Death and the Chaste Apprentice (7 page)

“Still, the guy, though scary, has a way with him,” said Krister Kroll ruefully. “What're the odds that Ketterick will
not
be doing
La Straniera
next year?”

“Never having heard it,” said Gillian, “I can't weep bitter tears about the
specific
loss.”

“Oh, it's great Bellini, and practically unknown. Even Beefy and Scrawny haven't recorded it.”

Beefy and Scrawny, it was explained, were the currently highest paid tenor and soprano in the world.

“It's the principle I'm concerned about,” said Ronnie.

“It's the personal level that concerns me,” said Kroll. “It won't be the death of the festival if I don't come back,
and I certainly won't while that monster is in charge. I'm a peaceful guy, but some of the things he said to me . . .”

Natalya Radilova, who was beginning to follow bits of conversation in English, went off into a bitter tirade in Russian. Peter paraphrased for her.

“She's complaining about my not being there when she did her big final scene this afternoon. He was vile to her apparently. It's a difficult scene— It's where she brings her husband's head in on a platter and goes mad over it.”

“My God!” said Gillian. “I thought this was supposed to be
‘opera semiseria.'
I'd really hate to see a serious one.”

“No, that's just another example of the amiable Gunter's influence,” explained Kroll. “There are two manuscript endings, and they'd chosen the first. In that, some functionary comes along and explains that for unspecified reasons Adelaide's marriage has been invalid all along. Adelaide goes off to be Roberto il Bruce's queen amid general rejoicing, with only the baritone throwing a fit. That Mexican is awfully good at throwing fits. Anyway, along comes Gottlieb at the first rehearsal and says: ‘No, we do the second.' In that one Adelaide hacks her husband's head off and then stabs herself after some fearsome coloratura. That's what Natalya is having to do. The annoying thing is that, as usual, Gottlieb is right. It's a much more effective conclusion.”

Natalya went on at length in Russian. Peter explained. “Natalya says it is ridiculously difficult to do because it's so way out—so gory and savage. The audience will reject it at the drop of a hat, because it just seems impossibly savage.”

Once again a familiar voice came from behind Peter's shoulder. He was beginning to feel he had a minor devil following him around.

“You wouldn't say it was impossible if you'd seen some of the things I saw in 1947, at the time of independence.
Some of those poor bloody Indians had been so hacked about that their own mothers wouldn't have known them.”

“Was this when you were viceroy?” Gillian asked sweetly. But Des did not appear to be listening. He was gazing ahead dreamily.

“Oh, yes, I've seen some sights, don't you worry.” His eyes were on a far table, where Gunter Gottlieb was pontificating to the Mexican baritone and Brad Mallory. “I learned all you need to know in India about how to even scores.”

A
MIST HUNG OVER
Ketterick and the London suburbs around it as the first day of the festival dawned. During breakfast, though, it began to lift, and by ten the town was bathed in gentle sunshine from a pale blue sky.

The visitors were arriving, that was for sure. By now Ketterick was securely established in the festival catalog, cunningly poised to take advantage of that moment, around May to June, when longen folk to goon on artistic pilgrimages. By car and coach, by late-arriving trains from Newcastle, Bath, and Manchester, even by bicycle they came, changing the character of the complacent suburb. Some of the visitors were regulars, with their diaries already filled in and their seats booked; some came on spec and sat around in parks and squares going through the festival brochure to see what they might take in. There was the
Play of Daniel
in the ruins of Walsey Abbey, three miles out of town; there was Bruno Brazen, the well-known American organist and showman in St. Margaret's Church; there was a wispy French soprano singing wispy
French songs; there was Morris dancing in the Queen's Square and a superb black dance group from Leeds in the Civic Hall. Tonight there was
The Chaste Apprentice
at the Saracen's Head and a popular operatic concert. Both these events were booked solid, but for the disappointed there was a beer race in the Ketterick football stadium. There was—as there was on that other pilgrimage, to Canterbury—something for everybody.

At one time or another during the day most of the new arrivals strolled into the Saracen's Head to look at the wonderful courtyard and stage. One of the hazards of this was that Des Capper was liable to sidle up with a proprietary air and ply them with information, advice, and cures for constipation. One of the American visitors, a lecturer in Renaissance studies at Kent State University, called him “a true English innkeeper” and “a real Harry Bailly after Chaucer's own heart”; but most of the rest sensibly ducked off to one or other of the bars. These were kept very busy, and Mrs. Capper in the Shakespeare was rushed off her feet, though help from her husband got she none.

If they were lucky, these stray visitors saw scraps of last-minute rehearsal. In the true spirit of the Elizabethan troupe, the cast was quite unembarrassed about putting finishing touches to the performance before future members of the audience, who marveled at the contrast between their apparel of jeans and T-shirts and their talk of ruffles and codpieces. The brothel scene had caused particular difficulty, being such a whirl of activity, and the casual dropper-in might see Peter Patterwit open that unedifying scene with Doll, the whore, indulging in some typically sparkling Jacobean wit:

D
OLL
: You, goodman swineface.

P
ETER
: What—will you murder me?

D
OLL
: You remember, slave, how you abused me t'other night in a tavern?

P
ETER
: Not I, by this light.

D
OLL
: No, but by candlelight you did . . .

Oddly enough, such samples did not put off most of the visitors. Somehow the setting and atmosphere (or the “ambience,” as several of them preferred to put it) were so exactly right for the play that many of them dashed straight off to the festival box office to see what tickets were available for later performances.

If Des was a hazard for the occasional visitor, he was an ever-present danger to the performers and residents. It was, after all, his first festival, and he naturally wanted to see everything he could. Unfortunately, he wanted to be part of everything, too, and there was abundant evidence that despite his recent rebuff at the Alhambra, the start of festivities had gone to his head. He was liable to pop up everywhere, poking his nose in and having his little word of worthless commendation or erroneous advice to all and sundry. Few were polite back, but he gave no sign to their faces of having registered their contempt.

Constance Geary's part as Old Lady Sneer was not a large one. She played a cousin of Sir Pecunius Slackwater, dragged into the marriage negotiations. Her performance was already a matter of well-routined gestures and intonations, and she left it to younger generations to overrehearse. She sat around in various parts of the Saracen's Head, holding court and allowing visitors to buy her drinks. Sometimes she could be found on her own in the little alcoves and open spaces that the inn abounded in, quite happy with her memories and her gin bottle. She also noticed a lot more than might have been thought, though she would have been hard put to order it in any way in her mind. It was nearly lunchtime, in one of those alcoves,
apparently deep in thought after a copious swig from her bottle, that she saw Des Capper coming.

“All on your own-e-o?” he asked with his horrible brand of jocularity.

“Trying to be,” said Connie.

“They can get tiresome, can't they, actors?”

“
We
can. But then so can most people.”

“What I mean is,” said Des, leaning closer, Connie thought to catch the smell of her breath, “you can have too much of them. They tend to emote is how I'd put it. Those Galloways, for example. Always at it, aren't they?”

“At it? You mean like Alice?”

“At each other's throats might be a better way of putting it. Morning, noon, and night. And both of them having a bit on the side and talking about it openly. Jeez, I don't know; it's not my idea of a marriage.”

“My dear man, I've known more different kinds of marriage than I've had hot dinners. There are as many recipes for a good one as there are for a bad one.”

“What makes them stay together, that's what I wonder? Why stick it out?”

“I imagine it must be because they rather like it.”

Des looked at her, then shook his head with wonderment. “Then there's young Peter Fortnum. He's up to something, that I do know.”

Connie Geary paused, looking at him contemplatively. She took her bottle out of her handbag, had a swig, and replaced it. Then she looked at Des again. “I presume we are now changing the subject, am I right? Because Peter Fortnum hardly comes under the heading of actors who emote. Indeed, he is an exceedingly quiet young man, which is pleasant but unusual. A youthful Alec Guinness, no less. So we are now discussing what he is up to, and I must confess I have no idea. Do you mean to ask if he is sleeping with the charming but impenetrable Russian lady?”

“Oh, as to that, maybe, but I think not,” said Des, rubbing his hands together. “But there's something going on, and I think it might be a sight more interesting than them sleeping together.”

“I'm glad to hear it. At my age there are a lot of things more interesting than sex, though I'm not sure there ought to be at theirs. Have you any idea what it is?”

“Oh, I've ideas all right. There's no flies on me, you know. I'll get to the bottom of it.”

“This is fascinating,” said Connie. She sat there hoping she would remember enough of this conversation for it to form a vital piece in the complaint to the committee when the present festival was over. She even decided to stop sipping from her bottle, to keep her head clear. “Is there anyone else at the Saracen in whom you are taking a special interest?”

“Oh, lots,” said Des, leering. “A student of the human condition, that's me.” He leaned forward. “Know how that Kraut conductor gets his girls?”

“He's Austrian. Not that anyone imagines
that
makes much difference after the Waldheim business.”

“Right. Same difference, that's what I say. Well, do you know how he gets his girls?”

“Animal magnetism?”

“His heavy recruits them for him. Just like that. He puts the proposition, then they're taken up to his room for a quick you-know, then they're out. He picks them out from among Krauty's fans. Doesn't pay them, either. I expect they form themselves into a sort of club or have a special tattoo or something.”

“I did hear whispers about that,” said Connie with a shiver of distaste. “It
is
rather disgusting.”

“And I'll tell you this: He likes them young. The younger the better.”

“ ‘His favorite form of sinning is with one who's just beginning,' ” sang Connie, from the Catalogue Aria.

“That's it. That's just about it. If I could catch him with one who was below the age of consent . . .”

“Yes?”

“That would do the trick. . . . Trouble is, at that age they're not usually interested in classical music, are they? And the heavy tells me he's very careful.”

“You'll have to find something else, then.”

“Yes, I will, won't I?”

“And is there anyone else of us that you have your eyes on?”

“Oh, yes. Oh, there definitely is. No question about that. . . .” Connie sat there quiet, but a cunning expression came into Des's eyes. “But that would be telling, wouldn't it? You're not going to draw me out on that.”

With a sigh, Connie took out her gin bottle.

“You know what that stuff does to your kidneys, don't you?” asked Des. He went on to describe it in detail before leaving with a wave and his favorite addendum: “Don't mind me telling you, do you?”

• • •

Onstage they were rehearsing a quarrel between Sir Pecunius Slackwater, suitor to Alison Greatheart, and the whore of Deptford, who was an old acquaintance.

S
IR
P
ECUNIUS
: Out, you babliaminy, you unfeathered, cremitoried quean, you cullisance of scabosity!

W
HORE
: Good words, Master Slackwater, to speak before a maid and a virgin.

S
IR
P
ECUNIUS
: Hang thy virginity upon the pole of carnality . . .

By the wall of the courtyard, Natalya, in slacks and jumper, was standing in a patch of sunlight near the
windows of the Shakespeare Bar. She was beginning to tap her feet and look anxiously at her watch, but then she saw Peter Fortnum coming through the great gates from the High Street.

“Did you get through? Have they arrived?” asked Natalya urgently in Russian.

“No, there's been some confusion about times. The party's not due for another hour at least.”

“Oh, my God.”

“I think it's a genuine confusion. There doesn't seem to be any doubt they will arrive.”

“I've got to go. I'm due at rehearsal in ten minutes.”

“I know. I'll stick around and ring them again in an hour or two.”

“Will you come and tell me?”

“Yes, if I can. I don't
think
I'll be needed to rehearse here, but you never know what people may take it into their heads to want to go over. But I'll try.”