Not at any level. I’ve done two productions of the play and they both were accident-free and very successful. As for the instances they drag up — Macbeth’s sword breaking and a bit of it hitting someone in the audience or a dropped weight narrowly missing an actor’s head — if they’d happened in any other play nobody would have said it was an unlucky one. How about Rex Harrison’s hairpiece being caught in a chandelier and whisked up into the flies? Nobody said My Fair Lady was unlucky.”

“Nobody dared to mention it, I should think.”

“There is that, of course,” Peregrine agreed.

“All the same, it’s not a fair example.”

“Why isn’t it?”

“Well, it’s not serious. I mean… well…”

“You wouldn’t say that if you’d been there, I daresay,” said Peregrine.

He walked over to the window and looked at the Thames: at the punctual late-afternoon traffic. It congealed on the south bank, piled up, broke out into a viscous stream, and crossed by bridge to the north bank. Above it, caught by the sun, shone the theatre: not very big but conspicuous in its whiteness and, because of the squat mass of little riverside buildings that surrounded it, appearing tall, even majestic.

“You can tell which of them’s bothered about the bad-luck stories,” he said. “They won’t say his name. They talk about the ‘Thane’ and the ‘Scots play’ and ‘The Lady.’ It’s catching. Lady Macduff — Nina Gaythorne — silly little ass, is steeped up to the eyebrows in it. And talks about it. Stops if she sees I’m about but she does, all right, and they listen to her.”

“Don’t let it worry you, darling. It’s not affecting their work, is it?” Emily asked.

“No.”

“Well, then.”

“I know, I know.”

Emily joined him and they both looked out, over the Thames, to where the Dolphin shone so brightly. She took his arm. “It’s easy to say, I know,” she said, “but if you could just not. Don’t brood. It’s not like you. Tell me how the great Scot is making out as Macbeth.”