Winsor, Kathleen (36 page)

"Gentlemen
nowadays," said Mally, "you'll find, have no patience with a woman
who troubles 'em in that way. And, Lord
knows, with matters as they stand a
woman needs what good looks she can be mistress of." She lifted up her
plump breasts and crossed her silken ankles, giving a smug little smile.

At
first Amber was in considerable apprehension whenever she left the house—even
though she habitually went cloaked and hooded and masked—for fear a constable
would stop her. The memory of Newgate weighed on her like an incubus. But even
more terrifying was the knowledge that if caught again she would very likely be
either hanged or transported, and she was already so rabid a Londoner that one
punishment seemed almost as bad as the other.

And
then one day she learned something which seemed to offer her a solution, and an
exciting new adventure as well. She had been surprised at the elegant clothes
worn off-stage by all the actors she had seen, and one night she commented idly
about it to Michael.

"Ye
gods, they all look like lords. How much money do they get?"

"Fifty
or sixty pounds a year."

"Why,
Charles Hart had on a sword tonight must have cost him that much!"

"Probably
did. They're all head over ears in debt."

Amber,
who was getting ready for bed, now backed up to have him unlace the tight
little boned busk she wore. "Then I don't envy 'em," she said,
jingling the bracelet on her right wrist. "Poor devils. They won't look
so spruce in
Newgate."

Michael
was concentrating on the busk, but at last he had it unlaced and gave her a
light slap on the rump. "They won't go to Newgate. An actor can't be
arrested, except on a special warrant which must be procured from the
King."

She
swirled around, sudden eager interest on her face. "They can't be
arrested! Why?"

"Why—because
they're his Majesty's servants, and enjoy protection of the Crown."

Well—

That
was
something to think about.

This
was not the first time, however, that she had cast covetous eyes toward the
stage. Sitting with Michael in the pit, she had seen how the gallants all
stared at the actresses and flocked back to the tiring-room after the play to
paw over them and take them out to supper. She knew that they were kept by some
of the greatest nobles at Court, that they dressed magnificently, occupied
handsome lodgings and often had their own coaches to ride in. They seemed—for
all that they were treated with a certain careless contempt by the very men who
courted them —to be the most fortunate creatures on earth. Amber was filled
with envy to
see
all this attention and applause going to others, when she felt that she
deserved it at least as much as they.

She
had looked them over narrowly and was convinced that she was better looking
than any of them. Her voice was good,
she had lost her country drawl, and her
figure was lovely. Everyone was agreed to that. What other qualifications did
an actress need? Few of them had so many.

Not
many days later she got her opportunity.

With
Michael and four other couples she was at supper in a private room on the
"Folly," a floating house of entertainment moored just above the
ruined old Savoy Palace. They sat over their cheesecake and wine, cracking open
raw oysters and watching the performance of a naked dancing-woman.

Amber
sat on Michael's lap; he had one arm hung over her shoulder with his hand slipped
casually into the bodice of her gown. But all his attention was on the
dancing-girl, and Amber, offended by his interest in the performance, got up
and left him to sit down beside one man who had his back turned while he
continued to eat his supper. He was Edward Kynaston, the fabulously handsome
young actor from the King's Theatre, who had taken women's parts before the
hiring of actresses had begun.

He
was very young, no more than nineteen, with skin like a girl's, loosely waving
blond hair and blue eyes, a slender but well-proportioned body. There was
nothing to mar his perfection but the sound of his voice which, from long
practice of keeping it high-pitched, carried a kind of unpleasant whine. He
smiled at her as she took a chair next to his.

"Edward,
how d'you go about getting on the stage?"

"Why?
Have you a mind to acting?"

"Don't
you think I could? I hope I'm pretty enough." She smiled, slanting her
eyes.

He
looked her over thoughtfully. "You certainly are. You're prettier than
anyone we have—or anyone Davenant has, either, for the matter of that."
Davenant managed the Duke of York's Theatre, for there were only two licensed
companies (though some others continued performing), and rivalry was sharp
between His Majesty's and His Highness's Comedians. "I suppose you think
to show yourself on the boards and get some great man for a keeper."

"Maybe
I do," she admitted. "They say there's a mighty fine profit to be got
that way."

Her
voice had a soft tone of insinuation, for Kynaston, everyone knew, had numerous
admirers among the gentlemen and had received many valuable gifts from them,
most of which he shrewdly turned into money and banked with a goldsmith. Among
his lovers he was said to number the immensely rich Buckingham, who had already
begun the ruin of the greatest fortune in England, squandering what he had as
recklessly as if it came out of a bottomless well.

Kynaston
did not take offense at her suggestion, but he had a kind of feminine modesty
which, for all that he sold himself in the open market, lent him the appearance
of dignity and virtue.

"Perhaps
there is, madame. Would you like me to present
you to Tom Killigrew?"
Thomas Killigrew was a favourite courier and manager of the King's Theatre.

"Oh,
would you! When?" She was excited, and a little fearful.

"Rehearsal
will be over about eleven tomorrow. Come then if you like."

Amber
dressed with great care for her interview and, though
it was a cold
dark early-November morning with no shred of sun filtering through the heavy
smoke and fog, she put on her finest gown and cloak. All morning long her
stomach had been churning and the palms of her hands felt wet. In spite of her
eagerness she was miserably nervous, and at the last moment such a panic of
doubt swept through her that she had to bully herself into going out the door.

When
she reached the theatre, however, and took off her mask the attendant gave a
low whistle; she laughed and made him an impudent face, suddenly relieved.

"I've
come to see Edward Kynaston. He's expecting me. Can I go in?"

"You're
wasting your time, sweetheart," he told her. "Kynaston doesn't give a
hang for the finest woman that wears a head. But go along if you will."

The
stage was just clearing and Killigrew was down in the pit talking to Kynaston
and Charles Hart and one of the actresses who stood on the apron-shaped stage
above them. It was dark inside, for only the candles in the chandelier that
hung above the stage were lighted, and the cold seemed to bring out a strong
sour smell. Orange-peelings littered the aisle and the green-cloth-covered
benches were dirty with the footmarks of the men who had stood upon them. Empty
now of people and of noise there was something strangely dismal and shabby,
almost sad, about it. But Amber did not notice.

For
a moment she hesitated, then she started down the aisle toward them. At the
sound of her heels they looked around, Kynaston lifting his hand to wave. They
watched her come, Kynaston, Charles Hart, Killigrew, and the woman on the
stage, Beck Marshall. She had met Charles Hart, a handsome man who had been on
the stage for many years, often risking imprisonment to act during the dour
years of the Commonwealth. And once she had been casually introduced to Beck
Marshall who stood now, hands on her hips, looking her over, not missing
anything about her gown or hair or face, and then with a switch of her skirt
walked off. The three men remained.

Kynaston
presented her to Killigrew—an aristocratic, middle-aged man with bright-blue
eyes and white hair and an old-fashioned, pointed chin-beard. He did not look
as though he would be the father of the notorious Harry Killigrew, a bold rash
drunken young rake whose exploits caused some surprise even at Court. Amber had
seen Harry once, molesting the
women in St. James's Park, but she had been masked
and well muffled and he had not seen her.

She
made her curtsy to Killigrew, who said: "Kynaston tells me that you want
to go on the stage."

Amber
gave him her most alluring smile, which she had practiced several times in the
mirror just before leaving home. But the corners of her mouth quivered and her
chest felt tight. "Yes," she said softly. "I do. Will you give
me a part?"

Killigrew
laughed. "Take off your cloak and walk up onto the stage, so I can have a
look at you."

Amber
pulled loose the cord which tied in a bow at her throat, flung back the cloak,
and Charles Hart offered his hand to lift her onto the platform. Ribs held high
to show off her pert breasts and little waist, she walked the length of the
stage, turning, raising her skirts above her knees to let him see her legs.
Hart and Killigrew exchanged significant glances.

At
last, having appraised her as carefully as any man buying a horse, he asked:
"What else can you do, Mrs. St. Clare, besides look beautiful?"

Charles
Hart, stuffing his pipe with tobacco, gave a cynical snort. "What else
should
she do? What else can any of 'em do?"

"What
the devil, Hart! Will you convince her she needn't even
try
to learn to
act? Come, my dear, what else do you know?"

"I
can sing, and I can dance."

"Good!
That's half an actress's business."

"God
knows," muttered Charles Hart. He could act himself and thought the
theatre was running amuck these days with its emphasis on nothing but female
legs and breasts. "I don't doubt to see 'Hamlet' put on one day with a
Gravediggers' dance."

Killigrew
gave her a signal and Amber began to dance. It was a Spanish saraband which she
had learned more than a year before and had since performed many times, for
Black Jack and his friends in Whitefriars, more recently for Michael and all
their acquaintance. Twirling, swaying, dipping, she moved swiftly about the
stage, all her self-consciousness gone now in her passionate determination to
please. After that she sang a bawdy street-ballad which burlesqued the old
Greek fable of Ariadne and Theseus, and her voice had a full voluptuous quality
which would have made a far more innocent song seem sensual and exciting. When
at last she sank to a curtsy and then lifted her head to smile at him with
eager questioning, he clapped his hands.

"You're
as spectacular as a show of fireworks on the Thames. Can you read a part?"

"Yes,"
said Amber, though she had never tried.

"Well,
never mind about that now. Next Wednesday we're going to give a performance of
'The Maid's Tragedy.' Come to rehearsal tomorrow morning at seven and I'll have
a part in it for you."

Half
delirious with joy, Amber ran home to tell Michael the
great news. But
though she did not expect to play the heroine, she was nevertheless seriously
disappointed the next morning to learn that she was to be merely one of a crowd
of Court ladies-in-waiting, and that she had not so much as a single word to
speak. She was disappointed, too, at her salary, which was only forty-five
pounds a year. She realized by now that the five hundred pounds given her by
Bruce Carlton had been a considerable sum of money, if only she had had the wit
to keep it.

But
both Kynaston and Charles Hart encouraged her, saying that if she attracted the
attention of the audience as they knew she would, he would put her in more
important parts. An actress had no such period of long training and
apprenticeship as did an actor. Pretty young women were very much in demand for
the stage, and if the men in the audience liked them they could sound like
screech owls and act no better than puppets.

She
quickly established a gay friendliness with the actors and was prepared to do
likewise with the women, but they would have none of it. Despite the fact that
women had been on the stage for no more than a year they had already formed a
tight clique, and were jealous and distrustful of any outsider trying to break
into their closed ranks. They ignored her when she spoke to them, tittered and
whispered behind her back, hid her costume on the day of the dress rehearsal,
all in the obvious hope of making her so miserable that she would quit. But
Amber had never believed that other women were important to her success and
happiness, and she did not intend to let them trouble her now.