Death at the Bar

‘I didn’t, Seb, but I will. I’ll stifle my æsthetic conscience, prostitute my undoubted genius, and send your portrait to join the annual assembly of cadavers. Do you prefer “Portrait of an Actor”, “Sebastian Parish, Esq”! or simply “Sebastian Parish”?’

‘I think I would like my name,’ said Parish seriously. ‘Not, I mean, that everybody wouldn’t know –’

‘Thank you. But I see your point. Your press agent would agree. What were you going to say about Luke? His generosity, you know, and his apparently liking me so much?’

‘I don’t think I ought to tell you, really.’

‘But of course, you are going to tell me.’

‘He didn’t actually say it was in confidence,’ said Parish.

Cubitt waited with a slight smile.

‘You’d be amazed if you knew,’ continued Parish.

‘Yes?’

‘Yes. Oh, rather. At least I imagine you would be. I was. I never expected anything of the sort, and after all I am his nearest relation. His next-of-kin.’

Cubitt turned and looked at him in real astonishment.

‘Are you by any chance,’ he asked, ‘talking about Luke’s will?’

‘How did you guess?’

‘My dear, good Seb –’

‘All right, all right. I suppose I did give it away. You may as well hear the whole thing. Luke told me the other day that he was leaving his money between us.’

‘Good Lord!’

‘I know. I happened to look him up after the show one evening, and found him browsing over an official-looking document. I said something, chaffingly you know, about it, and he said: “Well, Seb, you’ll find it out some day, so you may as well know now.” And then he told me.’

‘Extraordinarily nice of him,’ said Cubitt uncomfortably, and he added: ‘Damn! I wish you hadn’t told me.’

‘Why on earth?’

‘I don’t know. I enjoy discussing Luke and now I’ll feel he’s sort of sacrosanct. Oh well, he’ll probably outlive both of us.’

‘He’s a good bit older than I am,’ said Parish. ‘Not, I mean, that I don’t hope with all my heart he will. I mean – as far as I’m concerned –’

‘Don’t labour it, Seb,’ said Cubitt kindly. ‘I should think Luke will certainly survive me. He’s strong as a horse and I’m not. You’ll probably come in for the packet.’

‘I hate talking about it like that.’

Parish knocked his pipe out on a stone. Cubitt noticed that he was rather red in the face.

‘As a matter of fact,’ he muttered, ‘it’s rather awkward.’

‘Why?’

‘Well I’m plaguilly hard up at the moment and I’d been wondering –’

‘If Luke would come to the rescue?’ Parish was silent.

‘And in the light of this revelation,’ Cubitt added, ‘you don’t quite like to ask. Poor Seb! But what the devil do you do with your money? You ought to be rolling. You’re always in work. This play you’re in now is a record run, isn’t it, and your salary must be superb.’

‘That’s all jolly fine, old man, but you don’t know what it’s like in the business. My expenses are simply ghastly.’

‘Why?’

‘Why, because you’ve got to keep up a standard. Look at my house. It’s ruinous, but I’ve got to be able to ask the people that count to a place they’ll accept and, if possible, remember. You’ve got to look prosperous in this game, and you’ve got to entertain. My agent’s fees are hellish. My clubs cost the earth. And like a blasted fool I backed a show that flopped for thousands last May.’

‘What did you do that for?’

‘The management are friends of mine. It looked all right.’

‘You give money away, Seb, don’t you? I mean literally. To out-of-luck actors? Old-timers and so on?’

‘I may. Always think “there but for the grace of God!” It’s such a damn’ chancy business.’

‘Yes. No more chancy than painting, my lad.’

‘You don’t have to show so well if you’re an artist. People expect you to live in a peculiar way.’

Cubitt looked at him, but said nothing.

Parish went on defensively: ‘I’m sorry, but you know what I mean. People expect painters to be Bohemians and all that.’

‘There was a time,’ said Cubitt, ‘when actors were content to be Bohemians, whatever that may mean. I never know. As far as I am concerned it means going without things you want.’

‘But your pictures sell.’

‘On an average I sell six pictures a year. Their prices range from twenty pounds to two hundred. It usually works out at about four hundred. You earn that in as many weeks, don’t you?’

‘Yes, but –’

‘Oh, I’m not grumbling. I’ve got a bit of my own and I could make more, I dare say, if I took pupils or had a shot at commercial art. I’ve suited myself and it’s worked out well enough until –’

‘Until what?’ asked Parish.

‘Nothing. Let’s get on with the work, shall we? The light’s no good after about eleven.’

Parish walked back to the rock and took up his pose. The light wind whipped his black hair from his forehead. He raised his chin and stared out over the sea. He assumed an expression of brooding dominance.

‘That right?’ he asked.

‘Pretty well. You only want a pair of tarnished epaulettes and we could call it “Elba.”’