"Ferends, Rhomans, Cohuntrymen lehend me your eeeeeeears."
Quintilian was thrown overboard: for there was nothing restrained in
Leonard Gimp's declamation. His arms waved like flails, his legs, slack
at the knee, took strides and then "as you were'd" with bewildering
rapidity. It was ju-jitsu, foils and Swedish drill all mixed up
together. One moment he was exhorting Windover, the next he was telling
Sallie in a voice that throbbed like the engaged signal on the telephone
how "gerievously hath Caesar paid for it." The emotion engendered by
the munificence of Caesar's will produced a new action, which broke an
electric globe and, midst the shattering of glass, the doom of Brutus
was sealed.
"That is Shakespeare's Deraaama," he declared, as he resumed his seat
and proceeded once more to stroke his legs.
It was clear to all of us that something had to be done, and it was Dick
Little who did it.
Jocelyn Dare is a magnificent elocutionist, although he can seldom be
prevailed upon to recite. To-night, however, he readily responded to
Dick Little's invitation. He selected Henry V's exhortation to the
troops before Harfleur. After Gimp's vigorous demonstration, Dare's
almost immobile delivery seemed like calm after a storm. He looked a
picturesque figure as he stood, from time to time tossing back the flood
of black hair that cascaded down his forehead. He has a beautiful voice,
deep, resonant, flexible and under perfect control.
Bindle seemed hypnotised. His pipe forgotten he leaned forward eagerly
as if fearful of losing a word. Gimp sat with a puzzled look upon his
face, impressed in spite of himself.
It was the first time the Night Club had heard Dare, and when he
concluded there was a lengthy silence, broken at last by Gimp, whose
voice sounded like an anaemic drum after Dare's magnificent tones.
"Haaa! thank you, sir, excellent," he cried patronisingly. "You should
go on the stage, haaa!"
"Well that knocks the bottom out of ole Shakespeare any'ow," said Bindle
with decision, as he proceeded to light his neglected pipe.
"It is Shakespeare," said Sallie.
Bindle looked at her over the lighted match, then to Dare and on to
Gimp. Finally he completed the operation of lighting his pipe.
"Well," he said somewhat enigmatically, "that proves wot they say about
there bein' somethink in the man be'ind the gun."
Soon after Gimp took his departure with Angell Herald, leaving us with
the consciousness that the evening had not been a success.
"You took it out of ole 'Amlet, sir," said Bindle with keen enjoyment.
"That ole phonograph in 'is middle sounds sort o' funny arter 'earin'
you. An' didn't 'e throw 'isself about, broke your globe too, sir,"
this to Dick Little, "an' then never said 'e was sorry."
"He regarded it as the jetsam of art," said Windover.
"P'raps you're right, sir," was Bindle's comment.
That evening resulted in the committee making it generally understood
that no one was to be introduced to the Night Club without his name
first being submitted to and approved by Bindle, Dick Little and myself.
Some weeks later I happened by chance to run across Gimp in the West
End. He thrust himself upon me and clung like a limpet, insisting that
I should have what he called "a tonic," which in his case consisted of a
continuous stream of glasses of port wine. When we parted some two
hours later I had a story, in return for which he had received ten
glasses of port wine, for which I paid, and five shillings. The last
named he had obtained by a "Dear old boy, lend me a dollar till next
Tuesday morning.
"Good-bye, my dear boy, God bless you," he cried with emotion as he
pocketed the two half-crowns and left me, turning when he had taken some
half-a-dozen steps to cry once more, "God bless you."
He did not inquire my address, and I am sure he did not know my name, so
that in all probability he is to this day walking London searching for
me to repay that dollar.
The story, however, was worth, not only the dollar but the port wine.
"Fancy Old 'Amlet 'avin' a story like that in 'is tummy," was Bindle's
comment.
This was Leonard Gimp's story:
*I*
"But how do you know I can't do it, Mr. Telford, if you won't let me
try?" There was something suspiciously like a sob in Elsie Gwyn's voice
as she leaned forward across Roger Telford's table. "Please let me try,
it means so much to me."
"My dear girl, a part like that requires experience and a knowledge that
you could not possibly possess. The whole play turns on that one
character. Now don't be disappointed," he continued kindly, "you're
doing very well and your time will come. Now you must run away like a
good girl, because I've scores of things to do. I shan't forget you and
I'll cast you for something later.
Seeing that further argument was useless the girl rose to go.
"Good-bye, Mr. Telford," she said soberly, blinking her eyes more than
seemed necessary, "I'm sure you don't mean to be unkind; but really you
ought to give me a chance before judging me. It's not quite sporting of
you."
Telford placed his hand for a moment on her shoulder. "Now cheer up,
little girl," he said, "Your time will come." He opened the door and
closed it again after her--Telford's courtesy and kindness were the
"joke" of the profession.
Roger Telford returned to the table and for a few minutes sat pondering
deeply. He was the most successful theatrical manager in London.
Everything he turned his hand to seemed to prosper. Rival managers said
he had the devil's own luck; but instinctively they knew that it was the
sureness of his judgment that resulted in one success after another
being associated with his name.
In the profession he was regarded a "white man." Many laughed at him
for being a prude, and he was known among the inner circle as "Mrs.
Telford," on account of his attitude towards the girls in his companies.
He had been known to knock a man down to teach him how to behave to a
"Telford girl." Those who could not get into his companies sneered at
him as "a fish in an ice box"; but those who were in his employ knew
what a good friend he could be. He was a bachelor and possessed a
reputation that not even his worst enemy could sully. Men affected to
despise him, and a certain class of theatrical girl looked upon him with
contempt; but Roger Telford's was a great name in the theatrical world.
"Little Elsie Gwyn wanted the part of Jenny Burrow in _The Sixth
Sense_," he remarked a few minutes later to Tom Bray, his stage manager
at the Lyndhurst Theatre.
Bray shook his head. He was a man of few words.
"Exactly what I told her," said Telford; "but where the devil are we
going to get anyone? There's Esther Grant, Phyllis Cowan, Lallie Moore;
but none of them have got it in 'em. They're just low comedy turns.
This thing wants something more than that. It wants dramatic grip, it
wants guts, and I'm hanged if I know of a woman who's got 'em."
"There's not much time," was the comment of the stage manager.
"Of all the damned uninspiring chaps, you beat the lot, Tom," laughed
Telford. "Here's the infernal show getting into rehearsal on Monday,
and you're as calm as an oyster."
"Better cast the understudy, let her do it for a time," said Bray.
"It looks as if we shall have to fall back on Helen Strange," grumbled
Telford.
"She'll wreck the show, sure," commented the stage manager.
"Damn!" said Telford, as he crushed his hat on his head, seized his
stick and gloves and went out to lunch.
*II*
Elsie Gwyn had been on the stage three years, two of which had been
spent in the provinces, principally in understudying. Like many other
ambitious people, she told herself that she had never had a chance.
"It's rotten," she confided to a friend. "They always cast you according
to your face. They're as bad as the American managers, who are always
talking about 'the type.' Just because I've got fair hair and small
features and blue eyes, and a sort of washed out appearance (as a matter
of fact Elsie Gwyn was exquisitely pretty with golden hair, refined
features and deep blue eyes, almost violet in tint), they cast me for
vicars' daughters, milk-and-water misses and the like. I am sure I've
got drama in me, only no one will give me the chance to get it out."
"Oh! dry up, Elsie," her friend had responded, "you want to be Juliet in
your first year."
Elsie Gwyn had walked down the stairs to the stage-door of the Lyndhurst
Theatre feeling that if anyone spoke crossly to her she would inevitably
cry.
"It isn't fair," she muttered to herself after saying good morning to
the stage doorkeeper, "it isn't fair to say I can't do it without giving
me a chance. It's rotten of them, absolutely rotten."
She seemed to find some comfort from this expression of opinion.
"When I'm famous, and I shall be famous some day," she told herself,
"he'll be sorry that he didn't give me my chance." With this comforting
assurance Elsie Gwyn entered the small Soho restaurant she frequented
when in the West End and ordered lunch.