Rosalie Ham - The Dressmaker

Elsbeth sprang. ‘There will be no squabbling or you will be told to leave!’ She glared at the cast. The inspector cracked the heels of his shoes together and bobbed his head up and down quickly.

Elsbeth looked to Trudy. ‘Control your cast,’ she snapped.

Trudy sucked in her cheeks and said, ‘Mrs Almanac you are wardrobe mistress.’ Irma looked down at her swollen knuckles and loose fingers. ‘I’ll make some tomorrow,’ said Tilly. ‘Double strength.’

• • •

Several nights into rehearsal, things were progressing slowly.

‘Right,’ said the director, ‘Banquo and Macbeth, enter now.’

‘So foul and fair a day I have not seen.’

‘How far is’t call’d to Forres? …’

‘STOP, stop for a moment please. Erm, that’s very good now, Sergeant –’

‘Banquo …’

‘Banquo then. The kilt is good – but no one else has a Scottish accent and the bagpipes aren’t necessary either.’

Hamish was in charge of props and staging. Trudy approached him, ‘Why are you building a balcony, Mr O’Brien?’

‘For the love scene.’

‘That’s Romeo and Juliet .’

‘Aye.’

‘We’re doing Macbeth .’

Hamish blinked at her.

‘It’s the one about the ambitious soldier’s wife who convinces her weak husband to kill the King. It’s set in Scotland.’

The high red colour drained from Hamish’s cheeks, ‘The Scottish play?’ he hissed.

‘You have to make forests that walk and a ghost,’ said Trudy.

‘I’ve been lied to,’ cried Hamish, ‘by that bloody Septimus!’ He dropped his tools and ran from the hall.

• • •

February passed quickly for Tilly. She rose early each day to sew costumes in the morning light and organise fittings or alterations. She hummed as she worked. In the evenings she sometimes wandered down to sit at the back of the hall and watch the township of Dungatar rehearse.

The citizens looked increasingly stressed and tired and didn’t seem to be enjoying themselves at all. Trudy sat in the front row.

‘Begin again, Scene Three,’ she croaked – she had lost her voice.

Septimus, Big Bobby, Sergeant Farrat, Reginald, Purl and Fred moved nervously to their places on the stage.

‘Enter Porter … I can’t hear you Porter,’ called the director.

‘I’m not saying anything.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I can’t remember my next line.’ Faith burst into tears. The other actors rushed to her.

The director threw down her script. ‘Oh jolly good, let’s have another five-ruddy-minute break while someone else has a bawl – any other lousy actors here feel like a bit of a bawl? Oh you do, do you?’

‘No.’

‘Well why are you holding your arm up again?’

‘I want to ask another question.’

Trudy blinked at the Attendant – Bobby Pickett – standing on the stage. ‘No, you can’t ask another question,’ she said.

‘Why can’t he?’ Elsbeth walked out onto the stage and stood beside Bobby.

‘Because I said so.’

‘You’re not a very considerate director, Gertrude .’

William went and sat in a corner next to Mona and put his head in his hands.

‘I suppose you think you could do better?’ snarled Trudy.

‘I know I could. Anyone could.’

They stared at each other. ‘You’re fired.’

‘You can’t fire the producer, you silly girl.’

Trudy stepped close to Elsbeth and, leaning down over her, yelled, ‘You’re always telling me what I can’t do. I can do anything I want. Now get out.’

‘No.’

‘Go.’ She pointed at the door.

‘If I go, so does the rest of the funding!’

William looked up hopefully. His mother continued, counting on her fingers. ‘There’s the hall hire, transport, not to mention the set and we can’t have the soldiers’ costumes until we’ve paid the balance.’

‘Oh … f … fiddlesticks,’ said Trudy and clenched her fists at her temples.

Faith started bawling again. The cast threw up their hands or threw down their scripts and William came to the front of the stage. ‘Mother you’re ruining it for everyone –’

‘Me? It’s not ME that’s ruining it!’

Tilly, watching from a dark corner, smiled.

Purl stepped forward. ‘Yes you are, you keep interrupting …’

‘How dare you, you’re just a –’

‘She knows what you think she is,’ bellowed Fred and stepped to Purl’s side.

‘Yes,’ said Purl and pointed a red fingernail at Els-beth, ‘and I know what your husband thought you were.’

‘And anyway, Elsbeth, I can pay for the soldiers’ costumes, I’ve still got all the house insurance money in the post office safe,’ cried Ruth, triumphantly.

Everyone turned to stare at her.

‘Haven’t you sent it to the insurance company yet?’ asked Nancy.

Ruth shook her head.

‘See?’ cried Trudy, ‘we don’t need you at all. You can just go and buy William his ruddy tractor.’

‘No one’s insured?’ cried Fred.

Ruth began to look afraid, stepping away.

Nancy put her hands on her hips and glared at the cast. ‘Well, there hasn’t been an earthquake lately, and I hope you don’t think just because she pays it for us every other year it stops fires and floods, do you?’

‘That’s true!’ said Trudy.

The cast looked confused.

‘We can’t win without the soldiers’ costumes …’ said Faith, weakly.

‘Or a set.’ Trudy put her hands on her hips. The cast-members looked at each other, then slowly gathered behind their director.

Elsbeth stamped her foot and yelled, ‘You’re just a bunch of fools! Hams, dullards, shopkeepers and half-wits, you’re uncouth, grotesque and common …’ She stomped off but stopped and turned at the door, ‘… loathsome all of you. I hope I never set eyes on any of you ever again.’ She marched out, slamming the door behind her. The windows shook and dust fell from the light shades.

‘Right,’ said Trudy, ‘let’s start again, shall we?’

‘I didn’t get to ask my question,’ said Bobby.

Trudy clenched her teeth. ‘Ask away.’

‘Well, when you say “Out, damned spot! out I say!”, well … where is he?’

‘Who?’

‘Spot.’

• • •

March arrived. The temperature climbed and the hot northerlies dusted washing on clothes lines and left a fine brown coating on sideboards. William Beaumont – Duncan, King of Scotland – was due at 11:30 am for his first fitting. He stepped onto Tilly’s veranda at 11:23 am. Tilly showed him in. ‘Off with your shirt,’ she said.

‘Right,’ he said. He had trouble with his buttons, but eventually she could approach him with a calico vest. She held it up for him to put his arms through.

‘Is that it?’ William was disappointed.

‘This is a toile. It’s customary to make a toile to get a perfect fit so you don’t need lots of fittings.’

‘So it will be yellow with lace, like we said?’

‘Just like you wanted.’

The underarm curve had to be raised (thin arms) but she’d got the neckline right. She re-pinned the shoulder seams, lifting the fullness around the armhole to accommodate William’s rounded back, then helped him off with the toile and went to her big table.

William was left standing in her kitchen in his singlet with his arms out. He watched her bending over the yellow cloth with pins in her mouth, doing clever things with tailor’s chalk and a needle and thread. She glanced up and he quickly looked up at the light fitting and bounced on his toes, but he was drawn to watch her again, tacking lace to a collar with her fine long fingers. She picked up his yellow coat and helped him into it, circled him, tugging and drawing lines with a bit of fine chalk and making titillating sensations on his ribs and backbone so that his scrotum curled and his hair crawled across his scalp.