Lovers Make Moan

“You ought to have a better part.”

“I’ve got the one I opted for. I’m going to be Wall in the workmen’s play. I was only a stand-in tonight. At college they would always cast me as Desdemona or Ophelia and in my third year I was St Joan and most unconvincing.”

“It meant you can act, though. I can’t act and I can’t make anybody want to listen to me when I speak, and I couldn’t make any actor pretend to fall in love with me, however much I tried.”

“Oh, nonsense!” said Deborah. “Your husband certainly wouldn’t agree.”

“Oh, Marcus fell in love with my money, not with me.”

Deborah tried not to look as embarrassed as she felt and, to relieve the situation, she said impulsively:

“Look here, I’ll tell you what. I used to lecture in Eng. lit. before I married, and I know The Dream backwards. If you’ve got any free afternoons, why don’t you come along to our place and I’ll read your cues for you so that you really soak up the part and make it your own? We’ll do it indoors first and then have a go in the garden so that you get used to speaking in the open air. Even with amplifiers it’s quite different from playing a scene indoors, I always think.”

“What about your husband?”

“He can take the children down to the beach or somewhere. Jonathan isn’t any problem.”

“‘How happy some o’er other some can be,’ ” said Emma, with an effort to produce a smile. “I’d be better as Helena than as Hermia, if I’ve got to be one of them, especially now I’ve heard Mrs Bourton read the part.”

“Well, swop over parts. Look, Mrs Bourton is just being helped on with her coat. Helena would suit you better. Come on, let’s see how she reacts and then we can tell Mr Yorke. I don’t suppose he’ll have any objection, so long as you and she are satisfied.”

“Well, it’s up to you, I suppose,” said Marcus Lynn, “though I would have liked to see you in the plummier part. After all, I am standing Sam for this do.”

“Well, you know, Marcus, I really couldn’t do Hermia, but Mrs Bradley thinks I will be quite all right as Helena. She says I’ve got the ‘feel’ of the part already. She’s been wonderful, the way she’s helping me.”

“That’s another thing. If she’s coaching you she’ll expect to be paid. Well, I don’t grudge it. You’d better find out what the figure is.”

“Oh, Marcus, she said nothing about coaching me. Besides, I couldn’t mention money to her! She’s a lady.”

“Oh, well—”

“And I do hope you won’t mention it, either. She would be so offended that she might stop helping me. In fact, I know she would. You can’t offer those sort of people money.”

“Not my experience of the world, but have it your own way. I suppose I can always give her a thumping present after the show. Probably cost more than paying her, but I expect I can shoulder the overheads.”

“Thank you, Marcus. You are very kind-hearted. The only thing is—”

“Well?”

‘I don’t think she would like an expensive present, either, and perhaps her husband wouldn’t like you to give her one. It might—well—suggest something to him, don’t you think, you being a man?”

“Well,” said Marcus again, looking in the mirror and smirking as he straightened his tie, “there could be that, I suppose.”

“She’s so beautiful, you see,” said Emma wistfully. “Anybody could be excused for—well, you know.”

“There’s one fellow who wouldn’t be excused—not, at any rate, by Bradley (God help us, what a gorilla!) and that’s Rinkley.”

“Oh, dear, yes!” said Emma, grateful to get away from the subject of emoluments or presents to Deborah. “It was quite frightening, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, any red-blooded chap would have done the same,” said Marcus, trying to make himself look taller and slimmer than nature had allowed for, “and Rinkley had better watch his step. If he tries any of his antics on Madam Dr Fitzroy-Delahague, that husband of hers will put a knife in his ribs, Hippocratic Oath notwithstanding.”

“Oh, Dr Jeanne-Marie Delahague has turned down the part. Says that a doctor’s hours are so uncertain that at the last minute she might have to let us all down. Her husband agrees, but the two little boys are to stay in as elves and Deborah Bradley has promised to look after them and to put them to bed in her house after each performance, so that nobody need come and take them home.”

“Deborah Bradley ought to be a Boy Scout,” said Marcus, “except that she’s all woman and as goodlooking as they come.”

“It was Rudyard Kipling’s Kim who was the friend of all the world, ‘’ said Emma. Marcus looked surprised, but made no comment except to remark that Emma must be a deeper reader than he had supposed.

It was after the second read-through—“just to get you accustomed to picking up your cues, ladies and gentlemen, as the actual words you are to learn will present no difficulties, for this is a lovely play”—that Deborah was asked whether she would take on the part of Titania.

“But you’ve got others to choose from,” she said, “and, anyway, I’m too old for the part.”

“Titania is a fairy and the fairies are immortal,” said Donald Bourton gallantly. “I’m swopping Demetrius for Oberon and I’d love to play opposite you.”

“So who is playing Demetrius?” asked Valerie Yorke, who was Hippolyta. “We haven’t any more men.”

“Bradley is a handsome, saturnine chap,” said Tom Woolidge, who was playing Lysander. “Would he do it?”