Chapter Twenty-Nine

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

S ally would have loved nothing more in the world than to slink home after all that had happened and hide in her room with Dougie. They could have curled up in the bed, under the quilt her mother had made her for her wedding, and she’d have watched him read and let everything from the last few days just settle through her, like water sinking through the sand on the beach at Blackpool. The hard, biting truths her in-laws had told her, and the feeling she’d just made a terrible fool of herself in front of Tom.

Her in-laws didn’t come to Highbridge often, but they made a special effort round Christmas to see Dougie. They’d had tea in the pub, then gone for a walk in the park so Dougie could feed the ducks, and when she told them about her job in the theatre, they’d told her about what had happened to Noah. Not that they’d had it from him – he wouldn’t have wanted to give them cause for worry. He’d confessed how hard things had got to his brother, just a week before he’d been killed.

She pushed on with her work, trying not to think of that look of pain in Tom’s eyes, or the burn she’d felt when he started to say her name, then Lady Lassiter had volunteered. She couldn’t have done it. Wouldn’t have done it. But still, that half-hearted way Tom had spoken, and the way they hadn’t even heard him, had scorched her. The usherettes and waiters started to clock on, all twittering about the notices on the wall, and she looked at the clock over the bar and realised she had five minutes to get out of her apron and run a brush through her hair before Belle and Alfred arrived with Dougie to see the show. It would be tonight they’d arranged to come, with her all disordered, and chaos both backstage and front of house. She shut the broom and dirty linens in the cupboard, then hightailed it to her locker behind the secret door near the WCs in the stalls, then was out of the side door to find her boy. The look of joy on his small face just about wiped her misery away.

‘What’s this?’ Belle whispered to her as they made their way up to the circle. ‘Everyone outside is saying Lady Lassiter is going to be on stage tonight!’ She was pink, as if she’d run all the way from the Bricklayers Arms. ‘Lordy, and I almost sent our Bill down in my place so I could stay and keep an eye on the pub.’

The usherette in the circle winked at them and showed them to their seats, right in the middle among the gentry of Highbridge. Mr Poole had looked after them all right.

‘What a spot!’ Alfred said as they sat down. ‘Never thought I’d sit among the nobs like this. What do you think, Dougie?’

Dougie was a little pale, with pink spots on his cheeks. He put his chin on the velvet top of the barrier at the edge of the circle and looked down at the red curtain.

‘It’s . . .’ He paused, looking for the right word. ‘It’s grand . . .!’

‘You breathe slowly, Dougie,’ Sally told him, ‘through your nose, like the chemist said.’ He nodded, eyes shining like gas lamps, and Sally pulled a packet of aniseed balls from her pocket. ‘There you go, lambkin. And there’s an orange, too, if you’re good.’

‘Can I share with Belle and Alf?’

Her heart squeezed. ‘Of course you can. It’s been madness this afternoon,’ she told them over Dougie’s head. ‘So I’ve no idea what it’ll be like.’

‘It’ll be something,’ said Belle. ‘I’m sure of that.’

When the overture started, Grace was holding a bucket ready for Harold. He was pale and sweaty even under the paint, which was an inch thick tonight. The chorus ran on in a sprightly fashion, and started their business. Grace glanced round. Nikolai was standing in the wings, wearing evening dress and twirling his tail. Lillian was rereading her script by the prompt light, wearing one of her long velvet evening gowns to which Fairy Bow Bells’ wings had been sewn on – a little crooked – by Grace herself. Fitzwarren and Alice, thank goodness, had opted for high tea at the Lyons teashop after the matinee, so at least some of the cast had a rough idea of where to stand. The chorus, all a little twittery after an hour in the pub, promised to guide Lillian and Nikolai about as best they could.

Jack approached her in the darkness, carrying a pitcher of water. ‘To wash with or drink, depending’, he whispered, setting it next to her. ‘I’m on props. How are you holding up?’

Grace looked at him. ‘It’s exciting, isn’t it? How is Miss Chisholm?’

‘Lying on the floor of the office with a copy of The Gramophone . I told her about our plans for Empire Records. That’s all right, isn’t it? It seemed to take her mind off her troubles briefly.’

‘Yes, of course – now do get into position, Jack! There’s a lot to do in the first act. Are you ready, Harold?’

He held up one hand, the other over his mouth, and Grace readied the bucket. Then he gave a sharp nod.

The overture ended, and with a blast on the trumpet, the curtain rose.

‘So this is London!’ Josie announced, and the audience – bless them, Grace thought – gave them a round of applause for getting that far.

Grace had never been skiing, but she’d seen pictures in the Illustrated News , and that evening she had some fellow feeling with a person hurtling down a slope, unsure if a crevasse or a rock or a tree was going to bring them to a disastrous halt, or if they would skip past the hazards and, through a mixture of luck and momentum, reach their destination intact.

Lillian’s first entrance was greeted with loud cheers; leaving Harold on a stool, clutching a bucket, Grace watched from the wings. Lillian was still a magnetic presence on stage; knowing the whole audience was in on the joke that she was appearing, she flirted shamelessly with them and with Josie. Josie, to her credit, did not try and compete, and as Lillian kicked her heels on her first exit, and glanced over her shoulder, she applauded along with the rest of Highbridge.

Nikolai’s accent became considerably thicker as he snarled at the audience and skittered from one side of the stage to the other, eliciting delighted shrieks from the children and dodging Harold’s rolling pin with aplomb. As Harold tumbled off stage, tossing the pin at Jack, then collapsing into his chair again, Grace began to think they might actually get away with it.

For Act Three the stage was transformed, a little unsteadily, into the court of the Royal Family of Zanzibar. The chorus as the plague of rats, with added ears and tails, managed their ballet of destruction with a great deal of noise and mess, most of which was planned. Nikolai made another triumphant entrance, sauntering in, tail twirling and clambering onto the table and driving off the King and Princess with satisfying shrieks, then Grace heard a stifled yell from the prop table and turned to see Jack, poking around among the wedding props with Fairy Bow Bells’ wand.

‘Jack!’ Grace hissed. ‘What on earth are you doing?’

He looked at her, eyes wide with dismay. ‘Harry’s here!’

On stage, the vamp for Nikolai’s victory song began. Grace gasped as she spotted Harry nosing curiously around the edge of the stage. She grabbed a clean basin and lunged, trying to cage him under it, but Harry spotted her coming and dodged expertly right and left, then fled onto the stage itself.

The audience began to laugh.

Nikolai missed his cue; the orchestra manfully continued the vamp while Grace and Jack stared in horror from the wings as the rat reached the middle of the stage and stood on its hind legs.

‘Grace! This is a disaster! Do I chase him off?’ Jack asked, stretching forward like a greyhound spotting a rabbit.

Grace grabbed his arm. ‘No, wait, Jack.’

‘Ah!’ Nikolai said. ‘What news, my friend?’

Grace put her hand over her heart, not sure what she was praying for this time, but praying for it very hard indeed.

And Harry squeaked.

‘Then our triumph is complete!’ Nikolai replied, and the crowd cheered as he launched into the song. When it became clear Harry was not going to leave any time soon, Nikolai began singing the song to him. On the final chorus, Nikolai got off the table, knelt and offered his hand to the creature. Harry hesitated, then ran up his arm and perched on his shoulder. The audience whistled and whooped.

As she watched from the circle, Sally’s determination to leave The Empire became clouded with regret. Dougie was practically bursting with excitement beside her, laughing at every joke, booing King Rat so vigorously that the rather grand-looking lady behind them broke into smiles. Belle and Alfred beamed at each other, at her and Dougie, and at the stage. By the time they got to the singalong at the end, they all looked misty-eyed with delight.

Jack Treadwell came onto the stage at the curtain call and made a handsome speech thanking Nikolai and Lillian for stepping in, praising Harold’s fortitude, and saying how none of it would have been possible without all the staff of The Empire pulling together. Dougie turned to Sally, his little face bright with pride at that. Then Jack thanked the audience for joining in and they had a final chorus of ‘I’m Sitting on Top of the World’, before the house lights came up. As they filed out of the circle, Dougie describing everything they had just seen to Belle again, Sally noticed Ruby Rowntree perched on the usher’s stool by the door. Ruby caught her eye and beckoned her over.

‘Did you have fun, Sally?’ she asked. ‘I couldn’t resist coming in to see how they managed. It went rather well in the end, didn’t it? Lillian has such a lovely voice – I’d forgotten. I saw her sing in Paris, you know, before she became Lady Lassiter.’

Sally smiled. It was impossible not to when Ruby looked at you in that robinish way. ‘Did you now? She does. Feel the weight come off my shoulders when I listen to her, but I think the rat might have stolen the show, Miss Ruby.’

‘Have you seen Tom today? He’s been so busy this week with the new enterprise, and then today he’s been caught up in these shenanigans.’

Sally lowered her eyes. ‘I did. Ran my mouth at him, too.’

‘Good for you. Keeps him honest. I don’t suppose he’d even have had these ideas about a record company if you hadn’t given him what for.’

‘A record company?’ Sally felt a flame of pride, somehow. Then squashed it. She’d have no more dealings with Tom Lassiter.

‘Yes, didn’t he tell you? It’s very exciting. He’s throwing everything he has into it.’ She looked to where Belle and Alfred were standing with Dougie, and waved at them. ‘Come and see me soon, Sally. I’ve done an arrangement for you of your oak tree song, and there’s another tune I have I think will suit you.’

Sally shuffled to one side, to let a laughing couple in evening dress pass them. The woman was holding the hand of a little boy about Dougie’s age. He had a collar and tie, and his hair split with a razor-sharp parting. The woman bent down to wipe crumbs from around the boy’s mouth with a snowy white handkerchief.

‘Miss Ruby, I’m not sure. I’m leaving The Empire as soon as I can find something else, and you shouldn’t waste your songs on a girl who does the occasional singalong in the pub.’

The old lady tilted her head to one side. ‘I’m not. I’m offering my advice, and my songs, to someone who I think has the talent to make them famous.’

Sally felt a fierce heat in her cheeks. ‘There’s . . . circumstances, Miss Ruby. I’m not sure I can.’

Ruby studied her with slightly narrowed eyes. ‘Sally, dear, you must make your own decisions, but please don’t decide to be small and dress it up as a scruple. We all have to make our way against the current sometimes. I . . .’

Her voice disappeared, and she seemed to be seeing something in the shadows Sally could not.

‘Miss Ruby . . .?’

She blinked and returned her gaze to Sally’s face. ‘I’m getting old, dear. Sometimes the bravest thing to do is to live quietly, and we all have to make our own rules. Trust me, I do know that.’ She reached out and took Sally’s hand, holding her fingers with surprising force. ‘But don’t let yourself be bounced out of the life you want because a voice inside you says you can’t, or you shouldn’t. A little defiance, Sally. A little grit.’

Sally felt her eyes getting hot.

‘I can’t, Miss Ruby. There are other things to consider . . . I would be betraying . . . if I carried on this way . . .’

‘Ah, that’s a big word, betrayal. Big enough to become a shield to hide behind, if we let it.’

Then she released Sally’s hand again and sat back in her seat. ‘All this excitement. I’m quite drained. I think I shall sit here a little. You go with your friends, and your little boy, dear. But come and see me.’

A fresh covering of snow had fallen in the valley during the evening as The Empire family fought its way through the performance, so by the time they drove back to Lassiter Court, the applause still ringing in their ears, the fields at the edge of town had been transformed into a shadowed fairyland of greys and silvers, the frost firing like opals in the moonlight.

Lillian was as happy as she could ever remember being, except for the day she realised her son had not died in the war, as she’d believed, but washed up at her theatre, ignorant of who she was, but absolutely, miraculously, alive. That had been a painful, confusing day, too, though, mixed through with guilt and grief. This, by contrast, was purely joyous.

Next to her in the passenger seat, Nikolai was humming the King Rat victory song and chuckling to himself. He had refused to take off the ears or the tail for now, and Lillian was still wearing the dress with the improvised fairy wings.

‘I think,’ he said, pausing his song, ‘that I now understand pantomime.’

Lillian laughed. ‘It was wonderful, wasn’t it? And Harry! I wonder why he hasn’t joined in the performance before.’

‘I think, like his friend Dixon, that Harry is a very clever creature,’ Nikolai said, swirling his tail. ‘He knows that Marmaduke would never share the limelight and the applause. I, on the other hand, am willing to be generous.’ He twisted in his seat. ‘A magical moment, Lillian. I met the eye of a wild beast, an untamed creature, and we understood each other. It was . . . an experience.’

‘And extremely funny.’

He grinned. ‘Yes. And singing with you was also very nice. Might you perform again, Lillian?’

Lillian slowed the car, taking the turn into the long carriage drive of Lassiter Court, following the tracks left by Jack, who had left the theatre in his car with the others just ahead of them.

‘I don’t know, darling. It never seemed appropriate when I was married to dear Barney.’

‘But now you are marrying a disreputable exile, perhaps you will be more free?’

‘You are still a grand duke.’

Nikolai tutted dismissively, and stroked his ears as she halted the car, then, with a distinct scurry, jumped out and ran round the front to open the door for her.

They were only just behind Jack. He and Grace, Dixon and Tom, were handing their coats to Hewitt and Gladys and calling for champagne.

‘I think we deserve it, don’t we?’ Jack said quickly.

‘Oh, we certainly do,’ Lillian agreed. ‘Hewitt, do you like my wings?’

‘They are splendid, Lady Lassiter,’ he said very calmly. ‘Though may I suggest His Excellency is more careful with his tail? The Tiffany lamp on the hall chest is precarious.’

Nikolai snatched his tail closer to him with an expression of deep contrition and Hewitt’s upper lip very nearly twitched into a smile. ‘Miss de Monfort and Mr Allerdyce have just had a crate of Pol Roger delivered, Lady Lassiter. I understand they were in the audience this evening.’

‘Oh, let’s have those, then,’ Lillian said. ‘And Hewitt, will you see if Miss Stanmore is awake, and invite her to join us if she is?’

The champagne that Joe and Agnes had sent was excellent. Lillian looked round the room, at the flush and animation in Jack and Grace’s faces, at Tom’s broad grin, at Dixon, with his warm smile and obvious, gentle pleasure at being included in the jokes the others were sharing. Perhaps the record shop would be a success, perhaps it would be a disaster; her magic wand had only limited powers off stage, after all. But she made a new resolution: that she would at least try to enjoy it.

The door opened, and they all looked round expecting to see Stella, the stories of their nerves and triumphs springing to their lips again in anticipation of a new audience, but instead in came Hewitt. He carried an envelope which he offered, with a slight bow to Grace, then stood back. They watched as she opened it.

‘Oh,’ Grace said almost at once. ‘It’s from Stella. She’s gone.’

Lillian leant forward. ‘Gone? Do read it, Grace.’

‘Sorry, darlings. I am being an absolute drag on you. Off to London, then away for a while. Have read enough books.’ Grace frowned and turned the page over. ‘That’s it! Honestly . . .’

‘I’ve always liked Stella,’ Tom said. ‘But she has been terribly strange of late. Grace, do you think she was actually in love with the girl who died?’

Grace handed the note back to Hewitt. ‘If you could leave that on my desk, Hewitt. Did she say she was leaving?’

‘No, Mrs Treadwell. She declined any supper when she came back from the theatre in a taxi cab, and went to her room. Her suitcases have gone.’

‘Thank you.’

Hewitt departed and Grace sipped her champagne. ‘I don’t know, Tom. I don’t think so. Did she seem struck by grief to you? Or broken-hearted?’

Tom blushed slightly and shook his head.

‘I keep thinking of what she said to you when she arrived, Grace,’ Jack said. ‘That the newspapers said she’d killed the girl. I mean, they were awful, but they didn’t say that as such.’

‘You should have seen her when the police detectives accused her of supplying Tasha with drugs,’ Grace said, looking into the fire, then around at the rest of them. ‘Of course, she’s a wonderful actress, but I’m sure that her indignation and shock were quite genuine. So not grief, not guilt over supplying her with cocaine . . .’

‘Lillian,’ Nikolai asked, ‘you have known Stella a long time, too. What do you think?’

‘I’m not sure.’ She took his hand. ‘It’s quite possible it is just Stella being Stella, but I can’t help feeling it looks more like guilt than heartbreak, even if she had nothing to do with the drugs.’

Grace nodded thoughtfully and Jack interlaced his fingers in hers. ‘I think perhaps you are right. But her worst sin is she has deprived us of someone new to describe our cleverness to. I shall fill up our glasses, and we shall tell each other one more time, I think.’