THAT was how the audience saw it, but they were outsiders. There was
one outsider left on the island, Wally Shine, the photographer sent
by the Universal Syndicate to take pictures of what was a “notable
society event” in a place of which the public had heard much and seen
nothing. He had arrived that morning with two cameras and a delighted
appreciation of the beauty he was to record. But, unlike the other
outsiders, his impressions extending over a longer period had not been
so agreeable. He had seen the actors at close range, in their habits as
they lived, lunched with them, watched the last rehearsal, taken a lot
of pictures of Miss Saunders in the house and garden. And he had sensed
an electric disturbance in the atmosphere, and come upon evidences of
internal discord.
That was at the last rehearsal, when the poetic Viola had lost her
temper like an ordinary woman and jumped on the Tracy boy--something
about the place he stood in--nothing, as far as Shine could see, to get
mad about. And the boy had answered in kind like the spitting of an
angry cat. An ugly scene that the director had to stop.
Then the man Stokes who played the Duke, a handsome, romantic-looking
chap--something was the matter with him. “Eating him” was the phrase
Shine used to himself and it wasn’t a bad one. He had a haunted sort
of look, as if his mind was disturbed, especially when he’d turn his
eyes on Miss Saunders. Shine had noticed him particularly when they
gathered for the group pictures; his hands were unsteady and the
perspiration was out on his forehead though the air was cool from the
sea. His wife--the woman they called Flora--was on to him. Shine saw
her watching him, sidelong from under her eyelids, the way you watch a
person when you don’t want them to see it.
The photographer was a fat easy-going man, inured to the vagaries of
those who follow the arts. But he was sensitive to emotional stress and
he felt it here--below the surface--and was moved to curiosity.
The photographs were finished and the group broke up. Part of the
company were going and they ran toward the house--a medieval route--the
big Sir Toby with a rolling amble, Sir Andrew, long and lank, cavorting
like a mettlesome steed. Their antic shadows fled before them over the
dried sea grass, and their voices, shouting absurdities, rang rich and
deep-throated on the crystal atmosphere.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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