It Ends with Revelations (8 page)

‘Well, yes. But I knew about Mother by then, so I repressed them. And now I’m always nervous in case they dash at me all the worse for being repressed. Oh, dear, you haven’t drunk any of your chocolate, Mrs Quentin. Has it gone cold?’

‘No, no.’ Jill took a hasty drink. ‘It’s just right.’ She drank some more, gratefully, feeling slightly battered by the conversation.

The girls had punctuated their disclosures by chocolate drinking and were now refilling their cups.

‘We haven’t meant to harrow you, Mrs Quentin,’ said Kit. ‘Everything’s set fair now. Already Father’s a new man, and doing very well at the Bar though he’s really more interested in his political career.’

Robin said, ‘What we’d like most is for him to marry again, if we could find just the right person.’

‘Someone like you,’ said Kit. ‘Really, from our point of view, it’s a great pity you’re married. And very happily married, I’m sure.’

It had been a statement, not a question. All the same Jill thought there was a hint of a question in the slowly raised smiling eyes. She answered, with great firmness, ‘Very, very happily married.’

‘Naturally – to such a wonderful husband,’ said Kit. ‘One knows at once that Mr Quentin is a good person, as well as a great actor.’

‘He is, indeed,’ said Jill. ‘But reverting to your father, I do advise you not to go wife-hunting for him.’

‘No doubt it is a job he should do for himself,’ Kit conceded. ‘Though he did slip up over Mother. And we
are
a bit scared of getting a step-mother we dislike.’

‘Still, what really matters is that Father should be happy. Now we’ve talked far too much about ourselves. Do let me give you some more chocolate, Mrs Quentin. There’s still some in the pot. No? Then you have it, Kit. I’m full.’

Kit accepted and spooned the last of the cream onto it. Jill, in a momentary silence, thought how much the girls had left unsaid, in spite of their frankness. She had only a very hazy picture of their lives and scarcely any picture at all of their father’s. How does a man cope with a wife who drinks – and over such a long period of years? If it had begun when Kit was only two, and the wife had died only – was it eighteen months ago? Already, Jill found, various details of the story were eluding her. She would have liked to get them straight and also ask for more details but hardly felt she could, especially as the girls had now let the subject drop and were talking generally.

Fairly soon Robin said, ‘I think perhaps we should go now. We have to help Father entertain some local bigwigs at lunch. Kit, you have a blob of cream on your nose.’

Back at the hotel, the girls went on duty with their
father, and Jill, having collected sandwiches, went on duty at the theatre.

She found Miles fairly pleased with the way the photo-call was going. But when, in the late afternoon, he got back from it he had changed his mind. He had just settled down to tell Jill all about this over tea when the three Thorntons, who were returning to London that evening, arrived to say goodbye. Miles at once switched off annoyance with the photo-call and asked them to come round and see him after the London first night.

‘In your dressing room? Oh, marvellous,’ said Kit. ‘You
are
kind.’

He talked with the utmost patience until Geoffrey Thornton finally shepherded his daughters off – and then reverted to the photo-call while they were walking away.

Peter, it seemed, had treated young Cyril shabbily. ‘Again and again he was in a bad position. Peter insisted on shots that favoured me. It’s not fair, when the boy’s made such a success.’

‘Do be reasonable, Miles. It’s photographs of you that’ll draw people into the theatre, not photographs of Cyril.’

‘Still … Anyway, I insisted on a couple of big heads of Cyril – and he’s been photographed with his own fair hair, which means he’ll be allowed to keep it for London.’

‘Hardly his own, is it? What about that black line at the roots you told me about?’

‘Oh, well … Why shouldn’t the poor kid be fair if he wants to?’

‘Have your tea, darling.’ She had thought of telling him
of her outing with the Thornton girls but this was certainly not the moment for it.

The theatre was so fully booked that night that Miles had been unable to buy a box for her and she again stood at the back of the dress circle with Peter Hesper. For the first time, she was faintly dubious about the audience’s reaction. There was some restlessness in the cheaper parts of the house and occasional giggles in the wrong places.

‘New Town people, I gather,’ said Peter. ‘They get their pay packets on Fridays. I’m told tomorrow night will be worse. Apparently Spa Town people shun entertainments on Saturday nights.’

‘Well, one must never be influenced by Saturday night reactions in the provinces,’ said Jill. ‘And the Spa Town
reaction’s
a much better indication of how London will react.’

‘In these days? I’m not so sure.’

It was the first time, since the triumphant Monday opening, that she had seen him look gloomy.

But at least the Saturday matinee went well. Jill got a seat in the stalls and listened to Spa Town old ladies praising Miles and Cyril across precariously held tea trays. She then went back to the hotel to pack, having made sure that a good dinner would be sent into the theatre for Miles to eat between the shows, and did not return to the theatre until the middle of the evening.

She had arranged to meet Peter Hesper at the back of the dress circle and had some difficulty in locating him as there was a double row of standees. He slipped his arm through hers and whispered, ‘Agony, dear. Sheer agony.’

All over the house people were coughing, fidgeting, giggling. They weren’t, she thought, inimical; sometimes they shushed each other. But they simply were not held. Towards the end of the second act, matters improved; Miles was playing superbly. Then came the dramatic climax. Young Cyril delivered his denunciatory speech at the top of his lungs. It was greeted by a huge roar of laughter.

‘And, my God, who could blame them?’ said Peter. ‘Come on, let’s get out.’

They eeled their way through the crowd on the stairs (the only remark Jill overheard was, ‘Still, you must admit Miles Quentin takes his part well.’) and out into Spa Street. The air was sultry. She said, ‘Going to be a storm.’

‘There is, and all,’ said Peter. ‘And you, my love, must now stick to the bargain you made with me on Sunday night.’

‘What bargain? Peter! You can’t mean you’re going to re-direct,
now
?’

‘Of course I must. Oh, I don’t say London audiences will be as oafish as this one is, but they will be realistic and so, believe me, will the critics. We’ve just let ourselves be lulled by a lot of drooling old ladies. Let’s go round and see how Miles feels.’

‘You lay off Miles until the show’s over – and if you’ve any sense you’ll lay off him until tomorrow. We can talk on the train.
Could
you make the changes in time?’

‘Of course. It’s largely a matter of different positions and different lighting, plus a general toning down of that ghastly boy. Why the hell didn’t we listen to Tom Albion?’

It began to rain, hard. They went back into the theatre and steeled themselves for the last act – which held rather better than they had expected. – ‘And you know why?’ said Peter. ‘It’s because it’s almost entirely focussed on Miles. And that’s how the whole play has to be.’

There was a fair amount of applause at the end but no real enthusiasm. Jill heard one illuminating remark. ‘
Old-fashioned
, wasn’t it? Funny, it didn’t seem like that on television.’ So much for Peter’s ultra-modern direction, with its non-realistic sets and lighting. Perhaps they had showed up the play’s old bones, like teenage clothes on an elderly woman.

Peter said, ‘If you don’t want me to start work on Miles tonight I’d better not see him at all. Anyway, I want to take a look at the script and have everything at my finger tips tomorrow. So I’ll just have a word with the stage
management
and then clear off.’

It was still raining heavily so they went back-stage through the pass door; it was opened in response to Peter’s thumping. Jill, glancing at the staff dismantling the set as she crossed the stage, thought of the many Saturday nights when she had been up till the small hours seeing the load out of provincial theatres. Thankfulness that those days were in the past made her less depressed about the present – for depressed she was: Miles was going to be worried about this last-minute contretemps.

But apparently he hadn’t yet started to worry. He looked up from taking his make-up off and said cheerfully, ‘Swine, weren’t they? But it doesn’t mean a thing.’

‘
Of course
it doesn’t,’ she agreed, fervently. ‘There’s a cloud-burst outside. I’d better get the stage-door keeper to ring up for a taxi.’

‘And say a soothing word to our leading lady, next door, will you? She says the audience hit her full in the solar plexus. Young Cyril took it like a trooper and an American trooper, at that. He said, “Just hicks, aren’t they, Mr Quentin?”’

By the time Jill got back from ordering the taxi andsoothing the leading lady’s solar plexus Miles was almost ready to leave. He asked her to see if Cyril and his understudy would like to be driven home. ‘They’re on the next floor, Room 7.’

The door of Room 7 was open. She saw that the boys had gone. Sticking out of a wastepaper basket was the chocolate box with Spa Street on its lid – young Cyril obviously hadn’t cherished it as a souvenir. She went closer and looked down on it, already feeling a whiff of nostalgia for the sunny Saturday afternoon just a week ago. She had thought, then, that the painting on the lid was better than most chocolate box art. Seen under the dressing room’s glaring lights it was woolly and conventional. Perhaps her mood had supplied the touch of impressionistic
atmosphere
. Curious, that in her mind’s eye, she could still see the picture as she remembered it.

Also in the wastepaper basket was a paper bag
containing
a few congealed acid drops. She particularly disliked the smell of acid drops and the very sight of them was enough to evoke it for her. They seemed, somehow, highly
suitable for Cyril. For the first time, she admitted to herself that she, like Peter, found the boy repulsive. Well, all the more honour to Miles, for being so kind to him. She went down to the waiting taxi.

Spa Street now looked more like a river than a road. She hoped the shaving-brush chestnuts were enjoying their drench. Back at the hotel the golden lion shone wetly.

She remembered it, shining and streaming, just before she fell asleep.

6

Birth of a Teeterer

Jill unlocked the door of the flat and strode briskly through the hall, saying brightly, ‘Nice to be back, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, indeed,’ said Miles heartily.

She was pretty sure he disliked the flat as much as she did but neither of them had, as yet, admitted their dislike aloud.

The sitting room, in the early evening light, looked even more cheerless than usual as there were no flowers; and though the large windows gave an impression of airiness it felt airless. She flung the windows open onto the balcony but was not tempted to step out. After two months she still experienced vertigo when on the balcony; and Miles had recently confessed that he did too. It seemed a pity they hadn’t pooled their vertigo before taking a tenth-floor flat.

She hoped that Miles was not, as she was, remembering many home-comings to their old Islington house where
Mrs Topham would have been on hand to welcome them – beloved Mrs Topham, none too clean but a glorious cook, who had been Miles’s housekeeper long before he married. Alas, their leases on home and help had run out at the same time; the house was now demolished and Mrs Topham had retired on what she called ‘me bits of pensions’ – to which now was added one from Miles. Even the friendly old Islington furniture had gone into retirement, as this ultra-modern West End fiat had seemed to call for ultra-modern furniture. They had chosen
first-rate
pieces; anyway, Miles believed them to be first-rate and she, most implicity, believed in his good taste. She had felt sure she would get to like them but, instead, had come to hate their guts, and doubted if they had any.

‘I ought to have asked Miss Linton to buy us some flowers,’ she said, looking round the spacious, austere room. (‘So wonderful to get such a large room in a flat,’ kind friends said.)

‘They would have withered at her touch,’ said Miles, ‘unless made of tin.’

Miss Linton spent two hours on three days a week keeping the flat scrupulously clean while remaining scrupulously clean herself in spite of the fact that she never donned an overall. She wore neat dark clothes, appeared to be middle-aged, and spoke only when spoken to. Jill had elicited from her that she lived with her mother ‘very quietly,’ but Miles insisted that she was really a robot who returned to a factory every night for servicing.

‘Well, at least she’s never obtrusive,’ said Jill. Mrs
Topham had been very obtrusive, but the obtrusiveness had ranked as friendliness.

‘What are you going to do about food? Why don’t you change your mind and come with me to Peter’s?’

She had refused Peter’s invitation partly because she wanted to unpack and do various odd jobs but also because she thought Miles should go on his own. When he was with some of his oldest and best friends she had an idea that he and they occasionally found her presence inhibiting. Also she wanted Miles and Peter to consolidate the beautiful state of agreement they had now reached. During the discussion on the train Miles had surprisingly put up no fight whatever. He pointed out that he had always been willing to accept changes in the direction, once young Cyril had found his feet. And it now seemed that he had been more impressed by Tom Albion’s criticisms than he had admitted, and less impressed by the Spa Town’s approval than Peter had been. He was also, Jill guessed, feeling guilty towards Peter. ‘I muddled you, Peter,’ he said apologetically. ‘If you’d had your way we’d probably have pleased the Spa Town fogies
and
the Saturday night toughs. It was just that I didn’t want to hurt the boy.’

‘Well, I’ll handle him with kid gloves,’ Peter had said, beaming with relief at having won Miles over. Jill was overjoyed at the sweetness and light in which he and Miles were now basking and they were welcome to an evening of it; also to an evening with Peter’s manservant-friend, Gaston, whom she found trying. She assured Miles that
she didn’t fancy going out to supper. ‘I’ll just get myself something here.’

‘There won’t
be
anything here.’

‘Yes, there will. I asked Miss Linton to get in some staples. And there’s plenty of tinned stuff.’

‘Why not ring down for a decent meal?’

She considered the restaurant on the ground floor charged impressive prices for unimpressive food. ‘Well, I’ll see.’

After he had gone she unpacked, got herself a drink, and then went into the small, gleaming kitchen. During a girlhood spent in bed-sitting rooms and boarding houses she’d had few chances to cook, and scarcely more during Mrs Topham’s benevolent dictatorship. She had planned to cook at the flat but Miles preferred to go out for most meals. ‘Anyway, you couldn’t really cook in that kitchen,’ he told her. ‘It looks outraged if so much as an egg-boiler’s out of its place.’ Not that they had an egg-boiler.

She now wondered if she would attempt something dashing, then decided that toast and Gentleman’s Relish would do very well – and coffee. The sitting room, when she carried her tray in, was now rather too airy. Before closing the glass doors she stood for a moment admiring the view, that view which had played a major part in attracting them to the flat (and if they had to leave their beloved old house, surely something quite new and stimulating was a good idea?). She could see the Houses of Parliament. Did the Thorntons live in Westminster? Yes, she remembered Geoffrey Thornton saying so, during
supper at the Civic Reception. Pleasant people…. Really, it was absurd: even to
think
about the drop below the balcony made the backs of her knees feel peculiar. She closed the doors and retreated to a nice, safe armchair.

Later, she wondered if there would be any interesting music on the radio, something like the Schubert Octet – how extraordinarily happy she had felt while listening to it. But though she twiddled with a will, even trying foreign stations, she could get nothing that pleased her. She settled for television. Miles, returning, found her fast asleep in front of it.

‘You didn’t have a proper meal,’ he said, looking at her tray. ‘I shall make you some bread-and-milk. I’ll have some, too.’

She smiled. ‘I wonder if we’re really as fond of
bread-and-milk
as we think we are – or is it sheer association with that first time you made it for me? Anyway, it would be nice.’

The next morning, when they were discussing where they should meet for lunch, Miles asked if she could manage to give a party after the first night of the play.

She looked at him in astonishment. ‘But you loathe even going to first-night parties, let alone giving them.’

‘I know. They’re ghastly if a play’s gone badly – and even if it’s gone well, one’s never sure. But it’s Frank Ashton’s first production and a young author’s first play. And I’d like to do a little something for the company. Everyone was a bit shattered on Saturday night.’

‘You mean you want to ask the whole company?’

‘Well, not unless you think you can manage.’

‘Oh, I’ll manage all right,’ said Jill. ‘But it won’t be like one of our Mrs Topham parties.’

Mrs Topham could always be counted on for hot suppers served in enormous earthenware dishes, the contents of which combined tastiness with mystery. Guests had been known to penetrate her kitchen to ask for recipes, only to be fobbed off with, ‘Oh, this and that, madam, depending on what I had by me.’ There was, indeed, some truth in this. Mrs T. was as improvisatory as a Jazz player.

‘How about getting in a firm of caterers’?’ said Miles.

‘I might. But their food’s so conventional. Don’t worry, I’ll cope. Let’s add up how many. Lucky the company’s small.’

Still, with the understudies, the stage management, Frank Ashton, the author, Peter, the Albions … they were soon up to twenty.

‘And how about the Thorntons?’ said Miles. ‘Those girls would love it.’

‘They would indeed. Well, it’ll be a squash but we ought to be able to manage with a room this size.’

‘And if it’s fine we can use the balcony – that is, people who aren’t us can. I must go now. I said I’d meet Peter at the theatre. Let me know if there’s anything I can do.’

‘You can order a great deal of champagne,’ said Jill.

‘Right. I’ll do that on my way.’

After he had gone she found the Thorntons’ number in the telephone directory and rang it. Kit answered and accepted the invitation to the party ecstatically. ‘Oh, roll
on, Thursday. We’re all gasping to see you again, Mrs Quentin.’

Jill found herself feeling cheerful. Somehow she would manage to make it a good party, not a formal, catered affair. The restaurant below should be bullied into sending up some really interesting hot food. And she would shop for exciting cold additions. She began to feel hungry – absurd, at ten in the morning.

Miss Linton arrived and, though unable to lend a hand at the party as her mother could not be left in the evening, showed willingness to wash all the glasses in readiness. Less robotish than usual, she remarked, ‘This flat
needs
a party.’

‘Of course!’ Silly not to have realized that before. Miles would like the flat much better after a party, and so would she … perhaps. But she was in for a wild rush between now and Thursday night, what with the food and the flowers, getting her hair done and having a last fitting for her dress, buying presents for the whole company, meeting Miles for most meals, and spending much of Wednesday at the dress rehearsal.

The day sped by with far less accomplished than she had counted on. But she made better headway on Tuesday as she was off duty for lunch – Miles said he was going to take Cyril out for it, ‘In case he’s been upset by the morning rehearsal.’ When she got back to the flat, after a satisfactory afternoon of present-buying, she found the boy in the sitting room with Miles. Cyril was looking distressed, she even thought he had been crying; (
impossible
to believe he was eighteen). Miles, with a slightly histrionic breeziness, said,
‘We’ve been having a little private rehearsal. Cyril found things a bit difficult this morning.’

‘Last-minute changes are always worrying,’ said Jill sympathetically. ‘But we all want to do what’s best for the play, don’t we, Cyril?’

Cyril merely nodded and gulped. Yes, he had been crying. She was wondering if she should offer him tea – or a drink, perhaps? – when Miles said, ‘Now off you go, young Cyril. We’ll have another run-through at the theatre in the morning, and you’ll be as right as rain by the dress rehearsal.’ He put his arm round the boy and steered him into the hall. Cyril barely managed a dejected ‘Goodbye, Mrs Quentin.’ Just before the front door closed she heard a short, low-toned conversation, out of which all that came to her clearly was ‘I swear it, Mr Quentin. I won’t let you down.’

‘I take it things are difficult,’ she said, as Miles returned.

‘Well, those kid gloves of Peter’s had holes large enough to let his claws through. Not that I altogether blamed him. The boy’s just a drooling mass of self-pity.’

It was so unlike Miles to speak so harshly that she guessed he must be worried. ‘Well, you’ve done all you can,’ she told him. ‘Just try to get your mind off his troubles.’

‘That’s easier said than done. You don’t know the half of them.’

‘And I don’t think I want to,’ said Jill firmly. ‘Oh, I’m not unsympathetic but you really must relax. Now let’s have a drink and then go out to an early dinner.’

She was thankful that he did not mention Cyril again all evening. And even more thankful that, as almost always, he slept well.

Next day the dress rehearsal, due to start at six-thirty, started only ten minutes late, but from then on it became a classic example of the bad dress rehearsal; indeed, there was a time when Jill thought it was going to prove a
record-breaker
for productions in which Miles had played. Scenery fell down, all the new lighting cues went wrong. No one, not even Miles, remembered the subtler points of Peter’s re-direction, and Cyril reverted to the shouting performance he had given all the previous week; the end of Act II had to be done six times. Three people, including Cyril, wept. (Peter said, ‘It’s like hysteria going through dog kennels.’) Miles and Peter had a shouting match across the (non-existent) footlights. Around one
A.M.
Frank Ashton, feeling he ought to make a noise like a
management
, came to Peter and said, ‘Running a bit late, aren’t we?’ Peter, white with temper, said, ‘Go away.’ Frank Ashton, wisely, went. The author said miserably to Jill, ‘I suppose this means we can’t open?’ She soothed him, handing out all the dope about bad dress rehearsals being lucky. And in the end the record remained unbroken as they finished at three
A.M
. She could remember a dress rehearsal that had lasted until five, and then the last act had been held over.

As she took Miles home she decided they lived in a lunatic world. None of this should happen – but again and again it did. And if the play succeeded one forgot about
the nightmare, much as women were said to forget the agonies of childbirth.

But could this play succeed?

Some sixteen hours later, after working so late on
last-minute
preparations for the party that she barely had time to change into her new evening dress, she was almost past caring. She just longed to get through the first night and the party, and go to sleep. She gave a loving look at her bed, and then mentally shook herself. At least she didn’t have to act, as Miles and the company did. And the stage management would be the tiredest of all.