Читать книгу Uncle Rudolf - Paul Bailey - Страница 18

—You are my mascot, my lucky charm, my uncle said as I watched his face in the dressing-room mirror being transformed into that of Zoltan Kassák, the brigand with whom the Crown Princess Zelda falls at first hopelessly, and then triumphantly, in love. Zoltan has a duelling scar on his left cheek, which Uncle Rudolf created each night with a strip of blood-red plasticine stuck on with theatrical glue.

—It mustn’t look too livid, he told me as he dabbed it with powder. Zelda has to find it irresistible.

As Zoltan, my uncle wore immensely baggy trousers that billowed above his leather boots. His brigand’s clothes also included an embroidered shirt and a cap from which protruded an eagle’s feather. The sword and dagger hanging from his belt proclaimed him to be a man who would fight his enemies to the death, should it be necessary. I can remember, now, watching from the side of the stage as he roused his fellow brigands into action with the song ‘What fear we of the foe?’ and marvelling that I was there, on that summer evening, to bring him luck. I stood, entranced, throughout the first performance of Magyar Maytime, though I was confused by the story, and still am, if I think about it. In the last scene, Zoltan is discovered to have noble blood, and this means that Zelda, who is forbidden to marry a commoner, can become his bride. My uncle loathed the coy badinage – ‘You are my lovely, my wonderful Zelly’; ‘You are my handsome Zolly, who is so brave and strong’ – that preceded the duet in which they declare eternal love for one another. His leading lady was equally embarrassed at having to call him Zolly, and sometimes he substituted ‘smelly’ or ‘belly’ or ‘jelly’, and she ‘folly’ or ‘dolly’ or ‘Molly’, and then they would giggle, and the angry conductor in the pit would be forced to wait for them to stop before raising his baton.

—It is a silly life I lead, Andrew. Yours will be more sensible I hope. And happier.