Final Curtain. Ngaio Marsh

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       5

       The Bloody Child

      I

      At half past ten the following morning Troy, hung with paint boxes and carrying a roll of canvas and stretchers, made her way to the little theatre. Guided by Paul and Cedric, who carried her studio easel between them, she went down a long passage that led out of the hall, turned right at a green baize door, ‘beyond which,’ Cedric panted, ‘the Difficult Children ravage at will,’ and continued towards the rear of that tortuous house. Their journey was not without incident, for as they passed the door of what, as Troy later discovered, was a small sitting-room, it was flung open and a short plumpish man appeared, his back towards them, shouting angrily: ‘If you’ve no faith in my treatment, Sir Henry, you have an obvious remedy. I shall be glad to be relieved of the thankless task of prescribing for a damned obstinate patient and his granddaughter.’ Troy made a valiant effort to forge ahead, but was blocked by Cedric, who stopped short, holding the easel diagonally across the passage and listening with an air of the liveliest interest. ‘Now, now, keep your temper,’ rumbled the invisible Sir Henry. ‘I wash my hands of you,’ the other proclaimed. ‘No, you don’t. You keep a civil tongue in your head, Withers. You’d much better look after me and take a bit of honest criticism in the way it’s intended.’ ‘This is outrageous,’ the visitor said, but with a note of something like despair in his voice. ‘I formally relinquish the case. You will take this as final.’ There was a pause, during which Paul attempted, without success, to drag Cedric away. ‘I won’t accept it,’ Sir Henry said at last. ‘Come, now, Withers, keep your temper. You ought to understand. I’ve a great deal to try me. A great deal. Bear with an old fellow’s tantrums, won’t you? You shan’t regret it. See here, now. Shut that door and listen to me.’ Without turning, the visitor slowly shut the door.

      ‘And now,’ Cedric whispered, ‘he’ll tell poor Dr. Withers he’s going to be remembered in the Will.’

      ‘Come on, for God’s sake,’ said Paul, and they made their way to the little theatre.

      Half an hour later Troy had set up her easel, stretched her canvas, and prepared paper and boards for preliminary studies. The theatre was a complete little affair with a deepish stage. The Macbeth backcloth was simple and brilliantly conceived. The scenic painter had carried out Troy’s original sketch very well indeed. Before it stood three-dimensional monolithic forms that composed well and broke across the cloth in the right places. She saw where she would place her figure. There would be no attempt to present the background in terms of actuality. It would be frankly a stage set. ‘A dangling rope would come rather nicely,’ she thought, ‘but I suppose they wouldn’t like that. If only he’ll stand!’

      Cedric and Paul now began to show her what could be done with the lights. Troy was enjoying herself. She liked the smell of canvas and glue and the feeling that this was a place where people worked. In the little theatre even Cedric improved. He was knowledgeable and quickly responsive to her suggestions, checking Paul’s desire to flood the set with a startling display of lighting and getting him to stand in position while he himself focussed a single spot. ‘We must find the backcloth discreetly,’ he cried. ‘Try the ground row.’ And presently a luminous glow appeared, delighting Troy.

      ‘But how are you going to see?’ cried Cedric distractedly. ‘Oh, lawks! How are you going to see?’

      ‘I can bring down a standard spot on an extension,’ Paul offered. ‘Or we could uncover a window.’

      Cedric gazed in an agony of inquiry at Troy. ‘But the window light would infiltrate,’ he said. ‘Or wouldn’t it?’

      ‘We could try.’

      At last by an ingenious arrangement of screens Troy was able to get daylight on her canvas and a fair view of the stage.

      The clock – it was, of course, known as the Great Clock – in the central tower struck eleven. A door somewhere backstage opened and shut, and dead on his cue Sir Henry, in the character of Macbeth, walked onto the lighted set.

      ‘Golly!’ Troy whispered. ‘Oh, Golly!’

      ‘Devastatingly fancy dress,’ said Cedric in her ear, ‘but in its ridiculous way rather exciting. Or not? Too fancy?’

      ‘It’s not too fancy for me,’ Troy said roundly, and walked down the aisle to greet her sitter.

      II

      At midday Troy drove her fingers through her hair, propped a large charcoal drawing against the front of the stage and backed away from it down the aisle. Sir Henry took off his helmet, groaned a little, and moved cautiously to a chair in the wings.

      ‘I suppose you want to stop,’ said Troy absently, biting her thumb and peering at her drawing.

      ‘One grows a trifle stiff,’ he replied. She then noticed that he was looking more than a trifle tired. He had made up for her sitting, painting heavy shadows round his eyes and staining his moustache and the tuft on his chin with water-dye. To this he had added long strands of crêpe hair. But beneath the grease-paint and hair his face sagged a little and his head drooped.

      ‘I must let you go,’ said Troy. ‘I hope I haven’t been too exacting. One forgets.’

      ‘One also remembers,’ said Sir Henry. ‘I have been remembering my lines. I played the part first in 1904.’

      Troy looked up quickly, suddenly liking him.

      ‘It’s a wonderful rôle,’ he said. ‘Wonderful.’

      ‘I was very much moved by it when I saw you five years ago.’

      ‘I’ve played it six times and always to enormous business. It hasn’t been an unlucky piece for me.’

      ‘I’ve heard about the Macbeth superstition. One mustn’t quote from the play, must one?’ Troy made a sudden pounce at her drawing and wiped her thumb down a too dominant line. ‘Do you believe it’s unlucky?’ she asked vaguely.

      ‘It has been for other actors,’ he said, quite seriously. ‘There’s always a heavy feeling offstage during performance. People are nervy.’

      ‘Isn’t that perhaps because they remember the superstition?’

      ‘It’s there,’ he said. ‘You can’t escape the feeling. But the piece has never been unlucky for me.’ His voice, which had sounded tired, lifted again. ‘If it СКАЧАТЬ