ChapterThirty-Nine
The Athena Theatre, Covent Garden, London
November 1962
Isabella
‘You know, if you’re going to point that rotten little peashooter at me, you might just as well do it with more conviction.’
‘Oh, so suddenly you’re an expert on firearms, are you?’
Isabella sighed and turned to the director, Mallory Carlisle, for backup. ‘He was pointing the gun over my shoulder,’ she complained.
‘Isabella, sweetie, it’s only a dress rehearsal.’
‘Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the whole point of a dress rehearsal to get things right in order to be ready for the actual performance?’
‘And correct me if I’m wrong,’ boomed the old goat at her side, ‘I am the one with more theatrical experience under my belt than this ...’ he waved his hand dismissively in her direction, ‘than this nobody has had hot dinners.’
‘Judging by that paunch of yours,’ Isabella muttered under her breath, ‘you’ve also had plenty of experience when it comes to hot dinners.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
From the front row of the stalls, Mallory clapped his hands. ‘Let’s take a short break, shall we?’
Isabella had a dramatic flounce down to a fine art, but as she marched off the stage in a marked manner, she had to admit Hugo Gerrard gave an impressive performance himself.
Isabella had wanted to do a more modern play afterThe Importance of Being Ernest, but when her agent had received a call asking specifically for Isabella to join the cast forThe Broken Vow, and with nothing else on the horizon, she accepted the role. She was told that the leading lady she was taking over from had walked out on the production, and Hugo Gerrard, the leading man, had refused to continue with the understudy. Opening night was in four days and Isabella had had less than a fortnight to learn her part.
She was always up for a challenge, but Hugo Gerrard was a challenge she hadn’t bargained on. She could quite understand why the actress she had replaced had thrown in the towel. Having done very little in the way of acting for the last decade, other than a few minor parts on the television, and a cigar advertisement, Hugo’s return to the stage was being billed as ‘long awaited’ and something thetheatre-going public shouldn’t miss. Nobody in the cast was allowed to utter the word ‘comeback’, not without risking a dressing down of monumental proportions, and they spent most of the time walking on eggshells around Hugo, theso-called star of the play.
‘I never went away!’ Isabella heard him roar at some poor stage hand yesterday.
Hugo was older than Isabella by thirty years and in playing her jealous lover it was a laughable piece of miscasting. As a romantic lead he was about as convincing as acoal-scuttle making advances on her. The scenes when he was supposed to be making ardent love to her were pure torture.
Two hours later, and when the rehearsal was finally over, and Isabella had changed out of her costume, she made her way to the box office where she had agreed to meet Ralph. She was keeping the promise she had made the night of the party at Meadow Lodge and was having dinner with him. After what had happened to Julia that night, Isabella regretted encouraging Ralph to dance with the poor woman. He claimed at the time that he hadn’t meant to get his stepmother tipsy, but Isabella wasn’t so sure.
She found him already waiting for her. Leaning nonchalantly against the wall and dressed in a smart suit and an overcoat with the collar turned up as he smoked a cigarette, he looked very rakish. He gave her a languid smile and kissed her cheek.
‘Cousin Isabella,’ he said, ‘you look positively divine.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Well, I feel like hell after a day spent with that dreadful lush, Hugo Gerrard. He’s such an old ham of an actor. Where are you taking me for dinner? I’m starving.’
‘I’ve booked us a table at Rules. But first I suggest we have a couple of cocktails in the bar. Hopefully that will smooth your ruffled feathers.’
‘You know I’m still quite cross with you,’ she said, when they had walked the short distance from the theatre to the restaurant and were seated on padded stools at the bar.
‘Why? What have I done?’
‘You know jolly well what I’m talking about. You got your poor stepmother into so much trouble the night of Kit and Evelyn’s party.’
‘Am I to be held responsible for her inability to hold her drink?’
‘You knew exactly what you were doing, and what the consequences would be. You did it to annoy your father, I shouldn’t wonder.’
He frowned. ‘Are you going to be like this all evening?’
‘Like what exactly?’
