CHAPTER II
THE BANK-NOTE
I.
Alderman Machin had to stand at the back, and somewhat towards the side,of that part of the auditorium known as the Grand Circle at the EmpireMusic Hall, Hanbridge. The attendants at the entrance and in the lounge,where the salutation "Welcome" shone in electricity over a largeCupid-surrounded mirror, had compassionately and yet exultingly told himthat there was not a seat left in the house. He had shared theirexultation. He had said to himself, full of honest pride in the FiveTowns: "This music-hall, admitted by the press to be one of the finestin the provinces, holds over two thousand five hundred people. And yetwe can fill it to overflowing twice every night! And only a few yearsago there wasn't a decent music-hall in the entire district!"
The word "progress" flitted through his head.
It was not strictly true that the Empire was or could be filled tooverflowing twice every night, but it was true that at that particularmoment not a seat was unsold; and the aspect of a crowded auditorium isapt to give an optimistic quality to broad generalisations. AldermanMachin began instinctively to calculate the amount of money in thehouse, and to wonder whether there would be a chance for a secondmusic-hall in the dissipated town of Hanbridge. He also wondered whythe idea of a second music-hall in Hanbridge had never occurred to himbefore.
The Grand Circle was so-called because it was grand. Its plushfauteuils cost a shilling, no mean price for a community where sevenpounds of potatoes can be bought for sixpence, and the view of the stagetherefrom was perfect. But the alderman's view was far from perfect,since he had to peer as best he could between and above the shoulders ofseveral men, each apparently, but not really, taller than himself. Byconstant slight movements to comply with the movements of the rampart ofshoulders, he could discern fragments of various advertisements of soap,motor-cars, whisky, shirts, perfume, pills, bricks, and tea, for thedrop-curtain was down. And, curiously, he felt obliged to keep his eyeson the drop-curtain, and across the long intervening vista of hats andheads and smoke, to explore its most difficult corners again and again,lest, when it went up, he might not be in proper practice for seeingwhat was behind it.
Nevertheless, despite the marked inconveniences of his situation, hefelt brighter, he felt almost happy in this dense atmosphere of success.He even found a certain peculiar and perverse satisfaction in the factthat he had as yet been recognised by nobody. Once or twice the ownersof shoulders had turned and deliberately glared at the worrying fellowwho had the impudence to be all the time peeping over them and betweenthem; they had not distinguished the fellow from any ordinary fellow.Could they have known that he was the famous Alderman Edward HenryMachin, founder and sole proprietor of the Thrift Club, into which theirwives were probably paying so much a week, they would most assuredlyhave glared to another tune, and they would have said with prideafterwards, "That chap Machin o' Bursley was standing behind me at theEmpire to-night." And though Machin is amongst the commonest names inthe Five Towns, all would have known that the great and admired Denrywas meant. It was astonishing that a personage so notorious should nothave been instantly "spotted" in such a resort as the Empire. Moreproof that the Five Towns was a vast and seething concentration ofcities, and no longer a mere district where everybody knew everybody.
The curtain rose, and, as it did so, a thunderous, crashing applause ofgreeting broke forth--applause that thrilled and impressed and inspired;applause that made every individual in the place feel right glad that hewas there. For the curtain had risen on the gigantic attraction whichmany members of the audience were about to see for the fifth time thatweek; in fact, it was rumoured that certain men of fashion, whose habitwas to refuse themselves nothing, had attended every performance of thegigantic attraction since the second house on Monday.
The scene represented a restaurant of quiet aspect, into which entered awaiter bearing a pile of plates some two feet high. The waiter beingintoxicated, the tower of plates leaned this way and that as hestaggered about, and the whole house really did hold its breath in thesimultaneous hope and fear of an enormous and resounding smash. Thenentered a second intoxicated waiter, also bearing a pile of plates sometwo feet high; and the risk of destruction was thus more thandoubled--it was quadrupled, for each waiter, in addition to the risks ofhis own inebriety, was now subject to the dreadful peril of collidingwith the other. However, there was no catastrophe.
Then arrived two customers, one in a dress suit and an eye-glass, andthe other in a large violet hat, a diamond necklace, and a yellow satinskirt. The which customers, seemingly well used to the sight of drunkenwaiters tottering to and fro with towers of plates, sat down at a tableand waited calmly for attention. The popular audience, with that quickmental grasp for which popular audiences are so renowned, soon perceivedthat the table was in close proximity to a lofty sideboard, and that oneither hand of the sideboard were two chairs, upon which the two waiterswere trying to climb in order to deposit their plates on the top-mostshelf of the sideboard. The waiters successfully mounted the chairs,and successfully lifted their towers of plates to within half an inch ofthe desired shelf, and then the chairs began to show signs ofinsecurity. By this time the audience was stimulated to an ecstasy ofexpectation, whose painfulness was only equalled by its extremedelectability. The sole unmoved persons in the building were thecustomers awaiting attention at the restaurant table.
One tower was safely lodged on the shelf. But was it? It was not!Yes? No! It curved; it straightened; it curved again. The excitementwas as keen as that of watching a drowning man attempt to reach theshore. It was simply excruciating. It could not be borne any longer,and when it could not be borne any longer, the tower sprawledirrevocably, and seven dozen plates fell in a cascade on the violet hat,and so, with an inconceivable clatter, to the floor. Almost at the samemoment the being in the dress suit and the eye-glass--becoming aware ofthe phenomena--slightly unusual even in a restaurant, dropped hiseye-glass, turned round to the sideboard, and received the otherwaiter's seven dozen plates in the face and on the crown of his head.
No such effect had ever been seen in the Five Towns, and the felicity ofthe audience exceeded all previous felicities. The audience yelled,roared, shrieked, gasped, trembled, and punched itself in a furiouspassion of pleasure. They make plates in the Five Towns. They live bymaking plates. They understand plates. In the Five Towns a man willcarry not seven but twenty-seven dozen plates on a swaying plank foreight hours a day, up steps and down steps, and in doorways and out ofdoorways, and not break one plate in seven years! Judge, therefore, thesimple but terrific satisfaction of a Five Towns' audience in thehugeness of the calamity. Moreover, every plate smashed means a demandfor a new plate and increased prosperity for the Five Towns. Thegrateful crowd in the auditorium of the Empire would have covered thestage with wreaths if it had known that wreaths were used for otheroccasions than funerals; which it did not know.
Fresh complications instantly ensued which cruelly cut short theagreeable exercise of uncontrolled laughter. It was obvious that one ofthe waiters was about to fall. And in the enforced tranquillity of anew dread, every dyspeptic person in the house was deliciously consciousof a sudden freedom from indigestion, due to the agreeable exercise ofuncontrolled laughter, and wished fervently that he could laugh likethat after every meal. The waiter fell; he fell through the large violethat and disappeared beneath the surface of a sea of crockery. The otherwaiter fell too, but the sea was not deep enough to drown a couple ofthem. Then the customers, recovering themselves, decided that they mustnot be outclassed in this competition of havoc, and they overthrew thetable and everything on it, and all the other tables, and everything onall the other tables. The audience was now a field of artillery whichnothing could silence. The waiters arose, and, opening the sideboard,disclosed many hundreds of unsuspected plates of all kinds, ripe forsmashing. Niagaras of plates surged
on to the stage. All fourperformers revelled and wallowed in smashed plates. New supplies ofplates were constantly being produced from strange concealments, andfinally the tables and chairs were broken to pieces, and each object onthe walls was torn down and flung in bits on to the gorgeous generaldebris, to the top of which clambered the violet hat, necklace, andyellow petticoat, brandishing one single little plate, whose life hadbeen miraculously spared. Shrieks of joy in that little plate playedover the din like lightning in a thunder-storm. And the curtain fell.
It was rung up fifteen times, and fifteen times the quartette ofartists, breathless, bowed in acknowledgment of the frenzied andboisterous testimony to their unique talents. No singer, no tragedian,no comedian, no wit, could have had such a triumph, could have givensuch intense pleasure. And yet none of the four had spoken a word.Such is genius!
At the end of the fifteenth call the stage-manager came before thecurtain and guaranteed that two thousand four hundred plates had beenbroken.
The lights went up. Strong men were seen to be wiping tears from theireyes. Complete strangers were seen addressing each other in the mannerof old friends. Such is art!
"Well, that was worth a bob, that was!" muttered Edward Henry tohimself. And it was. Edward Henry had not escaped the general fate.Nobody, being present, could have escaped it. He was enchanted. He hadutterly forgotten every care.
"Good evening, Mr. Machin," said a voice at his side. Not only heturned, but nearly every one in the vicinity turned. The voice was thevoice of the stout and splendid managing director of the Empire, and itsounded with the ring of authority above the rising tinkle of the barbehind the Grand Circle.
"Oh! How d'ye do, Mr. Dakins?" Edward Henry held out a cordial hand,for even the greatest men are pleased to be greeted in a place ofentertainment by the managing director thereof. Further, his identitywas now recognised.
"Haven't you seen those gentlemen in that box beckoning to you?" saidMr. Dakins, proudly deprecating complimentary remarks on the show.
"Which box?"
Mr. Dakins' hand indicated the stage-box. And Henry, looking, saw threemen, one unknown to him; the second, Robert Brindley, the architect, ofBursley; and the third, Dr. Stirling.
Instantly his conscience leapt up within him. He thought of rabies.Yes, sobered in the fraction of a second, he thought of rabies.Supposing that, after all, in spite of Mr. Long's muzzling order, ascited by his infant son, an odd case of rabies should have lingered inthe British Isles, and supposing that Carlo had been infected! Notimpossible! Was it providential that Dr. Stirling was in theauditorium?
"You know two of them?" said Mr. Dakins.
"Yes."
"Well, the third's a Mr. Bryany. He's manager to Mr. Seven Sachs." Mr.Dakins' tone was respectful.
"And who's Mr. Seven Sachs?" asked Edward Henry absently. It was astupid question.
He was impressively informed that Mr. Seven Sachs was the arch-famousAmerican actor-playwright, now nearing the end of a provincial tourwhich had surpassed all records of provincial tours, and that he wouldbe at the Theatre Royal, Hanbridge, next week. Edward Henry thenremembered that the hoardings had been full of Mr. Seven Sachs for sometime past.
"They keep on making signs to you," said Mr. Dakins, referring to theoccupants of the stage-box.
Edward Henry waved a reply to the box.
"Here! I'll take you there the shortest way," said Mr. Dakins.