Between the acts, p.14
Between the Acts, page 14
“What’s the use, what’s the use,” he sank down into his chair muttering, “O sister swallow, O sister swallow, of singing your song?” The dog, who had followed him, flopped down on to the floor at his feet. Flanks sucked in and out, the long nose resting on his paws, a fleck of foam on the nostril, there he was, his familiar spirit, his Afghan hound.
The door trembled and stood half open. That was Lucy’s way of coming in—as if she did not know what she would find. Really! It was her brother! And his dog! She seemed to see them for the first time. Was it that she had no body? Up in the clouds, like an air ball, her mind touched ground now and then with a shock of surprise. There was nothing in her to weight a man like Giles to the earth.
She perched on the edge of a chair like a bird on a telegraph wire before starting for Africa.
“Swallow, my sister, O sister swallow . . .” he murmured.
From the garden—the window was open—came the sound of someone practising scales. A.B.C. A.B.C. A.B.C. Then the separate letters formed one word “Dog.” Then a phrase. It was a simple tune, another voice speaking.
“Hark, hark, the dogs do bark,
The beggars are coming to town . . .”
Then it languished and lengthened, and became a waltz. As they listened and looked—out into the garden—the trees tossing and the birds swirling seemed called out of their private lives, out of their separate avocations, and made to take part.
The lamp of love burns high, over the dark cedar groves,
The lamp of love shines clear, clear as a star in the sky. . . .
Old Bartholomew tapped his fingers on his knee in time to the tune.
Leave your casement and come, lady,
I love till I die,
He looked sardonically at Lucy, perched on her chair. How, he wondered, had she ever borne children?
For all are dancing, retreating and advancing,
The moth and the dragon fly. . . .
She was thinking, he supposed, God is peace. God is love. For she belonged to the unifiers; he to the separatists.
Then the tune with its feet always on the same spot, became sugared, insipid; bored a hole with its perpetual invocation to perpetual adoration. Had it—he was ignorant of musical terms—gone into the minor key?
For this day and this dance and this merry, merry May
Will be over (he tapped his forefinger on his knee)
With the cutting of the clover this retreating and advancing—the swifts seemed to have shot beyond their orbits—
Will be over, over, over,
And the ice will dart its splinter, and the winter,
O the winter, will fill the grate with ashes,
And there’ll be no glow, no glow on the log.
He knocked the ash off his cheroot and rose.
“So we must,” said Lucy; as if he had said aloud, “It’s time to go.”
The audience was assembling. The music was summoning them. Down the paths, across the lawns they were streaming again. There was Mrs. Manresa, with Giles at her side, heading the procession. In taut plump curves her scarf blew round her shoulders. The breeze was rising. She looked, as she crossed the lawn to the strains of the gramophone, goddess-like, buoyant, abundant, her cornucopia running over. Bartholomew, following, blessed the power of the human body to make the earth fruitful. Giles would keep his orbit so long as she weighted him to the earth. She stirred the stagnant pool of his old heart even—where bones lay buried, but the dragon flies shot and the grass trembled as Mrs. Manresa advanced across the lawn to the strains of the gramophone.
Feet crunched the gravel. Voices chattered. The inner voice, the other voice was saying: How can we deny that this brave music, wafted from the bushes, is expressive of some inner harmony? “When we wake” (some were thinking) “the day breaks us with its hard mallet blows.” “The office” (some were thinking) “compels disparity. Scattered, shattered, hither thither summoned by the bell. ‘Ping-ping-ping’ that’s the phone. ‘Forward!’ ‘Serving!’—that’s the shop.” So we answer to the infernal, age-long and eternal order issued from on high. And obey. “Working, serving, pushing, striving, earning wages—to be spent—here? Oh dear no. Now? No, by and by. When ears are deaf and the heart is dry.”
Here Cobbet of Cobbs Corner who had stooped—there was a flower—was pressed on by people pushing from behind.
For I hear music, they were saying. Music wakes us. Music makes us see the hidden, join the broken. Look and listen. See the flowers, how they ray their redness, whiteness, silverness and blue. And the trees with their many-tongued much syllabling, their green and yellow leaves hustle us and shuffle us, and bid us, like the starlings, and the rooks, come together, crowd together, to chatter and make merry while the red cow moves forward and the black cow stands still.
The audience had reached their seats. Some sat down; others stood a moment, turned, and looked at the view. The stage was empty; the actors were still dressing up among the bushes. The audience turned to one another and began to talk. Scraps and fragments reached Miss La Trobe where she stood, script in hand, behind the tree.
“They’re not ready . . . I hear ’em laughing” (they were saying). “. . . Dressing up. That’s the great thing, dressing up. And it’s pleasant now, the sun’s not so hot . . . That’s one good the war brought us—longer days . . . Where did we leave off? D’you remember? The Elizabethans . . . Perhaps she’ll reach the present, if she skips. . . . D’you think people change? Their clothes, of course . . . But I meant ourselves . . . Clearing out a cupboard, I found my father’s old top hat. . . . But ourselves— do we change?”
“No, I don’t go by politicians. I’ve a friend who’s been to Russia. He says . . . And my daughter, just back from Rome, she says the common people, in the cafés, hate Dictators. . . . Well, different people say different things. . . . ”
“Did you see it in the papers—the case about the dog? D’you believe dogs can’t have puppies? . . . And Queen Mary and the Duke of Windsor on the south coast? . . . D’you believe what’s in the papers? I ask the butcher or the grocer . . . That’s Mr. Streatfield, carrying a hurdle. . . . The good clergyman, I say, does more work for less pay than all the lot . . . It’s the wives that make the trouble. . . .”
“And what about the Jews? The refugees . . . the Jews . . . People like ourselves, beginning life again . . . But it’s always been the same. . . . My old mother, who’s over eighty, can remember . . . Yes, she still reads without glasses. . . . How amazing! Well, don’t they say, after eighty . . . Now they’re coming . . . No, that’s nothing. . . . I’d make it penal, leaving litter. But then, who’s, my husband says, to collect the fines? . . . Ah there she is, Miss La Trobe, over there, behind that tree . . .”
Over there behind the tree Miss La Trobe gnashed her teeth. She crushed her manuscript. The actors delayed. Every moment the audience slipped the noose; split up into scraps and fragments.
“Music!” she signalled. “Music!”
“What’s the origin,” said a voice, “of the expression ‘with a flea in his ear’?”
Down came her hand peremptorily. “Music, music,” she signalled.
And the gramophone began A.B.C., A.B.C.
The King is in his counting house
Counting out his money,
The Queen is in her parlour
Eating bread and honey. . . .
Miss La Trobe watched them sink down peacefully into the nursery rhyme. She watched them fold their hands and compose their faces. Then she beckoned. And at last, with a final touch to her head dress, which had been giving trouble, Mabel Hopkins strode from the bushes, and took her place on the raised ground facing the audience.
Eyes fed on her as fish rise to a crumb of bread on the water. Who was she? What did she represent? She was beautiful—very. Her cheeks had been powdered; her colour glowed smooth and clear underneath. Her grey satin robe (a bedspread), pinned in stone-like folds, gave her the majesty of a statue. She carried a sceptre and a little round orb. England was she? Queen Anne was she? Who was she? She spoke too low at first; all they heard was
. . . reason holds sway.
Old Bartholomew applauded.
“Hear! Hear!” he cried. “Bravo! Bravo!”
Thus encouraged Reason spoke out.
Time, leaning on his sickle, stands amazed While Commerce from her Cornucopia pours the minted tribute of her different ores. In distant mines the savage sweats; and from the reluctant earth the painted pot is shaped At my behest, the armed warrior lays his shield aside; the heathen leaves the Altar steaming with unholy sacrifice. The violet and the eglantine over the riven earth their flowers entwine. No longer fears the unwary wanderer the poisoned snake. And in the helmet, yellow bees their honey make.
She paused. A long line of villagers in sacking were passing in and out of the trees behind her.
Digging and delving, ploughing and sowing they were singing, but the wind blew their words away.
Beneath the shelter of my flowing robe (she resumed, extending her arms) the arts arise. Music for me unfolds her heavenly harmony. At my behest the miser leaves his hoard untouched; at peace the mother sees her children play. . . . Her children play . . . she repeated, and, waving her sceptre, figures advanced from the bushes.
Let swains and nymphs lead on the play, while Zephyr sleeps, and the unruly tribes of Heaven confess my sway.
A merry little old tune was played on the gramophone. Old Bartholomew joined his finger tips; Mrs. Manresa smoothed her skirts about her knees.
Young Damon said to Cynthia,
Come out now with the dawn
And don your azure tippet
And cast your cares adown
For peace has come to England,
And reason now holds sway.
What pleasure lies in dreaming
When blue and green’s the day?
Now cast your cares behind you.
Night passes: here is Day.
Digging and delving, the villagers sang passing in single file in and out between the trees, for the earth is always the same, summer and winter and spring; and spring and winter again; ploughing and sowing, eating and growing; time passes. . . .
The wind blew the words away.
The dance stopped. The nymphs and swains withdrew. Reason held the centre of the stage alone. Her arms extended, her robes flowing, holding orb and sceptre, Mabel Hopkins stood sublimely looking over the heads of the audience. The audience gazed at her. She ignored the audience. Then while she gazed, helpers from the bushes arranged round her what appeared to be the three sides of a room. In the middle they stood a table. On the table they placed a china tea service. Reason surveyed this domestic scene from her lofty eminence unmoved. There was a pause.
“Another scene from another play, I suppose,” said Mrs. Elmhurst, referring to her programme. She read out for the benefit of her husband, who was deaf: “Where there’s a Will there’s a Way. That’s the name of the play. And the characters. . . . ” She read out: “Lady Harpy Harraden, in love with Sir Spaniel Lilyliver. Deb, her maid. Flavinda, her niece, in love with Valentine. Sir Spaniel Lilyliver, in love with Flavinda. Sir Smirking Peace-be-with-you-all, a clergyman. Lord and Lady Fribble. Valentine, in love with Flavinda. What names for real people! But look—here they come!”
Out they came from the bushes—men in flowered waistcoats, white waistcoats and buckled shoes; women wearing brocades tucked up, hooped and draped; glass stars, blue ribands and imitation pearls made them look the very image of Lords and Ladies.
“The first scene,” Mrs. Elmhurst whispered into her husband’s ear, “is Lady Harraden’s dressing-room. . . . That’s her. . . . ” She pointed. “Mrs. Otter, I think, from the End House; but she’s wonderfully made up. And that’s Deb her maid. Who she is, I don’t know.”
“Hush, hush, hush,” someone protested.
Mrs. Elmhurst dropped her programme. The play had begun.
Lady Harpy Harraden entered her dressing-room, followed by Deb her maid.
LADY H. H. . . . Give me the pounce-box. Then the patch. Hand me the mirror, girl. So. Now my wig. . . . A pox on the girl—she’s dreaming!
DEB . . . I was thinking, my lady, what the gentleman said when he saw you in the Park.
LADY H. H. (gazing in the glass). So, so—what was it? Some silly trash! Cupid’s dart—hah, hah! lighting his taper—tush—at my eyes. . . . pooh! That was in milord’s time, twenty years since. . . . But now—what’ll he say of me now? (She looks in the mirror.) Sir Spaniel Lilyliver, I mean . . . (a rap at the door). Hark! That’s his chaise at the door. Run child. Don’t stand gaping.
DEB . . . (going to the door). Say? He’ll rattle his tongue as a gambler rattles dice in a box. He’ll find no words to fit you. He’ll stand like a pig in a poke. . . . Your servant, Sir Spaniel.
Enter Sir Spaniel.
SIR S. L. . . . Hail, my fair Saint! What, out o’ bed so early? Methought, as I came along the Mall the air was something brighter than usual. Here’s the reason. . . . Venus, Aphrodite, upon my word a very galaxy, a constellation! As I’m a sinner, a very Aurora Borealis!
(He sweeps his hat off.)
LADY H. H. Oh flatterer, flatterer! I know your ways. But come. Sit down. . . . A glass of Aqua Vitae. Take this seat, Sir Spaniel. I’ve something very private and particular to say to you. . . . You had my letter, Sir?
SIR S. L. . . . Pinned to my heart!
(He strikes his breast.)
LADY H. H. . . . I have a favour to ask of you, Sir.
SIR S. L. . . . (singing). What favour could fair Chloe ask that Damon would not get her? . . . A done with rhymes. Rhymes are still-a-bed. Let’s speak prose. What can Asphodilla ask of her plain servant Lilyliver? Speak out, Madam. An ape with a ring in his nose, or a strong young jackanapes to tell tales of us when we’re no longer here to tell truth about ourselves?
LADY H. H. (flirting her fan). Fie, fie, Sir Spaniel. You make me blush—you do indeed. But come closer. (She shifts her seat nearer to him.) We don’t want the whole world to hear us.
SIR S. L. (aside). Come closer? A pox on my life! The old hag stinks like a red herring that’s been stood over head in a tar barrel! (Aloud.) Your meaning, Madam? You were saying!
LADY H. H. I have a niece, Sir Spaniel, Flavinda by name.
SIR S. L. (aside). Why that’s the girl I love, to be sure! (Aloud.) You have a niece, Madam? I seem to remember hearing so. An only child, left by your brother, so I’ve heard, in your Ladyship’s charge—him that perished at sea.
LADY H. H. The very same Sir. She’s of age now and marriageable. I’ve kept her close as a weevil, Sir Spaniel, wrapped in the sere cloths of her virginity. Only maids about her, never a man to my knowledge, save Clout the serving man, who has a wart on his nose and a face like a nutgrater. Yet some fool has caught her fancy. Some gilded fly—some Harry, Dick; call him what you will.
SIR S. L. (aside). That’s young Valentine, I warrant. I caught ’em at the play together. (Aloud.) Say you so, Madam?
LADY H. H. She’s not so ill favoured, Sir Spaniel—there’s beauty in our line—but that a gentleman of taste and breeding like yourself now might take pity on her.
SIR S. L. Saving your presence, Madam. Eyes that have seen the sun are not so easily dangled by the lesser lights—the Cassiopeias, Aldebarans, Great Bears and so on—A fig for them when the sun’s up!
LADY H. H. (ogling him). You praise my hairdresser, Sir, or my ear-rings. (She shakes her head.)
SIR S. L. (aside). She jingles like a she-ass at a fair! She’s rigged like a barber’s pole of a May Day. (Aloud.) Your commands, Madam?
LADY H. H. Well Sir, ’twas this way Sir. Brother Bob, for my father was a plain country gentleman and would have none of the fancy names the foreigners brought with ’em—Asphodilla I call myself, but my Christian name’s plain Sue—Brother Bob, as I was telling you, ran away to sea; and, so they say, became Emperor of the Indies; where the very stones are emeralds and the sheep-crop rubies. Which, for a tenderer-hearted man never lived, he would have brought back with him, Sir, to mend the family fortunes, Sir. But the brig, frigate or what they call it, for I’ve no head for sea terms, never crossed a ditch without saying the Lord’s Prayer backwards, struck a rock. The Whale had him. But the cradle was by the bounty of Heaven washed ashore. With the girl in it; Flavinda here. What’s more to the point, with the Will in it; safe and sound; wrapped in parchment. Brother Bob’s Will. Deb there! Deb I say! Deb!
(She holloas for Deb.)
SIR S. L. (aside). Ah hah! I smell a rat! A will, quotha! Where there’s a Will there’s a Way.
LADY H. H. (bawling). The Will, Deb! The Will! In the ebony box by the right hand of the escritoire opposite the window. . . . A pox on the girl! She’s dreaming. It’s these romances, Sir Spaniel—these romances. Can’t see a candle gutter but it’s her heart that’s melting, or snuff a wick without reciting all the names in Cupid’s Calendar . . .
(Enter Deb carrying a parchment.)
LADY H. H. So . . . Give it here. The Will. Brother Bob’s Will (She mumbles over the Will.)
LADY H. H. To cut the matter short, Sir, for these lawyers even at the Antipodes are a long-winded race——
SIR S. L. To match their ears, Ma’am——
LADY H. H. Very true, very true. To cut the matter short, Sir, my Brother Bob left all he died possessed of to his only child Flavinda; with this proviso, mark ye. That she marry to her Aunt’s liking. Her Aunt, that’s me. Otherwise, mark ye, all—to wit ten bushels of diamonds; item of rubies; item two hundred square miles of fertile territory bounding the River Amazon to the Nor-Nor-East; item his snuff box; item his flageolet—he was always one to love a tune, Sir, Brother Bob; item six Macaws and as many Concubines as he had with him at the time of his decease—all this with other trifles needless to specify he left, mark ye, should she fail to marry to her Aunt’s liking—that’s me—to found a Chapel, Sir Spaniel, where six poor Virgins should sing hymns in perpetuity for the repose of his soul—which, to speak the truth, Sir Spaniel, poor Brother Bob stands in need of, perambulating the Gulf Stream as he is and consorting with Syrens. But take it; read the Will yourself, Sir.
