“Was it a good murder?” asked Serge.
“It was a horrible murder.”
The curtain was drawn. It showed some reluctance and had to be assisted by the King. Gertrude was the Fairy Gruffanuff, and Bennett Lawrie was Prince Bulbo, with a tenor song much too high for his light baritone voice.
The entertainment was very indifferent in quality, but it seemed to give great pleasure to the performers, especially to Bennett Lawrie, the Bottom of the company. He acted with extraordinary intensity. He seemed to have hypnotised himself into the belief that he was actually a Prince, so that he was extremely comic and yet very pathetic. His legs were very thin, large at the knees and more than a little bowed, and in his pink tights they looked enormously long—a figure of fun, and yet he was compelling and quixotically heroic. He was right out of the picture, and nothing else in it seemed to exist for him. When he was on the stage nothing else existed for his audience of two. He had naturally the gift of making his personality surge over the footlights into the auditorium, and he seemed to exult in the exercise of his power without in the least caring what he did with it. Serge admired him, but on the whole disliked his exhibition. He whispered to his father:
“Sheer blatant egoism.”
“Who?”
“That boy.”
“He’s very funny. Queer, he never says a word when he comes to the house. He is preternaturally solemn and always looks as though he were on the point of bursting into tears.”
“I’ve seen many young men like that here. I fancy they don’t get enough to eat.”
Bennett appeared on the stage again, and Francis began to shake with laughter at his antics. A moment later and he was brushing a tear-drop from his nose.