Part 7

“I must tell you, sir,” I said firmly, “that I only _perfectly_ know ‘My Duty to my Neighbour.’”

Dexter laughed, as I knew he would, but Mr. Merridew by no means laughed.

“You could not know anything better, Mr. Corkey,” he answered, “but words hallowed by—by sacred memories and—and—in fact—no. It will do for the moment if you just give us the alphabet—speaking slowly and distinctly, putting character and feeling into the letters. In fact, make them interesting.”

I stared in my great ignorance before this amazing man. I felt that it was quite beyond my power to make the alphabet interesting, or put character and feeling into the letters; and I told him so honestly. I said:

“No doubt you could, sir; because you can act anything, from a billiard ball to Macbeth; but it’s no good my trying, because I haven’t the faintest idea how to set about it.”

“I’ll show you,” answered Mr. Merridew. “A thing of this kind, you must understand, is merely academic—an exercise, like a Chopin study—but it will give you a glimpse into the expression and control of emotions and passions, and show you how the skilled actor can make bricks without straw and something out of nothing.”

He rose from his professorial chair and lightly ascended the steps to the stage. Then he stood for a moment, rapt in brooding thought of the profoundest character, and then suddenly began:

“A!” (astonishment combined with joy, as though he had suddenly met an old friend, long given up for lost). “B?” (a note of inquiry uttered with tremulous emotion, as though much depended upon it). “C” (gladly, with great relief and a nod of the head). “D—E—F” (spoken loudly and swiftly with an expression of increasing satisfaction and happiness.) “G!” (a sudden peal of laughter which shook the room and echoed from the walls). “H” (more laughter; gradually subsiding). “I—J” (laughter; dying out and at last completely at an end). “K!” (a loud and ringing note of alarm accompanied by the raising of the hands to the breast). “L!” (the alarm increasing, the hands lifted gradually and thrown back, the face showing considerable fear). “M!” (uttered with immense relief, as though the danger was past, but the effect still apparent in nervous turning of the head to right and left). “N—O—P!” (three gracious bows in different directions, as though three welcome persons had come on to the stage to meet the professor). “Q—R—S” (three gestures each different from the others, indicating that the professor was shaking hands with each of the new arrivals). “T!” (a sudden drawing back, as though the last of the arrivals wasn’t behaving nicely). “U!!” (a most tragic and sudden explosion, accompanied by a dagger-thrust which settled the last of the arrivals and laid him dead at the professor’s feet). “V—W!!!” (a sudden half-turn, during which the momentary triumph over the last of the arrivals was evidently swept away by the onslaught of the others). “X!!” (a violent struggle, in which the professor was thrown this way and that by his invisible antagonists). “Y!!” (a long-drawn, deadly hiss of rage, accompanied by a flash of victory in the eye and a rapid dagger-stroke, which prostrated another foe). “Z!!!” (a loud cry of acute despair; both hands pressed over the heart and the professor sank to his knees, thus indicating that his remaining foe had been too much for him).

It was a drama in a minute and a half, and we were all so much moved that we burst into loud applause. Then the professor regained his feet gracefully and bowed, as though we were an audience of a thousand people. This magnificent inspiration, executed with consummate _aplomb_, almost bewildered me and Mr. Smith and Brightwin by its magnificence. It showed, too, the sort of man who was going to take us in hand.

But Mr. Merridew made nothing of it. It was just a superb bit of spontaneous acting, dashed off as Michael Angelo would dash off a statue, or Beethoven a symphony.

In a way it was rather depressing, because it showed how much lay before us. But we were all excited and hopeful on the whole. Even Mr. Smith felt a sort of divine fire in his veins. He offered to stand Brightwin and me some supper after the lesson was over, and we gladly consented to let him do so.

Mr. Smith told us about himself presently—how he had come into a little money and was now in a position to give up his work (which, he said, had been of a subordinate character, but didn’t specify) and seriously devote himself to the stage.

We listened to him very patiently and made a huge supper.

And afterwards, when we had seen Mr. Smith home to his wife and family off the Tottenham Court Road, Brightwin said that to be stage-struck at Mr. Smith’s age and with his figure was a tragedy of the deepest dye.

“There are only certain parts he could play,” explained Brightwin to me; “but his voice belongs to quite a different order of parts. He has the voice of a tragedian and the body of a second low comedian. In fact, there is no hope for him that I can see.

“He might, however, start a theatre; which would be hope for us, if we kept in with him,” added Brightwin thoughtfully.

IX

My victorious career received a very serious check about this period. I had, of course, bought Aristotle’s _Poetics_ and a cheap edition of _Hamlet_, and on one or two occasions I much regret to say that Mr. Westonshaugh, the best and kindest of men, had found me reading them when I ought to have been registering policies of insurance.

He had rather a stealthy way of approaching the staff of the Country Department from the rear, and, though a large man, revealed the instincts of a hunter wonderfully developed; so that he was often upon his game, which generally consisted of junior clerks, before the quarry was roused and aware of its danger.

The first time he cautioned me; but the second time I grieve to relate that he reported me. It was, of course, his duty to do so; and I believe he regretted the necessity. But so it was; and it meant that I had to go before the Secretary of the Apollo and meet him face to face, much to my disadvantage.

The Secretary was, of course, the pivot round which the whole office turned. The Directors themselves seldom dared to interfere with him; for he was the hero of a thousand fights, so to say, and had climbed to the giddy altitude of the secretarial chair after a lifetime spent in heroic and successful efforts to advance the prosperity of the Apollo Fire Office. His fame naturally extended far beyond the walls of the Apollo. He was known throughout the whole insurance world as a light in the darkness. He had written more than one book on the subject; and the _Insurance Guide_, the journal of the insurance craft, seldom appeared without some respectful allusion to his great fame. I believe he was a sort of king over the secretaries of other Fire Offices; at any rate, nobody ever pretended there was anybody to equal him. He was called Septimus Trott, Esquire; and there came a gloomy morning when I stood before him alone in the silence of the secretarial chamber. But, of course, the interest was profound, for my fate might be said to hang in the balance. I had seen Mr. Trott far off on several occasions, and had once, in the Board Room, where I went with a message, witnessed the solemn sight of him conversing on equal terms with six Directors simultaneously, and easily making them think as he thought, thanks to his enormous experience and easy flow of words; but this was the first time I had approached him _in propria persona_, as we say.

He was of a sable silvered, with a florid complexion, and his eyes had a piercing quality. He wore gold-rimmed glasses divided horizontally, so that when he looked through the tops of them he could see men and things about him, and when he looked through the bottom he could read documents and data, or see to write himself if necessary.

He now looked through the upper story of his glasses and focused me with an expression that I had never seen before on any human countenance. It was not pity, by any means, and it was not scorn. You couldn’t say that Mr. Trott was angry; but then you certainly couldn’t say that he was pleased. He regarded me thoughtfully, yet without what you might call much emotion. He was perfectly calm, yet under his easy self-control I soon found that he concealed a good deal of quiet annoyance at what he had heard about me. Having studied my features, which I had striven to make as apologetic as possible, he dropped to the lower story of his glasses, and I perceived that he had open before him some registers of my writing. They evidently dismayed him, and for some time he said not a word. At length he broke a silence which was becoming exceedingly painful.

“Mr. Corkey,” he exclaimed, “I believe you are in your eighteenth year!”

“Yes, sir,” I answered. “It will be my eighteenth birthday in the autumn.”

“And do you desire to celebrate that event with us, or elsewhere, Mr. Corkey?” he inquired.

I told him that I greatly hoped to celebrate it with him—at least, with the Country Department of the Apollo; and I breathed again in secret, for this showed that I was not going to be dismissed.

Indeed, Mr. Blades had told me that a man was always cautioned once.

“They never fire you the first time,” was his forcible expression.

But the revulsion of feeling caused by knowing that I was saved made me strike rather too joyful a note with Mr. Trott.

“I’m very sorry indeed that Mr. Westonshaugh had to report me, sir,” I said, in a hearty sort of voice. “It was well deserved, and I promise you it shan’t occur again.”

But the Secretary didn’t seem to want my views. In fact, he held up his hand for silence.

“You are here to listen, Mr. Corkey,” he replied. “Now, before me I have some of your recent work. Will you kindly consider these pages in an impartial spirit, and tell me what you think of them? I invite your opinion.”

As bad luck would have it, before him were some registers of policies that I had done under very unusual pressure. In fact, I had made a bet with a chap called Mason that I would register twenty “short period” policies quicker than he would register twenty of the same. My friend, Dicky Travers, held the stakes, which amounted to a shilling a side, and I won by one “short period” policy in record time.

These things, naturally, I did not tell my judge, for they would only have hurt him and led to Mason. Therefore, I merely regarded my handiwork with honest scorn and an expression of contempt, and said the writing was not worthy of the Apollo Fire Office.

“I had come to the same conclusion,” said Mr. Septimus Trott. “We are of one mind, Mr. Corkey. Now, I appeal to your honour as a gentleman, and as one who is drawing a good salary here—I appeal to you, Mr. Corkey, to do your work in future so that we may respect you and value your services, and not deplore them. Remember henceforth, Mr. Corkey, that from ten until four, or later, as the occasion demands, we have a right to your whole time and energy and attention and intelligence. To deny us that right, and to offer us less than your best, is quite unworthy of you, and neither just nor honest to your masters. Good morning, Mr. Corkey; I feel sure that I shall not have to speak again.”

I did not know what to answer, for this exceedingly fine man had made me feel both uncomfortable and mean. I had, however, to say something, so thanked him and promised that he should never be bothered by me any more. But he had already dismissed the subject and was buried in a pile of complicated documents, which were no doubt destined to melt under his hands like the dew upon the fleece.

I returned calmly to my department and wrapped myself in silence as with a garment. But I concealed a bruised heart, as the saying is, and determined to rectify this unpleasant event as swiftly as possible. I decided to stop after hours for six consecutive nights and write till eight, or even nine o’clock, and so produce an amount of work during the current account that should delight Mr. Westonshaugh and gratify Mr. Trott, if he ever heard about it. I wanted, before everything, to show them I bore no malice, but quite the contrary.

Mr. Blades thought my idea good, and that very night I stopped on and on, long after the staff had gone. It was a weird and interesting thing to be alone with my solitary gaslight in that huge and empty office. All was profound silence, save where my industrious pen steadily registered policy after policy. Here and there out of the darkness glimmered a knob of brass or some such thing, like the watchful eye of a beast of prey, and far below one heard the occasional, eerie rattle of a hansom, or cry of a human voice in the empty City. In all that huge hive of industry only I appeared to be humming! It was a great thought in its way. And yet I felt the presence of my colleagues in a ghostly sort of fashion, and knew where the warlike Bassett sat, and the musical Wardle, and the sporting Tomlinson, and so on. But, of course, they were all far away in the bosoms of their families, or elsewhere, as the case might be.

And then came a strange experience—the event of a lifetime, or, at any rate, the event of mine so far, for suddenly and without anything much in the way of premonitory symptoms, I got an urgent craving to write a poem! It is impossible to say how it came, or why; but there it was. My fatal experiences of that day, and being so sorry for myself, and one thing and another, depressed me to a most unusual flatness; and then nature, apparently rebelling against this flatness, urged me to write a poem upon a dire and fearful subject.

You might have thought that I should have taken refuge from the troubles of the morning by writing something gladsome and joyous, or even a regular, right-down hymn, with hopeful allusions to higher things; but far from it, owing to the gloom of the silent office, or the gloom of my mind, or perhaps both together, I produced stanza after stanza of the most deathly and grim poetry you could find in the language. It was called “The Witches’ Sabbath,” and I amazed myself by the ease with which I handled corpse-candles, gouts of blood, the gallows tree, ravens, owls, bats, lightning, the mutter of thunder, the stroke of Doom, spectres, demons, hags, black cats, broomsticks, and, in fact, every dreadful image you can possibly imagine from the classics at large. These things simply rolled off my pen; I could hardly write fast enough to catch up with the dance of horrors which seemed to get worse and worse in every stanza; and I remember wondering, while my nib flew, that if this ghastly thing was the result of a mild and temperate rebuke from Mr. Septimus Trott, what sort of poem I should have made if he had dealt bitterly and sarcastically and cruelly with me. I stopped to examine the question, and finally decided that it was the great patience and tenderness of Mr. Trott that had reduced me to this black depth of despair; and I believed that if he had slated me with all the force of barbed invective undoubtedly at his command, I should have gone to the other extreme and not stopped overtime, and been reckless and ferocious and mad, and very likely have produced a wild drinking-song, or some profane limerick of a far lower quality than this stately poem with all its horrors.

One verse especially pleased me, and I set it down here without hesitation, because the time was actually coming when my poem would see the glory of print—not, of course, that I should see the glory of anything else in the way of reward. But merely to be in print glorifies one for a long time.

“Through a dim gloaming with the hurtling crash And thunder of their batlike wings they came. Their tongues drip poison and their eyes they flash; And twenty thousand others did the same.”

The effect of this horrible poem was entirely to restore my happiness; and hope, long a stranger to my heart, as they say, returned, like the dove to the ark. I simply rejoiced at the poem. I stopped registering policies for that night and copied out the twelve verses of “The Witches’ Sabbath” carefully. I said farewell to the messengers whose duty it was to guard the Apollo by night; and I took home my poem, filled with a great longing to read it to Aunt Augusta. She consented to hear it and was much interested; and so surprised and pleased did she appear to be that I had not the heart to tell her about the sorrowful thing that led to it.

The next morning my poem was the first thought in my mind, and I read it carefully through before getting up. The glow had rather gone out of it; still, it was good. And I considered whether I should read it at the office to Mr. Blades and others. But, strangely enough, though my affection for Mr. Blades was deep and lasting, as well it might be, considering all his goodness, something seemed to whisper to me that he would not much like “The Witches’ Sabbath.” I had a wild idea of asking Wardle to set it to music, but second thoughts proved best, as so often happens, and I just kept the poem in my desk and waited till the next lesson at the Dramatic School. For I felt that in the genial atmosphere of tragic art my poem would be more at ease than in a hive of industry.

I improved it a great deal before the time came for the next meeting with Mr. Merridew. Not, of course, that I was going to show it to him; but I felt I should have courage to submit it to my fellow-pupil, Brightwin, and ask him for his can-did opinion upon it. Of course, measured according to Aristotle, it might have been found wanting; because there was simply not a spark of pity about it. But the terror was there all right.

To close this rather painful chapter, I may mention that I stuck to the resolve to work overtime for a week, but was not rewarded by inventing another poem. However, the result seemed highly favourable, for Mr. Westonshaugh complimented me on my work in the account, and showed a manly inclination to let the dead past bury its dead, as they say.

X

The rehearsal of the first scene of _Hamlet_, conducted by Mr. Montgomery Merridew, went off with great verve. We were all very eager to please him and there was naturally a good deal of excitement among us to know how he would cast the parts.

He decided that Leonard Brightwin should be Horatio and George Dexter Marcellus. I was Bernardo, and Harold Crowe took the rather minor part of Francisco. Mr. Henry Smith had the honour of playing the ghost, and it was very valuable to him for stage deportment and gesture; but not much use in the way of his _h’s_, because the ghost does not make a single remark in the first scene. Nevertheless, after Horatio, who was easily the best, came Mr. Smith. In fact, he quite suggested “the Majesty of buried Denmark,” in my opinion, though he didn’t manage his hands well, and put rather too much expression into his face for a ghost.

Dexter as Marcellus was bad. He made Marcellus a bounder, and when he said, referring to the ghost, “Shall I strike at it with my partisan?” you felt it was just the sort of utterly caddish idea that Dexter would have had. My rendering of Bernardo was not well thought of, I regret to say. Mr. Merridew explained that I must avoid the sin of overacting.

He said:

“You must correct your perspective, Mr. Corkey, and remember that the dramatist designed Bernardo for an honest but simple soldier. He is, we see, punctual and we have every reason to believe him an efficient member of the corps to which he belonged. He is, moreover, an officer; but more we do not know. You impart to him an air of mystery and importance that are calculated to arrest the audience and make them expect wonderful things of him, which he is not going to perform. In the matter of deportment, Mr. Corkey, a man of your inches cannot be too careful. Your legs—you understand I don’t speak offensively, but practically—your legs are long and thin. They are, in fact, the sort of legs that challenge the groundlings. It behoves you, therefore, to manage them with perfect propriety; to tone them down, as it were, and keep them as much out of the picture as possible.”

I very soon found, when it came to stage deportment in earnest, that I had not time left to overact Bernardo. In fact, when I once began to grasp the great difficulties of walking about on the stage with the art that conceals art, I had no intelligence left for acting the part at all, and my second rendering of Bernardo was colourless, though my legs were better.

After a third rehearsal Wilford Gooding took my place, and he gave a very different reading. In fact, when he and his friend Harold Crowe found themselves together on the stage, they showed a decided inclination to repeat their former imitation of the “Two Macs,” and Mr. Merridew reproved them angrily.

“You are here to work, not to fool, gentlemen,” he said, “and if you think the battlements of Elsinore by moonlight at the beginning of _Hamlet_ is the proper place to be funny, then let me tell you you have mistaken your vocation.”

A rehearsal, in fact, has to be conducted with deadly earnestness, and for beginners to take it in a casual or lightsome spirit is a very great mistake. There is nothing lightsome about it.

Mr. Merridew directed us to buy a further book, written by himself, on the subject of voice production. It contained throat exercises for strengthening the larynx and diaphragm and vocal chords, and so on; and among other things, for a full hour every day we had to go into some private place and shout the vowels with the full blast of our lungs.

“It will make a great deal of noise, and people won’t like you for doing it,” prophesied Mr. Merridew, “but you must not mind a little opposition. Your voices naturally want quality and tone, and these can only be got with severe practice. Recollect that merely to speak is useless; you must shout.”

He told us where to buy his book, which fortunately cost no more than sixpence—in fact, only fourpence-halfpenny in reality.

During this lesson Mr. Merridew had to leave us for a short time, to attend a meeting of the Directors of the Dramatic School; and while he was away I ventured to show Leonard Brightwin my poem entitled “The Witches’ Sabbath.” He read it with great interest and was much struck by it.

“I’d no idea you were a writer,” he said; and I told him I hadn’t either; but he believed it was in me. He, too, was a writer, and he offered to introduce me to a friend of his who was an editor.

A glimpse of literary life was, of course, worth almost anything to me, and I said that I should be exceedingly thankful to meet a professional editor, if he didn’t think such a thing was above me. Then he explained that his friend, Mr. Bulger, was an enthusiast of the drama and edited a penny paper called _Thespis_.

“He owns it and does everything himself but print it,” explained Brightwin. “It is not strictly self-supporting yet, but the amateurs read it regularly, for he devotes a good deal of attention to their performances. I often go and criticise them for him. He pays expenses and hopes some day to do more than that. I write a good deal for him. My belief is that he would publish that poem in his paper, though, of course, I can’t promise.”

With the kindness and enthusiasm of the true creator for an inferior artist, Brightwin promised to show the poem to Mr. Bulger, and I was still thanking him most gratefully when our preceptor returned.

His face was gloomy, but he did not divulge the reason, and he proceeded with the rehearsal.