William Somerset Maugham 18 страница

de people roar with laughter. They all said it was as good as a play,

and her own impression was that it was much better than most. She

told it to Roger now. He listened with his slow, quiet smile; but she

had an uneasy feeling that he did not think it quite so funny as she

did. She sighed in her heart. Poor lamb, he could have no sense of

humour. Then he made some remark that led her to speak of Nowa-

days. She told him its story, and explained what she was doing with

her part; she talked to him of the cast and described the sets. At the

end of dinner it suddenly struck her that she had been talking enti-

rely of herself and her own interests. She did not know how she had

been led to do this, and the suspicion flashed across her mind that

Roger had guided the conversation in that direction so that it should

be diverted from him and his affairs. But she put it aside. He really

wasn't intelligent enough for that. It was later when they sat in the

drawing-room listening to the radio and smoking, that Julia found

the chance to slip in, apparently in the most casual fashion, the qu-

estion she had prepared.

" Have you made up your mind what you're going to be yet? "

" No. Is there any hurry? "

" You know how ignorant I am about everything. Your father says

that if you're going to be a barrister you ought to work at law when

you go to Cambridge. On the other hand, if you fancy the Foreign

Office you should take up modern languages. "

He looked at her for so long, with that queer, reflective air of his,

that Julia had some difficulty in holding her light, playful and yet af-

fectionate expression.

" If I believed in God I'd be a priest, " he said at last.

" A priest? "

Julia could hardly believe her ears. She had a feeling of acute dis-

comfort. But his answer sank into her mind and in a flash she saw

him as a cardinal, inhabiting a beautiful palazzo in Rome, filled with

wonderful pictures, and surrounded by obsequious* prelates; and

then again as a saint, in a mitre and vestments heavily embroidered

with gold, with benevolent gestures distributing bread to the poor.

She saw herself in a brocaded dress and string of pearls. The mother

of the Borgias.

" That was all right in the sixteenth century, " she said. " It's too la-

te in the day for that. "

" Much. "

" I can't think what put such an idea in your head. " He did not ans-

wer, so that she had to speak again. " Aren't you happy? "

" Quite, " he smiled.

" What is it you want? "

Once again he gave her his disconcerting stare. It was hard to

know if he was serious, for his eyes faintly shimmered with amuse-

ment.

" Reality. "

" What do you mean? "

" You see, I've lived all my life in an atmosphere of make-believe. I

want to get down to brass tacks. You and father are all right breat-

hing this air, it's the only air you know and you think it's the air of

heaven. It stifles me. "

Julia listened to him attentively, trying to understand what he me-

ant.

" We're actors, and successful ones. That's why we've been able to

surround you with every luxury since you were born. You could co-

unt on the fingers of one hand the actors who've sent their son to

Eton. "

" I'm very grateful for all you've done for me. "

" Then what are you reproaching us for? "

" I'm not reproaching you. You've done everything you could for

me. Unfortunately for me you've taken away my belief in everyt-

hing. "

" We've never interfered with your beliefs. I know we're not religio-

us people, we're actors, and after eight performances a week one

wants one's Sundays to oneself. I naturally expected they'd see to

all that at school. "

He hesitated a little before he spoke again. One might have tho-

ught that he had to make a slight effort over himself to continue.

" When I was just a kid, I was fourteen, I was standing one night in

the wings watching you act. It must have been a pretty good scene,

you said the things you had to say so sincerely, and what you were

saying was so moving, I couldn't help crying. I was all worked up. I

don't know how to say it quite, I was uplifted; I felt terribly sorry for

you, I felt a bloody little hero; I felt I'd never do anything again that

was beastly or underhand. And then you had to come to the back of

the stage, near where I was standing, the tears were streaming

down your face; you stood with your back to the audience and in yo-

ur ordinary voice you said to the stage manager: what the bloody

hell is that electrician doing with the lights? I told him to leave out

the blue. And then in the same breath you turned round and faced

the audience with a great cry of anguish and went on with the sce-

ne. "

" But, darling, that was acting. If an actress felt the emotions she

represented she'd tear herself to pieces. I remember the scene well.

It used to bring down the house. I've never heard such applause in

my life. "

" I suppose I was a fool to be taken in by it. I believed you meant

what you said. When I saw that it was all pretence it smashed so-

mething. I've never believed in you since. I'd been made a fool of

once; I made up my mind that I wouldn't ever be made a fool of aga-

in. "

She gave him her delightful and disarming smile.

" Darling, I think you're talking nonsense. "

" Of course you do. You don't know the difference between truth

and make-believe. You never stop acting. It's second nature to you.

You act when there's a party here. You act to the servants, you act

to father, you act to me. To me you act the part of the fond, indul-

gent, celebrated mother. You don't exist, you're only the innumerab-

le parts you've played. I've often wondered if there was ever a you

or if you were never anything more than a vehicle for all these other

people that you've pretended to be. When I've seen you go into an

empty room I've sometimes wanted to open the door suddenly, but

I've been afraid to in case I found nobody there. "

She looked up at him quickly. She shivered, for what he said gave

her an eerie sensation. She listened to him attentively, with a certa-

in anxiety, for he was so serious that she felt he was expressing so-

mething that had burdened him for years. She had never in his who-

le life heard him talk so much.

" D'you think I'm only sham? "

" Not quite. Because sham is all you are. Sham is your truth. Just

as margarine is butter to people who don't know what butter is. "

She had a vague feeling of guilt. The Queen in Hamlet: " And let

me wring your heart; for so I shall, if be made of penetrable stuff. "

Her thoughts wandered.

(" I wonder if I'm too old to play Hamlet. Siddons and Sarah Bern-

hardt played him. I've got better legs than any of the men I've seen

in the part. I'll ask Charles what he thinks. Of course there's that blo-

ody blank verse. Stupid of him not to write it in prose. Of course I

might do it in French at the Francaise. God, what a stunt that would

be. " )

She saw herself in a black doublet, with long silk hose. " Alas, poor

Yorick. " But she bethought herself.

" You can hardly say that your father doesn't exist. Why, he's been

playing himself for the last twenty years. " (" Michael could play the

King, not in French, of course, but if we decided to have a shot at it

in London. " )

" Poor father, I suppose he's good at his job, but he's not very in-

telligent, is he? He's so busy being the handsomest man in Eng-

land. "

" I don't think it's very nice of you to speak of your father like

that. "

" Have I told you anything you don't know? " he asked coolly.

Julia wanted to smile, but would not allow the look of somewhat

pained dignity to leave her face.

" It's our weakness, not our strength, that endears us to those who

love us, " she replied.

" In what play did you say that? "

She repressed a gesture of annoyance. The words had come na-

turally to her lips, but as she said them she remembered that they

were out of a play. Little brute! But they came in very appositely.

" You're hard, " she said plaintively. She was beginning to feel mo-

re and more like Hamlet's mother. " Don't you love me? "

" I might if I could find you. But where are you? If one stripped you

of your exhibitionism, if one took your technique away from you, if

one peeled you as one peels an onion of skin after skin of pretence

and insincerity, of tags of old parts and shreds of faked emotions,

would one come upon a soul at last? " He looked at her with his gra-

ve sad eyes and then he smiled a little. " I like you all right. "

" Do you believe I love you? "

" In your way. "

Julia's face was suddenly discomposed.

" If you only knew the agony I suffered when you were ill! I don't

know what I should have done if you'd died! "

" You would have given a beautiful performance of a bereaved

mother at the bier of her only child. "

" Not nearly such a good performance as if I'd had the opportunity

of rehearsing it a few times, " Julia answered tartly. " You see, what

you don't understand is that acting isn't nature; it's art, and art is

something you create. Real grief is ugly; the business of the actor is

to represent it not only with truth but with beauty. If I were really

dying as I've died in half a dozen plays, d'you think I'd care whether

my gestures were graceful and my faltering words distinct enough

to carry to the last row of the gallery? If it's a sham it's no more a

sham than a sonata of Beethoven's, and I'm no more of a sham than

the pianist who plays it. It's cruel to say that I'm not fond of you. I'm

devoted to you. You've been the only thing in my life. "

" No. You were fond of me when I was a kid and you could have

me photographed with you. It made a lovely picture and it was fine

publicity. But since then you haven't bothered much about me. I've

bored you rather than otherwise. You were always glad to see me,

but you were thankful that I went my own way and didn't want to ta-

ke up your time. I don't blame you; you hadn't got time in your life

for anyone but yourself. "

Julia was beginning to grow a trifle impatient. He was getting too

near the truth for her comfort.

" You forget that young things are rather boring. "

" Crashing, I should think, " he smiled. " But then why do you pre-

tend that you can't bear to let me out of your sight? That's just ac-

ting too. "

" You make me very unhappy. You make me feel as if I hadn't do-

ne my duty to you. "

" But you have. You've been a very good mother. You've done so-

mething for which I shall always be grateful to you, you've left me

alone. "

" I don't understand what you want. "

" I told you. Reality. "

" But where are you going to find it? "

" I don't know. Perhaps it doesn't exist. I'm young still; I'm igno-

rant. I thought perhaps that at Cambridge, meeting people and re-

ading books, I might discover where to look for it. If they say it only

exists in God, I'm done. "

Julia was disturbed. What he said had not really penetrated to her

understanding, his words were lines and the important thing was not

what they meant, but whether they " got over", but she was sensiti-

ve to the emotion she felt in him. Of course he was only eighteen,

and it would be silly to take him too seriously, she couldn't help thin-

king he'd got all that from somebody else, and that there was a go-

od deal of pose in it. Did anyone have ideas of his own and did anyo-

ne not pose just a wee, wee bit? But of course it might be that at the

moment he felt everything he said, and it wouldn't be very nice of

her to make light of it.

" Of course I see what you mean, " she said. " My greatest wish in

the world is that you should be happy. I'll manage your father, and

you can do as you like. You must seek your own salvation, I see that.

But I think you ought to make sure that all these ideas of yours

aren't just morbid. Perhaps you were too much alone in Vienna and I

dare say you read too much. Of course your father and I belong to a

different generation and I don't suppose we can help you. Why don't

you talk it over with someone more of your own age? Tom, for ins-

tance. "

" Tom? A poor little snob. His only ambition in life is to be a gentle-

man, and he hasn't the sense to see that the more he tries the more

hopeless it is. "

" I thought you liked him so much. Why, at Taplow last summer

you just lived in his pocket. "

" I didn't dislike him. I made use of him. He could tell me a lot of

things that I wanted to know. But I thought him an insignificant, silly

little thing. "

Julia remembered how insanely jealous she had been of their fri-

endship. It made her angry to think of all the agony she had wasted.

" You've dropped him, haven't you? " he asked suddenly.

She was startled.

" I suppose I have more or less. "

" I think it's very wise of you. He wasn't up to your mark. "

He looked at her with his calm, reflective eyes, and on a sudden

Julia had a sickening fear that he knew that Tom had been her lover.

It was impossible, she told herself, it was only her guilty conscience

that made her think so; at Taplow there had been nothing; it was

incredible that any of the horrid gossip had reached his ears; and

yet there was something in his expression that made her certain

that he knew. She was ashamed.

" I only asked him to come down to Taplow because I thought it

would be nice for you to have a boy of that age to play around with. "

" It was. "

There was in his eyes a faint twinkle of amusement. She felt des-

perate. She would have liked to ask him what he was grinning at,

but dared not; for she knew; he was not angry with her, she could

have borne that, he was merely diverted. She was bitterly hurt. She

would have cried, but that he would only laugh. And what could she

say to him? He believed nothing she said. Acting! For once she was

at a loss how to cope with a situation. She was up against something

that she did not know, something mysterious and rather frightening.

Could that be reality? At that moment they heard a car drive up.

" There's your father, " she exclaimed.

What a relief! The scene was intolerable, and she was thankful

that his arrival must end it. In a moment Michael, very hearty, with

his chin thrust out and his belly pulled in, looking for all his fifty odd

years incredibly handsome, burst into the room and, in his manly

way, thrust out his hand to greet, after a six months' absence, his

only begotten son.

THREE days later Roger went up to Scotland. By the exercise of

some ingenuity Julia had managed that they should not again spend

any length of time alone together. When they happened to be by

themselves for a few minutes they talked of indifferent things. Julia

was not really sorry to see him go. She could not dismiss from her

mind the curious conversation she had had with him. There was one

point in particular that unaccountably worried her; this was his sug-

gestion that if she went into an empty room and someone suddenly

opened the door there would be nobody there. It made her feel very

uncomfortable.

" I never set out to be a raving beauty, but the one thing no one

has ever denied me is personality. It's absurd to pretend that beca-

use I can play a hundred different parts in a hundred different ways I

haven't got an individuality of my own. I can do that because I'm a

bloody good actress. "

She tried to think what happened to her when she went alone into

an empty room.

" But I never am alone, even in an empty room. There's always

Michael, or Evie, or Charles, or the public; not in the flesh, of course,

but in the spirit, as it were. I must speak to Charles about Roger. "

Unfortunately he was away. But he was coming back for the

dress-rehearsal and the first night; he had not missed these occasi-

ons for twenty years, and they had always had supper together after

the dress-rehearsal. Michael would remain in the theatre, busy with

the lights and so on, so that they would be alone. They would be ab-

le to have a good talk.

She studied her part. Julia did not deliberately create the charac-

ter she was going to act by observation; she had a knack of getting

into the shoes of the woman she had to portray so that she thought

with her mind and felt with her senses. Her intuition suggested to

her a hundred small touches that afterwards amazed people by their

verisimilitude; * but when they asked her where she had got them

she could not say. Now she wanted to show the courageous yet une-

asy breeziness of the Mrs. Marten who played golf and could talk to

a man like one good chap to another and yet, essentially a respec-

table, middle-class woman, hankered for the security of the marri-

age state.

Michael never liked to have a crowd at a dress-rehearsal, * and

this time, anxious to keep the secret of the play till the first night, he

had admitted besides Charles only the people, photographers and

dressmakers, whose presence was necessary. Julia spared herself.

She had no intention of giving all she had to give till the first night. It

was enough if her performance was adequate. Under Michael's busi-

ness-like direction everything went off without a hitch, and by ten

o'clock Julia and Charles were sitting in the Grill Room of the Savoy.

The first thing she asked him was what he thought of Avice Crichton.

" Not at all bad and wonderfully pretty. She really looked lovely in

that second-act dress. "

" I'm not going to wear the dress I wore in the second act. Charley

Deverill has made me another. "

He did not see the slightly humorous glance she gave him, and if

he had would not have guessed what it meant. Michael, having ta-

ken Julia's advice, had gone to a good deal of trouble with Avice. He

had rehearsed her by herself upstairs in his private room and had gi-

ven her every intonation and every gesture. He had also, Julia had

good reason to believe, lunched with her several times and taken

her out to supper. The result of all this was that she was playing the

part uncommonly well. Michael rubbed his hands.

" I'm very pleased with her. I think she'll make quite a hit. I've half

a mind to give her a contract. "

" I wouldn't, " said Julia. " Not till after the first night. You can never

really tell how a performance is going to pan out till you've got an

audience. "

" She's a nice girl and a perfect lady. "

" A nice girl, I suppose, because she's madly in love with you, and

a perfect lady because she's resisting your advances till she's got a

contract. "

" Oh, my dear, don't be so silly. Why, I'm old enough to be her fat-

her. "

But he smiled complacently. She knew very well that his love-ma-

king went no farther than holding hands and a kiss or two in a taxi,

but she knew also that it flattered him to imagine that she suspec-

ted him capable of infidelity.

But now Julia, having satisfied her appetite with proper regard for

her figure, attacked the subject which was on her mind.

" Charles dear, I want to talk to you about Roger. "

" Oh yes, he came back the other day, didn't he? How is he? "

" My dear, a most terrible thing has happened. He's come back a

fearful prig and I don't know what to do about it. "

She gave him her version of the conversation. She left out one or

two things that it seemed inconvenient to mention, but what she

told was on the whole accurate.

" The tragic thing is that he has absolutely no sense of humour, "

she finished.

" After all he's only eighteen. "

" You could have knocked me down with a feather when he said all

those things to me. I felt just like Balaam when his ass broke into

light conversation. "

She gave him a gay look, but he did not even smile. He did not

seem to think her remark as funny as she did.

" I can't imagine where he got his ideas. It's absurd to think that

he could have thought out all that nonsense for himself. "

" Are you sure that boys of that age don't think more than we ol-

der people imagine? It's a sort of puberty of the spirit and its results

are often strange. "

" It seems so deceitful of Roger to have harboured thoughts like

those all these years and never breathed a word about them. He

might have been accusing me. " She gave a chuckle. " To tell you the

truth, when Roger was talking to me I felt just like Hamlet's mother. "

Then with hardly a break: " I wonder if I'm too old to play Hamlet? "

" Gertrude isn't a very good part, is it? "

Julia broke into a laugh of frank amusement.

" Don't be idiotic, Charles. I wouldn't play the Queen. I'd play Ham-

let. "

" D'you think it's suited to a woman? "

" Mrs. Siddons played it and so did Sarah Bernhardt. It would set a

seal on my career, if you know what I mean. Of course there's the

difficulty of the blank verse. "

" I have heard actors speak it so that it was indistinguishable from

prose, " he answered.

" Yes, but that's not quite the same, is it? "

" Were you nice to Roger? "

She was surprised at his going back to that subject so suddenly,

but she returned to it with a smile.

" Oh, charming. "

" It's hard not to be impatient with the absurdity of the young;

they tell us that two and two make four as though it had never oc-

curred to us, and they're disappointed if we can't share their surpri-

se when they have just discovered that a hen lays an egg. There's a

lot of nonsense in their ranting and raving, but it's not all nonsense.

One ought to sympathize with them; one ought to do one's best to

understand. One has to remember how much has to be forgotten

and how much has to be learnt when for the first time one faces life.

It's not very easy to give up one's ideals, and the brute facts of

every day are bitter pills to swallow. The spiritual conflicts of adoles-

cence can be very severe and one can do so little to resolve them. It

may be that in a year or two he'll lose sight of the clouds of glory

and accept the chain. It may be that he'll find what he's looking for,

if not in God, then in art. "

" I should hate him to be an actor if that's what you mean. "

" No, I don't think he'll fancy that. "

" And of course he can't be a playwright, he hasn't a sense of hu-

mour. "

" I dare say he'll be quite content to go into the Foreign Office. It

would be an asset to him there. "

" What would you advise me to do? "

" Nothing. Let him be. That's probably the greatest kindness you

can do him. "

" But I can't help being worried about him. "

" You needn't be. Be hopeful. You thought you'd only given birth to

an ugly duckling; perhaps he's going to turn into a white-winged

swan. "

Charles was not giving Julia what she wanted. She had expected

him to be more sympathetic.

" I suppose he's getting old, poor dear, " she reflected. " He's losing

his grip of things. He must have been impotent for years; I wonder it

never struck me before. "

She asked what the time was.

" I think I ought to go. I must get a long night's rest. "

Julia slept well and when she awoke had at once a feeling of exul-

tation. Tonight was the first night. It gave her a little thrill of pleasu-

re to recollect that people had already been assembling at the pit

and gallery doors when she left the theatre after the dress-rehear-

sal, and now at ten in the morning there was probably already a