The Grin of the Dark (5 page)

I'm alone in the house when somebody starts ringing the doorbell
and clanking the knocker. Is it Natalie or more likely Mark? I save
my last five minutes' work on the opening of
They Made Movies Too
and hurry out of the room. As I reach the stairs the letterbox disgorges
several envelopes. All of them look sufficiently official to contain bills
or other unwelcome missives. I'm taking my time until the slot emits a
final card: a notification that the postman was unable to deliver an
item.

I sprint downstairs and grab the envelopes as well as the card. It's
addressed to me, almost by name. I haul the door open and see the
postman tramping down the short cracked path. His stocky body
looks deformed by the contortions he's performing to return my
package to his bag. Despite the winter afternoon, which is dark with
unbroken cloud, he's wearing capacious shorts. 'Excuse me,' I call.
'Hold on.'

He pivots as if the weight of the bag is dragging him. His rounded
pockmarked face is so pale that I could imagine he's wearing makeup.
When his virtually colourless eyes light on the card I'm brandishing,
his small nose shares a twitch with his broad mouth. 'You Simon
Lesser?' he says.

'It's Lester, actually. That's me all right.'

As he squints at the label on the padded envelope, the corners of
his lips wince upwards and then droop. 'Says Lesser here.'

'It's a mistake. Our normal postman knows me.'

Neither comment pleases him. His mouth sags further before
discovering a reason to invert the process. 'Got any proof you're who
you say?'

This is idiotic, but I want my mail, especially since the package
may contain an aid to my research. 'I'll get something,' I tell him.
'Don't go anywhere.'

I leave the front door open as I dump the envelopes on the hall
table and dash to my room. The screensaver Joe added to the
computer produces the sound of waves to reassure me that the system
is still functioning although the screen is blank. I grab my passport
from the drawer that hides the furtive pipe, and run downstairs. The
postman stares at the passport before trudging to scrutinise the page
I'm holding open. 'It says Lester,' he complains.

'We've been through that. It's my name.'

'Haven't you got a licence?'

'To be myself? We don't need those yet, do we?'

The corners of his mouth jerk up and immediately sink. 'A driving
licence.'

'I haven't, no. I don't drive.'

'That hasn't got your address.'

'I live here. You can see me doing it,' I protest in a voice that
sounds increasingly unlike my own. I dig out my keys and shove one
into the lock. 'Satisfied? There's your proof.'

I turn the key, or at least I attempt to. The lock doesn't budge. I
strive to twist the key until I'm afraid it will snap. I yank it out and
realise it's the key to Natalie's apartment. I jab the right one into the
lock and turn it at once. 'There,' I manage to say without shouting.

'You want to lay off whatever you're doing to yourself. Can't even
let yourself in.' An undecided grimace flickers over his lips before he
thrusts the package at me, muttering 'Suppose that's yours.'

I retrieve the keys and drop them in my pocket. I'm making to shut
the door when he lurches forward. 'I need that off you.'

I'm distracted enough to wonder if he means my passport until I
gather that he's staring at the card. At last I'm able to close the door
and switch on the hall light to see whose post I left on the table. Most
of it is mine – invitations to order credit cards, as if my Frugo Visa
isn't nearly more than enough. I tear them up unopened and stuff
them into the kitchen bin, then set about unpicking staples from the
padded envelope. The scruffy item inside is a videotape. It is indeed
Those Golden Years of Fun
.

I hope the tape is in better condition than the packaging. It's an
early VHS rental cassette in a cardboard slipcase. I suspect that the
distributor – Variety Video – is small and defunct. The cover bears an
amateurish collage of silent comedians, one of whom has been scuffed
faceless. I've no reason to assume it's Tubby Thackeray, although he
does look bulkier than his companions. The blurb on the back is
uncertain of its typeface and of the space between lines, all of which
have been rubbed partly illegible. 'Relive... our grandparents... laugh
till they... more innocent... all the family...' Why am I trying to piece
this together when I could be watching? I hurry into the communal
lounge and switch on the video player.

A tape is nesting in it. When I eject the cassette, which bears only
a blank label, I can't find its slipcase. I stow it in the case of my film
and plant it among the cans and dreggy glasses on the mantelpiece.
Once I've entrusted my tape to the player I clear a pizza box off the
least lumpy armchair as the television screen lights up. It looks as if
the brightness is trying to scratch the screen white, but surely only the
start of the tape is so worn. Most of the ragged glaring strips drift off
the screen as the distributor's trademark appears – two Vs so close
together they could be taken for a W – and I'm able to suppress some
of the lingering interference with the remote control, which is sticky
from someone's television dinner.
Those Golden Years of Fun
is
compiled and narrated by Charley Tracy, which is all that the credits
have to say. 'First of all there was music-hall,' a voice with a faint
Lancashire accent declares over a shot of the Playhouse, a theatre
converted into a cinema, and I'm wondering whether the entire
commentary is in rhyme when two car doors slam in front of the
house.

I lean on one insecure arm of the chair to peep out of the window.
The car is Natalie's white Punto, beside which she's on the phone
while Mark runs up the path. I stop the tape in response to a
prolonged eager shrilling of the doorbell, and let Mark in while
Natalie tries another number as she paces after him. 'Are we going to
the circus now?' Mark hopes aloud.

'Let's let your mother finish her call, shall we? I was just looking
at a film for my book.'

Natalie hugs my shoulders with her free arm and parts her lips to
give me a kiss just not protracted enough for Mark to voice his
embarrassment. 'Is it suitable?' she murmurs.

'For Mark? I should think so. It's clips of silent comedies.'

'I'll leave you boys to watch it while I nip over to Windsor.'

'Why, what's happening there?'

'I don't know.' A quick frown pinches two of her freckles together
and seems to dull the blue of her eyes. 'Mark took the call while I
was driving. What did grandma say again, Mark?'

'She wanted me to ask if you could come and then she got cut off.'

'And she sounded how?'

'Like it was important but she didn't want to tell me why.'

'And now I can't get an answer on her phone or my dad's, and the
land line's engaged. We've still got an hour, haven't we?'

'Under one,' I say, since it's the truth.

'Time enough for me to drive over and then meet you two at the
circus if I don't have to stay for any reason. Better give me my ticket
in case I'm late. You don't mind, do you?'

'I won't,' I say before realising she's asking Mark.

He gives his head two shakes so vigorous they tousle his red hair
and gazes up at me. 'Can I help you with your book?'

'You certainly can. I'd like to know what you think of a comedian
no one's ever heard of. We'll see how he shapes up against the clowns.'

All the same, as his mother hastens to her car I feel a little
awkward to be left alone with Mark. I shut the front door and grin
somewhat too readily at him. At least I don't ask what or how he's
doing at school, but I fall back on saying 'Would you like a drink?'

'Can I, may I have a Coke?'

'I was thinking more of water.' So is my computer by the sound of
it. 'Any use?' I have to prompt.

'Do you mind if I wait till we get to the circus?'

'Of course I don't. No popcorn either, I'm afraid,' I say as he leads
the way into the front room.

He dumps a stained paper plate off the armchair next to mine and
kicks off his trainers before jumping onto the creaky seat and folding his
legs under him. He's unimpressed by the television and video recorder.
'Doesn't anyone play games in here?' he objects. 'I thought students did.'

I assume we can thank his grandparents for the idea. 'You should
see my new game,' he says as if it's urgent. 'Someone's hunting for
treasure and people that aren't really alive are trying to stop him.'

'Does grandma approve?' I immediately feel sly for asking.

'She hasn't seen it. Don't say or she might want to stop me
playing.'

'I won't tell your grandparents anything you don't want them to
know if you'll do the same for me. Is it a deal?'

'Deal,' Mark says and smacks my palm harder than I intended to
slap his. 'Can we see the film now?'

'I may have to fast forward to the bit I'm looking for. You can
always watch the rest another time.'

He's amused by the speeded-up film, unless he's just being polite.
A few music-hall performers prance about various stages before
newsreel footage of scurrying crowds and collapsing vintage
aeroplanes and cars racing several times as fast as they ever could
represents the rise of commercial cinema. That's followed by clips of
Laurel and Hardy struggling at length to undress in an upper berth,
Buster Keaton falling into landscape after landscape on a screen,
Harold Lloyd coping with ghosts and having to cope with the loss of
a finger and thumb in a stunt, Fatty Arbuckle in drag and mincing
around a bedroom... Might the performer with whom he has been
compared come next? I release the button and hear the commentator
say 'Fatty's fame and his fall from favour eclipsed the films of a
comedian who some say could have outclassed Chaplin.'

Mark sits forward, presumably because I have, although the film
has reverted to the image of the Playhouse. 'Thackeray Lane was
drawing crowds at English music-halls when Keystone director
Orville Hart decided he could be a silent star,' says the commentator.
'Here's all that's left of one of their most famous films.'

How famous could that be? What's the film called? I can distinguish
only 'Tubby' or possibly 'Tubby's' before a thick frayed band
of white climbs the screen and then sinks back into the void, carrying
the end of the introduction with it. I rewind and try to tune the
soundtrack in, but the interference won't be tamed, and so I let the
tape run. I'm as impatient as Mark to watch Tubby now that we've
had a glimpse of him.

He's in a toyshop. Perhaps his black bow tie and bulging dinner
jacket signify that he has left a party or a drunken meal. With his
head that's too small for his oval torso and long legs, he looks shaped
for comedy before he makes a move. His disconcertingly round eyes
are wide with innocence. His black hair is so glossy that it might be
painted on his cranium, and resembles a monk's tonsure parted
precisely in the middle. The transfer to video, or the age of the copy
of the film, may have lent extra pallor to his face. He glances around
the shop and notices a Jack-in-the-box opposite a toy pram, and then
he grins at the audience as if he can see us.

The grin reveals large almost horsy teeth and broadens his face
until it looks nearly circular. Having invited our complicity, he plants
the Jack-in-the-box inside the pram and pretends to be a salesman
until a real one ushers a silently garrulous old lady into view. As the
salesman rocks the pram to demonstrate its quality, a malevolently
gleeful head with Tubby's face springs up from it, and the customer
faints, displaying her bloomers. It's a good job Bebe isn't here,
because Mark's mirth is no longer polite. The distracted salesman
revives the old lady by waving his dickey in her face. Perhaps he's the
manager, since he leaves her in the care of an assistant while he sallies
to banish Tubby from the shop.

The comedian is hiding behind shelves full of Jacks-in-the-box.
Head after grinning head pops up as the manager dashes back and
forth, and too many of the heads seem to belong to his tormentor.
When he pounces behind the shelves Tubby darts out from the far
end, but the instant the manager lunges in that direction the
comedian appears behind him, then pokes his head out from
between two boxes halfway down the aisle. The manager dances
with rage, tugging at his sunburst of hair. As he shouts for assistance,
a trumpet in the orchestra that has been providing a jittery
accompaniment to Tubby's antics emits a stricken croak. A troupe
of natty salesmen flushes Tubby out, only to discover that there are
several of him. One pedals off splay-legged on a child's tricycle,
another releases all the Jacks that are still boxed as he roller-skates
away, while a third makes his exit skipping nimbly with a rope. The
shots are edited so that the three appear to be communicating with
one another, not just with outsize gleaming grins but with laughter,
which the trumpet simulates like wordless speech.

At last all three are expelled from the shop. The manager is so
exhausted that he locks up early, hanging a sign that says
CLOSED BECAUSE OF BANANAS
on the door. We next see him preparing for bed.
As he ducks to the sink with his toothbrush Tubby's face is revealed
in the bathroom mirror, grinning at the audience. Mark's giggle
sounds eager but a little nervous. The manager emerges in his nightshirt
from the bathroom and, having climbed into bed, tugs the cord
above him. The film gives him time to settle into restfulness before his
brow twitches and he reluctantly opens his eyes to peer down the dim
bed. Between his feet is a lump under the blankets. As he sits up, it
rises too. The bedclothes sag away from it, exposing Tubby's
delighted face. A change of angle shows it emerging upturned from
beneath the mattress, and another finds it as it pokes up from behind
the pillow. Did the cameraman intend to light each appearance so
that it glows like the moon? A shot of the frenzied manager fighting
the blankets dissolves to a close-up of him as he wakens. That's
reassuring only until a long shot reveals that he's wearing a straitjacket.
As he begins to thrash about rather more realistically than
comically, three attendants converge to restrain him. I suspect who
they might all prove to be, but that's the end of the film or at least of
the clip. 'And now here's a solo by that graceful pudding Oliver
Hardy before he met his mate,' says the commentator.