Skull and Bones

Chapter 21

Mr Abbey stood on tiptoes to put the blindfold round Selena's eyes. Then he led her to the table. She was wearing her new costume: the one with the riding boots — her own suggestion, having been used to wearing boots aboard ship and feeling comfortable in them — but the gleam of skin above the boots was the genius of Mr Abbey's costumiers. He looked at her and sighed. What was it that made her quite so lovely? Sometimes he thought it was the tiny waist over curving hips, sometimes it was the lovely eyes, sometimes the slender, round limbs. He shook his head.

Whatsoever, he thought. Who cares, so long as she's playing to packed houses! Aloud, he said, "There, madame, all is prepared. Let us see you do it!"

He stepped back and went to stand with Katty Cooper and his entire company, together again for Sunday rehearsal. They whispered and whistled at Selena's latest outfit, even those of the men who stepped lightly; perhaps them especially, for they truly appreciated costume, and marvelled that so much could be contrived out of so little.

"Go on, Selena!" they cried.

"Selena!"

"Go on, girl!"

And there was a cheer as Selena stamped her foot, slapped her thigh and stood forth bold and heroic: legs apart, hands on hips, tossing her head.

"Aha!" she cried. "Now, sir, take your guard!"

Another cheer and applause, for Abbey had discovered that the way to get the best out of Selena was to send her strutting boldly round the stage on her long legs, since that was guaranteed to raise a stand within every pair of britches in the house.

As he'd said to Katty Cooper: "When she comes on, dear heart, don't worry if there is profound silence from the men… for that is not a bad sign." And indeed it wasn't. And now, not just audiences, but the entire city of Polmouth — the biggest town in the West Country — were falling in love with Selena. Yet there was still further development to come, from a chance remark Selena had made.

"Now then," cried Mr Abbey, clapping his hands. "Let's see you do it!"

Selena stretched out her hands, and found the pistol and paper cartridge on the table in front of her. She felt for the flint, to make sure it was in place, set the lock to half-cock, bit off the end of the cartridge, primed the lock with powder, snapped down the steel, poured the rest of the charge down the up-ended barrel, and rammed ball and paper down the barrel with the ramrod, which she neatly replaced before cocking the lock, levelling and giving fire with a flash and a bang… and a loud CLANG from the great sheet of iron plate hung on a ropes ten paces to her front.

Cheers filled the amphitheatre as Selena pulled off her blindfold, threw it away, put down the smoking pistol, and stamped forward again, smiling and bowing with easy grace to left and right, and blowing kisses to all the house… as she'd been taught.

Mr Abbey, Katty Cooper and the company surged forward, ears ringing from the shot and the clang, and laughed and surrounded Selena.

"Where did you learn that?" said Mr Abbey. "Do you hunt?"

"No," said Selena.

"Then what do you shoot?" said Abbey, for he affected gentlemanly pursuits, including shooting, and went out after game of all kinds, and it was his own conversation on this favourite topic which had led to Selena's boast that she could load a gun blindfolded. "So what have you shot?" he repeated. "Do tell us!"

"Nothing…" she said, in a small voice "… only men."

Everyone thought this a wonderful joke. They laughed enormously, even Katty Cooper, who knew less about Selena than she thought. And as they laughed, inspiration crept up on Mr Abbey. He noticed that some of the dancing girls were clustered around Selena in their gowns and pumps, which made them seem smaller than Selena with her boots and her pistol…

"Stap me!" he said, growing excited. "Do you know, dear heart, I think I might cast Mrs Henderson as the principal boy player in one of my pantomimes!"

Katty Cooper frowned.

"But she's a woman."

"That's the whole point!"

"What is?"

"Well, if we present her — with legs and tits — stamping around the stage pretending to be a man, firing off pistols, and taking the heroine in her arms…"

"Ahhhh!" said Katty Cooper, beginning to understand, for many gentlemen of her professional acquaintance were exceedingly partial to such displays between women.

"We'll have something the men will adore," said Abbey, "while the ladies and children will think it mere innocent nonsense…"

"Which will offend nobody."

"Not at all, not even clergymen," said Abbey, and laughed… and gasped and all but staggered, as he received the second wave of inspiration. He spun Katty Cooper around by the arms, and looked up into her pretty little face. "D'you know what I'm going to do?"

"No?"

"I'm coming with you!"

"You are?" Katty frowned.

"Yes! In fact, I'm taking you. We shall tour together: York, Edinburgh, Exeter, Chester — all of them, at my expense!" Katty's frown darkened, but Abbey failed to notice. "I shall form a travelling company. I shall write a piece!" He waved a hand. "Songs, dances, scenery — everything. We shall tour!" His eyes gleamed. "And then we shall descend upon Drury Lane in triumph!" Katty Cooper growled. "And the lynch-pin and keystone shall be Mrs Henderson," he said. "And I shall make her fortune, mine — and yours, dear heart!"

"Mine?" said Katty Cooper with a twinkling smile, for until that instant she'd seen herself written out.

"Yes!" said Abbey. "And you must not even think of entering her into your profession — " He blinked. "I mean… I mean… your old profession, dear heart."

"Must I not?" she said nastily, for the dear little face could display tremendous spite when it chose to do so.

"God stap me, no! You'll make ten times the money this way!"

"Ahhhhh!" Katty smiled again. That was different.

"Then you agree?"

"Oh yes," said Katty Cooper, and delivered yet another pretty smile.

She smiled and smiled… but Katty Cooper hated Mr Abbey from that moment on, because although she could never say no to money, she was so corrosively — so viciously — selfish that she could abide no plan than her own, nor any hand than hers upon the tiller.

Worse still, Katty Cooper now hated Selena, too, for being better than her mentor and not needing her.

And so, Katty Cooper began to think of ways to punish Selena.