Three Sons (Timeless Classics Collection) by Ursula Bloom

Author:Ursula Bloom [Bloom, Ursula]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: 1940s fiction, Edwardian fiction, classic women's fiction, classic literary fiction, literary fiction, women's literary fiction, women's fiction
Publisher: Wyndham Books
Published: 2020-12-10T05:00:00+00:00

IX

THE GREAT MAN

Mike had been quite right when he said that it was now or never, and it had been now!

It meant meeting a whole set of new people and it coincided with Hilda going down to Bonchurch for a long holiday with her mother. She had never liked London in the summertime, and this seemed to be a good idea.

Before he realised what was happening, Marty was lost in the whirl of fresh rehearsals, which made him moody, so that it was as well that he had the place to himself, and anyhow she would be back for his first night.

One day in the middle of it all, his mother met him for lunch, a scampered, hurried lunch after a particularly difficult morning, for the play was in labour pains and going badly. During the lunch she dropped one or two casual remarks that gave him the idea that she was suspicious that life was not well with him and Hilda.

‘Not well? That’s the first I’ve heard of it. Everything is okay. Where did you get that idea from?’

‘I really don’t know. I thought you seemed a little strained at Adam’s wedding.’

‘Who wouldn’t feel a little strained at Adam’s wedding? I know where you got the idea that something was wrong; it was that awful hat that Hilda had got on! That dress, too. She looked peculiar, I admit, but that was what the trouble was.’

Yet his easy explanation kept recurring in his mind all through the afternoon’s rehearsal. He couldn’t concentrate. The producer got at him about it, one of those difficult producers who gave a man no licence, pouncing on any slackness. Because it worried Marty a lot, he rang Hilda up that night, and had some difficulty in getting through. When she came to the telephone she sounded offhand, probably bored, as he would be with all those Staffordshire china white dogs, and the frayed rose silk of a tired cottage piano.

‘Something you want, Marty?’

‘Only to know how you are.’

‘I’m all right. A bit tired.’

‘What have you been doing?’

‘I’ve been distempering my bedroom.’

‘Good heavens! Whatever for?’

‘It had to be done, and I liked doing it. Nice of you to ring up, Marty.’

Then there was a silence, it was almost as if she were a stranger, and he did not know what to say next. ‘The rehearsals are going well,’ he told her.

‘I’m glad.’

‘It’ll all be over in a fortnight now. You’ll be up for the first night?’

‘I expect so,’ rather hurriedly as though she were skimming over a dangerous abyss.

‘Well, good night, Hilda, God bless you.’

‘Good night, Marty,’ and he heard the click as she rang off. Funny, he thought. It irritated him that she should have been so quick to hang up; and when he came to think of it none of the conversation had been natural.

Then rehearsals got him again; it was a most trying play, quite the worst he had done yet.

In the final week they suddenly decided to change the complete last act.

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