Star Trap Page 5

  But it wasn’t popular with the rest of the cast, because Christopher Milton’s comic instinct was only applied to his own part. The rest of the action was hurried through and substantial cuts were suggested. Only occasionally would there be a long discussion about one of the straight scenes, and that was only if the opportunity was seen for another entrance by Tony Lumpkin.

  ‘Um, Christopher . . .’

  ‘Shut up, David. I’m thinking.’

  ‘Look, we want to get on with this first meeting between Young Marlow and Kate.’

  ‘Yes, I was thinking it might be better if Tony Lumpkin overheard this scene. I could be behind the screen and . . .’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ snapped Mark Spelthorne. ‘This is one of the most famous scenes in English drama. It would make nonsense of the plot if Lumpkin overheard it. It wouldn’t add anything.’

  Christopher Milton did not seem to hear the objection; he was still working the scene out in his own mind. ‘I mean, it’s not a very interesting scene, no jokes or anything. I think it could be improved with Lumpkin there.’

  Mark Spelthorne grew apoplectic. ‘That’s a load of absolute balls!’

  ‘Um, Christopher,’ said David Meldrum tentatively, ‘I think we probably will be better off doing the scene as it is.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Again he was distant, still mentally planning. There was a long pause. ‘I’ll have a look at it.’ He moved from the centre of the stage, picked up his script and sat quietly in a corner looking at it. The rehearsals continued.

  Such confrontations were not conducive to good feeling. Griff’s bar became a centre of disaffection and at any time of day there would be a little knot of actors there discussing their latest grievance against the star. Mark Spelthorne was always one of the most vociferous. ‘I mean, let’s face it, when Goldsmith wrote the play, he intended Young Marlow to be the hero. There’s no question about that. Which was why I took the part. Of course, my bloody agent didn’t check the script, just assumed that I would be playing the lead. At least one has the comfort that all this mucking about with the show is making a complete nonsense of it. It’ll never run. Doubt if we’ll actually come in, die quietly on the tour, I shouldn’t wonder. And that won’t do a great deal for the career of Mr Christopher Milton. Maybe teach him the dangers of over-exposure.’

  ‘I don’t know, Mark. He doesn’t actually do that much work. He’s very selective in what he does. Anyway, you can’t talk. You’re doing plenty yourself.’

  ‘Oh yes, that’s always a danger if one’s popular. Have to watch it. I mean, no doubt there’ll be another series of The Fighter Pilots. And then if this radio takes off . . .’

  ‘Oh yes, that was the pilot show. How did it go?’

  ‘Bloody marvellous. Really went a bomb. The planners’ll be fools to themselves if they turn that one down. So I suppose I’ll be stuck with doing a series of that early next year. Not that I mind. I mean, radio doesn’t take long and in fact I have quite an affection for it. The main thing is it’s comedy, and really comedy’s my best thing. The radio might persuade the telly boys how good I am at it. That’s the trouble in telly, they do so like to pigeonhole people. After this Fighter Pilots thing, they seem to think I’m only good for the handsome young hero type, whereas of course . . .’

  There were plenty of others in the company with complaints about Christopher Milton, but Charles put it down to the ordinary ineffectual bitching of actors. No one seemed sufficiently motivated to want to sabotage the show. As time went on, Gerald’s fears seemed more and more insubstantial.

  It was on the Tuesday of the fourth week of rehearsals that Charles began to wonder. By then the scale of the production had got larger. The dancers had joined the company, though they kept somewhat aloof in their self-contained, camp little world. None of them had identifiable parts, except for the prettiest girl who had been given the wordless rôle of Bet Bouncer. There had also been a music rehearsal with the full orchestra (‘We can’t afford more than one with the band, because of the expense’), and the musicians added another element of an alien culture. The rehearsals became more concerned with details. There were constant discussions with Derbyshire Wilkes, the designer, and Spike, the stage manager, about exact sizes of parts of the set. The pieces of tape which marked their outlines were constantly rearranged. Actors were continually being rushed off in taxis for final costume fittings. The whole production was building up to its first appearance in a theatre on the Saturday week. On that day, their last in London before the tour, Lumpkin! was going to have a run on an improvised set in the King’s Theatre.

  The presence of the augmented company did not stop Christopher Milton’s continual interruption of rehearsals while he worked out new entrances and business for Tony Lumpkin. His fits of temperament did not worry the dancers or musicians. Both were well used to hanging around at the whim of whoever happened to be in charge. Whether the break was for a broken microphone or a tantrum did not make a lot of difference to them. They just waited impassively until it was time to continue. And the male dancers had a stage-struck camp affection for stardom. They would have felt cheated if Christopher Milton hadn’t behaved like a star.

  On the Tuesday they were rehearsing the closer (that is, the last new song of the show, not the acres of reprises which followed it). It was called Never Gonna Marry You (‘gonna’ was a favourite word in Micky Gorton’s lyrics) and it sewed up the Lumpkin side of the plot by getting him out of marriage to his cousin and into marriage with Bet Bouncer (while, incidentally, leaving the rest of the plot totally unresolved). It was the only moment in the show when Charles had to sing, which was a great relief to him. Just one couplet and he was quite pleased with it. The lines rose above the general level of Micky Gorton’s wit.

  ‘Marriage is like a hot bath, I confess –

  The longer you’re in it, the colder it gets.’

  It probably wasn’t an original line and it didn’t rhyme properly, but it was a line that would get a laugh, and that was quite a bonus to an actor in a supporting rôle. Charles cherished it; it was the only laugh he stood to get in the show.

  After he had sung the couplet in rehearsal that Tuesday, there was a long pause. Christopher Milton had the next line, but he let the music continue and was silent. He looked at Charles with the preoccupied expression he always wore when he was working something out. As the accompaniment died down to untidy silence, he spoke. ‘You know, that line will probably get a laugh.’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Charles cheerily. ‘Unless I cock it up.’

  ‘Hmm. I think I ought to sing it.’

  ‘I beg your pardon.’

  ‘I think I ought to have the line rather than you.’

  ‘What?’ Charles was stunned by the directness of the approach. He was a fairly easy-going actor and didn’t make scenes over minor details as a rule, but the brazenness of this took him off his guard. ‘Oh, come on, Christopher, you can’t have all the laughs in the show.’

  ‘I think I should have that line.’ Christopher Milton’s voice had the familiar distant quality of previous encounters with other actors whose parts he had raided.

  ‘But it strikes me, Christopher, that that line would come much more naturally from Old Marlow, the man of the world, than from Tony Lumpkin, who, let’s face it, is meant to be fairly uneducated and –’

  ‘I think I should sing it.’

  ‘Look, I’m not claiming that I’d deliver it better than you or anything. ‘It’s just that –’

  ‘Huh.’ The laugh came out with great savagery. ‘I should think not. You’d hardly expect great delivery of lines from a tired old piss-artist. I’m sure there are lots of actors who get through their careers with your level of competence, but don’t you start comparing yourself with me.’

  The suddenness of the attack hurt like a blow in the face. Charles tried some acid line about people who felt they should have all the lines and about acting being a team effort, but it misfired. He appealed to Da
vid Meldrum for a decision and – surprise, surprise – David thought Christopher Milton probably had got a point.

  Charles spent the rest of the day’s rehearsal in a state of silent fury. He knew that his face was white and he was hardly capable of speech. He felt sick with anger.

  As soon as he was released, he got a taxi back to Bayswater. Too churned up even for the distant conviviality of the pub, he stopped at an off licence on the way and went back to his room with a bottle of Scotch.

  The room in Hereford Road was an untidy and depressing mess, with grey painted cupboards and yellow candlewick on the unmade bed. Its atmosphere usually reduced him to a state of instant depression, but on this occasion it had too much anger to compete with and he hardly noticed his surroundings. He just sat and drank solidly until there was a slight shift in his mood and he could think of something other than his fury.

  It was only a line, after all. Not even a particularly good line at that. And the show was hardly one that was very important to him or one that was going to make any difference to what was laughingly called his career. It wasn’t like him to get so upset over a detail.

  And then he began to realise the power of Christopher Milton’s personality. From his own over-reactions Charles understood the intensity of resentment that the man could inspire. Which made him think that perhaps there were people who felt sufficiently strongly to sabotage any show Christopher Milton was in.

  Charles decided that he would make a belated start to the business of investigation for which Gerald Venables had engaged him. Since he had no rehearsals the following morning, he would go and see Everard Austick.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  EVERARD AUSTICK’S ADDRESS was a block of flats in Eton College Road, near Chalk Farm Underground Station. Charles found it in the phone book and went along on the off-chance that its owner would be out of hospital. He could have rung to check, but felt disinclined to explain his enquiries on the telephone. Also there was a chance that the dry agony of his hangover might have receded by the time he got there.

  In fact the tube journey didn’t help much and, as he stood in the old lift gazing ahead at its lattice-work metal door, he felt in need of a red-hot poker to burn out the rotten bits of his brain. The only coherent thought he could piece together was the eternal, ‘Must drink less’.

  The block of flats was old, with long gloomy corridors interrupted by the stranded doormats of unwelcoming doorways. Number 108 was indistinguishable from the others, the same blue gloss paint, the same glass peep-hole to warn the inmate of approaching burglars, rapists, etc.

  Charles’ pressure on the door-bell produced no reaction. Perhaps it wasn’t working. He pressed again, his ear to the door, and caught the distant rustle of its ring. Oh well, maybe Everard was still in hospital, or away convalescing. One more try.

  This time there was a distant sound of a door opening, a muttered curse and the heavy approach of a plaster-cased foot. The door opened and Everard Austick peered blearily out into the shadows of the corridor. He looked a mess. His grey hair stuck out in a series of Brylcreemed sheaves as he had slept on it. He had only shaved sketchily for a few days and the areas he had missed sprouted long bristles. A dilapidated camel dressing-gown was bunched around his large frame. His right leg was grotesquely inflated by its plaster. He was probably only in his fifties, but he looked an old man.

  ‘Can I help you?’ he asked in a public school voice furred with alcohol.

  ‘Yes. I’m sorry to trouble you. My name’s Charles Paris.’

  Fuddled incomprehension.

  ‘We worked together once for a season in Glasgow.’

  ‘Ah. Ah yes, of course.’ But he didn’t remember.

  ‘Look, I’ve taken over the part you were playing in Lumpkin!’

  ‘Oh. Do you want to come in?’

  ‘Thank you.’ Everard Austick backed away and Charles moved past him into the dim hall. A door gave off on to a large sitting-room and he made towards it. ‘Er, not in there if you don’t mind.’

  Charles had seen the smart decor of the room and looked back quizzically at Everard. ‘Fact is, old boy, I don’t use all the flat. No point in using it all when I’m away so much . . . I . . . er, there’s a young couple who also live here. Just on a temporary basis. Helps out with the old rent, what?’ The jovial tone could not hide the facts. Everard Austick was so hard up that he had to rent out almost all his flat to keep his head above water.

  This impression was confirmed when Charles was led into Everard’s bedroom, obviously the smallest in the flat. The air tasted as if it hadn’t been changed for a fortnight. A pile of dusty magazines against them showed that the windows hadn’t been opened for months, and the bed was rumpled not just by one night’s occupation, but by long days and nights of simply lying and staring at the ceiling rose.

  A half-empty bottle of vodka on the dressing-table was evidence of the only activity the room had seen for some time. ‘Sorry it’s a bit of a tip,’ said Everard, attempting to play the line with light comedy insouciance. ‘Can I offer you a drink? There’s only the vodka, I’m afraid. Well, I suppose I could make some coffee, but . . .’ His mind was unable to cope with the incongruity of the idea.

  ‘A little vodka would be fine.’ A hair of the dog might possibly loosen the nutcrackers on Charles’ head.

  He received a clouded tooth mug half-full of vodka. Everard Austick’s hand shook as he passed it over and topped up his own tumbler. ‘Down the hatch, old boy.’ The long swallow he took was not an action of relish, but of dependence. He grimaced, shuddered and looked at Charles. ‘Now, what can I do for you, old man? Want a bit of help in your interpretation of the part, eh?’ Again the cheerfulness sounded forced.

  ‘No, actually I just wanted to pick your brains about something.’ Charles paused. It was difficult. He did not want to reveal his rôle as an investigator into the show. He realised that he had not done enough preparation for the encounter; he should have worked out some specious story to explain his interest, or even made the approach in some other identity. Still, too late now. Better to try the direct question and hope that Everard’s bemused condition would prevent him from being suspicious. ‘You know when you broke your leg – what happened?’

  ‘I fell down the stairs.’

  ‘Just an accident?’

  ‘Oh, God knows. I’d had quite a skinful the night before, met a few chums, celebrating actually being in work, it had been a long time. And I had a few more in the morning, you know, to pull me round, and I managed to leave late, so I was hurrying, so I suppose I could have just fallen.’

  ‘Or?’

  ‘Well, there was this chap on the stairs, ran down from behind me, I thought he sort of jostled me. I don’t know though.’

  ‘And that’s what caused you to fall?’

  ‘Could have been. I don’t know.’

  ‘Did he stop to help you when you fell?’

  ‘No, he seemed to be in a hurry.’

  ‘Hmm. Did you see what he looked like?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Not even an impression?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Did you tell the police?’

  ‘No. Who’s going to believe me? I’m not even sure it happened myself. Could just have fallen.’

  ‘Yes.’ The interrogation did not seem to be getting anywhere. Everard Austick was so fogged with alcohol that he didn’t even trust his own memory. No one was going to get anything else out of him. Charles drained his glass and rose to leave.

  ‘You’re off?’ Everard seemed to accept the departure with as little surprise as he had the arrival. Nothing seemed strange in his half-real world. ‘Actually, there is one thing, old boy.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This damned leg, I find it so difficult to get about, you know, get to the bank and so on, a bit short of cash, for the . . . er . . . you know, basic necessities of life.’

  The expansive gesture which accompanied the last four words was meant to signify
a whole range of food and domestic essentials, but it ended up pointing at the nearly-empty vodka bottle.

  Out of guilt or something, Charles gave him a fiver. Then a thought struck him. ‘Everard, why didn’t you use the lift that morning?’

  ‘Wasn’t working.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘I pushed the button for it and it didn’t come for a long time. I told you I was in a hurry.’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  Charles walked slowly along the dim corridor until he came to the lifts. He looked at them closely. Both were the old sort with sliding doors. A notice requested users to close both doors firmly. Otherwise the lifts would not function. So it would be possible to immobilise both by calling them to another floor and leaving them with their doors ajar. It would then be possible to linger in the gloomy corridor until Everard Austick staggered out of his flat, watch him call unsuccessfully for the lift and then help him on his way when he started downstairs. Unlikely, but possible.

  ‘Hello, Gerald, it’s Charles. I got your message at the rehearsal rooms and I’m afraid this is the first chance I’ve had to call.’

  ‘Okay. How’s it going?’

  ‘Nothing to report really. Nothing else has happened.’

  ‘No tension in the company?’

  ‘No more than in any show with Christopher Milton in it which starts its pre-London tour in a week.’

  ‘Hmm. Maybe I was being alarmist’

  ‘Maybe. Anyway, thanks for the job.’

  ‘Any time. Keep your eyes skinned.’