Midsummer Madness (17 page)

The letter was circulating the theatre and cast. Even the stage crew were reading it. My face was pink with the humiliation, the loss of dignity, the lack of privacy. I knew what it was all about. The damning, assassination letter with two-dozen signatures. The guillotine letter. Start knitting, folks, I’m being dragged along in a cart. I’d better wear two shirts like Charles I.

How they got hold of a copy was anyone’s guess. Maybe Joe had demanded to see it. After all, he was the director. The boss man. He had a lot of influence. But it was not in his nature to pass it around like a prize specimen at a flower show.

I was starting to flag. There was a limit to my concentration and to my energy. Everyone was getting tired and tempers were honing sharp. Even Jessica, who was as cool as an iceberg most of the time, told Fran off twice for standing in front of her. Upstaging.

‘Get your butt out of my space,’ she hissed. ‘Who do you think you are? Keira Knightley?’

‘There is a resemblance,’ Fran smirked.

‘In your dreams, crab-face,’ said Bill, loud enough for everyone to hear.

‘Silence,’ Joe shouted. ‘Pick it up at the same line. We’ll take a break at the end of this scene.’

At some point a catering courier arrived with a huge basket of sandwiches, beers and soft drinks. Joe had ordered them from a local delicatessen. We fell on the basket like starving refugees, tearing open the packets. I managed to get a whole round of granary with tuna, cress and tomato, and a carton of orange juice.

Joe came over to me to check a new move.

‘Didn’t you get any?’ I said, offering half of my sandwich to Joe. He took it and bit into the moistness.

‘No, the rampaging mob beat me to it.’

‘Never mind. You had a filling lunch.’

‘Filling about describes it. Sophie, I’ve seen the letter that was sent to the management about your unreliable work. Apparently Elinor demanded to see a copy and it looks as though practically everyone signed. A few names are missing.’

My heart did a peculiar jerk. ‘Did Bill Naughton sign it?’

‘No, nor had Elinor. But Hilda did and so did Millie. Very odd.’

‘I don’t believe it. Hilda and Millie? What do they know about prompting?’ I was shocked. ‘The skill, the concentration, the hard work.’

‘Nothing. It seems weird, especially when they are your friends.’

‘I thought they were my friends,’ I said bitterly. ‘Now I don’t know who my friends are.’

‘Better get started again or we’ll be here all night. OK, folks. Back on stage. Act III. Where’s Bill?’ Joe slapped shut his laptop. The technology was being spiteful and spitting out crumbs.

‘He’s gone home, boss.’

‘What? He’s gone home? Has the whole world gone crazy?’ Joe spluttered. ‘He’s the stage manager. I need him as much as I need the cast.’

‘We can manage for a bit,’ said the crew hopefully. ‘Bill said it was very important. He’s coming back.’

‘I suppose I should be grateful for that,’ said Joe, glaring impatiently. ‘Anyone else feel like nipping home? Something important cropped up, fridge to defrost, answerphone to check? Anything more important than the show? To hell with our opening night on Wednesday.’

There was an embarrassed silence, a few coughs and foot fidgeting. I took the opportunity to finish my juice and try to make my bomb-proof concrete corner more comfortable. It needed the woman’s touch. I made do with water and cough sweets. It was like sitting in an underground shelter, minus the buskers and the trains.

‘Let’s get on then. Act III music. Have we a prompt or has she
gone off home, too?’

I didn’t mind if he took it out on me. He knew I was there. He wanted to sharpen his tongue.

‘Present and almost correct,’ I said, almost Julia Roberts, meaning I’d nearly found the page.

The sandwiches and beer had done the trick and the rest of the rehearsal was not bad at all. Joe looked halfway pleased. He was nodding to himself as he made electronic notes.

The cast began to relax and thus their performances flowed, as Shakespeare meant the words to flow. Claud was perfecting the sadness and madness of impossible love. The scenes buzzed with vitality yet had a haunting quality. I even laughed at some of the jokes which I’d heard a hundred times before. They came over fresh and new.

‘Well done,’ said Joe at the end, pushing back his hair. ‘A big improvement. Somehow we managed without the Stage Manager. We’ll do new curtain calls tomorrow, making use of the bigger set. You can have the morning off. Have a sleep-in. See you at two o’clock sharp. Thank you all for working so hard.’

I heard the stage door open and the clump of Bill’s crutches. He’d made good time, used a taxi both ways. The management were paying him expenses while he was on crutches. He was getting a taste for expensive transport.

‘Stop. Stop, everyone. Wait a minute. Don’t go yet,’ he called out, coming on to the stage. He was waving a large envelope. Joe was about to say something but then thought twice about it. Bill’s craggy face was thunderous. He looked as if he was about to explode.

‘Listen to me. I’ve something to say,’ he said loudly. Plenty of projection from our stage manager. There was a general slow down in hasty exits and the majority of the cast and crew began easing back, curious. It was rare to see Bill so angry.

He stood centre stage, took a deep breath. He’d never had a speaking part before.

‘You’ve all seen the letter sent to management about our inefficient and useless prompt, haven’t you?’ There was a bit of murmuring and disagreement with his harsh words. I curled up,
out of sight, shutting out the misery. I wanted to disappear, go home, hibernate.

‘The letter was sent and signed by about eighty per cent of the company. But that letter smelt like rotten eggs. I knew there was something wrong with it but I couldn’t work out what it was. Suddenly the answer was there. It came to me in Malvolio’s scene when he reads the forged letter.’

Bill had everyone’s attention now, including mine. I held my breath. What had he found out?

‘Now, that letter was a clever forgery sent by Maria to Malvolio. This letter to the management is the same thing, only the modern equivalent of forgery. Get it? It’s a load of photocopying.’

‘What do you mean?’ Voices rose, clamouring. ‘Bill, come on, tell us.’ ‘Spit it out.’

‘I wondered why my name wasn’t on it,’ Bill went on. ‘Why not me? Then it dawned on me that my signature wasn’t on it because the whole lot of signatures had originally been sent to me. So I rushed home to get the proof, to show you. And here it is.’

What was he talking about? It didn’t make sense until he produced a large Get Well card. One of those enormous cards with room for everyone on the planet to sign. On the front was a drawing of a buxom blonde nurse saucily comforting a bandaged patient who had every limb in splints.

‘This was sent to me when I was in hospital. Everyone signed it. I didn’t sign it because it was sent to me. Got it? Elinor didn’t sign it because she was taking it easy at home. Easy enough to photocopy the signatures off the card. Print a nasty letter on a sheet of A4, then rearrange the signatures below. Photocopy the whole and pop in the post. I bet if we compare the signatures on the card with those on the letter, we’ll find they are identical in every little dot and flourish.’

I let out a big sigh. It had to be the explanation. No one had signed the letter. They were the names from the Get Well card sent to Bill. Photocopiers were brilliant these days, producing work as good as the original. No giveaway smudges or hazing.

I was trembling. My friends hadn’t signed the letter. They didn’t think I was inefficient and useless.

‘Let’s hear it for our Sophie,’ Byron shouted.

They began clapping. They were climbing on to the stage, whacking Bill’s back till he nearly fell over.

‘There,’ said Joe, lost for words for once. He patted me awkwardly as if I was a child. ‘Now we know. Photocopied signatures.’

He leaped on to the stage and was shaking Bill’s hand. They were comparing the card and the letter, nodding and agreeing. They were finding identical signatures, it seemed.

My legs were not working very well. They had turned to straw. I didn’t think I could make the ten yards to centre stage. Somehow I made the journey, like it was to the Earth’s core. I reached up and kissed Bill’s cheek.

‘Thank you,’ I said, blinking back hot tears.

‘I’m not just a pretty face,’ he grinned. He put his arm round my shoulder and gave it a rough shake. ‘No crying on stage,’ he said. ‘It’s not allowed.’

Then I saw he was looking over my shoulder and Millie was easing forward, her face wreathed in smiles. He let go of me and was looking at her as if she was the only person there.

‘What a clever old clod of earth you are,’ she said. ‘I shall have to watch you. You could turn out to be brilliant.’

‘Hang around, sister,’ he said, winking. ‘I may surprise you.’

I had to smile. I had turned Bill down so many times, sometimes cruelly. But now he had found someone who liked him. Millie was all smiles.

Joe was taking me somewhere away from the crowds, his hand under my elbow. I would have fallen down without his support. But people were still crowding around, congratulating me. It was like the first night all over again. This was theatre. This was my life blood. Will Shakespeare would have loved it. The drama of life. He would have written it as a play called, say,
What You Will
. (Joke) And it would have been a rip-roaring success at The Globe. The prompt corner would have been matting and straw. The script a hand-written manuscript. His hand.

‘So who organized this vulgar Get Well card for Bill in hospital and got signatures from everyone, but not mine?’ It was Elinor, who
should have gone home by now but hadn’t. She looked radiant, younger, wearing elegantly chic Parisian black and skyscraper heels. She had a new admirer, some high-up executive in late-night television. It was never too late. He was coming by to give her a lift home.

‘Yes, who organized the card?’

It wasn’t hard to guess.

But Miss Goody Two-Shoes had scurried off into London’s dark streets, down into the sewers where she belonged. We never saw her again for this production. Joe promoted the second lady-
in-waiting
to first lady-in-waiting and Hilda agreed to alter the grand dresses.

‘It’s the least I can do,’ she said to me.

‘Are you all right?’ said Joe. ‘Did I say something about having supper? Was that today? I’ve lost track.’

‘I don’t remember,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t eat anything anyway. It’s too late. I want to go home and go to sleep.’

I was nearly asleep. I might fall off the stage.

‘That’s a perfect idea,’ said Joe, drawing me close. ‘Would there be room for a frazzled, exhausted, grumpy old director who can’t face his lonely king-sized bed?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said, wondering if my hearing had gone. ‘Does this grumpy director snore?’

‘How should I know? I don’t keep myself awake.’ He was laughing at me and there was a tenderness in his eyes which I had never seen before. He touched my hair. It was still short and bouncy, as he liked it.

‘I don’t believe in sleeping with producers or directors,’ I said. What was I saying? All I wanted was to lay down with his dear face beside me. I only wanted him. ‘I don’t need that kind of career incentive.’

‘Quite right, too. It doesn’t work with me. I only sleep with women that I love.’ Joe took my hand and held it against his lips. ‘And since you call’d me master for so long,’ he said, using Orsino’s last Act V words. ‘Here is my hand: you shall from this time be your master’s mistress.’

Viola had no answer to make, nor had I. There was still a lot to
tell Joe and I did not know how to tell him. Or when. It wouldn’t be tonight.

But I took him home as I had once before on a frosty winter’s night hung with mist, and we climbed the endless stairs to my rooftop flat. The bed was still a single but the rose-patterned duvet was warm and comforting and soft pillows embraced us.

We left the curtains open so that we could search the sky for stars, wondering if it would snow. If it did snow, then neither of us knew. Sleep took us to separate dreams but we were together even in those dreams.

‘You’ve cold feet,’ I said.

‘Mmn.’

The show closed after a six-week run to full houses. All shows close in the end and
Twelfth Night
was no exception. It wasn’t a
Mousetrap
or
Sound of Music
. The Bard couldn’t run forever. But he would certainly be on the boards again and again. Long after the others were gathering dust on shelves in theatrical museums.

The last night of the show was one to remember. The audience roared their approval and the curtain calls went on and on. I sat in the prompt corner listening to the applause, hugging the script to me, all my acquired history there between the lines. Joe came round to me and put his hand briefly on my shoulder.

‘It’s all over,’ he said. ‘A wonderful show.’

‘Magical,’ I said. All over. Joe would be going home for good now. I couldn’t bear to think of it. He’d already made a couple of trips back to discuss new shows. I’d raced down to Swanage for walks and talks and hugs.

We had a fantastic after-show party on stage, tears and laughter, relief and euphoria. No one wanted to leave. It went on into the small hours. But there was work to do the next day, dismantling scenery, packing props and wardrobe.

‘I hate putting a show to bed,’ said Hilda, folding and packing costumes into hampers. ‘It’s so sad. All that work and now it’s finished.’

‘Till the next one,’ I said. ‘There’ll be another one, I’m sure.’

The West Enders went into voluntary hibernation. The company had no theatre and had to wait until the Royale was rebuilt. We dispersed like migrating birds to softer climes.

Elinor had another contract to fulfil. Jessica went off to Italy to film. Byron successfully auditioned for a small part in a soap. Bill and Millie got engaged and we all needed a holiday after their party. Joe flew back to the States. I didn’t go to Heathrow to see him off. I didn’t want to see him go, walking through passport control.

The management apologized profusely about my abrupt dismissal, said it was a complete misunderstanding and they had been misinformed as to my contribution to the show. They had not realized I was the unknown who had saved the opening night from being cancelled.

It was quite a fulsome apology but not earth-chewingly grovelling. They did not feel they were to blame for the mistake. However, they did give me a glowing reference and a handshake, not quite golden, silver or bronze, but a shade of metal that bolstered my bank account for a few months, settled the urgent bills.

I was packing up the contents of my flat, only a few days after closing, when Elinor phoned me. I was trying to cut down on the self-breeding mountain of books and CDs and ancient 78 rpm records. Soon I would be settled in Dorset and there was barely room for me in the cottage, let alone all my clobber.

‘Sophie dear, are you all right, after that ridiculous fuss?’ It was Elinor.

‘Sure,’ I said, putting a pile of books aside for the charity shop, then changing my mind. How could I throw any away? They were like extended family. ‘Life has to go on. I’m OK, really. How are you?’

‘Madly rehearsing, as usual. Nice to have a part where I don’t have to try and look young. I can relax my wrinkles and let them drop.’

I laughed. ‘You mean, both of them?’

‘You don’t have to flatter me, my dear. Now, Sophie, you know I have a very nice man friend who owns the television company that produces this late-night chat show called
After Dark
. You may have seen it? No? Apparently they have been let down at the very last moment. Someone has cancelled. Very inconsiderate. And they are one guest short. So I suggested you.’

‘Me?’ I didn’t really understand what Elinor was talking about. I’d never seen the show. ‘Why me?’

‘All you have got to do is chat about what it’s like being a prompt at the Royale, throw in a few famous names, preferably mine. Add some funny anecdotes, you’ve dozens of them, I’m sure. Piece of cake. About ten minutes at the most. They’ll pay, of course.’ Elinor was breathless by the end of all that. ‘Quite generously. And expenses.’

‘But I’m not a chat show person. I don’t know how to chat. Sorry, ask someone else, Elinor. You must know dozens of other, far more suitable people.’

‘Anybody can do a chat show. You sit on a sofa, cross your legs and talk naturally. Easy as pie. Say you’ll do it, Sophie. They are desperate.’

I nearly laughed. So desperate at this moment that they would take anyone, even a total nonentity like me. A couple of parrots could talk themselves into the job without even trying. ‘So when is it?’ I asked, casually, still packing, barely listening.

‘Tonight, dear. Be at the studios by nine o’clock. The show goes on at eleven. Got a pen? Here’s the address. Write this down.’

I panicked. ‘Tonight? You mean, this tonight? I can’t do tonight.’

‘Yes, of course, you can. Are you doing anything else?’

‘No, I’m not, but I can’t. I can’t go on television. I’ve nothing to wear, nothing suitable. I haven’t got a wardrobe full of posh clothes.’

‘Take a selection,’ said Elinor, airly. ‘They’ll choose something. They can do wonders with a scarf. Are you writing this down? Good. Thank you, Sophie. Break a leg, darling.’

That’s how it started. I was a last minute fill-in guest when
After Dar
k were desperate. I was a face and a voice. I could recite
Mary, Mary Quite Contrary
and make it sound like a sonnet if I liked. They wouldn’t care what I said so long as I filled in a spare space on that sofa.

I phoned Hilda in a panic, wondering if I could borrow something out of the West Enders wardrobe. The costumes were carefully stored in a warehouse while the Royale was being rebuilt. Hilda had the key.

‘Of course you can,’ she said. ‘What about that red fringe dress you wore to the press night? You looked stunning in that.’

‘A bit bright, isn’t it?’

‘You’re worse then Elinor. You’d wear black day in and day out like every day was a funeral. I’ll pick out a few dresses for you to take along.’

‘Thank you so much. Or else I’ll have to scour the charity shops for something to wear.’

‘Never. We’ll find you something for the show. For heaven’s sake, we can’t have you going on television in a charity dress. What would Joe think?’

‘He won’t know. He’s back in the States. Directing a new show.’

‘Are you sure?’ There was something in Hilda’s voice but I couldn’t make out what it was. My mind was spinning with what to talk about, stories to tell, how to get the ordeal over without making a fool of myself. This was a madness.

What had Hilda said about Joe? I couldn’t remember. The rest of the day raced into oblivion, filled with washing hair, face pack, doing my nails. Who’d notice my nails? Glittery nail varnish perhaps? A morale booster.

Those devil nerves were starting to attack me. What had Joe said? You need those nerves to give you an edge of danger, something like that. I was only going to sit on a sofa for ten minutes, for heaven’s sake. Not exactly rocket science. And it was late at night. About three people and their dog would be watching. The dog wouldn’t mind what I was saying as long as he had a biscuit.

Hilda met me outside the television studio. She had a couple of bulging carrier bags. ‘The dresses are all non-crease. Just shake them out. I popped in a couple of pairs of sandals,’ she said. ‘Your hair looks great. Sock it to them, girl. Show them what you are made of.’

‘Thank you so much.’ My voice was already trembling. I was feeling sick. I was made of pink marshmallow. ‘I’m sure the dresses will be wonderful.’

‘Don’t forget to mention the West Enders! You know what they say about publicity. Any publicity is good.’

If I got that far. I was going to pass out in the dressing room,
collapse on the way to the set, fall off the sofa. It was written in the stars. There was no Joe to support me. There was only me. I was on my own.

A young make-up girl fussed over my face, redoing what I had already done so carefully, fluffing, powdering, glossing and crimping. She zipped me into the red dress, put sandals on my feet. My limbs weren’t working on their own. She chatted away but I didn’t take in a single word.

A groovy, spike-haired male assistant pinned on a body mike as if I was a shop dummy, gave me directions about not looking at the cameras but I didn’t understand a word he said. He was speaking some foreign language, Albanian perhaps.

He pointed me in the direction of the set which was at the end of a bare, empty corridor. I was Alice in Wonderland going down a long tunnel, not knowing where I was going, wading through mud, waiting to die. Over a doorway was a red flashing sign saying ‘Transmitting’. A girl with a clipboard held me back at a curtained doorway, then suddenly said ‘Now,’ and pushed me through. It was like walking on broken glass. My toes curled in the sandals.

The lights were bright, hot. For a second I was totally blinded by the light. I aimed for the sofa, a long leather affair stretching for miles. It was all I could see though it looked solid enough. What on earth would Mark think of his Mum now? Mark. Suddenly I thought of him, smiled at everyone, the invisible millions out there, radiantly, but the smile was secretly for Mark.

‘Hello,’ I said, holding out my hand, on autopilot. ‘I’m Sophie Gresham, recently the occupant of West Enders draughty prompt corner.’

‘Hello, Sophie. Welcome to
After Dark
. Come and sit down. It’s lovely to have you here. I don’t think we’ve ever had a prompt before.’

‘Not many people know that we exist,’ I said. ‘Yet every show has one. We’re one of the invisible little people.’

I didn’t remember what else I said, loads of idiotic gibberish, off the top of my head, skimming through the surface of my life. The ten minutes were over in a flash, speed of light. The host was seeing me off the set, thanking me. He looked pleased but it could have
been a polite act.

Someone guided me back along the corridor. I was completely lost.

Then I collapsed in the dressing room. They were wiping the sweat off me and fanning me with paper, and giving me sparkling water to drink. It tasted like champagne. I drank and drank. Soon I would be drowning.

‘What did I say?’ I gulped, asking the assistant as he took off the mike. ‘Was it total rubbish?’

‘No way, Sophie. It was funny. It was hilarious, in fact. Everyone loved it. Viewers are phoning in, droves of them. You did good, girl.’

The host rushed into the dressing room. ‘Fabulous,’ he shouted. ‘Sophie, you were great, so funny. You’re a natural. Come back again, any time. Prompt in a corner? You shouldn’t be hidden in any corner. And those voices, all those different voices! Cate Blanchett, Renee Zellweger, Goldie Hawn, Nicole … coming out so naturally. You were absolutely spectacular. I loved it.’

He planted a big kiss somewhere on me, not quite sure where, fairly decent, I think. I was overwhelmed.

They sent me home in a taxi, with bundles of clothes and shoes and bottles of water. I was still in the red dress. I never wanted to take it off.

The phone was ringing. It never stopped ringing. I think Elinor had sent round-robin emails to everyone in the cast and crew. They’d all stayed up to watch
After Dark
.

Then Mark phoned. ‘Wow,’ he shrieked hysterically. ‘My Mum’s on the telly. In a late, late show. Everyone at school will be so jealous. Gran let me stay up to see it. Some lady we don’t know phoned to tell us you were on. You don’t mind, do you?’

‘No. But it’s very late,’ I said, loving his young, excited voice. ‘You should really be in bed.’

‘In bed, when my Mum’s on telly? You’re joking. Fab dress. Do you get it to keep? You looked like a lampshade.’

‘No, it was borrowed. Now you go to bed and I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Goodnight, sweetheart.’

‘Goodnight, telly star Mum. Shine on.’

Shine on. I slept with those words echoing through my head, my son’s voice. I would be seeing him this weekend and nothing was ever going to part me from him again.

I awoke to the phone still ringing. Was it never going to stop?

‘So how is one very funny lady?’ It was Joe. He sounded as if he was in the next room. ‘I caught the show. You’re a dark horse, hiding all that talent. Well done. You were great.’

I tried to wake up, to clear my head. The red dress was flung over a chair. Then I remembered everything. It came back to me in a shock wave.

‘How could you see it? You’re in New York.’

He coughed. ‘Satellite dish,’ he said. ‘They work wonders.’

‘I was as nervous as hell.’

‘The edge of danger. Remember what I told you? Go back to sleep now, angel. I just wanted you to know.’

The rest of the day went by in highly charged confusion. And not only because of Joe’s call. I got another call from a business-like personal assistant. I was summoned immediately to some posh office, somewhere in the West End, to meet the production company. I wore a plain, straight navy slip dress Hilda had put into the carrier bag, hid my basic street anorak in another when I got there.

The office was acres of chromium and silver and a carpet as thick as a bouncy castle. I was surrounded by men in Armani suits, white shirts but no ties. A spectacularly skinny girl poured coffee and handed it round. It was my breakfast. Elinor’s executive friend was there, silver-haired and gracious, not saying much, smiling encouragement. I gathered he owned the company.

The team of producers all began talking at once. They were offering me a regular spot on
After Dark
. My own spot on that sofa. It would be called Prompt Cornered.

‘I don’t want to do television,’ I said.

‘Surely everybody wants to do television?’ They were amazed.

One of the men came over and hunkered down in front of me. He could see I was stunned. I hardly caught his name, Jones or something. He had very bright blue eyes, probably tinted contacts.

‘You’d interview stars from the shows. Anyone you like. Clear
field, but then you’d tell it like it was when you prompted them, if you did, if you didn’t then make it up. No one will check. Be yourself. All the backstage stories. Just like it is,’ he said. ‘About wardrobe mishaps, make-up melting, scenery falling down—’