IN THE OFFICERS’ MESS
PEOPLE who have seen both tell me that my performance of Polly Eccles is
inferior to that of Mrs. Bancroft. But I have, I fancy, excelled Mrs.
Bancroft in one particular: I have doubled Polly and the Marquise. I did
it in Simla—did it with _éclat_.
The generous friend who was coming from Subathu to play the Marquise was
detained at the last moment. We were in despair. The house was
beautifully sold for that, our first night in Simla, and we could ill
afford to return the money; we could still less afford to postpone our
opening and break faith with our public.
“I will double the part with Polly,” I said as we sat mournfully on the
stage at two in the afternoon.
“It’s an impossible double,” said Sam Gerridge.
“It’s a very ugly double,” I said. “But if you like, I’ll try it.”
We took the prompt-book and we did some remarkable things to it. But I
am sure that Robertson himself would have forgiven us—under all the
circumstances—had he been there.
Then we had a flying rehearsal of the changes, and I went back to the
hotel to face the grave difficulty of dresses for Madame la Marquise. I
had frocks enough that would do for the part at a pinch. But the great
desideratum was to contrive something into which and out of which I
could get with very great rapidity. I think that we did well, Ayah and
I. She didn’t in the least know what it was all about, but she did what
she was told—and did it exactly. Dear old black treasure! How calm, how
helpful she was!
Fortunately there had been no question of studying for me. I had played
so many times in _Caste_, I had rehearsed so many Marquises, and my
“study,” as we play-folks call the memory of words, has always been a
blessed and useful one. It never fails or betrays me.
The first act went as well as I had ever known it to do. We were all
just enough nervous to be rather brilliant. There were three Gordon
Highlanders in the caste, and well as they had played their parts in
their own regimental theatre, they excelled themselves at Simla.
Captain Macready’s “George D’Alroy” was a masterly performance.
Surgeon-Captain Barratt’s “Hawtree” was really fine.
The second act came. I went on, more pins than anything else. When the
Marquise was announced I cried, “Oh, let me see her!” D’Alroy picked me
up and carried me through the folding doors at the back. I pulled out
pins as we went. Ayah was there at her post. Screens had been arranged
for me and, while I made a change, I called out that I greatly desired
to see a “real live Marchioness.” Ayah never spoke, but she worked like
the heroine she was, and I went back on to the stage, as La Marquise de
St. Maur, in less than one minute after I left it as Polly.
How they cheered me! I had heard that Simla audiences were cold, and
that they looked unkindly upon professionals, whom they regarded as
intruders in Simla. But we must speak of people as we find them, even if
we find them in Simla. And I found that audience kind to a fault. My
professional experience has been very varied, and it was no great thing
for me to change frock and wig inside of a minute. But I suppose they
thought it quick work, and they applauded and commended as if I had done
something very plucky. I made seven “changes” that night, and they
greeted each in the heartiest way. It was brisk work, but on the whole
it was rather good fun and left one no time to think. Poor Ayah was
rather puzzled. But the next night it all dawned upon her and she
exclaimed, “I now see, lal coatie memsahib no come. My memsahib do two
piece—her proper piece, and lal coatie memsahib’s piece. Now lal coatie
memsahib yes come, my memsahib do one piece, her proper piece.”
Strangely enough I have since then doubled Polly and the Marquise not
once but thrice: once at Murree, twice at Rawal Pindi.
There is no spot in India lovelier than Simla. We went on “off nights”
to play at the regimental theatre at Jutogh, a tiny cantonment a few
miles from Simla. Several companies of different regiments were
stationed there for rifle practice. We went and came in ’rickshaws. I
often dream of those rides. Simla seemed very near heaven when the stars
came up over the big trees and the moon hung low over the mountains. And
the birds thought it was day, and called to their mates. The ride was
long—but to me it never seemed half long enough. I could have leaned
back in my ’rickshaw and let the coolies pull me on into eternity, up to
the infinite. One felt very near Nature up there in the hills. I often
thought of home as we went slowly on through the night and the great
silence. But I never was home-sick, save for the past, and I knew in my
heart that I should feel it bitterly when we came to say a last good-bye
to India. And I did feel it, very bitterly indeed.
But it was the grandest of grandeur when the storms broke up there in
the mountains. Then one could hold one’s breath and think what an atom
one was, and how little anything mattered.
I shall never cease to regret India. The country itself appealed to me;
the people delighted me. But, above all, it was India that taught me how
staunch, how kind, how true, how generous, how altogether noble our race
is,—I learned that in the cantonments of India.
There are a hundred little midnight hospitalities that I wish I might
chronicle. Perhaps some day I may. One I remember with especial
gratitude, because it was offered us by men whom we did not know. I have
had many a cosy little after-the-play supper in an Officers’ Mess, and
many a hamper of goodies sent from the same bountiful quarter, but one
night, when the rain poured down as if it would wash Simla away, we were
urged into the mess at Jutogh by hosts who were to us entire strangers.
Even now I don’t remember their names, though they all, if I remember,
exchanged cards with my husband. But I remember the kind hands that
pulled us in out of the rain, into the warmth and good cheer. We had
just finished playing at the desolate little cantonment theatre, and
were facing, with what grace we could, the long ride back to Simla. When
they came for us, we were abominably dishevelled, but the invitation
into comfort and good cheer was irresistibly pleasant. It was a
charmingly pretty place. But I believe that the interiors of all
officers’ messes are that,—all have been that I have ever seen. I was
vulgarly hungry, and would have been delighted with a sandwich and a mug
of milk; but with a great courage which is the birthright of men—
“from Severn and from Clyde
And from the banks of the Shannon—”
they had aroused not only the khansamah but the mess cook; and the cook
and the khansamah submitting, as poor natives must to tyrannous
Englishmen, gave us a hot supper that made the rain sound like music.
It was always a wonder to me where all the good things came from that
found their way into regimental larders. I suppose that, as a matter of
fact, they came from all the four quarters of the globe. I know that
they had, in that out-of-the-way place, viands that I could by no means
have bought in the big bazaars of Simla.
People talk of the good old times. Veterans tell of the great old
battles. I believe in the British army as it stands, man to man and
shoulder to shoulder. I believe that it would come triumphant through
any test. Opportunity makes heroes. Given the opportunity (which I pray
they never may be) I for one am sure that the men in the ranks and the
men who officer England’s forces would to-day prove themselves, one and
all, heroes.
Above all I have faith in the subaltern. I think he is a very
undervalued person. The Major-General regards him as of less importance
than a private; and the private regards him as of no importance at all.
He is in great demand for private theatricals. He is made useful as an
orderly officer and about the stables. He distinguishes himself at polo;
and is splendidly _en evidence_ on the regimental drag and at gymkanas.
I have been told that he writes eloquent love letters. But he does more
than that. He takes life and its vicissitudes like a man. Whatever he
does, he does like a man, and when his hour comes, he takes his life in
his hand, and if he falls—he falls with his face to the foe and with
never a murmur. Perhaps his heart cries out sometimes, in the thick of
battle or the loneliness of the cantonments, cries out for home and for
mother. But he keeps a smiling face to the world; and, take him all in
all, he is as true to himself as the sun is to its orbit. If he takes
you out in his “tum-tum” (and he will if you are not too very old and
ugly) he will come very near breaking your neck, but he probably won’t
do it. In the first place, his pony is sagacious and not over mettled;
in the second, his sais knows his business; and in the third, he himself
is not half so reckless as he pretends to be.
“Do you ever run over a native?” I asked a subaltern in Allahabad.
He was simply rushing through the densest part of the native quarter,
and I wondered if our drive wouldn’t end at the police court.
“Not often,” he said, “they are very clever about getting out of the
way. And it is ridiculously expensive to run over a native. It costs
fifty rupees the first time, and a hundred the second.”
Dear lad! he wouldn’t have hurt a fly. Every dog in the cantonment loved
and trusted him. But I believe that a heartless magistrate did once fine
him twenty rupees for shaking his bearer.
Yes; I most cordially like the subaltern. Make him your friend if you
can, and count yourself lucky. He will be staunch and true as long as he
lives, and he will do any earthly thing for you.