Jimmy Quixote: A Novel

by Tom Gallon

Mr. Bennett Godsby was a small, spare man, with a rather lined face, and with deep-set eyes; he seemed to look Jimmy over carefully while he talked to him. The talk was difficult, because it was interrupted every now and then by Mr. Godsby himself, when he stood up to shout at the stage, and by various people who came from time to time into the row of stalls behind, and whispered to Mr. Godsby over his shoulder.

"Well, Mr. Larrance—I'm very glad to see you," he said. "Perhaps my letter was a little impulsive," he went on, with an indulgent smile—"but then I am nothing if not impulsive; it's the life, you know. But there is something in your book that seems to appeal to me; something in that particular character that seems to move me. Have you had any experience with stage work?"

Jimmy was learning wisdom; Jimmy was giving over that habit of showing his hand on all occasions. Now he shrugged his shoulders, and spoke with what carelessness he might.

"I have studied it a great deal—from an outside point of view," he said. "You see, I am still rather—rather young."

"That is in your favour," said the other, with another smile. "Now, how does your work appeal to you in the sense of a play? Have you, for instance, thought of me in regard to it at all?"

Jimmy, again with wisdom, said that the idea had certainly occurred to him, and that he thought Mr. Bennett Godsby would be the one man to interpret the character. Mr. Godsby nodded, and smiled; then suddenly started up in a fury, and roared out at the young man on the stage:

"What in the world have you got those people up there for?" he shouted. "Take 'em all back; show 'em exactly what I showed you yesterday. How do you think I'm going to make that entrance through that crowd, when they're all fighting together up in that corner? And teach 'em how to jeer; remember they've got to jeer at me at the beginning of that scene, or it goes for nothing." Absolute silence on the stage, while the pale young man craned his neck over the footlights, and nodded emphatically, and looked more anxious than ever. "Oh, my God!" concluded Mr. Bennett Godsby, as he sank back into his stall—"the amount of work that I have to do with you people, because you won't remember from one day to the other——There—get on—get on, please!"

"Now, Mr. Larrance—what was I saying? Oh, to be sure—I wanted to know whether you had thought of me; and it seems you have. Very well, then—do you think that it is possible for you to make a play out of this—or have you already done anything in the way of a play with it?"

On Jimmy confessing that he had not yet done anything with it, the actor pulled a long face; on Jimmy assuring him that it would not take very long, his face lengthened still more. But it came at last to the point that the great man stated, in urgent whispers, what he was prepared to do.

Jimmy was to set about and prepare that extraordinary thing known as a "synopsis"; was to set out, act by act, and scene by scene, what the play was to be; and, on that proving satisfactory, was to have twenty pounds. After that, on the completion of the play, another twenty—and there was to be a small percentage every time it was played.