Part 8 (1/2)
The idea of Shylock as a blonde was too ridiculous to be tolerated.
False hair was not to be bought in a small village, and Maxwell's youthful face boasted as yet only the faintest shadow of a moustache.
The question was left over for consideration, and an inspiration came the same afternoon, when Robert hurled one of the roller-like cus.h.i.+ons of the sofa at Oswald's head, and Oswald, in catching it, tore loose a portion of the covering.
”Now you've done it!” he cried. ”The room will be covered with feathers, and then you will say it was my fault! We shall have to fasten the stupid thing up somehow or other!” He peered through the opening as he spoke, and his face changed. ”It's not feathers--it's horsehair! Here's a find! What about that wig for Shylock?”
Esther was dubious.
”It would take a great deal of horsehair to make a wig. It would spoil the cus.h.i.+on if the horsehair were taken away; it would spoil the sofa if the cus.h.i.+on were small; it would spoil the room if the sofa--”
Peggy interrupted with a shriek of laughter. ”Oh, oh, oh! It's like the 'House that Jack built'! How long do you intend to go on like that?
Nonsense, my dear! It would be perfectly easy to take out what we want, and put it back afterwards. I'll promise to do it myself and sew it up tightly, though, if you desire my opinion, I think the cus.h.i.+on would be improved by letting in a little air. You might as well lean your head on a brick. Max, you are a made man! You shall have a beautiful, crinkly black wig, and a beard to match! We will sew them to your turban, and fasten them with black elastic. It will never show, and I'll finish off the joins after you are dressed. You'll see?”
”You can do as you like! I'm in your hands!” said Max easily; and when the night of the reading arrived, and he was attired in wig and gown, Peggy seated him in a chair and tucked a towel under his chin with an air of business. She had a number of small accessories on a table near at hand, and Max was first instructed to stick pieces of black plaster over alternate teeth, so that he might appear to possess only a few isolated fangs, and then made to lie back in his chair, while his dresser stood over him with a glue-brush in one hand and a bunch of loose horsehair in the other.
”Shut your eyes!” she cried loudly. And before he could say ”Jack Robinson” a tuft of the wiry stuff covered his eyebrow. ”Keep your face still!” And, to his horror, the gum was daubed from the borders of the beard, halfway up to his eyes, and little p.r.i.c.kly ends of hair were held in Peggy's palm and pressed against his cheeks until they were firmly attached.
This, indeed, was more than he had bargained for! He jerked back his head, and began a loud-voiced protest, only to be interrupted by shrieks of excitement.
”Oh, oh, oh! It's beautiful--beautiful! What a fright! What a delicious fright! No one would know you! You look an old hairy monster who would gobble up half a dozen Christians. Do look at yourself!”
Peggy felt the pride of an artist in the result of her efforts, and Max was hardly less delighted than herself as he stood before the gla.s.s, gazing at his hairy cheeks and leering horribly, to admire his toothless gums. If the result were so hideous as to astonish even those who had watched the process of his make-up, what wonder that the effect upon Shylock's fond parents was of a stupefying nature!
Horror kept Mrs Asplin silent until the middle of the scene between Shylock and Antonio when the bond is signed, and then her agitation could no longer be controlled, and Shylock's little speeches were interrupted by entreaties to take that horrid stuff off his teeth, to use plenty of hot water in was.h.i.+ng his face, and to be sure to anoint it plentifully with cold cream after doing so.
An ordinary lad would have lost his temper at these interruptions; but Max adored his mother, and could never take anything she did in a wrong spirit. Anger being therefore impossible, the only other resource was to laugh, which, in Peggy's opinion, was even worse than the former. A Shylock who chuckled between his speeches, and gave a good-humoured ”Ha!
ha!” just before uttering his bitterest invective, was a ridiculous parody of the character, with whom it would be impossible to act. It would be hard indeed if all her carefully rehea.r.s.ed speeches lost their effect, and the famous trial scene were made into a farce through these untimely interruptions!
The second part of the play went more smoothly, however, as the audience settled down to a more attentive hearing, and the actors became less self-conscious and embarra.s.sed. If four out of the six were sticks, who never for a moment approached the verge of the natural, Portia and Shylock did n.o.bly, and, when the reading was over and the young people gathered round the fire in the drawing-room, it was unanimously agreed that they had acquired a more intimate knowledge of the play by this one evening's representation than by weeks of ordinary study.
”I feel so much more intimate with it!” said Esther. ”It seems to have made it alive, instead of just something I have read in a book. It was a delightful thought, father, and I am grateful to you for proposing it.
I wish I could do all my lessons in the same way.”
”I've not enjoyed myself so much for ages. You just did beautifully, all of you, and the dresses were a sight to behold. As for Peggy, she's a witch, and could make up costumes on a desert island, if she were put to it! But I don't know what is going to happen to my poor, dear boy's face. Oswald, what is he doing? Isn't he coming to have some lemonade and cake?” asked Mrs Asplin anxiously. And Oswald chuckled in a heartless fas.h.i.+on.
”Pride must abide. He would be Shylock, whether we liked it or not, so let him take the consequences. He is fighting it out with cold cream in the bathroom, and some of the horsehair sticks like fun. I'll go up and tell him we have eaten all the cake. He was getting savage when I came down, and it will sweeten his temper!”
CHAPTER TWELVE.
PEGGY IN TROUBLE.
As Peggy sat writing in the study one afternoon, a s.h.a.ggy head came peering round the door, and Robert's voice said eagerly--”Mariquita! A word in your ear! Could you come out and take a turn round the garden for half an hour before tea, or are you too busy?”
”Not at all. I am entirely at your disposal,” said Peggy elegantly; and the young people made their way to the cloak-room, swung on coats and sailor hats, and sallied out into the fresh autumn air.
”Mariquita,” said Robert then, using once more the name by which he chose to address Peggy in their confidential confabs, ”Mariquita, I am in difficulties! There is a microscope advertised in _Science_ this week, that is the very thing I have been pining for for the last six years. I must _get_ it, or die; but the question is--_how_? You see before you a penniless man.” He looked at Peggy as he spoke, and met her small, demure smile.
”My dear and honourable sir--”
”Yes, yes, I know; drop that, Mariquita! Don't take for granted, like Mellicent, that because a man has a t.i.tle he must necessarily be a millionaire. Everything is comparative! My father is rich compared to the vicar, but he is really hard-up for a man in his position. He gets almost no rent for his land nowadays, and I am the third son. I haven't as much pocket-money in a month as Oswald gets through in a week. Now that microscope costs twenty pounds, and if I were to ask the governor for it, he wouldn't give it to me, but he would sigh and look wretched at being obliged to refuse. He's a kind-hearted fellow, you know, who doesn't like to say 'No,' and I hate to worry him. Still--that microscope! I must have it. By hook or by crook, I must have it. I've set my mind on that.”