It didn't much help her temper that they would have to drive wildly back to Grampion and have only a sandwich for dinner, if Mahala was to be in her dressing-room on time.
Bethel spent part of her isolation in imitating Mrs. Tzirka's tricks of chain-smoking--taking five puffs of a cigarette, exactly five, lighting another from it, and crushing out the first with a nervous sidewise brushing motion; of showing her knees and nervously, constantly, pulling down her skirt; of arching her right big toe in her half-sandals; of widening her eyes with glad surprise every time she looked at a male.
When Mrs. Tzirka galloped back, gushing 'So sor-ry--we were looking at my espaliered pears,' Bethel bowed quite amiably and in silence.
In the car Mahala shrieked, 'You were very rude, not even saying good-bye to your hostess.'
Bethel was pleased to hear herself saying nothing whatever, and pleased that, whether Mahala knew it or not, there was war between them now, and no sex loyalty need stop her if she should ever be able to protect Andy Deacon, her god and reckless child, from the man-eating Mahala.
XIV
During the week of July 11th, while Nile Sanderac was playing Candida in the evenings, Bethel was rehearsing for Stage Door, along with the whole stock company, all the apprentices, and a few summerite outsiders from Grampion Centre, so large was the cast.
It was the first time that she had ever played with professional actors, the first time she had tried to play comedy, the first time she had had, to devour and treasure, real professional typed 'sides' instead of a book; and in all, the first time she had been entirely away from the pleasing school of extempore acting, as demonstrated in Russian schools, in Point Royal College, and on the bench in the Prindles' garage in Sladesbury.
Andy was David and Mahala was Terry in Stage Door; Iris was the Kaye who committed suicide; Toni was Jean Maitland, who went to Hollywood; Pete Chew was the Texas student of acting; while Harry Mihick suffered clear down to the bottom of his sensitive boots as the coloured houseman.
Bethel's own role was that of Bernice Niemeyer, the curiosity-driven girl who was the pest of the theatrical boarding-house. She was glad that it wasn't merely a pretty ingénue part. She would have to represent a person as alien to herself as Cleopatra, and that was the training for which she longed.
She had heard from Doc Keezer an old stock-company belief that an actor ought not to learn his part before rehearsals, but during them, so that he might tie up lines and business. But two days before the terrifying Tuesday morning when they ran through Stage Door, in the orchestra pit, in front of the Candida set that stared down superciliously at their ragged beginnings, Bethel knew all of the Bernice part, and she had studied such speeches as 'I'd rather go out with the handsome one' as though they were the last words of Fanny Kemble . . . She was Bernice, sharp-nosed and brassy and a little touching in her predestined failure. When Toni demanded, 'Shove over the box of shredded hay' at Monday-morning breakfast, Bethel looked sleepily at her, sighed and murmured, 'With the handsome one'.
Whatever she did, remembering the stripes and afflictions she had borne over Nora, Bethel was not going to overplay the role. Her chief concern was that she had the very first speech, opening the play.
All Saturday night she worked with the other apprentices removing the Night of January 16th set and erecting that of Candida--good work, for all its weariness; laughing and clattering on and off the stage together; the boys in undershirts and belted trousers, their shoulders glittering with sweat, the girls in slacks or babyish gingham rompers, allowed to stay up till dawn, feeling that they were doing something pioneering, something important for the drama; never stopping their boasting about what great actors they were going to be, and swapping faith for faith. Yet again on Monday night, after the Candida opening, Bethel stayed up till three, studying her part at the dormitory dining table, under one economical light (Roscoe saw to that), her legs twisted around a table leg, her small tongue poked out of the corner of her small red mouth. She was, in fact, so thorough about it that when she came to the first rehearsal of Stage Door, at ten on Tuesday, she couldn't remember a word, and had to read her part, like all the others.
At the beginning of the play, set in the jumbled living-room of a boarding-house for girl aspirants, one Olga is at the piano. The busily intrusive Bernice stops her letter-writing to ask about the music. So, beginning the rehearsal, looking not at Olga but at Mr. Roscoe Valentine, who sat in the front row of the orchestra, scratching one fat calf, his usual resemblance to a ripe olive heightened by a dark green hunting jacket, Bethel gave her first line, 'What's that you're playing?' like a plunging sparrow beholding a very small worm. All the while she sat rigid at the writing desk . . . She wasn't overplaying this!
Roscoe bellowed.
Usually, Roscoe would only squeak, pipe, pullulate, whine, whimper, bleat, blat or blether, but this was a man-sized bellow.
'Bethel, have you by any chance looked at the role you're supposed to play? Have you taken one single moment from the golden joys of swimming and amorous dalliance to read maybe a couple of Bernice's speeches? Did anyone tell you that they can be procured in manuscript, all nicely typed? Also in book form, at all literary emporia? Have you looked at the play? Do you even know which character you are, by the wisdom of Mr. Deacon and Miss Sample and myself, elected to portray?'
'I know it by heart.' Bethel wasn't sure whether she sounded dangerous or blubbering. She felt both.
'Then you have no excuse. Or maybe no heart. Now let's save a lot of time at the beginning, by getting your concept of the part right. Bernice is supposed to be an active, inquisitive busybody--a sort of oversized blue jay. When you give your line--what is it?--"What's that you're playing?"--make it as fresh and irritating as you can. And don't sit there lolling. Get up. Make a cross. Look at Olga's music, over her shoulder. Breathe down her neck. Make yourself as generally objectionable as you can. Understand?'
'Yes, sir, I'll try to be very objectionable.'
'On-stage, I meant.'
Roscoe Valentine was a skyrocket; heated-looking for a time, but cooling with celerity. For the first three or four out of the twelve half-day rehearsal periods (including dress rehearsal, on Sunday evening) he was savagely on time, and fussy as a watchmaker. He would spend ten minutes in discussing whether, in view of the fact that she was later to commit suicide, it would be more significant for Kaye Hamilton--that is, Iris Pentire--to turn right or left, when she sat down.
But each day Roscoe was later at rehearsals, each day he was angrier when actors were even later than himself. By the end of the week, when an actor would ask, 'Don't you think I ought to cross here?' or 'What about my standing up before I answer?' Roscoe would clasp his breast and moan, 'Hasn't anybody told you the news? We're not rehearsing ten weeks! We're playing stock, with six days for rehearsal! I'm directing for tempo and mood, not for business. Can't you work out anything for yourself?'
At his best, Roscoe could take out enough time in explaining that he hadn't enough time for directing to have directed a mystery melodrama.