Cedric and Paul now began to show her what could be done with the lights. Troy was enjoying herself. She liked the smell of canvas and glue and the feeling that this was a place where people worked. In the little theatre even Cedric improved. He was knowledgeable and quickly responsive to her suggestions, checking Paul’s desire to flood the set with a startling display of lighting and getting him to stand in position while he himself focussed a single spot. ‘We must find the backcloth discreetly,’ he cried. ‘Try the ground row.’ And presently a luminous glow appeared, delighting Troy.

‘But how are you going to see?’ cried Cedric distractedly. ‘Oh, lawks! How are you going to see?’

‘I can bring down a standard spot on an extension,’ Paul offered. ‘Or we could uncover a window.’

Cedric gazed in an agony of inquiry at Troy. ‘But the window light would infiltrate,’ he said. ‘Or wouldn’t it?’

‘We could try.’

At last by an ingenious arrangement of screens Troy was able to get daylight on her canvas and a fair view of the stage.

The clock—it was, of course, known as the Great Clock—in the central tower struck eleven. A door somewhere backstage opened and shut, and dead on his cue Sir Henry, in the character of Macbeth, walked onto the lighted set.

‘Golly!’ Troy whispered. ‘Oh, Golly!’

‘Devastatingly fancy dress,’ said Cedric in her ear, ‘but in its ridiculous way rather exciting. Or not? Too fancy?’

‘It’s not too fancy for me,’ Troy said roundly, and walked down the aisle to greet her sitter.

At midday Troy drove her fingers through her hair, propped a large charcoal drawing against the front of the stage and backed away from it down the aisle. Sir Henry took off his helmet, groaned a little, and moved cautiously to a chair in the wings.

‘I suppose you want to stop,’ said Troy absently, biting her thumb and peering at her drawing.

‘One grows a trifle stiff,’ he replied. She then noticed that he was looking more than a trifle tired. He had made up for her sitting, painting heavy shadows round his eyes and staining his moustache and the tuft on his chin with water-dye. To this he had added long strands of crêpe hair. But beneath the greasepaint and hair his face sagged a little and his head drooped.

‘I must let you go,’ said Troy. ‘I hope I haven’t been too exacting. One forgets.’

‘One also remembers,’ said Sir Henry. ‘I have been remembering my lines. I played the part first in 1904.’

Troy looked up quickly, suddenly liking him.

‘It’s a wonderful role,’ he said. ‘Wonderful.’

‘I was very much moved by it when I saw you five years ago.’

‘I’ve played it six times and always to enormous business. It hasn’t been an unlucky piece for me.’