwyn,” he said smoothly. “It grows late, and I must go to Newmarket tonight.”

And then he left me alone in the beautiful room with the food I did not want.

I directed the royal coach to return me to Tom’s house, where my loyal friends (all but Johnny—he has accompanied the king to Newmarket) waited up for me anxiously.

“Well?” demanded Teddy.

“Disaster,” I said flatly, shedding my dove-grey mules (they pinch). “It is over. It was short. It was gruesome. I did nothing.”

“Did you—” began Lacy.

“No,” I said. “I didn’t. I didn’t
do
anything. Except—”

“Maybe that is good?” interrupted Tom. “A blank canvas—”

“No, it was dull. I was dull. I was not myself. I was no one, in fact. I was not memorable.” I will never have a second chance. “Except—”

“Except?” queried Teddy, his eyes narrowing, like a fox-hound on the scent.

“Except … I did…” Should I tell them? “I did ask how his wife … fared,” I ventured timidly.

“You
what
!” Tom exploded.

“Well, she miscarried, and I know how badly he needs a child, and…” I cast about the room hopefully, looking for supporters. There were none.

“So you thought
you
would bring it up?” choked Teddy, aghast. “You thought he would want to discuss the queen’s, his
wife’s,
fertility over a private supper with an
actress
?”

“What did he say, my dear?” Lacy asked gently.

“He … he called for the footman to escort me to my carriage.” I flushed, remembering the abrupt, awkward moment. “And he told me he had to leave for Newmarket,” I finished lamely.

“In the middle of the night?” asked Lacy.

“Oh my.” “Marvellous,” said Teddy, heavily dropping into a chair.

Yes,
I thought. He
was
marvellous.

Finished up
Virgin Martyr (again,
although I never tire of this role), very late as there was a ruckus during the performance and we had to stop. A drunken member of the audience climbed onto the stage and tried to embrace Becka. I was impressed; she kept herself in check and managed to stay in character (St. Dorothea) while the man was removed. She came back and did her death scene beautifully. The king, not back from Newmarket, did not attend the performance tonight.

“Anything?” Teddy asked, coming offstage.

“Nothing.” I was stumbling my way through a terrible performance, and smiled at Teddy, grateful for his patient forbearance.

“Mmm, difficult.” He was whispering. Everyone whispers, trying to be discreet. As if whispering bad news somehow improves it.

“Nothing.” I repeated. “Not even a note.” I was not expecting anything. But I hoped. Against reason and logic, I still hope.

Hart brought me a mug of raspberry sack this evening after the performance, his face creased with worry.

“Ellen, are you … all right?” He eyed me anxiously.

“Yes, of course,” I said quickly, surprised and touched by his concern. I cannot remember a time in the last few months when he has been anything but vexed with me.

“Yes, of course,” Hart repeated awkwardly, as if I had refused him, and then hurried away, presumably for his nightly appointment.

Tom came to find me in the tiring room after rehearsal today.

“Ellen, I have spoken to Hart,” he said abruptly.

I waited for him to continue. Hart no longer criticised me openly but was perpetually going to Tom with his complaints: my posture, my singing, my untidy hair.

“I had to assure him that you were not … unwell.” Tom said, pulling me from my reverie.

“Unwell!” I said, startled. “Why would I be unwell?” I quickly touched the wood of my painted dressing table. I had mercifully escaped the most recent bout of company cold and fever.

“Perhaps not unwell,” Tom hedged. “More pregnant…”

“Pregnant! By who?”

“By ‘whom,’ “Tom corrected. “Well, no one, naturally, and I told him as much, but he knows something is afoot and is worried for you.”

“Nothing is afoot,” I said flatly. “Nothing at all.”

Before the performance tonight I heard Hart’s unmistakeable growl in the hallway outside.

“This oil is dripping all over the wall! Did you not see it?” he bellowed at Laurie, our lamplighter. “Clean it up, now!”

I slipped outside, pulling my silk wrapper closely around me. I had been waiting all day to catch Hart alone. I had to reassure him, to thank him.

“Hart … I—”

He rounded on me, swiftly redirecting all his irritation at me. “You what?” He scowled, his voice loaded with sarcasm and latent mistrust, all yesterday’s tenderness absent.

I slipped back into the tiring room without a word. A difficult man, I thought sadly, and one I no longer understand.

Dryden, Aphra, and Buckhurst were in the house tonight. Dryden was checking on
Queen
—he is perpetually tweaking his scripts and driving the actors mad. Buckhurst did not come back to the tiring rooms, as his presence still infuriates Hart. Then again,
my
presence still infuriates Hart. Everything seems to infuriate Hart. We discreetly joined them in the foyer, where Buckhurst was lurking with Dryden behind a large potted plant.

“We hear you were sent for, my dear,” said Dryden, adjusting his complicated hat in the long mirror (ostrich feathers
and
ruffled velvet bows). He is slightly built but insists on following the fashion of long wigs and hats, giving him a top-heavy look.

“Yes, but only once—is that true?” asked Buckhurst, elegant in a pale grey ensemble, with a touch of malice. Aphra shot him a dirty look.

So be it. “Yes, it is true. You may as well know, I was terribly dull and will never be sent for again.” There, I’ve said it.

“
Dull?
You?” squeaked Dryden, surprised. His genuine reaction heartened me, and I gratefully squeezed his arm.

“Yes, dull,” Well, dull with one small incidence of fireworks, I thought privately.

“Oh my,” said Aphra thoughtfully. “How to recover from dull?”

Exactly.

Note
—Buckhurst just returned from Newmarket, brought us all the court news, and, after my anxious enquiries, told me that Johnny is sober but
subdued. Alcock, on the other hand, is perpetually drunk, and Johnny encourages him. I did not ask about
him
.

Outrageous news: Buckingham brought his mistress, the Countess of Shrewsbury, a dreadful bullish sort of woman, home with him.

“When his wife objected that the two women could hardly share a roof,” Teddy recounted, aghast, “Buckingham told her he entirely understood and therefore had already ordered her a coach to take her to her father’s.”

“Booted out of her
own
home?” asked Nick, agog.

“The house her father paid for, no less,” said Teddy.

“Dangerous world for women,” I said softly, to no one.

Lovely talk with Johnny this evening; he is back to dark wigs, thank goodness. He returned with the king this morning. Everyone is in town for the debut of Sedley’s
The Mulberry Garden
—still too wordy and stiff. He showed me the draft of a letter he is writing to his wife, who is tucked away at his country home of Adderbury. He takes refuge in the overdone style of the time, but his true sentiment shows through. He does love her, but will not change to content her. He says he is
“endeavouring to get away from this place I am so weary of…,”
but he is not endeavouring terribly hard, I must say.

I am supposed to be making up for this afternoon and I find I cannot sit still. Nothing is wrong, exactly, but things feel just out of place, out of reach, and too loosely knit for me to feel true peace. I am enjoying the stage, but when I let myself look too far ahead, I feel a snaking unease. How will all this end? And who, if anyone, will it end with? I feel I am painting the
scenery when I do not know the play. What does the puzzle look like? When will I feel the click of my life piecing together?

“Everyone is falling in love with their wives, it is quite
à la mode
at the moment,” Johnny said, lazily fanning himself with my peacock-blue hat (new—I
love
it). We were lying in the grass in the Foxhall Gardens after a splendid picnic of olives, bread, cold meats, grapes, and cheese spread out over a pink-checked cloth.

“Everyone?” I asked cagily.

“Well, not
everyone
. Buckingham has wreaked havoc in his domestic affairs, and I never seem to see mine, although I am fond, but the king is certainly spending time with the queen,” he said, watching me out of the corner of his eye. Trying to gauge my reaction, no doubt.

I will not be so small as to feel jealousy. He is her husband, and it is her right. I hear of the joy his attention brings her and know her love to be profound and unselfish—that is what people say, anyway. I am glad for the unassuming queen—or so I keep telling myself. I have met this man less than a dozen times, and, king or no king, he should not loom so large in my irresponsible heart.
No king
—in fact, I do wish he were no king but an ordinary man, who might notice an ordinary girl.

“And when the little butterball came out to dance, the queen just up and left,” Teddy clucked. “Brava Caterina Regina!”

We had just finished our rehearsal and were lying on the stage, exhausted. Lacy had drilled us for hours, learning the steps for his new
dance for the end of Act II. We were discussing the queen’s daring snub.

“The Great Snub of ‘68. That is what they will call it in years to come. And I was
there
, petals!” Teddy said with self-important glee. “Brilliant! Ah, to be a part of history.”

“Bold move,” Lizzie said, approving. “And how unlike her. She normally seems such a mouse.”

“Poor woman,” I said, propping myself up on my elbow. “It can’t be easy to applaud your husband’s mistress.”

“Moll Davis is hardly a
mistress,
” Nick interjected. “She is more of a hobby, like tennis. You know, something you pick up, and then when you get the knack of it, you drop. She will not be around long enough to be called a mistress.”

Can an actress be more than a hobby to a great man? To a
king
?

Philaster
with Hart—a Beaumont and Fletcher play we both love, although the heavy costumes were stifling in this heat. At least on that we can agree. I play Bellario, a part with wit and verve. The audience were wild for us, and the takings were huge; so little was needed—set, costumes, props, even playbills—as we have done it so many times before. I have finally asked Tom Killigrew to be my banker—unconventional, but I trust him, and I honestly do not know how to handle financial matters. He has explained various trusts he has established in order to keep my money safe—and even increasing. When I told Rose, she shook her head in disapproval.