Grand Finale

Chapter 3. An Unexpected Actor

Bentley looked down at Tommy to the small coffin-like trunk on wheels that a stagehand was tucking Tommy into. A flicker of resentment bulged from Bentley's eyes as the wooden lid of the trunk began scraping heavily over the dummy's head. The lid finally clunked shut, blocking out the soft mellow lights of the theatre wing.

Bentley was left standing there, in a blind panic, a fear beyond description. He was on his own. It was always this way in the final moments before taking to the stage. The usual symptoms of pre-performance anxiety, psychologically but not medically dangerous, attacked him: heart palpitations, dizziness, a feeling of suffocation, sweating, nausea and shaking.

At such times, Bentley was lost to the world.

He could sense that, contrarily, Tommy was grinning invisibly in his confident, some would say arrogant, toothy mischievous fashion, as he lay motionless in his temporary sarcophagus. Bentley knew that Tommy would not be suffering any nerves whatsoever.

Suddenly, on the stage, the show's compere enthusiastically announced, 'What a show it's been. And it doesn't end here! It leads to here: to our Grand Finale! So without further ado, ladies and gentlemen in the audience, and viewers all over the world, the Royal Variety Performance, here at the London Palladium, welcomes...the Great Bentley and his Talking Timber, Tommy!'

A deafening applause rippled and rose to a crescendo as Hartnel shoved Bentley forwards.

Out from the theatre wings into the bright limelight of the main stage stumbled Bentley nervously pushing the four-wheeled trunk. He looked like a rabbit caught in the glare of a juggernaut's headlights. Laughs broke out immediately at the comical sight of the ungainly terrified Bentley.

'Break a leg, Bentley! Knock 'em dead!' shouted Hartnel encouragingly in the time honoured tradition of the theatre.

Bentley said nothing but a muffled voice from the trunk he was shuffling along barked, 'He couldn't break his little fingernail!'

'Oh, Bentley, what a marvellous talent you are,' praised Hartnel, his enthusiastic eyes twinkling like a child receiving a birthday present.

The trunk slowed to a halt in accord with the dying applause. In the dampening silence, Bentley could feel the loaded anticipation of the audience. Shock, horror...what were they in store for this evening, he wondered?

Bentley dragged into position a nearby simple wooden chair that he did the majority of his routine on. The stage directional microphones picked up a screech as the legs scuffed the polished mahogany stage floor. Nervously, he drew back the chair and sat down on it waiting for Tommy to begin the act, for he had no idea what form the act would take? He stared down at the silent trunk...waiting...waiting...

But for the first time Tommy remained silent! No singing, no jokes. Nothing.

After an unbearable amount of time, though it was less than a minute, Bentley realised he would have to open the act.

'Tommy? I say, Tommy? Are you in there?' he said, struggling even to play the role of the straight man.

Tommy did not answer.

'Tommy! Are you in there?' Bentley knocked hesitantly on the lid of the trunk. His face looked uncomfortable as if the weight of those watching were squashing him into a single point of embarrassment. He tried his best to smile but the theatre audience and millions of homes saw only a Draculian grimace.

Bentley's increasingly desperate situation and his agonising reaction to it came across as very humorous and laughter was beginning to roll and break onto the stage like happy waves onto a beach. Everyone knew that Tommy must be in the trunk and the growing anticipation of how the situation would unravel itself was adding significantly to the tension and humour.