‘At least we didn’t have to go to their aid,’ said Thackeray, conscious of the fury in Cribb’s silence.
‘If I ever meet ’em in the course of duty, they’ll need aid all right.’
The curtain descended and the limelight returned to the chairman’s table. ‘And now, my friends, after that rare entertainment, not being a temperance-observer, I shall enjoy a tipple of fizz generously subscribed by the table on my right. The show proceeds with a redoubtable display of manly vigour from that sovereign of strong men, the ’Ercules of Rotherhithe, the great Albert.’
Albert’s props were the most interesting so far. He stood like some eccentric costermonger behind a substantial platform on wheels, neatly stacked with an extraordinary array of articles: books, folded clothes, the plinth for a statue, a top-hat, flags, a picnic-hamper and three sets of bar-bells. With a nod to the conductor, a cue for the Anvil Chorus, Albert mounted his platform and stood with legs apart, chest inflated and head in profile to the auditorium, and then clasped his hands so that his biceps bobbed up like ferrets in a sack. He was wearing a one-piece costume of the type introduced by Leotard, the original Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze. Generous applause greeted this display of muscularity, so Albert climbed on to his plinth, leaned forward, positioned his legs carefully, and assumed the classic stance of the Discobolus.
‘Pose Plastique,’ explained Cribb authoritatively. ‘The man’s got a fine body. Pity about the moustache, though. Don’t look like ancient Greece to me.’
Albert now descended and progressed to a series of lifts with the bar-bells, accompanied by intermittent chords from the brass section and exhortations from the gallery. Just as the interest was threatening to flag, a novelty was introduced, in the person of an extremely stout, florid-faced woman in long white robes and a hat with red, white and blue ostrich feathers.
‘Blimey!’ shouted someone from the gallery. ‘Keep away from Albert, missus. You’ll rupture ’im.’
The lady’s contribution to the performance was soon made clear, however. While Albert ducked behind his platform to change his costume, she curtseyed and made the following announcement: ‘Now, ladies and gentlemen, in a tribute to a most distinguished member of our race, my son Albert gives his unique portrayal of the bard, Shakespeare!’
There, leaning against his plinth in the pose of the monument in Westminster Abbey, was Albert, with legs crossed, one arm resting on a pile of volumes on the plinth, the other holding an unfurled scroll. He wore breeches, doublet and cloak and a false beard. When the impact of this tableau was fully appreciated, he placed both hands on the edge of the plinth and gracefully upended himself into a slow handstand, the cloak draping itself elegantly over the back of the plinth. Then to a drum-roll and a powerful gesture from his mother’s right arm, Albert removed one of his hands from the plinth and remained poised on the other. The audience broke into open cheering. Theatres like Drury Lane and the Lyceum might have their Shakespeare; only the Grampian had him upside down on one hand!
‘Had me worried for a moment,’ admitted Cribb, when the strong man had righted himself. ‘There was the makings of a nasty little accident there. What are they doing now?’
Albert had disappeared behind the platform again for a change of costume while his mother occupied the centre of the stage with a Union Jack. To the strains of a patriotic tune, she began singing in a strong contralto,
‘O’er all the mighty world by British sons unfurled
The red and white and blue!
But to drag it in the mire now seems the sole desire
Of Gladstone and his crew.’
Unshaken by the mixed reception this got, she proceeded to:
‘Oh England, who shall shield thee from the shame?
And thy sons and thy daughters who shall save?
But we cherish in our hearts that one undying name—
Lord Beaconsfield, now lying in his grave!
Ladies and gentlemen, my son Albert now portrays the Greatness of Britain and her Empire!’
From the dangerous area of political controversy, the limelight made a timely return to Albert, now standing on the platform, which had been cleared of everything but a huge bar-bell and the picnic-basket. He was dressed convincingly as John Bull. A portentous thrumming from the orchestra-pit promised something even more spectacular than Shakespeare upside down.
John Bull spat into each hand and crouched at the bar-bell as the drumming slowly increased in volume. He braced, strained and began to lift, his veins protruding with the effort. The bar itself bowed impressively as it took the weight of the massive iron balls. He hauled it to the level of his knees. His hips. The Union Jack on his chest. His chin. His top-hat. Finally the lift was complete, his arms fully extended above his head, his legs vibrating with the colossal strain.
The role of the picnic-basket was now explained. While Albert bravely held his stance, his mother began unstrap-ping the lid.
‘Fancy bothering to strap it up, Sarge,’ murmured Thackeray. ‘The poor cove has to stand holding that lot above his head while she—Good Lord!’
One second of action transformed the scene. From the basket struggled a large white bulldog with a Union Jack tied about its middle. Snarling ferociously, it sank its teeth into the nearest of Albert’s quivering calves. His howl of pain echoed through the theatre, even after the crash of the bar-bell descending straight through the platform. Man and dog, still attached, disappeared in a mass of splintered wood.
‘That’s it, Thackeray!’ shouted Cribb. ‘Get the dog!’
Whether Thackeray used the route he had planned he could not remember afterwards; his descent was a four-second fumbling confusion among gilt bosoms and bottoms and torn curtains. But his debut on the stage was impeccable. The great Irving could not have moved with more despatch to the battered structure at the centre of the stage, pulled the debris aside with more vigour or seized the collar of the bulldog with more resolve. So surprised was the animal that it relaxed its grip on Albert and found itself hoisted by collar and tail-stump and clapped into the basket before uttering another growl.
CHAPTER
4
‘SERGEANT LIKES TO TAKE a look
For anarchists and spies
Down the basement-stairs when cook
Bakes her rabbit pies,’
chorused the singing policemen, Salt and Battree, on special duty. In the best theatrical traditions, they had volunteered to return to the footlights and divert the audience until order was restored backstage. So in front of a hastily lowered act-drop of mountain scenery they padded the beat with truncheons drawn, singing hilariously about life in the Force.
On the other side of the cloth the great Albert lay in the ruins of his dais emitting heart-rending groans. Around him stood the interested group who could be counted on to materialise around any unfortunate, from a lost child to a broken-down cabhorse.
‘Animals on the stage are always the next thing to disaster,’ a small cigar-smoker in a dress-suit was informing the group. He was evidently the stage-manager. ‘I’ve had ’em all here—dogs, monkeys, mules and baby elephants. Perfectly docile off-stage. Put ’em in front of an audience and you’re in no end of trouble. If they don’t bite you they’re liable to knock the scenery down and if they don’t do that there’s ways of drawing attention to ’emselves I won’t go into. You wouldn’t believe the jobs I’ve had to tell my stagehands to do.’
‘Right now you can tell ’em to lift the lumber off this poor cove,’ barked Sergeant Cribb. ‘Where’s the medical chest? He’ll need attention.’
‘Keep your voice down, sir,’ appealed the manager. ‘No need for panic. We’re professionals here.’