Paul Theroux - The Family Arsenal

He wanted to wake up Mr Gawber and tell him he was going; he could wait in the lobby until it was all over. And he had half-risen to leave when a boy made his appearance on stage — a handsome boy in an old army shirt and woollen cap and boots.

— You mean, while we were in Majorca you were sleeping in the garage?

— Yeah. I’m a squatter.

— Spanish style? Well, there’s a time and place for that.

— He means he’s moved in .

— He can bloody well move out. He’ll rust me mower.

— You can’t throw me out like that. Anyway, maybe I can help.

Hood sat down. The boy, unseen by the man, winked at the woman, who was obviously attracted to him. The man gave in and allowed the boy to help with the dishes. This was the beginning of a prolonged and punning flirtation, with winks for emphasis, that lasted throughout the first act. The audience screamed at the farce the woman made of the cooking and barked at the sexual innuendo. But Hood was looking closely at the boy, studying the face, the ears, the set of the mouth.

The woman tossed a bowl into the sink, splashing and soaking the boy’s shirt.

— Oh, I’m terribly sorry. You’re drenched.

— That’s okay. It’ll dry.

— Here, take that off. Can’t have you catching cold.

— I’ll get you one of my shirts. Won’t be any worse than the one you’re wearing.

The man plucked at the boy’s shirt, but the boy objected and covered himself. The man snatched and with fumbling fingers worked at the buttons. He opened the wet shirt and shook loose two well-developed breasts, nodding softly in the man’s astonished face.

That was the end of the first act.

Mr Gawber woke and smiled, ‘Disappointing.’

‘Who did you say the girl was?’

‘Araba Nightwing. Client of mine. Awfully nice girl. She’s going to play Peter Pan in the Christmas pantomime.’

‘I’d like to meet her.’

‘Would you?’ Mr Gawber seemed surprised. ‘I can arrange that. It’s the least I can do after putting you through this. We’ll go backstage afterwards. But I think it’s only fair to say that her company can be rather, um, frenzied. How about a tub of ice-cream?’

He hailed a woman passing with a tray and bought two ice-creams. He gave one to Hood and said, ‘Or more than frenzied, if there’s a word for it. It’s the profession, you know. All that publicity. Money, then unemployment. It does things to them. They never stop acting — it’s very trying. They cry and it’s not sad. They laugh and you wonder why. I’d applaud if only they’d stop, but they take it as encouragement. Norah loves them, poor old thing. I always think they could have puppets instead of actors. Big puppets, of course.’

‘The Japanese have them,’ said Hood, digging at the ice-cream.

‘You don’t say,’ said Mr Gawber. ‘I thought it was my own invention. Big puppets, absolutely life-like. I’d feel better about it. It wouldn’t be so embarrassing somehow.’

‘It’s a good idea.’

There was a thump behind the curtains. Mr Gawber laughed. ‘Oh, I say!’

Hood said, ‘I hate this play.’

‘Then we shall go,’ said Mr Gawber, crushing his empty ice-cream tub and shifting in his seat.

‘No,’ said Hood, ‘I want to meet that actress.’

‘She’s got quite a reputation.’

The warning bells rang at intervals of a minute and then the lights dimmed, the chatter ceased, and the curtain rose. Mr Gawber went to sleep at once. The second act was a reversal of the first: now the boy was exposed as a girl in a tight-fitting dress. The woman was angry. The man flirted. There were whispers.

— She’ll have to go .

— But you wanted her to stay !

— That was when she was a boy .

— But you’ve got to admit she knows how to cook .

The cooking, the preparations for tea, had gone on. The woman made mistakes; it was the girl who made the cakes, the scones, the kippers and poached eggs. This amazed and delighted the audience: cakes baked before their eyes, an egg poached on stage, the scones brought steaming from the oven. The food was theatre. A little cheer went up each time a new item appeared and was set out on the table. And it was the cooking that won the woman over. At the end of the play they sat around the table, the woman champing on a cake, the man leering, the girl looking at once seductive and demure.

— We dreamed about this in Spain.

— A real English tea!

— Kippers, cakes and scones.

— Toast.

— No garlic.

— And a bit of crumpet.

‘Awfully disappointing,’ said Mr Gawber, blinking as the curtain came down.

There were five curtain calls, and then the audience was depleted, but smiling in the glare of lights. They filed out with mincing stateliness, as they had entered. Hood noticed how fat and satisfied they looked, repeating the lines of the play with sleek self-assurance, laughing through down-turned mouths in hearty contempt.

At the stage door Mr Gawber said, ‘I feel such an ass doing this.’

Hood said, ‘I’ll ask for her.”

A porter in a peaked cap said, ‘Help you?’

‘We’re looking for Miss Nightwing.’

‘Come in. I think she’s still inside,’ said the porter. He spoke to another man. ‘Has she turned in her key?’

The other man, at the window of a booth just inside the door, glanced up at a board on which were a number of keys with tags. He said, ‘It’s not here. She must be changing.’

An old man walked towards them, carrying a leather satchel. He moved slightly stooped and his head shook. He wore a thin brown overcoat and a small trilby hat. His face was deeply wrinkled and pale and he looked very tired as he passed and handed a key to the man in the narrow booth. ‘Night, George.’

‘Night, Mister Penrose. Mind how you go.’

Mr Gawber whispered, ‘Dick Penrose.’ He saw the old actor struggle with the door and pull his satchel through, and he thought: Poor old fellow, he must be seventy. He felt a tug of pity seeing the actor alone, so exhausted, stepping into a damp wind gusting from Drury Lane. He had never seen an actor after a performance, and he could not separate the two men in his mind. He watched the battered door, sorrowing for the man, then turned to face Araba Nightwing, who tripped into him and burst into tears.

‘Mister Gawber!’ she held him tightly and sobbed.

‘This is my friend. Mister Hood, I’d like you to meet Miss Nightwing.’

Araba’s crying ceased. She smiled at Hood. Suddenly she said, ‘Your wife — what’s happened to her!’

‘Under the weather, I’m afraid. A bout of flu. Nothing serious.’

‘I was going to suggest a drink,’ said Hood.

‘God, I need one,’ said Araba. She wiped at her tears and wiped away that mood. She gave her key to the man in the booth and they started through the door. There was a shout from the hallway.

‘Has my old man ditched me again?’ The speaker was a short fat woman with a face the colour of plaster. The voice was Blanche Very’s and she was still shouting as the stage door banged shut.

They went up Catherine Street to the Opera Tavern, Araba wrapped in a black cape, speaking slowly in her deep attractive voice, repeating how kind it was for Mr Gawber to have come to the play. She did not speak to Hood directly, and it was not until they were in the pub and seated under the old theatre posters and signed photographs that he was able to get a good look at her face. The shine, the pinkness she’d had in the play, was gone — that mask was off — but there remained traces of the make-up flecking her long cheeks. She was tall, with large perfect features forming true angles and sloping planes which, because they fit so exactly, did not give the impression of largeness. She had the sort of beauty that is at once familiar and strange, a remembered face, full of clues. Her lips were full and she spoke emphatically without noticeable effort, but with an anger she hadn’t used in the play. The scarf she’d wrapped tightly on her head in imitation of the great Twenties’ actress she was often compared to, hid her hair, and tailing to drape her shoulder gave her the look of a desert princess. But it was her eyes that struck Hood — they were green, and she seemed to be able to intensify their light to give a point to her words. She still spoke to Mr Gawber — he was jammed against the wall — but she watched Hood with those green eyes, studying him closely, almost suspiciously.