Will Thomas - Some Danger Involved

The pastor nodded gravely. "My congregation has been fearful about getting out at night. A couple of drunken louts gave one of our young men a black eye on the way here last week, and the girl he was with had the comb and veil stolen from her hair. But we're accustomed to persecution here. This is a dangerous area, particularly in the alleyways."

Barker turned to me. "Come, lad. Let's leave the gentleman to his sermon notes. Thank you for your time, sir."

On our way out the door, Barker stopped me with a raised arm. He'd stopped once or twice before during our investigation, for a final look, a remark, or a note to me. I flattered myself that I was beginning to catch on. In this case, there was an offering box by the door. Barker ran a thumb across the side of his index finger, and I reached for the wallet in my pocket. He extracted a ten-pound note and folded it several times before it would fit into the small slot on the top of the wooden box. No doubt they were not accustomed to large denominations in Poplar.

Barker fished the watch from his pocket and popped the case.

"Ten minutes until six. We have just enough time to return home. Have you any plans for tonight, Thomas?"

"None at all, sir." It was a formality, of course. He knew I didn't.

"Excellent. You have no objections, I trust, to accompanying me to the theater? It shall give you an opportunity to try on your evening kit."

My employer had given me the impression that he was not a theatergoer, and it was not in his character to do something so frivolous as to attend an evening's entertainment in the middle of a case. It took me several minutes' silence in the cab before I finally remembered Sir Moses' concern about a production of The Merchant of Venice. As he said, Barker was leaving no stone unturned.

Once in the door, the Guv was giving orders to Maccabee, while I went upstairs to change. My evening clothes were my most impressive outfit, and I admit I felt it something of an extravagance, since I would get little or no use out of it. As usual, Barker had prepared for every contingency. I changed my day suit for evening wear and smoothed my unruly hair. I had never been so formally dressed in my life. My shirt front was snowy white, my white silk tie peeped from under the tips of my collar, and my evening jacket was of the latest cut. There was even a pair of kid gloves.

Mac provided himself and me with a cold meal by the door: slices of game pie, a bean salad with vinaigrette, and a carafe of water on a silver platter. I leaned against the wall and ate standing up. Presently, our employer came down as well.

Cyrus Barker in evening dress was a sight to behold. The expanse of white linen across his chest seemed immense. His day spectacles had given way to an evening pair, the round disks inside the tortoiseshell frames as green as jade. Altogether, he looked grand and foreboding, a figure of mystery.

Gloveless, he picked up a slice of game pie in his fingers and consumed half of it in one bite. Mac handed him a goblet of water and began whisking imaginary crumbs from his suit with a small brush. For once, this all seemed rather decadent. Evening wear, cold suppers, and a butler brushing away stray crumbs was a far cry from starving in a garret. London is truly a city of extremes.

"Mr. Llewelyn, I must ask you not to lean on the wall, please. It is indolent. Mac, whisk him."

Mac took the broom to me rather thoroughly. There hadn't been a crumb on me to begin with. Any satisfaction the butler derived was removed by Barker's next question, however.

"Might Llewelyn borrow your silk hat for the evening? I have not had the opportunity to purchase one for him yet, and I did not anticipate he would require one so soon. I fear one of mine would o'erwhelm him."

For a moment, Jacob Maccabee looked as if he'd just been slapped. He glanced at me as if I were a species of vermin that had somehow been carried into the house. Then his professional demeanor took over, he acquiesced, and in a moment or two was adjusting a beautiful silk top hat on my head at just the perfect angle. Somehow I wanted to apologize, though I knew it was not I but Barker who had commanded him. Mac tied a voluminous opera cape around Barker's neck, handed us our sticks, and we were off.

Arriving at one of London's premiere theaters in a top hat and evening kit was a novel experience, but my day had been full of them. In the last twenty-four hours, I had been shot at, had a knife thrown at me, and been nudged by a wild beast. I'd faced down an old tutor and watched a man defeated who may have tried to assassinate me. Still, none of these events had prepared me for a night at the theater, or the sight of my employer in an opera cape.

I suppose I had once aspired to come here and walk among these beautiful, elegant people as one of their own, but that had been long ago, before all my dreams had been dashed like porcelain on paving stones. Now that I was finally here, I felt all the more like a Welsh collier's brat, as if I were still twelve, nose running, and starting to outgrow my brother's cast-offs. I was in the right place at the wrong time. Such was the refrain of my life.

"Cheer up, Thomas, old man," I told myself, looking down at the crowd from one of the immense stairways. I would try to enjoy the evening out for its own sake. Heaven only knew if I would ever be in such a situation again.

The Pavilion was as long in the tooth as an old dowager, but a fresh coat of paint covered a multitude of sins. The plush was wearing thin on the seatbacks, and plaster showed here and there beneath the gilt of the cherubs and ribbons, but all in all she was still handsome. The marble flooring and stairs had reached that luster of beauty which nothing save time and millions of pairs of shoes could create. Barker and I were admirably situated mid-distance between the orchestra pit and the stalls, close enough to hear all of the dialogue, yet far enough away to have the illusion unspoiled by heavy-handed makeup and garish sets. I must state as well that I am a classicist, and much prefer Shakespeare over the latest patter-operas of Messrs. Gilbert and Sullivan.

The performance was a tragedy in every sense. The actor playing Antonio was stoic and noble, and Bassanio was justly aggrieved at his kinsman's predicament; Portia was just as I imagined her, and in the portrayal of the Jewess Jessica there was nothing of which Sir Moses could disapprove; but in the casting of Shylock the sponsors of the play had made a dreadful mistake. The Merchant of Venice is a play which must be done subtly if one is to get the full benefit of the tragedy therein, and the character of Shylock should be portrayed realistically, so that we feel his alienation as a Jew. Instead, the actor, Frederick Rosewood, portrayed him as a cold, calculating villain, whose only desire is to destroy every Gentile he gets in his clutches. Such a performance might have caused little concern to the Board of Deputies had the audience been merely members of the upper class, but the shilling stalls were filled with East Enders who booed and hissed whenever Shylock appeared. They seemed very likely to vent their emotions from the play in the streets afterward.

"No wonder Sir Moses is concerned," Barker murmured, as we gathered our things. "I had the good fortune to attend Irving's interpretation at the Lyceum in 'eighty-one. Now that was a performance."

"Rosewood was heavy-handed," I admitted. "He's turned Shakespeare into a cheap melodrama."

Barker and I had fallen in with the crowd making their way out to the staircases, when he turned to me. "There's something I'd like you to do, Thomas. I've got a mind to have a word with Rosewood, and it might be useful if you would mill about and see if you recognize anyone from the investigation."