The Fun Factory (26 page)

I passed the whole of that week in an agony of indecision, until, on the Saturday I awoke and realised that I would in all probability see Karno that evening at the Enterprise when I went to get paid. Perhaps I should make some progress.

I spruced myself up, slicking down my hair and popping up to the High Street for a nice close shave. I spent some little time shilly-shallying over what I should wear, trying to decide which of my (two) suits and (three) ties were most ideal for philandering in. I shined my shoes. Twice. I sat on my bed, feeling slightly
faint. I opened the window. Let some air in. Began to shiver in the November chill…

Then I heard Clara and Charley go out of our front door, taking Edie and Miss Churchhouse up to the Common for a stroll, and I got a grip of myself. Come on, I said out loud. Now or never. Faint heart and all that.

I felt rather odd as I knocked on Edith Karno’s front door. It seemed utterly unreal, somehow, to be calling on her with this purpose in mind.

The door opened, to reveal not the maid I was expecting but Edith herself. “Mister Arthur Dandoe!” she cried when she saw me. “Well! I think I can guess what
you
are after!”

I was speechless. Terror-struck. How could she
possibly
know? I felt my face burning as she turned and disappeared into the hallway. When she returned a moment or two later she had a letter in her hand, which she thrust at me.

“Here you are, this is what you’ve come for, isn’t it?” she said. “Delivered to our door by mistake. Is this what you’ve been waiting for all this time?”

I looked down at the envelope. It was addressed to me, and had come from Paris. From Paris! All thought of my strange mission fled from my head, and I began to retreat down the steps.

“Yes … yes, that’s right. Thank you very much.”

“I would have popped round with it shortly, you know, but you beat me to it,” Edith smiled. “A lady’s handwriting, if I’m not mistaken – but don’t let me pry.”

She gave me a conspiratorial wave, then closed the door. I took my letter onto the Common and tore it open eagerly. It was from Tilly, of course, the first I had ever had from her, and it contained unexpected news.

“My dear Arthur,” she began. I liked the sound of that, and I read it again. Then she went on:

“Events have taken such a surprising turn here since you left. Maurice’s combustible fiancée
10
became so distraught at his relationship with Mistinguett that she attempted suicide by poisoning – unsuccessfully, thank God. However, he feels duty bound to take care of her as she recuperates, and so
La Valse Renversante
has come to an abrupt end. I feel sure it will be revived shortly, but without me, for I have determined to return to England. Amy Minister – you remember her, of course? – has helped me out. I’ve got an audition with Fred Karno himself, no less, next Wednesday in the afternoon at his house, while his wife is out at the shops, so fingers crossed for me, hey? With a bit of luck I shall not be unemployed for long! Shall we meet for tea afterwards, say four o’clock at the Fun Factory?”

She closed then with the two words “your Tilly”, which made my head spin. I could hardly believe it. Tilly was coming back, and wanted to meet. The possibility that she might come to work for Karno, and that I might soon be a number one, able to pick and choose the members of my company, why, suddenly it was all falling into place perfectly. I was walking on air, I can tell you.

When I pitched up at the Enterprise later that evening, I was surprised to see Fred Spiksley, Jimmy Crabtree and Billy Wragg already ensconced in a corner, their habitual fug of smoke hanging over their table.

“Evening there, lads,” I said. “Wasn’t expecting to see you till Monday.”

“Aye,” said Fred. “Yon Charlie asked O’Neill to bring us down early. Couple of things he wanted to work on, he said, so we thought why not, if he’s payin’…?”

“Is that right?” I said, looking around to see if Chaplin was there, and he was, deep in conversation with Syd not far off, not paying me any attention.

So, I thought to myself, it’s going to be like that, is it? All’s fair in so-and-so and also of course in you-know-what. I realised it might be a very good idea to get these lads on side as soon as possible, so I clapped my hands together and opened my mouth to offer them all a drink on me. Before I could do that, though, Karno himself walked up and clapped me on the back.

“Arthur, my boy, come with me. Someone I want you to see.”

I followed him around the bar and there, beaming fit to split his face in half, was Stan.

“Took your advice, you see?” Karno said. “Got to help one another in this business, haven’t we, eh?” He gave me a look laden with meaning, and then turned to Stan. “What does your Dad have to say about it, eh, young Jefferson?”

“Well, to tell the truth, I’ve not told him,” Stan admitted.

“Ha!” Karno cried. “I’ll bet you’ve not, neither! Oh, I meant to ask,” he said, turning to me and snapping his fingers as though this had only just occurred to him. “Have you by any chance seen Mrs Karno since we spoke?”

“This very afternoon,” I said, neglecting to go into any details.

“Good lad,” the Guv’nor said, patting me on the back. He then drifted off to circulate amongst his flock, and Stan pumped my hand enthusiastically.

“So, I’ve to thank you, have I?” he grinned. “I thought as much!”

“Well, I only mentioned your name,” I said. “What happened?”

“I went to a Karno pantomime when I was in Manchester and presented myself backstage afterwards. He was there, the Guv’nor
–
your
Guv’nor, that is – said that he’d heard all about me and took me on there and then. I’ve been rehearsing
Mumming
Birds
these last few days and start at the Hippodrome in Hulme next week.”

“Marvellous news,” I said, punching his arm. “So you’re a Karno man now.”

“I’m only sorry I shall miss all the fun next weekend,” Stan said. “I hear it’s between you and Charlie for Harry Weldon’s number-one spot.”

Just then Freddie junior passed by, and I grabbed his arm. “Hey, Freddie, meet Stan. Stan, this is Mr Fred Karno
junior
.”

Stan turned, grinned his happy grin, and stuck out his hand. Freddie shook it, and gave me a puzzled look.

“Stan’s the new boy,” I explained. “Your dad’s just taken him on.”

Freddie’s face darkened. “Oh, for pity’s sake!” he cried. “Another one?” And he pushed off through the crowd, looking for something to kick.

Just before closing time big Billy Wragg came up to me, took me to one side. I was a bit surprised. He was a quiet lad, Billy, just used to sit at the table with the others, puffing away, drinking along, while Spiksley or Crabtree made the running. Not one to take the initiative.

“If you want,” he said, “we could work on a bit of – what do you lads call it? Stuff?”

“Business,” I said. “What sort of thing do you have in mind, Bill?”

“Whatever you think,” Billy said. “I know Charlie’s all for trying something new with Fred and Jimmy, like, and I thought mebbe you wouldn’t want to get left behind…”

We arranged to stay behind after rehearsals the next week and see what could be done. Of course, I understood perfectly well that Fred and Jimmy would be touching Charlie for a few quid for their “help”, and that Big Billy would expect similar. I offered him a generous – I thought – remuneration, with a bonus to be paid if I was successful on the night. I reckoned I’d be able to afford it then, and it might give him the incentive to put plenty into it.

Of course I didn’t realise then just how much he would put into it.

26

DON'T DO IT AGAIN, MATILDA

EVERYONE
attached to the Karno organisation, and plenty who weren't, got caught up in the contest as it drew nearer.

I was reliably informed – well, I say reliably, it was Mike Asher who told me – that a book was being run and some substantial sums were being laid down on me and Charlie. That should have put me on my guard, knowing the footballers as I did. I noticed Fred Spiksley and Jimmy Crabtree hanging back rather, trying not to get involved, keeping their powder dry for young Mr Chaplin's sake, but I didn't think there was much they could really do to actually undermine me. Not without losing their jobs, anyway. I actually looked forward to rubbing their noses in it once I took over as the new number one.

Anyway, Billy Wragg was my man. After the large cast rehearsal was finished the two of us started working on a piece of business, or ‘stuff', as Billy called it. Obviously there wasn't much leeway to add to what was already there, but we were able to come up
with a couple of ideas to embellish the football action passages of the piece. In our best little sequence we worked it so that Billy would stop the ball and instantly brace his leg behind it so that I, as Stiffy, could throw myself full-bloodedly into a save, giving it everything. When we showed it off to the rest of the company later, the meaty slap of the two of us colliding made the other players wince, and drew a smattering of spontaneous applause from those watching the rehearsal. I knew we had a winner.

I had the Wednesday off, and was looking forward to meeting Tilly at the Fun Factory later that afternoon. I hadn't done anything more about the ‘favour' that Karno had asked of me, and I supposed I should grit my teeth and get on with it, if I was going to.

Clara Bell seemed to know as much about my neighbour as anyone, so I had in mind that a chat with her might be useful. I poked my head into the kitchen, where I found Clara warming her hands on a fresh pot of tea.

“Clara?”

“Hullo, Arthur, my lad. What are you about this fine morning? No rehearsals today?”

“No, that's right,” I said.

“Tea?” Clara asked, her hand poised on the teapot handle, and I nodded and took a seat at the table while she fetched another cup.

“I wanted to ask you about the lady next door. Edith.” I said.

“Oh?”

“How did she and the Guv'nor come to split?” I asked. Clara gave me such a piercing glance at this that I flushed bright red.

“I was only wondering,” I went on hurriedly, “because she speaks of him so fondly, always wants news of him.”

“You are her friend, I know you are,” she said, after a moment or two, and I nodded keenly. “I have heard her speak of how much she enjoys your little chats. The view she gets from Freddie, and I am afraid from most of us, is rather jaundiced about her husband, you see, knowing what he is and what he has done. That's why you are like a breath of fresh air to her. Worshipping him the way she does. The way you do.”

“
I
do?”

“Oh, of course you do, you silly boy. It's perfectly plain. And I don't know if it's really my place to bring you down to earth. Perhaps it's better if you don't know.”

“Don't know what? Tell me.”

Clara took a sip of her tea, and then decided to begin. And once she began, there was no stopping her. “It was … not a happy marriage. She was seventeen when they met, working in the box office at the Theatre Royal in Stockport. He was a gymnast with his act the Three Karnos, and he set his cap at her right away. Her parents, though, didn't like him, and thought Edith was too young to marry, so they eloped. Very romantic, but he treated her as a slave, all along, right from the first. She'd sell tickets for his shows, then be in his shows, and then scrub the stage once his shows were finished while he and everyone else was in the pub. She was still a child, and he was a bully, that's all, she was like a piece of property to him.”

Clara paused, took another sip of tea.

“What he started to do, you see, eventually, was say she had to be nice to a particular theatre manager, so that they'd get more bookings, and so she would be, to please him, but then he would get it into his head that she must have gone as far as his filthy mind imagined she would, and he would fly into a jealous rage.
He'd beat her black and blue, time and time again. He brought a doctor to her once, and when he saw her the doctor threatened to horsewhip him on the spot, that's how bad it was. She has a scar, just here, on her cheek. Have you seen it?”

I shook my head. I had, though.

“She covers it well, but she'll have it till the day she dies, like a little crescent moon. He did that to her, threw her to the ground and stamped on her face with his heel.”

The image of Karno's smart, shiny little shoes flashed into my mind.

“She stayed with him, though,” Clara went on. “There were the children, of course, but she adored
him
still despite it all, if you can believe that. There was Freddie, the eldest, you know him. And Leslie too. In between there were six more that, well, they just weren't meant to be, poor little scraps. And when each one died he'd beat her again, like it was her fault.”

Clara took a moment to compose herself.

“It wasn't just the beatings, though they were bad enough. It was the mistresses, too. When little Leslie was born … what is he now? Seven? The brute had set up a second home, on the very same street, with that … woman…”

“Maria?”

“One of his Amazonian chorus girls, she was then. We all knew about it, everybody did, except poor Edith, and we hadn't the heart to tell her. Introducing her as ‘Mrs Karno' to everyone, he was, it was disgraceful, with his real wife still recovering from the birth of his own child. Well, one day he decided he'd let Edith know that he had a mistress now, and one who would … do things that she wouldn't do. Wouldn't
dream
of doing. So he delivered a packet of photographs. Oh, such things, they were!
The two of them, naked as the day they were born, in a field if you please, cavorting around, posing, doing … well, anything you could possibly imagine, and then worse.”

“You don't mean…?”

“I
do
mean. Well, Edith could hardly turn a blind eye any more, then, could she? When she left him, finally, she came to us, you know, and we took her in. Charley went and told Karno straight that Edith was under his protection now, and we got her and little Leslie a room next door. Karno was furious, but he couldn't fire Charley, too many people would have had something to say about that, and Charley would never leave. But he's never got the leads he deserved, Charley, because of it. Been a number two for, ooh, ten years now.”

“So why did they never divorce? Edith and the Guv'nor?” I asked.

“Edith went to a solicitor at the Variety Artistes Federation, who said to her that she should seek a separation, not a divorce, as that way Karno would have to support her while she raised his sons. He fought her in court, though, and was winning his case, spinning his ridiculous sob story, until I brought those photographs into the judge. Edith would never have done it, but I knew where she kept them, and I wasn't going to let him get away with it. The judge allowed that they should be separated, and determined that Freddie should be left with his father for some reason I couldn't fathom then and still cannot now. Something to do with the chance of one day being brought into the family business. It's a miracle that boy has turned out as well as he has, a perfect miracle.”

I was finding it harder with every passing minute to imagine that I would ever be able to oblige Karno with his request.

“Does she ever…? I mean, has she been alone since she and the Guv'nor separated … or have there been…?”

“Good Heavens! What sort of a question is that?”

“I'm sorry,” I said, flustered.

“Of course not, is your answer! She is a saint, that woman, a saint. She'd no more break her marriage vows than she'd cut off her own right hand. The very idea!”

“I see.”

“She has two satin pillows on her bed to this very day, one with ‘EDITH' embroidered upon it, and the other with ‘FRED'. I do believe she'd take him back, even now.”

I must have looked pretty crestfallen, for she said: “There now, that was more than you wanted to know, wasn't it? He's not a bad man to be working for, I dare say, if you can manage to stay on the right side of him. And it's not really any of our business, now, is it? More tea…?”

I didn't need tea, I needed the open air. I needed to think. I grabbed my hat and strode out to the Common.

Clearly what the Guv'nor had asked me to do was beyond the pale, and equally clearly the man I had idolised since I came to London had feet of clay. In fact was little short of monstrous.

Nonetheless, the tantalising vision of a near future in which I was the lead comic of a Karno company of which Tilly was a member, well, could I really pass that up? I could find somewhere else to live, far from Streatham and the protective Charley Bell. I could find a way of avoiding Freddie junior, for the next … well, for the rest of my life. Couldn't I…?

Tilly was doing her bit that very afternoon. I reckoned if I was going to go through with this, then I really should do it as soon as possible. I wasn't sure how far I actually had to go before the weekend and Karno's big decision. Perhaps I would be able to make him see that his scheme was madness? Perhaps the attempt itself would be enough to show him that in fact he was in the wrong?

The one thing I couldn't get away with doing was nothing at all.

I decided that I should bring some flowers if I was really going to ‘pitch woo', as Charlie would no doubt have called it, to a married lady. Whether I actually thought that flowers would make a difference, or I was just postponing the moment again, I can't now quite recall. Whichever it was, I found myself browsing at a florist's barrow at the bottom end of the Common for some considerable time.

“If you wait until they turn they'll be cheaper, is that what you're thinking?” the crone in charge eventually enquired. I laughed off her sledgehammer sarcasm.

“No, no, I beg your pardon. I just wanted to be sure I get it right. Difficult … choice,” I said.

“Courting, are you?” she said. “Here, let me help you out, sonny.” She quickly gathered a two-bob bouquet together for me and thrust it into my arms. “Never a woman born yet that wouldn't swoon at the sight of that little lot.”

I thanked her, paid her, and was turning to leave, when she called me back and stuck something into the lapel of my jacket.

“Lucky heather,” she whispered.

“Thanks,” I said. “I've got a feeling I'll need it.”

A few minutes later I stood by the gate of next door's house.
Actually maybe it was longer: I may have walked around the block a couple of times. And nipped into a pub for a stiffener. Anyway, I stopped there at the gate and took a deep breath. I just about felt like I'd screwed my courage to the old sticking place, when a voice hailed me from across the street.