‘What, and stand in line with all the other hopefuls, begging to be noticed? No fear!’
Benedict, who was used to his friend’s strange ways, shrugged his shoulders and followed him to their club.
At the end of the week, a small package was delivered to the theatre, addressed to Miss Madeleine Charron. It contained a single diamond ear drop and a note that simply said, ‘You may have its twin if you come out to supper with me on Monday. My carriage will be waiting outside the stage door after the performance.’ It was unsigned.
It was meant to intrigue her and it certainly succeeded. Maddy was used to being sent flowers, but they usually arrived with their donors, anxious for the privilege of taking her out, or accompanied by billets doux or excruciating love poems and definitely not penned incognito. But a whole florist’s stock, every night for a week, followed by a single ear drop of such exquisite beauty it brought a lump to her throat, was something else again. This latest admirer was different.
‘And rich,’ Marianne said, when she saw the trinket. Marianne Doubleday was her friend, an actress of middle years, but a very good one, who had once, not many years before, fooled the entire beau monde for a whole season into believing she was a lady and a very wealthy one at that. ‘Are you sure you have no idea who it might be?’
‘None at all.’
‘And will you go?’
‘I don’t know. He is undoubtedly very sure of himself.’
‘So what is that to the point? No doubt it means he’s an aristocrat. That’s what you want, isn’t it?’
Years ago, when she had first joined the company as a wardrobe seamstress, Marianne had befriended her and later, when Maddy had been given small parts, had taught her how to act, how to project her voice so that a whisper could be heard in the gods, how to move gracefully, how to use her hands and her eyes to express herself and still conceal her innermost thoughts, how to listen and understand the undercurrents in a conversation, the innuendo behind the way a word was said, the ways of the worldly-wise, everything to bring her to the standing she now enjoyed.
In return Maddy had confided her secret ambition to be a lady. Marianne had not mocked it; after all, noblemen sometimes did marry actresses, but she had told her how difficult it would be, how they were usually ostracised by Polite Society and that being a lady was not all it was cracked up to be, that with wealth and status came responsibilities.
‘Besides, you’ll find all manner of obstacles put in your way by the young man’s parents,’ she had said. ‘If they have any standing in Society, they’ll fight you tooth and nail. They’ll have a bride all picked out for him, unless, of course you set your cap at someone old, but then he’s like to be a widower with a readymade family.’
Maddy had grimaced at the idea. ‘No, that won’t do. I want people to envy me, to look up to me, to take what I say seriously. I want to have a grand house, a carriage and servants. No one, no one at all, will dare look down on me or take me for granted ever again…’
‘A tall order, Maddy. My advice is to take what is offered and enjoy it without wishing for the moon.’
Although Marianne knew about her ambition, she did not know the reason for it. She did not know the inner fury that still beset Maddy every time she thought of Henry Bulford and his uncaring parents. It had not diminished over the years. All through her early struggles, she had nursed her desire for…what was it? Revenge? No, it could not be that, for Henry Bulford had inherited the title and was married and she did not envy his top-lofty wife one bit. They had attended the same theatrical party once and he had not even recognised her. But then why would he connect the skinny, pale-faced kitchen maid he had tried to rape with the beautiful actress who had taken London by storm?
A great deal of water had flowed under London Bridge since then, some of it so dreadful she wished she could forget it, but it would not go away and only strengthened her resolve. She had risen above every kick dealt her by an unkind fate, but sometimes it had been touch and go. She had nearly starved, had begged and even stolen—and she was not proud of that—until she had found a job as a seamstress. Hours and hours of close work, living in dingy lodgings, quite literally working her fingers to the bone and all for a pittance.
Her ambition was smothered by the sheer weight of having to earn a living, but it did not die altogether and one day in 1820—she remembered the year well because it was the year the King had tried to divorce his wife and become the butt of everyone’s ribaldry—she found herself delivering a theatrical costume to the Covent Garden theatre. Her employer sometimes helped out when they had a big production and this was wanted urgently. She had told Maddy to take it round there on her way home.
On this occasion, the whole company was carousing, having just pulled off a great performance at a large aristocratic mansion. The troupe was led by a colourful character called Lancelot Greatorex, who fascinated her with his strange clothes and extravagant gestures. Seeing her ill-concealed curiosity, he demanded to know if she were an actress.
‘Oh, no,’ she said.
‘How do you know you are not?’
‘Why, sir,’ she had said, laughing, ‘I have never been on a stage in my life.’
‘That’s of no account. You don’t need to tread the boards to play a part, we all do it from time to time. Do you tell me you have never had a fantasy, never pretended to be other than you are?’
‘I hadn’t thought of it like that.’
‘You speak up well. What do you do to earn a crust?’
He may have been speaking metaphorically, but to her a crust was all she did earn, and sometimes a little butter to put on it. ‘I am a seamstress,’ she said.
‘Are you good at it?’
‘Yes, sir. I did most of the stitching on the costume I have just delivered.’
‘Quick, are you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘How much do you earn?’
‘Six pounds a year, sir.’
He laughed. ‘I can double that.’
‘Oh, I do not think I can act, sir.’
‘I am not asking you to. Actresses are ten a penny, but good seamstresses are like gold dust. Would you like to join my troupe as a seamstress? Having work done outside is not always convenient.’
Maddy had not hesitated. The flamboyant life among stage folk appealed to her and, somewhere in the back of her mind, her sleeping ambition revived. If she wanted to better herself, to act a part for which she had not been born, then where better to learn it?
She had become a seamstress, sewing, mending and pressing costumes and from that had progressed to becoming a dresser for Marianne Doubleday, chatting to her in her dressing room, learning, learning all the time. She was quick and eager and when they discovered she could read, they gave her the job of prompter, so that when one of the cast fell ill, who better to take her place but Maddy, who already knew the lines? And so Madeleine Charron, actress, had been born.
But was it enough? Did it fulfil her dream? Was she still burning
