Ngaio Marsh - Light Thickens

“Yes.”

“It’s only been something to talk about. Never calling for a decision. Or for anything real.”

“No. And now it does, and he’s face to face with it, he’s appalled.”

“As she knows he will be. She knows that without her egging him on he’d never do it. So what has she got that will send him into it? Plans. Marvelous plans. Yes. But he won’t go beyond talking about plans. Sex. Perry said so, the first day. Shakespeare had to be careful about sex because of the boy actor. But we don’t.”

“We certainly do not,” he said. He moved behind her and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Do you realize,” Maggie said, “how short their appearances together are? And how beaten she is after the banquet scene and they are alone. She makes a superb effort during the scene, but I think, once she’s rid of those damned thanes and is left with her mumbling, shattered lion of a husband and they go dragging upstairs to the bed they cannot sleep in, she knows all that’s left for her to do is shut up. The next and last time we see her she’s talking disastrously in her sleep. Really, it’s quite a short part, you know.”

“How far am I affected by her collapse, do you think?” he asked. “Do I notice it? Or by that time am I so determined to give myself over to idiotic killing?”

“I think you are.” She turned to look at him, and something in her manner of doing this made him withdraw his already possessive hand. She stood up and moved away.

“I think I’ll just ring up the Wig and Piglet for a table,” he said abruptly.

“Yes, do.”

When he had done this she said: “I’ve been looking at the imagery. There’s an awful lot about clothes being too big and heavy. I see Jeremy’s emphasizing that and I’m glad. Great walloping cloaks that can’t be contained by a belt. Heavy crowns. We have to consciously fill them. You much more than I, of course. I fade out. But the whole picture is nightmarish.”

“How do you see me , Maggie?”

“My dear! As a falling star. A magnificent, violently ambitious being, destroyed by his own imagination. It’s a cosmic collapse. Monstrous events attend it. The heavens themselves are in revolt. Horses eat each other.”

Dougal breathed in deeply. Up went his chin. His eyes, startlingly blue, flashed under his tawny brows. He was six feet one inch in height and looked more.

“That’s the stuff,” said Maggie. “I think you’ll want to make it very, very Scots, Highland Scots. They’ll call you The Red Macbeth,” she added, a little hurriedly. “It is your very own name, sweetie, isn’t it — Dougal Macdougal?”

“Oh, aye, it’s ma given name.”

“That’s the ticket, then.”

They fell into a discussion on whether he should, in fact, use the dialect, and decided against it as it would entail all the other lairds doing so too.

“Just porters and murderers, then,” said Maggie. “If Perry says so, of course. You won’t catch me doing it.” She tried it out. “ Come tae ma wumman’s breasts and tak’ ma milk for gall . Really, it doesn’t sound too bad.”

“Let’s have one tiny little drink to it. Do say yes, Maggie.”

“All right. Yes. The merest suggestion, though.”

“Okay. Whiskey? Wait a moment.”

He went to the end of the room and pressed a button. Two doors rolled apart, revealing a little bar.

“Good heavens!” Maggie exclaimed.

“I know. Rather much, isn’t it? But that’s Teddy’s taste.”

She went over to the bar and perched on a high stool. He found the whiskey and soda and talked about his part. “I hadn’t thought ‘big’ enough,” he said. “A great, faulty giant. Yes. Yes, you’re right about it, of course. Of course .”

“Steady. If that’s mine.”

“Oh! All right. Here you are, lovey. What shall we drink to?”

“Obviously. Macbeth .”

He raised his glass. Maggie thought: He’s a splendid figure. He’ll make a good job of the part, I’m sure. But he said in a deflated voice: “No. No, don’t say it. It might be bad luck. No toast,” and drank quickly as if she might cut in.

“Are you superstitious?” she asked.

“Not really. It was just a feeling. Well, I suppose I am, a bit. You?”

“Like you. Not really. A bit.”

“I don’t suppose there’s one of us who isn’t. Just a bit.”

“Peregrine,” Maggie said at once.

“He doesn’t seem like it, certainly. All that stuff about keeping it under our hats even if we do fancy it.”

“Still. Two successful productions and not a thing happening at either of them,” said Maggie.

“There is that, of course.” He waited for a moment and then in a much too casual manner said: “They were going to do it in the Dolphin, you know. Twenty years or so ago. When it opened.”

“Why didn’t they?”

“The leading man died or something. Before they’d come together. Not a single rehearsal, I’m told. So it was dropped.”

“Really?” said Maggie. “What are the other rooms like? More nudes?”

“Shall I show you?”

“I don’t think so, thank you.”

She looked at her watch. “Shouldn’t we be going to your Wig and Piglet?”

“Perry’s taking the witches first. We’ve lots of time.”

“Still, I’m obsessively punctual and shan’t enjoy my oysters if we’re cutting it short.”

“If you insist.”

“Well, I do. Sorry. I’ll just tidy up. Where’s your bathroom?”

He opened a door. “At the end of the passage,” he said.

She walked past him, hunting in her bag as she went, and thought, If he pounces I’ll be in for a scene and a bore.

He didn’t pounce but nor did he move. Unavoidably she brushed against him and thought: He’s got more of what it takes, Highland or Lowland, than is decent.

She did her hair, powdered her face, used her lipstick, and put on her gloves in a bathroom full of mechanical weight-reducers, potted plants, and a framed rhyme of considerable indecency.

“Right?” she asked briskly on reentering the sitting room.

“Right.” He put on his overcoat and they left the flat. It was dark outside now. He took her arm. “The steps are slippery,” he said. “You don’t want to start off with a sprained ankle, do you?”

“No. That I don’t.”

He was right. The steps glimmered with untimely frost and she was glad of his support. His overcoat was Harris tweed and smelled of peat fires.

As she got into the car, Maggie caught sight of a tall man wearing a short overcoat and a red scarf. He was standing about sixty feet away.

“Hullo,” she exclaimed. “That’s Simon. Hi!” She raised her hand but he had turned away and was walking quickly into a side street.

“I thought that was Simon Morten,” she said.

“Where?”

“I made a mistake. He’s gone.”

They drove back over the river and along the Embankment to the Wig and Piglet. The street lights were brilliant: snapping and sparkling in the cold air and broken into sequins on the outflowing Thames. Maggie felt excited and uplifted. When they entered the little restaurant with its huge fire, white tablecloths, and shining glasses, her cheeks flamed and her eyes were brilliant. Suddenly she loved everybody.

“You’re fabulous,” Dougal said. Some of the people had recognized them and were smiling. The maître d’hôtel made a discreet fuss over them. She was in rehearsal for a superb play and opposite her was her leading man.

She began to talk, easily and well. When champagne was brought she thought; I ought to stop him opening it. I never drink before rehearsals. But how dreary and out of tune with the lovely evening that would be.