The Little Shadows (35 page)

VERRALL:
Well, East, but neither can you.

EAST:
But, Verrall, I could
learn
.

Then Bella pranced on, after a quick kiss from Clover, to apply for the job soon to be left vacant by Verrall. Her eyes danced like her feet—any hotel would have been glad to have her on the front desk. But of course East wanted no one but Verrall, and was determined to make things difficult for her.

BELLA:
I’ve come for the job you advertised in the paper.

EAST:
Have you had any experience?

BELLA:
(biting her lip and confessing)
Once a fellow got me out in a car. He told me he ran out of gas …

Verrall kept dodging out of the restaurant to report on kitchen disasters, each worse than the last (‘The chef backed into the meat grinder and got a little behind in his work …’), causing some in the audience to groan, and others to convulse with pleasure. ‘One important thing I’ve learned in the kitchens,’ Verrall told Bella, earnestly. ‘Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.’

During the sketch, Clover watched the slack-rope for the Ioleen Sisters being set up in three. The sisters walked back and forth along
the rope, testing and retesting. They were like Amazons, Clover thought, their harsh Australian voices only adding to that impression. They wore lots of glitter but very little cloth, and in the blue backstage light they glowed.

But it was time to go down to the dressing room. Aurora would need help with her hair and her nerves. Clover did not wait for Bella to flounce offstage, but trotted down to find Aurora in a dreadful state, bone-white, very still, an occasional shudder passing through her body. Clover knew she had not eaten. She pulled out a folded napkin to give Aurora a torn bit of Mrs. Hillier’s homemade bread. Aurora turned her head away, shutting her eyes, but Clover persisted. ‘Once
The Casting Couch
is done, you will feel easier,’ she said.

Aurora nodded. She was not dressed, but had her Miss Sylvia costume half-on, bodice and sleeves folded down and protected with a light towel. Her makeup was done, but she looked tired and listless. Clover set to work quieting Aurora’s nerves.

The Play Unfolding

Flora sat out front with Mayhew to watch the second half. She did not entirely enjoy the melodrama, seeing herself as Sylvia’s aged and foolish mother. In lieu of Sybil, the part was now played by the violinist Alberick Heatherton’s maiden aunt, formerly on the legitimate; Flora
had
wondered whether Mayhew might ask her to do it herself, but Miss Heatherton got the nod.

Flora watched the little play unfolding, her hands nervously twisting in her lap. She had a band of pressure in her head and eyes, and often these days felt her heart pounding unexpectedly. As it pounded now, watching Aurora pleading with Malverley for her virtue. East was a devilish mimic, and had put something of Mayhew into his walk, even his voice. Flora hoped Mayhew would not notice—people often did not see themselves in caricature. It was cruel, and in any case inaccurate. Nobody had ever made Aurora do anything she did not want to do.

MALVERLEY:
It is entirely your own fault for enflaming me, Sylvia—my heart has been yours since first setting eyes on you. Let me call you—my Own.

SYLVIA:
(blushing)
Oh, sir! Please, sir! Unhand me!

MALVERLEY:
(aside)
She maddens me! But her
beaux yeux
will not make me
marry
her …

But he
had
married her. It was a kind of triumph, Flora supposed, to have her daughter so well settled. The bothersome pressure behind her eyes made them prone to seeping. She dabbed at the wetness and smiled, as Sylvia and her mother confounded Malverley’s malevolence with a neat bit of foolery.

Now there was only the foppish violin to endure, and then it would be her dear girls, bursting upon the audience in all their loveliness.

Little Bird

Backstage, Bella stood in the wings behind the violinist Alberick Heatherton, the handsomest boy she had ever seen. Mercurial wings of dark hair swept above the most romantic brow, the darkest and most haunted eyes. She could feel something straining in her chest, like a bird struggling to be free—she must be in love, she thought. She had watched him rehearse that morning, lost in a passionate dream of playing, swaying alone onstage, hairs flying wildly off his ferocious bow. He was so lonely, so sad—and his aunt, playing Sylvia’s aged mother in the melodrama, was a dried-up prune with no understanding of the artistic temperament, prone to scold.

Her heart squeezing, Bella stepped closer to Alberick and put a hand on his sleeve, meaning to wish him good luck.

‘Don’t!’ he exclaimed in a fierce whisper. ‘I must not be touched!’

‘Oh!’ she breathed. ‘I am sorry.’

He stared at her, all the fervour of his glare bent in hatred. ‘Do you know who I am?’

‘Of course! I only meant—’

She broke off. The stage manager had held up a hand to still their voices. Alberick hissed, his face jutting close to hers, ‘Don’t
mean
anything! Don’t come near me!’

Goodness. Bella swallowed, even that sounding loud. She nodded, not wanting him to have an utter tantrum, and backed away and out to the stairs. He was not romantic at all, but had something wrong with him, she thought.

Aurora came dashing offstage and hurried Bella in front of her. ‘Quick, quick! Oh quick!’ she cried in a quiet panic. ‘You are not dressed!’

Bella ran.

No Veil Between Them

In the applause that followed the violinist, Clover shifted from foot to foot, her lovely new slippers not quite broken-in to comfort yet. Aurora was pale but calmer; Bella (rushed into costume and pinked-up quickly in the cheeks) irrepressible but stoppered, like a shaken ginger-beer bottle. Clover let herself rest within their arms for an instant. They would be all right—headlining only differed from opening by how warm the audience was, how willing to be happy. She wished Gentry could be here to see them.

The music began,
Florian’s Song
. Hands clutched, on they went, right foot first, in the chain-step of the village maidens, ‘Ah,
s’il est dans votre village
…’ The backdrop was charming and they were charming, and the audience was led into the French countryside. When the dirndl skirts flew off as they went round a maypole, and they transformed into Moulin Rouge petticoat girls with that funny-sad song
Mon Homme
, the crowd went there too. Clover and Aurora slid off stage left, where Mama was waiting for them with their quick change into the
Lakmé
costumes. They could look over their shoulders, in between ducking and fastening, to see Bella still translating
Mon Homme
, making it both sadder and funnier than she ever had before, maintaining a hint of a French accent in the English version.

‘Two or three girls has he that he likes as well as me
But I love him!
I don’t know why I should—he isn’t true—he beats me, too
—
What can I do?’

She will be very good someday, Clover thought, letting Mama swing the pearl-beaded
Lakmé
dress over her tiny hoop. She already is!

Bella drooped off stage right, betrayed and downtrodden but with some inexhaustible sprig of optimism still springing in her gait, and the lights swirled through a transformation.

Scrim forest-panels descended to the cello-swoops of Delibes, and revealed a Brahmin princess and her maid-servant, gathering flowers and singing the interweaving, looping, many-petalled duet—Aurora finally at rest on the wings of this absurdly pretty song, Clover happy to serve her: the two of them able to sing to each other with no veil between them, as there had been ever since the wedding night.

‘Sous le dôme épais où le blanc jasmin
,
Ah! descendons ensemble!’

Their voices, sweeter in tandem than they could ever be apart, twined on as they descended, together, together … The flowering lights dimmed, and the audience took that priceless moment to pause and remember, and then broke into a wave of applause.

As the wave went on and on, the girls were rushed back onstage for another bow, all three of them—they had no encore ready, and in the fluster of the moment did not dare return to one of their non-French old favourites in case Mayhew might disapprove, so they merely bowed again, apologetically, and danced off, and the pictures began.

A conquest, Mayhew declared. He appeared in their dressing-room doorway within minutes of the final curtain, bearing in one hand a bottle of champagne, and in the other silver-wrapped boxes for each of the girls.

Mama came close behind him, weeping a little with the excitement—her girls, their first night as headliners! She admired the pretty coral
beads that Bella pulled out of her box, and the pearls curled in Clover’s, and gasped at Aurora’s box: diamonds set in small flower clusters, pretty as falling water when Mayhew clasped the necklace round Aurora’s neck.

The crowd descended, and Mayhew drew Aurora out into the hall to meet some of her admirers, pressure on her elbow indicating the more important of the pressmen.

Clover turned back to her mirror to steel herself to follow, and found a long parcel on the dressing table, marked with her name. Another present from Mayhew? Then she saw the sender’s address: San Francisco. Inside, scribbled in Victor’s jagged hand:
Only a fiddle, made by a Métis in Montana, they tell me, but it has a sweet true voice. Like you
. She folded back the velvet that cradled the violin, and gazed at its chestnut glow. Then wrapped it, quickly, before anyone else could see.

An Honest Charm

The papers in the morning were as fulsome as the night’s admirers.
The Herald’s
man reported that the entire bill made for a red-letter week at the Starland. Aurora read aloud that article, which hailed Mayhew as a bona fide New York producer, a boon to the city’s artistic life. One reviewer called East & Verrall’s hotel sketch ‘horseplay and low comedy, which everybody wants at least once on a vaudeville bill; people laughed until they were ashamed of themselves.’ East & Verrall were used to good notices. But it was new for the girls, basking in the parlour at Mrs. Hillier’s (where Aurora and Mayhew had moved into a double front room), to read about themselves:

The newest sensation on the vaudeville circuit,
Les Très Belles Aurores de Nouvelle France
, have an honest charm about them. Musical modesty, refined and accurate, without strain or artifice, gives their vocal acrobatics warmth without ever succumbing to egoism. The charming dual-language rendition of
Mon Homme
, a Mistinguett cabaret favourite, will remain with this reviewer. Two of the sisters gave us the finely executed
Flower Duet
from
Lakmé
, accompanied by a pleasing Oriental dance, with fragrant hints of musical exoticism.

Miss Aurora Avery’s performance was crucial to the success of the playlet. The melodrama
The Casting Couch
is an examination of innocence. The production was not laden with excessive emotion or elaborate gestures, offering simplicity, grace and directness.

And now, Aurora thought, they had to do it all again.

Men of Vision

As it turned out, the climax to their Starland time came sooner than expected. After little more than a week, the consortium that ran the Starland out of Winnipeg sent their Mr. Cocklington to inspect the operations. He congratulated Mayhew on his management and foresight, and paid extravagant compliments to Aurora. The praise continued through a lavish dinner and both evening performances—lasting in fact until Mr. Cocklington came back next morning, after having spent the night at the Palliser Hotel poring over the ledgers.

At which point Mayhew and Mr. Cocklington closeted themselves in the manager’s office, and the shouts began.

Mayhew slammed back to Mrs. Hillier’s before the women left for the theatre and warned Aurora—as an introduction to his topic—not to take over to the theatre any costumes or accoutrements she didn’t mind losing when the locks were changed.

Aurora stood stock-still in the parlour, one glove on and one off. She saw how quietly Clover set her violin case behind the sofa, and the way Mama sat down, holding her side and breathing very shallowly as if at a sudden cramp. Bella crouched beside Mama, fingers crammed firmly into her mouth.

It’s a long time since we’ve been at the mercy of a man’s temper, Aurora thought, surprised at the thought. She looked at Mayhew, searching for signs that he was worth it.

Mayhew prowled round the room, laying it out against the Cocklingtons’ cowardly, penny-pinching ways, beginning with a controlled disquisition on Smallness of Outlook and Mishandling of Opportunity but soon descending to diatribe and invective, until Mama put her fingers tight into her ears.