"I want to go to Piccadilly Circus now. Stop at the fountain," said
Edward Henry to his chauffeur. He gave the order somewhat defiantly,
because he was a little self-conscious in the new and gleaming suit, and
because he had an absurd idea that the chauffeur might guess that he, a
provincial from the Five Towns, was about to venture into West End
theatrical enterprise, and sneer at him accordingly.
But the chauffeur merely touched his cap with an indifferent lofty
gesture, as if to say:
"Be at ease. I have driven more persons more moonstruck even than you.
Human eccentricity has long since ceased to surprise me."
The fountain in Piccadilly Circus was the gayest thing in London. It
mingled the fresh tingling of water with the odour and flame of autumn
blossoms and the variegated colours of shawled women who passed their
lives on its margin engaged in the commerce of flowers. Edward Henry
bought an aster from a fine, bold, red-cheeked, blowsy, dirty wench with
a baby in her arms, and left some change for the baby. He was in a very
tolerant and charitable mood, and could excuse the sins and the
stupidity of all mankind. He reflected forgivingly that Rose Euclid and
her friends had perhaps not displayed an abnormal fatuity in discussing
the name of the theatre before they had got the lease of the site for
it. Had not he himself bought all the option without having even seen
the site? The fact was that he had had no leisure in his short royal
career for such details as seeing the site. He was now about to make
good the omission.
It is a fact that as he turned northward from Piccadilly Circus, to the
right of the County Fire Office, in order to spy out the land upon which
his theatre was to be built, he hesitated, under the delusion that all
the passers-by were staring at him! He felt just as he might have felt
had he been engaged upon some scheme nefarious. He even went back and
pretended to examine the windows of the County Fire Office. Then,
glancing self-consciously about, he discerned--not unnaturally--the
words "Regent Street" on a sign.
"There you are!" he murmured with a thrill. "There you are! There’s
obviously only one name for that theatre--’The Regent.’ It’s close to
Regent Street. No other theatre is called ’The Regent.’ Nobody before
ever had the idea of ’Regent’ as a name for a theatre. ’Muses’ indeed!
... ’Intellectual!’ ... ’The Regent Theatre!’ How well it comes off the
tongue! It’s a great name! It’ll be the finest name of any theatre in
London! And it took yours truly to think of it!"
Then he smiled privately at his own weakness.... He too, like the
despised Rose, was baptising the unborn! Still, he continued to dream
of the theatre, and began to picture to himself the ideal theatre. He
discovered that he had quite a number of startling ideas about
theatre-construction, based on his own experience as a playgoer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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