Chapter Seventeen #2
As the fairy-quarrel scene contained Frances’ longest speeches in the play, she had practiced them at length, both alone and with her siblings, to learn them by heart.
Which now left her free to notice other things while she spoke, little discomfiting things, such as how Oberon now hovered too near her for her comfort, his dark eyes narrowing in assumed coldness, while his lips contrarily pursed and wriggled in a series of bizarre expressions which might have meant anything from flirtation to smoldering heart-burning to dyspepsia.
After her own abortive attempts to flatter him earlier, Frances would have feared it was flirtation, except that he delivered his speeches half to her and half over her shoulder to Puck.
Could he be trying to make Jane jealous?
Or did he want to make her, Frances, jealous?
Whatever the case, Frances did not dare to acknowledge his display, much less to respond in kind, though the thought of Mrs. Dere witnessing any of it made her anxious.
What could she see from where she sat? Would she think Mr. Midgecomb was trying to decide whom he liked best?
Mr. Tilson must still be accounted the safest target for Frances’ faux affections.
Granted, her efforts thus far had been brief and lukewarm, but he took no more notice of her than he ever had.
Even now, instead of poring over his playbook in preparation as Lysander, Hermia, and Helena were doing, he lounged beside Mr. Hearne, his gaze sliding right past her to dart from Mr. Midgecomb to Jane and back, his fingers and lips moving as if he were calculating something.
If Mrs. Dere asked, Frances could say her heart wavered between Mr. Midgecomb and Mr. Tilson, but sadly she did not think either of them reciprocated.
Not ideal, but it would have to serve as her excuse for not pursuing Mr. Hearne or, worse, as her excuse for having refused him, should Mrs. Dere ever learn of his offer.
Her gaze drifting toward that same Mr. Hearne, she thought him in danger of dozing, his blinks having slowed and his chin sinking toward his breast.
The quarrel scene was followed by the Athenians wandering in the forest, and George and Miss Jarvis kept Frances very busy with having to prompt them, while Mr. Midgecomb stopped them frequently to adjust their movements.
Nevertheless the back of her neck prickled in awareness as Mr. Midgecomb continued to divide his attention between her and Miss Eveleigh.
At least I am not in the scene this time, Frances told herself, and Puck must bear the brunt of his fantastic faces.
Only when the mechanicals took the stage did Frances forget her own concerns in the fun of watching them.
She sat to the side, Titania now being “asleep” in her bower, while the miracle of acting once again transformed Mr. Hearne from sleepy blockhead to boastful Bottom.
The character might be as foolish as the man who played him, but Bottom was quicker, livelier, and Frances could close her eyes and listen and almost persuade herself Mr. Hearne was those things too.
“No, no, Gordon, you should be nearer the left side of the stage for this speech,” Mr. Midgecomb corrected, “for if you are to ask questions about each person’s role, you must not block any of them.
But after Quince tells everyone to sit down, you have no more speeches, so you may sit further back. Note that down.”
Sarah had finished construction of the ass’s head, and though no other costumes or properties had been used yet, she brought it to Greenwood Hall as a surprise.
And it was a surprise! Bottom exited the scene after his last speech, leaving the rustics to continue their practice, but when he emerged again, following a giggling Puck, his transformation met with genuine screams and gasps of delight.
All came to a halt, so Sarah’s work could be admired and the squirrel fur petted and the ears bent and straightened.
Even the audience members rose from their chairs to join in.
Frances was the only one not to approach, and it was not only because she had seen the ass’s head before.
No, she hesitated because a danger lay ahead, and the nearer they had drawn to it, the more uncomfortable she grew.
For not once had she and Mr. Hearne ever rehearsed the scene where Titania fell in love with the ass-headed Bottom.
The scene where she must caress him and say caressing things—!
She might tell herself it would be nothing.
That the whole world would be gathered around, with Mr. Midgecomb undoubtedly too near, dictating how they must sit and how, exactly, she was to caress Mr. Hearne, but her heart beat faster all the same.
What if he is the wolf in the undergrowth again?
If only I might don a basket head as well—then I might blush all I pleased, with no one the wiser.
Inexorably the moment neared.
Mr. Midgecomb had much to say about which mechanical was to flee in which direction and collide with whom, but it was got through, everyone making notes in their playbooks.
“Very well, they are all gone at this point, Adam. Now I want you to come front and center and turn in a slow circle, first clockwise and then counterclockwise, to show your confusion. Then, when you reach ‘I will walk up and down here,’ you will do just that, taking care to remain at the stage front. Then sing your song facing the audience, so that Titania might wake behind you, unseen. And make much of this, Miss Barstow. You must appear completely charmed, as if the loveliest melody in the world were stealing to your ears, and you could hardly countenance it. And all this time you will have been sleeping in your bower, of course, not sitting there in a chair.”
It helped that Mr. Hearne chose to make braying sounds before his first words and that he either had a wretched singing voice or pretended to have a wretched singing voice, so that by the time he yowled about the “woosel cock so black of hue,” everyone was splitting his sides with laughter and paying no heed to her.
She sat up slowly, rubbing her eyes and tilting her head to catch the heavenly music.
No one would have heard her line at all, had Mr. Hearne not broken off after “the wren with little quill” to thump his breastbone, as if he had swallowed wrongly.
As it was, her “What angel wakes me from my flow’ry bed?
” drew another laugh, and Frances felt a thrill of a different kind. She had made them laugh!
This stage magic, heretofore unknown to her, cast a spell over the scene, giving her courage to continue, as did training her gaze to his tall ears and furry cheeks, rather than his eyes.
“Bottom, you must stand like a rock,” Mr. Midgecomb instructed.
“You are more interested in your song than in the beautiful fairy queen’s attentions.
The greater the contrast between her infatuation and your indifference, the funnier it will be.
And Titania, you must circle him as you speak and, at the end of the scene, lead him toward your bower.
Start again at ‘I pray thee, gentle mortal.’”
When they repeated the bit, Frances managing to utter the “I love thee” required of her without shriveling in mortification, Mr. Tilson interposed. “If she loves him, ought she not to caress him as she circles? His head, I mean.”
“Er, yes,” agreed Mr. Midgecomb, though he frowned, as did Jane, standing off to the side.
“I did speak caressingly,” Frances put in meekly and was ignored.
“Again!” said Mr. Midgecomb.
Swallowing, Frances obeyed. Lifting a hand as she had at Iffley Cottage, she circled him once more, drawing two fingers across the fur like a surveyor drawing boundary lines.
“Good,” said Mr. Midgecomb.
“Not good at all,” complained Mr. Tilson. “Miss Barstow, if that is how you caress the Barstow housecat and pup, they must be very dissatisfied creatures.”
“Excuse me, John, but I am the manager here,” Mr. Midgecomb protested.
“Then do your job,” his friend retorted. “As you pointed out, the scene is funnier the more she lavishes unacknowledged affection upon him. Running a couple fingers across his head as if she were inspecting the wainscots for dust is hardly convincing.”
His frown deepening, Mr. Midgecomb gave a curt nod. “All right, all right. You heard him, Miss Barstow.”
She made the mistake, then, of seeking Mr. Hearne’s eyes, to determine what he made of this, only to find his sleepiness vanished, once more replaced by the lurking wolf.
Like a puppet twitched by unseen wires, Frances flinched, and then she was obliged to pretend a reason for her jerky motion, swatting the empty air a few times, as if pestered by an unseen fly.
Good gracious. Don’t look at him, you ninny! Mr. Tilson is right—you must think of Mr. Hearne as Poppet or Outlaw. Or—or—as a velvet-covered bolster.
You can do this.
You must.
Clearing her throat, she drew a deep breath and crossed to her starting point.
“I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again,” she cooed, taking his ridiculous head between both hands. In for a penny, in for a pound, she even rubbed her cheek against the ass’s nose Sarah had fashioned from a twisted basket handle covered in grey felt.
It was easier once she started, and she almost smiled to think how the aphorisms were coming thick and fast. A begun work is half ended.
Why, how true that was! The hardest part was beginning, and Frances found she could even enjoy herself.
Perhaps because the squirrel fur was very soft and perhaps because—in her heart of hearts—she liked to caress Mr. Hearne, even through fur and glue and wicker.
“Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful,” Titania praised Bottom, Frances Barstow adding to herself, Ah, if only.
There was the briefest pause before he replied, and when he did she was surprised to hear a hitch in his voice. A huskiness to be overcome.
His line was delivered before she could think more about it, and it was her turn again, but somehow her heart was thumping in her ears, and she heard herself replying in even more purring tones.
By the time Titania declared her love a second time for the ass-headed Bottom, Frances had daringly fluttered her hands from his furry head down his arms to his hands, which she took in her own to draw him bower-ward, promising her fairies’ attendance.
“Let us stop there for now!” cried Mr. Midgecomb, clapping his hands and halting Moth, Mustardseed, Peaseblossom, and Cobweb as they hurried over.
“But—was it all right?” asked Frances.
When Mr. Midgecomb did not reply immediately, it was Mr. Tilson who chuckled. “Oh, yes. That will do very well indeed.”