Tipping the Velvet Read online

  Alice and I visited the Palace on the very first night of Gully Sutherland’s week. By this time we had an arrangement with the lady in the ticket-booth: we gave her a nod and a smile as we arrived, then sauntered past her window and chose any seat in the hall beyond that we fancied. Usually, this was somewhere in the gallery. I could never understand the attraction of the stalls ticket; it seemed unnatural to me to seat oneself below the stage, and have to peer up at the artistes from a level somewhere near their ankles, through the faint, shimmering haze of heat that rose above the footlights. The circle gave a better view, but the gallery, though further away, to my mind gave the best of all; and there were two seats in the front row, at the very centre of the gallery, that Alice and I particular favoured. Here you knew yourself to be not just at a show but in a theatre: you caught the shape of the stage and the sweep of the seats; and you marvelled to see your neighbours’ faces, and to know your own to be like theirs - all queerly lit by the glow of the footlights, and damp at the lip, and with a grin upon it, like that of a demon at some hellish revue.

  It was certainly as hot as hell in the Canterbury Palace on Gully Sutherland’s opening night - so hot that, when Alice and I leaned over the gallery rail to gaze at the audience below, we were met by a blast of tobacco- and sweat-scented air, that made us reel and cough. The theatre, as Tony’s uncle had calculated, was almost full; yet it was strangely hushed. People spoke in murmurs, or not at all. When one looked from the gallery to the circle and the stalls, one saw only the flap of hats and programmes. The flapping didn’t stop when the orchestra struck up its few bars of overture and the house lights dimmed; but it slowed a little, and people sat up rather straighter in their seats. The hush of fatigue became a silence of expectation.

  The Palace was an old-fashioned music hall and, like many such places in the 1880s, still employed a chairman. This, of course, was Tricky himself: he sat at a table between the stalls and the orchestra and introduced the acts, and called for order if the crowd became too rowdy, and led us in toasts to the Queen. He had a top-hat and a gavel - I have never seen a chairman without a gavel - and a mug of porter. On his table stood a candle: this was kept lit for as long as there were artistes upon the stage, but it was extinguished for the interval, and at the show’s close.

  Tricky was a plain-faced man with a very handsome voice - a voice like the sound of a clarinet, at once liquid and penetrating, and lovely to listen to. On the night of Sutherland’s first performance he welcomed us to his show and promised us an evening’s entertainment we would never forget. Had we lungs? he asked. We must be prepared to use them! Had we feet, and hands? We must make ready to stamp, and clap! Had we sides? They would be split! Tears? We would shed buckets of them! Eyes?

  ‘Stretch’ em, now, in wonder! Orchestra, please. Limes-men, if you will.’ He struck the table with his gavel - clack! - so that the candle-flame dipped. ‘I give you, the marvellous, the musical, the very, very merry, Merry’ - he struck the table again - ‘Randalls!’

  The curtain quivered, then rose. There was a seaside backdrop to the stage and, upon the boards themselves, real sand; and over this strolled four gay figures in holiday gear: two ladies - one dark, one fair - with parasols; and two tall gents, one with a ukulele on a strap. They sang ‘All the Girls are Lovely by the Seaside’, very nicely; then the ukulele player did a solo, and the ladies lifted their skirts for a spot of soft-shoe dancing on the sand. For a first turn, they were good. We cheered them; and Tricky thanked us very graciously for our appreciation.

  The next act was a comedian, the next a mentalist - a lady in evening dress and gloves, who stood blindfolded upon the stage while her husband moved among the audience with a slate, inviting people to write numbers and names upon it with a piece of chalk, for her to guess.

  ‘Imagine the number floating through the air in flames of scarlet,’ said the man impressively, ‘and searing its way into my wife’s brain, through her brow.’ We frowned and squinted at the stage, and the lady staggered a little, and raised her hands to her temples.

  ‘The Power,’ she said, ‘it is very strong tonight. Ah, I feel it burning!’

  After this there was an acrobatic troupe - three men in spangles who turned somersaults through hoops, and stood on one another’s shoulders. At the climax of their act they formed a kind of human loop, and rolled about the stage to a tune from the orchestra. We clapped at that; but it was too hot for acrobatics, and there was a general shuffling and whispering throughout this act, as boys were sent with orders to the bar, and returned with bottles and glasses and mugs that had to be handed, noisily, down the rows, past heads and laps and grasping fingers. I glanced at Alice: she had removed her hat and was fanning herself with it, and her cheeks were very red. I pushed my own little bonnet to the back of my head, leaned upon the rail before me with my chin upon my knuckles, and closed my eyes. I heard Tricky rise and call for silence with his gavel.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he cried, ‘a little treat for you now. A little bit of helegance and top-drawer style. If you’ve champagne in your glasses’ - there was an ironical cheering at this - ‘raise them now. If you’ve beer - why, beer’s got bubbles, don’t it? Raise that too! Above all, raise your voices, as I give to you, direct from the Phoenix Theatre, Dover, our very own Kentish swell, our diminutive Faversham masher ... Miss Kitty’ - clack! -‘Butler!’

  There was a burst of handclapping and a few damp whoops. The orchestra struck up with some jolly number, and I heard the creak and whisper of the rising curtain. All unwillingly I opened my eyes - then I opened them wider, and lifted my head. The heat, my weariness, were quite forgotten. Piercing the shadows of the naked stage was a single shaft of rosy limelight, and in the centre of this there was a girl: the most marvellous girl - I knew it at once! - that I had ever seen.

  Of course, we had had male impersonator turns at the Palace before; but in 1888, in the provincial halls, the masher acts were not the things they are today. When Nelly Power had sung ‘The Last of the Dandies’ to us six months before she had worn tights and bullion fringe, just like a ballet-girl - only carried a cane and a billycock hat to make her boyish. Kitty Butler did not wear tights or spangles. She was, as Tricky had billed her, a kind of perfect West-End swell. She wore a suit - a handsome gentleman’s suit, cut to her size, and lined at the cuffs and the flaps with flashing silk. There was a rose in her lapel, and lavender gloves at her pocket. From beneath her waistcoat shone a stiff-fronted shirt of snowy white, with a stand-up collar two inches high. Around the collar was a white bow-tie; and on her head there was a topper. When she took the topper off - as she did now to salute the audience with a gay ‘Hallo!’ - one saw that her hair was perfectly cropped.

  It was the hair, I think, which drew me most. If I had ever seen women with hair as short as hers, it was because they had spent time in hospital or prison; or because they were mad. They could never have looked like Kitty Butler. Her hair fitted her head like a little cap that had been sewn, just for her, by some nimble-fingered milliner. I would say it was brown; brown, however, is too dull a word for it. It was, rather, the kind of brown you might hear sung about - a nut-brown, or a russet. It was almost, perhaps, the colour of chocolate - but then chocolate has no lustre, and this hair shone in the blaze of the limes like taffeta. It curled at her temple, slightly, and over her ears; and when she turned her head a little to put her hat back on, I saw a strip of pale flesh at the nape of her neck where the collar ended and the hairline began that - for all the fire of the hot, hot hall - made me shiver.

  She looked, I suppose, like a very pretty boy, for her face was a perfect oval, and her eyes were large and dark at the lashes, and her lips were rosy and full. Her figure, too, was boy-like and slender - yet rounded, vaguely but unmistakably, at the bosom, the stomach, and the hips, in a way no real boy’s ever was; and her shoes, I noticed after a moment, had two-inch heels to them. But she strode like a boy, and stood like one, with her feet far apart and her hands t
hrust carelessly into her trouser pockets, and her head at an arrogant angle, at the very front of the stage; and when she sang, her voice was a boy’s voice - sweet and terribly true.

  Her effect upon that over-heated hall was wonderful. Like me, my neighbours all sat up, and gazed at her with shining eyes. Her songs were all well-chosen ones - things like ‘Drink Up, Boys!’, and ‘Sweethearts and Wives’, which the likes of G. H. Macdermott had already made famous, and with which we could all, in consequence, join in - though it was peculiarly thrilling to have them sung to us, not by a gent, but by a girl, in neck-tie and trousers. In between each song she addressed herself, in a swaggering, confidential tone, to the audience, and exchanged little bits of nonsense with Tricky Reeves at his chairman’s table. Her speaking voice was like her singing one - strong and healthy, and wonderfully warm upon the ear. Her accent was sometimes music-hall cockney, sometimes theatrical-genteel, sometimes pure broad Kent.

  Her set lasted no longer than the customary fifteen minutes or so, but she was cheered and shouted back on to the stage at the end of that time twice over. Her final song was a gentle one - a ballad about roses and a lost sweetheart. As she sang she removed her hat and held it to her bosom; then she pulled the flower from her lapel and placed it against her cheek, and seemed to weep a little. The audience, in sympathy, let out one huge collective sigh, and bit their lips to hear her boyish tones grow suddenly so tender.

  All at once, however, she raised her eyes and gazed at us over her knuckles: we saw that she wasn’t weeping at all, but smiling - and then, suddenly, winking, hugely and roguishly. Very swiftly she stepped once again to the front of the stage, and gazed into the stalls for the prettiest girl. When she found her, she raised her hand and the rose went flying over the shimmer of the footlights, over the orchestra-pit, to land in the pretty girl’s lap.

  We went wild for her then. We roared and stamped and she, all gallant, raised her hat to us and, waving, took her leave. We called for her, but there were no more encores. The curtain fell, the orchestra played; Tricky struck his gavel upon his table, blew out his candle, and it was the interval.

  I peered, blinking, into the seats below, trying to catch sight of the girl who had been thrown the flower. I could not think of anything more wonderful, at that moment, than to receive a rose from Kitty Butler’s hand.

  I had gone to the Palace, like everyone else that night, to see Gully Sutherland; but when he made his appearance at last - mopping his brow with a giant spotted handkerchief, complaining about the Canterbury heat and sending the audience into fits of sweaty laughter with his comical songs and his face-pulling - I found that, after all, I hadn’t the heart for him. I wished only that Miss Butler would stride upon the stage again, to fix us with her elegant, arrogant gaze - to sing to us about champagne, and shouting ‘Hurrah!’ at the races. The thought made me restless. At last Alice - who was laughing at Gully’s grimaces as loudly as everybody else - put her mouth to my ear: ‘What’s up with you?’

  ‘I’m hot,’ I said; and then: ‘I’m going downstairs.’ And while she sat on for the rest of the turn, I went slowly down to the empty lobby - there to stand with my cheek against the cool glass of the door, and to sing again, to myself, Miss Butler’s song, ‘Sweethearts and Wives’.

  Soon there came the roars and stamps that meant the end of Gully’s set; and after a moment Alice appeared, still fanning herself with her bonnet, and blowing at the dampened curls which clung to her pink cheeks. She gave me a wink: ‘Let’s call on Tony.’ I followed her to his little room, and sat and idly twisted in the chair behind his desk, while he stood with his arm about her waist. There was a bit of chat about Mr Sutherland and his spotted handkerchief; then, ‘What about that Kitty Butler, eh?’ said Tony. ‘Ain’t she a smasher? If she carries on tickling the crowd like she did tonight, I tell you, Uncle’ll be extending her contract till Christmas.’

  At that I stopped my twirling. ‘She’s the best turn I ever saw,’ I said, ‘here or anywhere! Tricky would be a fool to let her go: you tell him from me.’ Tony laughed, and said he would be sure to; but as he said it I saw him wink at Alice, then let his gaze dally, rather spoonily, over her lovely face.

  I looked away, and sighed, and said quite guilelessly: ‘Oh, I do wish that I might see Miss Butler again!’

  ‘And so you shall,’ said Alice, ‘on Saturday.’ We had all planned to come to the Palace - Father, Mother, Davy, Fred, everyone - on Saturday night. I plucked at my glove.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘But Saturday seems so very far away ...’

  Tony laughed again. ‘Well, Nance, and who said you had to wait so long? You can come tomorrow night if you like - and any other night you please, so far as I’m concerned. And if there ain’t a seat for you in the gallery, why, we’ll put you in a box at the side of the stage, and you can gaze at Miss Butler to your heart’s content from there!’

  He spoke, I’m sure, to impress my sister; but my heart gave a strange kind of twist at his words. I said, ‘Oh, Tony, do you really mean it?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And really in a box?’

  ‘Why not? Between you and me, the only customers we ever get for those seats are the Wood family and the Plushes. You sit in a box, and make sure the audience gets a look at you: it might give them ideas above their station.’

  ‘It might give Nancy ideas above her station,’ said Alice. ‘We couldn’t have that.’ Then she laughed, as Tony tightened his grip about her waist and leaned to kiss her.

  It would not have been quite the thing, I suppose, for city girls to go to music halls unchaperoned; but people weren’t so very prim about things like that in Whitstable. Mother only gave a frown and a mild tut-tut when I spoke, next day, of returning to the Palace; Alice laughed and declared that I was mad: she wouldn’t come with me, she said, to sit all night in the smoke and the heat for the sake of a glimpse of a girl in trousers - a girl whose turn we had seen and songs we had listened to not four-and-twenty hours before.

  I was shocked by her carelessness, but secretly rather glad at the thought of gazing again at Miss Butler, all alone. I was also more thrilled than I cared to let on by Tony’s promise that I might sit in a box. For my trip to the theatre the night before I had worn a rather ordinary dress; now, however - it had been a slow day in the Parlour, and Father let us shut the shop at six - I put on my Sunday frock, the frock I usually wore to go out walking in with Freddy. Davy whistled when I came down all dressed up; and there were one or two boys who tried to catch my eye all through the ride to Canterbury. But I knew myself - for this one night, at least! - apart from them. When I reached the Palace I nodded to the ticket-girl, as usual; but then I left my favourite gallery seat for someone else to sweat in, and made my way to the side of the stage, to a chair of gilt and scarlet plush. And here - rather unnervingly exposed, as it turned out, before the idle, curious or envious gaze of the whole, restless hall - here I sat, while the Merry Randalls shuffled to the same songs as before, the comic told his jokes, the mentalist staggered, the acrobats dived.

  Then Tricky bade us welcome, once again, our very own Kentish swell ... and I held my breath.

  This time, when she called ‘Hallo!’ the crowd replied with a great, genial roar: word must have spread, I think, of her success. My view of her now, of course, was side-on and rather queer; but when she strode, as before, to the front of the stage it seemed to me her step was lighter - as if the admiration of the audience lent her wings. I leaned towards her, my fingers hard upon the velvet of my unfamiliar seat. The boxes at the Palace were very close to the stage: all the time she sang, she was less than twenty feet away from me. I could make out all the lovely details of her costume - the watch-chain, looped across the buttons of her waistcoat, the silver links that fastened her cuffs - that I had missed from my old place up in the gallery.

  I saw her features, too, more clearly. I saw her ears, which were rather small and unpierced. I saw her lips - saw, now, that they were not n
aturally rosy, but had of course been carmined for the footlights. I saw that her teeth were creamy-white ; and that her eyes were brown as chocolate, like her hair.

  Because I knew what to expect from her set - and because I spent so much time watching her, rather than listening to her songs - it seemed over in a moment. She was called back, once again, for two encores, and she finished, as before, with the sentimental ballad and the tossing of the rose. This time I saw who caught it: a girl in the third row, a girl in a straw hat with feathers on it, and a dress of yellow satin that was cut at the shoulders and showing her arms. A lovely girl I had never seen before but felt ready at that moment to despise!

  I looked back to Kitty Butler. She had her topper raised and was making her final, sweeping salute. Notice me, I thought. Notice me! I spelled the words in my head in scarlet letters, as the husband of the mentalist had advised, and sent them burning into her forehead like a brand. Notice me!

  She turned. Her eyes flicked once my way, as if to note only that the box, empty last night, was occupied now; and then she ducked beneath the dropping crimson of the curtain and was gone.

  Tricky blew out his candle.

  ‘Well,’ said Alice a little later, as I stepped into our parlour - our real parlour, not the oyster-house downstairs - ‘and how was Kitty Butler tonight?’

  ‘Just the same as last night, I should think, said Father.

  ‘Not at all,’ I said, pulling off my gloves. ‘She was even better.’

  ‘Even better, my word! If she carries on like that, just think how good she’ll be by Saturday!’

  Alice gazed at me, her lip twitching. ‘D’you think you can wait till then, Nancy?’ she asked.

  ‘I can,’ I said with a show of carelessness, ‘but I’m not sure that I shall.’ I turned to my mother, who sat sewing by the empty grate. ‘You won’t mind, will you,’ I said lightly, ‘if I go back again tomorrow night?’