Michele Forbes - Ghost Moth

Right beside him, squashed into a tiny section of the backstage area that was free of props and stage furniture, the Cigarette Factory Girls practiced their choreographed routine for the first extract they were to perform, their smooth, white, young faces all wearing the same kind of forced smile. Their conical felt hats, which were perched precariously on the sides of their heads, shook violently as they danced. Katherine could see clearly that they were only adding to Charlie’s agitation. They were jumping and fussing and becoming overly excited, thumping on the floor as they moved, insisting they rehearse the same piece again and again. Whenever they stopped to draw breath, she could hear Charlie muttering loudly enough so that the girls would hear him say, “What in God’s name are they at, these lumps of girls? Why can’t they rehearse somewhere else? Why are they so damn eager?”

Her gaze lifted from Charlie and across to James McCauley, who was standing behind the street sellers’ baskets, wearing too-generous earrings as Escamillo. The earrings looped like two large, glinting dog’s ears to grace his shoulders. He kept making small movements with his head, testing out their weighty sway, a little unsure as to whether or not they made him look foolish, so that his heavily made-up eyebrows seemed to be signaling pathos even before he had begun to perform.

Then beside her, Rosemary Wylie appeared, talking to the air and insisting on leaving her wristwatch on. It had been a present from her fiancé and she was refusing to part with it. No one would notice that it wasn’t in period, she was saying — what was the period anyway, did anybody know? Rosemary Wylie was playing the part of Micaela, but from the very first day of rehearsal, it had been obvious that she would much rather have been playing the part of Carmen — it was the way in which Rosemary Wylie had smiled at everyone when the cast list was announced, as though she were smelling something dreadfully unpleasant. Now, she was not happy with the three enormous gold leaves that had been sewn across the bodice of her costume. They were unflattering, she thought; they interfered with the shape of her bosom. Much better the décolletage that had featured in the original costume designs. Why had it been changed? The stage manager, a plump, short-haired woman named Cissie McGee, whispered loudly from the prompt corner that there would be no time to discuss costumes. Most of the cast had seen their costumes for the first time tonight. Some of the costumes were not even finished — that’s just the way it had turned out — and so everyone just needed to get on with the job at hand, check their props and be ready for the performance. Curtain would be up in ten minutes. Rosemary Wylie’s features sank slowly back into her face, as though they were flotsam on quicksand, as she listened to Cissie McGee, her nostrils flaring in a last but vainglorious attempt to save herself.

Hugh Drummond — Don José—suddenly arrived and rushed into the backstage area, tucking his ruffled shirt into the waistband of his pantaloons and swinging his costume jacket high above his head and around his shoulders. Urgency always made Hugh feel important. He slapped Charlie Copeland on his back as he passed behind him, nearly knocking Charlie off his little wooden stool.

“Charlie, my good man, just made it. And how’s the lumbago this evening!”

Charlie made strenuous efforts to regain his composure before replying sourly, “Never better, Hugh, never better.”

“Oh, hello there, girls!” Hugh watched the Cigarette Factory Girls skip and hop as he tucked in the last ruffle of his shirt.

“Hugh Drummond, where have you been ?” Cissie McGee’s whisper was a razor blade.

“I told you — I have rugby training Wednesdays!”

“Rugby training! But this — is — it’s the opening night!”

“It’ll be great — don’t worry.” Hugh rushed off to check that all his props were in place. Cissie McGee sighed loudly with exasperation.

Katherine stood quietly, watching everything, hardly visible to anyone in the dim light. She needed to focus on what was happening. She needed to watch Charlie Copeland and James McCauley and Rosemary Wylie and Hugh Drummond and the Cigarette Factory Girls and Cissie McGee in order to keep her mind from splitting. She needed to pay attention to every detail around her in order to distract her from what she knew she had to do. And as she ran her hand along the front of her costume, she could feel where some of the buttons would not close properly, as though her abdomen had swollen a little since the costume fittings. Glancing through a gap in the scenery flats, she could just about make out Mrs. Davenport, Miss Robinson, Mr. Creaney, and Miss McGrath taking their places at piano, violin, flute, and percussion, respectively, in the tiny orchestra pit at the front of the stage. They were smiling and nodding to one another as they organized their music sheets on the stands. Those in the audience were settling themselves. It had been decided that Katherine’s mother, her sister, Vera, and her brother, Frank, would come to see Katherine perform Carmen on Friday, the second-to-last night of the show, as George would be off duty from the Fire Service then and could accompany them. Tonight, however, he would be working and would call on Katherine at home after the show.

Katherine felt a rising pressure in her chest. She knew things could no longer remain as they were. She knew what she had to do. She had to tell George that it was over between them. And tonight she would tell him. Tonight she knew she would not see Tom, as he was taking his mother and sister out to the Grand Central Hotel for his mother’s birthday. So she would go straight home and she would have time to talk to George. But the more this thought took position in her mind, the more she felt her body tightening with a sickening dread.

Cissie McGee began issuing orders from the prompt corner again. Immediately, Katherine turned her head to listen to Cissie, who said if anyone, for any reason, did not have a costume check before the performance, they would, unfortunately, have to wait until after the show and approach Miss Harper then. Cissie McGee stroked her thorax apprehensively as she spoke. It was Miss Harper who was to take over all the costume requirements now that the show was up and running. Well, almost up and running, Cissie added, giving a short, nervous laugh.

Katherine looked at Miss Harper, who now stood beside Cissie McGee. Miss Harper’s dark brown hair fell softly onto her shoulders, highlighting the sweet cherub curve of her face, and in her hands she held a small black notebook. It was Tom’s. The one he had used to record Katherine’s measurements. The one whose pages he had made the fire lilies from. Oh, Tom. Katherine’s thoughts began to race. She felt her blood was jangling in her veins, her heart tight and heavy, her breath lost to her. Everything as it once was, she said to herself. No — now everything was not as it once was and never could be, no matter how badly she wanted it to be. Now everything had changed.

“I was hoping to find you here.”

She was suddenly startled by Tom’s voice. She turned to him, her breath catching in her throat.

“Tom — you’re here?” She felt the blood drain from her face.

“You like the costume?”

“What are you doing here, Tom? Why are you here?” Katherine’s tone was slightly desperate now. “You told me you wouldn’t be here tonight!”

“Plans fell through,” he said with a composure that pricked her a little. “Mother wasn’t feeling well. Anyway, tell me what you think of the costume.”

Katherine stared at Tom.

“It’s lovely,” she said eventually, a slow chill seeping through her veins.