But he was also known to say about his life in the theatre, and fortunately not in interviews, ‘Fuck the real world. Who needs that?’
It was Evie who you might say chose to live in the real world, when she gave up the stage, where she’d disported and dazzled like the best of them, to become Jack Robbins’ wife and, as it proved, rather more than that. What a big gamble that was, and what a big mistake it might have turned out to be. But look how it had paid off. Just look at her now. And all when she might have had her ongoing stage career, not to say marriage to Ronnie Deane, who had even become the ‘Great Pablo’.
But who has heard of the Great Pablo now? That magician chap. Whatever became of him? And Jack never became the Great Jack, or even Sir Jack. But life is unfair, you do or you don’t have your moment, and if the show must come to an end then there’s always the sound theatrical argument: save the best till last.
• • •
Ronnie hadn’t said anything. He’d just looked into Evie’s eyes. Did it need a magician? And he saw that Evie saw that he saw. So what was to be said or done? It was confession time? Accusation time? Or time to carry on in a state of pretence—merciless or merciful pretence, which one would it be?
He had been to see his mother, who’d been there and not there. There was in each dissembling situation that had faced him one after the other a feeling of the world’s having revealed its underlying falsity, as if the two confrontations might have been the same.
He might have turned the tables. He might have unmagicked the magic. He might have really stuck those swords through Evie, truly have sawn her in half. Or just let the thought of such an expedient turn every performance into a possible execution. That scream—was it real?
But of course not. How could he have done this to Evie? And all that stuff with the swords and the saw and the boxes, he’d been wanting to dispense with it for some time. It was just toys. It was just kids’ stuff. It was not real magic.
This was to be the time anyway—when everything was falling apart—when their act really took off and Ronnie Deane, otherwise known as Pablo, but now not just that, even acquired greatness. All in the space of a few summer weeks.
And what might Eric Lawrence, who in his unseen but crucial way had made it all happen, have thought? He might have smiled, and been a little rueful even as he smiled. He’d never been known as the Great Lorenzo.
And what might his mother have thought? Silly question. ‘You come to see your dead mother, Ronnie, and then you go away and call yourself the Great Pablo!’
And Evie? Still just ‘Eve’, only ‘Eve’. Wasn’t that a kind of demotion, a punishment? No. Wouldn’t ‘Eve’ always have its immaculate ring? First of women. And did the world need to be told, to have it confirmed, that for him she would always be the great Eve, the wonderful Eve. And, if only for a little while, his Eve.
‘And now, folks, I want you to meet a friend of mine. I used to call him Pablo, but now I’m going to call him the Great Pablo. You heard what I said, folks, and I mean what I said and you’ll see why in a moment. I want you to give a big hand to the Great Pablo! And I want you to give a big hand too—and I know some of you gents would be only too glad to—to the Great Pablo’s one and only helper—the one and only, the delightful, the delicious, the delorable Eve!’
• • •
The moment would come. There would be a pause, a hush, a tingle. Even the audience would know it—‘Come and See with Your Own Eyes!’ Everything else had been a preliminary. This was the famous finale.
How many times, Evie thinks now, did they perform it in that last month or so? No more than thirty. But enough times for it to become legendary and spoken of, even to be named on the billboards. And each time—she could vouch for it—more amazing and (literally) more glowing than the last.
And how was it done? She would never tell, of course she wouldn’t. And for a simple reason. She merely took part in it, she ‘assisted’. She simply did what he told her to do. Well she would, now, wouldn’t she? What else could she do? She had her legs, her famous legs, but she no longer had a leg to stand on.
Ronnie would have the lights dimmed. He was the Great Pablo, so could command such things. Only dimmed and only briefly. Illusions, he was known to say, should always be done in good clear light, otherwise people might suspect it was all just—trickery.
The dimness was just a signal, an anticipation. You might hear a general whisper. Then down in the pit the drummer (he was called Arthur Higgs) would start his own little whispery scuffling. A little gathering shimmer on the cymbals. Then the lights would come up. They were seeing only what they were seeing.
From the wings Ronnie would bring the small round table and place it centre stage, and she would bring the glass of water and—with the customary lift of her knee and flurry of her feathers—place it on the table. Then she would step—pirouette—to one side. It was her role now simply to watch, and the audience might watch him or they might watch her, it was their choice, but in a little while they would be watching neither him nor her, but something, you might say, using the exact word for the situation, that transcended both
