‘“Dear Bella,”’ she read. ‘That’s a bit familiar. It was “Dear Miss Parkinson” last time. “Good Luck for tonight. I shall be watching you. Yours, Rupert Henriques.” He must be crazy about you. That’s the eighth time he’s seen the play, isn’t it?’
‘Ninth,’ said Bella.
‘Must be getting sick of it by now,’ said Rosie. ‘Perhaps he’s doing it for “O” levels.’
‘Do you think he’s that young?’
‘Expect so — or a dirty old man. Nobody decent ever runs after actresses. They’ve usually got plenty of girls of their own.’
Bella fished a fly out of her bottle of foundation and had another look at the card. ‘He’s got nice writing though,’ she said. ‘And Chichester Terrace is quite an OK address.’
There was a knock on the door. It was Queenie, their dresser, come to help them on with their costumes. A dyed-in-the-wool cockney with orange hair and a cigarette permanently drooping from her scarlet lips, she chattered all the time about the ‘great actresses’ she’d dressed in the past. Bella, who was sick with nerves by this stage, was quite happy to let her ramble on.
‘Five minutes, please! Five minutes, please!’ It was the plaintive echoing voice of the callboy.
Bella looked at herself in the mirror, her smooth, young face belying the torrent of nerves bubbling inside her. Then she sat down on the faded velvet sofa with the broken leg in the corner of the room and waited, clasping her hands in her lap to stop them shaking.
‘Beginners, please! Beginners, please!’ The sad echoing voice passed her door again.
Rosie, who didn’t come on until later, was doing the crossword. Bella took one more look round the dressing-room. Even with its bare floor and blacked-out windows, it seemed friendly and familiar compared with the strange brightly lit world she was about to enter.
‘Good luck,’ said Rosie, as she went out of the door. ‘Give Freddie a big kiss.’
They stood waiting by the open door under a faded orange bulb — Brabantio, Cassio and herself. Wesley Barrington, who was playing Othello, stood by himself, a huge handsome black man, six and a half feet tall, as nervous as a cat, pacing up and down, murmuring his lines like an imprecation.
The three of them left her. Help me to make it, she prayed.
Othello was speaking now in his beautiful measured voice: ‘Most potent, grave and reverend signiors.’
In a moment she would be on. Iago came to collect her.
‘Come on, beauty,’ he whispered. ‘Keep your chin up.’
It had begun. She was on. Looking round the stage, beautiful, gentle, a little shy. ‘I do perceive here a divided duty,’ she said slowly.
She was off, then on again, flirting a little with Cassio, and then Othello was on again. Here, where she found life a thousand times more real than in the real world, she had words to express her emotions.
But all too soon it was over. The appalling murder scene was ended and the play had spent its brief but all too vivid life.
And as she took her curtain calls, she had nearly reached the limits of her endurance. Three times Othello and Iago led her forward and the tears poured down her cheeks as the roars of applause increased.
‘Well done,’ said Wesley Barrington in his deep voice.
Bella smiled at him. She fancied him so much when they were acting, but now he was Wesley again, living in Ealing with a wife and three children.
Bella would now go out for a cheap dinner with Rosie and in the morning she would lie sluttishly in bed until lunchtime. She avoided the busy, glamorous world that her fans imagined she lived in. It was a question of conserving her energy for what was important.
In their dressing-room, however, she found Rosie in a fever of excitement. ‘Freddie’s asked me out.’
‘I expect he wants to discuss the way you’ve been upstaging him,’ said Bella. She collapsed on to a chair and felt depression descending on her like dust on a polished table.
Not that she wanted Freddie to ask her out. She’d long ago decided his curly hair and neon smile weren’t for her. But if he started up a serious affair with Rosie, there’d be no more cosy little dinners, no more Rosie and Bella, united and gossiping together against the rest of the cast. Still, it was nice for Rosie.
‘Where’s he taking you?’
‘Somewhere cheap. He’s amazingly mean. Do you think one earring looks sexy?’
‘No, silly. As though you’d lost the other one.’
There was a knock on the door. It was Tom, the doorman.
‘There’s a Mr Henriques downstairs, Miss Parkinson. Wonders if he could come up and see you.’
‘Oh,’ said Bella, suddenly excited. ‘What’s he like?’
‘Looks orl right,’ said Tom, fingering a five pound note in his pocket.
‘Not a schoolboy?’
Tom shook his head.
‘Nor a dirty old man?’
‘No, quite a reasonable sort of bloke. Bit of a nob really. Plum-in-the-marf voice and wearing a monkey suit.’
‘Oh, go on, Bella,’ said Rosie. ‘He might be super.’
‘All right,’ said Bella. ‘I can always tell him to go if he’s ghastly.’
‘Great!’ said Rosie. ‘I’ll finish off my face in the loo.’
‘No!’ yelped Bella, suddenly nervous. ‘You can’t leave me.’
At that moment Queenie, the dresser, appeared at the door.
‘You’d better get out of that dress before you spill make-up all over it,’ she said to Bella.
Bella looked at herself in the mirror. Against the low-cut white nightgown, her tawny skin glowed like old ivory.
Let’s knock Mr Henriques for six, she thought.
‘Can I keep it on for a bit, Queenie?’ she asked.
‘And I’m supposed to hang about until you’ve finished,’ said Queenie sourly.
‘Come on, you old harridan,’ said Rosie, grabbing her arm and frog-marching her out of the room.
‘You can have a swig of Freddie’s whisky to cheer you up.’
Bella sprayed on some scent, then sprayed more round the room, arranged her breasts to advantage in the white dress and, sitting down, began to brush her hair.
There was a knock on the door.
‘Come in,’ she said huskily in her best Tallulah Bankhead voice.
As she turned, smiling, her mouth dropped in amazement. For the man lounging in the doorway was absurdly romantic looking, with very pale delicate features, hollowed cheeks, dark burning eyes, and hair as black and shining as a raven’s wing. He was thin and very elegant, and over his dinner jacket was slung a magnificent honey-coloured fur coat.
They stared at each other for a moment, then, smiling gently, he said: ‘May I come in? I hope it’s not a nuisance for you.’
He had an attractive voice, soft and drawling. ‘My name’s Rupert Henriques,’ he added as an afterthought.
‘Oh, please come in.’ Bella stood up, flustered, and found that her eyes were almost on a level with his.
‘You’re tall,’ he said in surprise. ‘You look so small on the stage beside Othello.’
Embarrassed, Bella tipped a pile of clothes off the red velvet sofa.
‘Sit down. Have a drink.’ She got out a bottle of whisky and a couple of glasses. She was furious that her hand shook so much. She rattled the bottle against the glass and poured out far too large a drink.
‘Hey, steady,’ he said. ‘I’m not much of a drinker.’
He filled the glass up to the top with water from the washbasin.
‘Do you mind if I smoke?’
She shook her head and was pleased to see his hand was shaking as much as hers when he lit his cigarette. He wasn’t as cool as he looked.
As she sat down she knocked a jar of cold cream on to the floor. They both dived to retrieve it and nearly bumped their heads.
