It was hot in London, dense and languid, but in Edinburgh the sunshine was glassy, spiked with ice. Nell shivered in her summer clothes, her sandals clacking against cobbles as she scrutinised the festival map. She turned it round, traced the emerald oblong of the park, the straight avenue of Princes Street, the Royal Mile in narrow parallel above it, and then, no clearer, she folded it into her pocket and prepared to climb the steep grey hill that led up towards the castle. By the time she reached the top the breeze had turned her legs to goosebumps and her heels were nicked and torn. She pulled the map out again, puzzled over it, attempted to fill in the missing, theatre-less streets, even asked directions from a passer-by, a man in a tartan beret, who turned out to be Danish. ‘It’s all right, don’t worry,’ she called, as he began to unfurl his own unwieldy map, and she hurried on, cutting between the houses, dragging her bag down a steep gulley of steps and then hauling it up again until she emerged in a crescent of tall houses. It was cooler than ever amidst so much stone, and the air smelt sweet and bitter as if something were being brewed up in a giant pot. Below her fell another flight of steps and from here she could see the gauge of the railway line she’d left behind, with trains like glinting streams, the rails as sleek as silver. Carefully she made her way towards it, thinking she’d start again, and found herself unexpectedly in the road that she’d been searching for, and there, halfway along, was the venue – MacDillons.
MacDillons looked closed and shabby, its neon sign switched off, but when she leant against the door it opened. Inside were shapes and shadows, and the pale moon of a woman’s face, rushing towards her as the door fell back. ‘Shhh,’ her hands flew up as wood and metal crashed, too late, and then noticing her bag, the woman softened. ‘We’re about to start the run-through. You must be Nell. Come in. Sit down.’
There were four actors in the play, two men and two women, and they were all American. They circled around each other, flirting, worrying, caught up in lies and misunderstandings and occasional simulated acts of sex. There was a tall, lolloping actor and a short neat one, and each time they stood beside each other, it was impossible not to laugh. The women regarded these men with pity, confiding in each other that they might have married the wrong people, but all the same, when one woman tested out this theory with the other’s husband, it led to a mighty scene of retribution which involved the small actor huddling naked in an oversized bed, while the two women hurled objects at each other, and then, when he tried to intervene, at him. A cushion, a book, and a lethal-looking stiletto, which he managed to dodge before being rescued by his friend – a frilly pink nightie hiding his vanity as he was carried swooning from the stage.
‘Well done. All of you. Well done!’ The beaming director stepped out of the shadows, the lights came on, and applauding people uncurled from the darkness.
Nell stood beside her bag and clapped, and when that no longer seemed appropriate she pretended to be transfixed by the set. ‘Aha, can this be Nell? Our budding actress?’ The director had spotted her. He was a short, balding man, with a warm handshake. ‘I’m Dominic, we spoke on the phone.’
‘Yes.’ Nell imagined he was comparing her to Hettie, who’d had this same job the year before. Handing out leaflets, running the box office, charming them all, Nell imagined, with her filthy sense of humour and her brazen smile. They’d asked her again, but Hettie’s mother was ill and she’d gone back to Leeds to help take care of her.
‘So . . .’ Dominic looked round. ‘You haven’t met your partner in crime yet, have you?’ and he called to a pale blonde girl, tall, in sneakers and white jeans, talking to the lolloping actor. ‘Cath. Over here a minute.’
The two girls greeted each other, and even while they smiled, Nell felt a pang of fear that she and Cath had not a single thing in common.
‘Right.’ Dominic rubbed his hands. ‘This man here will tell you what to do.’ He pointed to the stage manager, who nodded gruffly. ‘If you listen to him, you’ll get along fine. We need you to drum up business, hand out leaflets, put up posters, walk the streets, sell your bodies if you think it’ll help.’ He gave a snorting sort of chuckle. ‘Basically, do whatever it takes to get bums on seats.’
Nell and Cath both nodded. ‘So . . .’ Nell began, but Cath had turned away.
The actresses had changed out of their costumes, and now they moved breezily across the room, their long boots swishing under skirts, their arms weighed down with bags. ‘Sorry we can’t stay and have supper.’ They embraced their director – so self-assured and professional, and neither of them in fact American. ‘But we’re going back to our digs to work on that monster of a bloody scene.’
‘You’ll be marvellous.’ Dominic kissed them both. ‘You are marvellous,’ and once they were gone, he looked round for the men. ‘Snakeskin should be here in half an hour,’ he told them. ‘Once they arrive we’ll go and find somewhere to eat. Make them feel welcome.’ He eyed Nell and Cath: ‘I hope you girls will come along too, but in the meantime, if you could stack the rest of those chairs, and if there’s a broom somewhere . . . this place turns into a nightclub in an hour.’
The stage manager handed Nell a broom and went back to his clipboard, checking items off with a pencil as he collected up the props. She and Cath glanced at each other and together they trailed the room, gathering up the scattered chairs, stacking them into the corner, sweeping the dust-black floor. Dominic and the short, neat actor, Kyle, sat at the bar and opened wine. They hunched together and talked in great earnest about what worked and what didn’t about the play, while Nell wondered what training Kyle had had and if he knew about the six basic character types, the conscious and unconscious states, and why so far at Drama Arts, no one had mentioned the importance of learning to do an American accent.
‘Girls,’ the tall actor, Richard, was calling to them, ‘if you’re finished, come and have a drink,’ and so they went and stood over by the bar while Dominic poured out warm white wine. ‘Here’s to us.’ He raised his glass. ‘Cheers.’
Snakeskin didn’t arrive till late. They’d called in from a service station to say their engine had overheated not far from the border. If they were careful they’d most probably make it without having to stop again.
‘Where will we eat?’ Richard asked, concerned. ‘They’re bound to be starving.’ But Dominic waved his glass and said they’d find somewhere. ‘There’s a little Italian on the corner. We can go there.’
They opened more wine and waited, perched on red velvet seats, watching as the nightclub staff arrived and adjusted the lighting, bathing the room in pools of pink. They tested the strobe above the dance floor, dimming the spots around the bar, so that finally, when the music blasted on, Dominic conceded defeat, and heaving himself up, bustled everyone out.
It was freezing on the street, the sun long gone, the sky grey with fading light. ‘Smell the sea air.’ Dominic pointed his nose east, and they all turned to stare into the distance where the sea apparently lay. Nell shivered. All she could smell was the baking of potatoes from a Tasty Tatty booth at the end of the road. Her stomach contracted with hunger. ‘Shouldn’t be long now,’ Dominic said, and Nell wondered if she should unzip the bag at her feet and pull on a jacket and a pair of socks. I’ll hold on, she decided, and she tucked her hands under her arms for warmth.
The mini-van hooted as it turned the corner. It rattled slowly over the cobbles, its windows rolled down, heads and hands stuck out. ‘Yoohoo,’ voices called. ‘We’re here! We made it.’
‘Well done!’ Dominic strode towards the van. ‘Welcome,’ and he yanked open the door. A tall boy staggered out, his legs stiff at the hips. He stood for a moment, grinning, and then he leant back in and pulled out two grey crutches. Next came a girl, delicate, in a delicate pink shirt, pushing a white stick before her, its fine end feeling for the pavement, sending small vibrating messages up to her white hand. The driver was unpacking a wheelchair from the back, and when he had it ready, he lifted out a man. The man seemed older than the others, with a proud dark face, long arms and huge, strong hands. The driver lifted him under his arms, and as he swung free of the van, Nell saw he had no legs. Instead of legs there were two bare feet protruding from a rolled-up pair of shorts. The feet were twisted, set at an odd angle, their soles turned upwards like palms.
‘Anish, my friend,’ Dominic exclaimed. ‘Good to see you.’
Anish swept the welcoming party with his large black eyes. ‘Good to have finally fucking arrived.’
‘Are you all starving? What a journey that must have been.’
The driver was unpacking another wheelchair, and this time Dominic helped him as they shifted an older girl on to the stretched seat. ‘Helen,’ he said. ‘Welcome.’ And white-faced with exhaustion Helen nodded her thanks.
Now everyone was out they set off along the street, the driver pushing one wheelchair, Dominic the other, the tall boy lunging forward, the girl beside him, nosing her stick over the stones.
‘Shit.’ Dominic held open the door to the Italian restaurant, behind which was a steep flight of steps leading into a basement. ‘Wait one minute. I’ll see if there’s any other way in.’ He appeared a moment later. ‘Sorry, folks. Onwards. No wheelchair access here.’ The party rolled downhill, craning their eyes for somewhere open. They found a bistro, its menu up in the window, and they crowded round, reading it for the blind girl, Amelia, and for Anish and Helen, neither of whom could see that high. ‘Anything vegetarian?’ Amelia asked, but when they pushed open the door, a waitress hurried out to say that no, it was impossible, they were about to close, and anyway they didn’t have the . . . amenities. She drew back, appalled, her eyes swerving away from the huddle of figures, taking one more look, despite herself, as she caught sight of Anish’s bare brown flipper feet resting on the canvas seat of his chair.
‘Don’t feel bad.’ Anish shrugged as the door chimed shut. ‘We’re used to terrifying the non crips,’ and he spun his own wheels in his hands, and led the party on. They attempted two other places, a pub that was already full, and a fish and chip restaurant, the door of which was too narrow to fit a chair through.
‘Anyone fancy a baked potato?’ Dominic asked, embarrassed, but Anish screeched to a stop. ‘Now you’re talking!’ And he began to heave back up the hill, while the others, heady with enthusiasm, hurried along beside him, chatting, laughing, telling jokes, flanked by the members of Dominic’s company, mindful of the tangle of grey metal, the wheels and the thin white stick. ‘On me, on me, ladies and gentlemen.’ Dominic was the first to arrive at the counter. ‘Whatever filling you like. Don’t hold back, caviar, foie gras . . .’ An air of supreme satisfaction settled over the party as, warm from their hike, they ate out on the street, scooping prawn cocktail and egg mayonnaise, cheese and beans, salad and tuna out of the hot buttery baked potato cases.
Nell’s flat was up by the castle, on the top floor of a house whose front door opened, sideways, on to a sheer drop of steps. It had an unlived-in feel – with bare boards, cheap, undersized furniture, and in the sitting room, a row of curtainless windows facing the castle ramparts, through which shortly after eleven a burst of fireworks exploded into the sky. It was the culmination of the Edinburgh Tattoo, a spectacle of Scottish military might, kilts and sporrans, and bagpipe-players, marchers and drummers and flag-wavers, which took place every night. Nell stood at the window and watched the night sky crack open with a volley of rockets, their red and green flares ascending, the sparks falling into the ravine below. New flares went up, silver and blue, leaping like fountains, hissing and whirring, and then the rockets cracked again, shivering the window panes, echoing in the near empty rooms.
Nell waited till it was over before going to bed. She and Cath were sharing a room, and as she lay reading, she watched Cath undressing out of the corner of one eye. Perfect, flawless, a head girl in white knickers and sports bra, a Snoopy on her thigh-length T-shirt, the faint smell of peach as she folded her clothes. Nell turned away. They had to be at the theatre by 10 the next morning. The show was opening for its first performance at 5. She let the book fall from her hands and just as she drifted into sleep she saw the horrified face of the waitress rushing towards her. ‘We don’t have the amenities.’ The woman’s voice was high, and then there were Anish’s blazing eyes as he spun away from the closed door.
Armed with bundles of slippery new leaflets, Nell and Cath trawled the city, jostling with jugglers and stilt-walkers, clowns, contortionists and fire-eaters, to thrust adverts for A Hell of a Marriage into the hands of passers-by. They walked from the Castle down to Hollyrood Palace, across to the Grassmarket and along the high terrace of shops that curved into the hill. They walked across to Princes Street and found to their surprise that here, in this shopping street, there were people, local people, real people, who hardly knew there was a festival on at all. They stared in surprise at the proffered leaflets, exclaimed over the early starting time, and muttered that they’d be at work then, or fixing tea. Nell and Cath walked back through the park, stopping to admire the clock of flowers, its face planted with pansies and primulas, its large hand clunking heavily as it ticked. They passed the railway station, pushing leaflets into the newly arrived hands of visitors, watching them pityingly as if they’d lived here all their lives.
As lunchtime approached, they took a short cut to the theatre, climbing a cobbled ramp that led into the street above, and as if the city really was theirs now, and everyone in it, they saw the bright-shirted figure of Dominic, walking towards them. ‘Girls!’ he called, ‘good timing,’ and he pointed out a group of figures above them on the corner, turned in on themselves as if in consultation. ‘Why don’t you join Snakeskin for lunch? They’re going to try The Stag.’
‘Oh.’ Cath blushed. ‘I said I’d . . .’ she looked back towards MacDillons. ‘That I’d meet Richard . . .’
Nell and Dominic both looked at her. That was quick. But neither of them said it. ‘Nell. You free?’ Dominic patted her distractedly on the arm, and he nodded in the direction of the pub.
Nell swallowed. What would she be expected to do? To say? Her heart hammered high up in her chest, but even as she neared the group, she saw Anish turn and wheel himself through the double doors of the saloon bar, bursting them open like a cowboy in a film. Nell began to run, entering the pub just in time to see a solitary man pick up his pint and shuffle to the back of the room.
Snakeskin settled themselves around a cluster of small tables, adjusting their wheelchairs, laying down crutches and sticks. Nell sat on a spare stool. ‘Get us a pint of Guinness, would you?’ Anish pressed some money into her hand.
‘Anyone else?’ Nell could feel the place where Anish had touched her, the strength of his cool fingers, the callus on the pad of his thumb.
Amelia felt for her bag. ‘I’d love a lemonade, and a cheese toastie.’
‘I’m on toasties,’ David, the tall boy, insisted. ‘Toasties can’t spill,’ and leaving his sticks under the table he staggered to the bar.
There weren’t many people in the pub, but Nell could feel every inquisitive eye on them. Whenever she looked up, heads quivered and glances swerved. Snakeskin seemed oblivious. Their show was opening in three days. ‘I can’t see,’ Amelia started, ‘I mean I know I can’t see, God,’ the others giggled, ‘but what I mean,’ she was choking on her lemonade, ‘is how it’s going to work.’
‘It’s not going to,’ Anish cut in. ‘Unless we all make a superhuman fucking effort.’
‘I’m trying.’ David was defensive.
‘Yeah. Not hard enough.’ Anish stared him down. ‘Who says we do extra rehearsals from now on, every evening?’
Helen, a heavy girl, welded to her wheelchair, nodded. ‘I’m in.’
‘And me.’ Amelia tilted her head. Her blind blue eyes were opaque as cloud, wide-spaced and plaintive in her heart-shaped face. She had the look of an old-fashioned minstrel, a lute-player from a ballad. Nell found herself wondering if she knew that she was beautiful. If she sensed with her fine fingers the clothes she was choosing were the right light colours for her skin. David leant into her and whispered in her ear, his thin legs bent at an odd angle. ‘All right,’ he conceded. ‘If you think it’ll help. But I don’t want a repeat of Backerjack. I was ill afterwards for a month.’
‘You’ll be fine.’ Anish shrugged. ‘Be a man.’ And he held up his pint. ‘Cheers. Here’s to a Fringe First. Here’s to us.’
‘Cheers,’ the others agreed.
The toasties, when they finally came, were delicious, or maybe it was simply that there’d been nothing for breakfast in the Castle Terrace flat. Nell bit into hers, burning her tongue, soothing it with the cool swirls of cucumber arranged on a scattering of cress.
‘So,’ Nell looked up, ‘what’s your show about?’
Anish wiped the froth of Guinness from his top lip. ‘That’s a very good question.’
‘To be honest,’ David said, ‘we’re not quite sure.’
‘To be really honest,’ Helen added, ‘no one has any idea.’
‘Now children,’ Anish shook his head, ‘enough of that. There’s still time to re-cast rebels. There are plenty of other wannabe Snakeskins out there who’d kill for your jobs.’
‘Sure,’ said Amelia, ‘but it’s just getting them up here. It’s taken us most of the morning to find this pub.’ And she, David and Helen shook with laughter.
‘OK.’ Anish took another swallow of Guinness and turned to Nell. ‘It’s a sort of philosophical meditation . . . a soul-wrenching, but entertaining extravaganza, a rollercoaster journey . . .’
Nell nodded solemnly. ‘Right.’
‘Is it fuck.’ He grinned at her, and he drained the last of his Guinness. ‘Oh, I nearly forgot to give you these.’ He leant down and retrieved a brown paper package from a bag attached to his chair. ‘We’re relying on you now, for our audience.’
Nell saw that they were leaflets, at least 500 of them. She slipped her hand in and drew one out.
‘I don’t know about you lot,’ Anish stretched, ‘but I need another drink.’
‘Right.’ Nell stood up. ‘Anyone else?’
The others shook their heads.
‘Oh and another toastie, go on then.’ Anish smiled.
‘Greedy pig,’ Helen goaded him.
‘I’m a growing boy. What’s that expression? Oh yes.’ He winked at Nell. ‘I must have hollow legs.’
Before she could stop herself she laughed. ‘That’s terrible!’ She clapped a hand over her mouth, and turning away, hurried to the bar. As she waited for her order she glanced down at the leaflet.
Like nothing else you’ll see all year.
A new play by Snakeskin.
Don’t Look Away.
‘How was lunch?’ Cath asked her as they waited in a queue at the Fringe Office to collect any unsold tickets.
‘All right. How was . . . Richard?’
‘Nice.’ She frowned. ‘He wanted me to run through his lines. He’s really nervous about tonight.’
‘Really?’ Nell couldn’t imagine any of the cast of A Hell of a Marriage being nervous. They seemed so assured. She wondered if any of them had even needed drama school, or if they’d been born like that, swishing through life, saying darling, running over lines.
‘I’m definitely going to see Snakeskin when they open,’ Nell said.
Cath shivered. ‘What will it be like? I can’t imagine.’ She lowered her voice as the queue moved forward. ‘Just think.’ She wrapped her arms around herself. ‘If we’d been born a few years earlier . . .’
‘Yes.’ Nell exhaled. ‘My mother was sick as a dog when she was pregnant with me.’
‘They might have given her that pill too. Thalidomide.’ Cath’s face paled. ‘If she’d asked for it. Or even if she hadn’t.’
Yes, Nell thought. How odd that even if they had, she might still have wanted to be an actor. They shuffled forward in silence.
Fifty-five tickets had been sold for that night’s performance of A Hell of a Marriage. The venue held seventy and they might sell more on the door. ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we sold out on the first night?’ Cath said, and buoyed up with this thought they thrust spare leaflets into people’s hands, gaining in confidence, hollering as they went: ‘First night tonight. Be there or you’ll regret it. Only one hour long.’ With every leaflet they handed out, Nell included another one for Snakeskin, Don’t Look Away. And under the title, the picture of a snake, its mouth open, and out of its mouth, a perfect naked child.
Nell met up with Snakeskin again the next day for lunch. ‘How are rehearsals going?’
‘Bloody awful.’ Anish shook his head. ‘The show’s going to be a disaster.’
‘That’s not true,’ Helen put in. ‘You’re just such a perfectionist.’
‘Listen,’ Anish spat back. ‘People will be paying to see us from the day after tomorrow. It’s not a charity. It’s a theatre company. I don’t know about any of you, but I’m not after pity.’
They sat in silence. Nell wondered if there was anything she could do to help. She shook her head. She could offer to go through his lines?
‘Sweetheart,’ the touch of his hand startled her, ‘would you mind getting me a juice?’
‘No Guinness today?’
‘No, not today.’ He looked at her sadly.
David came too and ordered more toasties. ‘Don’t mind him, he’s . . .’ David paused. Nell waited expectantly. A frustrated genius? In terrible pain? David sighed. ‘A self-indulgent twat.’
Nell set the drink down in front of Anish. ‘You’ll be there on the first night, won’t you?’ He leant towards her, and she felt her heart quicken as his fingers grazed her hand.
Snakeskin were performing at a hall on the other side of the Grassmarket. Their show started at seven. Dominic and the actors headed off as soon as they were changed, but Nell and Cath had to stay and tidy up. Props had to be put away, chairs stacked, floors swept, the theatre left ready to be transformed into a nightclub.
‘Done?’ Nell called optimistically, but the stage manager wasn’t finished. He took a last look round, knelt down for a fleck of dust, found the weapon of the stiletto hidden behind a pillar and then, finally, reluctantly, let them go.
Nell ran, stopping occasionally to wait for Cath, glancing at her watch, dreading the thought she might be late. ‘Where are we?’ They’d reached the Grassmarket but there was no sign of the theatre. She looked round for someone to ask, consulted her flimsy, disintegrating map, and then remembering it was above the Grassmarket, they set off, climbing up towards the main road, pounding along the pavement, until they found themselves outside a church hall, a ramp over its steps, a large poster pasted across its noticeboard.
The hall was half full. Richard turned to wave at them, to wave at Cath, and he moved along the row of chairs to make room. The lights dimmed. There was silence and then Anish wheeled himself on. Slowly he circled the stage, a showman, sombre in his ring, his short broad body, his powerful arms, his face austere in the dim light and then, he spun around, straight on to the audience and grinned. The lights came up. The audience smiled back. It was audible. The relief. ‘Welcome, ladies and gentlemen.’ There was a dangerous glint in his black eye, a cruel twist of his mouth, and everyone sat back. It was clear he was in charge. Behind him, in a pool of light, Amelia began to sing. She let her eyes roll upwards as the pure high song poured out of her. Anish put one finger to his lips and slipped into the shadows and Helen, who’d appeared silently, slid from her wheelchair, and using her hands and the strong muscles of her shoulders she began to dance. She danced unlike any other. She rolled and arched and slithered. A mixture between break dance and ballet. David swung himself on. He stopped, and letting his crutches fall, he braced his legs and held his hands out to Helen, who lifted herself up like a mermaid. They danced in slow motion, their fingers interlinking, slipping, catching, turning, while Amelia stood behind them, her voice filling the hall, an angel singing, until just when the audience had fallen into a trance, Anish uncoiled a circus master’s rope and flicked it across the floor. It snapped, cracking, and the actors froze, a tableau of tenderness and beauty, just for a moment before the lights blacked and the low harsh thud of the bass began.
There was a party afterwards at Snakeskin’s flat. Dominic had provided beer and Ellie the wardrobe mistress was in the kitchen making sandwiches, pouring crisps into bowls.
Nell had to work her way through a crowd of admirers to get to Anish.
‘You were fantastic.’ She knelt down beside his chair and emboldened by the rapturous clapping and the glass of lager she’d gulped down, she took hold of his hand.
Anish almost crushed her fingers in his own. ‘Bloody amateurs, did you see David? He messed up a line in the car chase scene, just before the end.’
Nell stared at him. ‘You’re mad. Really, it was brilliant.’
‘No.’ He lifted her hand to his lips. ‘I’m not mad. I want it to be good.’
‘But it was good!’
He looked at her. ‘You’re very kind. But if I haven’t done my best, if I know the show isn’t as good as it can be, I can’t care about anything else. Not really.’
Nell felt her eyes fill with tears. ‘Right,’ she said, untangling her fingers. ‘Of course.’ And leaving him, she struggled through the crowd to get herself another beer. She pressed the cool bottle against her face. But it was good! She looked round at the animated people, enlivened and invigorated by what they’d seen, and she remembered Patrick Bowery telling them how the long-ago actor Henry Irving had sacrificed everything that stood between him and his passion for the theatre, cutting himself off from his disapproving parents, abandoning his wife when she failed to mask her irritation as she waited, pregnant, for him to be done with his repeated curtain calls after the first night of Hamlet at the Lyceum. ‘Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?’ she’d asked him, later, in the carriage, and without answering he’d ordered the driver to stop, and gathering his cloak around him, he’d stepped out into the night. From then on Henry Irving had devoted every moment of his life to the theatre, re-popularising Shakespeare, commissioning new plays, overseeing the design of elaborate scenery, taking his company across America, through blizzards and snowstorms, the sets for up to seventeen productions in wagons attached to the actors’ train. He’d lived a long and fruitful life, dying finally without ever having seen his wife again, only minutes after performing Becket on a tour of the north of England which his doctor had warned him not to undertake.
It was almost midnight before Nell arrived back at the flat. As she put her key in the door the fireworks began to burst. She ran up the stairs and rushed to the window as a cascade of red and orange petals fell from the sky. Babies crying, she found herself thinking, inexplicably, and she imagined cut glass shooting from their eyes. As the flares melted away, Cath appeared on tiptoe in her Snoopy T-shirt. ‘Hello,’ she mouthed, and she disappeared into their shared room. ‘Night.’ She blushed as she appeared again, and on pale, bare legs she ran in the direction of Richard’s room. Nell turned back to the window. The sky was dark. The night was silent. And then a volley of gold rockets scorched up through the blackness and cracked open the sky.