“I say,” said Adrian enthusiastically, “what an excellent idea.”

“I’m always having them, darling,” said Cleep. “Now, what I suggest you do is to spend the night here and then tomorrow I will take you down to see Clattercup.”

“Wonderful,” said Adrian. “Thank you very much indeed.”

“I myself,” said Ethelbert reddening slightly, “am playing a minor part in the show. Not that I approve of it, you understand, but, dearest heart, one must live.”

And so Adrian and Ethelbert got Rosy into the lean-to shed where Ethelbert made his elderberry wine, having first carefully removed anything that had the slightest alcoholic content. Then, going back into the house and up to the loft, Ethelbert drew back the chintz curtains displaying on one side an enormous brass double bed with a canopy over it, and at the other end an extremely uncomfortable-looking trestle bed.

“You may take your choice,” he said, “but I always sleep in the double bed.”

“Thanks,” said Adrian. “Um, actually I’m a very bad sleeper, so I think I’ll take the other bed.”

“As you like,” said Ethelbert cheerfully, “as you like.” Adrian decided, as he was dropping off to sleep, that the sight of Ethelbert Cleep in a long white nightshirt, a Japanese kimono and a night-cap with a tassel, was one that would live with him for many days to come.

The following morning when Adrian awoke, he found that Ethelbert had been up for some time and had prepared a substantial breakfast. An enormous, volcanically bubbling pot of porridge with thick cream and sugar, and a huge plate of bacon as brown and as crisp as autumn leaves and just as fragrant, almost covered with great golden fried eggs and piles of large mushrooms like strange fleshy edible umbrellas running with black juice.

“I think it always advisable to start the day with a good breakfast,” said Ethelbert earnestly. “After all, one must consider one’s art, and it requires a lot of both mental and physical energy to get inside the part that you are playing.”

“Incidentally,” said Adrian, with his mouth full, “what part are you playing?”

“One of the Sultan’s harem,” said Ethelbert without batting an eyelid. “It’s a very exacting part.”

Later, when they had done the washing-up, Ethelbert dressed himself in his outdoor clothes, which consisted of an Inverness and a deer stalker cap of mammoth dimensions. Then they hitched Rosy to the trap and made their way into the town.

Adrian was astonished when he saw the theatre. Although Ethelbert had told him that it was a large one, he had no idea quite how large, and the façade with its Doric columns, its flying buttresses and Gothic windows, argued that Mr. Clattercup must have acted as his own architect.

“I told you it was big,” said Ethelbert in triumph, delighted at Adrian’s astonishment “Darling boy, it’s something they’d be pleased to have even in the city, and I’ll let you into a secret.”

He paused and looked round furtively. There was nobody within earshot apart from Rosy, so he leant forward and whispered in Adrian’s ear:

“It’s got a revolving stage!”

He stepped back to see the effect his words would have on Adrian.

“Revolving stage?” said Adrian. “The man must be mad.”

“He is, darling boy,” said Cleep. “It’s a deadly secret. We are going to astonish the audience on the first night, so don’t tell a soul.”

“I won’t,” said Adrian, “but I still think he’s mad. It must have cost him a lot of money.”

“This,” said Cleep, waving his hand at the architectural conglomeration that confronted them, “Is Clattercup’s last great work. This is the monument that he has built for himself so that he will go down in history. Now, you wait here with Rosy, dear boy, while I go in and see him.”

Adrian and Rosy waited patiently out in the road for half an hour or so until out of the theatre flitted Ethelbert, followed by a tubby little man dressed somewhat incongruously in a cutaway coat and striped trousers.

“Adrian,” said Ethelbert, “this is Emanuel S. Clattercup, our mentor.”

“Oh, aye,” said the mentor. “’ow do?”

“I am very well, thank you,” said Adrian, slinking hands. “Understand you want a job,” said Clattercup, peering somewhat nervously at Rosy.

“Well, yes, if it were possible,” said Adrian. “I thought that since you were doing Ali Baba a little bit of Eastern pomp might be in keeping, and Rosy’s quite used to wearing trappings and so on.”

“Aye,” said Clattercup, “well, she would be, wouldn’t she, coming from er . . . from eh . . . coming from where she does.”

“She behaves,” said Adrian, colouring slightly at the falsehood, “extremely well and I’m sure that she would lend a certain something to your show.”

“Je ne sais quoi?” suggested Ethelbert.

“What’s that?” asked Clattercup suspiciously.

“It’s French for I don’t know what,” explained Ethelbert.

“What jew mean, you don’t know what?” said Clattercup.

“What I mean,” said Ethelbert, “is that it’s French, meaning ‘I don’t know what’.”

Clattercup stared at him wall-eyed for a minute.

“I ’aven’t the least bloody idea what you’re talking about,” he said at last.

Ethelbert raised his eyes to heaven.

“And some fell on stony ground,” he said.

“Well, ’ow much would you want?” enquired Clattercup of Adrian. “These cultural shows take a lot of brass to get ’em on. I’m not made of brass, jew understand?”

“Well, I was just thinking in terms of a modest salary, enough to cover my own expenses and the expense of feeding Rosy,” said Adrian.

“And of course you would provide the costumes,” said Ethelbert.

Clattercup lit a large cigar and pondered for some minutes behind a cumulus of acrid smoke.

“Does she cost much to feed?” he said at last, jerking his thumb at Rosy.

“Er, a fair amount,” said Adrian.

“Well, I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” said Clattercup, “and I can’t say fairer than this. I’ll pay for her food and I’ll pay for your keep until we see how you are going on. Then, if you are a success, we can discuss it further.”

“Right,” said Adrian, delighted, “that’ll suit me perfectly.”

“I shall want you for rehearsals at two o’clock this afternoon,” said Clattercup.

“Fine,” said Adrian, “I’ll be here.”

“All right,” said Clattercup. “Tara.”

Turning on his heel, he walked back into the theatre.

“Darling boy,” said Ethelbert, “isn’t that wonderful? Now we’ll go back to the cottage and have a celebration, and then we’ll get back here a little before two and I’ll show you round the theatre.”

After a celebration at Ethelbert’s cottage, which consisted of apples for Rosy and a bottle of elderberry wine for Adrian and Ethelbert, the whole thing being accompanied (in a very cultural manner) by a spirited rendering by Ethelbert on his tuba of what he insisted was a fine old Irish ballad entitled “If I Were a Blackbird”, they had lunch and hurried back into the town.

They tethered Rosy in a big shed outside the back of the theatre where the scenery was stored, made her comfortable with some hay and some mangolds and then Ethelbert led Adrian into the theatre.

“I have never been back stage in a theatre,” said Adrian.

“Haven’t you, darling boy?” said Ethelbert. “But it’s such an experience. Come, I’ll show you.”

He danced away in the gloom and Adrian could hear the click of switches. Suddenly before him, glittering resplendent as a wedding cake, was the Sultan’s palace in all its cardboard glory. Adrian looked out into the centre of the stage and gazed into the dark auditorium what he could just dimly discern the rows of seats and boxes perched around the walls. He was amazed at the great flats and sheets of scenery held on ropes and pulleys high above the proscenium arch out of sight of the audience, presumably waiting to be lowered at the appropriate moment by some minions of the theatre.