A LADY NAMED ROSE
Chapter Forty-Three
While the director--Daphne Marceau, her name
was, and they most certainly could call her Daphne--was distracted handing out
scripts to her assistants for distribution, Rose saw her chance to escape for
the nearest exit. She began squeezing her way past other students to the aisle,
Sebastian on her heels.
"Where do you think you're going, young
lady?"
She turned and confronted him, hissing
through clenched teeth, "I don't appreciate being held up for
ridicule."
Those maddening gray eyes revealed nothing.
"Who's ridiculing you? Far as I could tell, you signed your name to an
audition list."
"Oh, stop it, you know I did no such
thing." Rose hadn't noticed one of Daphne's assistants approaching, bound
script in hand, and now the young woman was waiting for her to take it.
Sebastian accepted it for her.
"Here, you'll need this to learn your
lines," he teased.
Rose knocked the script out of his hand and
pushed her way into the aisle.
"Well, I see we have a volunteer to go
first," Daphne chirped from the stage. "I so hate having to coax
people to take a turn. Thank you, Rose."
Once again, all eyes were upon her. Rose,
face flushed, weighed her options quickly. She heard a muffled snicker down
front and turned in time to see Angelica covering her mouth. That decided it.
There was no way she could walk away gracefully now.
Facing Sebastian, she said, "I believe I
dropped my script."
He raised his eyebrows as he handed it to her
but said nothing. Rose made her way down the aisle and ascended the short
flight of stairs at stage left. Outwardly she was the picture of calm, but her
stomach was threatening to relieve itself of her supper.
"You'll notice that some of you received
The Tempest and others the Cervantes plays," Daphne was explaining.
"I encourage you to audition for any role you choose, though some of the leads
have been cast already. Who will you be this evening, Rose?"
"I--I don't know."
More giggles from the front row. Rose
wondered how long this humiliation would last.
"That will be enough." Daphne spoke
sternly without glancing up from the pages she was studying. The giggles and
whispering stopped. "Why don't you read the role of Miranda. Angelica,
come up and give her a hand."
Angelica was caught off guard and obviously
displeased. With an exaggerated sigh she rose, taking her own sweet time in
joining her nemesis onstage. Neither of them looked at each other.
"Begin at Scene Two," Daphne
ordered.
Rose began. She was already familiar with the
tale of Prospero, a sorcerer and the rightful Duke of Milan, and his daughter,
Miranda, living in exile alone with their servants on an island until a storm
engineered by Prospero shipwrecks the king of Naples. But she'd never read the
words aloud.
Her voice, at first surprisingly strong
considering the state of her nerves, gradually softened:
"...O, I have suffered
With those that I saw suffer: a brave
vessel,
Who had, no doubt, some noble creature in
her,
Dash'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock
Against my very heart. Poor souls, they
perish'd..."
Unbidden, disturbing images came to mind...
A crewman, splashing in sub-freezing
water, screaming, "Bring back the boats!"
Jack's hands, so cold, so cold.
Rose's voice faltered as the lines on the
page blurred; then she quickly recovered, wiping the tears from her eyes. She
was unaware that a hush had fallen over the audience.
Angelica, as Prospero, tossed off her lines
with relative ease, and made a show of examining her fingernails whenever it
was Rose's turn to read. After about five minutes Daphne had them stop.
"Very good, Rose. We'll be posting a
cast list on the bulletin board on Monday. Angelica, a little slower next time,
please."
Angelica, pouting, brushed past Rose on her
way down the stairs. Rose left the building in a rush without acknowledging
Sebastian, who waited at the door with her coat.
"Darling, wait." He was behind her,
struggling to force her arms into the sleeves. "You'll catch cold, and we
can't have you getting sick before your big debut."
"Who said anything about a debut?"
Rose was furious. "I can't believe you embarrassed me in such a
manner."
"Don't look at me." Sebastian
laughed, throwing his hands up in mock surrender. "Vera and Charlotte
signed your name to that list, not I."
"At your urging," Vera said from
behind them. "You were wonderful!" she gushed to Rose. "Wasn't
she?"
"Marvelous," Sebastian agreed.
"You'd better clear your calendar for the next couple of months. There'll
be lots of rehearsals."
Rose dismissed them. "I no more won that
role than either of you did."
On Monday morning, Vera and Charlotte came
running up to Rose at breakfast, breathless with excitement, prodding her into
the vestibule. She'd deliberately avoided looking at the cast list prominently
displayed on the bulletin board until now. She couldn't believe she'd see her
name, but there it was. She was Miranda.
*****
The hard part would be telling the Scotts she
had rehearsals on Saturdays.
Rose had explained her employment arrangement
to Daphne right away. She'd felt obligated to do so, but part of her operated
out of sheer terror of appearing on that stage, regardless of her youthful
dreams. Her job provided the perfect excuse not to face that fear.
On the other hand, she'd had a taste of what
Sebastian and his theater friends spoke of: the thrill of the spotlight, the
anticipation of an audience waiting, watching one's every move. No experience
could match it, they said, and she believed them.
The choice she had to make was clear.
She took the train to Tarrytown as early as
possible Friday evening, carrying only a purse and a lightweight overnight bag,
as there was a good chance she'd be returning to campus first thing in the
morning. Daphne had allowed her to skip the first rehearsal that night on
condition that she report to the theater Saturday. If not, the part would go to
someone else.
As no one expected her this early, Rose
caught a taxi at the station and let herself in the kitchen entrance. Arnolde
and the new maid who was serving in Bridie's absence had left and the first
floor was deserted--save the study, where a light burned beneath the closed
door. Rose suddenly heard raised voices upstairs, then a tearful India came
barreling down the staircase, rushing past without seeing Rose.
Marie appeared at the top of the stairs,
calling her niece's name. She started when Rose appeared out of the shadows of
the foyer. "My goodness, you're home early. Did you see where India
went?"
Rose shook her head. "What
happened?"
Marie came downstairs quickly, glancing once
over her shoulder, took Rose by the arm and pulled her back into the kitchen.
"It's Madame Lucy," she groused, gesturing in the direction of the
girl's bedroom. "She and India had words. Her room wasn't cleaned to her
satisfaction or something. Nothing new, but you know how sensitive my niece can
be."
"Lucy's home already?"
"Had Mister Randolph drive all the way
to that school to get her, complaining she was feeling under the weather.
Feeling more like stepping out with that young man of hers, I say."
Well. This was news.
"I need to go find India," Marie
continued. "Can you check on Cecilia?"
Rose said she would, then asked after Mr. and
Mrs. Scott. Victoria was upstairs in bed, and William was still in New York,
but Randolph was in the study, if she needed to speak with him. Rose had to
hand it to Marie; she'd already adjusted to the mysterious ways of their
employers.
A haunting violin solo sounded from behind
the closed door of the master bedroom. Victoria didn't respond to Rose's knock,
so she cautiously let herself in. The room was in a state of disarray: clothing
strewn about the floor, the remnants of a dinner long gone cold on a tray at
the foot of the bed, an empty glass on the night table. Victoria was sprawled
atop the coverlet in a most unladylike position, nightgown bunched up at the
knees. She was snoring to beat the band. Rose tiptoed over to the Victrola and
reached for the volume knob.
"Don't turn it off, Bridie, I'm
listenin'," Victoria slurred.
"It's Rose, ma'am."
Victoria's eyelids fluttered open, revealing
a patchwork of tiny veins across her corneas. It was a pitiful sight. Rose
turned away and lowered the volume on the phonograph player.
"Rosie, can you tell my husband to get
in here? We need to have a talk."
"He's...not here."
Victoria laughed, and it came out sounding
more like a moan. "With that whore of his, no doubt," she spat. Rose
cringed. She'd never heard Victoria make such a vicious remark before.
"Mrs. Scott," she said, desperate
to state her case and leave the room, "Mrs. Scott, I need to request some
time off. I'm sorry to give you such short notice, but I've gotten a role, a
major role, in a theatrical production at school. It's for Founder's Day, and
being that I'm about to graduate--"
"Oh, that sounds lovely," Victoria
drawled. "Go ahead, Rosie, enjoy yourself. And on your way out, can you
please find Will for me, dear? I haven't seen him all day."
"Yes, ma'am." Rose backed out and
closed the door. She could hear Victoria humming along, off-key, with the
violin.
It had gone even worse than expected. Rose
felt a twinge of guilt at leaving Marie and India virtually alone to cope with
the madness in this household, but it couldn't be helped. They had to be
prepared for when she took leave permanently.
But she had to warn them. After looking in on
the children, Rose headed out to the cottage to explain her situation to Marie,
who was more than understanding and even offered to speak to the Scotts on her
behalf. Then she asked Randolph for a ride to the train station.
She didn't return for almost two months.