Part 8

"I never can remember: they change the title about once a day. Not that it really matters. 'Too Many Girls' is the latest; and pretty suitable, too! My dear, you simply can't get men for the theatre nowadays! The good ones have all joined up, and the rotters daren't walk on. You ought to see our chorus men! They are all about seventy, or else they have one lung, or one rib, or one ear, or something. Still, we carry on somehow. Are you driving a car for war work?"

"Yes. I don't really feel that I ought to be doing it; it's too much like fun. I was in a canteen at first, but I got rather run down and hard up, and I was offered this job as a chauffeur, so I took it. I think I should go back to the canteen if I could afford it. I never see any soldiers now. At the canteen one could do something for them, poor things."

"They're lambs!" agreed the passenger--"especially the young officers. Are you engaged?"

Marjorie, very much occupied in negotiating Piccadilly Circus, nodded.

"An officer?"

Marjorie nodded again.

"My boy's an officer, too. What's your name, by the way?"

"Marjorie Clegg."

"Mine's Liss Lyle. (It's Elizabeth Leek really, but in the profession one has to think of something better than that.) There's the Imperial there. Just shake me off at the front entrance, and I'll slip round to the stage door."

"Oh, but I want to drive you right up to the stage door!" said Marjorie frankly. "It will be wonderful!"

The little woman of the world at her side smiled indulgently.

"Very well then, dear, you shall! Round that corner, and then round again."

Marjorie set down her passenger with a genuine pang. She was certain now what was wrong in her life. She had no one to gossip with.

The two girls shook hands.

"Thanks awfully!" said Liss. "Also for Little Willie Waterproof." She took off the raincoat.

"Stick to it just now," said Marjorie: "it may be raining when you come out."

"Can I? I love you for that. I'll come round and leave it for you somewhere, shall I?"

Marjorie dived impulsively into the opening offered.

"Come to-night!" she said. "We might go and have some dinner somewhere. I can always get off for an hour--sometimes for the whole evening. I have a lot of evenings to myself," she added.

Ultimately the pair dined together, _chez_ Lyons, and Marjorie spent her happiest hour since her invasion of London. She found her little friend a characteristic medley of childishness and maturity--featherheaded, affectionate, naive, with far more worldly wisdom than herself, yet with all a child's dread of being laughed at for ignorance.

She came from Finchley--and apologised for doing so. She had no mother, and her father, overburdened, it seemed, with daughters, had raised no particular objection to Miss Elizabeth's theatrical predilections. She was at present living at a boarding-house near Paddington. Did not like it much. Said so--apparently to every one, including the other boarders. But nothing troubled her long. Her thoughts, birdlike, hopped to another twig, and her cheery little song of life was resumed. She was not deeply concerned with how and why. She pecked carelessly here and there at what fortune offered, without pausing to reason why or count the cost; but so far appeared instinctively to have avoided what was unwholesome. Her chief passions were dress, gossip, and expensive confectionery. Her conversation was a blend of theatrical shop and military slang--including many parrot-phrases which could have conveyed no meaning to her whatever--and was chiefly remarkable for a certain confiding frankness and a glorious contempt for what Mr. Mantalini would have called "demnition details."

"You must meet my boy," she said to Marjorie, as they walked homeward. "You'd love him. He's a _pukka sahib_!"

"What is his name?" asked Marjorie.

"I am not quite sure of his name," replied Miss Lyle, with characteristic candour; "but I think he's in the Yeomanry. His Christian name's Leonard. I met him with two other fellows at a party, and I got all their surnames mixed up--I always do--and I can never remember which of the three is his."

"You will find out before you marry him?" suggested Marjorie respectfully.

"Oh, rather! But there's plenty of time for that. Besides, he's going out soon, and then it won't matter."

"It won't _matter_?"

"No. We are not so potty about one another as all that. I could see the lad wanted to be engaged--after all, poor things, they can't afford to wait, these days--so I let him. He's nice, and clean, and it looks well to be called for after rehearsal. I shall miss him awfully when he goes. It's rotten to be by yourself in this world--isn't it?" A pair of pathetic eyes were upturned to Marjorie's.

Next moment Marjorie's arm was round the waif's shoulders.

"Liss, you shall come and live with me!" she said impulsively.

"Righto!" replied Liss. "I was dying to be asked, but it seemed too wonderful to be possible. I shall have to sponge on you for a bit, though. I haven't a bean until the show opens."

"That's all right," said Marjorie.

"Now, where shall we have our dug-out?" asked Liss, becoming terribly busy.

The pair spent a rapturous evening building castles in Kensington.

*CHAPTER VIII*

*CHORUS*

*I*

Finally they found an eyrie--a flat, somewhere in the sky at the back of Victoria Street, consisting of a big bedroom, a tiny sitting-room, a gas stove, and a surprisingly modern bath. They bought furniture at unpretentious establishments in Tottenham Court Road, laying their own carpets and hanging their own curtains. (The latter were the only really essential articles of domestic furniture in those days of aerial visitation.) Marjorie hung up a few reprints and photographs; Liss contributed a portrait of her nebulous and anonymous fiance, together with seventeen picture post cards of stage celebrities; and the ideal home was opened.

Still, Marjorie's hunt for happiness was not yet complete. There were two crumpled rose-leaves. Firstly, her implacable conscience continued to inform her that her war work was too easy. Secondly, her evenings were as lonely as ever. As soon as rehearsals finished, and "Too Many Girls" started upon its nightly and tumultuous presentation, Liss disappeared regularly every evening about half-past six; to return, sometimes exhilarated, sometimes gloomy, sometimes affectionate, sometimes quarrelsome, but invariably hungry and inexorably talkative, about midnight. Supper was then served. The two ladies rarely ate at a table: as already noted, the keynote of a feminine meal is its passionate avoidance of anything in the shape of ceremonial routine. As often as not Marjorie would take her supper to bed with her, while Liss, munching and babbling, plied back and forth between the sitting-room and bedroom, in progressive stages of disrobement, bearing fresh supplies and relating the experiences of the day--continuing long after she had shed her flimsy garments over two rooms and a vestibule, arrayed herself in night attire, and crawled into bed.

"My dear, we had the most wonderful house to-night. Seven _legitimate_ calls after the first act! What an audience these boys on leave make! (Here are a couple of sardines: the bloater paste is nah-poo.) They gave Phyllis Lane such a reception! She had to do the dance after 'Pull Up your Socks!' three times; (and if you want any more cocoa tell me, because I am going to turn out the gas-ring.) Her husband has been mentioned in dispatches. Leonard wasn't in front to-night--selfish pig! I'll tell him off for that, to-morrow. (Oh, you darling, did you put this hot-water-bottle in my bed? I must give you a kiss for that. There! No, it won't hurt you, it's only lip salve.) Mr. Lee came behind to-night, and spoke to us all. Said the show was a credit to everybody, and he was very pleased to hear how brave we all were during the raid the other night. Yes, he's the managing director. (Have you finished? Very well, then! Give me the tray. Here's a cigarette for you.) By the way, I was talking to Uncle Ga-Ga to-night. Oh, didn't I tell you about him? He's one of the chorus gentlemen--about a hundred years old, and simply mad to get into the war. But they won't take him. He keeps changing his name, and dyeing his hair a fresh colour, and trying again; but they turn him down every time. Seems queer, doesn't it, that when a man wants to go he can't, while there are so many who should and won't? (Can I use your cold cream, dear? I can't find mine.) Lee said they would probably put on a second edition about August: we start rehearsing the new numbers next week. Why don't you come and get a job in the chorus? It wouldn't interfere with your other work. There's two or three other girls doing the same as you, and Lee lets them off with one _matinee_ a week. He's very patriotic. A-a-a-h! Oo-oo-oo! Ee-ee-ee! What a _lovely_ warm bed! Well, as I was saying--Marjorie Clegg, what is the use of my wearing myself to a shadow waiting on you at supper and then the moment I get into bed and begin to chat for a couple of minutes before lights out you start snoring like a grampus? Very well, have it your own way. Live and let live, _I_ say.... That's all.... As for that little toad Leonard--!..."

Miss Lyle's baby eyes closed, her small nose buried itself in the pillow, and her little tongue was still for several hours.

But Marjorie was not asleep. She lay awake thinking, while outside London, shrouded in the blackest obscurity, snatched such slumber as that endless, flaring, muttering line of outposts in Flanders could guarantee. For all her splendid vitality, Marjorie was a highly-strung girl--with a conscience. That morning Colonel Bethune, passing through London from Scotland on his way back to the Western Front, had invited her to a "farewell luncheon." She had accepted, gladly--and had repented ever since. For behold, over the coffee, Colonel Bethune had asked her to marry him!

He had asked her very charmingly, and with obvious confidence--a combination which made it an ungrateful and difficult business to say no without offence. At first Marjorie had been too taken back to say anything at all. When her answer came its sincerity was unmistakable; and poor, vain Eric was obviously and deeply mortified. With a vague idea of consoling him, she had mentioned that her affections were already engaged. He had asked her for no name, but she knew that it had been written in her face, and that Eric had read it there. Then a new and disappointing characteristic of the man had cropped out. He had turned and reproached her--had told her that she had flirted with him, and led him on--which was a base lie. But for all that, she was filled with remorse. In her selfish desire for a good time she had been thoughtlessly inconsiderate of Colonel Bethune, and almost disloyal to Roy.

She and her host had parted miserably ten minutes later, each having learned a bitter lesson--Eric, that in the field of love, especially under stress of war, callow youth can be more than a match for dazzling maturity; Marjorie, that where a pretty girl is concerned no man can be regarded as 'safe' until he is dead.

Well, she would expiate her fault in the only way she knew. This decided, she fell asleep.

*II*

Next morning Marjorie, depositing her noble employer upon the steps of the Ministry of Intelligence, inquired:

"May I speak to you for a moment, sometime, Lord Eskerley?"

"Twelve-twenty-five," was the prompt reply--"after Downing Street and before signatures. But I will not exert my influence to have him made Commander-in-Chief!"

At twelve-twenty Marjorie presented herself to Mr. Meadows, in the secretary's room, and was passed through double doors into the presence of the minister. His lordship looked up over his spectacles and indicated a chair.

"Habakkuk! Good! Sit down. Four-and-a-half minutes! Well?"

"I want to say," announced Marjorie, plunging head foremost into her confession, "that I can't stay here any longer."

"Why?"

"I am not happy in my mind. I must go away."

"Good gracious! Don't say Meadows has fallen in love with you! I will not permit my subordinates to encroach upon my prerogatives! No--not that? Proceed, then!"

"I think I ought to leave you," Marjorie continued, quite unmoved by her employer's senile quips, "because I am having too good a time. I have been feeling all along that I ought to be doing something else."

"So I have observed. Well?"

"The only trouble is that if I go back to the canteen work (where they want my help very badly), I shan't get paid for it; and I can't afford to work without pay of some kind. I have a small allowance from home, but it doesn't go far, and the girl I share a flat with was pretty hard up when I first picked--became acquainted with her."

"Oh! Ah! So you keep a foundling hospital, too?"

"Only one!" explained Marjorie. "She's a dear," she added warmly. "She's on the stage. She was badly in debt before the new piece started--they don't get paid during rehearsals, you see--and she is only just beginning to get on her feet again; so I can't afford to work for nothing during the day just now, unless--"

"Unless you go on the stage yourself at night? Is that it, O _Capable de tout_?"

"I was thinking of it," confessed Marjorie; "but I don't know how you guessed."

"It's the first thing every pretty girl thinks of when confronted with the necessity of earning a living. Go on."

"And I want to ask you: Is it playing the game to be on the stage _at all_ in war time? I mean, ought the men to be encouraged to go to revues, and things like that, when they are on leave? Is it all wrong, and demoralising, and unpatriotic, as some people say?"

Lord Eskerley sat up, and took off his spectacles.

"Unpatriotic fiddlesticks!" he remarked with great vigour. "In war time there are just three things that matter. The first is morale. I have forgotten the other two. The maintenance of purely military morale can safely be left in military hands; but civilian morale--and that includes the morale of the men on leave of course, rests mainly on the triple foundation of the Church, the Press, and the Stage; and, as things are to-day, I am not sure that the Stage doesn't have the biggest say in the whole business. (Don't tell Doctor Chirnside I said that, will you?) So you are thinking of joining your foundling behind the footlights. Chorus, I presume?"

"Yes. They would give me three pounds a week."

"They would get you cheap! And you want me to satisfy your conscience that the life of a galley-slave in a vitiated atmosphere all day, followed by vocal and calisthenic exercises in an even more vitiated atmosphere for three hours every night, is a sufficiently close approach to hard work to exonerate you from all suspicion of lukewarmness with regard to the war?" The old man stood up and shook hands. "Donna Quixota Habakkuk, the certificate is granted! I suppose you will stay on for a week or two, until I find a successor--I won't say a substitute? Don't forget me, altogether. Come and see me sometimes. I am less busy, and more solitary, than you suppose. You know when to come: you are familiar with my goings out and comings in. And--good luck, my dear!"

*III*

Life behind the scenes, as usual, falsified expectation. Marjorie's first visit to the theatre was paid a few weeks after her interview with Lord Eskerley. They entered by the stage-door, Liss explaining to a taciturn but benevolently disposed person in a glass box, whose name appeared to be "Mac," that her companion had an appointment with Mr. Lee. Thereafter, Marjorie was conducted through an iron door, which commanded the thoughtless, by stencilled legend, to close it gently; through a mass of ghostly scenery, past whitewashed walls bearing notices extolling the virtues of Silence; and out through another iron door (marked, somewhat paradoxically, "_Not an exit_") into the auditorium, rendered dimly visible by the overflow of light from an economically-illuminated stage.

Liss turned back the holland covering from two stalls at the end of a retired row.

"Sit there, dear," she said. "I will grab hold of old Lee some time, and tell him you are here. I can sit with you for a bit. This rehearsal is for principals; the chorus aren't called until twelve."

The rehearsal of the principals consisted, for the moment, of an altercation between a fat man, standing in the middle of the stage, and the musical director, sitting at his desk in the orchestra. It was a most friendly--one might almost call it an affectionate--altercation. No epithet ever fell to a lower level of mutual esteem than "Old Boy!" or "Old Man!"--or, under extreme provocation, a "Dear Old Boy!" As is not unusual in these cases, it was difficult for the casual outsider to discover:

(_a_) What the argument was about.

(_b_) Which side of the argument was being sustained by whom.

In the front row of the stalls stood an ascetic-looking man in black tortoise-shell spectacles, apparently acting as umpire. Seated upon a partially dismantled throne beside a step-ladder, up stage, sat a pretty girl in a pink tam-o'-shanter, placidly perusing a crumpled brown-paper-covered manuscript. Other persons were dotted about the auditorium--fat men, cadaverous men; men with tortoise-shell spectacles, and men without; an occasional female. All were conferring in monotone. Round the bare walls of the stage, at present destitute of scenery, sat the ladies of the chorus, most of them wearing rehearsal dresses of unpretentious design--knitting socks of khaki, and occasionally exchanging a guarded confidence. Altogether the atmosphere struck Marjorie as more domestic than theatrical--almost ecclesiastical in its dullness and drowsiness.

"Who are these people sitting about in the stalls?" she asked Liss.

"Oh, just odds and ends! The author, and the lyric writers, and extra lyric writers, and costumiers, and photographers, and people like that--all waiting to catch Mr. Lee, and start an argument with him about something. That's Tubby Ames on the stage. He's having a row with Phil Kay; he has about two a week. I bet you he's trying to get Phyllis Lane's song cut. (That's her, in the pink tam; she's sweet.) It's been going too well lately. Tubby was kept waiting for his entrance in the Second Act last night while she did her third encore dance. Trust Tubby to step on other people's fat! Yes, I thought so."

The comedian's voice was heard again. The gist of the dispute was emerging from a cloud of verbiage.

"Phil, dear old man," he exclaimed earnestly, "I should be the last person in the world to interfere with a brother or sister artist; but really, I am only saying what every one feels. After all, we must all pull together in these days, and I feel instinctively that unless the way is kept _ab-so-lute-ly_ clear for that entrance of mine, the action will drop--and flop goes your Second Act! And where are you then?" He leaned right over the footlights.

The conductor, apparently a man of peace, flinched visibly.

"Old boy," he began, "it's this way. I quite see your point--"

The comedian pressed his advantage swiftly.

"I thought you would," he said. "I have had a good many years' experience in this sort of work--more than you, perhaps. For instance, when I was with Charles Wyndham--"

"It's the Story of his Life!" whispered Liss despairingly. "We get it about every second rehearsal. He's out of pantomime, really. It's only because there's nobody else to be had that he's here at all. He has varicose veins, and--"

But the ascetic referee in the stalls broke in upon the autobiographist.

"Mr. Ames," he commanded--his voice was strong and harsh, and was obviously extensively employed in shouting down other discordant noises--"talk sense!"

"That's Mr. Lancaster," whispered Liss excitedly. "He's the producer. We are all frightened to death of him. He's a wonder!"

"Miss Lane's song cannot be cut," continued the wonder, "and it cannot be transferred elsewhere; so you must lump it! Now, Miss St. Leger, come on, please, and try your 'Plum and Apple' duet with Mr. Ames."

Miss St. Leger, the leading lady, was standing in the wings. Her face was round and childish; her eyes were brown and pathetic; her whole appearance suggested timidity and helplessness. Hearing her name called, she walked obediently down to the footlights, favoured the producer with a dazzling smile, and began:

"Say, listen, Mr. Lancaster! I got a kick coming too! That duet I am putting over with Mr. Ames in the Second Act of the present show is practically a solo! When we started in singing it, way back in last fall, it was a duet, I'll allow. But somehow I got a kind of crowded feeling, now. I don't seem to belong in that duet when Mr. Ames is around. And I want to say right here that I am not going to stand for that kind of rough stuff any more!"

By this time the languid chorus were sitting straight up on their chairs. The scattered figures in the auditorium had ceased their muttered incantations, and were leaning forward, all ears. The pacific Phil Kay was squirming in his seat. Marjorie and Liss gripped hands ecstatically; the ecclesiastical atmosphere had evaporated.

"I understand team work," continued the ethereal Miss St. Leger, "as well as any artist; and you won't ever find me stepping on any other folks' laughs or business. But one thing I will not do, and that is feed fat to a dub comedian all the time--especially a guy that's too fat already!"

There was a roar of laughter from stage and stalls. Even the austere Lancaster grinned sardonically. Mr. Tubby Ames, gaping like a stranded fish, surrendered abjectly, as was his invariable custom when firmly handled.

"All right," he said, with a pathetic smile. "Carry on! Nobody loves a fat man! Chord, please!"

_Said an Apple to a Plum;--_ _"Seeing how this War has come,_ _Join me in the stew-pan, do!"_

Miss St. Leger, flushed with victory, took her demoralised opponent in an affectionate embrace, and replied:

_Said the Plum, "I guess I will!_ _I am fairly stony; still,_ _I will do my bit, like you!"_

"There's Mr. Lee now," said Liss--"just by the stalls entrance. Let's catch him!"

Our two conspirators descended upon the great man. He proved to be much less formidable than Marjorie had feared.

"We can make room for you, girlie," he announced paternally, "and"--with a glance at Marjorie's face and figure--"a hundred more like you, _if_ they can be found, which I doubt!" He patted her shoulder. "Now--where will you fit in? Let me think! You are too big to go prancing about the stage with Baby Lyle, and the other little people. Your life's work is to stand well down stage in a stunning frock, and fill the eye! Take her along to Mr. Lancaster, Baby, and say I sent you. I must be off."

"I ought to tell you," said Marjorie, "that I may find matinees a difficulty. I am working at a canteen. I have only one free afternoon a week."

"That will do," said Mr. Lee. "I believe in helping girls who are doing war work. I'm a special constable myself. Not bad for an old man of fifty-four, eh? But we all try to do something here. Now, run along to Lancaster, girls! I have to report for duty at Vine Street at three o'clock."

With a gracious smile, Mr. Lee disappeared through the stalls entrance. Liss squeezed Marjorie's hand excitedly.

"My dear, you have made a _tremendous_ hit with him! He can be horribly grumpy when he likes. Come and be introduced to Lancaster."

The producer was found dismissing the rehearsal of principals. The plum and apple had become jam in the last verse, so both romance and patriotism were satisfied.