Midsummer Madness (5 page)

‘The Earl of where?’

I couldn’t remember. I couldn’t even remember my own name or why I was there. Not a star, not cast, nothing. Everyone was laughing and having a wonderful time. My body was folding up. Any minute I’d be a parcel.

Some place to hide. That’s what I needed. I fled past my corner and down the stairs, holding on to the plastered wall. There was a sense of toppling as I lost touch with the surface.

I fell on to the last step, and sat, crying with a dazzling intensity. They were not only tears for the night, but for the years past. A time not forgotten. The memories were as clear and sharp as today.

Joe was leaning over me. My face was wet with tears that dripped in all directions. He gave me a handkerchief, a real linen one, not a tissue.

‘Blow,’ he said.

‘I c-can’t,’ I whispered in a storm of sobbing.

‘Don’t be ridiculous. Why are you behaving like this? The reception is a great success. Everything is buzzing. It couldn’t be better. Stop acting like a silly juvenile lead.’

I didn’t want Joe around, seeing me like this. He was part of the ghostly torment. But I couldn’t tell him that. It was buried under a frost of pain. I was happier on my own.

‘Go away,’ I sniffed. ‘Go back to your adoring audience. Make another speech. Leave me alone.’

‘You’re talking nonsense, Sophie. Do I care about the Press? Yes, they are a necessary force. Feed them, fill them full of drink, then send them home. That’s all. They know little about real life. But we need them and they need us. I care a lot more about my theatre company.’

It was a river of misunderstanding. We were talking about different things. I dragged myself back to now.

‘
Twelfth Night
isn’t real life,’ I said, blowing my nose. ‘It’s all fiction and fantasy.’

‘But we are real people bringing the story to life for our audiences. We’re making the story seem real for them. Don’t you see that, Sophie? It’s nothing to cry about.’

‘You can tell me when to prompt and not to prompt, and you can
make me wear a red dress when in my right senses, I would never wear red with my hair. But you cannot tell me when to cry and when not to cry.’

I wiped mascara and black liner on to his pristine handkerchief. Try getting that out without using Vanish. It was cold down in the basement, enough to freeze-dry tears. Roman ladies used to collect their tears in little glass phials. They found some phials at Pompeii, only those ladies didn’t have time to fill them. I wondered where exactly had I left my own clothes.

My skin was obviously turning blue because Joe got up and put his black jacket round my shoulders. It was still warm from his body and did extraordinary things to my thinking. He was wearing a black long-sleeved polo-necked jersey so was protected from the cold. Perhaps this basement ran alongside some Victorian sewer pouring effluent into the Thames. It even smelt cold.

‘Collect your gear,’ he said abruptly, ‘and put it in a carrier bag. We’re going to celebrate with some supper. I want to see you still wearing that red dress.’

It was an order. I nodded, not having the wits left to argue. A quick bite to eat, then I could go home and climb into a warm duvet. Then I remembered that Joe lived in the same house now. Anyway, I had run out of coffee so I didn’t have to offer him a late, late cup.

If I had been expecting a cosy little supper for two, then I was mistaken. Nearly all the cast were putting on wraps and coats and gathering in the foyer. It was going to be feeding the five thousand, not a simple thank-you for your wonderful hard work, Sophie.

My disappointment vanished in seconds. Sometimes I was an instant party girl. The poncho didn’t look bad over the red dress and it was worth seeing Fran’s raised eyebrows when I gave Joe back his jacket. We piled into taxis, talking non-stop, gathering warmth from close proximity. Bill managed to squeeze himself into a twelve-inch space next to me. I could feel his thigh against mine. It was the nearest he was ever going to get, but he never quite got the message.

We went to a Greek taverna with lots of vines and bottles hanging from the ceiling and faked Roman wall paintings. Joe had
booked a long table. It was already set with Greek wine and masses of dips and raw veggies and other Greek bits and pieces. Illyria was somewhere Greece, wasn’t it? Clever Joe. I’d forgotten I’d been drinking elderflower wine at the party, only soaked up with four flakes of pastry. I hadn’t taken seriously the warning that it was potent.

Jessica, our dedicated Olivia, was sitting next to me. She looked somewhat disconcerted by the venue. Perhaps she thought we were going to be served goat.

‘I’m definitely not drinking ouzo,’ she said. ‘That stuff is lethal. We’ve got to work tomorrow.’

‘You’ve got to work,’ said Claud, still in character as the conceited Malvolio. ‘I get all the laughs without even trying. But those wrinkled yellow stockings are ghastly. Talk about Norah Batty. I ought to be paid danger money. I could be arrested.’

‘The wine looks like straight Greek table wine. Nothing to worry about,’ I said, reassuring Jessica. A nice-looking Greek waiter was pouring it out all along the table. I gave him a smile. ‘It’ll taste lovely.’

More waiters were bring out grilled lamb dishes and kebabs, artichokes and asparagus salad and stuffed aubergines. A cheesy sort of tart arrived topped with anchovies that looked
mouth-watering
.

‘Not a goat in sight,’ I said, prattling on to no one in particular. ‘Did you know that Shakespeare invented the word anchovy? He invented loads of words, zany, vast, useless, grovel. If he couldn’t find the word he wanted, he made up one.’

‘So how do you know that the word anchovy didn’t exist before him?’ Bryan asked. He was in a good humour because he’d had his photo taken with Elinor for
The Sun
. He thought that meant he was still appealing to younger readers. They were, in fact, going to take the mickey out of his velvet smoking jacket and Garrick Club tie. It was one of those ‘worst dressed men’ stunts, I’d heard.

‘There wasn’t an English word for little salty fish, only the Spanish anchova. It’s in
Henry IV
, something to do with Falstaff’s pocket—’ My voice trailed off. I felt like Renee Zellweger in a Bridget Jones extremely sozzled flap.

‘What a brainbox,’ said Fran, sucking on a carrot stick. ‘No wonder Sophie never gives prompts on time. Her nose is always in some book, reading useless facts.’

‘But I don’t think that’s useless,’ said Elinor, calming waters. ‘I think it’s fascinating. Thank you, Sophie, for telling us. Now who wants some of this delicious salad?’

Elinor was looking like a cat who’d found the double cream opened. I think she had met someone new.

Joe was watching me. I could sense his eyes aimed in my direction. I kept my head down when it was not in a wine glass. The good-looking young waiter had my measure and kept filling it. I began to like him very much.

At some point in the supper, Joe stood up, glass in hand, tapping it with a spoon. It rang clearly like a bell.

‘I know you don’t want another speech from me, one is quite enough. But I can’t let the occasion pass without thanking the young woman who made our press reception such an outstanding success. The food might have been a little strange and the music not entirely original medieval but it all worked, and that’s what matters. Please stand and raise your glasses to Sophie, our
hard-working
prompt.’ Joe grinned in my direction. I suddenly realized that he meant me.

Everyone stood up including me. Bill tugged at my arm. ‘Not you, you daft twit. Sit down. We’re toasting you.’

‘To Sophie, our hard-working prompt,’ said the cast, slurping more drink. ‘Our g-gorgeous prompt.’

‘Sometimes our prompt,’ Fran added with her usual brand of acid. ‘When she’s awake.’

‘Thank you,’ I said, nodding generally. ‘You are all very kind. My dear friends. Well, most of them, anyway.’

Ice creams, sorbets and fresh figs were arriving now but I couldn’t eat a single mouthful more. It had been a lovely supper and a mile of taste buds away from my pedestrian beans on toast and chopped cheese and apple in front of late-night telly. I wanted to tell Joe how much I had enjoyed it, but Fran was superglued to him and ready to pounce if I so much as looked.

‘That was a lovely meal, wasn’t it?’ I said to Jessica. She had
relaxed and was telling me about her early days in rep. But she had no sense of humour and her stories were relentlessly banal. Maybe one day she would make a joke and her porcelain skin would crack.

Claud, on the other hand, had launched into his repertoire of jokes. He’d once been a standup comic when he could stand up. He’d worked all the clubs.

Everyone was leaving, a little unsteadily. I didn’t think I could stand up, let alone walk. Perhaps I would wait until everyone had gone and then I could crawl out.

‘Come on, Sophie, we may as well share a taxi,’ said Joe. ‘Stir yourself.’

Fran sidled up to him, flashing her smoky eyes. ‘How about coming back to my place for a brandy?’ she said. ‘A nice way to round off the evening.’

Round off the evening? Was that what horizontal wrestling was called these days? Joe was shaking his head. He was always so polite.

‘Sorry, Fran. Early start tomorrow. I’ve the technical in the morning.’

Bill groaned and clutched his chest. ‘The technical. I’d forgotten all about it. Jesus, it’ll be a bloody disaster.’

‘No, it won’t,’ I said comfortingly. I had no idea what I was talking about. ‘Not a disaster. Perhaps a bit of a shambles. You mark my words, mister.’

Joe was pushing my head through the poncho and pulling me to my feet. ‘Where’s your bag, lady?’

‘What bag lady?’

‘Your clothes. Remember them?’

Elinor put the carrier bag into my hand. ‘Are you looking for this, my dear?’ She was amused at my disarray.

Taxis appeared like magic on the street or had Joe ordered them? We all piled in, dropping people off at different places. This time I was squashed between Joe and Elinor. They kept me more or less upright. I very much wanted to go to sleep, a real sleep, like a
ten-day
coma with a handsome TV doctor hovering at my bedside.

Street lights flashed by like it was Christmas, only it wasn’t Christmas. Not yet. I wondered where I was being taken. Perhaps
back to the theatre. Did I have to do the clearing up? Yes, was that it? Do this, Sophie. Do that. Find a j-cloth.

The taxi stopped in a street that I vaguely recognized and Joe hauled me out on to the pavement, paying off the driver. ‘Thank you. Goodnight.’

‘I’ll go and clear up now,’ I said, wavering, happy to go and sweep.

‘Clear up what?’

‘The theatre,’ I said. ‘I’ll have to clear up the stage after the party before the … before the….’ Now this was worrying. I was not sure of what it was before.

‘Yeah, yeah, you can clear up the theatre tomorrow, Sophie, but first let’s get you into bed.’ He was unlocking the front door and propelling me into the hallway, both at the same time.

I sort of remembered the place, which was nice. And Joe smelt nice. He smelt very nice, after-shave and shower gel, and plain macho masculine. I sniffed the aromas and wallowed in the sensual pleasure.

‘Up we go,’ he said, pushing me towards the stairs.

‘Up we go,’ I said, leaning on him. He was one tall guy. I had forgotten how tall he was. ‘Up we go.’

Except that I wasn’t going up. I was more like sitting down. The word up didn’t have a recognizable meaning. I looked at him for clues.

‘Ye Gods, I can’t carry you up three flights of stairs, Sophie,’ he said. ‘I’m not Superman. How much do you weigh? You’ve got to help.’

‘I’ll help,’ I said happily, holding on to him. ‘Up we go.’

I’m not sure how we got there but Superman must have been giving me a hand. Then Joe was looking in the carrier bag for my keys and unlocking the door to my flat. He seemed to know what he was doing even if I didn’t. It was always thus. He was always the one who knew what he was doing.

‘Home,’ said Joe. ‘Into bed now.’

‘Up we go,’ I said.

‘No more up we go, it’s down we go now, into bed. Where is your bed?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t know where my bed is. It’s probably been taken away,’ I smiled knowingly. ‘Yes, it’s been taken away.’

He was pulling off the poncho and the sandals. Then he carefully slid the red dress over my head and hung it on a chair. He guided me towards my bed and wrapped the duvet round me like I was a parcel. That’s right, I was now actually a parcel. Send me somewhere sunbaked and sandy.

‘This is your bed,’ he said. ‘It’s for sleeping in. Goodnight, Sophie.’ He hesitated for a second, on the verge of going, as if he might kiss me, but he didn’t. I think he sighed and stood back, a shadowy figure now as he turned off the bedside lamp.

I was not surprised. After all, it wasn’t Christmas yet, despite the bright lights outside. Christmas was a long way off, at least I thought it was.

‘I think I’m going to sleep now,’ I said, even more happily. ‘Night, night, my Superman.’

Hangovers are not my normal scene. But it was there the next morning, staring me in the mirror. I put my face in cold water hoping to freeze out the dull ache in my head. It was many years since I had felt this bad.

I looked at the wavering idiot in the mirror. ‘And just who are you this morning?’ I asked.

The reflection didn’t have the strength to reply. It staggered back to bed.

About midday I surfaced again and managed to struggle into yesterday’s clothes. My face was streaked with stale make-up. Breeding ground for early wrinkles. Always clean face, moisturise, tone etc, they say. How long since I last toned? It was a foreign word.

I drank some water, tottered downstairs and let myself out. The fresh air hit me like a wet sponge. It would have to be the bus this morning. I couldn’t walk more than five yards without serious help.

I normally enjoy stalking London from a bus top. Watching the streets and houses pass by and curtained windows appearing above shops. Glimpses into other people’s homes. Everything looks different from the top of a bus. Trees brushed their golden leaves against the framework like gloved hands, clouds were like bruises. By the time I reached the theatre, I felt almost normal.

‘You look dreadful,’ said one of the stage hands as I walked backstage. He was either Alf, Bert or Fred. He was carrying some of
the court tapestry hangings.

‘I am dreadful,’ I agreed. ‘But I’m working on it.’

Bill Naughton and the stage hands were running around like demented squirrels who have forgotten where they buried their nuts. The lighting wizard was dancing over his switchboard in the projection box. He knew his remote controls, memories, pre-set keys and thyristor dimmers. The lighting for the cyclorama was crucial, especially in the shipwreck scene. Joe Harrison was roaring instructions into his mike from the stalls. This much had to be done. If the technical was not right, then it didn’t matter what words the actors said. That much I knew from my days as the lowest ASM of ASMs in rep.

That was my non-scary route to being a prompt. ASMs often had to prompt if no one else was around. And I was also call-boy, in charge of props, frequently all jobs at the same time. It had been a ruptured learning curve but one that I took on board with humility. I wasn’t going to be a star. No name in lights. No first nights. So I trained myself to anticipate every need. It was an unrecognized art.

And I’d taken on other part-time jobs, waiting at tables, bar work, Christmas sales assistant. Once I’d prompted two shows at the same time, which meant a lot of running between theatres and timing as precise as Greenwich.

I sank back into a chair in the back stalls. They paid a lot of money for this seat but the view wasn’t that good. Did management know that? I rarely spoke to management, believed in keeping my head down and out of sight. They were faceless people, banking the money, signing cheques, making decisions.

Joe Harrison did not look as if he had been up half the night, wining and dining his cast and helping the idiot prompt to bed. He was fresh and dynamic, on top of his world, trousers pressed,
open-necked
white shirt and dark navy fleece. It was sickening. He was talking to Lights on the intercom.

‘Let’s get the balance of the lighting right, footlights and battens,’ said Joe.

Hilda had been working on his costume designs for days. She was trundling back and forth with armfuls of velvet and brocade
and seafaring hessian. I slide out of my seat and took a devious route to wardrobe.

‘Do you want any help?’ I said.

‘Oh, would you Sophie? Thank you,’ said Hilda, brow furrowed. ‘I can’t sew and show. He wants to see everything at once. You know.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘What’s next?’

‘This is Olivia’s costume for Act I.’

I climbed the stairs with my arms overflowing with stiff black material. It was intricately pleated with tiny looped buttons. Olivia was in mourning for her brother. I felt swamped with her grief, just carrying the dress. Some of it was the hangover.

‘Sophie? What the hell are you doing here?’

‘It’s so terribly sad,’ I said to the empty theatre. ‘She’s lost her brother, a man she adored. For seven summers she will keep afresh a brother’s dead love.’

‘For heaven’s sake, Sophie. Leave it, will you? You’re not prompting now. This is a technical.’

‘Here is Olivia’s costume,’ I said, holding it up. ‘Made to your design. Does it suit the role? What do you think? Is she mourning enough?’

‘Black is black,’ he barked. ‘It’ll be the way Olivia wears the costume. Take it away and don’t bother me again. I’ve got enough to do.’

‘You said you wanted to see all the costumes.’

‘Did I? Well, I don’t remember. Bill, what’s happened to the gauze? It’s hooked up. Sort it out.’

‘Sorry, technical fault.’

I traipsed back downstairs to Wardrobe. ‘He says it’s perfect,’ I told Hilda. ‘Exactly what he wanted.’

‘Oh, good, thank goodness. He has such strange ideas. I know they’ll look magnificent on stage but they are not easy to make.’

I put on a Gwyneth Paltrow attitude for my next appearance. She can be so dignified and aloof. I timed my arrival on stage with a pause in the technical proceedings. Joe was beginning to look glazed.

‘Yes?’ he said.

‘Maria,’ I announced. ‘Scheming gentlewoman.’

‘I know who she is,’ he said wearily.

‘She has a sharp and witty tongue.’

‘Go away,’ he shouted. ‘I don’t want to see you or hear you again.’

‘This is her costume. Aren’t you interested?’

He tore his attention away from the script to the costume I was holding up. It was a painful process. I doubted if he was taking in an inch of the serving woman’s simple homespun clothing. I shook out the linen cap with downcast eyes.

‘Go away and do what prompts normally do when they aren’t prompting. Go shopping. Read a book. Anything except interrupt my technical.’

I vanished downstairs, gathering shreds of pride around me like another costume. There was plenty of sewing to be done and I could about see to thread a needle. Hilda made a gallon of strong black coffee which helped a lot.

‘I gather it was some party after the reception,’ said Hilda, trying to make a cap out of sweeping feathers for Feste, the clown.

‘You didn’t come?’

‘No, I peeped into the Press do and then went off home. I’ve an elderly mother to look after and I leave her alone enough as it is. She sits in front of the television all day. Cheaper than Prozac.’

‘Does she know what she’s watching?’

‘Heavens yes, she’s a dab hand with the remote. Zaps from soap to soap, checking situations. She knows more about them all than I do. She could go on
Mastermind
easily if she could manage that walk to the black chair.’

‘Good for her,’ I said, sorting a box of buttons and buckles for Hilda. She needed six matching silver buckles for Sebastian’s costume. Joe ought to come down here and see the miracles Hilda was performing.

There was a lot of hammering going on upstairs. The technical had finished by the sound of it and urgent repairs and alterations were in progress. We were rehearsing Act II, scene 1, the sea coast, at two o’clock. The shipwreck was a miracle in the making. Thunder and lightning and waves.

I went quietly to my corner, not that keeping quiet made any difference. The hammering and banging was horrendous. My ears went into rehab. I looked down into the stalls. Joe was fast asleep, long legs draped over the arm of the next seat, head cradled back on his shoulder, floppy hair falling over his face. He looked most uncomfortable. He’d wake up with cramp in his neck. There was nothing I could do. He wouldn’t thank me if I woke him to suggest he used the couch in Elinor’s dressing room.

The cast were creeping in with varying degrees of hangover. Bryan looked quite green as if he had been drinking pond water all night. Elinor was incredibly brave and jaunty but winced at every unnecessary step. Fran wore an extra inch of make-up. Only Jessica seemed unaffected. Perhaps she had been emptying her wine into the potted plant behind us.

Joe stirred, brushing his hair aside, and sat up with a jerk.

‘Act II, scene 1, the sea coast. Stand by Viola and Malvolio. Enter Antonio and Sebastian. Antonio, you’re an old sea captain, not the back row of
Chorus Line
. Walk like one,’ he said.

Sea-legs, I noted in a margin. Walk with sea-legs. It would be fun to practise sea-legs with Tony, who was playing Antonio. He was a private person. He had probably done that on purpose, to rile Joe, a touch of
Dirty Dancing
.

It was a smallish part but Tony knew his lines. I noticed he was growing a beard. Always the professional. His career was on the wane although once he had been a matinée idol, loads of lead parts in low budget Ealing Studio movies. Years ago I would have queued for his autograph. Now I was prompting him.

‘If you will not murder me for my love,’ I said.

‘I know, I know,’ he said abruptly. ‘It was a pause, a dramatic pause.’

‘Sorry. I’ll mark it.’ I didn’t mind.

‘If you will not murder me for my love, let me be your servant,’ he went on. The scene continued to the end. Viola and Malvolio followed in a street scene. It went well, flew. I could see that Joe was pleased.

‘Well done, both of you. Scene 3, Olivia’s House.’

The afternoon wore on as slowly as a weekend queue of
double-piled trolleys at a supermarket check-out. Singles eyed each other in case we had more than nine items in our baskets. I could feel my eyelids starting to glue. I didn’t care if they knew their words. Any minute now I would prompt with a line from Christopher Robin. See if anyone noticed.

‘Ten minutes, everyone,’ Joe announced. ‘And if you have any dramatic pauses, new or old, intentional or unintentional, please see our prompt so she can mark it in her book. You know that she needs to mark all moves, business and pauses arranged in the dialogue.’

I felt a small glimmer of satisfaction. Joe had noticed Antonio’s unfairness and made it a point. Thank you, Mr Harrison. I’ll carry up your post on a wet day.

My legs creaked as I tried to stretch them. The tea station was about three miles away and the biscuits would be soggy before I got there. The only sustenance available was a peppermint in my pocket which had lost half its wrapping paper and was sticky with fluff, crumbs and unmentionable debris.

Bill Naughton was there before me. He slipped his arm round the area which I jokingly called my waist.

‘So how are you doing, flavour of the month?’ he asked, pressing the coffee button.

‘Flavour? Don’t understand.’

‘Haven’t you seen the morning papers? Full of the press reception, highly original concept, medieval food, medieval music. Good preview of the show. Even if the chocolate fountain didn’t turn up.’

‘Didn’t it?’

‘No. Not a flake.’

‘Then we won’t pay for it.’

‘Has he thanked you yet? You know, money?’

‘No, but he made that speech at the party. It was a job to do and I did it.’ Call me slob in harness.

The theatre still smelled of the party. The scent of elderflower drifted from the curtains; beef in pastry was being swept off the floor; the scent of quinces and strawberries clung to the undisturbed air. It was nearly in the past. Soon yesterday’s papers
would be wrapping chips.

I wondered if Joe would ever understand my passion for the play? Was he on my wavelength? Once he had been, a long time ago. Nothing that he would remember now. Hunger, starvation, homelessness were things that were purposely forgotten. I didn’t blame him. I only blamed him for changing so much.

I took my tea in styrofoam and escaped to a corner where I would be undisturbed. London was outside, a crowded, noisy,
fear-ridden
metropolis with a history of centuries only a few feet beneath the cracked pavements. It worried me. All these Starbucks coffee outlets occupying the sites of Georgian coffee shops that had real character, real people drinking and shaping the world. Men with more than their annual million bonus on their mind and whether they could afford a journey to Middle Earth. I was nearly broke.

‘Have I thanked you for last night?’ It was Joe Harrison. He had a coffee in one hand, script in the other. His hair was flopping over in that old remembered way. Perhaps I ought to take a photo of his hair so that I’d remember him in thirty years. In thirty years? Where would I be when I was officially an old person?

‘There was the speech,’ I said. ‘I don’t remember a lot after the Greek taverna. That was a good idea, thank you. Loved the food, such fun. Different.’

‘You drank too much on an empty stomach.’

‘There’s an epidemic going around.’

‘Did you sleep well?’

‘Like a wall.’

I had an awful feeling. Why this interest in my sleeping? How did I get from the taverna to my bed? I didn’t remember the transition. Perhaps Superman had taken me in his arms and flown me home.

‘How did I get home after the party?’ I asked.

‘A magic carpet. The Genie was navigating. But you did remember to say goodnight, very nicely, thank you.’

‘Was I standing?’ This was important.

Joe had a sip of his coffee. He was taking in too much caffeine. I ought to warn him. ‘More or less,’ he said. ‘Depending on which
view you took.’

He wouldn’t tell me any more and I was left to guess. There was a ghost of a wink, or it could have been a strange and uncanny trick of the light.