“Everyone bangin’ about so,” said the lady. “What about a drink now? Rot waitin’.”
“Sorry,” said Philip. “Got an engagement. Very important—” The lady, however, had suddenly recognised an old friend. “Why, Charlie!” Henry heard her say: “Who ever ...”
They sat down on a sofa near the bar and watched the group. Henry was thinking: “He spoke to her as though he had known her all his life....” He was suddenly aware that he and his father and mother and aunts, yes, and Katherine too were babies compared with Philip. “Why, they don’t know anything about him. Katherine doesn’t know anything really....” He watched the women who passed him; he watched their confidential whispers with gentlemen who all seemed to have red faces and bulging necks. He watched two old men with their hats cocked to one side; they had faces like dusty strawberries, and they wore white gloves and carried silver-topped canes. They didn’t speak, and nothing moved in their faces except their eyes. He watched a woman who was angry and a man who was apologetic. He watched a girl in a simple black dress who stood with grave, waiting eyes. She suddenly smiled a welcome to someone, but the smile was hard, practised, artificial, as though she had fastened it on like a mask. Philip belonged to these people; he knew their ways, their talk, their etiquette, their tragedies and comedies. Henry stared at him, at his gaze, rather uninterested and tired. (Philip, at that moment, was thinking of Katherine, of the bore that her young brother was: he was remembering the last time that she had kissed him, of her warm cheek against his, of a little laugh that she had given, a laugh of sheer happiness, of trusting, confident delight.) Henry sat there, frightened, thrilled, shocked, proud, indignant and terribly inquisitive. “I’m beginning to know about life. Already I know more than they do at home.”
Two boys who must have been younger than he passed him; they were smart, shining, scornful. They had the derisive, incurious gaze of old men, and also the self-assertive swagger of very young ones. Henry, as he looked at them, knew that he was a babe in arms compared with them; but it seemed to him to-night that all his family was still in the cradle. “Why, even father,” he thought, “if you brought him here I don’t believe he’d know what to say or do.”
They went downstairs, then found their seats, and the curtain rose on the ballet. The ballet was concerned with pirates and Venice in the good Old Days. The first scene was on an island in the Adriatic: there were any number of pirates and ladies who loved them, and the sun slowly set and the dancers on the golden sand sank, exhausted, at the feet of their lovers, and the moon rose and the stars came out in a purple sky. Then the Pirate Chief, an enormous Byronic figure with hair jet black and tremendous eyebrows, explained through his hands, that there was a lady in Venice whom he loved, whom he must seize and convey to his island. Would his brave fellows follow him in his raid? His brave fellows would! One last dance and one last drink, then death and glory! The curtain came down upon figures whirling madly beneath the moon.
There followed then the Doge’s Palace, a feast with much gold plate, aged senators with white beards, who watched the dancing with critical gaze, finally a lovely lady who danced mysteriously beneath many veils. She was, it appeared, a Princess, sought in marriage by the Doge, her heart, however, lost utterly to a noble Stranger whom she had once seen but never forgotten. The Doge, mad with love for her, orders her to be seized. She is carried off, wildly protesting, and the golden scene is filled with white dancers, then with fantastic masked figures, at last with dancers in black, who float like shadows through the mazes of the music.
The third scene is the Piazza. The country people have a holiday—drinking and dancing. Then enters a magnificent procession, the Doge leading his reluctant bride. Suddenly shouts are heard. It is the Pirates! A furious fight follows, the Pirates, headed by their chief, who wears a black mask, are, of course, victorious. The Princess is carried, screaming, to the Pirates’ ship, treasure is looted, pretty village maidens are captured. The Pirates sail away. Last scene is the Island again. The ladies are expecting their heroes, the vessel is sighted, the Pirates land. There are dances of triumph, the spoil, golden goblets, rich tapestries, gleaming jewels are piled high, finally the captive lady Princess, who weeps bitterly, is led by the Chieftain, still masked, into the middle of the stage. She, upon her knees, begs for pity. He is stern (a fine melancholy figure). At last he removes the mask. Behold, it is the noble Stranger! With what rapture does she fall into his arms, with what dances are the triumphant Pirates made happy, upon what feasting does the sun again set. The moon rises and the stars appear. Finally, when the night-sky is sheeted with dazzling lights and the moon is orange-red, the Pirates and their ladies creep away. Only the Chieftain and his Princess, locked in one another’s arms, are left. Someone, in the distance, pipes a little tune ... the curtain descends.
Impossible to describe the effect that this had upon Henry. The nearest approach to its splendour in all his life before had been the Procession of Nations at the end of the Drury Lane pantomime, and, although he had found that very beautiful, he had nevertheless been disturbed by a certain sense of incongruity, Aladdin and his Princess having little to do with Canada and Australia represented, as those fine countries were, by two stout ladies of the Lane chorus. I think that this “Pirate” ballet may be said to be the Third Crisis in this critical development of Henry, the first being the novel about the Forest, the second his vision of Katherine and Philip.
It will be, perhaps, remembered that at Jules’ restaurant Henry had drunk champagne and, because of his misery and confusion there, had had no consciousness of flavour, quantity or consequences. It was certainly the champagne that lent “The Pirate” an added colour and splendour.
As the boy followed Philip into Leicester Square he felt that any achievement would be now possible to him, any summit was to be climbed by him. The lights of Leicester Square circled him with fire—at the flame’s heart were dark trees soft and mysterious against the night sky—beneath these trees, guarded by the flame, the Pirate and the Princess slept.