“Fine,” said Adrian, “I’ll be here.”
“All right,” said Clattercup. “Tara.”
Turning on his heel, he walked back into the theatre.
“Darling boy,” said Ethelbert, “isn’t that wonderful? Now we’ll go back to the cottage and have a celebration, and then we’ll get back here a little before two and I’ll show you round the theatre.”
15. THE REHEARSAL
After a celebration at Ethelbert’s cottage, which consisted of apples for Rosy and a bottle of elderberry wine for Adrian and Ethelbert, the whole thing being accompanied (in a very cultural manner) by a spirited rendering by Ethelbert on his tuba of what he insisted was a fine old Irish ballad entitled “If I Were a Blackbird”, they had lunch and hurried back into the town.
They tethered Rosy in a big shed outside the back of the theatre where the scenery was stored, made her comfortable with some hay and some mangolds and then Ethelbert led Adrian into the theatre.
“I have never been back stage in a theatre,” said Adrian.
“Haven’t you, darling boy?” said Ethelbert. “But it’s such an experience. Come, I’ll show you.”
He danced away in the gloom and Adrian could hear the click of switches. Suddenly before him, glittering resplendent as a wedding cake, was the Sultan’s palace in all its cardboard glory. Adrian looked out into the centre of the stage and gazed into the dark auditorium what he could just dimly discern the rows of seats and boxes perched around the walls. He was amazed at the great flats and sheets of scenery held on ropes and pulleys high above the proscenium arch out of sight of the audience, presumably waiting to be lowered at the appropriate moment by some minions of the theatre.
“This,” said Ethelbert, joining him in front of the Sultan’s palace, raising himself on tiptoe and doing a little pirouette, “is the revolving stage. We have got three scenes on it, and it goes right round when they pull those levers over there: Saves an awful lot of mucking about.”
“It’s really fascinating,” said Adrian.
“Well, come along, darling boy,” said Ethelbert, and he fluttered once more into the wings and switched off the lights, plunging the Sultan’s palace into dusty gloom. He dived away through the scenery piled in corners and Adrian followed him.
Presently they came to a long narrow corridor, on either side of which was a series of doors.
“This,” said Ethelbert flitting down the corridor to a door and leaning against it decoratively, “this is my dressing-room, dear boy.”
He pointed to the door on which was a card that stated, rather startlingly, ETHELBERT CLEEP—CHIEP WIFE TO SULTAN. He opened the door and led Adrian into a tiny, rather dingy little room, most of one wall being taken up by a large mirror lit by gas lamps. There was a cupboard in one corner, the door hanging half open, and in it Adrian could see various exotic and eastern-looking costumes and a number of diaphanous veils.
Reclining on a horse-hair sofa on the other side of the room was an extremely large and statuesque red-head, clad (it was quite obvious) in nothing but a rather moth-eaten dressing-gown trimmed with ostrich feathers. She lay in the attitude of one who has been carved from stone and placed on top of a medieval tomb, but instead of her hands clasping to her bosom some item of ecclesiastical interest, she was holding a half-full bottle of gin. Her snores were loud and rhythmic, though lady-like in their way.
“Oh, dear,” said Ethelbert, “she’s at it again.”
He flapped across the room and removed the bottle of gin from its owner’s firm clasp and then started patting her cheeks daintily.
“Honoria, my dear, Honoria,” said Ethelbert, “do wake up.”
The lady, thus appealed to, stirred and muttered something derogatory under her breath.
“This is Honoria,” said Ethelbert glancing over his shoulder at Adrian. “Honoria Loosestrife. She’s our principal boy.”
“Principal boy?” said Adrian.
“Yes,” said Ethelbert, “she’s awfully good” Adrian sat down on a chair and studied Ethelbert carefully.
“Just let me get things straight. You are playing the Sultan’s favourite wife, and she,” He said pointing at Honoria, who was now displaying a vast expanse of pearly bosom, “she’s playing the principal boy?”
“But, of course,” said Ethelbert. “Silly boy, it’s always like that in pantomimes.”
“Oh,” said Adrian. “Well, it sounds very queer to me?”
“You’ll soon get used to it,” said Ethelbert. ‘It’s merely a question of adjusting.”
He went over to a jug and basin in the corner, wet a large flannel and proceeded to apply it to Honoria.
“Gerorf. Leavemealone,” she said indistinctly.
“Now, now, dear,” said Ethelbert. “You must be ready for rehearsals. You know what old cretinous Clattercup is like.”
He squeezed about a pint of water out of the flannel all over Honoria’s face and turned to Adrian.
“Such a nice girl,” he said, “but she has, how shall I put it, a slight penchant for stimulants.”
“Yes,” said Adrian, “I can see that. Rosy has too.” Honoria dragged herself upright on the couch and sat looking at them blearily. Her dressing-gown had now become disarranged to a considerable degree. Adrian hastily averted his gaze.
“There we are then,” said Ethelbert. “Feeling better?”
“No,” said Honoria in a deep mournful contralto that was somehow reminiscent of the lower notes of Ethelbert’s tuba, “I feel dreadful . . . dreadful.”
“Well,” said Ethelbert philosophically, “gin on an empty stomach is not the best way to start the day.”
“Nobody cares about me,” said Honoria lugubriously, and to Adrian’s intense embarrassment and alarm large tears welled out of her eyes, trickled down her cheeks and fell on her ample bosom.
“Of course they do, my love,” said Ethelbert. “Everybody simply adores you.”
“They don’t,” sobbed Honoria. “They’re jealous of me and my art.”
Ethelbert sighed and raised his eyes to heaven.
“Adrian,” he said, “would you be a dear and go along to the stage door and get a cup of tea for Honoria? It will make her feel better.”
“Nothing,” said Honoria sonorously, clasping her forehead and one breast in a dramatic gesture, “nothing, but death will make me feel any better.”
Her gesture had succeeded in disarranging her dressing-gown still further, so Adrian fled before any more of Honoria’s voluptuous figure was vouchsafed to him. He eventually found a little be whiskered gnome of a man sitting in what looked like a glass-fronted pay box full of keys, and managed, after some argument, to extricate a large mug of tea which he carried back to the dressing-room.
To his astonishment, there was no longer an air of drunken gloom. Honoria was rolling about on the couch, giving vent to great, rich gurgles of laughter at what appeared to be some joke that Ethelbert had been telling her.
“Oh, my soul,” she said sitting up and wiping her eyes, “Reely Ethelbert, you are terrible.”
“Never a dull moment,” said Ethelbert, thrusting the mug of tea into her hand.
She sipped the tea and eyed Adrian appraisingly, then she wrapped her dressing-gown closer about her and drew herself up majestically.
“Who is this?” she enquired.
“Adrian,” said Ethelbert. “He has joined the show with his elephant.”
“Tarrach!” said Honoria, with such ferocity that Adrian jumped. “That’s all we need, an elephant in this show. Already half my best lines are killed by that ridiculous clashing of cymbals that Clattercup insists on. That orchestra deliberately plays off key to put me out in all my best solo numbers, and now we are to have an elephant stumping about the stage and no doubt Leaving huge mounds of excrement wherever it goes.”
“No, no,” Ethelbert assured her earnestly. “It’s a very clean elephant.”
“As a matter of fact,” said Adrian, who was beginning vaguely to grasp the method of handling Honoria’s rather volatile nature, “as a matter of fact, Mr. Clattercup when he employed me said that he had got such a wonderful principal boy that nothing but the best in the way of um . . . er . . .”